The woman shouldn't be very strange. She's human, and the cut of her clothing is odd – but there's a dizzying variety of fashion in the galaxy, so that doesn't mean anything at all except that she's possibly not from Chandrila. She's leaning against the railing when Palpatine sees her, looking out at the mists over the river, arms folded along the handrail. She isn't looking at Palpatine at first, but glances up as she approaches, and…

Her eyes are older than her face, and her gaze is heavy and intense.

The woman straightens and turns to face her more, and says: "My name is Vader."

And then, as Palpatine blinks, she's gone.

The reverberation in the world cuts out. It's massively disorienting, and Palpatine reels before regaining her balance in the world. She hurries over to where the woman stood – sees no puddling of water, no footprints, no dry patches, no indication anyone ever stood here –

Palpatine didn't hear her leave, and she shouldn't have been able to move that fast, not in the tiny moment Palpatine's eyes were closed. Not even Jedi are supposed to move that fast. 

She takes a deep, shaking breath, and she stares out at the same misty river that had caught the woman's attention. 

Over the next few days, the mystery does nothing less than consume her. She fits researching local legends, local people into every spare moment not taken by her other obligations. She returns to the bridge again and again – chafes as she realizes her father's spies have adjusted to that routine.

She doesn't know why this fever has overtaken her. She just knows that she needs to see that woman again. 

She doesn't need to wait long, at least. Only a week after Palpatine arrived on Chandrila, on another path through the city, in a deserted square after dark...

The woman's sitting on the edge of a fountain, and she looks to Palpatine as soon as the teenager enters the square. "Good evening," she says, voice soft. She no longer looks at all ordinary, a soft blue glow suffusing her form. Palpatine can see the faint waver of the fountain's water through her.

Good evening. Such inconsequential words, from a woman who's threatened to turn Palpatine's life upside down. 

"Where did you go?" she demands, rather than responding politely. "How did you disappear like that? How do you look like – like this?" Normally she wouldn't slip like this, would retain control of herself – but she's shaken, and she wants to know –

The woman smiles a little. "I apologize. Sometimes my ability to influence the world of the living is… Unreliable."

Palpatine's breath rushes out of her chest. "You're saying you're a ghost?" she asks, trying for skeptical, but... Somehow, she believes the woman. 

"Yes; I've been one for a long time, now."

Palpatine steps forward, almost involuntarily. "I've heard legends about that – ancient Sith Lords who overthrew death." She'd have dismissed it as mere campfire tales, if not for the scant traces of historical archives she's found.

"...They didn't. They just trapped themselves within it."

"Wouldn't eternal existence even as a ghost be better than oblivion, though?"

"There are worse things than death; worse things than forgetting," she says quietly. "Many of those ancient Sith Lords preserved only shattered remnants of themselves. Cursed angry things, unable to grow or learn, and their influence on the world is reduced to yet another scary tomb."

"I've kept my selfhood, but my freedom is still limited, just... Differently so. And my influence is even less than that of a cursed tomb – I've been reduced to no more than a whisper in the minds of the few who can hear me."

Palpatine nods slowly. "You're more than a whisper to me, though," she says. "And even if all you can do is observe... You must know a lot."

That gets Palpatine a pleased smile. "You're the first to see me so clearly, yes," she says, then she quietly pats the ledge beside her. "Come sit, and I'll tell you some stories."

Palpatine sits, of course, as something warm sparks in her chest. But: "My father's security will catch up sooner or later, and they'll want me back at my dorm."

"They won't find us. The Force shelters us tonight."

"Are you a Sith Lord?"

Vader sobers. "Yes."

"I'm not quite so ancient as your ghost stories, and it could be said I've grown beyond the Sith – but my proper title in life and death is Darth Vader." It has a heavy resonance to it, a weight that settles between them.

Palpatine should flee – should at least be scared – 

She leans in, instead, noticing in a quick moment that the woman's taller than her – Palpatine still hasn't hit her teenage growth spurt in full. "Tell me more," she insists, nearly breathless. Her history books are censored, she knows they are, and the few Jedi she's crossed paths with won't answer questions –

Vader smiles down at her, then begins to talk, and if Palpatine doesn't stop her she'll talk through the night, on history of both the Jedi and Sith, on philosophy, even on the Force and what separates the light from the dark, the Sith from the mere darksider...

Palpatine does nothing to discourage her, asking as many questions as Vader will entertain, slowly leaning ever closer over the course of the night.

And then Vader vanishes with the the dawn.

Palpatine blows off her commitments the next day, sleeping through noon possibly for the first time in her life. As the dark begins gathering, she slips into the streets of Hanna, away from her father's spies, to the nearest uncrowded part of the city.

She finds the woman in a tiny urban garden, this time. Vader smiles at her and picks up where she left off the night before.

Palpatine goes on like that in a haze. Vader pushes her to keep attending her classes and mock trials, and Palpatine grudgingly does so, catches sleep in tiny snatches between the dawn and her first lecture, when it isn't her turn to speak in the trials – she doesn't dare sleep as evening approaches, though. Doesn't dare miss her appointment.

(Gratifyingly, Vader is always waiting for her.)

Then, a week and a half later, as her residency on Chandrila comes to a close (she's told Vader where to find her on Naboo, and the ghost has promised to come, but Palpatine's anxious on if she'll be able to, if she'll be inclined to, and she's distracted) – instead of her university's chartered ship, she finds herself shepherded by her father's security onto their private craft. It's annoying – she'd hoped to network a little longer – but she doesn't fully register something is wrong until they've broken atmo, and she's brought into the office to see her father there, and he'd never come pick her up from something like this –

His words filter through to her like faint light through murky water. She finds herself screaming in a way she hasn't since she was a child – "You can't just pull me out of school!" – "What about the Youth Legislature – " – "What about my friends?" "What about my future?" "There's no future for me locked away on some backwater – " "I'm your daughter, not your pet!"

He doesn't listen – he never listens – he says Damask is a threat and if she won't see that she doesn't need her friends, doesn't need school, doesn't need a future because he's sending her to the isolated estate of a friend of his, one well outside of the backwater politics of Naboo, one much better regarded in the wider galaxy, and that friend has a son her age –

Thunder fills the air, the smell of burnt meat assaults her, as her father's guards pull their blasters much too late – their blood splatters the bottom edge of her robe as their useless corpses crumple against the wall next to the door sliding open to reveal her useless mother, her asshole brothers who've always stolen what's rightfully hers ever since they were small children shouldering their way in past the frozen woman –

It doesn't occur to her that a ghost could help the living, that Vader could even hear her.

 It's Magister Demask she calls, blood speckled across her cheeks, bodies cooling at her feet, body trying to shake itself apart.

Stay where you are. Give me your coordinates. Follow my orders.

(He's close, she thinks distantly. (He's suspiciously close.))

 He steps onto her craft not as Demask, but with a shadowy power coiling around him, and she knows this –

She doesn't know whether to laugh or cry as he reveals himself as Darth Plagueis, the last and mightiest of the Sith Lords, so instead she keeps her expression flat and kneels at his feet as he demands, swearing herself to his service, to obey him as her teacher, her Master, and he names her in turn –

She rises to her feet as Darth Sidious, and she walks off her family's ship without a single look back, trusting his promise to take care of things. 

He doesn't permit her to return to Naboo nor Chandrila, not right away, but that's alright because surely Vader will wait for her, and Sidious is too enthralled by this chance – too excited about having some of her own stories to tell Vader, to stand between both Sith living and dead (yet she still doesn't tell Plagueis about the ghost). She deals with the fallout of her family's deaths from afar, Plagueis's invisible hand on her shoulder, and she lets him steer her away.

He doesn't explain anything. He doesn't tell stories; he doesn't even describe the Force. He takes her far away from any hyperlane, to a frozen nothing of a world, orders her to drink something she knows is poison, orders her to strip, then casts her out, throws her bodily down as a blizzard rages, and ice cracks under her as she tumbles to the base, frigid water bubbling up and threatening to consume her.

 She looks up, to see him resting easily on top of the slope, actually dressed for the weather, and his voice thunders through her mind – Climb.

Her startled rage gets her out of the stream, gets her partway up the slope – Climb – her feet slide, snow and ice collapsing from under her, and she falls heavily on her unprotected front. The ice adheres greedily to her wet skin – it tears as she pushes herself up, as she scrambles a few steps further up the slope – it burns, and her lungs burn with it, as she falls again, and Plagueis's laughter echoes somehow louder than the screaming wind, she can't see through the white hail and her frigid eyeballs and her incandescent rage –

Close your eyes.

It's barely a whisper, nothing compared to the maelstorm of Plagueis, to the blizzard she's wrapped in. It's nothing more than a whisper in her mind, and Palpatine hears it anyways.

 She obeys that whisper, her eyes sliding shut.

The Force courses throughout and is the universe. It is in you. It is in me. It is in this world. Breathe.

She breathes in, and it isn't that the cold leaves her, it isn't that she grows warm – the cold sinks even deeper into her – but so does the roaring fury of this planet, its howling rage at seeing a Sith dare set foot upon its ground again, the blizzard rising in her –

Pathetic. Have you given up already?

Sidious forces herself up as her meditative immersion in the storm shatters – but the ice doesn't sting so much as it whips at her skin, and with every breath the rising drumbeat of her heart calls out in an ever increasing crescendo: hate-him hate-him HATE-HIM.

She pushes herself up, but it isn't his taunts that drive her on (isn't even the blizzard in her core, the hatred in her heart, perhaps; perhaps is that gentle whisper in her mind).

She keeps her face placid, mask-like, as she slips again and again, as he mocks her again and again – she refuses to make any expression, to twitch a single muscle of her face, as she reaches the top and instead of anything resembling a reward he pins her down and humiliates her, rubs her face into the ground just to make sure she'll remember her place –

(I killed my own family for less, her blank expression doesn't say.)

A month later, Palpatine sits in her family's summer house, on the patio overlooking the lake. She's warm, the thermostat set to blazing, but she still feels cold all the time. She's supposed to be putting affairs in order here, getting the house cleaned up and deciding what she'll keep or dispose of. 

It's the dead of night, and a mist rises from the lake, and all Palpatine can think of is how to get back to Chandrila.

There's a soft noise – a familiar swell of power – and Vader sits down beside her, a concerned expression on her face. The colors of life animate her as they haven't since that first brief meeting.

She waits for Palpatine to speak.

"I'm a Sith now, too," Palpatine says into the dead air. "I killed my family, and I swore myself to the cause of the Sith Lords."

"You have that air about you," she says, softly. "Are you alright?"

Palpatine laughs, dryly. "I'm powerful, or I will be. What does 'alright' matter?"

She places a hand on Palpatine's arm – it's the first time Vader's touched her, and it doesn't feel like skin, but like a soft concentration of the Force pressing exactly so. "The Force is stronger than any of us," she says. "And you can't swim its currents wounded."

"What harmed you?"

Anger lashes through Palpatine, taking her breath away. "Everything!" she shouts. "Everything and everyone! Naboo – my father – my useless mother – my brothers – Darth Plagueis – "

Vader nods solemnly, like she expected that answer, and she brushes hair out of Palpatine's face with a gentle touch of the Force. "They betrayed you."

"They did. And you will, too – you're a Sith, and that's the way of us."

"It is not my way. Freedom means nothing, power means nothing if you wrap yourself in chains of your own making – in whatever betrayals you inherited."

"My master was a Sith like Plagueis. I died because I refuse to be the same."

The fight leaves her as her breath rattles out of her chest. 

"That was you I heard, wasn't it?"

"Yes."

"I warned you that at times I'm little more than a voice; I would have struck him down for harming you, if I could."

It doesn't square in her head – Vader is knowledgable, important. How can she not be powerful? 

"...Why?" she asks, and at Vader's understanding look the floodgates burst. "Why do you care – why doesn't he care – I didn't hate him, this entire thing started because I didn't hate him, I would've worked towards his goals, he didn't need to – why does he want me to hate him?" Her voice breaks. "Why don't you want me to hate you, if that's what strength in the dark side requires?"

There's a gentle pressure over her mouth, a quiet 'hush' bringing a pause to the tirade. The image of her hand rises to cup Palpatine's cheek, and her sincerity presses in through the Force. "Because he's blind, and he can see no other way than the way he was raised, no other path than the one he was set on by those whose memories have been lost to the dusts of time. He's blind, because he cannot see your true worth."

Palpatine blinks, takes in a shuddering breath – and tries to surge forward, to grab Vader's hair, to brush the ghost's mouth with her own, as a strange and powerful emotion slams through her.

Vader lets her for the briefest of moments – then Palpatine finds herself on her back, pinned with Vader above her, the Force dark and heavy and wrapping around her body like a vice –

It's nothing like when Plagueis did this, some distant part of her notes. (The beautiful woman she's been obsessed with looming over her helps; that she technically started it helps more; something about Vader's presence, about how the Force wraps around her, helps even more.) She can't wriggle; she makes a frustrated noise instead.

"If this is something you want from me... I will be the one in control – and I do not want you to agree to that lightly, not until you understand what I mean; not until you've made your choice about your future." The vice-like grasp releases her.

Palpatine sits up slowly. "My future – ?"

"Plagueis is my enemy. You call him Master."

Palpatine's stomach drops. "I have to choose – ?" She hates him this shouldn't be a contest – but she needs him, he's the only one she can rely on – she needs him to teach her to use the Force, to stand on her own – she'd thought Vader would approve but Palpatine's apparently a fool –

"I need a teacher," she says, hating the way her voice cracks.

"Plagueis is not the only Sith Lord."

She wavers, then: "What – what would be the difference, between the paths?" She doesn't really know she can trust Vader, and trust is for small children and simpletons anyways, but...

Vader pauses for a long moment.

"Under Plagueis... You would grow powerful, true, perhaps far more powerful than I could ever make you. You would remake the galaxy in your own image, and in time he will die as your father did, and his name will be forgotten as yours lives on in infamy – you will be the greatest of Sith Lords... Until you die as your father and your Master did."

"The path through me is cloudier; I cannot see myself. But I will teach you, anything and everything you might need, and the day you surpass me will be my proudest day. I do not know yet what that future will look like, but... I want to reach it with you."

"Plagueis will teach you power; I will do everything in my own power to teach you to flourish."

Vader's words – her prophecy, because that must be what this is, it rings so true – Vader's words hit Palpatine like a blow to the chest. She takes a deep breath through it, tries to marshal the thoughts her brain is telling her area important.

"...People need to have a place in society. A purpose. One that fits for them, but society – it isn't giving them that. It gives the unworthy power, and suppresses the weak. It makes the rich richer, and leaves the poor to starve. And no one knows how to fix it, what they want or what's best for them, so they make choices that just make everything worse, and they hurt each other. They're like... They're animals, trying to climb out of a gorge." She shivers at remembered cold. "They'll pull each other down, at the cost of climbing out. So they need someone strong, someone smart, someone who'll always do the right thing, to order society correctly. To tell them what to do." To remake things in her own image, she supposes.

"...That isn't... How I would describe things. Not how I would describe everyone, at least."

"...Plagueis agreed with me. He told me the Sith are that person – even when I thought..."

"I thought he was just Magister Damask. I thought – I thought he was smart and clever and he knew what he was doing, and he agreed, and he opposed my father politically and he wanted trade and prosperity for the whole galaxy – "

"He told me I could be that guiding hand. That I didn't have to sit back and just leak my father's scandals and hope someone else fixes things, that I could fix things, that I could be that person."

"He told me I can be a Sith and I can be powerful and I can lead the galaxy at his right hand, and he lied. He isn't interested in trade, he isn't interested in sharing power, he doesn't care about me." 

"I thought he understood, I knew there was something – I knew he didn't – I knew society would disapprove of him, my family disapproved of him, but society's morals are shit anyways and it was flattering, the way he was interested in me, and anyways it wasn't a big trade for power, for things being right, everyone has flaws and that's what teachers always want anyways, what anyone wants from someone weaker. But he was lying and he didn't even care, he just wanted to manipulate me, he wanted to get me dependent on him then humiliate me so I'd be a better Sith, and he said it was good for me and that if I survived I'd be grateful."

"He said if I died, then it'd just prove that I'd always been worthless anyways. That I wasn't able to handle power, that I couldn't draw on the Force well enough, and if I'm weak I might as well be dead."

"But I don't know what I'm doing."

"Maybe I'm wrong and everyone else is content and in their place and this is how the galaxy is meant to be, but - but - "

"I don't know where I fit."

"And how am I supposed to know what future I want, what flourishing would look like, if I don't even know where I'm supposed to be now?"

Something warm and heavy wraps around her.

"Your place in the world... That's not something anyone can give you. No one knows you, not truly, not the way you know yourself. And the Jedi claim the Force will guide those who open themselves to it – will work through them and bring them to their place in the world – but..."

"I don't think even the Force can decide that for us. It's something you'll need to find for yourself – but my job as your teacher i would be to help you. Not to lead you, but to give you the tools you need – and it's okay if you discover that place is 'under my control;' you don't need to be powerful to be worthy, and I will never mock you for it. But it's also okay if that place is somewhere far from me, surpassing me."

"Isn't the Force everything? Isn't it all powerful? How can it not – ?"

"The Force is in everything, but it isn't everything – it is the connections between everything. It is the bond between us and our fellow people, us and the world we inhabit – our present, our past, our future. It connects you to those you've never met and never will – but it connects you most strongly to those closest to you."

"Something told you that both I and Plagueis are important, didn't it?"

Slow nod. "The Force. That's – that's how I knew."

"It did."

"But that connection doesn't mean you can trust us. It's a bond, for better and worse – and you will always be connected to Plagueis, to your father, to your planet; the past can never leave you, because it is part of you, now."

"I can never abandon you, either, even if you turn away from me."

She looks away, taking a deep, shaking breath and squeezing her eyes shut.

Vader gives her space.

"...I want to be your apprentice. I don't know what that future will hold," and that's terrifying, "But I want to find out... Master."

There's a tiny catch in Vader's Force signature, something almost like pleased surprise. "I will rename you," she says – warns, almost. "You will swear a new oath to me."

She very promptly kneels at Vader's feet, and then discovers she likes that little flutter around her new Master. (A superior who can be properly flustered is a new treat.) "What would you have me swear?" Plagueis had demanded simply that she pledge that it was her will to join her destiny forever with the Order of the Sith Lords; a far more insulting oath than one of personal loyalty, in some ways.

"I'd like to see what you can think up."

Her mind goes immediately to the oaths between Houses, for some reason – including those sworn in the clan-marriage of a subordinate Matriarch to her House's new patron. "I swear to bind my House to yours," she says, "I swear that your enemy shall be my enemy; that your House shall be my House. I swear that whatever befalls you shall befall me; that wherever you guide me, I shall follow. If I turn back from this oath, may I be cast out; may my name be stricken from the annals of history; may my works become sand beneath the water."

Does she believe it? Maybe, maybe not. Does she like watching Vader's face as she says it? Absolutely. 

Vader is obligingly making quite a few faces! Still, she gets herself under control long enough to say, "I swear to bind my destiny to yours; to guide you with care and wisdom. I swear to support you should you falter; to lift you should you fall. I swear to oppose any who assault you; to aid any who assist you, for so long as you choose to walk beside me. If I turn back from this oath, may the Force take me in full; may I be forgotten."

"Rise and take your place beside me, Darth Fidela."

She stands as commanded. "What first, Master?"

"We begin your training in the Force properly... And we plan what to do with Plagueis."

Some time later, on a mostly-unremarkable Mid Rim planet, a Jedi padawan is on a mission. Specifically, a mission to the marketplace to get supplies for dinner. Elesse has many nice things to say about Master Breha. She's conscientious, diplomatic, an excellent duelist, has a surprisingly sly sense of humor and a frankly unexpected number of underworld contacts. But left to her own devices, she would consume nothing but prepackaged ration bars and plain water without even thinking twice. Which is, y'know, fine, that's a way for a person to be. But Jedi aren't actually forbidden from taking joy in life's little pleasures, so after about a week of living with Master Breha, Elesse signed up for a series of culinary electives at the Temple and has diligently continued her studies in that area for the past eight years. Ration bars are for emergencies, damn it, and she wants to eat real food even when they're out in the field.

Oh, and there's something about a locked-door-murder investigation, political instability, potential Black Sun involvement, et cetera, relating to why the Jedi are even on this planet in the first place. Elesse is on the lookout for certain characters, practicing keeping her mind open to the ebbs and flows of the Living Force as she walks. But business is business, and food is food. So yeah. Marketplace.

It's probably fortunate that she's keeping her mind open to the Force, since that means she feels a sudden darkening, a violent turbulence, approximately fifteen seconds before the first shouts of alarm from the other end of the long outdoor market. The predawn crowds and restaurant shoppers have left, and the tourists and late sleepers mostly haven't woken up yet, but there's still enough people she can't immediately see what's going on.

Ah, hell. She starts hurrying in that direction.

"Excuse me- Pardon me- Jedi business, thank you-" Please just be a fistfight, it is too early in the morning for blasters.

The good news: it isn't blasters!

The bad news: it's lightsabers; red ones, to be exact.

As Elesse finally breaks through, girl in generic dark robes with her face covered by what might be a scarf parries a heavy-handed blow by a tall figure in conspicuously menacing black clothes, then as he overcommits and stumbles she turns to run – further into the open street. There's already some light debris, and people are doing their damned best to start a stampede away from the fight.

She takes it back, this is worse.

Okay, enough panic. Mental ping to Master Breha. Then project calm, get to the front of the incipient riot, intercept the rogues' path. Her own amber saber out in a guard position. "Remain calm, evacuate in an orderly fashion," orders to the crowd in a loud, confident voice.

The taller of the darksiders turns to her, snarls, "Jedi," and takes an almost idle swing with his rather excessive lightsaber pike – it has a single long red blade attached to a long shaft with a short metal blade at the other end, likely cortosis – but he's fast, and the blow's clearly powerful – and with how wide an arc he's got, there's a couple people plausibly still in the danger zone.

Remember how she said Breha was an excellent duelist? She also has an interest in obscure and unusual weapons. So Elesse has sparred against spears before. She intercepts the swing on the plasma blade, which is not great for her in terms of leverage, but shorting out her own saber trying to get the haft would be worse and you'd have to be an idiot to be swinging something that long around if it could just be cut in half so she's not going to take the chance.

Then what she needs to is get inside his reach, but not in a way that lets him threaten the civilians who still haven't, argh- "Leave now," she- doesn't snap, says firmly. Now if she can maintain the blade lock and the other one (whyyyy are there two) cares more about stabbing this one in the back than getting away or starting a massacre of their own-

The other one does, in fact, turn quietly on her heel and lunge for her enemy's briefly unprotected back – and when he tries to disengage from Elesse, she goes low, blade flicking out for his underprotected calves, scoring a muffled yell before the sweep of the back half of his pike forces her to roll out of the way.

Okay. Okay. Reposition to better ward the stragglers while they're distracted. Then- she can't actually let them kill each other either, right, that sounds wrong. So... delay, distract, open negotiations.

"My name is Elesse Vendar, of the Jedi Order. Drop your weapons and surrender."

The tall one tries to say something surely witty and dismissive, interrupted by the shorter one totally ignoring Elesse and going for his side before darting back out of melee; the tall darksider turns his back on Elesse briefly, tries to swipe at the girl darksider, but she's retreating again – this time at least away from stragglers.

...It's a bit difficult to tell, but the girl actually probably had an opening for a fatal blow there, which she seems to have disregarded in favor of trying to maim her opponent again. (He's slowing down, at least, favoring one of his legs.)

That's... strange. That's makes this easier? Maybe? Still need to protect the civilians but also don't need to directly intervene to prevent a murder. She will hold her position but also launch some of the loose bricks at the pair, mostly concentrated on the taller one.

She might need to intervene to protect the girl, who gets significantly more aggressive – takes bigger risks – just as Elesse gets the sense her Master is rapidly approaching. The taller darksider is doing his level best to cut the girl in half.

The others are at a safe enough distance that she feels confident in doing so.

And then Breha Organa lands in the midst of the three-way melee like a crashing thunderbolt. She spins low, sweeping the taller darksider's legs out from under him, her azure blade flicking out with a life of its own to snag the other one's saber.

She turns the blade off and disengages, a smirk on her face, as the taller darksider starts cursing and trying to get back on his feet – a bit hampered by all the injuries the girl has inflicted to his legs.

She calls her lightsaber back and points it at the man's chest as she telekinetically pushes him down. "Stay down."

"What are you doing here?" she asks the girl.

Elesse starts circling around slowly to have a better line on the one her master doesn't have pinned.

"Being attacked, apparently."

"There are easier ways to get our attention."

"And inconvenience an enemy at the same time?" (These Jedi are kinda cute...)

"Depending on the nature of the enemy, yes."

"We have Holonet frequencies, you know."

"But this is so much more enjoyable." (Also, that wouldn't have helped with flushing out Plagueis's latest audition for the position of sole apprentice; this one's clearly had training for longer than Fidela herself, and he's been annoying to quietly eliminate - but she suspects he's less loyal to Plagueis, and will know more if he flips...)

(Speaking of being annoying to pin down, she's slowly and carefully maneuvering herself to make a run for it.)

"On the other hand, it would have endangered fewer bystanders. So pluses and minuses." Elesse isn't gonna get all the way around in time, is she...

"But I think way has worked out rather nicely, don't you?" Nope, the girl is almost to a plausible escape route, at least if she's acrobatic enough to jump up a few walls...

"It's not over until it's over." It'll be a rooftop chase, then. Elesse can work with that.

"We'll see." And with that, she jumps – clearly Force-assisted – and swings herself onto a convenient balcony before jumping again to reach the roof.

They will see!

"Wait, Elesse."

"But she's getting away!"

"Do not only react, padawan. Think. Act with reason."

Elesse takes a breath, recentering herself. How did that fight go? "...She wanted us to take the other one prisoner. She could have killed him, or run earlier, or gone into the crowd. But she focused on disabling strikes, using me to keep him pinned down until you got here."

She nods. "That is my analysis. Then we must ask, why? There is a message here for us, and I believe we ought to read it first."

"What if it's just a distraction? Maybe- she's involved with the murder and is going to tamper with evidence?"

"Possible, but unlikely. Revealing herself at all is risk, as we were not previously aware of her presence. And there could have been things that went wrong with the fight, had she misjudged her opponent or us, that would interfere with any plans she had later."

"What if she has allies? Oh, no, then chasing would just get me into an ambush."

"Consider also: what malice did you sense from her as she fled?"

Elesse bites her lip. "Not much... More- amusement?"

"Good, yes. And that much was genuine. I do not think we face an imminent threat from her direction, but I suspect we will be seeing that one again. So we will allow this one chance, and where it leads will determine our course when next we meet."

"Yes, master."

"Go comm the Temple and tell them we need a pickup. I will see about begging the loan of a jail cell from the magistrate."

It's as Elesse is heading back to their ship for the comm that she sees the woman – a muffled presence in the Force, little more than a shadow to Elesse's sight, and no one else is reacting to her despite how odd she is –

Somehow, Elesse knows that she's both proud and grieving.

What is that. She detours.

"Hello?"

Surprise flickers across her expression – and a significantly worse grief surges through Elesse's odd sense of her emotions. She wavers for a moment – nearly fades from view entirely, before a ghostly: "You can see me?"

"Yes. What... are you?"

"A ghost."

"I didn't think ghosts were real."

A wry smile, though her emotions still echo nothing but grief. "The Force contains a great number of mysteries still. Most cannot perceive me – in fact, my apprentice will be rather put out that she's no longer unique there."

"Your apprentice?"

"Yes. She's already disappointed you didn't chase her."

Elesse takes a step back. "The darksider."

Her apparent amusement fades, her grief twisting into sorrow. 

"I will not harm you," she says, somehow even more quietly.

"I'm not quite ready to take that on trust."

"I have been dead a long time. You are only the third to have perceived me, even briefly; only the second I could speak to."

She seems to be fading out.

"Perhaps, in time, you will trust that even Sith do not wish for such a lonely existence."

She certainly seems sad enough for that to be true, but Elesse doesn't know anything about ghosts and she does know some things about darksiders. So. They'll see, as the other one said.

After the ghost disappears, she continues on her way to the ship, deciding against including this last bit in the report. Stick to just the things that involve all alive people.

She's informed that Master Antilles and her padawan Meinwen will be rendezvousing with her at the earliest opportunity.

Great. Definitely who you want for helping with darksiders. Less good for a murder investigation, but maybe Meinwen will do her shatterpoint thing and wrap the whole thing up forty minutes after touching down.

Elesse calls Breha to let her know, and is in turn informed that their investigation will be paused until the others arrive, so that they can keep an eye on the darksider in his cell. So Elesse can bring some of the ration bars to Breha. (Sigh. So much for dinner.)

Well, as soon as the ship lands and she disembarks, Meinwen pulls up short when she sees Elesse.

"Something in my hair?"

"...A shatterpoint. A large one – and a new one."

"Oh. Great."

"Heard you caught a darksider."

"Master Breha's watching him. There was another, but she got away."

She hums. "Shatterpoint might have something to do with her..." She shakes her head. "It's difficult to say clearly, right now."

"We'd better go find Breha, then," Meinwen's master says, joining the padawans on the hangar floor. "More context might help."

Onwards, then?

Yep. Hopefully they don't get attacked again on the way.

Nothing springs out at them (except maybe a very faint sense of being watched, at least for Elesse)..

Surely it will be fine.

Breha is keeping vigil at the cell. She stands to greet them.

"Master Antilles. Padawan Meinwen."

She walks up to the cell and looks at the darksider for a few long moments, ignoring his angry taunts with an even expression, before turning away.

She doesn't think the shatterpoint on Elesse is centrally related to this darksider... But... There's a certain pattern of cracks in the Force... "There's something important around him," she says after a moment (after making sure he can't hear her). "But he, himself, is not the focus."

"Also, there's a major shatterpoint around Elesse that wasn't there before, but it's... Connected to something, I think, or part of a multi-center point with something else – something I can't see."

"Y'all find the most fucked up shit," Asha comments.

"It keeps life interesting."

"Keeps my life interesting, you mean."

"Just so." Breha smiles serenely. "Then, Master Antilles, I propose you and I escort this one back to Coruscant, while our padawans keep a handle on things here."

"An interesting life creates good challenges to learn from, Master Asha," she teases. "I wouldn't want to fall behind Elesse."

"Suppose leaving the two of you to catch up would be a good thing, then."

"And we do need to practice working independently."

"Don't do anything I wouldn't."

Then the senior Jedi will start getting ready to leave.

And she'll pull Elesse aside for a more thorough rundown on the local situation – both her original mission and the encounter with the darksider.

Sure. The original mission is like, half done? They've got most of the facts of the matter and the various testimonies, it's just a question of putting everything together and seeing what they're still missing. Elesse has some theories and is pretty sure Master Breha knows the most likely answer and is using this as a learning opportunity.

As for the darksider... it's almost like they were waiting for her.

"You specifically, or any Jedi – ?"

"I'm hoping any Jedi? Because otherwise I have a stalker problem. But if it was just whoever happened to show up on this planet and then the choice was me or Master Breha, you can kind of see why it would be me."

Thoughtful nod. "Do you think it was just the one who escaped waiting, or that this was a plan by both of them?"

"The one who escaped wasn't fighting to kill, really. The one we got was."

"Just one, then... But that brings up a question – why would a darksider want the Jedi to capture a different darksider, even a rival – ?" She then shakes her head. "Though that might be easier to answer once we know which cult the one we captured is from."

"Agreed. They should be able to get some information out of him at the Temple."

"Still... She was either being reckless or playing a complicated game by letting us know she's a darksider, too."

"Both are things darksiders are known for."

"True enough."

"Did she say anything else to you, beyond what was in the report – ?"

Elesse shakes her head. "No, that was all."

She nods. "Can you show me where the fight happened? And what direction they came from initially."

Yep. They can follow the Jedi Masters out the door and then split off for the scene of the altercation.

She identified the site once they're on the street, even before Elesse can point it out – and then she says, "A shatterpoint happened here recently... I can trace this back, I think..."

"Need any help?"

"Help wouldn't go amiss."

They can pool their senses, then.

They're able to follow the trail of the captured darksider, but... Meinwen can tell when he encountered the one that got away, but she can't sense where that one came from. 

Does Elesse have any better luck there? She has a more direct connection to the person.

...Maybe? She's getting a vague hunch, at least, almost like a whisper.

Vague hunch is better than nothing. Which way?

Towards the spaceport, maybe?

"Let's try the spaceport," Elesse says. "Might have records, if we're lucky."

She nods. "The chance even one of them - let alone both - is local is fairly low, after all."

And as they get closer, Elesse will see if she has a feeling about any of the bays in particular.

Not exactly a feeling – given she glimpses a very familiar ghost leaning against a particularly nondescript craft, one tucked away from casual eyes or, perhaps more importantly, any cameras.

Mngh. All right. What's the log have to say about that one?

It seems it's been there only a few days, though the captain had registered a departure date/ time of late the night before, and there's unanswered stern warnings about fees. This port doesn't do much to verify identities, but they were sent a license whose picture matches the captured darksider.

They should be able to wrangle that into jurisdiction for a forced boarding. Dump the navcomp, see where he's been.

He's scrubbed much of it.

...Also, Elesse and Meinwen aren't the only ones to access this in the last couple of hours. There's traces of another guest user being given permission for a forced boarding and then going through the same files as them.

Security logs?

It takes some persuasion to get ahold of actual camera footage (none of the logs have anything entered formally), but... 

It seems the darksider who got away beat them here - and no one seems to have seen anything at all strange about her just walking into the security office.

Mind trick? Or some related stealth technique, possibly, she's seen Breha do similar things.

Well, nobody they ask has more than a hazy memory of the girl.

Yeah, that tracks.

Okay, options from here. They could try meditating on the echoes of her actions here and try to pick up her trail that way. They could check the docking logs for a couple days in either direction around the time the male darksider's ship landed and see if there are irregularities there (though if she came on a shuttle instead of a private ship, that's not likely to be helpful). They could review more footage to try to track her back to a ship, since she doesn't seem to be spoofing the holocams.

Perhaps Elesse could meditate - she has a better sense of the girl - while Meinwen checks logs and reviews footage?

A sensible division of labor. She will see what she can divine. (And see if that... ghost... comes knocking.)

She seems to be quietly watching Elesse, actually. 

She will try cautiously reaching out a mental connection.

"Don't suppose you want to save me some time and tell me where your apprentice is?"

That gets her a carefully muted sense of amusement. "And what would you do with that information?" (It feels natural, almost easy, to talk to the woman like this.)

She should keep an eye on that, huh. "Spy on her to learn about her plans and figure out how t- if they need to be thwarted."

"Only if?"

"She's a darksider, but she ran away instead of escalating and she didn't try to hurt any civilians. So. She's not ontologically evil." Master Breha says that people are not their past, even if they are formed by it. The future is always in motion, which means you can make different choices in the present.

Despite her gentle smile, there's that same deep sense of grief again. "Is using the dark side of the Force in and of itself an evil act, then?"

"Most people would say yes, and for good reasons. Most of what the dark side is used for is evil."

That gets her a considering hum. "You are right - in more ways than you know, I suspect." 

"The other Sith Lord currently active would tell you that the light side is just as easily turned to evil as the dark; that the only difference between righteous war and craven murder is whether the rich and powerful approve; that the very concept of evil is a fiction to keep others in line. He would conveniently leave out that he has done evil with every tool he's had, dark side or not; that he, himself, is counted among the rich and powerful; that by freedom he means submission to him. It is what he told my apprentice, before I took her from him, and it is much the same as my own Sith Master told me."

"Even still, it would be a mistake to call either of them ontologically evil. Even my Master was a child once, who railed against poverty and corruption, who wanted to make the galaxy a better place; she grew up to be the most evil person I've known - and she chose evil at every opportunity given to her."

"My apprentice is a child still, one much like my Master once was." Exactly is that child, actually, but details are merely details. "I aim only to guide her away from that poisoned legacy, and to oppose the other Sith."

"Aren't there easier ways to do that than using the name and tools of your enemies?"

"Sometimes... We use the tools we have."

"And there's strengths to the dark side ‐ things I can accomplish with it, that I couldn't when I was a Jedi."

"Like what?"

"In general... At the simplest level, the dark side brings power. It hides itself, and it hides other things. It moves suddenly, directly. The light side brings control. It reveals itself, and it reveals other things. It moves slowly, indirectly."

"I am continuing my apprentice's lessons in the dark side because it is easier to teach someone control than power, to intentionally reveal something than intentionally hide, to slow down than to speed up. And... She's already drawn the wrath of a powerful Sith, one skilled at mind games - she needs every tool she can to protect herself."

"For me specifically..."

"As a ghost, cohering like this is more straightforward, so long as I maintain a balance and don't go too far into rage. I turned back to the light before I died, and at first I could only occasionally appear in the dreams of one specific individual - I couldn't really even observe the world from one specific vantage, not without quickly flowing away and back into the wider Force. After that individual died... I turned back to the dark, and while my existence was no less lonely, I could at least explore and think as myself."

"In life, it was much easier to act directly, and to hide myself and my actions - shielding my mind against my Sith Master had been next to impossible as a Jedi, but I learned the skill quickly after I fell. I was better able to immediately influence the world, including by healing myself."

"After I fell from the light to the dark the first time, I couldn't use battle meditation anymore, and I stopped having visions, but... I didn't mourn the loss. I'd emerged into Knighthood directly into a war; for me, the greatest powers of the light side all meant just that."

"Why are you telling me all this?"

She is defintely not serving as a distraction.

"I enjoy teaching, for one."

"But you still haven't answered my first question." Which Elesse had almost forgotten about, with all the philosophy.

"I suppose I haven't."

"What sort of plans would need to be thwarted?"

Okay that makes twice. "If you're not going to, just say so."

"I'm not going to give you information that could seriously endanger her. But... If you were inclined to target our mutual enemies instead - the other Sith - then... Something could be negotiated."

"My goal is to prevent people getting hurt. The... other... Sith seem more likely to do that. So far."

"That's my goal as well."

"Then maybe we can work together." Or the ghost could be lying. But she doesn't feel like she's lying, and Elesse doesn't think she's just fooling herself there.

"I'd like that."

"But I need to know where your apprentice is to trust you."

A small pause, then she gives a location. "She's about to leave. If you're serious about this... I can ask her to wait." 

"I won't start a fight if she doesn't."

"I'll tell her to be polite."

"Can you say the same for your fellow Jedi, though?"

"I'll stop her, if she tries."

She nods, then: "Are you planning to tell her about this conversation?"

"Not... yet."

"Why?"

"I want to learn more first."

"Then I'll tell my apprentice not to let on that we've been talking."

"That will make it easier."

"We have a deal."

Elesse will withdraw from contact, and wait for the ghost to disappear.

She fades out. 

Elesse spends a few more moments actually meditating. It'd be a good idea to be at least a little centered before going through with this.

Then, she opens her eyes and goes to Meinwen.

Who's had some success with the surveillance footage, though less with the logs - there's no recent arrivals nor departures matching the description of their renegade darksider, but she didn't make any particular effort to hide from the cameras and Meinwen's managed to track her movements. 

"I think I have a lead."

She nods. "Best I can tell, she got on a local transport - surveillance cuts out after that, but there's a few different places she could've gone..." She'll pull up a map; one of the locations is the one Vader told Elesse about: a smaller port used for shuttles to and from the planet's moon and a handful of stations in orbit, used almost entirely by locals.

Elesse points it out. "Here."

"I think... We should approach without aggression. Diplomatically."

She gives Elesse a searching look. "Are you sure?"

She nods. "It'll go better if we do."

She nods. "Your call, then."

"Thanks."

Then, shall they go?

She'll follow Elesse.

Off to visit a darksider. Maybe in a public lounge so violence would be contraindicated anyway. They'll see when they get closer.

No such luck - the darksider is apparently waiting in her own shuttle.

So much for public transit.

"Coming in with me or watching the perimeter?" she asks Meinwen.

(They did take public transport to get to this satellite port, at least - but a private shuttle is unusual. Most of the shuttles leaving from here are moving a large number of people to and from the moon.)

"I'd rather come with you."

"Fair enough."

Elesse will knock.

The shuttle door opens, revealing a very nice interior, though it's decorated in a distinctly bland style - and their darksider isn't immediately visible, though the angle of view through the open door isn't great. 

Money but no evident taste. Well, maybe she's incognito and doesn't want to give anything away.

"Hello?"

Their darksider steps into view. "How unusually polite of you to knock."

"Unusually polite of you not to try to kill me. Favor for a favor."

"You weren't my target."

"Collateral damage isn't a usual dark side concern."

"Then you've only run into inefficient, poorly trained idiots before."

"As contrasted with your... efficient self?" Leaving open the question of training quality and intelligence. "Though this is my first time meeting a darksider, actually."

"Intelligent, efficient, and it'd be a grevious insult to my Master to claim I'm anything but well trained." She's probably teasing?

"And it's better to form your own impressions, rather than relying on the propaganda of others."

"I'd be remiss to not at least seek the opinions of the Jedi who came before me. The galaxy is too vast for a single perspective to contain its totality."

"Yet that 'wisdom' was inaccurate here."

"Only for you. Your 'target' fit the profile well."

"And he's little more than a flash in the pan."

"Tell me - in the last thousand years, have the Jedi actually defeated any true Sith, rather than mere disposable pawns, rather than members of the myriad weak darkside cults?"

"You claim to be a true Sith, then?" (Cultists and upstarts and revolutionaries use the name sometimes - but to her knowledge not as part of an enduring tradition.)

She steps back suddenly. "If you actually want to talk - come in properly."

Meinwen gives Elesse an uncertain look.

Elesse gives her a confident nod, and steps into the ship.

She follows.

The door closes behind her, and the darksider - the Sith - goes to sprawl faux-languidly on a bench.

"I am Darth Fidela," she states casually, like she's discussing the weather, "Apprentice to Darth Vader. We are the inheritors of an unbroken line of Sith, one stretching back a thousand years to Darth Bane."

"All the way back to the Ruusan Reformations, huh. Not going to claim the Sith before that?"

"There was a rather meaningful political change going on."

Hum.

"My name is Elesse Vendar, padawan of the Jedi Order. My comrade Meinwen, of the same."

"It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Not sure if I'll say the same just yet."

"But it's a possibility?"

"Depends how much slaughter, corruption, and general malfeasance you plan to get up to."

"Much less than the other Sith. I'm planning to kill them, and anyone working for them who makes nonlethal takedowns impractical. 'Corruption' and 'general malfeasance' are difficult to define clearly."

"Undue unmitigated harm to civilians, local governments, or Republic institutions. There's a six-hundred page ethics handbook I can send you if you want. But it boils down to 'ask is this something a holodrama villain would do? If yes, consider not doing that'."

"And what if the local governments and Republic institutions are already corrupt and engaging in general malfeasance?"

"Then the harm may be due, and you should try to mitigate it."

"And if I instead use it to my advantage...?"

"Then we may find ourselves opposed to you, and it will be less of a pleasure to have met you."

"We'll see how things go, then."

"Is that the sort of thing you're planning to do?"

"If it's necessary to defeat Darth Plagueis."

"This galaxy is rife with corruption - I cannot fix that by artificially limiting myself."

"You could ask for help."

"Would a Jedi help me?"

"Take over the galaxy? No. Deliver justice for the forgotten and expose a hidden evil? Yeah, maybe. We're talking, aren't we?"

She looks skeptical, opens her mouth to respond -

And Vader appears leaning against the wall near her feet. "It's a not a bad idea, apprentice," she says.

(Meinwen doesn't react, instead just staring suspiciously at Darth Fidela.)

Darth Fidela doesn't obviously react, either - certainly doesn't look at the ghost - but she does close her mouth and then sigh. "If you want to help... Fine. We can talk."

Elesse is a hair less controlled in her reaction, but she takes a seat opposite Fidela.

"You mentioned a- Darth Plagueis?"

She nods, and her extremely tight hold on her emotions in the Force slips, revealing briefly a deep well of hatred before she wrests her Force signature back under control. "He's a Sith Lord - a master of the dark side like Darth Vader, albeit weaker and less knowledgeable." Not that she's biased or anything. "He doesn't currently have an apprentice, just acolytes, associates, and useful idiots."

"One of those being the one you clashed with here?"

"An acolyte, yes - though Plagueis seems apparently told him he'd win the spot of 'apprentice' if he succeeded at killing me." She rolls her eyes.

"Callous way to do it."

"...He's a callous person. Auditions through murder is how he operates."

"I won't fault you for wanting to take him down."

"He'd kill every last Jedi, if such a thing was in his reach. He's actively trying to build up that much influence - most of the Baneite Sith have been, and he's gotten ahold of the networks and other power structures."

"Do you know his identity?"

"Prove I can trust you not to do anything stupid with it, first."

"How do you want us to do that?"

"I'll see what you do with the information you already have, how about?"

"So you'll be watching us."

"The effects of your actions, at least."

"I might be watching more directly."

Wasn't she supposed to be a secret. Talking like she's part of the conversation when Meinwen is right there makes that kind of hard, actually.

"I can give you my holofreq so you don't have to ambush me with another darksider next time."

"Where's the fun in that?"

"Some of us don't subscribe to a philosophy that makes a virtue of violence."

Overly dramatic sigh. "If you insist..."

"I am afraid that I must." So she will share her contact information.

Fidela then shares her own.

"Suppose that's it then, if you don't want to tell us anything else yet."

She shakes her head after a moment. 

"Then, for now... It was nice to meet you."

"Perhaps next time we'll meet under better circumstances."

"Force willing." She stands to take her leave.

She watches them go.

Meinwen remains tense until they're well away from the Sith, at which point - "The shatterpoint - it's tied to one around her - I've never seen a shatterpoint so massive, and there was something else I couldn't quite get, almost the shadow..."

Probably the ghost. Not that she's going to say that.

"At least we can keep tabs on it?" she offers.

Nod. "Especially since it's tied to you as well."

"Right..."

The next step is to return to the Temple, right? They need to consult with their teachers. (Though Meinwen will help resolve the murder case that originally brought Elesse here, first.)

Yeah, plan is solve the murder then leave. Maybe send a progress update in the meantime.

Do they want to be careful about what they share in the update?

Might be a good idea, even over an encrypted transmission.

Details can wait for an in person meeting - for now they can just say they found a potential lead?

That should do, yeah. Nothing that'll get the wider Temple too excited beyond what Masters Breha and Asha are bringing back.

Works. 

And then off to focus on solving the murder - fortunately, Meinwen's tendency towards visions and ability to see and track shatterpoints is actually useful here...

They can nail it down in a couple more days at most. Then before they know it, it's back to Coruscant.

She gives Master Antilles a heads up that they're coming in with a report - one that she'd prefer to give first to Masters Antilles and Breha.

Oh, this should be good.

They'll meet the padawans in the hangar, then, and hustle them straight back to Breha's suite.

Does Elesse want to start, or should Meinwen - ?

Maybe Meinwen could?

Alright. 

"We tracked the darksider to a different port, one used mostly for travel within the system. Elesse suggested approaching the darksider non-violently. The darksider had her own shuttle, so we... Pretty much just knocked. She let us in, and she was apparently willing to talk."

"That was a risk," Breha says mildly.

"I had- a strong feeling, master. Combined with her behavior during the fight, I thought it worth taking."