SANJAY'S SECRET

"Hold on a second," you, the reader, say. "Sanjay? Why do we have a chapter about that guy? Isn't he super dead?"

Well yes dear reader, he is. But that doesn't mean he couldn't have left behind one Dxun of a secret.

What could it be? If you want to find out, you're going to have to do the time warp with us again!

...

Ommin Rash had heard the stories of his family's condition. His father had told him before he died, about the prophets Mordecai and Melia and the others with the strange powers. He never thought it would manifest in his own son.

Moments after Sanjay Iago Rash was born the droid pricked the bottom of his tiny foot for a blood sample, which Ommin and Sanda barely noticed. They were too busy marveling over their beautiful boy. They did however notice when the machine alarmed with the results and the droid announced that according to its tests, Sanjay was eligible for enrollment into the Jedi Temple.

Ommin demanded it repeat the test and the droid did. But the results were unchanged. "I will notify Coruscant immediately. Surely they'll want to examine him as soon as…"

Then Ommin switched the thing off and wiped its memory core for all he was worth.

For the first few years he held onto hope that the test didn't mean anything. Hundreds washed out of the Jedi Temple and into their service corps; it was entirely possible Sanjay could live as a normal little boy.

That delusion shattered the day Melaana stuck her finger in an electrical socket and Sanjay screamed a warning from the other side of the house.

Once he and Sanda were no longer worried about their daughter getting electrocuted he pulled Sanjay aside and asked how he knew Melaana was in trouble.

"I don't know," he replied and went back to his coloring. "I just did."

And so cemented Ommin's worst fear. He and Sanda had never told Sanjay of his midichlorian test results and never would, but now they had to take more precautions. Luckily he'd never liked sports, and he was a fairly good student but nothing which would draw attention. The only thing about him which really stood out was his art. Ommin had never seen a six-year-old actually color inside the lines. And when he progressed from coloring to freehand drawing it was truly something to behold. Sanjay's creations were lifelike even from the beginning.

This must have been how the force or whatever it was flowed through him. Well if that was it then Ommin was greatly relieved. Art couldn't hurt anyone. Sanjay's peculiarities would bring only joy to the galaxy.

Once again the family fell into a cautious routine. Sanjay's outbursts grew rare, and he got too old for the Jedi to care about taking him to their temple. He was going to be okay. He was going to be normal.

…

Sanjay didn't know why he could make people do things, or how he did it. His father said he was very persuasive and that he needed to use his talents wisely but it seemed different. Mother was very persuasive, but she couldn't get Melaana to parrot back whatever she'd said word for word and run off to do her bidding. That had been a fun trick when they were children.

Nor did Mother and Father know exactly how Melaana was feeling like he did. Mel was an expert at hiding her true emotions around them. It seemed Sanjay alone knew when she needed someone to talk to about her husband or the baby on the way.

Oh, Sanjay was so excited about the baby. He'd already made a list of all the gifts he was going to get for his niece or nephew. Shara joked Mel and Brem wouldn't be able to find the baby in the midst of all the dolls and stuffed animals.

"I can't help it!" He protested and added an adorable baby shirt that said I love my uncle to his virtual cart. "It's my duty as an uncle to spoil the child."

"You know he or she will be more interested in the wrapping paper than the actual gift?"

He shrugged. "When we have one of our own Mel will do the same for us."

"In that case, they definitely need a stuffed dalgo," Shara grabbed the datapad to start her own search.

Sanjay sat back content to watch her when the feeling blitzed him. It was like the feeling he got when Melaana was in trouble but different, new. Could it be…?

"Shara? Has Melaana or Bremon commed the house recently?"

"Not that I know. Why do you ask?"

He couldn't explain the feeling. "She usually comms or visits about this time."

Shara read his mind. "You want to be sure she isn't at the medcenter having the baby. Sanjay, we'll be the first people Mel comms when she goes into labor."

"I suppose," he relented though he wasn't convinced, and stood up to check the house unit for himself. "She's probably off flying -."

The pain broke over him like a tidal wave and knocked him to the floor.

"Sanjay!" Shara jumped off the sofa and looked him over. "What's wrong? What hurts?"

"Melaana!" He gasped. "Shara, comm Melaana. Something's gone wrong." He'd never been more certain of anything in his life - somewhere, somehow, something terrible had happened to his sister.

"Melaana?" Shara asked incredulous. "Sanjay you need to see a doctor."

"I'm fine." He gritted his teeth against the agony and pushed himself up. "Go comm Mel. Please!"

Shara ran off and Sanjay used the sofa to pull himself upright. He wouldn't do Mel any good lying on the floor and if his baby sister ever needed his help it was now.

Shara returned out of breath. "No one can get ahold of Melaana but Bremon's been admitted to the medcenter. Naidon beat him half to death. He told Mel to get in her ship and fly away so they'd be safe."

"Take me there." Bremon would have more information, and then Sanjay could figure out what he had to do to help Melaana...if there was anything he could do. It felt like something had snapped and disappeared forever. He could only hope it wasn't his sister's life.

…

The Blackwell birth announcement came like a slap in the face.

Mel and her baby were gone. There was still nothing to show for his and Shara's attempts. And here Marlon and Lana Blackwell were parading their child all over the HoloNet for the planet to see. An heir for House Blackwell while House Rash went extinct.

Sanjay didn't know why he kept watching it. To torture himself? That was what it felt like.

He slumped in his seat watching the happy little family. That should be him and Shara grinning, holding their bundle of joy. It should be Melaana and Bremon.

He was about to turn the channel to watch something, anything else when Lana Blackwell changed positions and the baby's face came into view of the camera.

The feeling came back for the first time since Melaana's death. He tried to push it away - had it ever done him a bit of good? - but it stubbornly remained.

There was pain, terrible pain in his chest. And a girl's voice singing in the old language, soft and sweet but not like Shara.

She spoke: "I'm not Shara."

He knew she wasn't. Who was she?

He'd have thought longer but just then Shara entered the room and Sanjay hurriedly switched off the holoscreen so she wouldn't see what he was watching. The story would only make her sad.

"Where have you been?" How could she leave him to be tormented by this broadcast and the dreams?

She blinked. "I was just visiting Brem. He's lost everything. I didn't think he needed to be alone. Edda's with him now."

Why was she paying so much attention to him? "I lost my sister and my niece!"

He didn't bother speculating that the baby could have been a boy. He knew Mel was supposed to have a little girl, just like the Blackwells' little girl and the girl who sang to him. Was it his niece in the dream? No, it couldn't be. His niece wouldn't have a northern accent.

"I don't like you spending so much time with him. You should be here with me. No wonder we don't have a child yet with you always off somewhere…" he gritted his teeth. "With him."

Shara caught the tension. "What do you mean, 'with him'?"

He looked her steadily in the eye. "You will come to bed with me?" He phrased it as a question but it wasn't a question.

She blinked. "I will come to bed with you." The words were flat and resigned with none of the passion and desire he would have liked.

Sanjay stood and took her hand, leading his wife toward their bedroom. He didn't want it to be like this. He released her from that strange persuasion that had been his talent for as long as he could remember and instead tried his best to arouse the lust in her more naturally. But her mind was on other things and as invariably occurred, his own arousal and impatience took over.

He must have fallen asleep because the voice came to him again in his dreams, "I'm not Shara." and along with it the pain in his chest. But that was not what woke him.

His wife was lying beside him, trembling with a quiet sobbing.

"Shara?"

She froze, "I didn't mean to wake you."

He laid what he hoped was a comforting hand on her shoulder. "What's wrong?"

She rolled over and looked at him almost guiltily. "I just can't stop thinking about it. I mean we've tried and tried and been unsuccessful. but to actually conceive a child, to know it's healthy and growing and feel it moving around." She dropped her gaze from his. "I can't imagine what he's going through."

He? The word sent a spike of hot anger through him. She was lying here in bed with her husband thinking about another man!

Sanjay tilted her face as gently as he could. He was fully aware that he could have hurt her in the jealous rage that was building up inside him. Instead he swallowed hard and looked deeply into her blue eyes. "You will not go and see him today."

"I will not go and see him today." She parroted emotionlessly.

"You will stay here with me."

"I will stay here with you."

After a couple of days of having her glued to his side like an unfailingly obedient droid, he knew he couldn't live that way. Besides it didn't make the dreams go away.

He allowed her to return to her regular schedule of tending her garden and visiting friends. It wouldn't have bothered him so much if it wasn't Bremon Kira that she spent the most time with.

Sanjay wanted her to come to him of her own free will. Surely she would. It was getting near time that she should be fertile again. They would have known for sure if Melaana hadn't taken that midwife droid along with her when she…

Really Sanjay just wished that Shara would show him any reaction at all, be it joy or anger or fear. He never regretted anything more in his life than what he did next. And in the morning Shara was gone from him forever.

He heard the voice many times, though only in his dreams and only accompanied by the crushing pain. It wasn't for seventeen years, when he was on the comm with Marlon Blackwell and Dalla rushed in calling for her father that he was able to identify the speaker.

...

So this was death. Well it must be, the pain in his chest was gone. He knew he should be on a one way express tram to Dxun or Haran or the seven Corellian hells, after the life he had lived. After all the people he had hurt it was all he deserved. And yet he didn't seem to be going anywhere. Was this part of his punishment, the dread of the unknown?

There wasn't nothing. He could still hear Dalla's voice, singing the same song she'd sung in his dreams. The same song which had played in his head when he did those horrible things to Shara. Maybe this was his torment, to stew forever reminded of the women he'd hurt most.

Won't you ride the wind and go, white seabird?

He wished he could but where was he to go? This place, if it even was a place, was total darkness. Sanjay had a feeling he could walk forever and never find the end of the darkness so he didn't try. Sometimes he sang the song for something to do. Mostly he listened.

He didn't know when his surroundings began to lighten or when the song began to change. Suddenly it was Shara! And the song, it was the song she had sung to him on their wedding night! She was singing the words in the old language just like she had done then but now, maybe it was a side effect of his death or this place… but he understood them.

"The child learns his father's way.

He seeks his guidance through the day.

And from his path he'd never stray.

The child loves his father."

A strangled cry of grief and self loathing gurgled from his throat. No wonder she had never wanted to sing it to him again. No wonder her sweet boy had been appalled when Sanjay had merely mentioned the title. No child had ever loved him. All the gods in the Galaxy forbid that any child should follow in his ways!

And yet the song, her voice, was so achingly beautiful. Yes, there was pain again, but not from the mortal wound in his chest. While he was listening to the song his surroundings had become a brilliant, blinding white.

He covered his eyes to shield them from the glare of it but his arms gave little relief. The song ended and there were voices speaking softly. They were familiar and he tried to make out the words.

"Shara?" He called but he knew she couldn't hear him.

There was another female voice.

"Dalla!"

And… the male voice with them… "General?"

Sanjay could make out his own name but not much else. It couldn't have been anything good from those three. They had all hated him. But no, he had asked for forgiveness! He had told them he was sorry for all those things he had done!

He heard a splash and then he sensed it. There was water all around him. No. He wasn't in the water. He was… on the deck of a ship?

He squinted around but everything was still so painfully white.

"Well now, what have we here?" This new voice was clearer very close but it had an eerie echo about it as if it were bouncing off the surf. "Never expected to see the likes of your sorry shebs aboard the Bloody Galia."

Bloody Galia? The name rang a bell, something from his childhood, a game Mel had liked to play? "I-I'm sorry?" he stuttered still trying to get a good look at who had spoken.

The red-haired woman materialized before him from the mist and it was a relief to have an image to focus on. Not so much, however to see the array of weapons she was carrying.

"Where am I?" He asked her, just the first of many questions he had for the first person he had come across in this place.

"I just told you." She took a bold step forward and he retreated. He thought he heard a snicker of a laugh from somewhere nearby. The woman acknowledged it with a smirk and then continued, "You're on my ship."

Her...ship? The truth hit him with the faint memory of reading Mel's favorite storybook aloud. "The Bloody Galia, the ghost ship that ferries the dead to their final destination? That means you're Sanya Harkon, from Mel's book!"

"Aye, the very one." She started away from him. "Hope you didn't mind the wait. I had more important souls to take care of first."

"Like my cousin?" He rushed after her unwilling to let her go. "I know I don't deserve any reward but do you take people to…" what did Dalla call it? "The salt gods' halls? Did Miranda Harkon get there safely? And Melaana and her child! You brought them to their reward, didn't you?"

She looked at him strangely. "You don't know? You didn't sense her?"

"Her?"

"Your niece is alive. I thought surely with your similar powers and the family connection you would have known."

"My niece is…" And then the image of the little girl jumped into his mind. He'd seen her before! He'd dreamed of her as long as he'd dreamed of Dalla's song. She looked just like Mel, but her eyes were all wrong and she could do things no normal child was able to do. She could move objects with her mind, and sense others' thoughts and feelings. And she could persuade people just like he did...

"Wait," he shook his head. "Similar powers? You're not implying that I could do something like that?" Even as he spoke he knew the answer.

"Let me at him!" A furious female voice snapped him from his shock while a dark-skinned young woman stormed toward him and the ghostly captain. "He's the reason I'm here!"

"Get in line, Steela!" Another redhead raged. "He killed my baby sister. I might not be able to kill him now but I sure as Dxun can make him suffer in the afterlife!"

Sanjay recognized both of them - the leader of the rebellion and Miranda Harkon's older sister. He didn't have to ask what had happened to cause their premature deaths and the guilt ate him badly as if he'd held the blade himself.

"I-I'm sorry."

"Your droids frakking killed me!" Steela spat. "Sorry doesn't cut it."

"How are you even here anyway?" Elinor swiveled her gaze to Sanya. "How is he here? Shouldn't he be heading to the fires of Dxun?"

Sanya didn't blink in the face of her rage: "Shara and Dalla."

Steela's jaw dropped. "I'm sorry, did someone just say Dalla is part of the reason he's here?"

Sanjay opened his mouth to explain but no words came out. How could he explain to this young woman, furious at him and at fate, just how much Dalla's actions meant to him?

Instead he watched as Steela screamed something without words to the - well, it wasn't the sky - and then let loose with a barrage of curses in old Onderonian which drew pause from even the hardened sailors on board. "Seriously, Dalla? Him?! Seriously?"

Elinor didn't waste time cursing Dalla or Shara. In an instant the cold steel of her knife was at Sanjay's throat.

"I wanted to do this with Sloan," she hissed. "But I'll settle for doing it myself."

"Go ahead," he slumped. "I deserve it."

He braced himself for the pain but Sanya's voice sliced through the air like one of her famous blades: "Fists only. And only until we get to the halls."

She didn't have to tell Ellie twice. Like lightning she sheathed her knife and came down on him with a flurry of blows.

It hurt, especially when Steela joined in his punishment, but Sanjay took it. He deserved all of it and worse.

It could have been seconds or years later Sanya called off her crew and stood over him while he shook off the pain and got to his feet.

"So this is Dxun then?" He'd never been more scared, but he resolved to remain calm. He would would go to his punishment stoically, with dignity. He wouldn't give the universe another reason to label him a sniveling fool.

Sanya wordlessly stepped aside and gestured down the gangplank. The gates there didn't look like Dxun. They were white and opened a crack to admit another ghostly figure onto the gravelly beach. A figure with wild untamed hair and the brightest smile in the galaxy.

"Melaana?" He whispered.

Ellie's jaw dropped. "You're not seriously going to let him in there?"

"No," Sanya scoffed. "But he has a job to do just like you do."

The redhead glared. "I only joined your crew and didn't see my baby because I thought Sloan would be here. You didn't tell me he was off promising to look out for Dalla."

Sanjay sprinted down the gangplank, completely ignoring the exchange. "Melaana!"

"Sani!" His sister threw her arms open and clobbered him in a hug. "You made it."

"I missed you!" Tears threatened to run down his face and he sniffed them back. "And your daughter...how is she? Is she getting along alright?"

Melaana pulled back. "You never found her? You never brought her home to Brem?"

"No, we were told she died in the crash with you. I swear I had no idea! I would have helped her if I could. I would have brought her home."

"You can see it now though can't you, the trouble she has to face?" Mel wrung her hands, frantic. "Sani, she needs her family."

"But what can I do now?" He gestured wildly. "I'm dead!"

"She has the power, same as you. You know that. you've felt it."

"I ... have," He admitted.

Melaana reached out and took his hands. "Then you'll help her."

"I don't know how."

"You'll know." She released his hands. "When the time is right I know you'll do the right thing and maybe you'll be able to make it up to someone else as well."

"Why can't you tell me now?" Sanjay lunged forward and grabbed her again. "We have all the time in the world."

"No, we don't."

"What do you mean? We're dead." He blinked. Was he going crazy, or was Mel starting to fade away?

"You have work to do first." Melaana stepped backward, fading away as she retreated through the gates of the salt gods' halls. "I'll see you soon, Sani."

"Melaana, wait!"

The gates clicked shut and Sanjay stood on the empty gravel beach for a long time. He knew what he had to do now, even if it scared him witless.

With one last look at the gates Sanjay turned back to the ghost ship and walked up the gangplank.

Sanya met him when he stepped oonto the deck. "So you need a lift."

Sanjay stared her straight on. "I need to find my niece."

Sanya grinned. "I've been keeping an eye on that one. She was named after me you know."