Mace Windu Vs Jaina Solo

Originally posted by NewGuy01
You don't think Mace could defeat a one-armed, injured Caedus?

Of course he could. He has Vaapad. Without it? Not a chance.

Originally posted by NewGuy01
The fact that his power was above normal par doesn't change the fact that he demonstrated the skill necessary to stalemate Darth Sidious.

Which is irrelevant as Mace was amped of Palpatine in that fight.

Originally posted by NewGuy01
Considering his power/physical feats are better than Jaina's in the first place, I'm not seeing how he would even need such an amp to win this.

What feats? The only one that are far better are his CW ones. Otherwise, I don't see any that put him beyond Jaina keeping up with Jacen.

Originally posted by NewGuy01

What advantage does Jaina have over Mace, really?

Well, her fighting style includes being trained to fight unconventionally and unpredictably, Windu's not likely to have encountered this at such a high level. Jaina's got the same force potential as her brother. Her mental force abilities are strong.

Originally posted by ILS

> Elects to ignore that Jaina fought a heavily injured Caedus while she herself was being amped

Jaina wasn't amped by anything outside herself, and while Caedus was injured, he also specifically has the ability to ignore pain and injury, so it wouldn't slow down his sword arm or such.

Personally, I'm not entirely sure who'll win. They're both extremely good, they both have shatterpoint, it may come down to who's style has the edge over the other.

Originally posted by ares834
How does that mean it exactly? She could easily be just exhausted after the beating she took. And she is exhausted. Could she have been amped by Luke? Perhaps, but it isn't concrete either way.

I said that her energies returned to "normal levels". If she were merely exhausted that doesn't fit.

Originally posted by ares834
Which is why I asked for proof. If he has definitive proof that Jaina was being amped by Luke and not having a one with the force moment I'd like to see it.

He said she was amped, but not specifically by Luke. In either case, Luke or oneness, she was amped beyond her normal level.

Originally posted by Nephthys
I said that her energies returned to "normal levels". If she were merely exhausted that doesn't fit.

Sure it does. It's why she returned to her "normal levels" (or at least could be).

Originally posted by Nephthys
He said she was amped, but not specifically by Luke. In either case, Luke or oneness, she was amped beyond her normal level.

And? Generally speaking, a moment of oneness is done by the user opening themselves to the force more fully. As Q99 pointed out it's basically Jaina amping herself.

Originally posted by ares834
Sure it does. It's why she returned to her "normal levels" (or at least could be).

"Then Jaina experienced an abrupt draining as her Force energies returned to their normal level."

Yeah, totally just tired.

Originally posted by ares834
And? Generally speaking, a moment of oneness is done by the user opening themselves to the force more fully. As Q99 pointed out it's basically Jaina amping herself.

I see, so Jacen wins every versus fight because he goes Super Saiyan with the most powerful state of oneness ever. Totally legit, its just him amping himself.

Originally posted by Nephthys
"Then Jaina experienced an abrupt draining as her Force energies returned to their normal level."

Yeah, totally just tired.

Cool story bro. If you hadn't taken by quote out of context initially you'd realize I was arguing against Luke amping her.

Originally posted by Nephthys
I see, so Jacen wins every versus fight because he goes Super Saiyan with the most powerful state of oneness ever. Totally legit, its just him amping himself.

Except it's explicitly stated that Jacen can't ever use that again. But yeah, end of NJO Jacen could probably beat anyone that's true.

Originally posted by ares834
Cool story bro. If you hadn't taken by quote out of context initially you'd realize I was arguing against Luke amping her.

Um, duh? I'm arguing it was Luke amping her. I took your quote in exactly the context it was in. That doesn't change anything. Her energies returned to normal levels from being amped. Again, duh.

Originally posted by ares834
Except it's explicitly stated that Jacen can't ever use that again. But yeah, end of NJO Jacen could probably beat anyone that's true.

Gee, it's almost as if a state of oneness is like, involuntary and you can't just pull it out whenever you want or something.

But yeah I totally agree that if Jaina just happens to achieve oneness she wins. But thats true of any character. 😬

Originally posted by Nephthys
Um, duh? I'm arguing it was Luke amping her. I took your quote in exactly the context it was in. That doesn't change anything. Her energies returned to normal levels from being amped. Again, duh.

You are? So I ask, do you have any concrete evidence Luke as amping her? Like I mentioned earlier, her energies could just as easily have returned to normal because she was exhausted and could no longer draw on the force so heavily.

Originally posted by Nephthys
Gee, it's almost as if a state of oneness is like, involuntary and you can't just pull it out whenever you want or something.

But yeah I totally agree that if Jaina just happens to achieve oneness she wins. But thats true of any character. 😬

Someone is bitter. Anyway, if this is a moment of "oneness" it seems to be far more like Zonakin or Kenobi when he defeated the Maul bros as she isn't glowing with force energy or even dying. Rather she is just using the force to a greater extent than typical. So frankly, I don't see the problem. This is just Jaina operating at her best not at her normal level.

If that's the case, then we should assume Mace is operating at his best as well.

Originally posted by NewGuy01
If that's the case, then we should assume Mace is operating at his best as well.

Of course. But only on the power that he can draw on on his own.

So because I am exhausted at people incorrectly debating the Caedus vs Jaina battle here:

The sniper was not surprised. The weapon simply spun free as it was abruptly released, and the snap-hiss of an igniting lightsaber sounded from inside the projection booth. Despite the pellet wound his shoulder had suffered earlier, Caedus did not hesitate to activate his own blade. His pain would only fuel his power, and if he did not attack the sniper, he knew the sniper would attack him. He Force-leapt up through the hole into the smoky, flashing interior of the booth and pivoted around to block the fan of blue light that came slicing toward his neck even before he could sense who he was fighting.

Whoever it was, the enemy was good.

Caedus felt a boot slam into his ribs-an instant before he saw it coming with his Aing-Tii fighting-sight-and the breath left his lungs. He countered with a head-high backslash and brought his own foot up, landing a Force-enhanced snap-kick between the legs of the brown-robed blur attacking him. The blow drew a pained grunt but failed to even stagger his foe.

A bony elbow slammed up under his chin, rocking him onto his heels. Then, finally, Caedus felt a familiar tingle in the back of his mind, and he saw the image of a violet blade slashing at his vulnerable side. He swept his own lightsaber down across the front of his body in a desperate reverse block that barely caught the attack in time to prevent it from slicing him in two, then whirled into a spinning back kick that landed squarely in his foe's stomach and drove him back:a mere two steps.

It was enough.

Now Caedus could see who he was fighting, and he could not believe it. A gaunt-faced man with eyes as blue and cold as vardium steel, nostrils flaring red with anger and exertion, a thin-lipped snarl filled with confidence and disdain.

Luke Skywalker.

Just a few minutes earlier, Caedus had sensed his uncle's presence far above Nickel One, in the same blastboat as his mother, father, and Saba Sebatyne. And now here Luke was, inside the asteroid. Even Jedi Grand Masters could not be in two places at once-Caedus knew that-but he did not waste time being confused.

All that mattered was that Luke was here, somehow, and that he was the one swordsman in the galaxy whom Caedus did not dare fight one-armed. Even as Luke leapt forward weaving a basket of lightsaber slashes, Caedus sprang back out of the projection booth, launching himself into a high Force flip designed to put as much distance between himself and his attacker as possible.

Luke flew after him, not even bothering to try for the high position, simply coming up under him with a wild slash combination that was anything but subtle or deft or even tricky; just pure relentless ferocity. Caedus had to stretch himself out belly-down in midair to meet the attack, and even calling on the Force to bolster the strength in his good arm, it was all he could do to keep the powerful strikes from knocking his guard aside and leaving him wide open.

They started to drop, trading a trio of lightning-fast blows that left Caedus's hands stinging and his heart racing. The last time he had fought Luke, he had started with a painful kidney wound but two good arms-and barely managed to survive. Now, with a relatively bearable shoulder wound and a single good arm, he had to do more than survive, he had to prevail-because now there would be no mercy at the last minute. This time, his uncle would not care whether he survived as long as Caedus died, because now Luke knew the truth about who had killed his wife.

After the third exchange, Caedus and Luke came down in the seating area, two rows apart. Both landed on their feet, Luke more lightly than Caedus.

Caedus deactivated his lightsaber and flicked his hand downward, arming the dart thrower he had begun wearing beneath his sleeve after their last fight.

But Luke did something even more unexpected, removing one hand from his lightsaber and pushing the palm forward. An instant later, the unseen hammer of a Force blast caught Caedus in the sternum and drove him not over, but through the seats behind him.

He slammed into the next row and dropped to the floor foot-to-foot with the big Mandalorian he had killed earlier-the one in the black armor and red helmet. Caedus's head was spinning and his chest was more than aching-it was throbbing, burning, clenching so tightly he could hardly breathe.

But he still had his lightsaber-and he needed it. He thumbed the activation switch and brought the weapon up just as Luke's blue blade came slicing down toward him. Caedus caught it on his own crimson blade, then straightened his arm, simultaneously parrying and pointing the dart thrower on his wrist into his attacker's face.

"Release!" he commanded.

A faint puff of air tickled Caedus's forearm as the thrower launched its darts, but Luke was already whirling out of the way. The slivers streaked past in a harmless black flash and vanished; then Luke was spinning into the row where Caedus lay, positioning himself above Caedus's head for the coup de grace.

There was no time to leap up or loose a bolt of Force lightning, and the angle was particularly poor for blocking and parrying. Caedus's only hope lay at his feet, and he seized that hope with the Force, using it to pull the dead Mandalorian up over him, then hurling the corpse headlong into Luke.

Two bodies collided with the sharp crack of metal impacting bone. When Caedus did not die in the next instant, he realized he had finally driven his uncle onto the defensive. He rolled to a knee, his lightsaber ignited and raised between them.

Luke lay buried beneath the huge Mandalorian, blood pooling around his head and one motionless arm protruding beneath the fellow's side. By all appearances, Luke Skywalker was dead-or at least unconscious.

Caedus's heart began to pound not with fear, but with excitement. His visions of late had been filled with his uncle's face-Luke Skywalker attacking him here on Nickel One, Luke firing on him from one of Fett's Bes'uliike, Luke sitting on Caedus's throne, claiming the New Empire as his own. Had he-Lord Caedus-finally put an end to those visions-finally ruled out the possibility of those futures becoming the future?

Eager as he was to be rid of Luke, Caedus was also suspicious. His uncle had been using a new fighting style, one that he had never taught his students at the Jedi academy-one that he had never, as far as Caedus knew, used on anyone who had survived to describe it. The style was essentially conservative, brutal, and ruthless, designed to deal damage without suffering it-and not all that tricky.

Which meant now would be the perfect time to switch styles and trap an unwary opponent by playing dead. Using the Force to keep the Mandalorian pressed firmly down on Luke, Caedus retreated twenty paces to the body of a fallen stormtrooper, then deactivated his lightsaber and tucked it under his wounded arm. When Luke still did not move, he pulled a fragmentation grenade off the trooper's equipment belt. He thumbed the arming slide, then sent the grenade sailing toward his uncle and the dead Mandalorian.

Part II

Despite the ringing in her ears and the gauze in her head-despite her hugely aching skull and the big knot of hurt swelling on her brow-Jaina had never been so filled with the Force. She could feel it in every cell of her body, swirling through her like fire, burning more ferociously every moment. She had never felt so strong or so quick or so alert. She could drive her fist through a durasteel wall, or catch a blaster bolt between her fingers. Despite the red curtain of blood cascading from the gash where Vatok's helmet had split her forehead, she was aware of everything.

Including that grenade sailing toward her.

So Jaina reached out with the Force and sent it flying back toward her brother. An instant later, the weight pressing down on her grew lighter as Caedus's attention shifted to the grenade. She started to Force-hurl her friend's body off-then recalled how her brother had been anticipating her attacks. She grabbed the beskad hanging from Vatok's waist, then sent his body flying after the grenade.

The iron saber had barely cleared its scabbard before the hammerfist of a grenade detonation jolted the forum. Vatok's body was silhouetted against the orange flash of the explosion. Jaina held him there, shielding herself from the fiery heat of the blast, and felt the searing bite of shrapnel only in her legs.

The detonation swept the last wisps of gauze from Jaina's mind. Not waiting to see if she had been seriously injured, she let her friend's body drop to the floor and leapt after her brother, lightsaber in one hand and Vatok's beskad in the other.

Caedus turned to meet her with his good arm forward and his wounded shoulder behind. Jaina struck high with the lightsaber and low with the beskad. Caedus slipped back, allowing both blades to pass, then sprang forward and counterthrust, trying to impale her with her own momentum.

Jaina was already spinning past his crimson blade, pivoting on a dead stormtrooper's chest plate as she brought Vatok's beskad around at neck height. But Caedus had anticipated her once again, leaning away to take the blow on his wounded shoulder rather than across his throat.

Jaina did not even feel the beskad cleaving bone. She simply heard a voice-Jacen's voice-cry out in shock and pain; then an arm landed on her boots. In the next instant Caedus was whirling away, screaming and flapping a red stump, and something hot and wet splashed across Jaina's face and throat and began to burn like acid.

A part of her-the part that had grown up with Jacen and trained with him on Yavin 4 and traded snowballs at Coruscant's polar playgrounds-was too horrified to act. That part wanted to stand paralyzed in shock, to pretend this was just some terrible nightmare from which she would shortly awaken. The other part-the part that had actually asked for this mission-knew what would happen if she let herself freeze.

Jaina launched herself after Caedus. The loss of an arm did not seem to faze him. He simply turned to meet her attack, his yellow eyes blazing with pain and fury, and their lightsabers met in a brilliant explosion of color. Jaina brought the beskad around again, striking low for his thigh:and knew she was in trouble when Caedus did not even try to block.

Caedus deactivated his lightsaber and let it drop between them. Jaina felt the beskad begin to bite, then her brother's palm sank deep into the pit of her stomach. In the next instant she was riding a bolt of Force lightning across the chamber, her muscles cramping, her teeth grinding, her ears roaring with the fiery sizzle of burning synapses.

A full second later, she slammed into a durasteel wall and felt a terrible popping in her ribs, then dropped to the floor, still holding her lightsaber and the beskad. The Force lightning had died away, but her muscles remained useless aching knots, and the stench of scorched flesh was so powerful she wanted to retch. Instead, she tried to rise-and succeeded only in sparking a dozen different kinds of pain.

Across the chamber, her brother was in little better shape. He sat slumped in a half-collapsed chair, his remaining hand clamped over the stump of his missing arm, his thigh wound dripping blood onto the floor. His yellow eyes were staring at Jaina more in confusion than rage, and his head was cocked as though he could not quite believe what he was seeing.

"You?" he gasped. "Jaina?"

Jaina managed to raise her throbbing head. It hurt-a lot-and her vision was starting to blur.

"I haven't changed that much, Jacen," she said. With her muscle control beginning to return, she pushed herself into a kneeling position. "And I hope you know how much this Sith nonsense is steaming Mom and Dad."

If Caedus heard her wisecrack, he did not show it. His yellow eyes began to dart around the chamber, searching for something Jaina did not understand-but maybe that was just because her head was throbbing so bad. The pain was beginning to muddle her thoughts.

Somehow, Caedus forced himself back to his feet. That would have been impressive-if it weren't so kriffing scary.

"Where's Luke?" he demanded.

"Right behind me," Jaina said, also standing. The effort sent pangs of anguish shooting through her lungs, and she realized she had a few broken ribs to go with the lightning scorch on her chest. She squinted in his direction, trying to keep him in focus so she could kill him. "Come over here, and I'll show you."

That brought Caedus's gaze snapping back toward her, and Jaina realized she might have overplayed her hand. She still had both arms, but the fact that her brother remained standing at all proved how much greater his Force powers were than her own. She tossed the beskad aside and summoned a fallen stormtrooper's power blaster to hand.

Then Jaina sensed someone watching her from the direction of the antechamber where the Moffs had fled. She looked up to find a pair of gray blurs dropping into firing positions in the doorways. She loosed a burst of suppression fire toward the two troopers, then Force-flipped up into the cover offered by the ruined projection booth, landing backward so she would be facing her enemy and in a position to defend herself.

Jaina's boots had not even touched the floor before the stormtroopers opened fire. She dropped the power blaster and used her lightsaber to deflect their bolts, angling them down toward her brother. If she kept him busy enough, he wouldn't be able to hurl another lightning attack her way. His lightsaber snapped to life and began to weave a crimson shield in front of him.

Then Jaina experienced an abrupt draining as her Force energies returned to their normal level. Suddenly she felt cold, tired, and in pain, and she barely had the strength to hold her lightsaber as it flicked back and forth, batting away blaster bolts. She retreated deeper into the projection booth, stumbling over combat debris that she normally would have sensed without any conscious thought. When she reached the wrecked control panel, she could finally drop behind cover.

Caedus's voice sounded out in the forum, still deep and booming and strong. "Not her! Skywalker is the dangerous one."

Skywalker?

Was Jaina beginning to hear things now, too? Or was Caedus beginning to imagine them?

The blasterfire shifted away from the projection booth and grew more erratic. Jaina poked her head up, peering over the scorched control panel through what remained of the projectionist's one-way viewport.

Her brother was limping up toward the anteroom, finally starting to look a little weak and dizzy himself. His good hand was still holding the stump of his severed arm. But his yellow eyes were round with fear and his brow was furrowed with anger, and he was looking toward the far corner of the chamber, which Jaina could not see from her vantage point.

"There, you fools!" he yelled. "Blast him!"

Fight II

"It's worth a try, but they won't obey." Caedus came to the door and, lacking a second hand to reach for the control pad, stopped to finish his order. "Have my StealthX prepped for immediate:"

He let the sentence trail off as the door opened on its own, revealing a dark-uniformed woman with an athletic build and brown, furious eyes.

"Jaina?"

A lightsaber snap-hissed to life, and suddenly Caedus felt as though he were going to vomit fire.

* * *

The invisible fist of a Force blast slammed Jaina in the chest and sent her flying back, her breath groaning from her lungs and her lightsaber hissing free of Caedus's stomach. From the fight on Nickel One, she had learned the dangers of letting her head snap back on impact. She tucked her chin, then fought to hold it there as she struck the durasteel wall on the far side of the corridor.

Jaina almost wished that she had been knocked unconscious. Stinging needle-thrusts of pain zippered down her spine as her vertebrae rocked beneath the impact, and the synthmesh supporting her half-healed ribs came apart in a single agonizing pop. She dropped to the floor, fighting to keep her pain from carrying her down into numb oblivion, gazing back to where she had surprised Caedus:where Caedus still stood in the doorway, his mouth gaping in surprise, with a thumb-sized scorch hole just below his ribs. But he was still standing.

Jaina's pain-clouded mind did not understand how he could take a lightsaber through the gut and do that. Why didn't Caedus just lie down and die like most people? Didn't he understand she was trying to do him a favor?

Apparently not, because as soon as she began to gasp for breath, his hand shot up, the fingers splayed and pointed in her direction. Jaina barely brought her lightsaber around in time to absorb the forks of blue lightning that came dancing toward her chest.

Then Caedus stepped forward, the Force lightning still shooting from his fingertips. Jaina could not believe what she was seeing. With that wound, he was coming after her. She feinted an attempt to roll to her knees. When Caedus shifted the lightning to block her, she brought her free hand up and gestured toward his shoulder, using the Force to hurl him back through the door. A loud, thudding crash sounded from deep in the shadows, and the voice of an annoyed droid began to complain about the mess.

Jaina was instantly on her feet, springing through the door. But Caedus was just as quick, forgoing his Force lightning in favor of his lightsaber. She saw a fan of crimson light arcing toward her out of the dark side of the pit and spun toward it, blocking and kicking in the same move. Caedus grunted as her boot caught him somewhere above the waist, but behind his crimson blade, he was no more than a gray blur, and it was impossible to tell where the kick had landed.

A black boot heel came shooting under Jaina's guard, driving hard into her sore ribs. She stifled a cry and circled into the shadows, trying to acclimate her eyes to the darkness because it was impossible to sense Caedus in the Force. He fought to keep his advantage, dancing back and forth behind his crimson blade, anticipating her every move-and making her pay for each step with a painful kick or elbow strike.

Knowing that sooner or later one of Caedus's blows could be fatal, Jaina risked a quick look around, searching for something she could Force-hurl. The dark side of the pit was black; she could see nothing in there. And the bright side of the pit was so glaring that she could see only the white, glaring mouth of the fusion incinerator and the conveyor belt that fed it.

Caedus made her pay for the survey in blood, landing a pommel across her cheek that split the flesh and smashed the bone. Jaina countered with a driving knee to the thigh, then a downward slash that Caedus barely turned in time to save his hand.

A flimsiplast crate emerged from the conveyor belt chute beside them. It wasn't much-certainly not heavy enough to do damage-but it was all Jaina had. She gave a little ground, allowing Caedus to force her toward the door so she could let the crate move past him and bring it flying into him from behind.

Then the dark shape of the pit droid came clanking out of the shadows. "Excuse me, please," it said. "I must inspect-"

That was as much as it said before Jaina grasped it in the Force and drew it, stumbling, into Caedus's flank.

The droid was more than heavy enough to send Caedus staggering. He whirled instantly, bringing his blade around at shoulder height. By then Jaina had slipped into the shadows and was lunging forward, her shoulders back but her boot heel driving in under his lightsaber.

Once again, Caedus anticipated her. He spun around, leaning away to protect his vulnerable midsection and bringing his leg up to counterkick. Jaina Force-launched herself into him anyway, whipping her lightsaber around in a down guard to keep his blade at bay. His counterkick landed first, driving into her stomach with a deep sharp ache. Her stomp caught him on the hip and sent him falling onto the conveyor belt.

The flimsicrate burst at the seams as Caedus's shoulder and head came down on top of it. Jaina leapt in to press the attack-and was stunned by how quickly he popped back up. There were more than a dozen used syringes hanging from his shoulder and face. He barely seemed to notice. Letting his lightsaber deactivate and drop to the floor, he reached toward her, making a twisting motion with his hand.

Jaina felt her chin twisting around and went with it, using the Force to accelerate her whole body into a spin, still leaping toward Caedus, bringing her lightsaber around in a clearing arc. She felt the blade meet metal, and the droid's ebony head popped into the air. Then she was on Caedus, slashing at his head with her lightsaber, bringing her boot toe up under his chin when he grew predictable and ducked.

The kick snapped Caedus's head back and sent him tumbling over the conveyor belt. Thinking she had just won the advantage, Jaina dropped her free hand toward the lightsaber he had let fall-then barely saved her arm when the crimson blade snap-hissed to life and went spinning past.

Caedus's hand shot up on the other side of the conveyor belt and caught the hilt; then the rest of his body slowly rose into view. His flesh was bulging around the scorch hole in his abdomen, and there were half a dozen syringes planted in his face almost to the barrels. He was in obvious pain-and he was feeding on it. His eyes were bulging and maniacal, his nostrils red and flaring, his lips drawn back so far it almost appeared that he didn't have any.

Jaina brought her lightsaber to high guard and braced her feet, ready for Caedus's attack.

Instead, he deactivated his blade.

"Jaina, listen to me." There was a throaty, gurgling quality to Caedus's voice, and it seemed obvious that the only thing keeping him on his feet was Force energy-a lot of it. "You need to get out of my way. I'm trying to save Tenel Ka and Allana."

"Sure you are," Jaina scoffed. As she spoke, she extended her Force awareness in all directions, trying to figure out why Caedus was stalling when his body was running out of time. "Just like you saved Isolder."

"Isolder would have made the same choice. In fact, he did." Caedus clipped his lightsaber to his belt, a trust-building gesture that might have had some meaning, had he not been a lying Sith murderer. "Jaina, we don't have time for this."

"So die already."

Fight II Part II:

Jaina launched herself into a Force flip, tumbling over the conveyor belt head-down so that she could strike before Caedus had time to unclip and ignite his lightsaber.

Caedus didn't even try. He simply glanced toward the open mouth of the fusion incinerator. In the next instant Jaina felt herself rushing toward its searing heat, and it took all her Force strength to pull herself aside the half meter that saved her life.

But the durasteel into which she slammed was still scorching, and the pain of impact was nothing compared to the sizzling shock of merely contacting the furnace exterior. She dropped to the floor screaming in rage and anguish, her nostrils filled with the stench of singed hair and charred skin, the black GAG utilities still burning on her back.

Then Jaina opened herself fully to the Force, drawing it in through the power of her emotions-not through her anger or pain, as a Sith might, but through her love of what her brother had been:the teenage jokester who could always find hope in a desperate situation, the questioning warrior who had bested the Yuuzhan Vong warmaster in personal combat, the reluctant champion who had shown a galaxy the way to compassionate victory.

The Force came pouring in from all sides, saturating Jaina and devouring her, filling her with a roaring maelstrom of power, carrying away her pain and leaving in its place the strength not only to survive, but to rise and fight.

Caedus was already on the far side of the conveyor belt, pulling the syringes from his face and shoulder while he staggered toward the exit. Jaina used the Force to depress the control pad, and the door closed in his face.

Caedus whirled with fury in his eyes, but Jaina was already bounding over the conveyor belt, her hair still trailing smoke. He splayed his fingers and sprayed Force lightning at her. Jaina caught it on her lightsaber and whirled past, bringing her blade down where Caedus had been an instant before and leaving a long gouge in the door.

Caedus's blade snapped to life beside her, a crimson fan whirling toward her shoulders. She dropped to her haunches and used her free arm to block the Force-driven snap-kick she knew he would launch at her throat.

Ankle met arm with a sharp crack. What looked like an extra joint appeared in the middle of her forearm, then her wrist flopped over Caedus's leg, a useless throbbing thing no longer under her control.

It didn't matter. Jaina was a dead woman if she didn't win this-maybe even if she did win. She whipped her lightsaber around in a high block and deflected the reverse slash Caedus was bringing down toward her neck.

Then she dived forward, whipping her violet lightsaber at his other foot. Caedus sprang away backward, trying to draw both feet out of harm's way at once, and countered by flipping his own weapon around, bringing it up beneath her belly.

Neither blade cut deep, but both did damage. Jaina felt a searing pain across her abdomen, then felt a terrible uncoiling inside her as something she didn't want to think about bulged into the void left by the slashed muscle.

Jaina's blade tapped Caedus behind the boot, touching just long enough to sever the crucial tendon running up the back of the ankle. He landed in an awkward stagger, nearly falling as his foot flapped and flopped without any control.

Jaina came to a knee facing him and knew Caedus was about to die. He had one arm and one good leg, and they were not even on the same side of the body. He could not pivot and he could not retreat. All she needed was to get past his lightsaber and attack the armless side of his body-before she collapsed herself, or he recovered enough to kill her with one last Force blast.

Jaina sprang.

Caedus tried to turn to meet her, but only staggered, his lightsaber falling to his side as though it were a cane. It wasn't, of course, and his momentum kept him stumbling back toward the bright side of the pit, his eyes filled with rage and exhaustion and despair.

Jaina feinted at his head, then began to whirl toward his armless side, bringing her lightsaber around in a flat, high slash that he could not hope to block. It was a sure kill, one that would land even if she died first-which she thought she might, since the attack would leave her completely open to an avenging counterstrike.

But Caedus seemed to know that Jaina had already killed him, and whatever he had in mind, it was not vengeance. When her blade came around, his lightsaber was still hanging at his side. He was staring up toward the ceiling, his gaze fixed somewhere far beyond the murk overhead, and the only attempt he made to save himself was to take one step back into the light spilling from the furnace.

It would not be enough, Jaina knew. She closed her eyes and felt the lightsaber sink in, felt it slicing through his ribs into his chest. And Jaina felt something in the Force, too-something that made her pulse stop and her chest sink and her blood freeze in her veins. Her brother was reaching out to Tenel Ka, screaming at her through the Force, warning her there was danger, urging her to take Allana and:

Then the blade reached Caedus's heart, and he dropped at her feet, and Jaina felt nothing at all.

Originally posted by ares834
You are? So I ask, do you have any concrete evidence Luke as amping her? Like I mentioned earlier, her energies could just as easily have returned to normal because she was exhausted and could no longer draw on the force so heavily.

No, nothing concrete. But she clearly was being amped and Luke was already projecting illusions into the area so he's the most likely source. A state of oneness doesn't make any sense. Luke helping more than we already know he was, does make sense.

Originally posted by ares834
Someone is bitter. Anyway, if this is a moment of "oneness" it seems to be far more like Zonakin or Kenobi when he defeated the Maul bros as she isn't glowing with force energy or even dying. Rather she is just using the force to a greater extent than typical. So frankly, I don't see the problem. This is just Jaina operating at her best not at her normal level.

Lol BS. Jaina was injured at that point, so how exactly was that her at her best? The amp continues even when she's barely standing, choking on her own burnt flesh and has blurred vision. I highly doubt that she could continue drawing on the Force deeper than she ever had at that point. And she wouldn't just suddenly stop in the middle of the action. An outside amp makes far more sense.

It's not something she can replicate here.

Originally posted by ares834
Of course. But only on the power that he can draw on on his own.

So Mace Shatterpoints her instantly.

No clue what you are talking about.