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Chapter 11

Rek quickly looked around their immediate surroundings and then to the Twi'lek. "Quick, into the tree," he said, pointing to the olbio tree beside them.

"Seriously?"

"Do you have a better plan?"

They couldn't fight all of them and they couldn't outrun them. She knew Rek was right. So she quickly made her way to the tree and began climbing the branches, leaving her samples and equipment on the ground. Rek was right behind her. They made it about 5 meters up the tree by the time the vornskrs made it to the base and began clawing at the trunk while standing on their hind legs.

"At least we have the high ground," Rek said as he took a few shots at the vornskrs with his blaster. The shots temporarily scattered them, but they soon regrouped at the base, with more still off in the distance. From this angle, Rek counted about two dozen of the canine like beasts.

"Yes, but we can't hold them off indefinitely." The doctor said, worried.

This pattern continued for an hour or two until it started to get dark. In that time, Rek was able to eliminate a handful of the beasts, but plenty still remained. As night began to fall and their view became increasingly dark, Rek thought that he noticed something in the distance, beyond the vornnskrs. It looked like movement in the underbrush of the jungle that they were in.

Movement? Is there something else out here? Another predator? He thought.

Just then, a barrage of plasma blasts came out of the forest and into the clearing that they were in, towards the vornskrs. At least six of them fell. This was followed up by another barrage and then came the charge. Twelve individuals, some human, some wookie, came rushing out of the bushes, ready to attack. Many of the humans held large bladed weapons, but the wookies went in with just their bare hands. They met the vornskrs head on in melee combat. This of course drew the beasts away from the base of the tree that Dr. Sienn'aris and Rek were in.

"It must be some sort of hunting party. Quickly! Let's go now while they're distracted. It may be our only chance."

They quickly climbed down the branches and made their way to the ground. As soon as they did, the doctor began to collect her samples and equipment.

"There's no time for that. We have to go, now!" Rek shouted.

"This data is why we came. It may very well prove vital in helping a much greater cause. We are not leaving here without it." The Twi'lek firmly responded.

Rek sighed and then knelt down to help her, "Very well. Let's be quick about it then."

After about thirty seconds everything was packed in the two cases they had arrived with. As they stood up to go, Rek seemed to remember something, "Oh, right. I almost forgot."

"Huh?" The doctor faced him.

Rek took off his outer jacket and used it to quickly capture a ysalimiri that was sitting on the lowest branch of the tree that they were just in. The lizard kept squirming around inside his jacket and Rek had to hold it against his chest to keep the creature still.

"You said you wanted one of these, right?"

"I did, didn't I? With all the chaos from those vornskrs, I had totally forgotten about that. Thank you Rek."

"Just doing my job ma'am. Speaking of which, we need to get you out of here. Ship's this way."

They quickly made their way away from all the fighting and chaos and into the jungle towards the shuttle they had arrived in. By the time the pair made it to their destination, they were understandably out of breath. Along the way, they had been ambushed twice by a few vornskrs that had followed them. Fortunately, Rek was prepared for that possibility. After a few minutes of catching their breath, they were on the shuttle, with what they came for intact, on their way back to known space.

"Ughh…my head," Dallon groaned, holding his head. "That was quite a landing Namakwo. Namakwo?"

As he began to open his eyes, Dallon realized that something was wrong, very wrong. The Jedi took in his surroundings and saw that he was no longer on the Morpheus, he was lying down in a bed.

"Wait. Where am I? What's going on?"

"Dallon, dear, what is it honey?"

Dallon quickly turned to face the source of the unexpected voice. He was shocked to see that it was Shayera speaking to him from the other side of the bed.

"Shayera? Is that you? What are you doing here?" He quickly jumped up out of the bed.

"Dallon, relax. It's okay." Shayera reached her arm out towards him. "Come back and lay down."

"Relax? What do you…This can't…" He began backing up from the bed towards a window. That's when he saw it. He'd recognize that view anywhere, anytime. It was Aldera. He was home, on Alderaan.

Dallon collapsed on the floor by the window, "How did…What's going on?"

Shayera was soon by his side, kneeling down with her hand on his shoulder.

"Just take a few seconds to breathe deep and relax. We're at home, on Alderaan. We got married two years ago, remember?"

"Married? What are you talking about? I'm a Jedi, I can't get married."

"No, you're not. You were diagnosed with schizophrenia a year ago. Your mind developed an alternate life for yourself where your family was killed and you became a Jedi. It created a lifetime's worth of memories to accompany this fantasy. You've been on steady medication for the past year to treat it. It works well, but the doctor said that even with the medication, sometimes the false memories from this fantasy can surface in your dreams. When this happens, the false memories can conflict with your real memories and cause the disorientation that you are experiencing now. It's okay. Give your mind a moment to adjust so that your real memories can resurface."

"Real memories? What…" Dallon was interrupted by a rush of memories flooding his brain. It was all there- his childhood on Alderaan with his family, growing up, going off-world to travel, meeting Shayera, their marriage, his diagnosis-as real as day. "My parents…they're alive?" A single tear formed in his eye.

"Of course, my love. We just had dinner with them last week, remember?"

He did remember. They went to a new restaurant by their house. The food was incredible and they had a great time. They talked about Shayera's new job. She's a mechanical engineer for a local starship manufacturer. But, this couldn't be real…could it? His 'other' set of memories of his life as a Jedi were still there in his mind, but they lingered in the background, like shadows.

Shayera took his hand in hers, "Come back to bed with me Dallon. It's still early. We can spend the whole day together later."

Maybe she was right. Maybe this was his life. He decided to give himself some time to think it over.

"Okay Shayera," he said, standing up, and followed her back to bed.

Namakwo crouched in the tall grass on the top of the hill that he was on. It was a perfect spying position for the mountainside entrance it overlooked. There were six terentateks, that he could see, patrolling the entrance. Poor abominations, he thought, Apparently Janus neglected to mention a few of them. I'm assuming that means the artifact is here too. The signal is coming from in there. This has to be where Dallon is.

Eight hours earlier-Namakwo began to awake in a haze. He found himself a few feet from where he had been right before they crashed. Now he was sitting with his back to one of the walls while he tried to fully regain consciousness. His vision was still dark and blurry and his motions were sluggish. The Mon Calamarian saw four humanoid figures wearing black cloaks walking towards him. However, they weren't apparently interested in him. They turned and began to pick up Dallon, who was still seemingly unconscious. Namakwo immediately tried to protest by attempting to stand up but as soon as he did darkness overwhelmed his vision and he found himself face down on the floor. However, he quickly recovered.

"No! Dallon!" Namakwo stumbled through the now open door and into the jungle outside. "Stop!" He lunged at one of the dark figures and managed to grab a leg, but was soon met with a swift kick to the face. Unbeknownst to his attacker however, Namakwo managed to place a tracker on figure's leg. The last thing that he heard before he passed out was the sound of a speeder rushing off. About fifteen minutes later, the Mon Calamarian re-awoke and sat up. With his head down, Namakwo took several deep breaths while his vision cleared. When he was ready, he stood up and assessed the situation. He needed to find Dallon, but he did not want to rush in unprepared. He had to see what he had to work with. The ship appeared to have crashed in the middle of a jungle. "What happened? Did they hit us with something? But the cloak was on. How could they have seen us?" Namakwo walked back to the Morpheus to take an account of the damage. "Hmm…minor structural damage, but nothing that threatens hull integrity. However main power, propulsion and communication systems are shot. I can get them working but not without replacement parts. For now, I'll just focus on where our mystery attackers went." He pressed a few buttons on his wrist pad, "Ah, there they are. They appear to have stopped. Hmm, I don't suspect that I'll be able to find any replacement parts in this jungle. So it looks like I'll be going on foot. I'd say it's about an eight hour walk. I better get going." Namakwo looked at the open entrance to the ship. "And how did they manage to get that door open? It was locked." Namakwo put the thought out of his mind for the time being, gathered what food, water and other supplies he could carry and began his trek.

A few hours into his journey, he came across what looked like some sort of outpost. But he soon discovered that something was quite off about the place. Perhaps it was the strange feeling that he got upon getting there, but more than likely it was the six metallic spikes that he saw at the entrance of the settlement. Each one was about five meters in height and they appeared to have a dark liquid residue on them. Upon closer inspection, Namakwo determined that it was blood.

"What happened here? This is really disturbing." Just then he heard some rustling nearby, further inside the settlement. Namakwo turned in the direction that he heard the sound come from, "Hello? Is there anyone there? Are you hurt? Do you need help? I'm a Jedi representing the Galactic Republic." No response. It was then that the Mon Calamarian noticed that he could not sense any sentients through the Force. Then he heard the rustling again, but this time it was accompanied by a high pitched screech and it sounded closer than before. He approached closer to investigate. As Namakwo moved further into the settlement, he saw more of the spikes. On the edge of his vision, something dashed by and into a building behind him. "What's going on? I couldn't sense that at all." He went towards the doorway of the building and saw something just inside, kneeling in the shadows.

Suddenly, it lunged at him. Namakwo quickly dodged out of the way and was able to get a look at it. It had the traditional features of a Toong- the disproportionately large head, the jaunted cheeks and the eyes near the very top of their head. However, the similarities ended there. Its skin was metallic grey in color and it had large glowing blue veins running all over its body. It appeared to have multiple cybernetic implants sticking out of its skin. The creature raised and turned its head to look at Namakwo with bright blue eyes, artificial and lifeless.

It screeched again and lunged for a second time, only to be met by Namakwo's outstretched arm and a brief but intense Force push. "What is that?" Unfortunately for him, he got his answer in a way that he did not expect when three more of these creatures charged him from his side. He jumped over top of them and pushed them to the ground with the Force as well. "I do not want to hurt you. Stop this now." The creatures seemingly ignored him and got back up for more. The Jedi sighed, pulled out his saber and ignited the yellow blade, "I guess that I have no choice then." Namakwo charged the creatures, aiming for their legs. A few quick slashes later, he had them all on the ground, immobilized…or so he thought.

Although their legs were incapacitated, they continued to drag themselves along with their arms, screeching the whole time. With one final slash of his saber, Namakwo ended the encounter with a quadruple decapitation. He knelt down to examine their bodies and took out a small syringe like device. "I need to get a blood sample to analyze later. I think that…these things…whatever they are, used to be Toongs. But something terrible happened to them." Namakwo quickly injected the device to gather his sample. After he was finished, a small amount of blood oozed out of the extraction site, it was black mixed with the same glowing blue as its eyes and veins.

A few analytical scans later, the Mon Calamarian stood up and looked down at his wrist pad. "It looks like there were more of them. I'm picking up trace amounts of that blood substance on the ground forming a trail off to the east. Looks like they went that way. Well, what do you know? It's the same direction that the homing signal is coming from. Maybe whoever is responsible for this is also involved in Dallon's abduction."

After a few more hours of signal tracking, Namakwo came across a mountain in the midst of the jungle. There was a hill nearby with a lot of grass and brush on the top. "That'll do. Good vantage point with plenty of cover. Let's have a look."