Ezra finished cutting through the vent cover and pushed it out. Thankfully, there was no one in the detention level Kanan was on. Certain that he was alone, he deactivated his lightsaber and put it back on his belt. After a few seconds of searching through the Force, Ezra walked up to the cell he felt Kanan in and opened the door. Sure enough, the Jedi was strapped to a platform inside.

"Turns out you taught me pretty well," Ezra noted, walking in to release his master's bonds.

If it weren't for the fact that Kanan had felt him earlier, he probably would have thought he was hallucinating. "You shouldn't have come here, but I'm glad you did."

He smiled and shrugged. "You would've done the same for me. In fact, you have."

With no further delay, Ezra deactivated the restraints and caught Kanan as he fell forward. He would be alright, but he had been stuck in the same position for a long time and tortured while he did so. Walking was going to be a struggle for a little while. Kanan kept an arm around Ezra's shoulders as they walked out together.

Kanan was still too dazed to navigate, so it was up to his apprentice to get them out. At one point, it briefly crossed Kanan's mind that he didn't know where the Inquisitor was. He wasn't dumb, he wouldn't just let the Jedi walk away. He would have tried to locate the Inquisitor if it wasn't so exhausting.

Ezra took a shortcut through the hyperdrive room, but that turned out to be a mistake. The Inquisitor was waiting for them in there.

It figures, Kanan grumbled internally. Can't have an escape plan work perfectly, can we?

The Inquisitor reached behind his back and grabbed his lightsaber, activating one of the red blades. Kanan stood up straight and forced himself to fight through the pain of doing so. "Let me borrow that," he told Ezra, referring to his lightsaber.

"Yeah, no problem," he replied, letting Kanan grab it off his belt and standing back. Kanan stood in front with Ezra's weapon, and he dropped into stance as he tried to get used to it. It wasn't his lightsaber, but he knew Ezra pretty well by now. The kyber crystal inside seemed as loyal to Kanan as he was.

Holding the blade in front of his chest, he ran with it pointed forward at the Inquisitor. The Inquisitor smiled, thinking Kanan wanted to duel, but before he got to close he deactivated the blade and instead used the blaster. None of the energy pulses hit the Inquisitor, but it caught him off guard enough that he barely managed to raise his lightsaber in time to deflect the shots.

He reactivated the blade just in time to trade strokes with the Inquisitor. Kanan's surprise had given him enough of an advantage that he was on the offensive, and he managed to push the Inquisitor down in a saber lock.

With a grunt, the Inquisitor pushed back up and aimed kicks at Kanan, but the Jedi saw it coming. He dodged just out of the way and flipped backwards to put distance between them. When he landed, he stopped the Inquisitor from chasing him down by shooting at him again.

Behind him, Ezra was just as impressed with Kanan's skill as the Inquisitor had been a few days ago. "I never thought of that," he realized, and promised himself he would try it out once they got out of this. For the time being, he ran up behind Kanan wanting to help.

When Kanan got close enough again, he deflected strokes from the Inquisitor and tried to stab through the lower abdomen, but the Inquisitor leaped over his head and landed on the other side of Kanan. He attacked Kanan with fierce, aggresive swings, eventually pushing Kanan over backwards in a saber lock.

What was that Depa was saying about balance the other day? he thought, but from behind the Inquisitor Ezra had his back. While the two of them had been dueling, Ezra thought quickly enough to pull Kanan's lightsaber off the Inquisitor's belt and to himself. He activated the blade, familiar enough to the weight of it from his earlier training to not be startled by the difference to his own weapon.

The Inquisitor noticed his new opponent and pushed Kanan back. "At last, a fight that might be worthy of my time," he announced, activating the second blade as well as the spinning mechanism on his lightsaber.

Ezra wasn't as comfortable dueling the spinning saber as Kanan was, but he held his own. Together, as master and apprentice, they engaged in their first duel together. Kanan took most of the heat, but Ezra attacked often enought that the Inquisitor couldn't afford to only keep his attention on the elder Padawan.

So the Inquisitor eliminated the nuisance. He pushed Ezra back on the walkway, keeping him away from the fight. Turning to Kanan, he forced him to retreat with his spinning saber before kicking him square in the chest. While he was still recovering from being winded, the Inquisitor threw him backward with the Force.

Having just gotten back up again, Ezra reactivated Kanan's lightsaber. The Inquisitor knew he was a novice, though. He threw his spinning lightsaber at Ezra, who successfully managed to block it but with a cost. The tip of the red blade grazed his face, and the momentum of the collision was enough to knock him off his feet. He lost his balance, falling over the edge of the walkway.

He could hear Kanan screaming above him, but he couldn't see him. The world went black as he fell.

The Inquisitor pulled his lightsaber back, deactivating the spinning mechanism and turning to face the lonesome Jedi. He was on his knees, still reaching for his apprentice. He saw the loss hit Jarrus as he pressed his eyes shut and grit his teeth, and the Inquisitor smiled. So much pain, so much anger. Death was a wonderful tool in the art of the Dark Side.

But it didn't last. The Jedi breathed out before slowly rising to his feet with the child's lightsaber in hand. "That was a mistake."

"Why?" challenged the Inquisitor confidently. "Because you have no one left to die for you?"

Jarrus reached a hand out, calling his lightsaber to his hand, the one the child had dropped as he died. Activating both of the blue blades and crossing them in front of his chest, he answered. "No. Because I have nothing left to fear."

The Inquisitor brought his weapon in front of his face, and Kanan mirrored him before running forward with one lightsaber in each hand. As he charged, he heard Ahsoka giving him some advice from the time he had asked to try fighting with her shoto: Don't try to do separate things with each lightsaber. You may have two weapons, but you're still one person. Keep it simple, keep it strong.

Two weapons did make easier to parry both ends of the Inquisitor's lightsaber, though. Now Kanan could block an attack from both sides. He didn't have as good of a grip as he did when he used two hands, but he maintained control and kept the red blades away from his body. It also helped a little with his balance too. One lightsaber in each hand was kind of nice. Not to mention Ezra's also doubled as a blaster.

He pushed the Inquisitor back to the control panels, alternating between defense and offense as he swung at his opponent. Kanan fired at the Inquisitor who blocked the shots with his spinning saber, but he made the mistake of backing up. Before he knew it, the heels of his boots were over the edge of the walkway. He barely managed to keep his balance, but now Kanan had him cornered.

"You were right," Kanan told the Inquisitor as he tried to land a hit on him. "I was a coward, but now I know there's something stronger than fear, far stronger. The Force."

Personally, the Inquisitor knew that wasn't true. Furrowing his brow, he held his weapon in front of him, spinning the blades around the hilt.

Kanan almost smiled when he realized his next move. Almost. "Let me show you how strong it is." With one swift movement, he thrust both his blades into the spaces inside the ring of the Inquisitor's lightsaber hilt. The Inquisitor realized what happened too late. Kanan pulled his lightsabers apart, the blades slicing through the ring of the hilt. The weapon short-circuited and the blades flew apart, falling into the reactor core at the bottom of the well.

The Inquisitor lost his balance, falling over the edge of the walkway but catching the lip of it at the last second. Below him, the core caught fire and sent a surge of energy up the shaft standing atop it. Smoke and sparks flew everywhere, and it was clear the damage would soon destroy the whole ship.

Walking to stand over the Inquisitor, Kanan held both of his lightsabers to the Inquisitor's neck, his face set. Beneath him, the Imperial agent considered his options. Death seemed unavoidable now.

He looked up at the Jedi. "You have no idea what you've unleashed here today," he warned him.

The notion didn't seem to bother Jarrus. He deactivated his lightsabers and lowered them, and the Inquisitor saw his chance to escape. Yet he didn't take it. His master would be waiting for him, and the punishment that would follow terrified the Inquisitor more than this man ever could. "There are some things far more frightening than death."

Before he could back down, the Inquisitor released the edge of the walkway and allowed himself to fall into the fiery abyss below. Jarrus's face blurred as the heat of the flames swallowed up his body, and the Inquisitor kept falling, falling, falling, until the entire world went black.

And then suddenly, the Inquisitor found himself laying on the ground in the middle of the fire. It hadn't stopped, but suddenly the heat from the explosion disappeared. He opened his eyes and looked around, trying to understand what he saw. It certainly looked like the bottom of the hyperdrive room, but the pain had faded and the world around him, it seemed...transparent. Fake.

"And so ends the Second Brother," a femine voice called out from beside him. He rolled over and looked up, trying to identify who had spoken. Unlike the world around him, she seemed very solid and real. It took a moment of concentration, but he saw horns on the top of her head as well as lekku falling down her chest.

"The First Sister," he realized, standing up. "So the stories are true."

"They are, but not the version you've been told," she explained, looking up to where the Jedi was still kneeling on the walkway. Beside him, the apprentice-

The apprentice! He was still alive? "What? How-how did he not die?"

To the Second Brother's shock, the First Sister let out a sharp laugh. "Oh, Brother. You should know better than to think you can kill a Jedi so easily."

"I hardly think you're one to speak. You've never killed a Jedi," the Brother reminded her.

"No, but I've killed a Sith."

"And you paid the price for your actions."

"So did you. At least I paid mine willingly," the Sister retorted, crossing her arms and staring down the Brother. "A lot of good your loyalty to the Empire did you."

The Brother walked up to the Sister, his tall figure towering above the girl. He had never realized how young she was, but she was little more than a child. "I served the Emperor faithfully with my whole being, and I never betrayed him! I preferred to die than fail him or his apprentice!"

To her credit, the Sister wasn't intimidated in the least by him. "Was it worth it?"

Her question caught him off guard. He blinked, his mouth dropping open ever so slightly. The Sister went on. "Was it worth it? Did it bring you satisfaction? Now that you're dead, do you stand by what you've done?"

He opened his mouth, fully intending to answer 'yes', but he couldn't force the lie out of his mouth. Memories came flooding back, memories of his suppressive and abusive training, memories of how eager he was to be deployed so that he wouldn't have to live under the menacing eye of his masters. He remembered how the power he gained was never enough to fulfill his desires, how afraid and weak he was.

The Sister seemed to already know. She grinned, chuckling. "They always realize too late," she mused to herself. Walking away, she called over her shoulder, "Stay here if you like. You'll be able to watch the Destroyer fall apart from here. When you're ready, though, come find me. There's much for you to learn, Brother."