Cal stumbled as he recovered from being shoved into the dojo. Predictably, Trilla took her place on the observation platform.
Just as Cal righted himself, the doors slammed shut. A second later, the other inquisitor lazily strode past him.
The inquisitors said nothing, instead opting to give a disdainful huff as he passed.
I get it, Cal sourly thought at the gesture, you're the big bad tough-guy, and you don't like me.
Trilla didn't pay the posturing inquisitor on the floor and mind as she unclipped Cal's lightsaber from her belt. With a bored nonchalance that hid her impatience just as might as her flat mask did, she tossed the piecemeal saber into the arena below.
"Don't hesitate this time," she shouted down a second before the saber hit the floor with a thud.
As if she were speaking to him, the Fifth Brother charged forward, hissing red saber flashing to life.
Barely able to stand, Cal had no time to make a snarky comment or entertain a weary thought before the inquisitor was upon him.
Cal's usual routine of dodges and sidesteps had helped against the purge troopers. But he'd been in slightly better shape during that fight, and the purge troopers couldn't draw on the Force to guide them through battle.
The Fifth Brother made a heavy swing down with his blade.
Evading it by mere inches, Cal had no time to recover before the inquisitor simply swung out with his free hand.
Taking a heavy blow to his chest, Cal went sprawling backward across the floor. Coming to a harsh stop when the floor turned from smooth duracrete to uneven metal grates over the thermal vents below, Cal was only distantly aware that his head hit something small but dense.
Huffing and coughing for breath, Cal rolled to the side. On hands and knees, he found that the small obstacle had been his lightsaber.
Hand grasped around the weapon, Cal teetered to his feet.
The Fifth Brother had simply waited and watched the display. His assignment wasn't to kill the would-be Jedi, not outright at least.
Seeing his opponent as recovered as he could be, the Fifth Brother strode forward.
"Fight me!" the inquisitor barked as he approached.
Chest aching and already tasting blood, Cal didn't plan on doing as the inquisitor asked. But he didn't see anyway out of the dojo either.
I don't want to die... was the only thought crawling through Cal's head as he ignited his own lightsaber.
The first blade hissed to life, shortly followed by the second. Cal wasn't sure if he were imagining it, or if the dread in the Fortress were draining the life out of the kyber crystals in the blade just as it was doing to him, but the already pale blue of the blade seemed more faded than the last time he'd seen it.
Legs protesting and shoulders grinding in pain at the smallest of movements, Cal settled into a familiar defensive stance.
Seeing it as an invitation, the Fifth Brother came barreling forward once again.
"Your find is weak, Second Sister!" The inquisitor snarled to their observer mid-strike.
Not listening for Trilla's reply, Cal twisted and detached his sabers, bringing them into a defensive X in the nick of time.
The inquisitor's red blade hissed and popped against Cal's pale blue. Wounded and ground down by weeks of torture, Cal pushed back as hard as he could. But his opponent was in his fighting prime, fresh off of some nefarious mission, and driven by dark forces.
Cal knew exactly what this fight was meant to be. A trap, a way to make his pull on the Dark Side. A place where he had a choice that wasn't really a choice at all.
"So long as you pick the answer that the empire wants you to make, you'll be rewarded."
Grunting at the memory of Trilla's poignant comment, and at the strain of holding back his enemy, Cal pushed forward.
The red blade drifted back. Cal pushed on, looking for a way to throw his opponent without calling on the Force.
In a flash, the inquisitor rocked his blade to the side, breaking the stalemate and dashing Cal's of hope that he might have a chance. Free of the blade lock, the enemy swung back around for another crushing blow.
Fatigue quickly settling in, Cal could do nothing more than leap to the side.
Just recovering from one dodge, Cal barely had time to slide into another as the Inquisitor pushed forward.
Cal could call on the Force. He could regain his strength, move like a blur, and build his stamina with a simple dip into the Force. But he couldn't trust himself not to call on the Dark Side to do it.
The Inquisitor swung once more, his blade landing a glancing blow along Cal's arm.
"Garhg!" Cal bit down a shout as he brought his own lightsabers up just in time to deflect another swing.
"Pathetic!" The inquisitor growled as he sung down again.
Bearing the brunt of one blow after another, Cal slowly began to buckle under the onslaught.
"Your defenses are weak!" The inquisitor bellowed as he swung, "Your form, sloppy! Disgraceful!"
Dropping to a knee under the attack, Cal struggled to keep a hold on his blades with each fearsome blow.
"Pathetic! What fool thought that you were a Jedi?"
The Inquisitors words bit at Cal in time with the blows.
"Sniveling child! Fight back! Or are you a coward!?"
Another heavy blow. Cal dropped one of his sabers.
"Of course, you are! Truly a Jedi. A weakling, trained by weaklings!"
Putting both hands on the long hilt that remained, Cal ground his teeth.
"Your display is insulting, even to the Jedi!"
More deadly strikes. Each one and each word driving Cal a little closer to snapping.
"Die then! Like your masters before you!"
"Stop!" A wild wave of power tore itself from Cal and crashed through the Force, staggering the inquisitor.
The inquisitor regained his footing, looking up just in time to see a seething opponent.
"Don't say another word about them," Cal all but growled out.
"Loyalty to those who abandoned you?" The inquisitor called out, "You're a fool as well."
Cal adjusted his grip in the remaining sabre, "They didn't abandon me."
"Then where are they?"
The inquisitor's words cut deep. And they filled Cal with an unmistakable rage.
"Where are they?"
"Stop it." Cal almost muttered
"Where are they?"
"Stop asking that!"
"Answer me then! Where have your so-called friends gone? Your precious Jedi Order?
Cal answered with silence.
Seeing her chance, Trilla dropped down from her observation perch.
Taking Cal's silence as an admission, she cooed, "That's right, they've gone into hiding, and you were not worth bringing along."
All but forgetting the other inquisitor and blade he had dropped, Cal rushed forward, single saber ready to strike.
Trilla deftly stepped to the side, Cal's movement made perfectly predictable by the twisting currents of the Force.
"Admit it," Trilla chided, "They left you. Everyone did, except for the Empire."
Cal took such offence to what Trilla said that he didn't even know where to begin.
"The Empire tortured me," so he began with the most recent crime.
Trilla held onto her cool tone, but she kept her saber at the ready, "Only because you've been defiant. You could make this stop any time you want."
"By joining the Inquisition?" Cal spoke with obvious bile, "No thanks."
With that Trilla saw an opening, "But you already have, Cal. This is your training."
Not leaving Cal the chance to reply, Trilla charged forward. Even with senses sharpened though the Dark Side of the Force, Cal barely reacted in time. The blades clashed, casting harsh shadows against Trilla's already harsh mask.
"Push back!" the Second Sister commanded her student.
Cal was left with a choice.
He could give in completely. He could stop fighting two enemies at once and let the Dark Side wash over him. He'd tried using it in small bursts, just enough to stay alive in this fight, but he was tired, and the Dark Side had no such limits. Cal tried keeping calm and clinging to the Light Side of the Force, but it wouldn't come to him. Not after he'd been trapped in this place for so long. Not after he'd used the Dark Side last time.
He could fight back.
Or he could die at the end of the Second Sister's lightsaber.
It was a choice that wasn't a choice at all, and it filled Cal with an undeniable rage. Pushing back with a fury that was his own Cal let out a wild shout.
Trilla felt the power behind Cal's renewed defense. In a real fight it wouldn't have driven her away, but she knew to reward the behavior she wanted to see.
Breaking the blade lock, Trilla leapt backward, "The torture was only a tool. A means to an end."
Skin crawling with disgust for what Trilla had to say, Cal called to the drooped half of his weapon through the Force. The short hilt zipped through the air and into Cal's waiting hand.
Refusing to acknowledge that the weeks of agony might have accomplished their goal, Cal went on, "Cere didn't leave me. Neither did Master Topal. They died for me."
"But did they really? Cere was trying to kill me. Jaro Topal died under Order 66. Are you sure he was trying to save you? Or was he trying to save himself?"
Cal had made peace with the death of his master. Or, he thought he had. Cal blamed himself for so long, been so bogged down by guilt and regret, that he never considered what final thoughts had run through Master Topal's mind. The Jedi knight had died in Cal's defense, but it was also during his own escape.
"Trust only in the Force," Master Topal's last words rang in Cal's ears.
And here I am, trying to ignore it. Cal adjusted his grip on the lightsabers in his hands, the temptations of the Dark Side telling him to strike out against Trilla. Wait, no. This isn't what he meant.
"No answer?" the Second Sister interrupted Cal's thoughts, "Your silence is telling."
Before her final word was done, the Second Sister lunged again.
Pulling on the Dark Side of the Force a little more with each flurry of blows, Cal managed to repel the attack.
"Good," Trilla called as she fell back once more, "Now you're beginning to get it. Think back to the Jedi Order. It wasn't just you who was abandoned, the Jedi Council betrayed all of the Galaxy. They were cowards, scoundrels, traitors."
Trying and failing not to think back to that day, Cal was quite as he spoke, "The clones attacked us first."
"So naïve, Cal Kestis." The Second Sister spoke with a grin, "The Jedi Council stormed the senate building. Only for their attempted insurrection to be thwarted at the last moment. What was the Republic to do? After their most elite guard turned against them? Were they to sit back and wait for the rest of the Jedi legions to attack? Were they to wait around for their death?"
That accusation against the Jedi Order hit Cal just as hard as Trilla's attacks. He'd known the Order to be peacekeepers. Protectors of all that was good.
"If the Jedi Council lead an attack on the Senate," Cal tried to rationalize, "than it must have been for the greater good. They must have had a reason."
Trilla barked out a cold and humorless laugh, "Listen to yourself! You look at the Empire as a legion of faceless attackers, yet you defend the indefensible when the Jedi do it. You're a hypocrite Cal. The Jedi Order was nothing but a cadre of liars blinded by their own deceit, and you believed them."
"No. The Council spoke the truth!"
"The Council thought it wise to send untrained children into battle."
"The clones attacked Master Topal and me with no warning!" A fresh wrath twisted at Cal.
"Yes they did." Tilla admitted, "And Topal cut through them as if they were nothing. Years of friendship and loyalty gone in a blink. I bet Topal didn't hesitate in cutting down legions of good soldiers. Force users are powerful beings. You and I aren't limited the way the rest of the Galaxy is, and that makes us very dangerous."
Once more the Second Sister lunged at her last word. Anticipating the move, Cal braced himself. Catching the blow, Cal swung wide with his second blade. Trilla reacted in time to the unprecedented attack, catching it with the far end of her dual blade.
Before Cal had the time to press forward, Trilla moved back once again.
"Yes. Let the anger be a tool. Attack me! Show me how dangerous you can really be!"
Not thinking of what he was doing, Cal rushed forward. Pain and injuries made distant memories by the Dark Side of the Force, he crossed the room in the blink of an eye.
Like so many fights before, Trilla brought her dual sided blade up to shield herself. Unlike before, Cal's blows were so fierce that she nearly buckled beneath them. Pushed to the defensive, the Second Sister struggled to keep up against her enraged opponent.
Moving with long-practiced strikes, through patterns of blows and feints that were second nature, Cal lost himself to the Dark Side. Sinister whisperings in the Force guided his strikes and drove him beyond his limits.
Striking in a blur and using the Force to slow the Second Sister's movements, Cal swung a killing blow.
Only to be stopped.
The other inquisitor had been watching, and now his blade was the only thing stopping Cal from cleaving the Second Sister in two.
Outnumbered, Cal fell back. The Fifth Brother let his opponent drift away.
Skidding to a stop, Cal came to a terrible realization: The Dark Side flowed through him.
And he was fine with it.
Cal looked up at his two opponents.
And they saw gold tinted eyes looking back at them.