The Knights of Ren - Star Wars Episode IX

Chapter 4 - The Caretaker

The low rumble of the engines of Supreme Leader Kylo Ren's huge command ship could be quite comforting. But to General Hux, today it was irritating. The ship was now in orbit over Lothal, the location of the latest Resistance attack.

Hux was looking over some charts on a monitor when Kylo Ren approached.

"General Hux, your lazy security once again allowed the Resistance another victory."

"Their message only broadcast for 16 seconds, hardly enough time to rally the galaxy against us, besides if it wasn't for the creatures on that plan..."

Kylo interrupted Hux, "You should have had more guards at that facility, more excuses" said Kylo Ren as he looked him in the eyes.

Hux snapped back, "If we were not spread so thin trying to conquer every planet in the galaxy, perhaps we would have more troops available!"

Kylo paused and looked at Hux in the eyes, "Do you like farming, General? This is your third failure in a month. Fix it or you will be fertilizing crops, with your corpse."

Hux gave a slight bow and slowly replied "Yes, Supreme Leader".

Kylo Ren turned to a nearby officer, "Prepare my ship!"

General Hux watched Kylo Ren carefully as he walked away.

Kylo Ren's ship entered the atmosphere of the planet Mustafar. Rumors were that his grandfather, Darth Vader, had a fortress here. The heat from the planet was heating up the instruments in Kylo's ship as it descended. The planet still contained many rivers of flowing lava. When the lava flowed into a body of water, it would produce large amounts of steam which clouded the atmosphere. However, the planet was appearing to heal, some vegetation was clearly beginning to grow across the land, but not enough to significantly change the coloring from its orange glow. There appeared to be few people left on the planet, mostly around pockets of mining, mostly non-humans who could withstand the heat.

Kylo circled the small planet, looking for locations of interest, but he especially wanted to find his grandfather's castle. He followed a large river of lava upstream until he saw a giant, tall structure, with a flow of lava pouring out of the base of it. The fortress had walls several meters thick with rock. It reached hundreds of meters high, with what looked like twin tuning forks reaching into the sky. Kylo found an open area near the fortress and landed his ship.

Kylo walked around the fortress until he found an opening apparently blasted open by some explosion of the past. The castle was almost completely dark, the sun above provided a little light through its thick atmosphere, and the lava below illuminated somewhat, but not enough to penetrate the castle walls significantly. Kylo found his way to what appeared to be the center of the fortress, where the twin towers found its base. There was a seam of lava encircling the base of the towers and an altar made of rock.

Kylo looked up and around, the air was still. He knelt down on the altar, and began to meditate. The dark side was strong here, it penetrated his very soul and he could feel his sensitivity to the Force heighten. His mood darkened and felt himself become more angry, more fearful, more hungry, more powerful.

As he mediated, he felt the presence of someone else nearby. His eyes cracked open and looked to his left. A tall, thin hooded creature was watching him from the corner of the room, illuminated by the seams of lava in the room. Kylo arose from kneeling and put his hand on his saber. The creature slowly approached.

The creature spoke, "I know you, I foresaw your arrival." The creature was native to this planet, a Mustafarian. It was a tall, bony and thin insectoid creature with two arms and two legs about the same length. It had a bald head and a hunched back, and two large bug-like eyes. It was hooded and carrying a staff. The staff had an oval object on the bottom and a blade on the top.

"You are of the loins of Darth Vader, the creator of this fortress."

"Who are you! How do you know who I am?" Kylo looked at the creature, dumbfounded and cautious.

"Do not worry, I am no Sith Lord looking for an apprentice, I am the Karr Corvax, caretaker of this castle. I am neither good nor evil, Jedi or Sith, and intend you no harm."

Kylo Ren took his hand off of his saber. "Keep your distance, creature. What is this place? What is it used for?"

"This was an ancient Sith temple, you can probably feel the dark side here. Darth Vader built this to become closer to dark side, and to be able to contact his love."

Kylo paused and stepped closer to Karr Corvax. "I am his grandchild. Did he succeed?"

Karr replied, "Vader connected to the dark side, and saw many things, but failed to communicate with your grandmother."

"How did this altar work? Is it powered? What does it do?"

"This castle has not been used to channel the Force for many years, it is now just an empty building. Sometimes it has visitors such as yourself, curious visitors, Sith, Inquisitors, simple adventurers, even Jedi. But the building itself does nothing now."

Kylo paused to look around. "How then did you know I was coming? I think you are lying, there is more to this place."

"I assure you the building does nothing. I have traces of Sith heritage in my blood, I feel the Force and can sometimes see into the future. I saw your coming arrival years ago."

Kylo reached for his lightsaber, ignited it and threw it at Karr. It flipped through the air and barely missed his head and lodged itself into the wall behind him. He then used the Force to pull it back to his hand.

"I see...if you were a Sith you would have blocked my throw. Then is your power really in your blood, or something else?" Kylo raised his hand to the caretaker and held him in place as he walked towards him. When Kylo came within a few meters of the creature, he started peering into his mind with the Force.

"What is in your mind...caretaker?"

The caretaker turned his staff to face Kylo, but not the end with the blade, but the bottom end with the oval object. Kylo recoiled back several feet, he was certain it was a Force push centered square in his chest. The insectoid put the staff on his back, fell forward to have all four appendages on the ground, and started scuttling out of the room towards an opening in the floor next to the far wall. Kylo recovered to see Karr Corvax escaping, moving faster than a human can run. He reached out with the Force to hold him in place right before he reached the opening. Kylo walked up to the creature and swiftly cut his staff in half with his saber. He picked up the oval shaped rock on the end and pulled it out of the staff. Karr Corvax's eyes widened.

"This must be it, this is where your power comes from", said Kylo Ren.

"You do not know what you hold. Th..That is no Sith artifact, it is a Force holocron, it is neither good nor evil. It will do you no good in channeling the dark side. For you, I expect it will only bring you pain."

Kylo held the oval rock with his gloved hand. "We shall see what power this has", and he put it into his pocket. "Now as for you..."

The Mustafarian kicked away from Kylo's stomach and dove into the opening. The sound of the creature sliding down into the darkness could be heard. Kylo could not see where the narrow tunnel led to.

Kylo Ren backed away from the opening and pulled out the rock. It was oval shaped and smooth. Its coloring was half light gray and half dark gray, split right down the middle across the short side of its oval shape, with some imperfections. He took off his glove to hold it with his bare hand.

Suddenly Kylo Ren had a vision, scattered images, a fight with his father, great physical pain, a trooper firing at him, someone he cared about was injured, Luke training him, an AT-ST shooting at some rebels. Every image blended together and overwhelmed him. None of it was pleasant. He dropped the holocron and the visions stopped. Kylo was amazed and confused, but thought twice about touching it again, for now. After a moment to recover, he put his glove back on and returned the holocron to his pocket.