Disclaimer: I do well and truly own nothing; it all belongs to someone else.
A/N: I guess I have to say that this will be very AU but just the same it was fun to write so why not? I'll post this to test the waters so to speak, if I still feel inspired in a few days I'll continue. Oh and no beta so if anything is wrong I apologise. Anyway hope you enjoy.
Walk With Shadows: Chapter one
It was the beeping that came to her first. It was distant but unerring, echoing through the otherwise dormant ship. Her mind, for so long the domain of fleeting memoires, began its inevitable march. How long passed between each glimpse of her past? How many years did her mind contain but one thought?
She could not have said if it was days, weeks or years after the beeping started that she actually heard it. That her mind comprehended once again that there was an external world. Yet, ever so slowly, her mind stirred. Worst of all, she could feel it. A mind that had kept itself alive by playing random games with her nightmares and dreamscapes was ill prepared for such stimuli.
At the base of her skull, something flickered briefly and died. An eternity later, a mere second later, it flared to life once more, searing an aimless path through her skull before disappearing. She twitched. Decades pasts, seconds barely had time to form. Three pinpricks in her skull. Three more scorched valleys of pointless meandering. Her right index finger jumped. A minute passed, a star died. Ten bright caverns of burnt flesh. She sneered.
In a process that could not be stopped, synaptic connections flared to life, unintentionally utilised for the first time in centuries. They grew in number, grew in their frequency, and grew in their ferocity. They ran through her mind, burning all in their path. First relief from their torture was commonplace. Activity would bloom, before petering out. Respite, however, came at ever longer intervals. Like the firing of a rail gun, the first shot came slowly, the second a little faster and the third faster still. Before long the gun was firing near continuously, deadly pellets that had no place in a perfect world. And there was pain, oh so much pain. A pain born of disuse. Like any other machine the rust needed to be removed, and the engine oiled.
A comet sent a planet into an ice age, its inhabitants perishing. Her heart beat once. Her mind blazed relentlessly in a fire that should have consumed the ship. The pain reached its zenith, and for the first time in generations, for the first time in hours, she gasped out a breath without the aid of the machine covering her face. With its release the pain began to recede. Another shaky breath, more of the pain flowed out with it. Distantly, she actually heard the beeping for the first time and surprise took her. She hadn't expected to hear anything again, she hadn't expected to live.
Her head lulled, left to right, moving at a command that was more instinct than desire. She felt the cool breeze on her face, though she forgot almost instantly. Her mind too scattered to focus on any one thing. Except the beeping, but that invaded her senses in a steady rhythm, it was her lifeline, her rock. Her right hand moved and touched her stomach. She felt neither. There was the knowledge she had moved her hand and to where, but she was absent of all sensation.
Another breath, her eyes flickered open briefly. Thousands died in war. Such knowledge surprised her disorientated mind, but its source was trusted. Her hand hit the edge of the basin that held her, again she felt nothing. The sound of her hand hitting the basin, however, didn't lie. 'Where the hell am I?' It was her first coherent thought. Memory flashed, and she shied away in protest as she shivered. She wasn't ready to face that just yet.
"Estimated time until consciousness is fully regained," a monotone spoke from her right, "One hundred and twenty three seconds." She groaned at the machine. A flood killed hundreds. "Beginning stage three…" And she screamed, hearing no more. She convulsed inside the basin, her back arching as her heels dug in and her arms flailed about wildly under her. It was as if someone had injected poison into every nano-meter of flesh that they could find and she felt the pain of the cells dieing in response. Her eyes snapped open, desperate to find the source of her torment. Instead a white haze engulfed her vision and she knew she was close to passing out. Through the haze she saw the black outlines of various objects, but nothing that sparked a sense of recognition.
"Circulation at seventy percent…eighty percent…ninety percent," The machine informed her without remorse, and the pain that she had identified as indiscriminate discharges of electricity began to subside, "Stage three complete." Her breathing uneven and ragged, she reached up and, snatching the breathing apparatus from her face, threw it as far as she could. In her fury it snuck over the edge of the basin. Disgusted, she allowed herself to take a small measure of comfort from the fact that she had felt the cold alloy under her finger tips, and that she could now feel the basin pressing against her body.
'Weak' her mind chanted, 'weak. Don't show weakness, strength. Need. To. Show. Strength. Strength…Power…Victory.' Ancient ideals even when she had first heard them, but useful just the same. She clutched the edge of the basin, stasis chamber rather, she remembered that much now, and with both hands, pulled herself upright, ignoring the sense of vertigo as best she could.
White spots and black flecks flared across her vision, fighting for supremacy. She shook her head slowly and only succeeded in making her vision swim. As it settled she got the first signs she was wining this small war. Dark blues mixed with the black. Soon they were joined with reds, silvers and a glint of yellow. Suddenly, shocking, her brain …slid. There was no better way she could think of to describe the feeling, parts of her brain seemed to shift, slip and churn. Her world came into focus with such clarity that her eyes stung.
Blinking back tears, a small smile took her lips. The silver became the metal of the chamber in which she sat. The dark blue was the hue of the light in the room. The yellow was the small warning light on the raised lid of the stasis chamber above her, its glass reflecting it haphazardly. The white the mist that the flooded the room, swirling before her eyes, caressing her skin. The red outlined the doorway to her right, pulsing in time with the rhythmic beeping.
"Reanimation complete," she started, before glaring at the offending speaker to her right, "Powering down." Above her the yellow light gave a final flash and died, leaving her alone in the near darkness.
"Bloody thing," she whispered. Experimentally she brought her legs up to her chest and was surprised when the muscles only groaned. She had expected violent protest. She took a deep breath that didn't do enough to sedate her need for oxygen. Perhaps she should have been more concerned that the life support systems seemed to be failing. But it mattered little to her then and there.
'Did it want her to succeed?' she mused. It seemed the only logical conclusion but still. 'Did it even know she was here?' The Force, an entity that she had come to realise she would never truly come to understand. Its nature was too foreign for one to completely grasp. Light and Dark, both motives utilised, both outcomes unacceptable. A balance desired. It sent her warnings of hidden dangers, and then informed her she would never succeed in protecting that which she valued. It taunted her with visions of one she could consider her equal, her aid, her fellow crusader, then put him as far out of reach as possible. She smirked, 'Nothing was impossible however.' That she had learnt.
If it had worked, and still she wasn't sure if this wasn't just a malfunction, it had to be the will of the Force. Or at the very least her will made possible through the Force. Any and all calculations were impossible; she didn't even know her destination. With a great effort she managed to heave herself out of the stasis chamber and stood on unsteady legs. Her robes matched her limbs, cold and stiff. When her knees nearly buckled under her and her hand on the lip of the stasis chamber was the only thing holding her up, she knew she needed help.
She reached out, as she had so many times before, to her silent friend, to her harsh master, to her cowering pet, and sought its strength. She felt the Force pause, and knew she had its undivided attention. It studied her, the way one might a wild animal out of the corner of their eye, not sure which way it will run. She felt her heart thud in her chest. It hadn't been expecting her. It may have sustained her and given her aid, but even the Force had not expected her gamble to succeed. Dark thoughts snaked through her mind, 'Had it just been trying to be rid of her?' Seconds later it relented and came to her, in all its glory, and she directed it to her body. She felt muscle strengthen, bones mend and ligaments replenish.
Revan Du Sal healed herself in the most secure compartment of a ship that was slowly venting its atmosphere. A ship that was a relic millennia ago, a ship that had been specifically modified for her purpose, based on a design from the earliest records of human space travel, though substantially improved. A ship that was so damaged and battered that through the door the floor curved up and to the left. It had been straight and level when she last saw it. Sleeper they had described such ships.
"And sleep she had," she muttered as she set off on unsteady legs, "it was just a question of how long." She walked slowly through the halls, not wanting to put a foot wrong, not wanting to apply the pressure that would finally tear the ship apart. She moved cautiously as the red light lit her path, bathing it in an eerie glow one minute, leaving it in darkness the next.
On the city planet of Coruscant, a high ranking politician found himself momentarily drawn from the debate that raged about the actions of the Trade Federation as the Force stalled. He could think of no other way to describe what he felt, and none but the Force sensitive would feel it but it was a full twenty seconds before normal service resumed. His mask slip and his benevolence died as a snarl took his lips. Any fool could see that something of significance had occurred; it was just a question of what. He wanted to rage, he wanted to destroy, but he held on by a thread. The darkness, his old friend, his only companion, lingered on his shaking fingertips before it whispered to him. 'Yes…yes. A missed opportunity was all, nothing more.' His features once again radiated reassurance as his attention returned to the Senate and talk of the blockade. All was well, everything was proceeding as planned. It was only a matter of time.
Deep in hyperspace Qui-Gon Jin was snapped from his mediation by the disturbance. Behind him, the hyperdrive that had been stammering for hours gave one final lurch, a stutter and then it inexplicably strengthened. The slight pressure that hyperspace put on his body evened out and the Nubian royal starship gracefully speed toward Coruscant on its mercy mission. "Interesting," was all he said before he resumed his mediation, albeit with a different focus.
High above Coruscant in the Jedi council chambers, Master Yoda leaned heavily on his cane while observing the organised chaos that flowed around him. The others would have questions, he knew, and their theories would be highly imaginative. All he did, however, was sigh, "Another's problem, I now have." How it would manifest itself, he did not know, but he was sure it would, just as he was sure they now rode into an unlikely future.
On Tatooine, a young boy waited out a sandstorm with only his mother for company and a droid to keep him occupied. The child was, as one would expect, completely unaware that his future had change irrevocably.
"This is Delta Two, we have breached the hull. Repeat we have breached the hull," the strike team commander's voice crackled onto the bridge via the ships communication systems, "Awaiting further orders."
Captain Grogan Baztof sighed, 'Why do these things always happen to me?' From his position on the bridge of the Republic Assault Cruiser, The Vigilance, he could quite clearly see both ships in the viewport. The DSEV, or the Deep Space Extraction Vehicle, was by far the smaller of the two. Designed to quickly and efficiently move its four man crew into volatile situations, be it a severely damaged allied craft or a civilian vessel that had found itself in trouble, and out again before everything went to hell. It had attached itself to the stern, or what was left of it, of the ship that was apparently dead in space before them. "Status report lieutenant, what do you see?"
"Sir, scans proved to be accurate," burst the commanders disembodied voice once more, "oxygen levels are minimal and atmosphere is approaching critical levels. The lights are out, visibility is down to a few metres." He paused and a tapping sound came over the speakers. "Sir, readouts show that only backup power is operating and even that is struggling to power life support. Do we continue sir?"
"Make it fast lieutenant," he grimaced, "A quick sweep, look for survivors and then out, no more." They were the Admiral's original orders, following Republic protocol. Any and all distress signals would be investigated, even if the one they were responding to stopped hours ago. When they had arrived and seen what was before them…he really wished the Admiral hadn't retired to his personal quarters.
He took another quick glance around the bridge in which he stood. The majority of the men, all of which should have being at their posts, were following his example and studying the medium sized vessel before them. Such indiscretions were normally severely punished, but looking at those restless and anxious faces he immediately decided to ignore it. The decision was easy enough, and two reasons made it so.
Firstly, The Vigilance was past due in port for scheduled maintenance. Almost all of the crew had leave while the repairs were carried out and, were it not for this time consuming detour to the middle of nowhere, Coruscant would have been at most a few hours away.
Secondly, the vessel itself was a sight to behold. It reminded him of an extremely old warrior that had seen one too many wars. In its youth, as hard to imagine as the youthful face of that old man, it was perhaps sleek and sturdy. It shape would have resembled two crescent moons joined together. 'The unimaginative minds of the military would have no doubt called it a W-wing, or some such,' he pondered, 'though it seems too large to be a fighter and too small to be an assault ship. So a smaller transport vehicle or civilian?'
Now, however, the fact that the ship was still together at all, that it had any atmosphere worthy of the name was, well, remarkable. Like the deeply lined and weathered face of the old man, the exterior of the ship would have been unrecognisable to all but those who knew it well. There were more dints, holes, scratches and missing segments of the metal shielding than he could count. The imperfections marred every inch of the ships surface. And that was ignoring that half the left crescent was missing, sheered off in some unknown calamity. The stump was still there, just like on the decommissioned old soldier, but the arm was missing. From his vantage point he could see the blast doors that had sealed shut when the incident had occurred.
In his mind he saw the old man on his death bed, gasping for breath, the time between the pings of the heart rate monitor ever increasing. It would have been sad, but then all relics eventually die. The scans indicated that the hyperdrive had been removed and replaced with something unidentified, and that is what troubled him most of all. 'How in the name of all things good, did the bloody ship manage to get this far out here then?' Without a hyperdrive…the word millennia rang in his mind.
'Civilian,' he quickly decided just to put an end to his wondering. 'That would fit nicely with the explanation that the scientists had come up with, that it was no more than a failed experiment.' His mind had begun filing with images of the strike team fanning out, searching each room of the vessel systematically, with only the lights from their helmets illuminating the gloom when the sharps communication system sparked to life.
"Sir, we made it to the bridge," the lieutenant paused and when he spoke again his voice was rapid, "Sir, we found a survivor, I'll never know how, but we did. It's a human female in her late twenties. I thought she was dead when I first saw her but she has a pulse, its weak buts its there. She's unconscious Sir. Do we have orders to extract?"
Grogan was, to say the least, surprised, so much so that the lieutenant's voice came again over the speakers. "Sir? Are you reading me? I repeat we have a survivor. Do we extract?"
To make up for his lapse he spoke quickly and firmly, "Extract the survivor. I want you back onboard The Vigilance in ten minutes. Am I understood?"
"Aye Sir, leaving now"
Satisfied, Grogan turned to the personal on the bridge. "I want the woman and the strike team quarantined from the moment they step back into the hanger and kept there until the infirmary gives the all clear." He turned and faced those on his right, "As soon as we receive word that they have docked I want that ship scuttled and a course set for Coruscant." He waited for confirmation that his orders had being understood before he turned and, leaving the bridge to the next in command, went in search of the Admiral. He needed to be informed that they were going to have a civilian aboard.
A/N: Anyway I hope it was a fun read…until next time.