Indiana Jones and the Sith Stone
Posted by: Darth Danno 06.04.08 12:01am

Indy hurried down the corridors of the tomb with Master Tenuto closely behind, carrying the lamp. Finally arriving in the chamber containing Naga Sadow's sarcophagus. Indy headed straight for the stone coffin, and proceeded to closely examine the skeleton.

Honj watched him go about his task, and thought that perhaps all this time spent in these dark, evil places might have done something to Indy's psyche. He felt sorry for the archaeologist. Here he was, so desperate to find something, he had been reduced to desecrat...

"A-HA!!!" Indy shouted as he held his prize up high.

The Jedi Master wasn't sure what he was looking at. Perhaps the low light in the room was causing his eyes to play tricks on him. What Indy appeared to be holding wasn't... couldn't be...

"Look!" Indy said as he brought the item up to Honj for closer review. Sure enough, the top had been cut off, and the item had been hollowed out. There was a space carved out that looked like it would fit a lightsaber crystal perfectly. The rest of the object looked to have been conformed to fit within the outer hilt exactly. Allowances for the activation switch, crystal lens, and power cell were all there. All that remained was to locate the requisite parts.

Jones gave Honj a hearty pat on the back. "See! I was right! It was right where I dreamt it would be!"

Tenuto stared at him incredulously. "You mean you were serious? You discovered this... this piece's location from a dream??"

Indy simply nodded. "Yeah. I had to fight Darth Malek for it though."

"Wait. Wait a minute. You fought Malek?"

Indy nodded again. "I had to fight dirty, but at least I didn't end up cleaved in two by his lightsaber."

"You must definitely elaborate, but some other time. Now, let me see this." He took the object in his hands and examined it closely. Sure enough, there was no way this could NOT be the interior piece for the hilt, but what it had been created from was beyond explanation. "Do you... do you know what this... this is???"

"It looks to be Naga Sadow's femur." Indy stated.

Honj couldn't believe it. "Malek used a leg bone of a deceased Sith Lord as an integral part of his secret lightsaber?!!"

"I guess so. Perhaps normal metals couldn't or wouldn't be able to contain this much raw, dark power, so the bone of a man powerful in the dark side acts as a natural insulator. The crystal may feel right at home!"

"I... guess. I swear, this journey gets stranger and stranger the further along we go. Indy, I must know, do all your adventures proceed this bizarrely?"

"Nah. This is pretty tame in comparison to most of my travels back on Earth."

"Are you serious?"

"Are you kidding? This whole space odyssey takes the cake!"

"Takes the cake? Takes the cake where, and from whom?"

"Never mind. Let's get out of here. I doubt there's anything more to find."

"But we still don't know where we're to travel to next. That clue must lie in one of the remaining two tombs."

Indy didn't consider that necessary. "There are only two planets left: Tatooine and Manaan. We know that there are pieces of this saber on both of them, does it really matter where we go next?"

"Unfortunately my dear friend, I believe it does matter. Malek set up this whole quest down to the minutest detail. Somewhere around here is our clue. We just need to persevere, and I believe we will be rewarded."

"All right. Since we've come this far, might as well see it through all the way."

This time it was Honj who patted Indy on the back. "That's the spirit! I believe we can save some time if we each take a tomb."

"Won't that take longer with each of us exploring a whole tomb by ourselves?"

"Hopefully the Force will be with us, and either you or myself will locate what we need to find quickly, then we can leave this wretched world behind us."

"I'll second that!" Indy replied, and the duo made their way out of the tomb and back into the valley.

Indy picked the tomb of Tulak Hord, and Honj chose the tomb of Marko Ragnos, and the two set out to find the last clue this world held for them. As Jones searched, he wondered about the ratio of tombs to clues. They had found two pieces of Malek's lightsaber hilt in two of the tombs, now they were searching the remaining tombs for a single clue as to where to venture next. If Indy found it, was the remaining tomb simply a red herring, or was there something to discover there as well? If so, what could it be?

The two kept up their search for a day, then two, then four, the next thing Jones knew, a week had gone by, and neither of them had found even an inkling as to which of the two remaining Star Map worlds they were to travel to next.

With no place left to look, Indy decided to examine the corpse of Tulak Hord himself. Hopefully he wouldn't find anything. Poking and prodding the remains of one of these dark lords was not his idea of a good time. Who knows what kind of power these bones might still contain. With all that had happened recently, it wasn't out of the realm of possibility that Ol' Tulak's spirit might return to this material plane, reclaim his body, or what was left of it, reach up and start choking the life out of this intrepid archaeologist.

As he examined the remains, he thought he heard a noise coming from behind him, as if someone were walking toward the chamber. He swallowed hard, quickly reached for his blaster, and whirled around. "Honj, is that you?" For a few long moments, there was no response. Indy pinched himself hard, hoping that action would wake him before he had to battle Lord Malek again. He felt the pain, but looked around, and after realizing he was still in the tomb and not safely aboard their ship, he knew this time it wasn't a dream. "Honj, are you out there?"

"Who were you expecting, a Sith Lord?" Master Tenuto replied as he strode into the room, a smile crossing his features.

Jones was not amused. "Very funny. Did you find anything?"

The smile on the Jedi's face quickly faded. "Not a thing. Maybe whatever he left here was taken when this tomb was looted numerous times before. I've been thinking you might have been right. We know only Tatooine and Manaan remain, we've got a fifty-fifty chance of making the right choice. Perhaps we should just pick one and head off. After all, we're only hitting dead ends here."

Indy thought about it for a time, then replied "I think we're both pretty tired. We should return to the ship, get a decent nights sleep, then, in the morning, decide our next move when clearer heads can prevail."

Now it was Honj who contemplated Indy's comment. "Agreed. Let's get some rest; I haven't had a good night's sleep since... before we arrived here. Something about this place, I desire to leave it as much as you." The Jedi Master sighed and scratched his head. "I guess I should tell you that had a vision last night."

"A vision?" Indy queried, "of what?"

"I believe it was the future, it appeared we were on Tatooine."

"So what happened?"

"What exactly transpired, or transpires, I could not tell, but I do know many dangers await us there. We must take extra care."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Indy wanted to know.

"I didn't want to burden you any more than you already were, what with your dream of fighting Malek so fresh in your mind."

Look, if we're going to get through this, we need to be completely honest with each other at all times. I know in my sound childish, but no keeping secrets! We can't afford 'em!"

Tenuto nodded. "Once again, your wisdom prevails over mine, I concur. Now let's return to the safety of the ship and get some sleep." The two then made their way down the long hallway towards the tomb's entrance.

"I don't understand it," Honj began as they walked the long corridor, "I was sure Malek would have made allowances for these tombs being raided multiple times since Revan's time. Historians, treasure seekers, Sith acolytes, who knows who entered these tombs before us. I feel that what we seek still remains here...somewhere."

Indy didn't like where his thought process was taking him, but he went with it anyway. "Maybe what we're looking for is hidden somewhere in the Sith academy, or perhaps it's in the town."

Honj's eyes widened at this sudden revelation. "Dreshdae! Of course! Why didn't I think of that? All this latent dark energy contained within these chambers must be dulling my connection to the Force, diminishing my capacity. That would explain a lot."

"Well there's still a lot about your worlds and culture I don't understand, and I highly doubt I will EVER be able to understand them. How your... ships can fly through space like they do, how your lightsabers actually work, how one planet can survive when it's almost all water, and another can contain life when it has two suns? Take this tomb; for instance, look at this wall right here. There are some detailed carvings etched into the stone, yet there are no other drawings like it anywhere around here, I know, I looked. Why would someone carve... "

The Jedi was no longer paying any attention to Indy, he was now more concerned with the wall carvings: drawings of a human and some sort of alien creature. "Wait a minute, wait... a... minute! Do you know what this is? This is the clue we were looking for!"

Now Indy stopped to examine the carvings. "What? What are you talking about? How can you tell?"

Tenuto smiled. "I'm sorry, I sometimes forget you're not from around here." He pointed to the alien figure etched into the stone. "You see this one? This is clearly a Selkath, and it appears that he is giving the human something."

"What?"

"I can't be certain, but I presume it's kolto."

"Kolto?"

"Yes, it had powerful healing properties. It was a precursor to bacta. You know, there was a Sith base on Manaan, and the Sith did try to recruit numerous Selkath youth to join them, and the dark side. That might have been of interest to the historians who came through here, but these drawings would be of no interest to any grave robbers or treasure hunters. Those who came here to learn the ways of the Sith might have given it a glance, but they were more concerned with finding any artifacts and weapons that would or could grant them power. Hoping to find a "fast track" to the dark side. Etching the clue into the stone was a stroke of genius! It's been perfectly preserved for all eternity."

"Unless there was a massive storm that caused a cave in, or someone decided to use their newfound Sith power to destroy this temple as an example of their ability. Or perhaps the Jedi, concerned that the volatile history of this world was something the galaxy needed to be cleansed of, decid... "

Honj conceded. "Okay, okay. I get your point. Anyway, now that we've found the clue, can we please leave?"

Indy nodded and the two ran back into the tomb, picking up the lamps and excavating tools, everything they had brought with them. These items might be of use on Manaan or Tatooine, no point in leaving them behind for some scavenger to find and sell off.

"You know, Indy said as he grabbed the last of their gear, slipped on his armor, and the two of them exited the tomb. "This is the one world I was sure we'd run into some sort of trouble on, and we've been here how long, and we haven't even had the slightest... "

"Don't move!" A voice said from their right.

Slowly turning, Indy and Honj saw they had been beset upon by a group of Mandalorians, at least fourteen of them that they could see. All of their rifles and blasters were pointed their way.

"Weren't your kind wiped out during the Mandalorian wars?" Master Tenuto commented snidely.

"Far from it, Jedi. There are still many of us throughout the galaxy, though not in the numbers we had before the war. Now we're relegated to being bounty hunters, assassins, hired guns, private security forces, and the like."

Honj was not impressed. "So what brings you here?"

"We had just finished up some business in the area when our long range scanners picked up your ship. We thought it odd that a Trandoshan vessel would be visiting Korriban, so we decided to investigate, and tracked your craft as it entered the atmosphere. When you didn't return, we believed you had been killed. By what, we did not know, nor did we care. We had just come down to scavenge your ship when you emerged from that tomb. Imagine our surprise when we see this vessel isn't piloted by Trandoshans at all, but two humans, and at least one of them a Jedi. Surely you'll be more than willing to turn over any Sith treasure you may have found... in return for your lives."

The Jedi slowly moved his hand down toward his lightsaber. "So you're really nothing more than petty thieves. I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I cannot allow you to take anything we may or may not have found."

"I'm not interested in things you didn't find, only things that you DID. If they have some value, we can sell them off to help finance our cause. Starship repairs, fuel, food, weapon upgrades, they all cost money you know."

Master Tenuto said nothing, simply drew his weapon and ignited it. The raiding party now trained all their sights on him.

Despite facing off against an armed Jedi, the Mandalorian leader remained quite calm. "It's not like you have a choice, Jedi. You're outnumbered and outgunned. I'm sure with your powers, you may be able to take some of us down, but we're prepared to die, are you and your friend? So throw down your... " It was then that the Mandalorian leader took his first good look at Indy. "Hold everything! You there! Where did you get... that?"

Darth Danno