Dark transfer was a Force power that allowed the user to bring others back from the brink of death or reawaken the dead by drawing upon the dark side to heal. Cade Skywalker was a notable user who instinctively used the ability without being taught. Darth Krayt learned it and succeeded in reviving himself from his own death.
Dark transfer was a Force power that allowed the user to heal someone who was on the brink of death or when used to its full potential, one who had been slain by drawing upon the dark side and applying the Force to shatterpoints. Healing another through such a transfer was regarded by some Jedi as imposing one's own will in defiance of the will of the Force. While tapping into the dark side to heal, arcs of Force lightning appeared around the user, concentrated around their hands. The same lightning could be focused into the flaws of an object or person to destroy the user's target.
At least one being, the Jedi learner Cade Skywalker, manifested the ability rather than learning the technique from another. He first instinctively used his healing abilities when his Jedi Master, Wolf Sazen, was near death after dueling Darth Nihl. Skywalker would draw upon his rage and fear, touching the dark side in his refusal to let someone die. When healing another being through dark transfer, the user perceived wounds or areas of weakness as broken red lines. By pouring the Force into the intersections of those lines, the shatterpoints could be healed; however, the perception of those points could be used to cause harm instead when combined with Force lightning. The more damaged a body was, the harder it would be to use it to heal a target.
Darth Plagueis and Lord Murr uncovered this technique in their lives. As such, Celeste Morne also knew how to apply the Force in this way.
Around 137 ABY, Marasiah Fel was killed by Darth Nihl on Vendaxa when she bodily blocked a lightsaber blow aimed at Cade Skywalker, who was frozen as he remembered the massacre at Ossus. Rejecting Sazen's protests, Skywalker drew upon the dark side and returned Fel from death.
Darth Krayt captured Skywalker in the hopes of healing the Yuuzhan Vong affliction that was slowly killing him. First, Krayt tested Skywalker's healing capabilities; Skywalker purged himself of lethal doses of ixetal cilona, but claimed that he could only heal himself. Krayt brought forward Skywalker's crewmates, Deliah Blue and Jariah Syn, who had been infected with deadly coral seeds by Darth Maladi. Although Skywalker had never previously healed two beings at once, he saved both of his friends from the seeds. Skywalker used his talent to injure Darth Talon with lightning after she attacked him for being impudent to Krayt. When Skywalker accepted Krayt's offer of lessons in using anger for power, he was ordered to heal the damage he caused to Talon.
Celeste Morne's rakghouls infected Skywalker and Azlyn Rae with the rakghoul plague, which was only known to be curable with rakghoul serum. Morne's mention that it was like a virus inspired Skywalker to successfully use his healing ability on himself and Rae.
Morne possessed the Muur Talisman and was slowly losing her control to Karness Muur's spirit within her. One of the first Dark Lords of the Sith, Muur was gifted in healing through the dark side during his mortal lifetime, and he had preserved his own essence in the talisman. Using Morne's body, Muur contacted Krayt and offered to heal the latter's Yuuzhan Vong infection, although it was part of Skywalker and Morne's ruse to lure Krayt to his death. Darth Wyyrlok affirmed to Krayt that the ancient Sith was said to know the art of dark side healing. At the meeting of the two dark lords, Muur began to heal Krayt; in the process, Krayt gained an initial understanding of how to utilize the ability.
After Morne's Force lightning mortally wounded Azlyn Rae, Skywalker ignored her desire to be allowed to die and forcibly sustained her life through dark transfer. He brought her to Droo Rawk, a Force healer who was married to Skywalker's uncle, Nat Skywalker, then known as "Bantha" Rawk. Cade secured the aid of his uncle and aunt by falsely claiming Rae did not want to die.
Cade Skywalker initially believed he could only utilize his talent for healing by drawing upon the dark side. The Force ghost of his ancestor Luke Skywalker urged the young man to be at peace with himself, as did Sazen, so that Cade could heal with the light side instead of using the dark. When Cade attempted to use the power as he had before to save Blue from the Embrace of Pain, he repeatedly failed and only caused her further pain. Sazen urged Skywalker to trust in the Force and the power of the light side to heal Blue instead of continuing his failed attempts with the dark. Skywalker was successful, and he used the light side again instead of dark transfer when he healed his mother, Morrigan Corde, after she was poisoned.
Although Krayt had been murdered by Darth Wyrrlok, Krayt told Skywalker that experiencing death had given him an understanding of how to use dark transfer to heal or to kill; Krayt had revived himself from his own death. The Sith lord believed that Skywalker would understand his vision for the One Sith through experiencing the same death and self-revival. As such Krayt killed Cade Skywalker and resurrected him while showing a vision of the darkly glorious future of dark side supremacy if Cade summited. Skywalker rejected this ideal and used the opportunity to finally defeat Krayt while the emperor was distracted. However, Krayt's Force ghost transcended his psychical form and taunted Skywalker, saying that he would either resurrect himself again or would claim Skywalker's body for his own through transfer essence, which he had learned through Darth Andeddu and Karness Muur. Skywalker prevented Krayt from using either power by sending the Sith's corpse into Coruscant's sun.
In the cut story Emanations of Darkness, Jaalib Brandl demonstrated an ability very similar to Dark transfer. In a climactic duel with his former flame, Fable Astin, Jaalib inadvertently forces his love from the top of a tall precipice. Fable's body is badly shattered on the rocks below, and she is dangerously near death. However, Jaalib cannot bear to have his one true love die at his own hand. Harnessing the power of the dark side, Jaalib saved Fable from death and healed her, but at great cost to himself, causing him to be captured by New Republic forces.