The Dune Sea

[Alex Lynd]

Twin suns danced overhead and rained their heat down on the man in the tattered cream colored cloak. The ultraviolet rays dyed his scan to a healthy tan color, but the heat was overbearing and had taken it's toll but he was a Jedi Knight after all. Was? That was the operative word wasn't it? He smirked as his blue eyes fixated on the horizon, moreover the ridge that lay directly in front of him a few hundred meters out. Alex took in a deep breath and rolled his eyes. Seriously? His damaged green hilted lightsaber flew into his hands, most of the paint had been long chipped away revealing bare metal and what looked like a burn mark that scored the green paint around the emitter, clearly a glancing blow from another blade, another blade, that was a story....one for another time anyway. His thumb flicked the ignition button and the green blade shot out of it's emitter. He stood there and stared in the distance as a great shadow formed overhead and the sound of engine. His blue eyes narrowed and he sighed audibly, he normally was not one to draw his blade first, in fact it was contrary to who he was as a Jedi, Consulars normally did not draw their weapons without proper provocation, but he was tired, more than tired and these times were not necessarily ripe for the stereotypical behavior of just knocking on the door. It's hard to knock on the damn door when it's rigged to explode in your face when you breathe on it wrong, knocking may very well not be the best recourse when it's sure to kill you.

He looked around again and waited for the ship to touch down off in the distance, surely he had been seen, the green blade against the brown sand and the blue sky made sure of that. That's okay however, he wanted to be seen, he wanted them to know that he knew they were coming and moreover he wanted to strike a fear of uncertainty into their very core by behaving differently than they would have expected to him. Who was Alex Lynd? A pacifist Jedi Knight or an unhinged hermit who could strike them down in the blink of an eye for looking at him funny. Who knew? Certainly not them and that was the most desirable outcome, because their fear would unbalance them and regardless of whether or not their fears were valid, they would be in his mind. They knew who he was, but not what he was not anymore, how could they? Even he did not know who or what he was. Time can change a man, even a Jedi, perhaps especially a Jedi, one who grew up with a heart of gold only to have his universe shattered by his own flesh and blood. Of course ESPECIALLY a Jedi was vulnerable to this type of pain, moreover he was uniquely vulnerable to this type of pain. Perhaps his whole blood was cursed, tainted by the dark side, perhaps this was the blood that must be paid for the sins of his father, the way he was. Alex had always loved his father, except for Miranda he was the only one that shared genuine care for the man that was responsible for his existence. Adrian had adored him at first, then he hated him, then Johnathon outright despised him and looked at him as an insect whose only good deed was creating the all seeing "Messiah" of the universe, force his twin had an ego on him, an ego fit for...well a dictator, that made sense the more he thought about it. What was it about Seers anyway?

He took another breath in as the landing ramp on the ship lowered. More pomp and circumstance? Johnathon certainly had a penchant for the grand entrance, it was the flair that sold his act, the pure elegance of it all was seductive, but he knew better. Alex knew that it was all a facade, concealing the true vulnerable nature of his twin brother whom he had often times had to bring back from the brink of full on mental collapse as a child. How had he not seen this coming? His grip tightened on his lightsaber as that frustrating question found it's way into his aura. How did he not do something about it? He could have gotten the other Jedi and maybe they could have talked him back, or maybe they could have killed him, somehow Alex now felt that would have been the preferable option all along. How could he kill his own brother though? He certainly had tried to in the past, the idea was simple enough, but he simply was not strong enough to go at it alone. Johnathon had toyed with him in their fight, Johnathon had been underestimated for so long that the perception of him as this emotionally crippled untrainable boy clouded Alex's judgement, had that not happened perhaps he could have stopped him early on.

"Your eyes...yellow....brother"

Those words echoed in his mind, he had known what Johnathon was and he did nothing to stop it. Perhaps it was because he was from the Council of Knowledge era of Jedi where Sith could coexist with Jedi and all would be fine. Except all wasn't fine, because Sith couldn't coexist with Jedi and Sith should be destroyed at all costs, that's just how it had to be and Johnathon was definitely a Sith, who deserved to die. He shook his head and dropped into a ready stance as a lone figure emerged down the ramp flanked by what looked like troopers in red armour.

"REALLY?! You bring your minions to see your own brother?!"

He shouted, again an out of character move one that was designed....to...it wasn't designed to do anything, his emotions were not in check as they usually were, they never were when Johnathon came into the mix, if they were Johnathon would have been dead a long time ago and he would have reported his findings to the council and they would have assisted him taking care of the situation. Instead he failed, he failed at being a Jedi which was the ultimate failure, one that he could not abide within himself. That's why he was here, this is where they had faced off all those years ago, where he had lost but was somehow spared. He never understood why Johnathon had spared him, perhaps it was because he knew what a pathetic mess of a person that he was on the path to becoming. His blue eyes reflected the darkness before him and he tensed up as the guards flanking the man came into view.

"Oh, You."

[Kaini Khatoin]

His cloak fluttered in the breeze and his suit of armour worked overtime to keep his body temperature normal in this harsh environment. The chips in his helmet were clearly visible in the twin suns, much the same as Alex's lightsaber hilt, his helmet had seen it's fair share of combat. The inky black glass where his eyes would be reflected the suns back at Alex. His aura was pitch black, not unlike his armour, he was the walking personification of darkness, but there was also a sense of torment about him that swirled in and out of his aura like a raging storm, one that made him wildly unpredictable and incredibly dangerous. The green blade had been in view since he stepped out onto the surface, but he was simply a Jedi, nothing but a bug to be squashed, Kaini had squashed the likes of him before, on more than one occasion and this situation would be no different, if his orders didn't forbid it.

His rough metal hilt found it's way into his right hand and the red blade extended in an inelegant manner and crackled the fire of the darkside of the force as it settled into a stable humm. He did not take a defensive stance and instead stood there menacingly about three meters from the Jedi coward. He hated Jedi, the scum of the galaxy that stood in the way of the Chancellor's plans, the cowards. How he wished he was allowed to kill every single last one of them. He lowered his head and stared menacingly at the disgraced Jedi before him

::Tpyical::

His voice augmenter conveyed his annoyance with the Jedi.

::Alex Lynd. The Supreme Chancellor requests your presence onboard his ship, don't ask me why I don't know nor do I care. I am to escort you there, you may keep your weapon so long as it remains on your belt.::

He wasn't entirely sure he was fond of that idea, but those were his orders. He stiffened up and stood there waiting for a response, a response that was sure to be typical of the blood lust that made a Jedi a Jedi.