First Reply In Pursuit of Justice || High Republic Preferred

[Kelan Dhal]

Nedij || OUTER RIM

It was hard to breathe on Nedij.

The air was thinner, breathable for a human, but not entirely pleasant.
​

The local people, avian in apperance, had been largely ignored by the galaxy for the past two centuries, barring this Empire or that coming in to cause trouble. But Nedij was removed from major hyperlanes, deep in the backwater Samix sector, and largely free from the conflicts of the major galactic powers. But that too was an issue, as without the protection of the major powers, the criminal element thrived, and Nedij was no exception. Black Sun had a small but noticeable presence, but that wasn't why Kelan had come.

No, his goals were far more personal.​

Nestled in the mountains lay the compound of a particularly vile slaver, a Dug who sought to retire somewhere quiet and out of the way after decades of trading flesh for credits. Vaidwi Dwoddar believed he could just walk away from that life and enjoy his final years in his snowy hideaway, but justice would come to him. While slavers of any sort were the foe of the Jedi, this slaver had been part of the original cartel that had brought death to Kelan's village so long ago, who had burned homes and stolen children away. They had robbed Kelan of his parents and his master, and for nearly half a decade, he had hunted them during his endless exile. Some were already dead by the time he got to them, others were so deeply hidden within the fabric of the criminal underworld that the Jedi Exile didn't even know where to look. But that had begun to change with Kelan's commitment to serve the High Republic, the final bastion of light in a galaxy consumed by war.

It had taken time, of course, a conversation here and a peek into sensitive data there, but Kelan brute forced his way into information on known slavers and low and behold, a certain Dug was on record for the sale of colonists that matched the group stolen from Dantooine so many years ago. No doubt Kelan broke protocol coming here, and it wouldn't be long until someone discovered that he had gone digging into databases he shouldn't have access to. But it didn't matter; Kelan would hunt down this monster and bring him to justice at the end of a lightsaber.

He'd been on Nedji for a few days, gathering information about the Dug's compound. It was protected by a sizable gang of off-world thugs and lorded over a frozen lake high in the mountains. A frontal assault might have proved suicidal if not for the fact that a transport landed at the local spaceport once a week to deliver fresh supplies to the compound. It should be a simple matter to slip aboard the cargo speeder. All that remained was to wait for the transport to arrive as scheduled, and so Kelan found his way into one of the few cantinas designed with off-world visitors in mind. The Jedi sulked in a quiet booth toward the back, finding some comfort in the drinks that were eagerly supplied by the bartending droid. Despite his desire for justice and trust in his abilities, Kelan could not help but notice the slight tremble in his hand as it grasped the glass, not to mention that feeling deep in his heart that whispered to him in those quiet moments.

Was this to be justice?

Or revenge? ​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Kelan Dhal​

Aiden Porte stepped into the cantina as if he belonged there.

His robes were buried beneath a heavy travel coat, the hood shadowing the lines of his face. No lightsaber at his belt in plain sight, only the quiet confidence of someone who didn't need it displayed. He moved through the room without haste, letting his presence remain unremarkable, another off-worlder seeking warmth and a drink.

Yet the Force had drawn him here all the same.

It tugged at him like a current beneath ice, subtle, insistent, guiding his eyes past the sabacc table, past the laughing patrons, toward the back where a lone figure sat too still for comfort. The air around that booth felt tight, wound around anger and purpose like wire.

Aiden kept his expression neutral and took a seat at the bar.

The bartending droid turned its photoreceptors toward him. "WELCOME. REQUEST?"

"Something warm," Aiden said, voice low, unplaceable.

As the droid busied itself, Aiden rested his forearms lightly on the counter and let his awareness widen. He didn't stare. He didn't reach. He simply listened, through the noise, through the smoke and heat, until the Force settled into a single, clear impression.

Someone here was standing on the edge of a choice.

And Aiden had not come by accident.

 

[Kelan Dhal]

Perhaps it had been foolish to hope that Kelan's investigations had gone unnoticed.
​

It wasn't like Nedij was known for offworlders, so a new arrival was noticed by the few patrons of the cantina, the Jedi hiding in the corner most of all. The strangers' forceful presence made it obvious why he had come, and Kelan was not at all pleased. For a time, he watched as his fellow Jedi made his way to the bar and ordered a drink as if it was not obvious why he was here. Instead of playing the game, the Jedi Exile grabbed the bottle he had been drinking from for the past hour and made his way to the bar, taking the empty seat next to the new arrival, though it wasn't as if the cantina was particularly bustling with guests. For a time, Kelan said nothing and continued to drink, waiting until the droid returned with a fresh drink for the new patron and a fresh bottle for the sulking patron.

"You should not have come."

Kelan's head did not turn to face his companion, though whether this was due to frustration or shame was not obvious.

"This is something that must be done. Slaver scum don't get to retire."

The Jedi's grip tightened around the bottle as he took another swig. The force of course dulled the effects of alcohol, but Kelan had been in this cantina for several hours over the course of the past few days. It appeared as though he hadn’t been sleeping based on the dark circles beneath his eyes; whatever was eating at him was now slipping to the surface.

“I owe it so so many to dispense justice upon this man. If you are going to try to stop me, I would rather get this over with now.”

While he didn’t reach for his lightsaber, it was clean. Kelan had talked himself into using force to carry out his duty, even if the thought was distasteful to him.

Or was it?​

That other part of him, the part that whispered from the shadows, desired nothing more than to wield the blade at his side in anger, to release emotions long buried in a sudden, fiery explosion that would see the death of one so vile that the galaxy would thank him for his actions. But even now, even as his senses became dulled after days of drinking, Kelan was suppressing these dark desires behind a wall of false nobility, behind the code of an Order he still did not believe he had the right to be a part of.

But the alternative was unthinkable.

The Dark Side.

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Kelan Dhal​

Aiden didn't look at Kelan right away. He let the droid set the warm drink down, let the steam curl between them like a veil, and listened to the tremor beneath Kelan's words.

"You don't owe the galaxy your soul," Aiden said quietly.

Only then did he turn his head, just enough to meet Kelan in the corner of his eye. No judgment, just a steady presence, the kind that didn't flinch from ugly truths.

"I didn't come to stop you from bringing him in," Aiden continued. "I came because the Force led me here… and because you're standing too close to the edge."

Kelan's threat hung in the air. Aiden didn't rise to it.

"I will not fight you," he said, calm as stone. "But if you're asking permission to burn, no. I will not allow it."

He shifted slightly on the stool, not closing the distance, but slightly turning towards him.

"We do this the right way. We take him alive if we can. We make him answer. And we do it without you feeding the part of you that's been whispering in the dark."

Aiden's voice softened, firm, but not unkind.

"Look at me my friend. Not the past or the bottle" Aiden spoke, giving off an aura of hope and light. "Tell me what you're really afraid will happen if you don't kill him yourself."

 

[Kelan Dhal]

​

Normally, Kelan was all too willing to heed the advice of a fellow Jedi, especially one who seemed so in touch with the force and its guidance.

But not now. Not here.

Not when he was so close.
​

But the fire that burned within him had but one ambition, and it was not to challenge a Jedi in the middle of a cantina. Despite the call of the Dark Side, Kelan truly believed in the righteousness of his actions and the tenets of the Order he served. He would not harm an innocent in pursuit of his prey; that was a firm line that had not been worn down by the day drinking or the bitter cold. With a deep sigh, Kelan pushed the bottle that he had been nursing to one side. hand bawling into fists on the counter before him. Despite the request to look his way, the Jedi exile could not bring himself to do so.

Not yet.

"Its not what will happen, but what has."

His voice was quiet, tinged with regret and pain. Flashes of days long since past filled his mind, of a village burning and the corpses of the dead lying scattered about. There were only glimpses of those responsible, a gang of sadistic slavers and raiders who sought a quick credit through the trade of flesh and suffering. But worst of all, at least to the boy standing amidst the ruin, lightsaber tightly clutched in hand, and yet it remained quiet. Kelan might have been able to save those who had been taken if he had been brave, if he had taken his master's lessons to heart and cast aside the selfish ego of a boy with such great power.

Memories fade, but the pain they contain remains.

"He won't remember me. He won't remember any of the people he hurt. But I carry the justice for a generation of beings who were silenced by monsters like him. Can a Republic court do that? Or will they spend months on inconsequential details while his wealth affords him the best and brightest in the galaxy to get him a reduced sentence?"

Kelan turned toward his guide, cold rage in his eyes.

"Would you take the chance that he walks free? Would you be able to watch someone as cruel as Vaidwi Dwoddar slip out of your grasp when he's so close?"

This was a genuine question. Kelan might have hidden it behind a seemingly impossible choice, but he was seeking a better way to handle this situation, but found no path that did not lead to cold-blooded murder or a waste of time. Though the new arrival and the Jedi exile were close in age, it was clear one had far more experince as a Jedi compared to the other.

But this was not a wound that could be easily healed.

Aiden Porte ​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Kelan Dhal​

Aiden held Kelan's gaze without trying to win it.

"No," he said, simple and honest. "I would not be able to watch him walk free." He let that truth sit between them, unadorned, because pretending otherwise would insult them both. "But I also wouldn't trade your future for his ending."

Aiden's hand stayed on the bar, steady. His voice stayed low, meant for Kelan alone.

"You're right about courts. Wealth bends outcomes. Time dulls urgency. And monsters know how to hide behind procedure." He exhaled once, controlled. He leaned in a fraction not crowding, just closing the distance enough to be real.

"We build a cage he can't buy his way out of. We document everything. We take his ledgers, his comms, his client lists. We put names and faces and dates on every life he sold." Aiden's eyes sharpened. "And we make the arrest loud enough that burying it becomes impossible."

He let a moment passed before he continued.

"You want justice for the silenced. Then don't give him a martyr's death or a clean disappearance." His tone hardened, just slightly. "Make him live long enough to be seen. To be remembered. To have every victim's shadow standing behind him when the galaxy looks."

Aiden's gaze flicked briefly to Kelan's clenched fists.

"And if you're asking me whether I'd stop you if you drew on him in anger, yes." No threat, no heat. Just a boundary. "Because the moment you kill him to soothe that wound, you teach the dark that it can buy you."

His voice softened again.

"You're not weak because you froze back then. You were a kid in a firestorm." Aiden held his stare. "What you do now is what decides who you are."

He nodded once, toward the mountain beyond the walls.

"He's close. Good. We take him together. Alive. And we take everything he's built with him."

 

[Kelan Dhal]

He was right. Damn him, but he was right.
​

Perhaps it was foolish of him to come here alone, to strike down a being, no matter how vile, in cold blood. The issue, however, remained deeply ingrained within Kelan, that anger that had been so carefully contained over a decade of wandering the galaxy to play at being a Jedi. He'd held true to the code; he defended the innocent and brought justice to the guilty. But now that it was his own justice, he began to stray from the path that had been so carefully followed for so many years.

"Because the moment you kill him to soothe that wound, you teach the dark that it can buy you."
​

That is what it really came down to. Was it worth sacrificing his soul for the sake of one dead Dug? Was it worth throwing away the legacy of his master for petty revenge? When he last saw this Dug, he had ripped away everything that he held dear. The child who froze and watched as his whole world burned now had another chance to make things right, but he could not be impulsive; he could not give in to the gnawing thing at the back of his mind. The Jedi exiles' fists slowly began to relax as he let out a shaky breath.

"This is new. Working together, I mean."

Kelan's voice had lost much of its edge, instead replaced by a remorseful softness that seemed to fit him better than the rage that had been eating away at him.

"I've watched the place for days. He doesn't leave, just his hired guns piloting the cargo skiff from the village and back. He has maybe a dozen or so men, former Black Sun enforcers, who come to the village to gamble and drink. In fact, I've gotten to know a few of them over the past few days, especially their schedules-"

The door to the cantina opened to reveal two humans, clad in black armor and furs that seemed wasted on mere gangsters.

"Darris, do you ever stop drinking? Your stomach must be pure durasteel!"

The pair came behind Kelan, patting him on the back like an old friend. For his part, the Jedi shot his newest companion a look before putting on a persona he'd apparently grown accustomed to over the past few days.

"Ah, just drinking away my sorrows! You nearly cleaned me out playing sabacc!"

"Poor bastard, just didn't know when to quit! Well, we do have an hour or so before we are expected back if you want a chance to recoup your losses."

While the pair of enforcers laughed, Kelan directed his gaze to his fellow Jedi and, though he had little practice, spoke without moving his lips, a message carried by the force.

"Get ready."
​

"Marki, has anyone ever told you that you talk too much?"

Before the enforcer could respond, Kelan had spun around, a punch directed at one of the new arrivals, sending him spinning, hands fumbling for the blaster on his hip while also attempting to nurse a broken nose.

"No lightsabers, we need those uniforms!"

Aiden Porte ​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Kelan Dhal​

Aiden heard everything Kelan said, not only the words but the softened edge beneath them. He felt the shift in the Force as Kelan allowed the idea of partnership to exist, even if it still sat awkwardly on his tongue. It was not weakness. It was a door cracking open.

Then the door to the cantina opened, and the moment became action.

Kelan's warning brushed across Aiden's mind, and Aiden moved at once. He rose from the bar with the ease of someone who had learned long ago that speed did not need to look frantic. When Kelan threw the first punch, Aiden flowed in behind the second enforcer as the man reached for his blaster.

Aiden's hand caught the wrist, turned it, and guided the motion away from the draw. He used the enforcer's forward momentum, stepped in close, and lowered him with a controlled sweep and a firm shoulder check, easing him down to the floorboards without spectacle. The man hit hard enough to lose the will to fight, but not hard enough to be maimed. Aiden's knee pinned him neatly, his grip calm and precise.

Aiden's mouth curved into a quick, quiet smile as he glanced toward Kelan.

"I see your mind," he murmured, voice warm even as he kept pressure on the enforcer's shoulder. A soft chuckle slipped out of him, light as breath. "Solid plan and thinking, my friend."

He shifted his weight, keeping the enforcer contained, and spoke again, still low, still private, but filled with truth.

"And you will soon find that working together is one of the greatest things to do," Aiden said. "We are never truly alone in this galaxy, not if we choose to stand in the light and strive to hope."

His gaze steadied on Kelan, a quiet anchor amid the sudden tension in the room.

"You have carried this burden for a long time," Aiden continued. "Let someone share the weight with you now. Hope is not a naïve thing, Kelan. It is a decision. It is what keeps us from becoming the very darkness we hunt."

 

[Kelan Dhal]

​

While his nose was broken, Marki was just angry enough to focus and pull his blaster from its holster. Kelan's quick reaction made sure he didn't get a shot off, but unlike his companion, he was not as careful and managed to break the poor enforcer's hand in the process of slamming it against the table he had stumbled back into. A second punch rendered the enforcer unconscious, leaving Kelan to stand back up and gather himself.

More importantly, he gathered the credits he lost to maintain his cover, swiping a pouch from the enforcer's belt.
​

It appeared as though Kelan's companion had the other unlucky gangster pinned, not that he had to doubt the prowess of a fellow Jedi. While they had never formally met, Kelan was aware of Aiden by reputation, a fearless Jedi Knight who dived headfirst into danger for the sake of the innocent and vulnerable. In many ways, they were alike, but Aiden was a true Jedi, one who had proved himself many times and properly gone through his trials. They even looked alike, though it was obvious that one of them had enjoyed the finer aspects of civilization while the other appeared to be little more than a vagrant with a lightsaber.

"You are wise indeed. Perhaps I was a fool to come here alone."

It was true, it was a mistake to come alone, to sit in some dingy cantina and drink away the convictions that he had held to for a decade. He had been terrified for so long that should he ask for aid, that he would be exposed as a charlatan and have the one bit of him that had held him together for so long ripped away in a single instance. Yet that was the assumptions of an Outer Rim orphan who long ago learned no to trust the intentions of others.

People were complicated. But maybe they weren’t all bad.​

“You’d make a fine Jedi Master, Aiden. Thank you for coming after me.”

A half smile crossed Kelans face, about as good as he could muster given days of drinking and planning.

“We should get these uniforms on, they won’t be a perfect fit but they’ll get us inside the compound if we play our parts well enough.”

The few remaining cantina patrons rushed to pay their tab and clear out, clearly a bit frightened that someone was stirring more trouble in their small village.

“The locals won’t give us away, at least. The compounds guards make regular trips down here to drink and cause trouble.”

Speaking of which, Kelan moved to the droid tending the bar, seemingly unbothered by the violence in its establishment. The Jedi Exile placed the pouch of credits on the bar and the droid wasted little time collecting them.

“For my tab. And the mess.”

The droid scanned the pair for a moment, its photoreceptors adjusting for a moment.

“Accepted. Please do come again.”

Turning back to his fellow Jedi, Kelan offered a nod.

“We should hurry. These two pilot the cargo skiff that the compound is expecting.”

Aiden Porte ​