From space, Malachor seems no more than a lifeless ball of ash. In the center of an open crater, however, lies the ancient Sith Temple. This colossal pyramid of black stone is the relic of a disastrous battle between the forces of darkness and light thousands of years ago.

Though the surface of Malachor has a breathable atmosphere, the air is dead still, and there is no sign of life. The caldera housing the Temple is a tableau of the terrible struggle that took place here so many millennia ago. Scattered through the causeways and crumbling boulders are the petrified figures of the foregone combatants, their hands raised eternally against whatever cataclysm took the life from their bodies. Some still grasp their Jedi weapons, though most likely the life is gone from them too. The pallid white light of the sun spreads unhindered through the crater, but it does little to illumine the intrinsic darkness of the stones.

The Sith Temple is not a place of the light side. It is said the very stones react to the touch of the dark side. The pyramid itself is seemingly inaccessible, though its blocked entrance is associated with an old saying: “Two must lift these stones, no more, no less.” Despite its undeniable age, the crater is littered with signs of a more recent calamity; ash and debris, columns toppled outwards from the Temple, broken arches. It is as though the millennial dust stirred, briefly, then returned to its repose under the sun.

The air was deathly still as Karracca and Spokk looked around as the ashen covered landscape around them, the looming pyramidal temple about 500 metres away. Signs that others, possibly looking for a secret cash of Kyber Crystals as they were, had been here before them. They grunted at each other in their native tongue and set off together down the causeway towards the vast set of structures. Blackhawk and Kalen were going to go and fuel up the ship at the nearest service station and return in a few hours.

They passed the petrified ashen states of those that had died here those thousands of years ago. Plunder of any valuables or rare metals from the site had been ongoing ever since that fateful day so long ago, and for the lost part, the area around the temple had been clean. But what brought the two wookies here wasn't melted blows of scrap metal or souvenirs. They were here for a long forgotten cache of kyber Crystals that were rumored to be buried somewhere here. The story was that a mad Jedi had once buried a stash of about 100 different Kyber Crystals in or near the temple roughly 600 years before. The story had been a campfire or barroom tale that people had told for generations.

Karracca being nearly 300 years old had heard this rumor and variants of it countless times over the years. But Spokk had a found a vague handdrawn map from roughly the same time period as the fabled Kyber deposition by the paranoid Jedi. By chance Kalen, Blackhawk, Spokk and Karracca had been sitting around chatting and Spokk had mentioned the map. Kalen had been talking about ideas for making credits and his future plans as usual and Spokk had pulled out his datalink and showed them all the map, which was from an eclectic manuscript found in a tome produced by a small forgotten offshoot of the Order. Spokk told Kalen that if he wanted to make money, there's likely be a bunch of Kyber crystals buried wherever the map led to. To which Karracca had initially scoffed, but as soon as he had looked at the map, the rotund old Wookies eyes had lit up with excitement. He instantly thought he knew some of the landmarks on the map, and growled with gleeful motivation as he wiggled and jiggled himself out of the booth they were seated in and headed back to the ship. That was a day, and 6 parsecs ago.

After walking about halfway down the long  causeway, Karracca stopped and clicked his tongue, a universal wookie combat signal to halt and be alert.

“You heard that too?” Spokk said quietly.

Karracca grunted an acknowledgment “I also smell it” the old wookie sniffed the air. They weren't alone.