Flying Blind (Novus/3597 BBY)

[Rugs]

“It’s this way,” the Lannik grunted as a door hissed open. “Boss’ll be meetin’ with ya right down the hall. Third door on the left, just follow the hall. Can’t miss it.”

“Thanks.” The door was already halfway closed behind Locke as he muttered the words, leaving the doorman behind. His stomach fluttered as he walked, alone, down the dimly lit hall. Thinking logically, he could see no reason to be nervous about the meeting. He’d put weeks of work into the job to this point. Weeks of tracking, infiltrating, scheming--everything to work his way into the Unseen and build the necessary trust to get the meeting he now walked to.

It wasn’t always easy. Never is, though, he thought has he stuffed his hands into his coat pockets. But I’ve been here before. Third door on the left. It hissed open as Locke turned to it, and down the hallway that followed.

This was different, though. Jazen had been knighted before Locke left for this mission, and was off tending to his own Jedi matters. Locke had friendly contacts here on the Smuggler’s Moon, but none that could help him with this job. Republic forces would stick out like a lightsaber in a blackout, and there weren’t many to spare as the Republic waged devastating war against the Sith Empire.

Locke was, for the first time in a long time, completely alone. It was unsettling, in its way.

But she’s here. He saw her a few days ago. She was unmistakable, even though every Republic intelligence report he’d seen in year and some change said she was dead. And he was certain that Sith Lords didn’t show up as Force ghosts.

And if they did, what would Novus’ ghost be doing on Nar Shaddaa, of all places? Yet he knew what he saw. But had she noticed him, spying on that meeting? She was a hard one to fool. Maybe that’s what set his hair standing on the back of his neck and had his stomach churning like a speeder engine with the wrong fuel mix.

“No time to worry ‘bout all that,” he told himself. Just gotta deal with what’s ahead of you.

The doors to the speeder unloading back rumbled open and Locke stepped through. He blended in well, in an unassuming spacer’s jacket made of dark nexu leather, and a working man’s sturdy pants and scuffed boots to go along with it. A blaster pistol hung at his waste. For once, Locke was without his sabers. He’d been searched thoroughly before coming in, and it already took some considerable telepathic effort convincing the guards to let him bring his pistol.

Besides, with the Force on his side, how much more could he need for a simple arrest?

All the disguises in the world wouldn’t matter in a moment, anyway. Locke’s target was in the middle of the bay, unloading some heavy-looking metal crates from the back of a worn-out twin engine speeder. Locke’s eyes narrowed. Just work Nemsee. Don’t make it personal.

“Tekt,” he called once he drew close, in as jovial a tone as he could muster, “long time no see.”

The Trandoshan, paused and stood, stretching to his full height. He dwarfed Locke. Mechanical wrists whiired as he dropped the crate with a loud thud.

“Now, what are you doin’ out here, old friend?” Locke asked. “Far as I know, you’re supposed to be in a jail station--470-B, if I recall right. Not all the way out here.”

“So how’s about you and I take a trip, hm?” Locke put a hand on his pistol, but didn’t draw it. “It’d be easier for both of us if you just came along with me. Wouldn’t want to uh...” he pointed at Tekt’s prosthetic hands, “mess those up again, if you know what I’m saying.”

The Trandoshan growed--a low, animalistic sound. “You think I didn’t know you were here, Jedi?” He asked. Locke suddenly became aware of more presences, with bad intentions, coming in through the far side.

“You think we’d be here together if I didn’t want to be?”

Locke suddenly realized he should have brought his lightsabers with him.

[Neology]

[googlefont="News Cycle"]

Lidah lay supine across the back seat of her speeder, door open, legs dangling. Her chrono chimed softly – precisely twenty standard minutes before her scheduled meeting with the Unseen’s representative. Exhaling a cloud of bluish smoke, she sat up and considered the compound before her. Duracrete and beetle-black glass. Two exterior doors with security checkpoints, a large freight bay. Hardly impenetrable. Third party? That would make sense. You didn’t saddle yourself with a spooky name like The Unseen and then go and make yourself easy to find. Still, she wouldn’t like to crack it alone. It wont come to that. Not unless something went wrong, and by then her employer would be long gone. Flicking the burning ember of her marcan cigarette away, Lidah got out and shouldered a heavy bag. Soil samples, nanites … Strange business for a gang but she wasn’t blind to the value. And she and Vance needed the money to stay afloat, at least until other business panned out. The Lannik guard insisted on checking her weapons. Lidah persuaded him otherwise with a growing feeling of disquiet, a yawning pit beginning to open beneath her feet. Someone else had already poked around in that man’s head, and recently. Acknowledging the guard’s directions with a smile, she started down the hall and cast her senses wide. Locke. That was bad. She knew the Jedi had spotted her the other night. He hadn’t acted on the information, so far she she could tell. Now this. A trap? The halls were strangely empty, a cluster of life in the freight room. Lidah made directly for the security office, slicing the lock in a few pensive moments. She couldn’t sense anyone inside but you never knew for certian. If Locke was here, why not others? The door slid open with a pneumatic hiss. Empty for now. Good enough. Blue-tinged screens showed camera feeds all over the building. Lidah sank into the synth-leather chair and winked out everything but the feeds from the freight bay. Sure enough, it did seem like a trap. Just one for someone else. No audio but the body language looked distinctly unfriendly ”Motherfucker.” Her being in this room meant the deal was already blown. Rolling back from the console, she held up both hands and fried the electronics with force lightning until the fumes and ozone forced her coughing back into the hall. Maybe she could salvage something from this mess. She’d never find out what, if anything, Locke had sent back to the Republic if he died tonight.

[Rugs]

Three shadows moved on the speeder bay’s far wall, half-hidden in the shadows. Locke felt them, more than saw them, as Tekt reached for something hidden beneath his coat. Another one, back on the railing. Locke’s senses alone picked out the other Unseen, who he only guessed was keeping a weapon trained on his back.

A bad situation, but not an impossible one.

“Come on, Tekt, there’s no need for that,” he said slowly. “There’s an easier way to do this.”

“If you wanted an easier way Jedi, then you should have come with friends.” Venom dripped from the emphasized title. “But you won’t be leaving here wi-”

:Locke decided he’d heard enough. “Alright, fine, Tekt. “ The pistol was in his hands in a flash, pointed square at the Trandoshan’s chest. “You don’t want this fight, buddy. Remember what happened last time.”

Tekt snarled, revealing a mouth full of sharp teeth. He dropped his weapon--a hold-out blaster that had to look hilariously small in his large hands--as he started to lift his hands.

“Of course, Jedi,” he said. “But you’re the only one here that thinks I would forget that lesson.”

Locke felt a surge of danger, but no sooner had the warning come than an immense, painful screeching filled his ears. It went beyond a merely loud noise, and seemed to claw into his mind itself. The Force slipped from his grasp like sand through his fingers, as his own pistol clattered to the ground.

Sonic... he started, until his surroundings jolted unnaturally. The pain blossoming from the side of his face told some part of his mind that he’d been punched before he crashed into a mechanic’s cart and crumpled to the ground in a heap.

Locke’s vision swam as he staggered back to his feet. His head throbbed, echoing with that accursed noise as Tekt laughed at him. He tasted blood at the side of his mouth. Still, through sheer force of will, he found the Force again and desperately clung to it at the Trandoshan closed in on him.

No time to pull the blaster to him, and he didn’t trust his reflexes in hand-to-hand combat--especially not against a giant walking lizardman--while shaking off the sonic blast’s after effects. He still had another trick up his sleeve, though.

Tekt’s advance halted abruptly, and the Trandoshan rose off the ground, against this own will. But before Locke could do anything else, another damned blast hit him, wailing and screaming and tearing the Force away as his concentration shattered.

Tekt landed like a cat, and loomed over Locke. A finger of fear chilled Locke’s spine.

“Nice try, Jedi,” Tekt said. A mechanical hand closed around Locke’s throat. A meaty knew crashed like a battering ram into his stomach, forcing the air from his lungs. Locke felt himself being lifted from the ground as a second hand clenched against his throat.

He struggled, shaking and trying to force the lizard’s hands open, but he couldn’t.

“See, I know your tricks, Jedi,” Tekt said. “They’re not hard to deal with, if you take the right precautions. And especially if you have a Jedi with his head head too far up his own ass to see the trap he’s walking into.

Locke’s vision started to darken. Tekt squeezed his throat harder.

“You should’ve killed me that first time,” Tekt said. “I won’t make the same mistake.”

[Neology]

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She didn’t know the floor plan and the hallways all looked the same. Even so, she didn’t need the Force to tell her when things must have boiled over in the bay. The high pitched discharge of a sonic weapon, more felt than heard through the walls. She had little personal experience on either side of those guns but she knew how they worked in theory. And that a lightsaber could not deflect the beam. So. She figured low odds that Nemsee was firing that thing. Someone had done their Jedi-murdering homework alright. She could still run … The missing security room guard came around the corner, saw her, raised a disrupter rifle smoothly from the waist. The doubt emptied out of her mind as she forced it into his. The bell of the weapon wavered and the shot went wide. Lidah was upon him, lightsaber hissing briefly to life. She took off a leg and kept running, blade winking back out. Screams chased her down the hallway. Finally, the bay. She forced her breathing to calm, switching on the stealth field generator on the back of her belt. What is going on here? Less men than one might expect. One huge trandoshan. Jedi Master Locke Nemsee, well on to the business of expiring messily by the look of him. Right. That chose a target for her. Moving as quickly as she dared to without spoiling the SFG’s effect, Lidah moved up behind the thug with the sonic blaster. She drew a long envenomed knife and brought it in low, up under the ribs, through the lung, scraping the pericardial sac. Teeth sank into the muscle of her bare forearm, drawing blood. A few heartbeats later the man shivered and died. Still alive, Nemsee? Dropping the body, she rolled one of her saber hilts across the floor and bent to retrieve her knife.

[Rugs]

Darkness, like vignettes around the corners of old photographs, crept into Locke’s vision. He struggled desperately, but even his adrenaline-fueled attempts to free himself were useless against the Trandoshan’s grip. Locke’s hands could not pry Tekt’s robotic stranglehold from his throat, and desperate kicks against the lizard man’s thickly-muscled core generated little more than amusement.

He reached for the Force every way he knew how, but panic and the incessant screeching in his head denied his grasps.

“Jedi, Jedi,” Tekt laughed as he tightened his grip further, “this is so unbecoming. Where’s the poise — the dignity?” Again, his hold tightened, and Locke found himself unable to gain tiny gulps of breath.

It was a bad situation, to say the least.

The situation grew worse when something that felt quite like a starfreighter slammed into his stomach, forcing up the last bits of oxygen — with fresh spittle to accompany it — in an unsightly coughing fit. Locke was vaguely aware that he’d been punched, but could hardly do anything about it.

He strained again for the Force, feeling it but not quite grasping it — like fingertips brushing against something just out of reach.

Something clanged behind him. Tekt looked up, sounding perplexed.

Ping. Ping. Ping.

Locke strained to look at the ground. The little metal cylinder rolling across the bay floor was, perhaps the best thing he’d ever seen in his life. It was a lightsaber.

“Hey, what the fuck is going on over there?”

Locke only vaguely recognized the Trandoshan’s words. Tekt’s group loosened slightly as he saw one of his goons falling to the ground. Sweet, disgusting Nar Shaddaa air rushed into Locke’s lungs, and with it, the Force into his being.

Tekt noticed his folly a moment too late, as the powder blue blade sprang to life a moment before the hilt slapped into Locke’s palm. To his credit, the Trandoshan dropped Locke quickly enough to evade the wild, angry slash at his arm. He started to duck back, then flew back as a furor-fueled blast of the Force erupted from Locke’s palm.

Rejoining the Force after being separated from it for even a few moments felt like opening his eyes for the first time. He could feel horror wafting from Tekt, and terrified confusion drifting from the goons with regular blasters on the far side of the bay.

So too, could he feel a presence he’d not felt in years. It belonged to a woman who was supposed to be dead, and yet Locke knew she was there. He turned, seeing a bloody knife remove itself from the corpse on the ground.

Adrenaline dulled his mind to the confusion he should have felt. Why here? Why save me?

Why are you not dead?

Not one of those thoughts crossed his mind as he casually reflected a blaster bolt from one of the Unseen thugs back into the wall near the man who’d fired it.

“Kill the other three,” he said simply, flatly. “The lizard is mine.”

Tekt, who’d gone crashing into a stack of crates, was rising to his feet as Locke turned around again. The Jedi’s head was pounding, throbbing as the Force screamed into him.He’d been hurt too much, been brought too close to death’s door to just walk away as if nothing were wrong.

But one matter remained to finish first.

“You were right, Tekt,” Locke called, though the frivolity in his voice was gone. “I should have killed you back then.” The Trandoshan fired blaster bolts at him. Locke knocked them away. “But everyone, even a piece of filth like you deserves a second chance.”

In an instance, a Force-powered leap brought Locke before the Trandoshan. He saw his parents, driven to the ends of wits, cut down by the very beast standing before him. A vision, burned into his mind during his Trial of Spirit. Anger, hatred, welled within him.

This is the way to the Dark Side, some voice warned. Locke did not care.

“You should have made yours count.”

Two clean strokes once again parted the Trandoshan from his hands. Another severed his legs at the knees. Locke’s hand stretched out behind him, fingers splayed wide as he tore the speeder from his maintenance station and sent it hurling at his helpless foe.

It crashed Tekt, and nearly through the duracrete wall behind him. Locke felt Tekt’s life wink out in the Force. The trail of splattered blood the speeder left behind as it scraped along the floor was enough to affirm the deed, even if the Force hadn’t.

The Force receded from him. A sudden exhaustion swept over Locke. His temples felt on the verge of bursting from the way his brain pounded within his skull. He turned to look at the woman again.

Darth Novus.

His vision seemed to swim.

“Aren’t you supposed to be de-”

The last thing he heard was the lightsaber blade receding as he crumpled to the ground.

[Neology]

Orders? That’s rather presumptuous, don’t you think? But those three did have to die, despite her natural inclination to argue. Perfectly timed, a bolt fizzled the edge of the field. Lidah remembered to move then, attention shifting from the strange and swiftly reversing tableau of Jedi and … Whoever this Tekt person was. It sounded – no, felt - very personal. But it had taken the Empire’s very best interrogation drugs and Vance’s unexpected intrusion to crack Locke Nemsee’s cool those years ago. Lidah crossed to the other side of the bay, SFG field flickering out entirely as the other lightsaber came to life in her hands. Somebody had been stingy with the credits, maybe, believing one sonic weapon was enough for this trap. And it would have been, she supposed, had her meeting been scheduled just a little bit later. Stalking forward, deflecting bolts, Lidah dispatched each of the gunmen with little fanfare, confirming the deaths with wide decapitating strikes. There were no screams to follow her this time. Just the trandoshan’s, brief though they were. She stared at Locke, wondering what he might call that later. Self-defense or murder? The former, unquestionably … Until the limbs started coming off. Until he got angry. Aren’t you supposed to be de- Until he suddenly shut up, that was almost a reassuring return to form. A smile began to tug up one corner of her mouth as she slowly turned around. ”You believed the reports? Oh. Oh shit.” Locke had collapsed beneath that big nexu skin coat, suddenly deprived of that animating cleverness that she found so arresting. Peering down at his face, she thought she could see where the creases would be when he was an old man. She knew it would be better not to move him but there wasn’t much choice. ”Could be more of them, so we have to go.” Lidah spoke to deaf ears and wheeled over a dolly, flicking the crates and speeder parts off it it with small, frustrated bursts of telekinetic force. Gingerly, she loaded the unconscious Jedi onboard. Turning, she pulled open the bay doors, the locking mechanisms screeching in protest. It looks clear. Lidah pushed the dolly out, dialing on her commlink with her other hand. Vance answered on the second ring. ”Hey. The deal’s blown. I’m on my way back, bringing a guest. Tell Garland I need my room and a doctor ready when we land. Okay?” She waited for confirmation and cut the link, hoping it wasn’t traced. Arriving back at her speeder, Lidah reclined the passenger seat and awkwardly maneuvered Nemsee into it. The briefest telepathic nudge confirmed that he was still alive, that she wasn’t wasting her time. For once, she was grateful for Nar Shaddaa’s complete lack of traffic laws as she gunned it on the way back to Garlands’s.

[Fromikeable]

Vance's evening had been remarkably relaxed. With his work for the day done, he'd retreated to the higher, more private suites as Garland's had opened to the Smuggler Moon's public, the lower levels filling with patrons of every kind. He didn't mind living above a business, but truth betold, he was glad he and Lidah had been given rooms high enough up not to hear the din of commerce below them. Thus he'd been enjoying his night in, sprawled out on a couch with a movie playing on a large holoscreen, a blanket draped across his legs and pillows surrounding him.

Then had come the call. Before it had even concluded, he'd literally dropped everything, leaving behind a rug covered in chips as he'd gotten dressed and set out.

"Tell Garland I need my room and a doctor ready when we land. Okay?”

"Okay." By this point in life, Vance had learned to forgo hesitation in favor of thinking as he moved. When Lidah called with a request that direct, not even disguised behind code, hesitance was no longer affordable.

By the time she arrived around the back of the casino, Vance was waiting with a doctor in tow, a path cleared and kept discrete to her suite via security, and the promise from Garland that the neighboring rooms would be evicted and empty by the time they arrived. The owner had been less than receptive to the idea of emptying some of his most profitable rooms, but Vance had made the urgency clear, the older man had been forced to come around. As the speeder finally came to a stop, Vance was already moving to open the back door, peering inside.

His heart skipped a beat, forcing him to duck his head out and stare at Lidah for a second. Immediately zipping back in, he only wasted one extra second to confirm the face he'd seen.

"Force help him..." Suddenly incredibly careful, Vance was precise in his control of the Force as he raised his hand, Locke's limp form lifting off the seat and into the casino beyond. Walking beside him, Vance went so far as to keep his arms under the Jedi Master's body the whole way up, even in the elevator. His expression was unmistakable; surprise being overrun with worry. Was he okay? Why was he here? How had Lidah found him? Had they fought? Were they still enemies? Would he be okay? When w-

Biting his tongue to silence his own mental speech, Vance just opened the door to Lidah's suite with his foot, directing the doctor with a flick of his chin. Immediately, the man ran to the bedroom, clearing the mattress of its bedding. With a feather touch, Vance gently directed Locke down onto the fabric, finally slumping when the Force no longer had to support him.

He had a million questions, but right now wasn't the time. The doctor was already scurrying to his patient, and he didn't even need to inspect Lidah's presence to know that this was serious.

So with a glance to her and a short stare at Locke, he shuffled. "I'll, uh... be next door." The concern in his voice was thick as could be, but with a reluctant pace, he left the suite.

[Rugs]

Four hours later

The world was a shapeless blur. Locke’s eyes squeezed shut again, then reopened. A blob of light. Some unrecognizable mass of grey around it. Something steadily beeped in the background. He reached for consciousness, but no it wasn’t quite there.

He slipped away to sleep again...

Three hours later

Locke surged awake with a sharp inhalation. Visions of his last surroundings flooded his mind. The speeder bay. Tekt. Goons with guns and a Force-damned sonic blaster. He bolted upright, or would have, if his body hadn’t sharply protested.

Instead, he lay back down on the small bed he found himself in, drawing a shaky breath. Tekt was dead. He’d killed him. Violently. The shame that came from that wasn’t as strong as it perhaps should have been.

He remembered the attacks, the pain as the sonic weapon tore into his head and as Tekt nearly crushed his throat.

Novus. Locke picked his head up and looked around. He was in a small room. Unadorned, save a counter and some tools on one side, and his small bed on another.

He remembered passing out, now, no one else but her in the speeder bay with him.

He remembered another situation like this. Seven years ago. Nex Humas, after Jazen had, in a fit of panic, blown up a spaceport on Vjun. He’d passed out there, too, and awoken in an Imperial prison where Novus proceeded to put forth considerable effort into cracking him.

Panic spiked in Locke’s gut. Had he been tricked again? He could see nothing in here, no window of the outside world. No chronometer to see the time, no friendly face to tell him he was safe. Nothing but the beep, beep, beep of the heartbeat monitor connected to him--that was accelerating as he came to the grips with the knowledge that he might, once again, be a prisoner.

Even the medical treatment was little immediate comfort — what use was he to the Sith dead?

He could feel others in the facility. He could feel her, somewhere nearby. And another, familiar presence that he, in his half-panicked state, couldn’t put a finger on.

“Oh no,” he half-moaned, half-whined as he set his head down on the padding. “Not again.”

[Neology]

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The initial scramble was bad. Garland himself looming on his private balcony as they came in, disapproval and, much worse, curiosity in his eyes. Vance biting his tongue, a temporary forbearance. Nodding vaguely later, she struggled through the nimble-fingered doctor’s endless questions as they walked, as they waited in the lift between floors. What happened? She answered with evasive vagueness Shot in the back with a sonic blaster at least twice. Strangled by a cyberneticlly enhanced assailant. Less vivid be no safer were the mundane questions: blood type, allergies, other details. Some she could answer, having briefly handled Locke’s files during his imprisonment and interrogation. Most she could not. Then she was heading downstairs again to make her excuses to Garland. It was the work of hours and more credits than she would have liked to charm him, to wake that cat-stuffed-with-canary grin. He thought he had something on her now. Not much to be done about that – though she tried to steer him carefully through the expected narrative. The man she had gone through so much trouble and expense to aid had to be current or run away Sith, not Jedi. Less tempting, worse reprisals. Eventually, the doctor tracked her down again. He stitched her arm back together and saddled her with a bottle of antibiotics. While he worked, he explained what to watch out for with his other patient. Most of it went over her head. At least Jedi don’t usually stay down for long ... Though perhaps her experience on the matter was skewed. Up in her own room, Lidah showered and slept, though not enough to feel rested. She was halfway through a breakfast of flavorless ration bar, water, and the first of those chalky tablets when she realized Nemsee was awake. She dwelt on that thought for a long moment. The time for clever banter had slipped out the door, leaving her with very little context in which to speak to the man. They’d always been enemies, before. He probably thought they still were – undercover seemed much more likely than free, even to her. And it had been her plan to begin with. Pulling on a fuzzy dressing gown and slippers, Lidah headed down the hall to see what, exactly, her money and effort had got her. The room was small and clean and free of monitoring devices. And yet more expensive than a weekend at the best core world hotels. She’d have to find a new buyer for those soil samples, very soon. ”Good morning, Locke. You can speak freely here, though you probably don’t believe me, eh?” Lidah sank down into a shabby chair, eyes following from patient, to plastic tubing, to the various machines. The monitors seemed a bit perturbed, but not yet dangerously so. ”Were you serious? About second chances?”

[Rugs]

The door hissed open, and in came Novus. Locke’s breath caught in his throat. His presence retreated hastily into itself as he tried to hide from her in the Force. The spike hurried pace of his heartbeat monitor betrayed his efforts to keep his outward demeanor calm.

What did it matter, though? She’d seen the veneer of calm break before. Why bother with the charade when his mind was still too fogged from a fresh awakening to put forth his best effort?

”Good morning, Locke. You can speak freely here, though you probably don’t believe me, eh?”

Locke said nothing by way of answer, only watching, or perhaps his gaze lingering curiously on her attire as she slid casually into a chair. She was, on the whole, much more casual than she had been in that prison. Or on Alderaan. Or anywhere that he’d seen her, now that he thought on it.

Again, his mind rolled over everything he knew about the current situation. He’d known she was there. She almost certainly knew he knew. She’d had a prime chance to kill him, if she wanted to, but didn’t.

And he knew from personal experience that Imperial prisons weren’t places for casual chairs and dressing gowns, nor soft beds like the one he found himself lying in.

Why? That was the curiosity that remained.

”Were you serious? About second chances?”


His brow furrowed. “I don’t believe I’ve ever been tortured by anyone in a gown,” he said simply, stupidly.

He forced himself to sit up, gritting his teeth against the aches as he adjusted the padding and pillows behind him for support. “Second chances...” he said, voice drifting off thoughtfully. “Ah, right. You must have heard what I said to the lizard.” He’d been so singularly focused on killing Tekt he hadn’t given any thought to what she might hear.

“Well,” he paused, considering how carefully he might choose his words. She had given him permission to speak freely. “You were supposed to be dead. That’s not just according to the news, but some of the best reports my best intelligence sources could get. But here you are.”

Locke coughed and grimaced at the pain in his core that lingered after. “Seems like as much a second chance as any, I guess.” He watched her for a long, quiet moment, storm-grey eyes thoughtful.

“But what about you?” He crossed his arms over his chest. “This is the second time I’ve found myself in your custody, after all.”

[Neology]

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Torture. The word lingered in the recycled air, heavy and ugly. ”That’s what you think I did to you?” Lidah’s voice went very soft, her brow creased. It explained the strange roiling of his aura, uncomfortable to witness. When she thought of Sith torture, it was almost always the bloody kind. Useless and uninspired. And yet … She could remember a different cell and a much shorter period of captivity. ”I see.” She leaned back in her chair, flexed and relaxed her hands, self-consciously trying to dampen the intensity of her bearing. ”It looked different to me then. Honor or – or mercy, even. For a worthy enemy.” It wasn’t an excuse or a defense. Even from this vantage she could see no better or kinder way through the past. Except, perhaps, to have killed him at the spaceport. Terribly wasteful, that would have been. A lot of work went into making a Jedi – and he had seemed like a good one. Made the right call with that noxious, sweating defector anyway. What had changed between then and now? Would that man have smeared Tekt the trandoshan all over the freight bay last night? Locke struggled with his pillows. She pretended not to notice. ”Do you think you need one, Locke? You aren’t my prisoner. You can leave whenever you like - though I would prefer that you stay until you can walk out under your own power. “As to anything else … I’ll answer your questions in as much detail as I can, if you’ll answer one of mine. I know you saw me the other day. Did you report it yet?”

[Rugs]

”Do you think you need one, Locke?”

Locke thought the answer was an obvious thing, or he had until the Arkanian woman sitting across from him asked the question. Well of course. She was a Sith. He was a Jedi. What else could be be, if not her prisoner?

Honor, his mind replayed the words she’d spoken a few moments prior. Mercy, even. For a worthy enemy.

But she spoke again, affirming that he was not a prisoner, and was free to leave of his own volition, physical condition allowing.

“Lady, we might be here a while if you answer all the questions I’ve got for you,” he said. He felt himself relaxing, perhaps for the first time since waking up. Maybe this was all a trap. Maybe she wanted him to spill his guts about some sensitive something that he knew and she wanted to find out.

But those drugs she’d given him the pleasure of experiencing those years ago were powerful, and in his current state, he didn’t know that he could resist them. So why go through the trouble if there’s an easier way? he wondered.

Maybe she’s telling the truth? What reason did she have to lie? And even she wasn’t, what could he do about it?

Locke sat in silence for moment that stretched just to the edge of discomfort, and decided to trust her.

"No," he said simply. "I didn't report you." He shrugged slightly, and huffed a gentle laugh. "I suspected you knew I saw you though. It'd be disappointing after all our little spy games if you hadn't."

Another moment. It felt strange, speaking like that to a former enemy.

“Alright then,” he said. “Since I woke up I’ve been going over what happened over and over. You saved me. But why? That’s what I can’t work out in my head.”

Locke frowned, then looked to Novus, a stupid grin spreading across his face. “Wasn’t just so you could bring me back here and look at me was it?”

[Neology]

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… Might be here a while ... Lidah quirked a brow, one hand twirling open and flat, hanging limp from the arm of her chair. As if to ask: do you have anywhere else to be right now, Nemsee? Of course, it was more than likely that he did. A Jedi’s time was always spoken for, tracked and counted. How long until someone missed him? ”Oh. Good. I’m so pleased that you aren’t disappointed.” She kept a straight face but reluctant amusement crept into her voice. Some of the tension Lidah carried in her shoulders and other joints began to slowly wick away. This was something like familiar ground and she wanted to believe him when he said her cover wasn’t blown. "I can only ask that you wont make that report when you leave here." Stupid, perhaps, to leave it up to trust. She knew he was a liar but the thought of starting over again was worse. ”I wanted to leave after Taris, Vance and me. The woman that is now Empress wanted an unopposed, quick rise to that lofty position. So, I asked her to kill me.” The details of the tale didn’t matter so she let them slip freely. He already had her dead to rights with a positive ID. Even if the Republic never came looking, certain Jedi might. Worse, certain Sith. ”Turns out, having a force bond ripped off you makes a pretty convincing show.” Lidah let her gaze wander briefly with the memory of that peculiar agony, weave and weft of the self fraying under a dull knife. Later, the first breath of real freedom had been worth it a thousand times. Locke was right in one way, though. There wasn’t much else to look at in that tiny room. Lidah acknowledged that shit eating grin of his with a tiny shake of her head. ”Though I’m sure you’ll turn some very interesting shades of purple, I didn’t know you’d be there. When I realized, I thought it was a trap. It seems like that was only about half right?” She paused, offering him a chance to confirm or deny that guess. ”Didn’t think I’d have any chance of endearing myself to the Unseen after I slagged their security room. “That just left you. I didn’t help all that much. Brought you here, paid for that.” She nodded to indicate the bed, the equipment. A tank would have been better but they left a bigger footprint.

[Rugs]

Taris.

The planet summoned unwelcome memories for Locke, and likely for Novus. And probably millions of other people spread across the Galaxy.

“Taris,” he said quietly, under his breath. “What a mess.”

An unyielding horde of white monsters, ravenous for Sith and Republic flesh alike. Locke remembered a chevron of bombers in the sky, unleashing an incendiary firestorm by his command. How many dead?

The Republic abandoned the world. The tried to tame it, but were forced to do the same a few short months later.

“I don’t blame you,” he muttered. “Though I don’t know if I’d ask to die.” He offered a sympathetic look at her mention of a Force bond being torn away. While he could offer verbal condolences, the experience wasn’t one Locke was familiar with. The one major bond he shared, with Jazen, was healthy and well, even if stretched to quietness by distance. Others, with friends, remained in place.

Still, he furrowed his brow at the information Novus was revealing. Her death had been a show, and if she’d asked the Empress to do it. She must be in on it. Locke’s eyes narrowed in thought.

You’re trusting me a lot here, he thought, meeting her eyes for a moment. Then again, maybe she didn’t have much choice. Perhaps, for once, Locke was the cat, and she the mouse.

Or maybe you’re still looking at this wrong, Nemsee.

“Oh, it was a trap,” he said, still mindful of the flow of conversation. “Woulda gotten me, too, if you hadn’t been there.” It was strange feeling gratitude toward a former foe, and yet, there it was.

Locke’s eyes followed Novus’ nod to the equipment behind him, which he probably owed some sort of Festival of Life gift. “Hey, you took out that fucker with the sonic blaster,” he said, turning back to her. “Good enough for me.”

A quiet settled, and Locke furrowed his brows in thought. There were so many question, tossing around in his mind, like a speeder trapped in a cyclone.

“Vance left with you?” he asked suddenly. His senses relaxed from the coil he’d placed them in, and there, somewhere near, was that familiar presence he hadn’t been able to identify upon waking up. “How has he been?”

Some warmth crept into Locke’s voice for the question. He didn’t know Vance as well as he would have liked, but the kid had a good head on his shoulders. It was a shame the Order failed him. “And,” he paused, lifting a brow as an amused smile touched his face, “what was the Sith Order like? I can hardly imagine him fitting in there. If most of the Sith are like the ones I’ve met during the war.

“You know,” he made claws with his hands, emulating someone shooting lightning, “hate, rage, infinite power of the Dark Side — that kind of stuff.”

[Neology]

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Lidah acknowledged the Jedi’s gratitude with an uncomfortable one shoulder shrug. She had been very close to leaving him there. Wouldn’t that have been smarter? … Maybe, though she liked this feeling. Warm regard and a peek at what this worthy enemy person was like when he wasn’t pretending to be someone else. Simpler though, without question. ”He’s been better here than he was there, certainly. Running away to Nar Shaddaa is a bit of a stereotype, I know, but … Well, certain doors had to stay closed. Couldn’t go anywhere with an extradition treaty if I didn’t want another execution. One that would no doubt take." Non-lethal alternatives weren’t much better. Spend the rest of my life locked up and force-blind, like you must have thought would happen to you. What was the Sith Order like? The question stunned her to puzzled silence for a few moments. Lidah fidgeted with the outrageously fluffy cuffs on her dressing gown, trying to find an answer. No one had ever asked her something like that before. He’d been so angry during that interrogation, when she’d said they were alike. She wanted to know what had changed since then. The war? This place was empty and sunless but spared all of that. ”Too many high strung predators sharing the same enclosure. Or a long space voyage on one quarter rations. I was a Jedi before, did you know that? Not a very good one.” Lidah wrinkled her nose, dismissive of her history. Still, she never knew exactly what the Jedi had on her, whether anyone ever drew the connection between one missing knight and, years later, a Dark Lady of the Sith. ”Rage, hatred, lust – those big attention-grabbing emotions, they work for some Sith. I always found fear much more motivating. For myself, anyway. Guess I never took either code to heart.”

[Rugs]

“That’s good to know,” Locke said. A rueful smile played at the corners of his features. “Vance is a good kid. He deserves better than he’s had, and if he can find it somewhere — even here...” Locke’s voice trailed off. He seemed on the edge of saying something more, but shrugged instead.

“We should’ve done better by him,” he said after a moment. His eyes rose to meet Novus’ for a steady moment. “Please, for whatever a request from a Jedi, or whatever I am to you is worth, take care of him.”

Her description of the Sith Order at least, was more along the lines of what Locke expected. He smiled, earnestly amused this time, as she described them as a den of predators, crammed too close together for their own good.

“No I can’t say I knew that,” he admitted. “Though I don’t suppose I ever went looking for your file, either. Never had the time.” Locke paused again, thoughtful. “I also don’t suppose there’d be a ‘Darth Novus’ Jedi file anyway, unless your folks really weren’t fond of you.”

Locke snickered at his own joke, uncaring of what Novus thought about him that moment. Some weariness was starting to creep into him again. He’d have to go to sleep again before long, but he was enjoying their little conversation.

“Fear’s a funny thing,” he said. “It can, many times keep you alive, no matter what the Jedi try to teach us. But sometimes it can, well, lead to bombing a spaceport.” Locke offered an apologetic smile. “Sorry about that, by the way. I promise you that had the situation been any different I would have stopped him from doing that. He meant well.”

It was strange, perhaps, to joke about what the Empire deemed a terrorist attack that resulted in the deaths of dozens. But compared to the things he’d seen on the front lines, Jazen’s desperate measure on Vjun seemed almost trivial.

“Anyway, one last question for you, and then you can ask me whatever you want. For now,” the pitch of his eyebrow carried an inferred question about future conversations--even if Locke didn’t want to outright admit he enjoyed the company. “What are you? You’ve been ‘executed,’” he emphasized the word with air quotes, “and at least nominally separated from the Sith.

“So are you a crime lord now?” he went on, “A sith in waiting?” Locke smiled, his tone turning too-sincere for a moment. “A leaf blowing wherever the currents of fate will?”

[Neology]

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”You don’t need to ask me that. Really, you shouldn’t.” Lidah shook her head, refusing the promise he had seemed to be searching for. Her expression turned briefly inward and abstract, trying to figure out where it had come from. Vance had had many Jedi masters – four, five? – but Locke wasn’t one of them, at least as far as she knew. So why do you feel obligated? Locke was closer to her own age, a different generation in terms of master-padawan relationships. Making Vance … The former student of a friend? A dead one, maybe. Lidah let out a long breath that she had been holding, letting the idea go with it. It would be easier to ask Vance later. ”I must not have made a very strong impression on you. First name Lidah. Arkanian offshoot. Disappeared about twelve years ago. That should be plenty to go on if you ever want to go digging. Ah. And while you are here, please call Vance ‘Thelonious’ instead.” Her own name had been buried a long time but people still remembered the past lives of Vance Asano. She waved off Locke’s remarks about the spaceport. The mind, supposedly, could only process empathy for a few dozen individuals at a time. Beyond that, lives lost their meaning. Worse for anyone blessed or cursed with the Force, or so she was inclined to believe. Another sense by which to measure suffering, more acute than sight or sound and not so easy to block out. ”I wonder how much use your side got out of the old man, the ship plans in his head?” Her lips settled into a bloodless line, pale to match her freezer-burn white complexion. Trading atrocities – don’t apologize to me of all people. I killed a planet. Top that, Nemsee. ”A mercenary, if anything. But I’m going to build something here.” And if not ... Lidah had been on the other side of that arrangement, knew the imperial spy network as it had been two years ago. Mirror sheen black glass and the best tech available. She would be fighting that to what end, pretending at a normal life? Teach kickboxing to kids, learn to grow things? Vance would like that. He’d always been a bit naive, even after his time with the Sith. A luxury that gave her a fragile kind of satisfaction. ”Renata cast me off. I don’t intend to fly back to the glove. Ever. So I'll do whatever I have to do to make the attempt less and less tempting for her.”

[Rugs]

Locke frowned at Novus’ response to his plea to protect Vance. His mouth worked, forming words that died before they could be given voice. Instead his lips settled into a line. Well I have, he thought, and I mean it.

The conversation swept along before he could dwell on that too long. Novus revealed herself to be Lidah, though her surname remained a mystery. Locke smiled, as if accepting a challenge. “Yea, I’m sure I’ll have that figured out by the next time we meet,” he said. If they met.

But was it so hard to think they might? After their meetings so far — and to run into each other here of all places — Locke could think of stranger things.

“Truthfully, I don’t know,” Locke said, shrugging. “Once Jazen got him back to Republic space, he was handed off to a protection program. Identify change, settled onto some unassuming planet, the whole nine yards. I was, uh...” he motioned at Novus, a quick, rolling motion of the hand, “stuck in a box for three months, so I missed a lot of the initial aftermath. The juicy bits. Reading about it in a report just ain’t the same, y’know.

“But he died a few months after I got back. Turns out you can have the best guards in the Galaxy, but even they can’t stop time,” Locke shrugged again. “He was too damn old. Guess he at least found some peace at the end. S’all any of us can hope for, I suppose.”

Locke fell silent, thoughtful after Novus explained her allegiance — or alleged lack thereof to the Sith and recently-minted Empress. If what she said was true, then that was, at least, the removal of a potent enemy from the Sith’s side. But was it so simple?

If it wasn’t, Novus was either playing a very long game, in being as open as she was with him, or making a mistake. Or telling the truth.

Locke felt he knew Novus better than just about anyone, from the Republic side, and she wasn’t the sort to make such casual mistakes.

“You asked earlier that I don’t make a report about you when I leave,” he said, slumping back against his pillows. The drugs were making him weary again, and he found himself lacking the strength to put up much of a fight, or to keep eyes gaze from lingering on her face. “I won’t.” 'For now' was how he'd usually follow up, but here, he did not.

He smiled too-sweetly at Novus -- Lidah? -- and cocked his head slightly to one side. “Need my address? I’ll be looking for card in the mail, come the Festival of Life, y’know.”

[Neology]

”You asked earlier ...” Lidah came to attention at that, held herself a little straighter. This was the treasonous heart of things, now. She understood that it was no small thing to ask of Locke. A Jedi was not allowed to hold anything so dear as the Order’s ideals and service to the Republic. Nemsee had been – was still? – A Blade. Jedi that joined the Republic’s war effort against the Sith before all the rest. Sure, sheer off another little piece of your soul. It had to be worth their lives, her and Vance. And his too, perhaps twice over now. Lidah let go of a half-formed grim contingency, the trailing ends of which had grown as muzzy as Locke’s voice. Pain-killers cutting back in, she recognized belatedly. ”Thank you.” A weak smile, slightly queasy. His was rather more charming, despite well … Everything. ”Sure. I’ll send a dozen if we’re both still kicking. Though I think I remember the temple well enough.” Locke had offered a chance to ask whatever she wanted and she felt remiss to be leaving that on the table. There were a few, starting with the immediately obvious: who was Tekt to you? But they were nothing that couldn’t wait until later, when all the figurative lights were on. Lidah climbed to her feet with a catlike stretch and a glance at her chrono. They’d been talking longer than she thought. ”I’ll let Vance know you asked after him, alright?” She relented slightly, in good faith. ”I’m sure he wants to talk.” Lidah cast a final backwards glance and slipped out into the hall.