Morgo's Bane, Part Three

Posted on Fri Jan 11th, 2013 @ 5:34am by Thane & Morgo Le'Shaad

1,696 words; about a 8 minute read

Chapter: Chapter III: Relics
Location: Red Raptor
Timeline: 1800 Hours, Day Seven

OLD

"But just as Bane hopes to use me, I hope to use him," he decided to go on, his tone even. "It is well-documented how the dark side offers a surer path to power. I have that potential, but I am not so weak-minded as many before me - with Sith teachings, it's important to have control over them, rather than the other way around; with what I am already learning from Darth Bane, I can multiply my ability with the Force, so I am more capable to do the things I should and not waste my potential like the Jedi do, or try to achieve more than I can, like some hapless Padawan with a poor midichlorian count."

Standing, Morgo pushed back a few strands of her blonde hair that had fallen into her eyes with slender fingers, “And is attempting to play a Dark Lord of the Sith something you can handle? You are a Verus, Thane, a noble. But you haven’t played the game of court life since you were a child, if you played it at all. ” Morgo said casually, “You’re rusty. And in this scenario, you may be the Padawan, out of his depth.”

NEW

Of course, Morgo didn’t tell Thane that she’d learned those things from a news report she’d seen as she shopped on Coruscant for supplies with Berry. Morgo’s attempted arrest was all over the news and of course, Thane had been involved. Oh, the press had speculated about what kind of business a Jedi Knight had protecting a fugitive woman—alluding to some things best left unsaid. Amused, Morgo had chuckled, entertained by the fantastical, vulgar creations of utter morons.

But along the way, they did an overview of Thane’s background, revealing him to be of House Verus from the world of Caanus. At the time, Morgo had already suspected that the man was a noble by the way he spoke and held himself, with highborn grace. When the news report flashed before her eyes in the Merchant’s Quarter, her suspicions were only confirmed.

“Funny thing about the Dark Side.” Morgo continued, placing a hand on her hip, “Once you’re taken in you begin to feel you can do anything—that there are no limits. When the time comes, Thane, would you know yours?” The blonde woman asked, glancing at the holocron in her gloved hand, “It calls to you even now, doesn’t it? A siren call to your darker passions that, as we speak, Bane is cultivating. The fact that when I came into your quarters the holocron was left sitting in the open, in plain sight means that you’ve come to accept this darker side of yourself. Had you covered it with a cloth or put it in a box I might’ve deduced that you were still in that phase, hiding and ashamed of your fall to the Dark side, still conflicted about being seduced like a Jedi should. But you’re not, are you?” Morgo observed, voice level, “Because if you’ve already given in, Bane has won half the battle. You are inexperienced yet in the Dark Side, and untested—yet you speak of control.” Gray eyes fixed on Thane, Morgo’s expression was searching, eyes narrowing just slightly, “How could you possibly know what true control means?”

For once, Morgo wasn’t talking down to anyone, taking a morbid interest in the man’s fall to the Dark Side and what would probably be his demise. Thane’s words from before were admittedly fine words—almost worthy of recording, the archivist in Morgo itching for pen and paper. But doubt ever gnawed at her. How long ago had he told himself he was not weak-minded and would not give in to the allure of the Sith, yet so recently betrayed such promises? Thane was now falling to the Dark Side at an alarming rate, and while he professed to resisting Bane, he was not resisting his own darkness…even as he spoke of control.

Of course, he had resisted when he stopped choking Merik in the Opera House—but at the time Thane had had an audience, CoruSec (among others) present with their ever judging eyes, their abject horror. To resist the Dark Side when it was expected of you was easy. But it was in the privacy of his own room that resisting the Call mattered—where a mind roamed free of social and moral expectation and dangerous ideas could take root in shadowy places, unchecked by conscience. And had the rogue Jedi been resisting? From his words earlier about learning much from Bane, Morgo suspected not. He probably even zapped flies in private, hot lighting surging from his callused fingertips.

Sharp eyes scanned Thane from head to toe, making little notes to herself. The man had definite potential, and perhaps was not weak-minded after all. But until he had faced his darkest hour in the throes of the Dark Side—and successfully overcome it, Morgo would continue to doubt his words. For his sake, Morgo hoped his hour would be later, rather than sooner. Not many came out of such an ordeal, sane.

"I've made my choice already," Thane said after a few seconds of thoughtful silence, truly contemplating what Morgo had said. He laughed inwardly to himself, thinking it funny how a self-professed misanthrope and fugitive murderess had spoken wiser and more intelligent words on the dark side - a woman absent in the Force - than generations of Jedi Masters, giving the wayward Jedi more to consider than any others had, but it did not change his mind.

"And I feel it to be a rational one. You make many good points - exceptionally good points, in fact" he admitted, with his grimace-grin, "but I can't help but dispute some of what you say, or have counters to your own thoughts. Namely: I am not falling into anything." His voice was calm, talking softly but with certainty to the other Human. "To fall would imply a failure, a giving in... I personally see this as a decision, and an acceptance. The dark side is not lower than the light side. For some, maybe, but it is well-documented, even by the Reborn Jedi Order, that the dark side is a surer path to power - to self-enrichment - and who has the most concentrated and most-developed of the dark side powers?" Thane answered his own question: "The Sith."

The Caanan placed a hand on the black box that contained his lightsaber, considering that it was in fact large enough to house the holocron once Bería had been given the weapon, as per Morgo's point about having it in plain sight. "Whilst I am just starting to learn how to harness the dark side, I can see already that being a true user of such arts, one must make many sacrifices of their own; they must learn to fully comprehend and understand it, and a concentrated fury - even with Sith teachings - can outweigh a childish tantrum of Force lightning volleys."

As his eyes wandered across the room to one of the stacked bookshelves, he noted a piece named The Golden Age of the Sith, an updated version of an old text - forbidden by the Order, but not illegal (despite the taboo subject) - that contained tales of the first true Sith Empire leading up to the Great Hyperspace War. In that, there were many fine examples of varying types of Sith Lord, ranging from the earliest of the Exiles from the Hundred Year Darkness to Naga Sadow and Ludo Kressh. In that, whilst some were typical of the stereotypical 'power for myself at any cost' group popularised by the Jedi, there were still examples of those with their own more advanced ideologies.

"Many have fallen under the sway of the dark and/or the Sith for ridiculous reasons," Thane then said, looking back to Morgo, "and we can both name umpteen figures that immediately come to mind, but we also know that the Sith are more complicated than most give them credit for. My powers will undoubtedly grow as a result of Bane's tutelage, but who is to say I will want to 'overcome' them, if they make me a greater and more capable person? Who is to say that it isn't really a matter of control, but a matter of understanding? Does it need resisting, or does it need embracing?" His eyes narrowed, thinking about his own points as he was making them. "There is much left to discover, and I need more than just Darth Bane's holocron to do that; there's a lot more out there than his own ideology and powers, and I intend to discover as much as I need to - as I want to."

Morgo smirked faintly, her expression unreadable, “And discover, we will.”

There was some amount of comfort knowing that Thane was thinking about these things rather than just doing. To Morgo’s trained ear, however, it sounded like Thane was working through his thoughts aloud for the first time—which she thought irregular, for Morgo was nothing more than a stranger aboard the ship. Had Thane never talked of these things before with anybody? Delicately placing the holocron back onto the mat where it rested before, Morgo’s fingers slid out from beneath the metal and crystal pyramid as she wondered to herself whether or not Bane (had the holocron been activated) would have taken offense to her existence outside of the Force and called her an abomination for it like the Oracle of Dromache had, years ago.

Looking at Thane from the corner of her eye, Morgo snapped a lavender hued glove off her hand, “Just try not to act like a complete, glove-less brute in the ruins of Tython, hmm?” she said, her lips tugging up in one corner.

"With you there to constantly remind me," he said dryly, but not unkindly, "I highly doubt that possible."

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