Chapter 1: Chapter 1-Prologue-The FallSummary:Newley edited by Kitsch!
Chapter TextThe escape pod's computer had taken a blaster bolt, leaving Cal without any information on when or where on the planet he would be landing. Even if it was undamaged, he wasn't sure he would be able to read it anyway, what with his vision so heavily blurred by a torrent of tears. All he could see was the rough outline of the pod's durasteel interior. Red lights flashed ceaselessly, with sparks flying across the small space from the damage caused by the clones' blue blaster fire.
The stagnant air quickly filled with smoke from the sparking equipment. Cal ran to the diagnostic computer, one of the few things spared from bolter damage. Looking down the list, there were more items highlighted in red than orange or green. Red meant it was irreparable, at least in mid-flight. Orange, offline, but repairable. Looking at the first item highlighted in orange, the accelerometer. Probably need that. Cal made a mental list of all the orange highlighted items, and quickly prioritized the most essential for repair before he went about repairing the pod. His mind raced through the escape pod drill that he had been run through bimonthly aboard the Albedo Brave, along with the rest of the 13th Battalion. Unlike the clones, Cal was expected to know how to repair most of the pod's internal systems. At the time, he had hated the extra lessons forced upon him by Master Tapal, failing to understand why a Jedi would be expected to perform such tasks. Now, all his complaints died out when he found himself in need of all the information and skills gained from those much hated and lengthy lessons.
Cal kept himself busy with his repairs, his mind never straying from his tasks. His eyes, never venturing a glance to the floor of the pod. His legs carried him around the pod, never cutting through the center. He forced himself to breathe from his mouth, subconsciously fearing the smell of burnt flesh he knew was present. All his actions were meant to ignore the dead body that lay in the middle of the floor. Master Jaro Tapal's body, his master. But even with his mind focused elsewhere, the tears wouldn't stop pouring. As Cal repaired system after system, he still clutched the damaged weapon of his master. The lightsaber hilt, meant for the large grip of a Lasat, looked giant when held by Cal's adolescent hand. His own weapon was destroyed along with the rest of the Albedo Brave, after their escape. His kyber crystal, the stone he almost died on Ilum for, gone. He had poured his hopes and aspirations into crafting his symbol of being a Jedi, and he lost it when it slipped from his hand.
Now, as he held his master's weapon, Cal felt the emotion behind its craft. He was flooded by the calmness and serenity that its crafter had exemplified. Cal wished he could experience the serenity emanating from the echo of the weapon, rather than just sense it. His mind was too fractured to get anything other than a slight tingle.
As Cal finished the last of the essential repairs, he glanced at the front of the pod. The pod was windowless, as that would mean structural weakness. Something that could not be tolerated when designing something that was meant to crash into a planet without damaging its occupants, too much. Cal vaguely remembers, in the escape pod drill, being told that the pod's speaker would start counting down one minute before impact, along with the main computer flashing numbers along with it, giving time for the pod's occupants to secure themselves in the seats. But the computer was broken, so all Cal had to rely on to know when to strap himself into a seat would be the speaker system, currently silent. Meaning Cal had more time to repair less essential systems. More time to ensure the pod survives the crash well enough to call for help, to get a message to the Jedi council.
Reading the diagnostics list, the first non-essential system listed for repair was… the speaker system.
"That can't be goo-" Cal's thoughts are left unspoken, his voice interrupted by the pod's crash into the surface of whatever planet the navigation locked onto.
[Break]
Merrin looks up from her task, blistered hands stopping their motions. Her heart ached, her eyes watered, and yet she held her dead Nightsister in her hands. She shook the pain from her soul, and focused once again on preparing her sister for burial. Her hands worked on instinct, as thinking would prove to be dangerous. She had memorized the ritual many times over, of course, as it was all she had been doing for a year.
She had preparied body after body, burial pod after burial pod, sister after sister. They had to be mummified, given burial rights, and then laid to rest in pods made of animal skins and strung up across the mountain. She had to preserve them to both honor their lives and connect them to their home one last time.
Merrin took another breath, in through her nose and out through her mouth. The smell of death didn't phase her anymore, with how many corpses she had worked with today alone. How many sisters had she buried in the past week? A dozen, maybe. How many in the last moon cycle? She wasn't sure, perhaps 30 or 40. But as for within the last year, she didn't know. Doesn't want to know.
More than a year had passed since the decimation of her coven- the slaughter of her sisters at the hand of one who wielded blades of plasma, a Jedi's weapon. Cutting her sisters down, as his army of droids fired, killing ceaselessly. The fires, the smoke, the smell of flesh, meat, and blood burned by plasma. The battle cries of her sisters charging into battle, to defend their homes, only to be put down along with them. Plasma bows and duskblades fighting blasters and blades of green and blue light. All that had been left behind were scraps of metal, the smoking remains of the Nightsister coven, and Merrin holding the body of her Ilyana.
What had taken only a few hours to be lost forever, she had grieved for for days. She spent her days cleaning the bodies, more often than not piecing them back together, and preserving them with magick. She had to preserve them, or else they would be lost to the scavengers of Dathomir before they could be honored. Though she worked tirelessly, working herself beyond the brink of exhaustion, she never found the body of Mother.
She could only pray to the spirits that she wasn't defiled in death.
After all the bodies had been preserved, she had the Nightbrothers transport the bodies across miles of dangerous land to the canyon of ancestors and to the mountain that lay in the middle of the vast canyon. The trip had taken months, but Merrin wouldn't allow her sisters to be put to rest anywhere but the Nightsisters traditional burial grounds. She herself had carried Ilyana's body on the journey, not trusting any of the filth around her with her beloved. Once they made it to the mountain, she set the Nightbrothers to work hunting for countless animal skins to make the burial pods. Over the months, droves of Nightbrothers had died hunting for more skins. It was a small comfort to Merrin that Nightbrothers were not afforded burial rights.
Nightbrothers were lucky if their fellow brothers deemed them important enough to retrieve their body to be thrown into a hole and covered in dirt. They didn't deserve the rights the Nightsisters did. It was common for them to be left for the scavengers, or used as bait for hunting. It was fitting for them to live and die as livestock.
In the burial grounds, she'd began the arduous process of honoring her sisters. Ilyana was not the first sister she had prepared for burial- she hadn't had the heart to bury her favored sister first. Ilyana had been the one she had believed she would spend the rest of her life with, and the thought of returning her to Dathomir so soon pained her. Instead, the first one to be prepared had been one of the martial sisters, her body cut into half a dozen pieces by burning blades.
Merrin could not fathom a more gruesome weapon. It had taken her weeks of preparing other sister's bodies, and looking upon Ilyana's body peppered with blaster burns to work up the will to bury her love, her heart... to bury the one source of light on Dathomir. When she had finally prepared and given Ilyana her burial rights, she had spent days traversing the mountain looking for the best spot to hang Ilyana's burial pod. She had settled for a cliff near the peak that had a perfect look of Dathomir's sunset, hanging her pod on the grave thorn that grew overlooking the cliff.
Merrin remembers the many evenings Ilyana would climb up the tallest of grave thorn trees near the Nightsister lair, Merrin joining her when she had grown old enough. They would watch the sunset as Ilyana would weave stories of planets with suns of yellow, orange, white, and blue. Ilyana had always wondered if the sunsets of planets without red suns were painted with different colors. Ilyana had always dreamed of traveling the galaxy, seeing as much of it as she could. Merrin had wanted to join her adventures, join her dream. She ached for this dream that no longer existed.
It had died alongside Ilyana. All Merrin had left was her task.
Merrin turned to the entrance of the stone structure she used to prepare the bodies, wordless as another party of Nightbrother hunters brought her more animal skins. Most of the skins were that of the Sprantal, a large three-eyed reptile that can be found in the swamps and flatlands of Dathomir. A few of the skins are that of Nydaks, mostly the skins of adolescent or elderly Nydaks, as a fully grown Nydak is too dangerous a quarry for most of the Nightbrother hunting parties. Another Nightbrother enters, rushing to her with panicked eyes.
"Nightsister, There are explosions in the north sky! Fire raining down from above!"
Merrin glowered at the nameless Nightbrother, annoyed at this interruption. What was she supposed to do about explosions in the sky! She proceeded to follow the fearful maleling, who was more scared of the irritated Nightsister than he was of the explosions at this point. As she took a step through the threshold of the doorway, Merrin tried to count the days it had been since she had last gone outside. After a second of thought, she decided it had been about half a moon cycle since she had last felt the heat of Dathomir's red sun.
She cast aside the thought of time, instead glaring at the Nightbrother once again to watch him cower. When she brought her vision over to the north sky, there was indeed the remnants of large explosions in the sky far above the northern flatland. Fire lit up the northern skyline like a second sun, painting it orange and red. There was nothing Merrin could do about it, even if the explosions had been right over the mountains' peak. The flames soon fell below to horizon, out of sight.
"Do not interrupt me for such trivial things again, do you understand?" She hissed, the male beside her quivering where he stood. She watched him run for a moment before she glanced at the horizon again. Whatever the light was, she had work to do.
With a tired sigh, she returned back to her sisters' corpses, brokenhearted.
[Break]
Cal woke to the smell of smoke, blood, and burning flesh. His head throbbed with an angry migraine. Instinctively reaching up to hold his forehead, Cal felt a wet sensation near his hairline.
"That explains the smell of blood… and the headache,"
Blinking open his tired eyes, he took in the scene around him. The pod had been cracked open like an egg- the metal ripped apart in jagged angry pieces. An electrical fire had been sparked in the opposite side of the pod.
"And that explains the smell…" He thought to himself.
Turning his head caused another wave of pain to shoot up to his head. The smell was apalling. It left an unpleasant taste in Cal's mouth and burnt his throat. Tears once again sprang from his eyes as he looked upon the lifeless body of his master, burning in the electrical fire. Master Tapal's body had been thrown only feet away from Cal in the crash, bent in unnatural ways. The young boy's master smoked, both from the blaster fire and the pyre. Cal gagged, the smell somehow worsening with the sight.
He held back the near-overwhelming urge to vomit.
The betrayal of the clones shook the young padawan down to his very core. From the cataclysm of the betrayal to now, Cal was sickened. He had lost Master Jaro Tapal, the father figure that had raised him for the past two years. He had died because Cal had failed him- had panicked when it mattered most. Cal had always felt insecure about being the padawan of such a well respected master of the Jedi Order. He had always feared he was not good enough to learn under Master Tapal. A haunting thought filled his head, crowing the same phrase over and over.
"If Master Tapal had chosen a different padawan would he still be alive?"
Cal took a breath. Now wasn't the time for such thoughts. He set his jaw and stood. He touched his head wound, trying to guage the severity. Aside from the pain echoing in his head and a few aggressive looking bruises he was relatively unharmed in the crash.
"Seems I'm not completely out of luck."
Taking hesitant steps, Cal exited the pod. He squinted as his eyes adjusted to the light, trying to determine his location. His eyes were met with a planet of red. The dirt was red, the sky was red, and the plants were various shades of deep reds and oranges. Hung in the sky, a red star. Once again grateful for training he had found tedious, he fell to his knees. He knew this planet, if just by chance.
Dathomir. The namesake for the Dathomir solar system, being the only habitable planet in the system. Home of the Dathomirians, a subrace of Zabraks that was rarely seen anywhere besides Dathomir. Besides that small amount of information, Cal knew almost nothing else about the planet. He couldn't even recall why the 13th Battalion's Star Destroyer, the Albedo Brave, had been stationed in the system for the past three months. From his understanding, Dathomir was as far away from anywhere important as one could be. There were no trade routes, no direct star jumps to important systems, no rare material that could be used in the war effort.
In the whole three months the 13th Battalion had been stationed in the system, they hadn't done anything of note beyond monitoring communications. That had also confused Cal, as there were no communications to monitor in a mostly empty star system anyways.
Taking a look at the sky, it seemed to be barely past midday, though, Cal couldn't do much with that information. He had no clue as to how long a day on Dathomir was. He had been taught of planets with only a few hours of daylight, and planets with daylight that lasted several Galactic Standard Days. He even knew of planets with multiple stars that caused the planet to have constant day all across the planet. Endless day was something he didn't really have to stress over, knowing that the Dathomir system only had the one star- the red giant Domir. A funny name for a star, really. Most names for celestial bodies outside of habitable planets involved numbers, letters, and code.
Glancing back at the broken pod, Cal spotted the orange box. It's purpose was to send out distress signals across the whole of the solar system. The box was supposed to be deep inside the machinery of the pod, but it had somehow found itself thrown dozens of meters away from the crash site. The only reason Cal had spotted it was thanks to its bright orange paint that stuck out when surrounded by the pale reds and dull browns of Dathomirian desert.
Cal limped towards it, the bruises spattered on his freckled skin throbbing. He sat next to it, needing a break from movement. He took another deep breath, preparing himself for whatever he may find inside the metal box. The lid opened with a little resistance, and its contents sent a rush of dread through Cal Kestis. The contents were nearly entirely demolished. The whole of its electrical innards were a harrowing combination of burnt, ripped, and shattered.
Unfortunately, any hope he had of getting off this hellscape mirrored the contents of this box. Cal's chances of being rescued had dipped from unlikely to devastatingly theoretical.
The padawan held the remnants of his hope in his hands, and sobbed.
[Break]
It turned out that Dathomir had a day night cycle that was a similar length to Standard Galactic Days, at least as far as Cal could tell. He had no definitive answers for his questions, and had lost many of the tools he may have used in the crash.
Cal had been able set up a relatively simple camp, not much, but enough to survive a few nights. Night on Dathomir was quiet; nerve rackingly so. Cal hadn't heard a sound throughout the whole night aside from the ones he and the pod made. The pod's fire had gone out halfway through the night, leaving the only light source for Cal to be Dathomir's two moons. Even at night, Dathomir was bathed in the red light. Cal swore that when he got off this planet, he'd never look at the color red the same again.
"How could one planet be so red? Red dirt, red sun, red plant life, red atmosphere, even the moons reflected the sun's red light." He'd complained to the stars as he set up his camp.
At least with two moons, the Dathomirian night was well lit.
Cal knew that he would need to move on at some point. There was no source of water near the crash site, and if he wanted any way off this planet and back to the Jedi, he needed to live. He needed to bring news of the death of his master, the betrayal, and the destruction of the 13th Clone Battalion.
But before he can even think of moving on, there was one task that Cal must do. After spending his first morning on Dathomir collecting wood, Cal quickly found that the task would be harder than he had first imagined. Cal had thought he had landed in the middle of a burnt forest of dead trees; all the trees were pitch black with bark that looked burnt, neither leaf nor flower in sight. It soon became apparent that the thought dead forest, was in fact, not dead.
The trees were very much living and tougher than stone. Using his master's saber, Cal would slowly sever branch after branch, never taking too much from one tree. After hours of collecting wood and gathering the wood into as neat of a pile as he could, Cal retrieved his master's body from the escape pod. Cal had to move him through the force, as the Lasat's body was much too large for him to carry conventionally. Placing Master Tapal's body onto the pile, Cal used the lightsaber to light the pyre.
He waited for the fire to grow for a few moments, layering more wood as it did. Once it had grown enough to obscure the corpse inside, he cut his Padawan braid and tossed it into the pyre as well.
The wood, despite its durability, had surprisingly caught relatively easily with the help of some lighter fluid Cal had found in the supplies of the escape pod. As Cal watched his master's body burn, another stream of tears started to fall. Cal had always known his time with Master Jaro Tapal would come to an end, but he had always imagined it would be a celebratory occasion; making it to become a Jedi knight. He would have still been able to see his old master that way. But now this would be the last he'd see of him. Cal's last memories of his old master being that of succumbing to fear, and getting Master Tapal killed. He'd remember his master sacrificing his life for his padawan, and would remember the stench of his burnt body.
The day he had been chosen by Master Tapal as an apprentice was the happiest day of his life. Jedi Master Jaro Tapal, a well respected master, known for his skills with the Force and the lightsaber alike. Some would go so far to say he rivaled even some members of the Jedi Council. In matters of wisdom and the insights of the force, Jaro Tapal's peers would look to him for guidance. When the war had started and the 13th Battalion had been put under his command, they had quickly earned a reputation as the "Iron Battalion" thanks to his guidance.
To Cal, however, Master Jaro Tapal was more than a teacher; more than a skilled warrior, and more than his wisdom. Master Jaro Tapal was a friendly face in a galaxy torn by war. He was a beacon of light in the force when Cal got lost in meditation, but above all, he was the closest Cal had to a parent. He was Cal's master. And now he was lost, forever one with the Force.
It was all Cal's fault.
A Jedi apprentice, barely above a youngling, found alone, found masterless, tear-stained, blood-stained, and afraid. Abandoned on a planet as red as his master's blood, as red as his own blood.
Looked down upon by a sun of immeasurable heat, Cal's surroundings were painted with crimson. His master had not lost his life on Dathomir, but his blood stained the planet. Cal wondered if soon his blood would coat the planet in more vermilion. He didn't really care if it did, he was alone for the first time in his life, and maybe for the rest of his life. How long would he last on this planet? A year? Two? Likely not.
His master, who had trained him, guided him, protected him, and cared for him. Gone.
Chapter 2: Chapter 2-Year 1-SurvivalChapter TextThe food and water rations that had been stored in the escape pod had only lasted Cal four weeks. Military regulation of starship escape pods dictated that an escape pod should have enough food and water to feed six adults for two galactic standard weeks, but due to military supply shortages and the Albedo Brave not being assigned to any active military campaigns, the escape pods rations and supplies seemed to have been neglected heavily.
Since he'd landed, Cal had spent most of his time in an almost numb state. Waking up to start meditating well into the evening, only stopping to eat and collecting wood for the night. Whenever he wasn't doing that, he was waiting- no, hoping to be rescued. He knew that if he left the escape pod's crash site, it would be unlikely that he would be found by any rescue teams. Unfortunately, the likelihood of a rescue team being sent was minimal. He was stranded on an outer rim planet and the whole of the Albedo Brave had been destroyed. He would find it surprising if the Jedi Council knew that the Albedo Brave was gone, let alone that Master Tapal's apprentice had survived.
Cal had found meditations to be a release from his worries of the world around him and the situation he had been forced into; a way to forget about all the dark emotions and memories that flared up in his mind. Of course, with every good thing, there was a bad- meditation included. The more he meditated, the more he was unnerved by the planet. Dathomir seemed to have a very strong and ancient connection to the Force. The connection Cal felt here was far too familiar and yet all at once unknown. It was similar to what had felt at the Jedi temples on Coruscant and Ilum, but turned on its head and painted red. It was both oddly comforting and eerily unnerving.
In those four weeks, Cal had encountered very little of Dathomir's wildlife. The one time he had, the creature had tried to kill him. Cal looked down at the bacta-patch covering the large laceration that the Dathomirian predator had cut into his upper left arm. The large quadruped with dagger-sized claws, needle-like teeth, and a bony faceplate it had used to ram Cal into a tree before ripping the wound into his arm. Cal had quickly decapitated the assailant before it had a chance to do any worse.
The only reason he hadn't run out of food yet was due to the fact he had started eating the creature that had attacked him. The meat took a considerable amount of time to cook, and gave off little to no smell besides that of wood smoke. When eaten, it had the unappealing flavor of rancid meat. He had to force his body to force it down the first time he had eaten it. He later found that cooking it to near burnt helped his body stomach the meal.
Though the food issue was solved, the issue of the lack of water had yet to be solved, especially since there weren't any water sources near the crash site. Cal had considered collecting rainwater, but he had yet to see any rain clouds, just red mist. Cal was going to be forced to move on at some point because of this and had set himself the task of taking stock of his meager survival supplies before leaving.
A half-stocked field medical kit; military regulation called for it to be fully stocked, but if the rations weren't fully stocked, then why would the medkit be full?
Two rebreathers. There should be six, though this didn't seem to be a problem for a planet that hadn't had a single whisper of water aside from mist. Cal couldn't see himself using the rebreathers any time, and he doubted he would need to dive deep into an ocean or lake either way.
Five water canteens. The best-stocked item, but there was supposed to be six canteens minimum. Cal wouldn't complain, though. Water was his current priority.
A small bundle of glow rods. There should have been at least two flashlights, especially since glow rods weren't even regulation, but that would be too convenient.
A small pot for cooking and utensils; regulation called for multiple pots and more utensils. In some cruel twist of fate, being alone was useful in this aspect.
And half a dozen short-range comlinks. The only thing that matched regulation, yay! Now, what could he do with those comlinks? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Gee, what luck.
There was also supposed to be a blaster carbine and ammo for hunting, but that didn't survive the crash. Cal didn't care for using a blaster anyways, and would probably find better luck hunting with the lightsaber.
But as he collected all that he needed a question made its way into his mind. What direction do I travel in?
His master's words rang in his head "Remember- trust only in the Force." So Cal decided to do just that.
[Break]
After delaying his departure by an hour or so, to meditate, it was time to finally say goodbye to the wreckage that had been his home for the past weeks. Despite having lived here, survived here for a non-insignificant amount of time, there were few memories directly associated with the site besides his master's pyre funeral. At the very least, none that Cal found he would commit to memory. In truth, his time here was mostly a blur already despite not having left yet. The meditation had been more helpful than Cal had expected. He had expected a minimal pull in the force, if anything at all, or turn in a random direction and pray.
Cal had certainly not expected to get a clear pull in the Force pointing him almost directly southward. What he was being steered to was important, but whatever it was was unknown, alongside what had made it so important. The young Jedi doubted he would know anytime soon.
Traveling south had started much better than Cal would have hoped for. Almost an hour into the journey, Cal saw rainclouds. Before seeing them, Cal would have believed the planet didn't have rain at all. The only reason he knew water existed on the planet at all was because of the sparse plant life, and even then he'd assumed it was dead when he had first arrived.
An hour after the sighting, the rain finally reached him. Relief washed over him with every droplet of rain, especially since his canteens had run dry far sooner than he would've preferred. The rain was heavy and obscured most of the land around him. There was no real shelter to take, as the only trees in sight bore no leaves. Any leaves it could have grown would be impossible on the brittle branches that made the trees anything other than oversized sticks.
The feeling of water washing over him gave Cal an idea, one he couldn't believe he hadn't thought of yet.
Quickly laying his supplies to the side and stripping down to his underclothes, Cal worked to wash off the weeks of dirt and filth from his body. He was grateful the rain was strong enough to wash the blood from his skin, and far more grateful for the cool water that sapped the heat from his weary bones.
What Cal hadn't anticipated was the wildlife taking advantage of the precipitation as well. Cal could feel the creature within the Force as it silently pounced at him. Cal rolled away, narrowly avoiding the beast's charge. Another one of those animals with large claws and boney faces. At least this time Cal had some idea as to how they moved.
Calling his master's weapon to him with the force, it was in his hands and lit moments before the creature's next charge. Opting to not risk meeting the charge head-on, he stepped to the side as the creature sped by. Cal took a swing at its neck in an attempt to behead the creature like the first one he had fought. Either the creature slipped in the muddy ground or was trying to adjust its direction because a slight movement of the creature caused Cal's cut to take its forward right leg instead of its head.
The creature roared in pain as it writhed in pain away from Cal.
He had expected the creature to flee from the injury and had not gone for a follow-up attack. Unfortunately, the creature had set up for another charge, missing leg be damned. Cal hadn't prepared for another charge, but the creature's surprise amputation was clearly hindering it. It stampeded clumsily and slow, giving Cal the time and room to recover to take another swipe at its neck.
His blade struck the beast right behind the faceplate, splitting the head in two rather than decapitating it. Nonetheless, the creature crumbled to the ground, dead.
[Break]
The short-lived rain had allowed Cal to fill up the canteens to last him a few more days. He knew his water situation was going to be a consistent problem; the rain was strong and heavy, but hardly frequent enough to survive off of for a prolonged period of time, and he had no idea how long he would be stranded on this planet.
After a few more days of travel, the terrain started to change from pure flatlands with partial trees into a more heavily forested area. The trees were still the same twisted burnt-looking kind with no leaves and few branches, but a change was a change. With the change in scenery came a change in the wildlife; that being that there was a noticeable amount of wildlife. The only non-plant life that Cal had seen before this were those bone-faced predators along with a few flying insects that seemed to swarm around some of the plant life.
First, he had seen a small brown and purple lizard that had four eyes, two on each side of its head. Then, he spotted a large spider a little smaller than an astromech droid. It had a dark gray exoskeleton and frankly looked like something out of a nightmare. When Cal had approached the spider, it had spit a glob of acid that ate a hole through his robes. After he slew the spider, it had exploded into a puddle of the same acidic liquid.
A large lizard about a meter had almost immediately descended upon the liquified spider, licking up the puddle. The large reptile had three eyes, one of which was on the back of its head, giving the creature 360-degree vision. Cal began to think all the reptiles of Dathomir may have more than two eyes.
Besides eyeing Cal as it ate its spider soup, it mostly left Cal alone.
Seeing the three-eyed lizard eat the spider remains did make Cal realize that he wouldn't be able to rely on meat alone for food. He would need to find some kind of plant that was edible. Having made camp for the night under one of the larger trees that twisted over to the side allowing for it to provide a considerable amount of cover, Cal decides to test some plants for edibility.
The first plant Cal tested would be a small bush-like plant that produces large yellow pod-like fruit. He would test both the yellow fruit as well as the plant's roots. It had no leaves and the branches were a tough wood covered in barbs that would often get caught on Cal's robes. Cutting one of the yellow fruits and rubbing the slice over a small patch of skin, he waited for a reaction. While waiting, he did the same with the roots, rubbing them over another small patch of skin.
Minutes later with no reaction from either he decided to cook both for further testing. It was normally recommended to boil any plants you wanted to test, but Cal had little water to spare, so toasting would have to suffice.
The fruit quickly turned to sickly mush when applied to heat, and when put to Cal's lips had a bitter soapy taste. Inedible. The roots smelled of meat when cooked, and turned from a neutral gray color to a dark orange hue. When put up to his lips and waited, the roots gave no reaction.
When he finally began eating the root, he was reminded of the nut paste that was often packaged in Republic rations.
"Thank the Force! There's finally something edible on this planet," He thought to himself.
The next plant to eat was another bush that grew almost everywhere. It grew in a range of sizes, going from as small a loth-cat to as large as some trees, and bore large red fruits that looked almost like hearts. Unsettlingly accurate, down to the veins and all. The roots and leaves were quickly found to irritate the skin, failing the edibility test. The fruit was as hard as wood but produced a sickly purple nectar that was found to be edible. It tasted like someone had mixed water, blood, salt, and dirt together. It tasted like iron to an unbearable point. The nectar could make a good replacement for water… maybe.
[Break]
Another burial pod finished for the Nightbrothers to take to string up somewhere on the mountain. Either hung from the branches of a large grave thorn, over a cliff, or on a wooden structure when a cliff or grave thorn couldn't be found.
Merrin hadn't personally attended the hanging of any of her sisters since Ilyana had been buried. After her favored sister had been given her rights, Merrin threw herself into her task. She masked her grief and pain by preoccupying herself with work. Giving little time for her to think about anything other than preparing the next body, crafting the next pod. She only ate to sustain herself, and very rarely slept. She did her best to avoid dreams, fearing what she may see, remember, or relive.
She would ignore the Nightbrother hunters that would bring in skins for the pods, only interacting with them when they would give her reports. Most reports involved a hunting party getting attacked by Gorgara, the queen of the canyon and Merrin's biggest headache. The Nightbrother hunters wouldn't hunt when Gorgara was out, slowing down the hunt for pelts and skins.
The over-hunting of the mountain has forced the hunters to venture into the swamplands in the canyon that surrounded the mountain, meaning hunting parties would be gone for days on end to return with only a few animal skins. It frustrated Merrin to no end to see how weak these wretched men were.
After finishing the mummification of another sister and finding there to be too few skins to craft a burial pod, Merrin had had enough. She desperately needed a break from her incessant work, having worn her body was to the end of its rope. She couldn't remember the last time she had eaten and hadn't slept in days. Taking a glance across her workspace, she spotted a bowl of food on a table near the doorway. A Nightbrother must have delivered it at some point. Walking over to the bowl, it appeared to be Veeka meat and broth. The soup was cold and had little taste left. Considering how long it may have been left there coupled with her hunger, it was better than nothing.
After finishing the meal, Merrin knew she needed to rest, but she dreaded the thought. Ever since her sisters' massacre, her dreams would attack her with visions of that night. She would be forced to relive the day she had lost everything over and over again. It was a small mercy when her night terrors would force her awake. She'd rather be given peace from her night terrors than rest.
She hadn't slept peacefully for a year. She was always exhausted. Nothing helped her sleep, and nothing brought her energy. Meditation had turned into her only rest- what with the little help it had.
It took her no time at all to enter a deep meditation, using her connection with the planet to sense the countless life forms that lived on the mountain, in the canyon, and beyond. Every creature, beast, and Nightbrothers gave off a darkness that could only be seen through meditation.
Dark souls for a planet seeped in darkness. Her mother had told her that everything born on Dathomir was touched by its power- the power the Nightsister covens used to perform their magicks. Every sister had this darkness as well, stronger than those of the beasts or the Nightbrothers.
All sisters except her beloved Ilyana; the only light of Dathomir. Where her sisters were drenched in the planet's darkness, Ilyana would glow brighter than the sun when viewed through meditation. Her sisters and mother had found Ilyana odd for her light, perhaps even resented her, but Merrin had loved her for it.
Thinking of Ilyana made Merrin's grief rear its ugly head once again. She would never see her sisters or mother again. Their spirits were stolen from the earth they walked upon too soon, leaving Merrin chilled to her core without her lover's warmth.
[Break]
The first sight of the vast lake seemed like a cruel hallucination to Cal. After months of traveling with little to no sources of water, always on the verge of dehydration, the young Jedi couldn't imagine such luck would befall him. So when the extensive body of water had shown itself from between the trees reflecting the red sky of Dathomir, Cal had little trust in his senses.
It wasn't until Cal grew closer that he realized this lake was indeed no illusion, with water as clear and still as glass. The joy and relief he felt stumbling upon this treasure were nearly overwhelming.
The last months of travel across had been difficult, to say the least. Especially when concerning the need for hydration. Cal had to rely on the nectar of the heart-shaped fruits for hydration, or at least he had planned to. He had quickly found that when drinking the nectar in the amounts needed to sustain himself, it would poison the body with debilitating side effects. The most debilitating side effects being uncontrollable and violent convulsions, hallucinations that brought his senses to useless ruin, and finally the blurring of vision that would last days.
When Cal had first been poisoned by the nectar, he had believed he was dying. When the hours of convulsions and hallucinations had ended and the blurred vision set in, there was little faith that it was temporary. After nine days of being unable to see the path in front of himself as he traveled, his vision was finally recovered. How Cal had survived those tortures nine days, always on the edge of death, is little short of a miracle of the Force.
He could no longer look at the fruits without growing lightheaded, and hadn't touched the nectar since.
Forced to rely on the rare rainfalls and small ponds of muddy water, Cal had dreamed of finding a body of clean water. He had never hoped that after what he estimated to be five to six months of travel, he would find such a clean and vast source of water. He hadn't seen such a large body of water since he had seen Dathomir's oceans from space, aboard the Albedo Brave.
Cal quickly found a perfect shelter to set up a semi-permanent camp to live in; a well-hidden cave in a cliffside about fifty meters from the lake. Cal could finally relax for the first time since being stranded.
A bath was in order, to begin. Cal was filthy, almost to the point where it was unbearable to smell. Though, he realized, this would be his first bath ever. The Jedi Temple on Coruscant and the Albedo Brave both only had refreshers.
Cal stripped to his undergarments, dunking them in the water in an attempt to clean them before setting them on a rock to dry. He placed his master's lightsaber next to the shore, careful not to let it get too close to the water in case the water stole it from him.
He took a deep breath.
In... and out…
And he ran like hell.
Cal couldn't hold back the yell of excitement that came from his mouth as he jumped into that water, splashing into the crisp water with a newfound joy.
His voice sounded almost foreign to the Jedi now. It had been months since he had used it for anything louder than a whisper to himself. In his travels, Cal had quickly adopted the planet's quiet demeanor. The whole planet was silent, and Cal had become the same, rarely making a noise. Hearing his voice in such a loud volume after so long felt wrong, and though he could be mistaken, he swears his voice has gotten deeper, if only by a fraction.
Swimming to the surface of the lake, Cal inspected his body. It was heavily changed from his time on Dathomir. Many scars now covered his body alongside bruises that painted his body in purple and yellow tones. His freckles were darker and more frequent, especially notable now that they were spattered across the refined muscles that he had earned.
All these new features looked out of place on his young body. He looked back to where he had left his Jedi robes, covered in many rips and tears and stained many shades of red and brown. The water was cold against his skin, and cooling and soothing his abused muscles. He leaned back, content to let his body float on the surface as he bathed in the light of Dathomir's red sun. Its rays of red light had never seemed to burn Cal, unlike the much more common yellow suns of other planets, or the white star that acted as Coruscant's sun.
Cal's blissful moment of peace was cut short when he felt something move near him in the water. Having been drawn to a near paranoia over the last few months, he acted swiftly and without hesitation.
He pulled his weapon to him through the force, and lit the weapon as soon as it hit his hand. The blue light that reflected off the lake's surface was of little comfort to him as he cut at the presence that had ventured too close. The water boiled at the touch from the plasma blade, two parts of a small fish floating to the surface after the bubbling subsided.
Getting an idea, the Jedi deactivated the lightsaber. He swam a little further into the lake and waited for a small shadow to pass by. Once it was near enough, he grabbed at the fish, catching it in both hands. Pulling it out of the water, Cal soon realized he recognized the fish's species.
A Burra fish, commonly farmed across the galaxy for its meat. It was part of the diet for countless planets, having grown popular for the ease of feeding and their rapid population growth. The fish were resilient, able to survive in most bodies of water. If by chance it escaped captivity, it would lose to native fish quickly. It was so common across many star systems, it had escaped Cal's memory that the fish had originated from the planet of Dathomir. It had even been served at the Jedi temple from time to time.
Seems this lake was worth more than what had been expected, providing both food and water.
[Break]
After resting at the lake for over a month, Cal had finally recovered from his months of travel while under constant danger from wildlife and always on the verge of dehydration. He had regained his strength on the diet of Burra fish, the roots that tasted of nuts, and the small four-eyed lizards. Cal had found that their meat was sweet when cooked- an unusual but not unwelcome taste.
The only thing that had truly unsettled Cal about the lake was how there were little to no large creatures, despite this being the only body of water in the area. The largest creature Cal had seen near the lake were the small four-eyed lizards. None of those large acid spiders, large three-eyed lizards, or the bone-plated predators.
Of course, after months of being hunted, Cal was hardly going to complain about not being bothered by the wildlife.
The wild Burra fish tasted better than the farmed Burra he had eaten at the temple. It didn't help that the chefs at the temple didn't believe in seasoning and were completely happy with serving cooked fish and hardtack. The clone rations were hardly better, but at least had some imagination to them. Rather than accept the bland food, the clones had imagination with how they ate their rations, and would gladly teach the young Padawan.
When Cal wasn't catching and gathering his daily meals, he found himself meditating often. He had hardly any chance to meditate when he had been traveling, scavenging, and hunting for his next source of water and a meal. So naturally, he filled his free time with meditation to catch up on the hours of meditations he had missed.
Master Tapal had kept him on a strict schedule of meditation aboard the Albedo Brave, but even when given free time to himself between training, sleep, and meals, it wasn't uncommon for Cal to pass the time meditating. Cal had always found meditation calming. It allowed him to center himself and temper his emotions; to get lost in the feeling of the Force surrounding everything and everyone. Besides, it wasn't like there was much for a fourteen-year-old to do aboard a star destroyer.
Unlike then, meditation only brought forth his hidden emotions and the memories that were attached to them. His meditations, though helpful in keeping his mind and connection to the force stable, were painful. His consciousness was filled with thoughts of the clones, his former friends and allies, and how they had attacked him and killed Master Tapal. He was bombarded with thoughts of failure, having caused his master's death by being weak and fearful. He knew these thoughts were false, knowing that he had been a child, that he still was a child. He wasn't to blame for the death of Master Jaro Tapal, but this knowledge helped him little when trying to chase away the thoughts of failure.
Cal knew he must keep up his meditations. It healed his mind, keeping him connected to the light side of the Force. But meditating also helped fight off the malevolent presence that seemed to exist on Dathomir. Dathomir has a strong connection to the dark side of the Force. Cal could feel the planet thriving in the darkness, and the longer he went without meditation, the more he felt its dark hands surround him, much like how it surrounded everything else on the planet. Whether it chased away this darkness or hid it away, Cal wasn't sure, but he had no interest in finding out. Whatever this malevolent force was, Cal feared it more than he feared his memories.
As a Padawan under Master Tapal's training and as a youngling back at the Jedi temple, the dark side had always seemed to be a distant foe, a story to scare the young Jedi in training. He was always told that the dark side is ever-present, always looking for a way to take hold, but Cal had never felt it, or at least, he thought he hadn't. That all changed while meditating on this red planet. The planet had introduced the dark side to him, the scary story manifested in his deepest fears, and it frightened Cal.
[Break]
An ear-splitting roar roused Cal from his sleep. His campfire had died down at some point in the night, leaving the cave dark aside from the light the two moons of Dathomir could provide through the cave entrance. A second roar split the silence, seeming to answer the first one, shaking the air around Cal. The echoes sent waves of shock, fear, and dread down his spine, paralyzing him for the briefest of moments.
The young Jedi crept to the edge of his cave, doing his best to be as silent as possible. Cal soon spotted the monsters that could create such blood-curdling cries. A dozen large masses- each the size of a small building, moved on the other side of the lake. The dark shapes stood together as a group as they patrolled their side of the lake. In the darkness, and given their distance, Cal couldn't make out any real detail besides their size.
Having no wish to get any closer, Cal retired back to his camp, to hide from the creatures as they moved past the lake.
Cal would be disturbed two more times by the chilling roars of the creatures, and he found himself ever thankful for the small cave he had made into a base camp.
The red light of the morning sun crept into the cave, waking Cal and assuring he would get a much better look at the creatures of the night. Upon exiting his cave, Cal swiftly jumped back into the safety of the hollow, barely suppressing the yelp that tried making its voice known. One of last night's creatures had made its way to Cal's side of the lake and was a mere dozen meters from Cal's camp. Only luck and a Force-honed reaction time had saved him from being spotted.
It was covered in a thick brown hide, rough scale, claws that looked capable of crushing or cutting through the largest of trees with ease, small eyes that were the color of a moonless night and conveyed no emotion.
Cal recognized the creature at once, a Rancor.
Cal had studied countless flora and fauna that can be found across the galaxy, both deadly and not. The Rancor in particular is known as one of the most dangerous predators the galaxy has to offer. Many crimelords and planetary warlords across the ages favored these beasts, capturing and transporting them across the galaxy to act as gladiators, trophies, and glorified pets. Rancors are well known in the galaxy. Several planets now hold sizable populations of the deadly creatures; most notably Felucia, with its subspecies of jungle and bull Rancors.
How could he possibly have forgotten the homeworld of Rancors was Dathomir? It was a hot topic among the 13th battalion when they had first been assigned to the Dathomir system. It seemed, despite Dathomir being viewed as a backwater planet and forgettable, much of its wildlife is quite prolific across the galaxy, like the Burra fish and Rancor.
Cal would just have to watch the herd of Rancors would move on and leave the lake, and pray they never caught him.
The young Jedi found himself struck with another bout of bad luck.
After a few days of watching the herd make its home around the lake, Cal had a very close call when sneaking to the lake to gather water and food at night. A Rancor had managed to sneak close to Cal as he gathered roots and firewood. Despite their size, they could move with minimal sound, giving Cal no warnings.
"I hate Dathomirian wildlife." Cal had only escaped by dropping the fish he had gathered earlier and running into the darkness of the night, only just dodging a claw swipe by mere centimeters.
Cal knew the rancors had no plans to leave anytime soon, and he knew he couldn't risk another close call. He was being forced to leave the lake before he lost what little luck he had left. Cal had known he would have to leave the lake at some point, especially as he was still being pulled by the Force to continue his journey south. Every meditation was a consistent reminder of this, but he had at least wished he wouldn't be forced from this sanctuary so soon.
[Break]
The last pod was finally finished. She said her final prayer before sending the pod off to be hung somewhere on the mountain by the Nightbrothers. Merrin had to bury countless sisters. She forced herself to work endlessly to make sure no sister would be laid to rest without the proper rites. Over the last two years, this had been her mission. She worked with a broken heart until every last one of her sisters were put to rest.
The thought of finishing her work had never really crossed her until she went to retrieve another one of her sister's bodies to prepare, only to find that there were none left. Every body had been prepared, and the last pod was off to be hung. The whole idea of it was sobering to Merrin; she didn't know how to feel about it, let alone how to cope with it. She had hated burying her sisters and had always wished to be done with it, but now that labor was over, what was she to do?
Revenge?
How?
She was stuck on Dathomir with no way to leave. Even if she could leave the planet to search the greater galaxy, she had no knowledge of the worlds beyond Dathomir. How would she find the one guilty of her sisters' massacre? All she knew was he wielded the weapons of another group of Magick users, similar to the Nightsisters. The weapon's name eluded her, but Ilyana had once called the wielders of blades of light to be called the Jedi. The founder of the Nightsisters had been a former Jedi named Allya, but besides this, Merrin had no knowledge of this enemy and no way to hunt them to enact revenge.
Rebuild the Nightsister coven?
Merrin may have been one of most skilled in magick among her sisters, even at a young age, but she held no knowledge or teachings of the martial Nightsisters trained as assassins and warriors. Nightsisters were both known for their magic and assassins, both equally important for a proper coven. And how was she to grow the coven's numbers? The very idea of taking a Nightbrother as a mate was appalling, sickening, and out of the question. Merrin tolerated the Nightbrothers at best, using them as tools and servants, nothing more. To be completely honest, she hated the malelings, and would never lay with one.
Merrin had no real future that she wished for herself.
Wanting to get her mind off such thoughts and as an act of respecting her sisters now that their burials were complete, Merrin went to visit Ilyana on her cliff where she hung, watching Dathomir's sunset. It seemed fitting to visit her pod after finishing her duty to her sisters. It was almost perfectly timed, as Merrin arrived at Ilyana's cliff right as the sun began its descent below the horizon.
Watching Dathomir's sunsets was the only enjoyment Merrin had left. Food had long become tasteless to her, her slumber attacked her mind with unyielding nightmares, and meditation- while relaxing, only reminded Merrin of the loss of her Ilyana. The sunset reminded Merrin of the countless sunsets she had seen with Ilyana while sitting on the grave vines near the Nightsister lair. Listening to Ilyana speak endlessly of her dreams and plans to travel the galaxy as the light faded and the temperature dropped.
When the sun had fully lost itself in the distant horizon and the low glow of Dathomir's moons revealed the countless stars of the universe, Merrin continued watching the horizon wishing the sun would reveal itself and set once again. She wanted to keep mind focused on the few good memories she had left. When no such miracle came to be, Merrin slipped into a deep meditation, hoping to feel the light of the red sun with her magick.
The meditation only served to remind her of the missing light that was Ilyana's presence in the magick of Dathomir. Every living thing radiated the darkness of the unforgiving planet. The only light left was the star that served as the planet's sun. Ilyana's light had been bright and clear, unlike the red glare of the sun. Warm and inviting like the embrace of a loved one. The kind embrace Merrin would never experience again.
Her mind wandered back to her now-complete task and a heart wrenching question that she had never asked stabbed itself to the forefront of her mind.
"Who will bury me, when my days end?"
Without a proper burial, a Nightsister cannot rest with her sisters and mother. Without a proper burial she would be lost to Ilyana. A tear escaped her eyes, going unnoticed by the meditating Nightsister. Hoping to distract her mind and the torrent of emotions, she reached further out with her magick to sense more of the planet, and faltered. A glow revealed itself in the magick of the dark planet. More tears escaped as Merrin sensed the light that was traveling Dathomir. Identical to her Ilyana's light was radiating from the north. She only felt it for a moment before her emotions forced her out of meditation, the magick dissipating. Panicked, she scrambled to force herself back into a meditative state to feel this light again- to confirm that it wasn't a trick of the cruel planet or her even more cruel mind. But her magick had not deceived her, and she sensed the light once again. The planet had given her another light to latch onto, to focus on.
Two years after Ilyana's light was murdered along with her.
Merrins hand came to her mouth, tempting to stifle her weeping, as tears now flowed freely down her face. She was once again forced out of meditation. Her last moments in the warmth of the light noticing it's path of travel. The light traveled slowly south, in a direct path to the canyon, to the mountain, to Merrin.