Outer Rim, Thyrsus, Eastern continent. Time: 1600 Hours. (RST)
Aiden peered about in genuine awe. The Echani settlement was more than he could have ever guessed was down on this planet.
The journey through the shrubbery, forest and over little creeks and streams had been relatively quiet… apart from the fact that Revan had not spoken the entire time except to Arren.
Arren had replied in short answers and she had kept the group at a fast pace to reach the settlement before nightfall.
They had made it in plenty of time, but Aiden still felt a nagging sensation in the back of his mind. A growing trepidation that started in his stomach, making it twist uncomfortably.
He followed Revan, Malak, Corina and Arren with the other Jedi as they walked through a very well disguised series of buildings that were intricately and beautifully designed.
They had already passed a series of sparring and practice areas, and a rather large building with several satellites on the roof. They were now coming up to many other buildings. One was rather smallish, but it had four guards posted outside the doors denoting its importance. The next building was a mess hall, Aiden thought this guessing from the smell of cooking food wafting through the air from the direction of the slate grey building with double doors.
They continued their walk past a building on the right with two doors also, but they were far separate from each other. The windows were smooth, but a frosted looking material that one could not see through. They were covered in condensation, announcing this was the bathhouse.
"The rest of these are bunk houses, with the exception of the one we passed earlier, Yusanis lives in his headquarters." She gestured backward to the low lying building with four guards watching the door.
Aiden absorbed this information quickly; he had an almost photographic memory after all.
Arren finally showed them to the quarters they would be using. It was another grey building with nice subtle intricacies. It was a piece of artwork, truly. The grey stone it was made of was something one did not often see when they were around Coruscant.
The windows were the same frosted crystalline panes that you could not see through but let light pass in. they entered the building, noting that it was much smaller than some of the other buildings around. Revan seemed to have noticed this as well as he voiced this to Arren.
Arren nodded and explained, "The other buildings are housing squads, and squads consist of twelve people each. There are four squads in each building, though they have their own dormitory for each squad within that building."
This made sense, there were only about twenty Jedi in their group, not including Revan Malak and Aiden, they only had about half the number that the Echani did in one building, so why waste the space?
Revan dipped his head in understanding and talked to Arren for a moment more. Arren looked thoughtful about whatever Revan had said and made a motion of acceptance.
"I'll ask him for you." She said loudly signaling to the rest of her squad that it was time to go.
Revan cocked an eyebrow at her in what looked like mild surprise and nodded, then turned to Malak and Aiden.
Before Aiden could ask about the interaction Malak was speaking, "what's the layout of this building anyway, rev?"
Revan looked up at his tall friend and explained. "This is all one level; there are three rooms and a toilet for each one. The smallest one is the one we'll be sharing, there
Are four beds in that one. The other two have roughly ten in each."
"Gotcha." Malak replied, he then turned and relayed this information to the Jedi who were still coming through the door.
Aiden watched this for a few seconds and then saw Revan move off to the room he had told them about, down a bit to the left. He followed quietly and entered after his friend swiftly.
Revan sat down on the bed closest to the far wall with a sigh of exhaustion. He lifted a hand and rubbed his eyes slowly. He let it drop with a soft thump on the mattress. The room was nothing to sneeze at. It was just big enough for four people to live in it and be comfortable. The beds were twin sized with several blankets and an extra thick fleecy blanket at the foot of it. The pillow was not overly lumpy, so Revan was happy. The only other things in the room was a small writing station where one could plug in data pads and upload new information and another door, which presumably led to the bathroom Arren had told him about.
Aiden had come into the room shortly after him and promptly sat down on the bed opposite Revan's own. He then kicked off his boots and lay back, closing his eyes as soon as his blond head hit the pillow.
Revan thought he had gone to sleep after Aiden was quiet for a few minutes, but then the Kenobi spoke. "What was going on with Arren earlier?"
"She says Yusanis is worried about the war with the mandalorians." Revan replied tiredly staring off into space, contemplating whether or not he should attempt to sleep now.
Aiden did not say anything for a while, he seemed to be soaking in the sparse piece of knowledge Revan had imparted upon him.
"Are you going to ask Yusanis to join us?" Aiden asked finally.
Revan looked reflective for a long moment and shrugged, "I think I will, but I won't force him." He said this softly, "Yusanis is a strong general, and I think the Republic could benefit from his assistance against the mandalorians…. I'll need to ask him what he thinks about this war before I ask him to join the war effort." Revan finally decided he had gone without sleep for long enough and pulled off his brown boots.
He put them neatly to the end of his bed on the floor and laid back. He had been right, the pillow wasn't lumpy, it was better than the ones on the Hawk at least….
Revan fell asleep in a matter of a few seconds, his insomnia finally calling it quits….
The light came from a saber. Then an unknown force yanked the blaster out of Kalen's hands. Revan looked up; a woman in grey and white robes with white hair like his mother's was holding a Jedi weapon. It glowed with yellow power.
The woman calmly held the blaster she had pulled away from Kalen in her free hand. Kalen looked startled as he gazed at the white haired woman. Rae continued to cough up blood on the ground.
"I was under the impression that mandalorians honorable when it came to women and children, I suppose my assumption was wrong." The woman said sharply,
"Leave, mandalorian. There is nothing for you on this planet now, all the others have either fled or died.
"You'll have to kill me Jetii." Kalen sneered back readying his combative stance.
The woman would have none of it; she flicked her wrist towards him, sending him flying in to the debris that was once a small infirmary. He hit one of the remaining slabs of concrete with a sickening crunch. He slid down it slowly, his eyes were wide open, staring at nothing, or perhaps everything….
The woman knelt down beside Rae and put a hand to her forehead.
Revan then noticed that there were many more Jedi than he had originally thought around them. Two more were standing close to him, his mother and the mystery woman. He felt as though he could not move, no matter how he willed his legs to work, to go to his mother, he could not budge an inch from his current position.
"She is fading." One of the other Jedi said quietly to their grey and white clad companion.
The mystery woman seemed to ignore the other two and closed her eyes; she held her position, one hand on Rae's forehead the other now placed on the wrist.
"Master Kae, her life force is fading beyond even your control," one of them said trying to persuade Kae to move away from the dying Echani woman.
Revan somehow found the will to move to his mother during these brief few moments, and felt a sudden weight come down on his young heart.
The only thing that had been constantly in his life was his mother, and now he would lose her too….
Revan felt as though his whole being would shatter into a thousand tiny pieces as he sat up suddenly in his bed. His hands flew to his face and rubbed his eyes in a desperate attempt to remove the images he had just relived.
A soft noise was made just outside the door…. Revan swung his legs over the side of the bed and pulled on his brown boots. He moved over to Aiden and grabbed his friend's wrist, checking the chrono, it was 0300. Who was up at this time of the morning? Revan wondered, also noting that Aiden had not woken even though Revan had used his wrist to determine the time.
He let his friend's arm drop back to its owner and strode to the door. Revan opened the door with in the quietest manner he could manage at this early hour, and revealed three Echani women. One was Arren, but the other two… Revan could not place them.
However, he could see a striking resemblance between Arren and the younger of the two other women, but then he noticed that the younger was but fourteen… Bastila's age, why was he thinking about her, now of all times?
Revan shook his head in an attempt to clear it. The women were arguing in a truly un Echani like fashion, they were silently gesturing at each other angrily with large hand movements….
Arren noticed Revan first and stopped motioning to the two others, turning to him when she heard the faint click of the durasteel door as it opened.
Revan looked at his former master quizzically, tilting his head to the side slightly in confusion.
Arren rolled her eyes in exasperation and grabbed his wrist, towing him through the dormitory door and out into the brisk morning air and the damp, dewy grass.
The moon was still somewhat high in the sky, Revan saw as he looked up momentarily, the stars were quite visible, but for the few that were covered by a thin layer of silvery clouds. They were very nice to look at; they glowed faintly, pleasantly, like nothing could much bother them.
"We have a slight problem." Arren said looking up at her former padawan. His face was halfway veiled in shadow as he looked up at the starry sky.
"What sort of 'slight' problem?" Revan asked looking down at her, making the quotation symbols with his skilled fingers.
"You are understating the direness of our problem, Arren." The older of the two others said in an angry whisper.
"I think you should be quiet, sister." The younger said, "Mother is doing her best in this situation."
"Perhaps we should get someone else to handle this then" the other shot back snidely, "she obviously cannot handle the task my father has given her, just look at the way she dallies when we need this resolved now."
"She would be able to go faster if you would stop being such a nuisance." The younger popped back, her face turning red from anger and contrasting sharply with her white braids even in the dim night.
The older one shut up to this statement and crossed her arms in an irritated fashion over her grey-tunic and cowl covered chest.
The younger was still seething her hands forming fists at her sides clenching almost uncontrollably.
Arren cleared her throat softly, "if you two are done…?" she asked.
The pair nodded reluctantly and remained silent.
Arren nodded approvingly and said to revan: "Yusanis said that it would be best if we discussed this problem in his personal living quarters, it's where he does much of his work, anyway."
Revan inclined his head to Arren and was soon following her back through the settlement to the low lying building, which currently had four guards around the front door. Arren said nothing to them as she passed, and they did not seem to take much notice of her either. They hastily went through the unobtrusive door and into the… stairwell…?
Realizing that Yusanis lived underground as an extra safety measure Revan felt the younger woman push his shoulder gently, a silent, move along.
Revan did as he was bidden and went in Arren's wake down the seemingly endless flight of stairs. They were not remarkable stairs in any case; they were grey like all the other buildings around here, except they lacked the adornment of some of the other structures.
There was no railing, and there were probably sconce like lighting in the well but no one had bothered to turn them on. The door at the top had closed behind them a few minutes ago when they had first come in… as soon as Revan finished thinking this he bumped into Arren.
He could hear her fiddling with something on the wall.
"I can't believe I forgot to turn on the damn lights, give me a sec…. there." Dim light washed over the stairs and revealed that they were standing in front of a rather plain durasteel door.
To the right of it was an access panel, which Arren was currently messing about with.
After a couple buttons pushed the door slid open and the four entered a much more brightly lit set of rooms.
The smells of caffa, something vaguely flowery and something musky assaulted Revan's nose as he was pulled through a room that was very much like a control room, lights blinking on vidscreen and a large circular holographic imager at the center. The walls were covered in scenery of the outside in what Revan determined immediately was surveillance and something that looked like a positioning system….
He was quickly pulled from this room and into another that was joined to it. Inside were five other people not including the four that had just entered. Revan recognized most of them immediately, Malak, Corina, and Bisera were sitting next to two others….
Revan remembered suddenly that he had not seen Malak since earlier when they had entered the dorms. The other two were older looking Echani men. One had obviously more status than the other, Yusanis. Revan comprehended. The other man was still a mystery to Revan however….
Yusanis looked up from a data pad he had been holding and set it down on a circular table in front of him. He motioned for the four to join him and the others around said table without delay.
Revan sat down in the chair next to Malak without looking up at his tall brother.
"What's going on?" Revan asked without mincing words, looking sharply at Yusanis.
Yusanis gazed levelly back at Revan, "You've been followed." He said simply motioning to the data pad he had just set down on the table. It was a miniaturized vidscreen, Revan grasped.
On it were roughly a score of mandalorians moving through the ferns and trees of Thyrsus.
"Where is this?" Revan asked adverting his eyes from the data pad.
"Only a couple of kilometers from the settlement." The other Echani male said softly. His voice reminded Revan of someone, but he could not place who….
"In any case they will be here soon." Arren replied briskly, "we can't just let them leave once they come into the settlement, either."
Yusanis nodded his agreement to Arren's statement, "no, we cannot. Revan, I thought I should wake you for this because I thought perhaps you would like them to be kept alive to question."
Revan let his eyes fall on Yusanis who was now leaning forward, his arms crossed on the table. Revan nodded, it was a good idea, and they had enough men to spare to capture the mandalorians.
"Very good, then." Revan responded, mimicking Yusanis' arm placement.
"Rein, please go and inform squads four, nine and eleven to meet our mandalorian guests as soon as they cross the third trip wire area. I wouldn't expect them to set it off, but make sure the squads don't get lazy and let the mandalorians get any further than that. The mandalorians are to be brought directly to the interrogation chambers when captured."
"Yes, General." Rein replied softly with a small bow, removing himself from his seat and leaving the group through the door that Revan had entered through not moments before.
"Why did the mandalorians follow you?" the youngest of the group asked, being the girl that was Bastila's age from earlier.
"I also wish to know the reason, Brianna." Yusanis said musing quietly he faced Malak who was looking down at Corina. Corina was continually rubbing a red spot on her left arm. Bisera looked as if she would cry, which was something for a Jedi master.
"Mak, what's going on?" Revan asked calmly.
Malak looked to his best friend, worry etched over his face, "it's Corina, when she was on Taris…." He trailed off momentarily then cleared his throat and continued, "They interrogated her, separated her from the group of padawans and younglings and when they could not get anything out of her they gave her that head wound that Arren healed. But, when she was out it appears that they put a small position transmitting device in her left arm. Corina thinks it was probably the Colonel she saw when she was being interrogated who suggested it, apparently he was quite smart." Malak finished.
Revan looked down at his rough, somewhat scarred hands in thought and then back up to Corina who was still rubbing the spot on her left arm.
"What was the Colonel's name?" Revan asked softly, watching Corina's face contort slightly in a mixture of emotions.
"Bralor." She whispered.
Revan felt like he was standing in the mucky sewers of Taris again, the voice of that mandalorian, he had heard it, he had stood not a few mere meters from him….
Oh goodness... I am so, so, so, so-ooooo-ooo... sorry my dear readers! I had mid-terms all this last week, and my grandparents came in to town so my house turned into a veritable zoo... I have one of those insanely humongous loud families that just will NOT GO HOME!! I love them all dearly, but enough is really enough!
I hope this chapter was good for you people, because I'm six hours away from my home computer right now and it's currently 12: 32 A.M. You people really guilt me into updating this late! sheesh! just kidding! AAAAAHHHH! PUT DOWN YOUR TORCHES AND PITCHFORKS! DOWN I SAY! DONT KILL POOR SCATCAT!
I promise I'll update within the coming week several times though, its spring break and I have mostly nothing better to do...
Oh! before I forget! I have set up a poll on my profile, please do it, because I have more I want to add onto this story, but I want you to tell me who your favorite characters are so that I can write more about them for you! thank you for putting up with me!
later- scatcat
AAAAHHHH! Quick thankyous! To: Anthony van Leuvan, hmmm, Tainava Vonroa, LordRevanGrandMasterofTheJedi !! Tnank You so very much for reviewing! You peoples made my day!!