Session 25: The Infinity Path, Part III

General Summary

Day 10, Afternoon After discussing the situation with Rosk 5 with Kyp, Dorsk 82, and Dal, Rin agrees with his old Jedi Master that he needs to confront Rosk 5 and end their conflict in order for him to move forward in his life. Lem agrees to join him, but first they head back to The Mynock's Wing to discuss it with Tomla. Tomla is not convinced that it is the right path, especially with Lyshea still unconscious. After meditating on it together, they agree that Tomla will remain on the ship while Rin and Lem go after Rosk 5. Lem and Rin meet Kyp, Dorsk 82, and Dal at the Star Temple. As Rin focuses on finding Rosk 5 in the Force, they all see a vision of the Khommite in a luxurious apartment on Khomm and the Infinity Gate opens in front of them. Rin and Lem enter the portal and find themselves in the residence of Sestra 638 who is meeting with Rosk 5. Behind them are the two assassin droids that they saw the last time they were here. Without hesitation, Rin immediately rushes forward and attacks the assassin droids. As Lem prepares for battle, he is suddenly lifted into the air and rendered completely immobile by a containment field activated by Sestra 638. With Lem out of the fray, the odds are stacked heavily against Rin. He fights valiently with his lightsaber, and as he is about to take out one of the droids, Rosk 5 calls out to him and says that he should step into the containment field before he gives in to his desire to blast him into a million pieces. Rin reluctantly retreats into the field and is likewise incapacitated. Now captives of the two Khommite conspirators, Sestra 638 demands to know how they are able to appear like they have here. If they don't tell her, then she will be more than happy to turn them over to Rosk 5 so that he can torture the information out of them. Rosk 5 slowly tell Rin that he has taken everything from him and that he blames the Duro for Ro Mibb's death at the factory earlier that day. Rin has a sudden realization and blurts out, "star gate". Sestra 638 looks at him and demands that he explain what that is. Smiling, Rin turns to a shocked Lem and says, "Do you trust me?" When Lem nods, he tells his friend to say nothing. Frustrated, Sestra 638 says that she has no choice but to turn them over to Rosk 5, who is looking positvely giddy with excitement. Rin simply remains silent, with a knowing smile. Suddenly, Dal Konur appears in the doorway to the room, rolling past the assassin droids, finishing off the damaged one as he does and then cutting the second in half as he kips up. He then picks up Sestra 638 and tosses her across the room into her desk and deactivates the containment field. Rin smiles at Lem and Lem realizes that Rin knew that Kyp, Dorsk 82, and Dal would do whatever was necessary to prevent the secret of the Star Temple from being revealed, so they were never in any real danger. Rosk 5, seeing that Rin is once again about to slip away from his grasp, loses the little sanity that he has held onto and rushes at his nemesis screaming. He plows into him in a bantha rush, knocking him back. Rin tries to defend himself but Rosk 5 is relentless, running at him again and knocking him back against a wall. Lem rushes in to save Lem and slices Rosk 5 clean through his armor and opening a giant cauterized wound in the incensed clone's back. As he does, Rosk 5's armor falls away, revealing numerous explosive charges strapped to his chest. With an insane grin, Rosk 5 presses a button on his belt (which Rin recognizes as some kind of communication device) and runs toward Rin as he depresses a hidden detonator, vaporizing himself in an attempt to take Rin with him. When the dust settles, Rin is lying unconscious on the floor, both of his hands reduced to nubs. A portal opens and Dal picks up the maimed padawan and carries him through with Lem alongside. As soon as they appear back in the Star Temple, Dal demands that Kyp and Dorsk 82 open a portal to the infirmary in New Bendu, which they do without hesitation, despite the shocked and concerned looks on their faces. Lem, furious at what has just occured, follows to make sure Rin gets the care he needs. As they arrive, the medical droid begins to assess the damage. Dal tells Lem to meditate with him and the two humans touch Rin's burned body. Dal focuses intently and transfers so much of his own life essence into his former padawan's body that he collapses. Rin gasps and sits up with the sudden surge of life force and screams in pain, but the medical droid quickly sedates him so that he can work on healing him. Meanwhile, back on the ship, Tomla has been meditating. She first focuses her entire being at trying to push through the barrier that is preventing her from finding Master Skywalker in the Force as she had done the day before. After some time, she is still unable to break through but she does sense that it is a person on Selvaris that is blocking her. With this information, she next turns her energy toward Lyshea and trying to help her to come out of her coma. Whether due to her aid through the Force or her own natural recovery, Lyshea does wake up. Tomla fills her in on most of what has been happening while still being careful not to overwhelm her with too many of the more upsetting pieces of the puzzle. Lyshea is disturbed by what she hears, but is glad that Rosk 1 is ok. As they talk, Salty rolls in, excited to see his friend Lyshea awake. The two of them start chatting as Tomla hears Squeegy greet someone he knows out in the hallway. With Rin out of critical condition, Lem sprints from the settlement back toward the cave just as Kyp and Dorsk 82 are coming out. Enraged, Lem shoves Kyp and asks him if this is what he wanted, to use two padawans as experimental womp rats. Kyp calmly, but sympathetically replies that they didn't want this to happen, but that unfortunately these things do happen, whether in service to the Jedi Order or to their new cause. They tries to pull them out when they were in danger but the containment field prevented it, so Dal came to rescue them. As Lem continues berating the Jedi Master, Tomla comms Lem to let him know that someone is on the ship. Lem rushes back to the ship. After she comms Lem, Tomla sees a thermal detonator roll into the ship's infirmary. She reacts immediately, using her ability in the Force to attempt to throw it back out of the room before it detonates, killing them all. Whether because of she was exhausted due to her previous meditation or some other cause, the Ithorian fails to move the explosive. Shocked at her inability to do something she can normally do without thinking, she doesn't notice that Salty rolls toward the deadly sphere. The droid picks up the thermal detonator into his chassis and rolls into the hallway faster than Tomla had ever seen him move before. A moment later, a massive explosion rocks the ship and sets it on fire. Lem sees the explosion as he is running toward the ship and races on board as Tomla steps into the hallway to see what happened. Vass Manduc is lying on the ground, badly burned but still conscious. Pieces of Salty are spread around the ship, but many of his core components have been vaporized. The ship's engine is damaged and burning. Lem runs toward Vass to make sure he is no longer a threat as Tomla runs to the cockpit to engage the fire suppressors. As Lem reaches Vass and plants a foot on his chest, Vass reveals a hidden vibrodagger in his wrist and slashes at Lem, cutting his leg badly before passing out. As Tomla puts out the fire, Lyshea huddles in a corner and the two padawans can do nothing but look at each other and wonder when things turned so bad for them.