By the time they landed at their base on the polar cap of Telos, Atris was ready. She put the Sith holocron back into her bag and stood. She had learned to trust her feelings. Feeling the new sense of power within her, she exited her quarters aboard the ship and walked up to the cockpit where one of the Handmaidens was shutting down the various systems.

"Mistress, is there anything you require?" the Handmaiden asked her, noticing her approach.

"Tell the others to assemble in the training room."

"I will see that my sisters are gathered, Mistress."

Atris nodded and turned, exiting the cockpit. A short walk through the ship brought her to the gangway and out into the hangar. She looked around with a sigh of relief. It'd had been a rude surprise waiting for her on Dantooine, but the lesson was finally learned. Those Masters had beens struck down because they were weak. She would not be caught unawares by either the Exile or the old woman. Master Varos' teachings from the Sith holocron had given her new insights not only into the Force, but into life itself. She'd embraced the teachings and found new strength in them for the trials that lie before her. Her worries and her fears were gone now replaced with cold determination, and a strange sort of calmness came with it.

The galaxy still needed a new Jedi Order, she thought to herself, walking up the incline into the control room and then down a passage in the direction of her meditation chamber. The Handmaidens, themselves were not Force users and could only serve as a means of enforcing her dictates. Therefore, it would be necessary to find others. But there were other matters which took greater priority at the moment.

It was a short while later that she stood in a circle of the Handmaidens. She looked around at them. "The Traitor will be returning here and will likely take this place by force. The artifacts must not fall into her hands, therefore we will remove them from here for safekeeping. Take the artifacts down to one of the restoration zones on Telos, and take care to mask your presence. There you will remain in hiding until I call for you."

"Mistress, we are warriors. We are prepared to fight the Traitor and her associates to the death."

"I know that well," Atris said. "But this thing I ask of you is far more important than proving yourselves in battle. The need to keep the artifacts safe cannot be emphasized enough. You must all understand. It is a testimony to my great faith in you that I entrust you with something this important. Do not betray that trust."

The lead Handmaiden bowed her head slightly. "It shall be as you command, Mistress."

"Begin loading the artifacts aboard the ship. You will depart as soon as possible," Atris told her.

"And what of you, Mistress? Where will you go?"

"There is something I must investigate. Something which you cannot help me with. Now I must meditate in the training room. I am not to be disturbed until you are are ready to leave."

"Of course, Mistress," said the lead Handmaiden. They filed out of the room, the last one closing the doors behind her.

Atris pulled a Sith holocron from her robes and set it on the floor. Kneeling before it, she drew upon the Force and focused on the small black pyramid before her. A hologram of Lord Varos appeared above it.

"I am ready to continue my training," she said to it.

"You have no skill with a lightsaber," he told her. "Your Jedi teachings are worthless. I lived in the time of Marka Ragnos, a time when the mastery of one's weapon was of the highest priority. I have observed from your techniques that that is no longer the case. You are unworthy to study his techniques, but I sense in you great possibilities. Are you ready to learn how to properly wield your weapon?"

"I am, Master."

"Then let us begin..."

Atris drew her lightsaber and adopted a fighting stance...

There was one thing Atris yet needed to see. Malachor. If the Exile had been successful, then it should be void of activity. And if not, then the old woman still needed to be dealt with. Whatever occurred there, she knew she must, finally, see for herself or be left wondering for all time. Ever since the news had first reached them of the victory at Malachor over the Mandalorians, she had wondered what exactly was the nature  of the weapon that Revan and the Exile had wrought. Of course, by now, she realized it hadn't been a victory at all. Victories did not bring about even greater troubles than that which they had triumphed over. No, this victory had cost the the Republic and the Jedi Order dearly. As the only surviving member of the Jedi Council, it was not merely curiosity but her duty to finally discover what had happened there.

Hours later the comm panel inside the training room sounded its alert.

"Sorry to disturb you, Mistress, but we are ready," a Handmaiden's voice broke through her trance.

Atris opened her eyes, not sure how much time had gone by. It took her a moment to bring herself to the waking world and out of the Fury she had entered as she practiced her lightsaber techniques . Finally, breathing heavily, she moved to the panel and activated it. A Handmaiden could be seen on the monitor. Atris nodded at her. "Very well. Do not forget your orders. Under no circumstances are you to leave Telos without hearing from me first."

"Yes, Mistress," the Handmaiden said, bowing her head.

"Depart now. I shall be leaving myself momentarily."

"Very well, Mistress. We will await your transmission." With another bow, the Handmaiden left. Soon after, Atris heard the thrusters of the ship lifting the ship out of the hangar, and in another moment she was left in silence.

Regretfully, she made the rounds of her once possible Jedi Academy. Each room in the place had special meaning to her, its design having been hers and hers alone. Each room had been carefully laid out to her specifications. But more than that, it had been a place of safety. A place where, for the longest, she did not fear the possibility of enemies arriving. It would have been a perfect place to train Jedi as well hidden as it was. The Sith hadn't found it despite the Exile's visiting it twice and despite the unfortunate appearance of the old woman. No Sith assassins had attacked as they had in so many other places. Perhaps in time, she thought to herself, it might yet be useful. But for now, for the immediate future, it would have to be abandoned. She switched off the complex's systems, leaving only the bare minimum on in case she should return. And then, slowly she made her way down the ramp one final time into the hangar and over to the Republic starfighter that awaited her. The ship that had brought her here from Dantooine the first time so long ago.

Climbing into it, she dropped her small bag of personal belongings in the compartment behind the seat and lowered the canopy and did a systems check. All were in order, the ship having been maintained well by the Handmaidens. In them she could always trust. There would be no need to worry about betrayal from them. Not like she had known betrayal at the hands of the Exile in any event. She powered up the thrusters and lifted it slowly off the hangar floor. Backing it out of the hangar into the cold air of Telos' polar cap, she turned it in midair bringing the nose up and pushed the throttle forward, sending the craft hurtling up into the atmosphere. With a final glance back down through the falling snowflakes, she let out a sigh and sent the ship piercing through the thick cloud mass. On the other side was blue skies, with the Telos' sun lighting up the tops of the clouds with a golden glow. Higher and higher the ship climbed until it passed through the upper layer of the atmosphere and entered orbit. From there, she could see Citadel Station floating above the planet with several Republic warships hovering near it. The green and red mass of Telos itself was below her and shrinking fast.

She punched in the coordinates for Malachor V into the computer. Lord Varos had provided the coordinates, and now she waited for the navigation computer to provide the hyperspace route. She guided the ship out of Telos' gravity well and set it in a hover, staring at the planet below silently as she waited. She had to admit, the Ithorians' restoration efforts had been going well, better than she thought they would. As long as the Republic stayed committed to the effort, the ugly scars of Malak's bombing would finally be erased.

Malak. The very thought of him disgusted her. One of many who had followed Revan and forsaken what common sense they had along the way, and instead they became the darkness they saw in the Mandalorians, had become worse than the Mandalorians in fact. Much, much worse. In the new Jedi Council, her Jedi Council, she vowed there would be no tolerance for rebellion among the members of the Order. They would follow the direction of the Council or there would be harsh repercussions.

The navigation computer interrupted her in her thoughts just then beeping that its calculations were complete. Reading them, she set the course in the ships hyperdrive computer, turned the ship in a lazy turn into the appropriate vector and the engaged the hyperdrive. The stars stretched out into white lines and the ship lurched forward into hyperspace. And once more she sank into her meditation...

The proximity alert brought her out of it sounding loudly inside the cockpit, and she snapped to attention to see the shattered stern of a Republic warship floating dead ahead of her, the ship having dropped out of hyperspace. Rubbing her eyes quickly, she grabbed the throttle and navigated around it, gaping at the massive amount of damage it had taken in the battle. All around her were the wrecks of ships, whole and incomplete floating in visual range. But it was what lie beyond them that took her breath away.

There, beyond the wreckage, was Malachor....in three almost equal pieces. A clearly lifeless rock, floating in space, and like the wreckage of the ships, its remains waited only to be drawn into the nearest gravity well be it star, black hole or whatever they might encounter in the depths of space. Sensors showed no atmosphere left, no gravitation, nothing but a dead rock. Whatever had happened here had been because of perhaps the most destructive force the galaxy had yet known. But sensors alone did not reveal all there was to know about this place.

The Dark Side was strong here. So strong that, it might well have overwhelmed a Jedi not prepared for its call. She could feel it, lingering about the ruins of the planet and about the ships, though the disturbance in the Force she had heard about, had expected to find here, had been mercifully stilled, perhaps by the latest activities of the Exile. She could not feel the deaths of the many Jedi, Republic soldiers and Mandalorians that had died here. For that she could be thankful, feeling at least in one sense, they now rested in peace. The echoes that had once emanated from this place, that had spread like a terrible sickness through out the Outer Rim and even further into the Core no longer were evident. The Council had spent much time discussing them, their effect on the Exile and the galaxy as a whole. There was speculation that they were even responsible for the new breed of Sith which had been stalking them, but there had been no way to confirm it.

Atris brought the starfighter in for a closer look at the remains of Malachor, wondering vaguely what it had looked like before its destruction, if it had a sizable population and if they would be remembered. Varos had revealed that the planet had been on the edge of the Sith Empire, but little beyond that. The Republic database had no entry for it, and Revan had never revealed what she had found there nor why she chose it to set her trap for the Mandalorians. Again she wondered what sort of weapon might do this to a planet. It had been coldly efficient. Too efficient.

Just then the alert sounded off again. This time the ship's sensors had detected another ship in the area. It had just exited hyperspace nearby, and Atris immediately brought her own fighter bringing it in closer to and behind the blackened, but intact, broken nose of the Republic warship floating nearby. She immediately cut her power to minimum to attempt to avoid detection, but set the ship's sensors on passive scan.

After a short wait, it appeared moving through the wreckage slowly. She could barely make it out around the edge of the Republic warship. It had a glistening black hull, that seemed to be difficult for her sensors to get a lock on in passive mode, but she dared not attempt a more aggressive scan. Instead she ran the ship's profile through the computer in an attempt to determine its origin. But the search was inconclusive. It was certainly not a ship she recognized on sight. So she closed her eyes and stretched out her senses in the Force. Slowly she extended them beyond the interior of the starfighter, past the hull and out into the immediate area. She could feel the lifeless hulks around her as well as the coldness of the remains of Malachor V. Focusing beyond that she tentatively reached out toward the other ship.

It met her halfway, the presences in the Force sensing each other, feeling each other out. From it she felt the Dark Side...a cold, malevolent being whose attempted to penetrate her thoughts. Briefly, they struggled against one another, each attempting to pierce the other's mind, but their skills in the Force seemed equal and neither could gain the upper hand.

"Jedi..." the thought came to her, sent by the other.

"Sith," she whispered to herself. "What is it you hoped to find here?"

At once the other ship turned and began to move quickly out of the wreckage. Atris pushed the throttle forward and accelerated to give chase. She brought the starfighter up and around the Republic wreck accelerating harder just as the Sith ship was reaching the edge of the wrecks.  She pushed the throttle to full, navigating through the ship graveyard at breakneck speeds. But by the time, she reached the edge, Atris saw the other ship make the jump to hyperspace. Checking her sensors, she was careful to log its jump vector. There were no known hyperspace routes in this part of space in the Republic database so further pursuit would be out of the question, she knew.

With a sigh, she brought the starfighter around for another pass through the graveyard and around the pieces of Malachor. The Dark Side radiating from the area she felt permeating her being, a cold, crisp sensation that moved through her, and with it came clarity and understanding. Other Sith existed beyond the Outer Rim it seemed, and they'd taken an interest in Malachor's demise. Vaguely she wondered if the Exile knew of them. With the aura surrounding it, they must have been familiar with it, knew how to reach it. The Sith should have been destroyed on Malachor, but clearly they must have had other bases in the Unknown Regions, Atris reasoned. Apparently, the battle was not over, merely beginning. And Atris smiled to herself. She would yet get her chance to meet them in combat, and they would taste years of pent up fury when she finally faced them. They would not simply die either, they would die slowly screaming their innermost secrets as their last breath left them. The last of the Jedi would see to it.

Her next destination became apparent just then. If Malachor's former masters had come to reclaim it or merely to find the reason behind the disturbance there, then Korriban would be their next stop. And Atris would be there to meet them.  There also she might learn of Lonna. She got the coordinates from the ship's computer, laid in the course and once more engaged the hyperdrive...

It was several weeks after the scout returned from Malachor, that the Sith warrior set his modified fighter down in what he knew to be the Valley of the Dark Lords, the resting place of the great Sith Lords, their ancestors. These ancient Lords had solidified the Empire when it was threatened by infighting and intrigue. Now, the warrior could see, as he climbed down from his ship, that the ancient tombs had been violated. What was more, the Valley itself showed signs of warfare. Taking a quick look around, he then stretched out his senses in the Force attempting to discern any other life forms nearby. But the ones in evidence had only the most primitive intellects, only the basest of emotions. Wild beasts roaming free in this sacred place. He pulled his double-bladed Sith sword from the cockpit and began to walk across the valley.

The Sun glinted off his crimson armor, and the wind stirred up his long, red cloak. Heavy red gloves and boots protected his hands and feet. Concealing his appearance and protecting his head was a rounded helmet with a narrow black triangular visor stretching across the width of the helmet, pointed downwards from which he could see out. In truth, he'd long since learned to ignore his sight in combat, instead relying on the Force to sense his opponent, just as the weight of his armor had long since ceased to inhibit his movements. As a Sith warrior, he was the elite of the rank and file among the Sith armies, and his only goal was to become one with his weapon. To have it be simply an extension of himself, guided by the Force and driven by all of his anger and hate. The brutality of Sith training had insured that he would always possess those two qualities in abundance.

Soon he had reached the deserted Sith Academy, noting the signs of battle within it and pausing to look upon the ancient statues which could only have been placed there by the ancient Sith. Throughout the place skeletons wearing various uniforms and robes lie about, a thick layer of dust partially covering them. Here and there were the dried remains of blood, and carbon scoring showed on the walls and floor. Clearly modifications had been made by recent generations, modern lighting providing soft illumination throughout and powering computers in a small library down one passageway. More computers could be found in the main dormitory section and across the central chamber from it, a passageway ended in a T junction, one direction leading to an interrogation chamber and the other to a training room.

The training room held  several cages for prisoners and a dusty computer terminal in the middle. The skeletons of several four-legged beasts lie about the room. His eyes quickly took in all but the most important detail of the room.

It may well have been his great exhiliaration to have seen the ancient world of Korriban and the structure initally built by long dead ancestors that caused the lapse in his alertness. An instant after having stepped into the training room, he was assaulted by a powerful wave of Force lightning that washed over him and and into him, jarring his system throughout. He felt himself temporarily paralyzed by it as he concentrated upon the Force to resist it. Only vaguely did he see a white blur at the edge of his line of sight. And then she was upon him, attacking with a blue-bladed lightsaber. The Force lighting disappeared, and in the instant it took him to regain his composure, the blade had sliced through his helmet, the tip of the blade cutting it across its width and only just missing his face. "Korriban shall be your grave, Sith," a female voice said just then.

He leaped backward and brought his own weapon up as he studied his opponent. A human female in white robes and white hair done up with strands trickling down the side of her face. A Jedi by appearance, but burning brightly in the Force with righteous anger. Revenge dominated her thoughts, as it did his own, but she made no attempt to conceal it.

And then he charged her, the blades of his weapon lashing out at her with one after another. She fended off some and dodged others, her white robes flowing about her as she moved out of reach of his attacks again and again. Her fighting style, he recognized as one practiced by the ancient masters, and within his helmet he smiled, even as he did his best to slay her. It was his incredibly good fortune to find such a worthy oppenent on this graveyard world. His attacks she met with the blade of her lightsaber, it's blue glow crackling against the alchemically hardened steel of his weapon again and again. The fight quickly became savage, each fighter calling upon the Force and focusing their passion into driving the weapons into their hands. Back and forth the battle went, each inflicting minor wounds on the other, merely enough to further fuel the Dark Side within them. The females robes were sliced through in places and bloodstains appeared on them, while on his own armor, the blackened cuts of her lightsaber began criss cross it. To his surprise, her wounds hadn't slowed her at all, merely increased her fury.

She began dodging in and amongst the cages, his double-bladed weapon having a difficult time navigating the confined space, before finally launching one of the cages at him in a furious Force push. He hacked it down with his weapon, the blade snapping off. But even as he did so, she was again in motion. He, caught off balance by the maneuver, could not dodge in time to avoid her driving the end of her lightsaber into his chest.

He froze until she had withdrawn the blade, his weapon clattering to the floor and then slowly he sank to his knees, trying to will himself to his feet, but his body failed him as the life seeped out of him. The blur of white and blue before him began to give way to blackness.

She eased him to the ground and pulled off his helmet to reveal a dark-haired, grey-skinned human male face underneath it. 'You shall not yet die. Not until you have revealed your masters to me," she told him, lying a hand on his wound.

This he fiercely resisted, twisting his body beneath her, until she moved her hand to his forehead and calmed him with the Force.  She focused on drawing the thoughts from his mind and at once encountered a wall of resistance there. Try as she might, she could not breach it, it obviously having been in place from years of training. Even as she did, she felt his lifeforce slipping away and quickly moved her hand back to the wound to begin to heal the damage. But the healing process was too slow, the blow to well placed, and it could not keep pace with damage spreading through out him. "They are coming," he whispered with a slight smile and then groaned.

"You will not die!" she said, cradling him in her arms, but his body twitched once, twice and then was still. In frustration she shoved his body to the ground and stood looking down at him. Only then did the Fury diminish in her and give way to exhaustion. She sank back down against the wall, her breathing heavy, and sat staring into space. She wiped the perspiration from her forehead with the back of her hand and then, closing her eyes, drew on the Force to heal her wounds. Eventually her breathing became normal and the pain had left her.

Then, with a final glance at the body of the Sith warrior, she stalked out of the room and across to the interrogation room beyond which she'd merely glanced into before, feeling the frustration threatening to overwhelm her at her inability to draw anything useful from him.

In the room was a cage, a table and various crude instruments of torture along with another computer terminal. But even as her mind adjusted itself to all that had just happened and attempted to decide what to do next, her eye was caught by a patch of brown. There in the cage, lying on the floor, dried blood next to it lie a skeleton in a Jedi robe. Her eyes widened and all other thoughts slipped from her mind as she bent down to look at it. Lonna. A DNA scan would reveal it later, she was sure, but she had no need for it. She simply knew it was the remains of her old friend. "Lonna," she whispered, through clenched teeth. "They will pay for this. All of them..."

That night, next to the Sith's starfigher in the Valley of the Dark Lords, Atris stepped up to the funeral pyre, torch in hand. The remains of Jedi Master Lonna Vash lie in the center of it. She had constructed it out of what flammable materials she could find in the Academy, and now putting the torch to it, she set it alight. And then she bowed her head as it lit up the surrounding pillars and walls of the Valley..