A glimpse of Peace

[Darth Abyss]

With a gasp Abyss awoke from his sleep, his body bathed in sweat and his mind in a state of confusion. Slowly he rose from the simple bed, somewhere deep down below the surface of Nar Shaddaa, and made his way to the small bathroom of his home. It was a ritual that had repeated the last few nights, the same dream, the same vision haunting his rest and every time he awoke he could feel that yet another part of his power had began to fade. He always believed himself truly in tune with the force, but now he was unable to understand what the force tried to tell him with this dreams, with glimpses of light, peace and serenity. The only thing he knew was that they brought his mind to rest, to peace and therefore made his power and control of the darkness fade away. He had lost his contact to the hate that had burned inside him like a dieing star, and without it he finally had to pay the price for letting the dark corrupt his body. Weakness plagued his flesh and bones, his senses felt numb and dull, it was like someone had put a filter in front of his vision to turn the brightness of colors and light down.

Without the darkness a sith was nothing, to weak to command the force and still to tainted to touch the light. Abyss looked up in the mirror scared of seeing how much his body had faded this time. As his eyes meet the reflection, he felt shock and disgust as brown eyes stared back into his own without even the slightest glow of yellow in them. His right moved to a bottle on the counter, but fate wasn't even with him in his desire to completely numb himself from reality. The bottle of corellian whiskey was empty to the last drop. Filled with frustration, Abyss threw the glass bottle towards the wall, but his muscles only managed to send if flying on the ground a meter away from him. It was time to seek help, but not that of a sith.

Tython, Jedi temple.

Abyss had traded his black robe in for a brown and grey one as he stumbled out of the freighter close to the jedi temple. Tython was a place riddled with history, a planet that was of historical importance for the jedi and even for the sith to some degree. The theater for the first conflict of light and dark, it seemed fitting. Normally he would have put his trust in a decision that he made because of the force, but choosing a random jedi temple simply by instinct in a state like his was more a game of chance than of fate.

He made sure to always keep his hood low as he moved towards the temple, so nobody could see the corruption in his face. At least he didn't had to worry about the jedi sensing his presence, as the darkness had turned into a muddy and weak grey. In alliance space that might would have been a problem, but the sliver jedi weren't as orthodox when it came to light and dark, so he could simply blend in. Now he simply had to find the way into the jedi archive without being seen by anyone. The only thing that would give his identity away was his cybernetic right leg, as the optic was rather unique and characteristic for him.

[member="Aria Vale"]

 

[NightSister]

Sleep issues, it would seem, were not uncommon ailments once a Jedi was at a certain point in their career: at least according to her Master, Jedi duties came before sleep and, Aria supposed, at some point your body clock caught on.

Such a problem arose for Aria that night: she had gone to Tython for another history lesson on the Order, self-conducted this time. Though as usual, the Jedi history had proved fascinating, something or another had made it such that Aria kept randomly getting pulled from her slumber, not by dreams or by noises but simply of her own accord. Finally Aria gave up trying to sleep, deciding she might as well make the most out of her two days on the planet, and she had thrown on her Jedi robes to go to the temple archives. Perhaps she had missed a good war story when she had done a quick browse earlier.

Even as a Jedi herself, this was Aria's first time at the Tython Jedi Temple and so took a while herself to find the archives. When she did, she stayed for around ten minutes browsing through files and textbooks along the rows and rows of shelves. Perhaps she could find something about the history of the Shadows? Skulking around in the archives had brought around that particular career choice, perhaps doing so could now further it. Eventually Aria found a set of records dating back to some of the first to form the Jedi Order's more covert branch of operatives, which would either prove fascinating or so boring that they put Aria to sleep, so it was a win-win for once.

The files tucked under one arm, Aria slipped back out again, closing the door behind her with a quiet click. It mightn't hurt to hunt down the kitchens and get a stimcaf to accompany her research...
Her thoughts were cut off as the sudden appearance of another cloaked figure made her start; she moved involuntarily backwards as the hooded person turned a corner into the hallway she had been walking down. She would normally have apologised and continued - it was hardly strange to find another unsleeping soul in the midst of a Jedi Temple, after all - but something made her stop: what cynical being pulled their hood up to wander down a hallway?
Then the figure aligned with that of somebody familiar to her; memories matched up and she smiled wryly.

"Abyss." Her voice, while sleepy and somewhat amused, was not reproachful in her greeting. "Wouldn't have expected to find you here."

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Abyss now brown eyes widened in shock as he realised that he had been caught. His painfully slow mind took a second to long to recognize the voice, and he could already feel panic pumping through his veins. Only when he slightly raised his head and his eyes noticed the familiar face, he noticed that this wasn't the end of his search.

"Aria...? I ... I."

His words were only a whisper as he looked at the jedi with a mix of confusion and relieve. At first he had been sure that his search had already come to an end, but meeting the only jedi that he had a somewhat friendly connection with had to be a sign given to him by the force. It wasn't the archives he had came here for, it had to be her, a real jedi to guide him through his struggle.

"Thank the force. Aria ... I .... I need your help. My power is fading, and every night I am haunted by dreams of light."

Both his stance and his voice showed no sign of the confidence he normally possessed, no hint of the sharp and cunning mind he normally brought with him. The last few encounters of the two had always included a bit of Abyss mindgames, of corrupting words and knowledge. Now he was simply to weak to even think of something like that, to worried about his power and body fading away to waste his time with meaningless games.

His hand moved to his hood to pull it a bit back, just enough to reveal the lack of yellow in his eyes and the overall state of his fading flesh. Showing his weakness so openly seemed like the only option he had to show her that this was no trick, no game and no lie. It was the reaction of a man who was slowly realizing that he wasn't invincible, and that his body was coming closer to death in an alarming rate.

"Please."

[member="Aria Vale"]

 

[NightSister]

It became clear at once that the man before Aria was not the cocky and quick-witted Sith she'd had to team up with when the starship crashed, not even the devout preacher of the Dark Side that she'd met when she had been trying to find motivation against falling to the Dark on Malachor. His power was fading... if he was trying to trick her, then he was a much more adept liar than he had been the last time they'd met; everything about him said that his words were in accordance to the truth. A Sith afraid of losing his roots, Aria thought wryly: that was something she'd not encountered before.

Then she was faced with an unusual test of morality: she was being asked to bring a Sith who had the potential to become a threat to the Jedi and the whole galaxy to a position where he was more liable to do so. But then, everyone was liable to be a danger to the galaxy, Aria and the rest of the Jedi included, and as far as she was concerned Abyss would not abuse the help she gave him. Besides, he was hurt, lost, out of touch, maybe even dying - wasn't the whole reason she'd become a Jedi to improve and save lives? By extension, she supposed, that even meant potential enemies. And Abyss was as close to a friend as two opposing forces could get. He had helped her, she had helped him. Now he needed her help again: who was she to deny it him?

"I have no idea why I'm doing this," she said, with a noise that was almost a laugh as she looked on incredulously. "But yes, I'll help you. Come on, let's find somewhere to sit down and you can tell me about these haunting dreams of yours. I promise I won't try and trick you into joining the Jedi."

And oddly enough, she meant it. Aria had always liked to consider herself as tolerant and un-zealotrous; she wouldn't try and force her way on anyone, especially not an ally of sorts who seemed almost to be experiencing withdrawal from the Darkness that gave him the will to live. Lucky for him, Aria thought as she began down the corridor for one of the kitchens, that it was she whom he'd run into on his quest to stay a Sith.

"A word of warning, though." She didn't think she needed to add it, but decided to anyway, her tone not unkind but still firm. "I'm trusting you here. Don't give me cause to regret this."

She meant that bit too.

"So tell me about these dreams of yours. When did it start?"

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Wordlessly Abyss followed her into the kitchen. He was thankful that he could hide from jedi eyes and he was even more thankful that she had agreed to help him, but it had already been hard for him to ask for her help, giving her thanks and praise before his condition had changed was still to much for the faded sith inside him. He was sure that she was aware of it anyway, even without any word or gesture to represent it. Leaning against a wall inside the small kitchen, his hands moved to his hood once more, now completely revealing his face and head. It was probably the most the jedi had ever seen of him, without cloth or his mask obscuring his appearance. Rarely he allowed others to see him like this, the last one had been his master, years before this day. Without anything to guard his identity, his humanity, he felt naked and even weaker than before.

"It started around a week ago. I was spending most of my time with researching the sith and jedi of old times, searching for those of our orders that transcended the physical world. My flesh was already fading, but with the darkness still burning inside me I barley noticed it, if at all."

Following his hood, Abyss took of his robe, now only wearing trousers and a grey, sleeveless shirt that allowed her to see the level of corruption that plagued his body. His arms looked boney, his flesh pale and his veins had the distinctive dark violett color of dark side corruption. The numerous scares only furthered the image of a slowly death.

"Then the first dream. Or rather a vision. I was unbound by this world, I was one with the force, my mind was at peace as I fully dissolved in the flow of energy that surrounds us."

For a short moment a small smile danced over his face before the worry returned. He was neither at peace with himself nor did he desire to, but the feeling of overcoming the physical plane had filled him with excitement. But the price for this experience seemed to be his live, and he was not yet ready to give up on that just yet. To much was there to learn, to understand, to explore.

"I awoke, amazed but confused at first. Then I looked in the mirror and saw for the first time what the constant exposure to the dark side has done to my body, and with every following day it got worse. I lost all connection to the darkness, yet I could not connect to the light either. I can barley sense the force at all. I feel numb, weak, confused. My only hope is that the force will guide me, be it the light or the dark."

[member="Aria Vale"]

 

[NightSister]

Reaching the kitchen, Aria hit a switch to bring the lights on, listening with a wary interest as Abyss explained about his dreams. Perhaps once, Aria might have dismissed them as dreams and nothing more, but it was her own dreams that had indirectly brought her to Malachor all that time ago and one look at the Sith without a cloak covering the effects told her that whatever these dreams were, whatever they meant, Abyss was at high risk of death.

"Wow, you don't look good," Aria said in a low murmur. It wasn't exactly a helpful thing to say, but it had come out mostly from shock.

"Right, for starters, you need something to eat," she went on, filling the kettle up and swinging the fridge door open. It wouldn't have surprised her if alcohol had played a part in worsening his condition, but she wouldn't comment. "Help yourself to whatever's in there and I'll make us caf."

Then she put her mind to trying to figure out what she could possibly do to help. Aria was not a Master; she had not been a Jedi for any great number of years and she had certainly never helped lost souls find their way again; she was fit to help Abyss only because she knew him and even trusted him to some degree, enough at least that she could ignore their differences and do what was needed of her. Aria had never been out of touch with the Force - the Light, at one point, but never had she felt that she was unable to connect with the Force. Still, she wasn't so incapable of independent thought that she couldn't hazard a guess at how to approach the problem.

"Alright then. You're saying you can't hardly feel the Force anymore; if that's the case, then how can you expect it to guide your path? Think about what it is you want. I'm going to go ahead and assume that you want to stay a Sith - if I'm wrong though, you tell me right away - but from there, I don't know."

The kettle turned off, and Aria poured two mugs of caf, handing one to Abyss before pushing herself up and sitting down on the counter.

"Oh, I know! I've been learning this trick where you make a connection through the Force with an item and use it as your anchorpoint to the Force; do you have anything that might work for that?"

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Abyss began to search through the cabinets for food that suited his needs. He settled on a protein bar, the thing that came closest to what he would normally eat. With the dark side fueling him he had often ignored the desire to eat, going days and in rare instances even weeks without a proper meal, surviving only with the force and a few of these tasteless nutrition blocks commonly found on soldiers. The first small bite was terrible, and he had to ignore his gag reflex as he swallowed the first piece of the bar down. It wasn't the taste that put him of, it was his body that rejected the consumption of any food at all. As she asked her questions he stopped in his attempt to bite of another piece, giving his answer some thought. It was almost the same question he had asked himself since this whole things started.

"I am unsure. Until recently I could trust in the force to guide my path, to give this meaningless existence a purpose. Now I just feel lost, unable to tell what is right or wrong. Was I really meant to be a sith, or did I simply chose to do so? Was it a mistake, is my place really here with the servants of light?"

He fell into one of the chairs of the kitchen, allowing his pained body to relax, while his mind was more chaotic yet slower than ever before. A sith seduced by the light, if it wasn't his life that was fading he would probably laugh about the absurdity of the situation. No he couldn't become a jedi, how should even do it. Sure he shared some traits that were normally associated with the jedi, but beyond that he was a true sith, even more so than many of the others that called themselves sith. The light had touched him, but there had to be meaning behind it that he just wasn't understanding yet, a hidden truth.

"I guess my path will stay the same, my heart, my passion is still bound to the sith ways. Only the force can give me clarity."

Thankfully he took the cup, downing half of the cup instantly afterwards. While eating wasn't going well, fluids did, as he knew from the amount of whisky he had wasted these past few days. Again his focus shifted back to her, as she vocalized her idea. A focus point for the force? He hadn't considered that, but it seemed like it could might work.

"Will that do?"

He took the lightsaber hilt from his belt, presenting the golden hilt of the broken weapon to her. His real lightsaber was still in his hideout on Nar Shaddaa, as it was so tainted with darkness that it felt strange and alien in his hands right now. He simply took the mostly empty hilt with him to seem more like a jedi. It was one of the few material possessions he had that he actually valued, a trinket that marked the begin of his long travel to and up the ranks of the sith.

[member="Aria Vale"]

 

[NightSister]

Aria pursed her lips as she saw Abyss take a nutrient bar from the fridge and force himself to eat it: while she was by no means disregarding his condition, it would appear that the problem of his health went past strange dreams. Again, not something Aria knew much about, but certainly something she could try and do something in the way of rectifying. Then again with his intended path; what was it with these Sith? To her the Force had never been more than a means to an end, but the amount of people who truly trusted in it to guide them seemed so odd.

"Look, the Force can't give you clarity when you can't feel it, okay? To hell with what you were really meant to be; if your passion or whatever is with the Sith, be a Sith. I can't believe I'm saying this, but it'll be easier to reconnect with the Force through the Darkness; it's what you know, what you're accustomed to. If at some point afterwards you realise you'd be better off a Jedi, by all means join us, but it'll be too much strain to try and become one when you've known being a Sith since however long you have."

Then as he presented a saber hilt Aria took it warily, turning it over in her hands and letting the lights shine on it. In truth, she wasn't certain of how varying the method was; likely it would take more than an anchorpoint to return Abyss to full strength. Was it possible to truly forge bonds - with an item? She knew of Force-bonds and of the many ways in which one could gain strength from them, but those were formed with people. Could one really link themselves to an item, even one of great personal importance? And would doing so take more strength than Abyss had left?

"I guess it could work," she said finally. "If you like, we can go back to the archives: there might be something about it. I'm sure it's been done before, though I can't imagine that any Jedi of relevance would've tried. I don't know a whole lot about it, but you would need to use the Force." She broke off and looked at him curiously. "How...can you still use the Force? Would you be able to meditate with it?"

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

Once more he became aware how far her view on the force was away from how he perceived it. Never before he had considered making such decision without the guidance of the metaphysical energy that empowered sith, jedi and anyone else born gifted to sense it. It was against everything he believed in, as the force had formed his path since a young age, long before he became a sith. Discarding all that, to make decision based on what his numb mind could piece together seemed wrong, and there was another problem even beyond that. He had to figure out what he wanted, but right now he wasn't even sure who he actually was. As his training under ophidia began he had made a great effort to leave his old live behind, to the point were he couldn't even remember the name he had before he called himself Abyss. He remembered any struggle he had to live through, the pain and the hate, but anything else was just a blurred memory that had faded far in the distance. Abyss was the name he gave himself to show his dedication as a sith, but he didn't felt like a sith right now. So who had to made this decision? Abyss or whoever he had been before?

"It always had been easy for me, you know? I mean being a sith. Others have to be broken, they have to be completely reformed, while I felt like one from the start. The darkness called me and I followed, I gave up anything I had, my friends, my family, my identity in a heartbeat, because I believed there was something greater in this galaxy, a path, a fate for all of us. Without it, I do not know who I really am. Is it still Abyss chained to this body, or am I the man I was before the dark side touched me?"

His eyes looked to the ground as he pondered about the things that happened ro him. There never had been any doubt in his heart, in all those years that he had been a sith know he never even once really considered that he shouldn't be one. Even his master had believed in him from the start, something very rare for a sith. Now Ophidia was gone, hidden even better than he had been, and he couldn't ask her for guidance in this time of need. Or could he? He was a sith, the invisible mark on his hand confirmed as much, and his master did have an absolute for a situation like this. "Success or death" as she often said. This was no different, just another test of his power on his path to greatness. With a bit more confidence in his voice he spoke again.

"Yes the archives. I actually came here in hope of finding something there before you caught me wandering through the temple. More the once a book could tell me what I could not tell myself."

It was true, he always had felt more comfortable around books than around people, he always enjoyed the solitude of immersing himself in the words and knowledge of times long gone by.

"I can still hear the force calling, but only as a faint, distant whisper. I can not enact any control over it, but I should be able to at least touch it when I immerse myself in meditation."

[member="Aria Vale"]

 

[NightSister]

It had always struck Aria as odd, the way that Sith considered the person they'd been before serving the Dark and the person they were after to be two totally different people. In Abyss's case, unless his parents had had an odd sense of humour then he had taken his rebranding a step further; it seemed so odd, but conformed to the idea in her mind that to be Sith meant to be shaped almost fully, so much so that one had to renounce their old identity in order to become one. She herself didn't know what she'd be without being allowed to retain her person, but she supposed that it held a twisted sort of appeal. A new start, a fresh slate. The chance to change everything.

"I guess I kind of know how you feel," she replied. "I've wanted to be a Jedi for as long as I can remember, but it's always been so difficult. Not just in that the training's hard, though it is. It's just so difficult, all of it. But I don't know where I'd go or what I'd be if I had to leave the Order."

In an way, Aria didn't know herself whether she would have stayed with the Order without having promised to do so. It had always been a sort of anchor, knowing that she couldn't leave until her Masterhood, but it had grounded her and made it so much easier to stay on the right path. Without it, she'd still want to be a Jedi, but whether she'd be as likely to succeed, she was glad she'd never find out.

Then at his next words, Aria hopped off the counter and led back to the archives, mentally navigating through the shelves to give them a good place to start among the vastness of the libraries. Opening the door again and switching on the lights, she scanned the labelled shelves for anything that could prove useful and went for an aisle titled Amulets and talismans, figuring it would be a start. She gestured for Abyss to help her scan, thinking over what he'd said.

"Well as long as you can sort of sense it you should be able to do something. See what you find."

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

After getting dressed in his robe again, the sith followed her inside the archives. With a glare in his eyes Abyss began to look over the books stored around him, his fascination overshadowing his weakness for a short moment. A Jedi archives filled with the vast knowledge of generations before them, conveniently collected and sorted for them to immerse in. He often fantasized about breaking into a temple to search through the books, but in that fantasies he never did it to save his life. His hands wandered over the shelves, his eyes following them while he scanned through every title in his range. Of some of the books he had heard, others he had even read, and even more he had never seen mentioned anywhere before.

The force made him many things, a warrior, a assassin and a monk but there was something he was even without it. A scholar, a man that could analyze and collect data from texts and books faster than most, someone obsessive enough to completely lose himself and reality around him once he began his work. It only took seconds for him to space out, as he picked out books, and placed them on a table behind him, and soon afterwards they already begab to pile up.

After he had picked out roughly two dozens, he moved away from the shelves, catching his breath for a second. In his almost trance like state he had been able to ignore the struggles of his body, but as he broke it for a even a second the feeling returned. Taking place on a chair on the table he opened up the book closest to him and began reading. For most others there was probably a more effective way to dig through information but once he would return to his trance like work state he would basically become the biological equivalent to scanner droid, marking important bits of information in his mind and piecing them together into a valuable network.

"This might take a while. You found something already?"

[member="Aria Vale"]

 

[NightSister]

Aria turned her head as Abyss spoke, noticing only then that he'd gotten totally caught up in a particular book and neglected the stack behind him and the masses of books on the shelves. Her eyebrows twitched to indicate her surprise, but she kept otherwise quiet on the matter. It wasn't as though she hadn't done the same while perusing, say, an excellent psychological thriller - she didn't usually do such things when scanning for life-saving information, but to each their own.

"Um, I think I have something here," she announced, picking a history textbook up from where she'd left it with the appropriate page open on the table and scanning for the right passage. "There's a chapter here about the Jedi purge - Darth Nihilus and Darth Sion went on a Jedi killing spree, from 3954 to 3951 BBY." She made a noise that plainly indicated what she thought about the Jedi killing spree. "Anyway, before they did, Nihilus had some sort of affliction, and it got worse so he stuck his spirit into his armour. I'm trying to find a book about the affliction, but if you want to know how he did it then I'd suggest looking in the Sith archives instead."

Putting the book in front of him in case he wanted to see for himself, Aria scanned the shelves again, hoping to find a less Darksided method of returning Abyss to power.

"There's a bunch of people who self-exiled when they lost touch with the Force," Aria suggested absent-mindedly. "It's supposed to help, I guess. Or if you've established a Force-bond with somebody, you can gain power and knowledge from them." Neither sounded very probable, but she was doing what she could. "And the focus discipline might work if you tinker with the method, you should be able to do it but it's not really designed to increase or restore power."

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

All of a sudden Abyss expression changed as she mentioned the lord of hunger. While the yellow glow was still lacking in his eyes, there was a glance, a hint of passion in them, as she gave his obsession new fuel to draw from. Often he had thought about the lord of hunger, ever since he came into contact with an echo of the past, a memory of times long gone by forever stored in the flow of the force. A vision given to him in a place of absolute darkness, a temple of the sith where his master granted him the title darth and the rank of a sith knight. The parallels between him and the lord of hunger were more than simply of visual nature. Two men plagued by a strange hunger, just for different things. Two men that looked beyond this physical plain, just with a different conclusion. Was it meant that he would follow further in his footsteps, that he would learn how to disconnect his spirit from his body and bind it to his armor? Maybe, but to be sure he still had to rekindle his connection with the force.

His focus returned to her as she continued to talk, this time about some less extrem methods. They all sounded like they could work, but he didn't had the time to go into exile and come to terms with his state and regain his connection through enlightenment. Also it was a very jedi method and would take even longer for him to accomplish, and it wouldn't keep his body from falling apart until then. A force-bond with someone was similarly unrealistic right now, as such a bond took time to build up, and he had neither a person nor the time to form one.

"This focus discipline, it is a form of meditation right? Sith and jedi alike meditate fairly often, but our methods vary greatly. We sith focus on our inside, on our passion and hate. I lack the inner strength to really rekindle these feelings, so connecting with the force around me sounds like my only option. I am not sure how to do it, would you guide my mind through the meditation?"

He lifted his feet up and crossed them on the chair he was sitting on, his eyes closed. It was the stance he always took during meditation, and until these last few days it always allowed him to easily connect with his inner fire. Now he only felt an inner emptiness, a void where the force had been. Without help he would never get close to the force in foreseeable time. The hilt of his old saber rested in his lap, should he feel the need to use it as anchorpoint for the force.

[member="Aria Vale"]

 

[NightSister]

Concern crossed Aria's features for a moment at Abyss's reaction to the mention of Nihilus - the last thing she needed was for her eagerness to help resulting in that particular chapter of history being repeated - and was replaced by relief as he asked for her to guide him through the focus discipline. She was no great teacher, but she knew Abyss to be a fast learner, perhaps even enough to make up for her inexperience in teaching. Desperate times, she supposed; desperate measures.

"I can try," she agreed, thinking back to her own lesson. "It really is just an extension of meditation; you need to reach out to your item with your mind and let it draw you deeper into the Force. It's a Jedi method, but I was taught to use whatever meditation ritual you usually use to get in the mindset, so I suppose you can still focus on your hate if you like." She made a mildly amused face at the thought.

"The idea is to form a connection, so that you can use the item to return to the Force no matter what; with Jedi, specifically to feel at peace with it, but if you're a Sith doing it perhaps the default changes."

It was an interesting thought: a Sith doing his own take on a Jedi method of meditation, using a technique designed for peace to be a gateway into power. Aria was certain it was achievable...just strange.

"Just take the saber hilt I suppose, and do whatever it is you normally do." It might even prove interesting to watch.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

Spoiler

In case Aria's explanation made no sense, here is the thread where she learns it and here is the Wookiee link.

 

[Darth Abyss]

"mhm"

A almost inaudible grunt came out of Abyss mouth as he thought about the technique presented to him. It was rather straight forward, but he wasn't entirely sure about the execution. If he would use the mediation that Darth Ophidia taught him, than he would have to find his inner hate and form a connection to it, or find another way to get in tune with dark side. For a few moments he simply sat motionless and silent, looking first at her, than at the hilt in his lap and than back to her. The hilt still had glimpses of the darkness of its former owner sealed inside, but to use it he had to find something he could draw hate from.

"For others this would be laughably easy, finding something to draw hate from in a jedi temple. Sadly I am not like most of my kind, I can not hate the jedi, simply because they are jedi."

A small grin in his face indicated that this was more of a joke than anything else, but it also obscured the short burst of worry inside of him. In his years as an acolyte his hate had burned bright, for the jedis, other sith, the mandalorians and basically anyone else, but with time came wisdom, and understanding even for a sith. There was few things he had real hate for, the last few years his power had mainly fueled by his obsessiveness and not by hate and anger outside of the battlefield. Then he remembered his greatest failure to this day, the battle of Katarr, the first battle he commanded, and his first defeat. It was a memory that had haunted him for months afterwards, but it had happened years ago. Yet, as his mind lived through his failure again, another battle came into his mind. Mindabaal, where sith turned against sith, and he had his leg cut of by a sith lord and traitor. His eyes closed.

"Revenge."

The word was spoken almost silent, as Abyss mind reached out to the hilt in his lap, his hate becoming one with the hate that still echoed around the cold metal. It wasn't the reawakening he had hoped for, but as his mind kept focused on his anchor point he could feel his own connection slowly sneaking back into the darkest corners of his mind. The memories of before flashed through his mind again, this time more vividly and clearer than before, followed by bursts of hate, of anger and of passion.

His eyes opened.

The yellow gaze hadn't returned fully, but the brown was filled but a certainly noticeable glow as he again looked at [member="Aria Vale"]

 

[NightSister]

Revenge. Something similar to intrigue showed in Aria's eyes, wondering what revenge it was that had helped Abyss to focus his mind. It was better than hatred, she guessed; she wasn't fond of the idea of a Sith using hatred, for the Jedi or otherwise, within a Jedi Temple, for personal power. But whatever it was that he apparently wanted vengeance for, it had worked, Aria noted with both concern and relief. Fine. Vengeance was fine. It was...noble, she supposed. In a way.

"Okay," she began, unsure what else to say. "That...worked, I guess? That's good. It'll take time, but it's easier once you're on the right track."

Even as Aria spoke, it crossed her mind yet again that he might not have as long as it would take. Even if the technique kept him from death a while longer, if it didn't restore him to strength soon then he was liable to die anyway. She knew full well that pessimism hindered any and every task - it was one of the principles of the Jedi method of learning, in fact - but that made it no easier to avoid the thoughts of failure that flickered through her consciousness.

Focus. She had to focus. If Abyss died because she was so caught up in her own negativity, things would not turn out well. She turned again, studying him more closely, trying to see if she could note any other changes besides the slight shift in his eyes. Nothing yet, but it would, of course, take longer than that. But it was working, at least it looked that way, and that was a start.

"Do you...do you think it worked? How do you feel?"

[member="Darth Abyss"]

 

[Darth Abyss]

"A bit more like myself."

Slowly he rose from his meditative stance, feeling as his feet and legs felt less weak when his wait rested on them. It was a good start, but it was still lightyears away from how he normally felt, with energy pumping through every muscle in his body, creating a tension inside him like his flesh was about to burst any second. With the fog that clouded his thoughts and judgment fading away, at least a bit, he could now see that maybe exactly that had been the problem. He had given in to the darkness every day and every night, without restraint or caution. The same trap so many sith had stepped into, seduced by the power of the darkness, enslaved instead of empowered. Now he knew, and now he would be able to be a master of the dark side, and not the other way around.

"I have done horrible things to my flesh. Wars, fights, corruption ... Even alcohol. I was foolish, blinded by the power I commanded, I felt invincible while it slowly devoured my flesh."

He began to walk up and down, and with every step he felt a little bit more like Darth Abyss again, and less like the pitiful excuse of a human he was before the sith. For so long he had kept the memories of his former live out, hidden and forgotten, but maybe it was time to face them once and for all. Death had called for a live, and it would only disappear once he gave it one. The yellow was slightly shimmering in his eyes as he turned to Aria again, feeling as something emerged in from his mind, for one last time.

"If my words ever leave the prison of your mind, I will hunt you. Without mercy, no matter what you have done for me."

He closed his eyes, a silent cry leaving his lungs, as the memories of his former life flashed through his inner eye for the last time, at least in such a clear state.

"Atton is dead, there is only the all devouring Abyss of the dark side."

It was the same thought that crossed his mind when his father died and he cut the murderers into little pieces. Back then it had merely been an rather abstract idea, now it was the truth.

[member="Aria Vale"]