Murmured into Felucia
I catapulted out of the end of Murmur's tunnel and fell to the ground with a groan. I had beaten the game, slain the demon boss, before that cutscene triggered and Murmur cast me away like garbage. Wasn't I supposed to leave the game with my hard-won powers? What was this fetid marsh? Straining I conjured a fire elemental to guard me, but that proved a little unwise as I passed out almost immediately.
A short distance away, somebody sensed something and rushed to investigate; whilst even more distantly my presence was having an even more dramatic impact than I could possibly have imagined.
I felt almost comfortable when I again regained consciousness. A feeling so odd swiftly roused me, my eyes snapping open to reveal an inhuman, blue face staring into my own. My reaction was instinctual, a pulse of force separating us as I rolled to my feet. I felt for my weapons as I snap-conjured another elemental, a tentacle pistol in my left and a focus on my right. The adrenaline rush was focusing my mind wonderfully as the demon landed softly across the small clearing. I spared a glance for the strange vegetation surrounding us – nothing I recognised – before concentrating on the more immediate threat.
She was blue, bald and humanoid, and I grimaced internally. The humanoid demons were typically more troublesome than the others and, though I didn't recognise this one, I could feel her strange words plucking at my mind already. Not bothering with subtlety I opened fire, my infernal spheres breaking against her glowing blade as she jumped away. Seeing her athletically evade the attacks of two fire elementals I conjured a phase elemental for my third, the wide area of effect catching the agile demon off guard.
Flickering out of phase she leapt upon my conjured elemental, abandoning her useless pretence of safety, but coming close enough for me to catch her with my pistol. Seven tentacles of toxic slime wrapped around her body with crushing force, holding her vulnerable to the combined fire of my three elementals. The slime proved resistant to the blade, of course, and I swung her round to slam into a nearby plant trunk. A conjured force elemental slammed into her, pinning her in place whilst I worked my strange magicks.
The best part about living a game was using the powers it offered in ways the game engine couldn't really support. The earth elemental flowed like clay, melding with the earth below and swallowing the little demon in it's maw. Her limbs trapped by the enchanted earth, she would have a tough time escaping. Not impossible, I'd wager, but enough for me to interrogate her. She was, after all, my only contact in this foreign hellscape.
"Identify Yourself!" I demanded as I approached, my weapons ready at my side.
The responding stream of syllables where meaningless, yet tinged with confusion rather than the demonic wrath I was used to. I sighed with frustration in response. Whilst I could attempt to wrest my answers directly from her thoughts, the earlier mental attack implied that she was more than passingly skilled at mental combat. Opening myself up to attack like that was not only dangerous, it would leave me vulnerable to false thoughts and faked data mingled amongst any real scraps I might gather, without any way of telling one from the other.
Instead I reached into my pocket-space and extracted a gorehide slab. One of my earliest true experiments into dark magic, it's surface was carved with 128 unique hieroglyphs, each imbued with a particular meaning. I'd intended it to facilitate communications with strangers, though as language barriers had so far been absent from the game I'd never truly tested it. No time like the present, however, so I carefully manipulated my captive's earthen cocoon to place the slab in her hands before drawing her eyes to the symbols that topped the page:
"toki pona," I began to recite.
Interrogating a demon with a mere 128 word vocabulary is neither simple, nor easy. Discovering that she wasn't a demon (something I confirmed by tasting her essence – not a drop of the Great Dark to be found) was just plain embarrassing. Fortunately, she seemed understanding – apparently she was a leader of soldiers, and found my response to be somewhat acceptable. We both stumbled a bit with the limitations of the common language we were forced to use, but it seemed that there was some sort of war going on here.
Not a demonic invasion, I hoped. Just to be on the safe side, though, better not summon any – if, as it seemed, I was no longer on Earth leading demonic legions here would be ill-advised. At the very least, I should warn someone first. Until then I would have to rely on my elementals – being conjured rather than summoned, they possessed no true connection to the Well of Midnight.
Releasing the trapped woman, I pondered my next move. I had nothing and no-one, and I still seemed to be in the game – although my exit function wasn't working, so I appeared to be stuck here. Perhaps the computer had died, permanently sealing the way in and out? I supposed it was possible someone might fix it if that were the case, though the time dilation could be incredible. I had a few powers that might help, besides fighting demons, but I still needed to give this some thought.
"sina tawa ala tawa?" she asked, stirring me from my thoughts.
"mi en sina tawa e jan utala sina." I decided; if I was going to be stuck in another war, might as well have a few warriors around.
She nodded and led me through the jungle. I paid close attention to my surroundings as I ran, quite sure this was an alien world. True, the plants held some resemblance to flora and fungi I'd known... never this size though. Unless I'd been shrunk? That wouldn't explain my new friend, but it was possible I supposed. Feeling out the energies of the world I noted that there was a distinct lack of the infernal energy that had so galvanised my own world's occultists when the hellgate opened. I could only hope that the existing energy would suffice for my powers.
We ran for an hour before coming upon a small encampment of white-armoured soldiers. By now I was somewhat recovered from my abrupt arrival, and my mind was screaming at me. Something was unbearably familiar here... but what? A glance around the clearing showed nothing I'd seen in the game or the 'real' world, but something was familiar and it left me with a sour feeling in the pit of my stomach as the blue lady approached her soldiers.
I didn't understand the words she spoke, as she had switched back to her own language to greet them. Nor did I understand their reply, though I was understandably distracted by the nagging sense of familiarity. The caution instilled into me by the conflict I had so recently left, roused by the dread in my gut, left me ready to respond when the squad raised their guns and opened fire. Tentacles plunged into the squad as I summoned another phase elemental, distracting them long enough for the pulse to strike them down.
More distant squads were quick to respond, my shields flickering under their attack as I summoned a toxic elemental next. Blasts of pure energy flashed from my fist as my first summon marched resolutely forward, determined to engage again having ensured that the first squad stayed down. Force and fire I summoned closer to the white-armoured soldiers,forcing them to divide their fire before my barrier broke. In truth I found these soldiers a little underwhelming. Compared to some of the demons I'd faced but recently, these were nothing.
With a final, savage gesture I unmade the elemental swarm, flooding the clearing with an elemental nova that ensured I would remain unmolested. The last of the soldiers lay dead and scanning the area showed no sign of reinforcements. A groan from nearby, however, alerted me that not all was well. My blue-skinned ally had been shot. Repeatedly. By her own soldiers.
Something was very wrong here.
A sense of panic floated up into me as I rushed to her side, analysing her condition. It was bad, she had multiple wounds of a type I didn't immediately recognise, though they appeared to be glancing shots rather than clean hits, and I could feel her life-force waning. My hands instinctively flew to my neck... where I found the chain I expected, but shouldn't have been there.
Shaking my head to clear it, I quickly administered a few drops of Lucy's Cordial to the fallen woman. It was something I'd created with a different power, not something that should exist in the game, but would quickly heal any malady short of actual death. Ever since I'd extracted it I'd carried it with me, in case of emergencies like this, and one of the first things I had confirmed when I entered the game was that I didn't get to take in outside equipment. Or powers, come to that; so if the cordial was here...
As the blue lady's eyes flickered open I focused on my soul, attempting to resonate it with hers as I spoke words in my own tongue:
"Are you alright?"
A gasp told me it was working, my omnilingual was once more at my disposal. Which should mean I was out of the game, yet, where was I? This was not where I had been when I entered, nothing like it. I barely caught the nod of acknowledgement as she turned to face her fallen soldiers, the elemental energies washing the battlefield clean as she attempted to process the situation.
"My clones," she murmured, "Why would they turn on me?"
I stiffened at that, many things coming together. That eerie familiarity that had haunted me, the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach... I knew where I had ended up now. As the woman in my mentioned 'Bly' my thoughts turned to a sick certainty. Hoping I was wrong, but dreading I was right, I addressed the girl in my arms:
"Jedi Knight Aaylas'ecura?"
"That is my name," she frowned, a new thought occurring to her, "I thought you didn't speak basic?"
"Shit." was all I could muster.
Murmured into Felucia: A Different Point of View
Jedi General Aayla Secura woke from her meditations as a shock rang through the force. The dark veil that had long dimmed her sight recoiled as a rare spot of hope glimmered and dimmed nearby. For a long moment she stopped in wonder before shaking herself fully alert. This warranted investigation. Commander Bly wouldn't want her to go alone, but he wouldn't stop her. She was in charge, after all, and the clones couldn't stop themselves from heeding the chain of command.
Stopping briefly to tell her soldiers what was happening, Aayla set off at a gentle run. Her force was advancing on a water treatment plant held by separatist saboteurs and could not afford to be distracted by the event, even if she felt it was particularly significant. Bly insisted on holding a platoon back to guard the base camp and give her a safe point to fall back to and, after a moments consideration, she agreed. It made them feel better, and might be needed if she found someone injured or hunted.
With the force flowing through her it did not take long to reach her destination, a small clearing amongst Felucia's dense mega-flora that played host to a strange human. He appeared to be unconscious, wrapped in a crude leather long coat marred with bizarre scars that almost shimmered in the light of the strange brazier he had left nearby. Reaching out with the force, he felt strange. Not a Sith, she thought, or even a Jedi, but there was definitely something odd about him besides the fact that he was here without any sign of how he had arrived and the outlandish scent of sulphur.
Though that might just be the brazier.
Sensing no threat she stepped closer to examine the man properly. He was tall and muscled, more like an athlete than a body builder, though he bore an array of scars that seemed to paint him as a warrior. Some of them were recent, very recent, and taking the man in her arms she felt that he had seen battle often, and recently at that, though his injuries appeared odd for they resembled nothing she had encountered on the battlefield. Entering into a light meditation she directed the force into his body, gently guiding it to improve his healing before his body collapsed under the strain of his injuries. She continued to meditate as the hours passed, and felt her eyes drawn to the man's crude leather clothing, and the strange prosthetic that ended his right arm. What kind of flesh was that?
So engrossed was she in the peculiarities of the man that her awareness dropped, and she did not immediately notice him stirring awake.
Sadly, he was not so slow. The stranger flashed to alertness with a sudden burst of force that separated them, arming himself even as he rolled to his feet. Definitely an experienced warrior, she mused to herself as she landed lightly on her feet. A roiling burst of power flowed through him and a second brazier sprang out of the air, immediately targeting her with what appeared to be a wad of burning sulphur. A corner of her mind distantly noted that the first was doing likewise as she gracefully sidestepped the attack, reaching out once more in an effort to quell the violence:
"Lower your weapon," she nudged her opponent's mind with the force as she spoke, "I mean you no harm."
Judging by the scowl that crossed his face at the attempt, that would be a no. Massive purple bolts flew from his strange prosthetic instead, forcing her to ignite a sabre and parry as well as dodge. Aayla smashed the attack from the air as she darted aside, noting that the strange braziers were far less formidable than the man, even as those strange energies roiled within once more. This time, it was a purple brazier that appeared in her path. One that swelled up and released a massive pulse of energy that swept through the clearing, leaving her no escape.
The blast struck her cleanly and tossed her into a crossfire between the other three. She felt strange, shimmering purple, and resolved to disarm the strange man before things got even further out of hand. Twisting to land properly and pushing off with all due force, she ran towards the man with sabres flashing.
Which was apparently just what he'd been waiting for. The bizarrely multi-barreled pistol in his other hand was brought immediately to bear, and she was unable to dodge every strike that emerged. Thick slimy tentacles clasped her firmly, and she could feel the contamination sinking through her skin and saturating her flesh. Her sabres flashed through them to no avail as she was flung against a nearby trunk with dazing force. Another of those strange braziers, this one glowing almost painfully white, appeared and engulfed her lower body, even capturing her hands and stilling her sabres.
At least the force still answered her call, slowly flushing the contamination from her body.
Warily the man approached, still covering her with his weapons as his strange contraptions spread through the clearing. Either they were covering her as well or he had them guarding against other's approaching. Not that any would, but perhaps his paranoia would stretch that far? A handful of strange words were barked at her, but none she understood. She tried to show her confusion on her face – this wasn't the first time she had been captured, after all – and was apparently successful if his visible irritation was anything to go by.
It did not last long, though. A huff of irritation soon passed as he presented her with a solid slab of some sort, it's surface decorated with strange symbols that shimmered with an eerie light. Her prison shifted around her as he placed the slab into her hands, forcing her to grip it. It felt like cold, dead flesh; but her fingers grasped it firmly as he directed her gaze to the first symbol.
"toki," he said, and understanding rammed into her brain...
After somehow forcing an entire language into her mind, the strange man proceeded to interrogate her with all the subtlety that crude tongue allowed – in other words, none, for it was an exceedingly simple language. Or perhaps it was her understanding that was simple, it wasn't as if they'd had time for a detailed etymology lesson. She cooperated as best she could in her dazed state, fortunately without revealing state secrets.
A simple goal when they lacked a common language in which to enunciate them! Her limited understanding forced them to speak in generalities only, though she quickly gathered that he was unaware of galactic affairs. Aayla managed to communicate that there was a war, which he had apparently stumbled into, and managed to reassure him that she was not one of the monsters he had been so recently fighting. Eventually he relented that point, though she felt queasy when he scanned her with his strange powers. Not the dark side, but still...
Finally he stepped back, pensive, and the cocoon that bound her disintegrated. He had already taken the language slab back, so she quickly retrieved and stowed her sabres before formulating her query. The language may have embedded itself in her mind, but that did not necessarily mean that it came naturally. It was still new to her, though when she asked if he would go his response came with an ease that spoke of long familiarity with the language, suggesting they return to her soldiers.
Nodding (a gesture that they seemed to share, thankfully) she led him through the jungle of Felucia at an easy pace. He jogged along just behind her, seemingly still lost in thought, though there was no danger of him falling behind. She could feel his strangely muted presence, never straying more than a handful of paces from her. It was a strange end to a strange day, she supposed, sighting the camp and Bly's platoon in the distance. He came over to meet her with his command squad... but why were they helmeted? Bly never wore his helmet inside camp.
"I found the anomaly," she told him as soon as he got within talking distance, "Jan Carthienes was lost nearby..."
"General Secura." Bly responded, almost monotone, "I would have preferred to do it in the back, but I suppose that's the coward's way out. In accordance with Order 66, all members of the Jedi order are to be executed. It will be quick, I promise."
True to his word, the entire squad immediately opened fire on the stunned Jedi. It was with only half a mind that she twisted to avoid the volley, catching several bolts for her trouble. Jedi General Aayla Secura fell to the jungle floor as darkness stole over her vision. She knew that her clones would be thorough, not leaving her for dead until they'd made sure. Her dieing thought, though, was a flicker of regret that she would not die alone...
A touch of sweetness broke through the darkness, and catapulted her to awareness. At the edge of her force perceptions she could feel hundreds of Jedi dieing, and shied away. Focusing instead on her miraculous recovery, she realised that she had awoken in the strange man's arms in a mirror of his own recent awakening. He must have destroyed Bly's platoon...
Glancing around, it appeared she was correct. Pools of strange liquids dotted the clearing, concentrated around piles of white armour – her clones, she realised. They had betrayed her, and died for it, but why? What could provoke this? Her companion was talking, but the words didn't really register until he spoke her name.
"I thought you didn't speak basic?" she asked, wondering about the charade with the tablet earlier.
"Shit," he swore in response, "I don't, long story, but we need to move fast. Palpatine's issued Order 66 to destroy the Jedi. We need to move fast if we are to salvage anything from the foundation of the new order."
"How do you know this?" she wondered. Bly had mentioned Order 66, but...
"Again, long story, later." He dismissed her, "Can you cut yourself off from the force? Just temporarily, we need you to sense as little as possible from that direction – and get us to a communicator."
"The force is filled with pain." she nodded, "Many deaths, I... I have dimmed my connection, and sense little but turmoil."
"I guess that will have to do." he muttered, "Can you get us to a communicator, though? We need to send a message if we are to achieve anything."
"I think so." she realised, "My frigate is off the books on this assignment, they won't look for us there. Can you fly?"
"No time to find out." he muttered, looking at the speeder she indicated, "Carry me?"
"Of course." she nearly smiled.
"Then set us down 10 minutes walk from our destination, please. It's important."
"Long Story," she muttered to herself as she ran over to seat herself, "Later."
"Yes," he whispered in her ear as he settled behind her.