Hearing the dread filled voice of Nizzal, the irls immediately took a more serious attitude. There was something unfortably sinister inside her voice that made them sober up and start to look around the shadowy corridors.

  Most of them, except Lily, reached out with the for an attempt to seheir surroundings. Unfortunately, it gave them little to s. Only their ears could pick up the unmistakable echoes of ining steps. This seemed to further baffle them.

  - I ’t sense anyone, but someone is obviously walking this way… This doesn’t make sense!

  Groaned Kalifa in a whispering tone.

  Barriss silently agreed with Kalifa’s words, even though she didn’t say it. She was more focused on the form of Nizzal. Standio her, she saw her pupils randomly ge to a murky gray and bck whirlwind like color.

  The abnormal phenomenon simply took her breath away while she was staring at it from the side. Her first thought was that she might have been part cyb. Since she could make her eyes ge color, but when she looked closer, the eyes seemed to be very much biological, and she would likely notice it before, if they weren’t.

  Cyberic teology was very advanced in the gaxy, still the eyes were not something you usually ged if you had a choice. The reason for that is pretty simple. Even the best existing cutting edge teology couldn’t seem to reproduce that certain mysterious glint in the eyes, of which made them so human. The eyes were mirrors of the soul, as they say. For that reason there were an growing facilities to repce damaged eyes with biological ones, it was more pricy true, but it worked like a charm.

  Most of the intelligent races wouldn’t want to ge their eyes into soulless, meic eyes. It was a sort of open taboo. Even one of the most famous cybs, General Grievous, who had basically his entire body made from cyberic parts, seemed to abide by this w.

  Anyway, at this time Barriss was absolutely sure that the girl who retly invited herself into their pany didn’t have cyberic eye impntations. That left the unspokeion. How the hell did she ge her eye color, and why? Is it doing something? Could twi’lek’s do that? She didn’t think so…

  She had been staring at her for quite some time now, and she didn’t seem to react much to it. That was alse.

  Her thoughts were distracted as a shadowy figure covered in a bck robe stepped out of the darkness, which suddenly seemed to surround their team a lot tighter than before.

  Nizzal activated her lightsaber without further ado, and her a prodded Kalifa and Barriss to follow suit. While Lily only gnced longingly at the bde that brought them here, and now was dangling from Nizzal’s belt.

  Now she felt left out, as she couldn’t activate her owly acquired on.

  She made an annoyed expression. Clearly not happy that this unfamiliar girl took it from her earlier and without saying anything, as; the situation didn’t seem right for pints.

  ing to this uanding, she also turned and looked at the suspicious form of this bck clothed man.

  The man’s figure was covered in dark robes, which were simir to the jedi’s, but maybe a bit more sinister in nature. Its most strikiure, aside from being ed in said dark clothes, was the burning gold and red eyes that were gring at us from the shadow of the rge hood c his head.

  Yes, he was a man. At least that much could be derived from the robust yet agile form. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that yers upon yers of muscles were hidden uhe loose, dark clothes. Especially for those who were traio see through disguises, those with the training of a jedi or simir one.

  Seeing this much was more than enough for Barriss and Kalifa, their palms tightening around the hilt of the bdes as their knuckles paled slightly uhe growing pressure. The man's key features were still hidden in the shadows and we could not yet know which race he beloo, aside from having a humanoid shape.

  At st the man spoke up. His voice was deep, holding an assured strength matg his appearance. His tone was surprisingly calm, but the boting ess yering it was suggesting that there was a burning fury barely covered uhe strained act of politeness.

  -I see, my Master had been right. Of course, it have been right…

  Spoke the voi a shallow and sarcastie, which fell dull on the ears.

  He took his time to carefully look over each of us, while we simirly scrutinized him. Then he tinued.

  -There is o be afraid. You have been brought here for a reason. Everything happehrough my Master’s will. You will soon e to uand the implications behind my words.

  He paused for a short time, letting our imagination fill the gap. Then tinued.

  -In other words, I have been waiting for you, Nizzal the Grey.

  Nizzal felt a cold sensation run up her lower back. Her skin prickled uhe possessive gaze that this bastard was giving her.

  Before she could speak back. The man turowards the rest of the group.

  -Unfortunately, the invitation didn’t include the rest of you.

  Kalifa was clearly not amused by this. True to her nature, she immediately protested.

  -And who needs your invitation, in the first pce, pray tell? We are jedi! So you better stop treating us like a bunch of snoopy kids, or you will regret it!

  Barriss’s expression paled as she was a step too te to stop Kalifa’s stupid outburst… She cursed herself silently.

  She was too distracted by this newly arrived person, who clearly wasn’t taken aback by the sight of their ignited lightsabers. Thanks to that, her imagination was running wild, seeing the infamous eyes burning in the darkness, but she didn’t want to it the same mistake twi a row. Having burning yellowish eyes doesn’t always mean that the person having them is a Sith.

  The best example of this is Lily! Unfortunately, because of her internal struggle, she has reacted a bit too te to straiupid friend's bbbering mouth. Now she could only hope that the sequences won’t cost them too much?

  The mysterious man snorted coldly. Following this, the temperature seemed to take a harsh dive, dropping a few degrees right away. The curtain of shadows around them have tightened even further.

  The ge was impossible to miss, and it seemed to effectively shut any further ents from Kalifa. Now, even Lily, who seemed to be on the slow side, started to react, taking a distinctively defensive body position.

  The girl seemed to have an acute sensitivity towards immediate danger as she reacted even faster than Nizzal. Who was momentarily shocked by the raw aura of blood thirst which was unleashed by the mysterious man.

  The hing Barriss saw was a blinding purple lightning, striking forward just about to e her. She closed her eyes in terror, holding out her lightsaber, her mind driven by pure instinct while bringing forth a few years of practice she had already accumuted.

  She wasn’t hoping to catch the lightning; it was impossible to do, at least for the current her. She merely tried to absorb some of its power, hoping that it would be enough to survive. After all, it took a special kind of training to be able to absorb force lightning with a lightsaber or even reflect them back towards its sender, a training which she never had. But now she vowed that if she survived this, she would learn how to do it. But for now, it was all she could do.

  After all, the cruel attack happened so fast that it was impossible to rea any other way. The sounds of burstiricity thuhrough the cave, the blinding lighting overwhelming her senses and c the cave walls in ahereal purplish hue for short periods of time, drawing the stretched out shadows of their bodies across the bed rocks.

  The lightning has already unleashed its third burst when Barriss got to realize that she was in faot dead, and didn’t feel any paitention was brought back to the present when the sounds of lightning strikes were repced by the sounds of violently g saber bdes. She reopened her eyes. Her skin was already covered in cold sweat and her visio blurry uhe excruciating knowledge and pressure, which was the fact that she came so close to being sughtered without the power to do anything against it.

  She has had a few close calls with death in the past; she has experienced her own fair share of missions, after all, but she never felt so defenceless in her entire life.

  Now, as she looked at the sight happening in front of her, she felt her kremble. A whirlwind of blood red light. It was a red lightsaber, no, a saber staff! And it was wielded by that man, the man who just tried to kill her!

  She felt her knees buckle, finally giving in to the relief that she felt. The relief that she was saved, before she could colpse, she felt a pair of stiff hands grab her from the side. Holding her up just enough to not fall on the ground.

  She looked at the person who was supp her and saw the deathly pale face of Kalifa. She was shaking, she could feel through her arms supp her body.

  Barriss should have been angry at her, because of her stupid mouth, she was almost killed! But she couldn’t bring herself to pin after seeing that pale expression.

  -I am sorry… Are… are you alright?

  Whispered Kalifa, as she no doubt realized her own stupidity.

  Barriss could only nod, to try to reassure her panicked friend, but she herself wasn’t sure about the question. Was she really alright? She felt dazed, that was for sure. A sense of disbelief was lingering around her, as if she couldn’t e to terms with the fact that she almost died, just like that.

  It might have been childish, especially after the ret events, but she always thought that her death would happen heroically, that her sacrifice would mean something, that it would save the lives of others or at least give them a ce to save themselves.

  A death like that didn’t feel bad for her, but being thrown aside like an unnecessary piece of trash was different. She couldn’t accept something like that, and almost ing to su end was unbearable for her young mind.

  This was what her shocked brain could uand at the time, then the hing she realized with a burst of bone chilling dread was that this man… their enemy, he was a Sith, he must be!

  At the time the clusion was made, she finally saas currently fighting with her enemy. It was Nizzal, that twi’lek girl, she was the person who saved her life, and was currently exging blows with the Sith. Who now has finally unleashed its suffog aura of darkness. The presence of the dreadful thing made her feel sick, and she almost threw up her breakfast right away.

  Still, she forced herself to watch the battle. It might be the st thing she will witness in this life, and she wasn’t willing to miss the show. There was nothing for them to do, it ainfully obvious that they had no p this battle. Which was leagues above their capabilities.

  Nizzal moved with a shog fluidity and grace, one she only saw from Jedi Masters who mastered the art of lightsaber dueling. The movements had no signs of hesitation; it was a plete and absolutely fluid series of iwined movements.

  Barriss already knew all the basic jedi fighting forms by heart. However, she could see more than a few unique movements and small additions to the basis that were clearly personal ges. The types which were not taught anywhere, they were signs of true mastery, showg the tremendous experience of the duellist, who were capable of making her own uyle, ohat atuated her racial abilities and ied them into the bat seamlessly adding to the effectiveness of the inal forms.

  Witnessing something like this, in the movements of a child a lot youhan her, was simply shog. She was absolutely sure that she would never believe it if the said girl hadn't just saved her life a few seds ago, and weren’t tinuing to do so in her presence.

  Unfortunately, as she withis, she also witnessed something, something that made her stomach .

  She didn’t reize the fighting style which the Sith was using… it was simply too chaotic to be parable to anything she knew. Every attack every dodge, came from an ued angle, either from out of sight utilizing the length of the saber stuff, or the two bded nature of it, which made it possible to deliver a deadly attack from a blind spot in a pletely ued angle.

  The man was throwis left and right, while igniting aivating his ons’s bdes o a time, creating opportuhat allowed him to strike from otherwise impossible angles. He had even broken out of a short saber lock by deactivating the bde that was crossing Nizzal’s silver saber, successfully throwing her off band delivering a heavy kick against her left ribcage.

  She mao move backwards at the st sed, moving in a way that absorbed or eled away most of the energy behind the powerful kick. Still, her painful wiold more than enough of the force reinforced destructive power behind the attack.

  A few more quick strikes were exged with deadly precision and swiftness. They were all dodged or blocked by both fighters.

  Then just as suddenly as the deadly daarted it came to an end when Nizzal and the Sith both jumped backwards, stopping and staring at each other with suffog tension.

  The entire exge ended in about twenty seds, but in that short time so many things happened, so many blows were sent and blocked that witnessing the sheer iy of the fight left both Barriss and Kalifa in a state of shock.

  Lily was also watg the fight closely, but her expression remained ral. Which was a bit of normalcy to hold onto for the two before mentioned girls.

  Barriss shook herself out of the stupor that seemed to make her limbs feel like heavy lead bars. She stepped closer to Nizzal, who was currently breathing heavily and pletely covered i.

  Her eyes were back to their normal pink color. Her expression was armed, disbelief showing from her paling cheeks.

  Barriss looked at the oppo. He was also breathing quicker than before, but he was clearly a lot less tired than Nizzal was. As an adult, his endurance was much better than Nizzal’s. She o utilize more of the force to ter the differences between their raw power. That meant she was tiring herself out a lot quicker.

  If everything goes on like this, the oute retty obvious from a gnce, and the results were far from ideal.