Whassup! Tomorrow Terraria Journey's end is officially a thing! So fucking hyped... But lemme read these reviews.

The Force is indeed a powerful ally. Yeah, loyalty to the Republic! It's going to be fun when we get out of Mandalore... The 501st is really unique, though it would be a good idea to make 'em do those silly things. His dreams are just in the early stages, the bad stuff will come in time. Ha! There's the chapter, but the author is a fucking moron who lies to everyone! Not at all, considering what I'm plotting for the future chapters.

Good to know! It is really hard to learn a whole new language, but I'm managing somehow. Ahsoka's paper is small for now, but when she comes to Mandalore, things will be back on track.

Humhumhum, weaken your mind through words, you show. Barely sustain yourself, I sense. Easy, victory will be, humhumhum.

Have a fine read!

– Shaak Ti –

The hyperspace ring had exploded, the Starfighter Eta-2 Actis Interceptor trembling and barely being consumed in flames and blazes, some metal parts hitting the ship's reflector shield. With cracked teeth, the Jedi master activated the ship's stabilizers, the Damage Panel pointing out that there were no high damage levels... But there was still no security to be celebrated. Following violently behind her, another Starfighter made himself, the pilot's signature bathed in the dark side of the Force. A drop of sweat descended on the back of her head, her bluish eyes turning to Mandalore's atmosphere surrounding the barren planet.

Just as she came out of her hiding place in Nar Shaddaa as she felt the powerful wave of Skywalker's Force, the Sith has been tracking her. He was furiously following her, the dark side in him making it a gale of hate behind her... But she couldn't let herself perish. The Light was washed away to anarchy when Order 66 began and weakened, bleeding with all the deaths that crossed through space... Any Jedi could feel it; there was no more hope, the betrayal of the clones led them to collapse.

But then, like a beacon, Skywalker sent a message across the galaxy; 'there's hope'. She could not ignore it, and above all, she could not die. The future of the Force lay in those who still stood.

Accelerating and performing evasive maneuvers, Shaak Ti deflected and fled the red bolts, guided by the Sith. The Force worked alongside the two, showing her how to deflect and him how to shoot... It was a stalemate. However, it didn't last long. Soon one of the missiles hit the left-wing of the Starfighter, the cockpit shaking and the woman almost smacking her head on the safety glass. Black smoke and flaming sparks were emerging from the destroyed engine on the left-wing, the stabilizer useless with such destruction. The landing would not be pleasant at all. Swallowing dry and resuming controls to at least dodge more reddish bolts, the ship soon entered the atmosphere, the gravity of the planet pulling her and increasing the speed of fall.

Relying on the Force, the Jedi master let the energy guide her hands through the steering wheel and controls, the rear parachute opening when the cloud layer was left behind, the Sith coming right behind with blood dripping on the Force.

In a horrible fashion, the ship scraped on the stones and sand of Mandalore, the ground being torn away and the woman's body hitting the walls, the Force preventing her from hurting herself ferociously, but not at all. A pained scream tore her throat, the hyperspace lever, broken during the quaking, was buried in her flesh and made her bloodstain the plasteel. In a mess of smoke, the smell of burning metal and plasticized parts clinging to the air and the tremendous heat caused by the flames around her, the Jedi master, with weak legs, came out of the ship, panting and falling to her knees, the hands hitting the ground... Her right side was bleeding and certainly, some ripped by the lever, still deep down in the leg. In a stressed mindset, she firmly grabbed the lever... And pulled it with fierce.

A yell came from her insides, the veins being pressured and tears in the edges of her eyes... With her hand and the Force applying pressure to the bloody bruise, her light brown tunic dyed red, the master watched as the other Starfighter landed a few meters from her destroyed ship... The Dark Side was powerful on anyone inside it. Very strong... Pulling the dry air into her lungs and biting her lower lip, the togruta used her right hand to pull the saber hilt out of her waist, her breathing compassing itself as she emerged full body in the secrets of the Force.

Jumping out of the cockpit, black robes swung in the air, two sabers hanging from the waistline of the Sith... He seemed to stare for a moment and suddenly let a sigh of... irritation? While, with his hands wrapped in black gloves, the man pulled the hood out of his head, revealing a reddish skin, yellowish horns, and eyes of the same tone, black markings all over his face.

"You're not Tano... What a waste." The Sith shook his head and the Jedi master clenched her eyes. Tano... Ahsoka Tano, Skywalker's padawan? "Still, one less Jedi in the galaxy means less trouble." With that end of the phrase, Maul brought one of the sabers from the waist, the color red sparkling in the morning sun of Mandalore.

Shaak Ti's own blue blade came to life next.

– Obi-wan –

The morning started packed, very packed. As soon as he woke up and had just under 60 minutes to sanitize himself and eat his rations, Obi-wan was already on the move. Anakin was resting, the duel against the Sith last day having taken much of him away; the children, on the other hand, were not so tired... Indeed, they have a lot of energy to waste. The fear against the clones still existed, so they preferred to play with Luke and Leia in the tent next to Anakin and Padmé's. It was a big problem, however, when someone sneezed in Luke's face and he started crying. Obi-wan was dragged from his conversation with the clones for three really, really stressed kids to Anakin's tent.

Now, with his hand on his face and tired features, Obi-wan watched the girl crying in front of him, her arms hugging him tightly, the very hand of the Jedi master trailing in the girl's back. sitting on a chair beside where Anakin was laying, Padmé, so tired and practically asleep, held a Luke who cried incessantly.

"It was by accident, I swear I didn't mean to do it!" the girl tried to speak, her own tears clanking the words. Obi-wan kept passing his hand on the girl's back, trying to make her cry stop.

"We know, no need to apologize..." Padmé tried to say in a low pitch, stretched out in tiredness, but nothing changed. The girl sobbed, but Luke's intensified cry and flounce just made her shed even more tears. At the door of Padmé's tent—it is important to mention that Anakin was clearly very angry whilst holding a pillow against his face—the other children were watching, the curiosity and pity embedded in their eyes.

"I harmed him, I'm sorry! I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" she screamed again, squeezing the Jedi master a little harder. Closing her eyes and rubbing her hand on her face, waving Luke up and down, Padmé almost fell to the ground so tired that she was. She had to take it so hard... And the moment she could get a rest, something like this happens. Leia, curious and still very angry looking, was lying on her father's abdomen, her little hands punching him to see what might happen.

"You didn't hurt him, honey... Luke's just a little stre—" but all that wavering resulted, out of nowhere, Luke threw upon his mother's back. Squeezing her eyes and legs shaking, Padmé momentarily stopped her son's swing... So that was it... The vomit dripped down her back and trashed her only clothe and Luke's crying ceased quickly over the moments, his head resting at her shoulder. With his hand running to his beard and hiding his mouth, Obi-wan turned his eyes to the wall, not only his sympathy for Padmé but also his criminal laughter, hidden. The girl, frozen where she was, watched that scene and the gleam in her tearful eyes vanished... And Anakin, with the silence, finally went back to sleep, ignoring Leia's little and mindless punches.

"He's sick... because of me!" Her screams started again, her face sinking into Kenobi's chest as the yells reached a pitch even more annoying. Anakin gnashed his teeth, Padmé wanted to cry and Kenobi, for very little, did not laugh.

"I'll... I'll clean myself up. And Luke...I'll be right back..." without another word and a voice tone that edged her rupture point, Padmé went trembling into the tent bathroom. Kenobi's laughter died in the air and, sighing, he separated the girl from his chest, staring at her with a calm look. Her guilty murmurs broke his heart, which only softened the face full of a sickening color of the Jedi master.

"Is Padmé mad at me?" she asked, sniffing in desperation.

"No, she knows It wasn't your fault, young one. That's a normal thing to happen-babies sometimes need help getting things out of their stomachs, didn't you know?

"No..." she denied it with her head.

"Now you know. Luke will be fine, so no more worries... Now, why don't you go outside with the other kids and meditate a little and try to calm down? Anakin and I need to talk." Anakin's grunt was heard very loud, but the master promptly ignored him. With her forearm, the girl tried to wipe her tears, a positive nod with her head. Looking at the floor, she followed to the other children, not mention even a look at them. At the same time that running water sounds begun the back of the tent, the children left the door.

Anakin moaned once again, Leia punching him a lil' harder than the other times. The period of time she is alive is so feeble and yet she was already learning how to hit... Lovely. Removing his pillow from his face and exposing to the world his sleepless red eyes, gargantuan dark circles, and tousled hair, Anakin yawned, Leia unbalancing loose in his belly and falling to her back, lying then on his thigh. Catching her carefully before she rolled out, Anakin brought her up, the girl's head resting on his shoulder while, with some care, he got up from the bed. Obi-wan noticed when he took the shirt on the side of the bed with the Force and put it on his shoulder, under where Leia was.

"You know what? There's a charm to a Jedi being a father, that I must agree." Obi-wan joked, Anakin smiling at the former master's comment.

"I imagine so; that's what Padmé would say, after all."

"Interesting, but there's something important we need to talk about, Anakin... many things, actually." he brought the spotlight, getting up from his chair, only now noticing how wet his clothes really were. "I'd love to let you rest a little longer, but there's no such privilege, not for now."

"It's war, after all." Taking a serious face, Anakin swung the baby up and down, little Leia hypnotized with something in the tent fabric. "Shall we discuss this with Rex?' a quick nod from Obi-wan was all he needed "Padmé, I'll be back in no time!"

"... Okay!" and with her yell from the bathroom, Anakin walked to the exit of the tent, confused when he didn't see Obi-wan coming too. Raising his eyebrow, Anakin stared at the master... He looked a little shy, his hand scratching the back of his head and his gaze not going straight to the young Jedi. "What happened, master?..." he asked, his face hard and serious, the note of curiosity there. The face of a warrior who faced a lot... waving a little baby up and down with few strands of hair on her head, a cloth under her to prevent the unholy vomit to mess his back. A father figure with his kid... Kenobi was truly disturbed with the vision,

"Uh... Nothing. It's nothing... Come on, we have no time to lose." Sighing deep, Obi-wan passed ahead of Anakin.

As soon as they left, Leia seemed fascinated by the things around her. With the little brown baby eyes, she followed the clones from there to here, their faces all the same. Some smiled at her, others looked confused and gazed at each other, and in fact, a good amount laughed at her, and she seemed even more irritated than before.

"In fact, Anakin, I'm afraid there's not a spare hand for you here." Obi-wan quoted, noticing the lack of a hand from his ex-apprentice. "Nor a lightsaber." Now the disappointment was more apparent and with a naughty smile, Anakin sighed in a comic intonation.

"I think it's genetic for me to lose the lightsaber."

"I don't remember irresponsibility being hereditary... If it is, I fear for Luke and Leia." As Obi-wan laughed, Anakin snorted with the little comment. "At least Padmé is the other side of the coin..."

"If any of them took the sweet spot of her for politics... I pray to the Force that they don't."

"I think it's a great outcome. Once Palpatine is overthrown, future strong leaders would be more than necessary, don't you think?" He asked, but the apprentice's lack of reaction made him curious for a moment. A slight hint of uncertainty poked the master in the Force, an internal concern rising up... It didn't seem like a desire for power, but... some kind of denial. Anakin saw that the master was looking at him with greater intensity and, hiding that uncertain face, he decided to change the subject.

"That can be discussed once we're out of Mandalore" he pointed to the front, the tent where the plans were being architected in front.

"Yes... And we will."

"For now..." Anakin stopped, a grunt of pain escaping his lips. "Guess you like daddy's hair..." Obi-wan, curious, looked at Leia, the golden threads of the father of hers between her tiny fingers, pulling them.

- Ahsoka Tano -

15 hours ago, Anakin got into a horribly, frantic, and bloodthirsty fight. Ahsoka felt everything and her body quivered... The hatred that spread like a snake through Anakin's Light was overwhelming, making a constant menace of trying to devour it; but her former master was fighting the Darkness with everything he had, his Light shining through their bond like a powerful sun... However, it wasn't exactly his Light, she observed. It was not homogeneous, but either his signature was quite heterogeneous... As if he was leaning on something else to keep the Light shining so strong. At the end of the electrifying duel, Ahsoka could feel her master's fatigue on her own skin, so communication was impossible for now.

That did not stop her from seeking other things. Probing their bond, she sought answers to the duality of the Force that permeated her master. It was a long, slow, and stressful process because, as she said before... It was too brilliant. Brilliant enough to make her body pressures against her own mind.

However, she had finally found the antenna that interfered with Anakin's Light. The Force was cloudy, it said nothing, so Ahsoka had no advice as to what to do next... Going with her instincts, she dug and dug, two lights appearing in her thoughts. Lights so similar to Anakin's that they almost blended, but they were still so young and undeveloped as if they had only seen a little in all the time they lived. If she hasn't the Master-Apprentice bond, surely she would never felt the difference in the Force.

With her eyebrows furrowed, Ahsoka couldn't go any deeper when she once got out of the meditation... She was really far from these two entities and, along with the lack of a bond with them, there wasn't much she could do. Opening her eyes and panting slightly, she faced the control panel of her ship, a fury emerging momentarily...

Still far away; only 14 more hours.

Enough time for her to think what the kriff those two Force signatures are...

– Shaak Ti –

The lightsabers beat and turned, the aggressiveness of the dark side dripping from Maul coming at full power at the tip of the red lightsaber. The Jedi master showed a worrying degree of difficulty in moving the lightsaber, the blood that escaped from the side of her leg painting the floor of Mandalore; because of that, she had to accelerate and win before she could lose much blood and the movements began to falter, sealing a certain death. With the Force flowing through her veins, the master raised the position of Ataru, a new ferocity emerging from her insides.

The sith responded with violence and domination itself, a willingness to tame her in combat alongside a satisfaction by every drop of blood and pain that erupted in the Force arising from master Ti.

"The Tano girl fought much better than you, what a joke!" Maul spoke, his lightsaber knocking the master's away and, in an attempt at impalement, pushed forward. With her feet locked and eyes dilating, the Jedi moved with difficulties, the reddish saber tearing her brown cloak and, without waiting when she saw an opportunity, the blue lightsaber was already trimmed the attack and, descending to Maul's right side, she expected a huge chunk of Maul's body to hit the ground... However, a black and whitish blade rose from the other lightsaber hilt. Opening her mouth in surprise but not being able to stay that way for long, the blue lightsaber was folded back and the defensive came to the surface, a new will of blood shining in the golden eyes of the Sith.

Greater loads of pain coming from the bruise and tiredness were beginning to arrive in her and so, with a jump powered in the Force, Ti landed on top of her burning ship, Maul following her.

A few blows were exchanged before she jumped away again, pebbles being pulled from the ground and thrown at Maul who, with the black saber, cut their and followed the Jedi like prey. Reconnecting with the Force on the deepest degree she could, the Master's efforts were all for a few defenses and many detours, trying to patch up her forces in the few seconds she had before Maul came to her again and again. Debris was pushed by the Force and Maul couldn't throw them back to the master, her connection being much deeper than that of the Sith. As time passed, she managed to keep him away straight, the anger that blossomed from him raging out as curses and misfortunes... All ignored by her.

After almost five minutes of constant escaping, the bleeding was stagnant in the Force and the fighting resumed.

Still, tiredness and pain were present more than anything. Fleeing spent a good part of her energy, and when the lightsabers flashed and burned the air, the battle proved more and more one-sided, the rage Maul built during her escapes being poured in his blades and striking her, making her bones tremble. She had a greater connection with the Force, but Maul was much stronger and more capable with the lightsabers. Faster and faster, she was being cornered, her attacks were losing power, and Maul was already anticipating them, being able to counter and parry them looming over for another attack rapidly...

It wouldn't be long before she was subdued... Turning her body and trimming the black blade, Ti scarred her teeth as the red lightsaber ripped a small cut on her forearm, the Force quickly saving her for a more profound wound. Various steps were mare, but Maul closed the distance as fast as humanly possible, his lightsabers spinning and blurring through her vision, her hands clanking as she tried to deflect them, using all the power she could to maintain a defense. Suddenly, a Force Push sent her lightsaber flying, the blue blade almost cutting her neck, her knees failing as she hit back on the ground.

... It's over.

However, instead of pursuing the master, Maul's golden eyes glazed on the horizon for a moment, a push of the Force throwing Shaak Ti away. Panting, she stared at Maul, sweat dripping from her horns and her orange skin and blood once again tint the arid ground of Mandalore... With a bizarre smile full of teeth, the Sith squeezed both lightsabers between his fingers. Looking in the direction he was looking, Ti searched whatever besides ground and rocks in the distance... very far away, a small black dot was crossing the sky... She had trouble concentrating on it but managed moments later to feel a signature of Force.

"Kenobi..." Maul whispered.

Don't sneeze in someone's face. It's rude. Man, we are really close to those sweet 100 favorites, which is a surprise. The fic is just my fever dream of Star Wars, but with a lot of memes and nonsense... But people liked it, so I'm not complaining!

Till the next time!

Next chapter: I'll fucking do it again.

sorry for my grammar errors! If one day I hire a beta reader, I ensure he/she will read a lot of things