Fate of the Chosen One
Chapter One
Prisoner
A man who had stood up to everything he had ever believed in, walked around the small confined to a small prison room for far too long. He was dangerous, so dangerous in fact that only the Emperor and Darth Vader ever visited him. He was known as prisoner X. The stormtroopers never entered his room, but slid his food in, nevertheless, the man always came up with some sarcastic quip to make them wonder just who he was.
Stormtrooper 99436 was assigned that particular task this day. It wasn't his place to ask questions, he was but a clone, a replica of Jango Fett, he had been engineered not to question. Even as he peered into the room at Prisoner X, he couldn't help but wonder what made the blonde man so dangerous, he didn't look dangerous to him. "Hey buddy," Prisoner X said to him. "Do you mind getting me a razor, it's been a long time since I've had a shave," the prisoner said to him. Stormtrooper 99436 knew better than to respond. He looked at him, and something seemed to stir within him, some glimmer of a memory, but it was gone before he could grasp it, and all he saw was a dirty man, with long stringy blonde hair and a beard equally as stringy. The man wore remnants of dark robes and he set there with his eyes closed most of the time. Over his right eye, there was a single scar, and bits of a glove covered what looked like a cybernetic arm.
There were rumors, rumors that Prisoner X had once stood up to Darth Vader and the Emperor. Some said he was the Last of the Jedi, but nobody really believed that. If he wore a Jedi, he would be dead by now, wouldn't he? Everybody knew about the Jedi Purge and Order Sixty Six. Still, Prisoner X was imprisoned with a yslammni, which effectively blocked the Force. There were those that said that the visits by the Emperor and Darth Vader were to torture him. There were others that believed that Prisoner X had made away with the Separatists gold.
Prisoner X sighed wondering what was happening to him now, even with the force blocker in his cell, he was beginning to hear the stormtroopers thoughts. Once he had fought alongside the Clones, until they had turned on him and the Republic. Now, however, they wouldn't even speak to him. For fifteen years he had been held captive. For fifteen years, he had been denied everything even his own name. He went to get his food. It was always missing flavor, but if the Emperor and his lapdog thought he was going to waste away to nothing, they were sadly mistaken. Part of Prisoner X was glad that he had been cut off from the Force, the cries of the innocent would have been too much to bare, if he had been connected with it.
Prisoner X looked down to see that his utensils had been denied again or forgotten. No matter, he would eat this slop with his hands the best he could. He had eaten worse things before. Prisoner X cupped his hands as he ran the food to his mouth as quick as he could. He felt a sense of foreboding as darkness draped over him. He looked up to see a familiar black-clad caped figure standing over him. Before he could react, the black clad figure had kicked his tray away, leaving his tray on the other side of the room and Prisoner X stared up at the Dark Lord.
"Are you still alive?" the Dark Lord 'enunciated.
"Are you still the Emperor's lapdog?" Prisoner X, quipped, a funny smile on his lips, even under all the stringy hair. The Dark Lord reached out and pulled Prisoner X to his full height, no sound coming from the room other that the hissing of Darth Vader's breathing.
"You….." the Dark Lord said, looking at him. Prisoner X imagined him glaring underneath the Sith warlord mask. "You are insignificant in the scheme of things."
Prisoner X couldn't argue with that. There had been many that had risked everything for him, there had been those that had thought more of him that this. Didn't he owe it to them to see that his fate was more than just being the prisoner of the Emperor's lapdog? The existence he had lived for the last fifteen years was not one he would have ever imagined living. He wondered what had happened to his friends, his comrades, and even his family, but such thoughts were dangerous for him. They could lead him into a depression that he couldn't escape from. Instead, he focused on the good things, and there were good things even now. He still had his health, and he knew who he had been, even if everyone else seemed to have forgotten. He knew that one day he would escape from this prison and he looked forward to that day.
"Perhaps, but we all know you aren't human, at least I have a grasp on my humanity," Prisoner X quipped back.
"You have grown weaker while I have grown more powerful," Darth Vader responded.
"You are a fool if you believe that the dark side is more powerful than the Light," Prisoner X responded, with a smirk on his lips. The Dark Lord didn't frighten him though he had more reason to be frightened of him than anyone that lived. "But then," a full-fledged smile alighting on Prisoner's X's face as his lifeless blue eyes twinkled with life, "you've always been a fool, have you not?"
Prisoner X was dropped to his feet as a familiar blood-red cylinder object was ignited, its blade placed a little too close to his grimy neck for comfort. Yet, Prisoner X met what passed for eyes on the Sith's head, almost defiantly. The Dark Lord seemed to be almost devoid of emotion, but Prisoner X knew better. And he knew how to anger him, and how best to push him. He also knew just how far he could push him.
"Whose the fool now? Only one of us is a prisoner," Darth Vader said, disengaging his lightsaber, he spoke carefully the sound of his respirator punctuating the silence.
"Perhaps, but is it better to be a prisoner or a slave?" Prisoner X seemed to gloat at him. It infuriated the Dark Lord that Prisoner X still existed. He would have thought that he would have lost the will to live so long ago, but he still lived. Darth Vader wasn't sure how he had survived so long. Or why he kept visiting him. It was like he was drawn to him, this sentient that tied him to his past.
It had been so long since Prisoner X had heard his own name or felt like himself. He wasn't quite sure who or what he was anymore, but one thing was sure, he had never been nor ever was a quitter. Darth Vader used the Force to toss him around a bit before leaving him to himself and his thoughts. As funny as it was, he almost enjoyed their visits. It was the most human interaction than he got these days, and their verbal banter was amusing to say the least, though he could do without the torture.
He walked over to the yslammi in the corner. They were replaced every few standard weeks, so that he could never feel the Force again. He remembered when he had first been thrown in here, the loss of the Force had been a physical pain to him, it had kept him on his knees for months before he grew accustomed to its loss. And he had still be reeling from his physical defeat at the hands of Darth Vader.
Over the years, whenever he wasn't in chains, Prisoner X had felt the Force. It wasn't as strong as it once had been, but it was there, elusive but there. Sometimes, thoughts evaded his brain before he had time to grasp them. Prisoner X knew that he shouldn't be able to feel the Force at all, not with the yslammi here in his prison, but he felt it nonetheless, though he couldn't feel his Force bonds, he could feel the Force, and that itself was a miracle. Every day, instead of growing weaker in the Force, he felt his Force powers returning, not as quickly as he would like but it was there. He knew that the Emperor and Darth Vader wouldn't suspect because the yslammi blocked them from sensing.
Prisoner X sensed something was about to change. He could feel something big out there in the unifying Force, though what it was, he could not say. He was about to get his life, his name, and his fate back and he almost felt sorry for anybody that would stand it his way. The beginning of the end of the Empire would soon rise.