Filo POV:
The smooth Shoto lightsaber's hilt smacked my leathery orange palm. I fumbled to grip it, sweat-slicking my trembling hands. The short blade ignited with a stirring crackle once I found the nub of activation, nearly searing my tense face. I leapt back, waving the brilliant yellow beam unsteadily before me in a defensive motion. The Shuttle quaked with my heart as the ship seemed to almost tilt unnaturally on its head.
Cognus cackled loudly, her own curved crimson blade whirling in rehearsed figure-eight arcs, tracing my back steps. "Miserable! Is that how you hold a weapon, child?" She pressed her onslaught instantly, driving me backward before I could truly react. I parried desperately, each crushing blow jarring bones. Sparks sprayed as our blades collided first overhead then underhand. The pure exhilaration kept me from collapsing under the fear of death.
I searched for small openings, any lapse in her impeccable form, but she was unfathomable - an engine of destruction honed over decades! Frustration mounted as I strained against her relentless crimson strikes, two looping swings nearly separating me from the knee. My anger swelled within. I felt the small artifacts in the room begin to vibrate around me almost as if in reaction.
I riposted, landing a glancing blow on her allusive saber arm. Cognus snarled, large yellow eyes smoldering. She then unleashed a devastating series of aggressive poking strikes without a word, forcing me to one knee gasping as her blade skimmed off my much shorter shoto. My limbs trembled with exhaustion. It was like each clash sapped my already limited energy. How long could I hold out?
"You waste my time, boy." Cognus's voice dripped contempt for my wretched flesh. "Your dread makes you weak." My breath came in ragged as I struggled upright, she allowed me to stand fully before her again without slashing me back down. "I...am...not...afraid!" I spat the lie defiantly. Cognus's mouth twisted in a cruel smile at my insolence, striking my face with a quickly timed punch.
I swung my blade in a backswing as she ducked elusively. "Oh, but you are, young Filo. I can feel it gnawing at you." With a throaty cry, she hurled me violently across the chamber with the Force. My back blasted into the far wall before I crumpled to the floor, the corners of my antiox goggles cracked and now smeared with my blood. Juicy essence trickled from my head as I crawled onto all fours toward her.
The yellow lightsaber lay several feet away, my mind raced as the distance was too much to bear. I reached desperately for it despite the aching of my body, only to feel an invisible beskar grip encircle my throat.
Cognus hoisted me aloft several inches above the ground, squeezing slowly around my bursting neck as my toes barely scraped the floor. I clutched frantically at her intangible steel-like claws digging into my windpipe from across the shuttles crimson room.
Dark motes swam across my vision along with tiny green dots beginning to take over my sight. "Pity..." Cognus mused. "You might have made a fine Sith given time." Her words barely registered through the pounding in my skull, the collapsing of my windpipe taking over all thought. I thrashed weakly, but her hold was unbreakable.
Is this how my meaningless life would end? No! I refused to let this filthy Rancor kill me here. Summoning my last reserves of strength, I fully channeled my budding outrage, simmering despair, and riled fear...My parents being cast from our home world for my father's frailty. The years I spent getting my ribs kicked in by pirates as my mother cried watching. Every indignity my body was forced to endure scraping for life amongst the stars came rushing back to me.
The dark side answered my silent screaming call. Raw strength flooded my tired limbs, I broke Cognus's chokehold, slamming her sideways telekinetically. The energy felt euphoric in my veins--Is this FUEL what she was trying to show me? Was she truly merely trying to make me strong? I fell to my feet, the air humming back to my chest.
She stared with no response, yellow eyes unchanged as she lifted herself with a simple flick of her hand. I blitzed to my borrowed lightsaber, the slender hilt smashing my now firm yet bloody palm with authority as I slid past it. Cognus regarded me anew, a smile twisting her ancient red lips. "Yes...employ your wrath. The dark side is your ally!" The momentum carried me into a smoldering side-cast slash that dispatched a small tremor through the luxury vessel.
Our blades crashed again, hers returning to her within the flash of an eye, just to cascade into mine. Her relentless defense wore me down as she stood unmoved with little effort against my full charge. Sweat stung my open wounds as I struggled to deflect the Force-backed clash of our lightsabers. Cognus was toying with me, I realized...All my rage had made me stronger, not more adept.
She could terminate this anytime she wished--ME whenever she saw fit. With not even a spasm, she unleashed a devastating burst of lightning that set the surface of my skin alight with white-hot agony. My strength was spent—I could scarcely raise my short lightsaber to deflect the short burst. With a contemptuous flick of her own red blade, she disarmed me, my yellow shoto skittering away with a loud clang once again.
Crimson carpeted floor came crashing toward me, finally succumbing to exhaustion. Cognus loomed over my puffing form. Gloating over her easy victory. "You fought well, boy... Yet know this, rage alone cannot defeat your adversary." Her remarks soaked over me as desperation took root in my soul. I could smell my singed skin mixing with my own blood.
My fist clenched...I had failed-- She would either kill me now or twist me into a heartless monster like herself. My fate was now something more horrific than even my worst piss-stained night terror. As if reading my thoughts, Cognus chuckled before tapping her cane 3 times.
"Your hatred gives you potency—we shall whittle it into a weapon meritorious to call my successor." Her convincing voice operated its way into my young sanity, eroding its fragile defenses. What did I have left to resist for? I clutched my bleeding head, only staring at her, my breath narrowly able to remain trustworthy.
Sensing my eroding resolve, Cognus unfurled a gnarled hand sincerely. "The Jedi fear the power of the dark side. You will not--Take my hand and you will never feel alone again..." Her words sank into the pit my stomach was forming. I hesitated, wavering on the edge of what seemed a crossroads.
The lure of the power I had tasted was too tempting for me in truth but my heart held on to the last shrivels of my parents' memory. With a shuddering breath, I placed my blood-stained clawed hand in hers. Cognus's warm hand caressed mine before she continued. "I thank you, my child..."
I grimaced at the title. "You are mine now, to mold as I see fit. A true son of the Sith...I am your only lineage now!" Cognus crooned, her voice echoing from vast depths of my psyche. I adopted the tempting twilight, letting it flood the last flickerings of light within me. My heart slowed as I pressed my eyes shut behind my breathing mask.
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Filo was gone--I could never look back, if this was my life, I would fully assume it. The Jedi Order and Republic were nothing but a looming menace my entire life...Cognus had shown me much cruelty and authority in a very short time, yet I felt warmth now, unlike ever before.
"What do I do now?" I heard myself say, as though from a great distance. Cognus's terrible visage filled my black mental space as I snapped my eyes open, feeling uneasy. "It is time to test your affinity for the dark side, my apprentice."
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Cognus rasped, leading me to the ship's sparse training hall. I betrayed no reaction, trying to mirror her stoicism though I felt tired and near my limits. The meager gray room was nothing more than a few durasteele crates and charred dummies painted like Jedi Knights.
"Reach out with your emotions, sense the rushing currents of the Force." I closed my raven-colored eyes, trying my hand at extending my perceptions without any danger around. Gelatanous-like energy eddied around me, colored void by Cognus's sickly pall. I focused on the gnawing tear she created in the force.
"Lift this container using your Force alone," Cognus commanded. I focused on the large container across the chamber, marshaling my resolve deeper than at any other time. With a grunt of effort, the crate slowly rose, wobbling in the air only centimeters off the ground. I held it shakingly a moment before dropping it with a resounding crash.
"Pitiful....Again!" Cognus barked. I complied unhappily, my bones straining under the immense weight of the container. Saving my aged father and even that simple outburst earlier scarcely compared to this sustained usage of my Force ability. My mind tried to focus itself on the contents of the large metal box, flashes of torn sizzled faces screamed at me from the claustrophobic dark causing me to slam the crate away.
Cognus cackled benevolently. "Oh, you feel them now....don't you?" The voice I heard was not hers but almost like it emerged from the box itself. "Who's there?" Confusion rippled within me. I walked over to the strange container feeling for any sort of lid but only found plasma fused lining where it once was. "Are you okay?" The room seemed to shift to black as I closed my eyes, the side of my skull to the large bin.
"Please! Let me leave! I promise I won't ---" My brain rattled at the sheer volume of the now crystal-clear voice...My younger brother Ud'oo. I ripped the saber from where I felt Cognus from across the room into my outstretched palm by sheer fury alone. "But...I saw you--" His antiox vodered was still young like when we had lost him. "Saw who, dear?" Cognus laughed on in the dark.
I hadn't thought of Ud'oo for almost a decade...he was scrawny like my father, a passed congenital effect from our grandad. The explanation of why we had been cast out, to begin with, was this pox on our genetic code. For some reason, I was spared but as the only one left unmarred by familial curse, this was not enough for our proud homeworld's people.
Ud had been only 6 years old when--I heard his small child-like voice staticky and barely recognizable, "I can't breathe Filo--there's something wrong with my mask! Help me! Help--"Energy thrummed through me intoxicatingly as I dashed the hopelessness. "You are dead Ud'oo."
The small golden blade shot into the area I had felt my crying brother's waning terrified speech coming from, silence took over as my eyes flashed open with apathy. Where the Force had once felt warm and full of light, sickly veins of darkness now threaded through it, coxing my anger from my past.
I regarded the lightsaber as one might a venomous serpent. "Are you sure I am who you want?" My weakness came through in my voice but I allowed myself to be genuine to Cognus. "My visions rarely tell lies." Cognus purred, misreading my aversion. "With time, you shall grow to embrace such apparitions, even manipulating them to your own whims." I nodded silently, feigning obedience while despair threatened to swallow me whole.
Had Cognus also once been an innocent in the Force's seductive clutches? Or had she willingly sacrificed all that was good within her just to gain more power? I wanted to ask her everything now that she regarded me with the truth, my mind had almost come up with the first set of questions before she cut off my train of thought.
"We set course for Dantooine," Cognus commanded, sweeping from the training hall in a flourished pivot of her black robes. "It is time I show you the true history of the dark side's power." I followed mutely to the cockpit as she entered the coordinates with knotted clawed fingers. "The dessert world of the Hutts?" I said attempting to correct her pronunciation of the planet Tatooine.
The ship lurched into hyperspace, blurred stars streaking past. Cognus eyed me keenly. "DANTOOINE harbors a secret known only to the Sith. An ancient structure built eons past, that shall serve as your true training grounds." My throat went arid, but I kept my face an impassive black antiox mask. I do not trust her yet I found myself drawn to how easily she took hold of her own life.
What fresh nightmares awaited on this remote Outer Rim world? Escape was impossible while trapped in hyperspace. I could only steel myself for the coming trial...hopefully, it was not as taxing as fighting for my independence--well my failed attempt.
The ship shuddered as it exited blaring hyperspace. The planet Dantooine loomed ahead, seeming placid at first glance. It was a dazzling emerald color that ebbed with near-glass transparent blue oceans. "Beautiful, isn't it?" She said softly. "It's so...serene." I marveled. It was nothing like the sweeping desserts I had imagined or the angry volcanoes I had envisioned she had crawled out of to kidnap me.
We descended into the atmosphere, I glimpsed a dilapidated ruin jutting from the plains, no creature could be seen at its craggy foot. We touched down a safe distance away near a much more inviting meadow. The engines powered down with a prolonged whine as I tried to make myself large, my loss to this old woman still stinging me deeply.
Cognus rose, her dark robes flowing behind her. "Come, your true initiation awaits." I followed her down the sleek boarding ramp, the soft wind tugging at my patchy clothes under a lilac sky.
From a distance, I noticed striped long-neck creatures feeding in a large group on small Blba trees. I marked them mentally, used to only being planet-side for a hard-fought meal. The Idea of roasting one of the towering beasts over a fire caused my stomach to grumble.
As we walked, the landscape grew more foreboding near the ruins now decimating into a plateaued wasteland. The energy felt murky here, stained by millennia of dark rituals etched into the ancient stones that now lay crumbled. She hovered quickly to the top as I struggled my way over steep jagged edges.
Loose boulders threatened to fall but I carefully pulled myself through the crags. We soon stood before the towering edifice, monolithic and ominous as the view of grassy Dantooine stretched as far as the naked eye could see. I could sense the darkness pulsing within almost morphing into a bubble around this wretched forgotten place. Cognus placed a hand on a half-broken statue of a crying Twi'lek.
Quickly ghostly screams could be heard grating over the gentle wind, stone scraping stone as a small opening made itself apparent from the wall in front of us. The yawning entrance beckoned, promising harrowing revelations inside. Cognus turned to me, yellow eyes blazing.
"After you, I am not the one who needs testing." I stepped over the rocky threshold, my heart hammering. The doorway sealed loudly behind us with an echoing boom sending a slight shiver down my spine. Cognus lit a small green lamp, casting erratic shadows over the black glyphs lining the walls.
This place was ancient beyond reckoning, cold and unforgiving. We descended timeworn swirling steps into the dark abyssal depths, the walls lined with tightly packed dirt in the shape of different tortured faces. Dread clawed at me, but I betrayed no weakness, fearing her wrath more than this place.
Finally, we entered a vast void-like chamber. Scattered bones littered the room, I glared at Cognus who appeared unbothered as she crunched through a human skull. Cognus lit the room using the force to activate strange glowing sconces that pierced the room a soothing dark purple.
My cells screamed to leave but I stayed, rubbing a clawed hand over the cold surface of the walls. She turned to face me, her pale countenance carved in the gruesome purple light. "Take in the audience of your fallen peers...." Her words sent a chill through my soul, her regard flitting to the near mountain of bones splayed all around.
I steeled myself for the torment to come...I missed...I didn't even have an answer to my own stupid self-pity, this was my life and I could know nothing else. I will accept nothing less than to be the Sith lord worthy as the only person in the galaxy strong enough to be burdened with its weight.