Chapter Ten
Qui-Gon latched his grappler hook onto the ledge of the fissure. He glanced down into the blackness of the depths, wondering again if his Obi-Wan was down there. Yet he had to go down there and see, if only to discover nothing.
With powerful pushes of his legs, he rappelled down the side of the crack. It was a difficult process in the weight of the water and seemed to take hours to finally catch sight of a dim glow that was similar to the Pennetian city above.
Looks like we've found something, Kyran's mental voice said in Qui-Gon's head. We'll have to be cautious.
I still can't feel Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon sent back, battling his frustration. He reached into the Force, trying to dig through the swirls and eddies to find his apprentice. Once—just once—he thought that he heard, felt, sensed a faint echo of Obi-Wan—but it was gone as quickly as it had come.
Finally, the two Jedi had reached a type of sandy bottom. Carefully, they detached themselves from the end of the hook, but left the smartrope hanging for their return. The water was the deepest blue before turning black and the pressure was almost too much to bare as they swam toward the glow.
We'll have to do this quickly.
Qui-Gon sent Kyran an agreement, wincing in the water at the physical and mental assault to his senses. The Force was very strongly active here and it cried out to him with words that he could not quite hear.
I've never felt the Force like this before. Almost as if it is...wounded, he told Kyran as they swam faster toward what appeared to be a smaller version of the Pennetian city. It's very much...
Alive, his friend finished. I'm starting to get a very bad feeling about this.
So am I.
Soon the two could make out humans hurrying to and fro in the bubble-protected city. Remembering the young mother's warning, they crouched low in the water by the blister, waiting for the way to clear to enter. The humans had all just passed beyond a curve in the corridor when Kyran started.
Qui, Kyran said tightly. I think we'd do better to take our chances with the unarmed humans than with the approaching Pennetians.
Qui-Gon looked up to see what his friend was talking about. A group of twenty or so Pennetians, heavily armed with spears and nets, were swimming upward from a large, milky bubble on their right.
I agree, he decided quickly as he swam toward the blister. He and Kyran both feel into the dry air at the same time, then paused in the shadows as the Pennetians swam past them with their powerful tails, headed toward the opening of the fissure.
Once they were gone, Kyran pocketed his breather and said in a low tone, "I feel so much...despair...here." He paused, then added quietly, "It's Obi-Wan's."
Qui-Gon nodded, scanning the coral hall in front of him. As soon as he had hit the air, he had felt his padawan's emotional echoes, though he still did not feel Obi-Wan himself. His heart yearned to find his padawan safe and unharmed, though he became less convinced of that possibility by the minute.
Kyran briefly lay a hand on his shoulder, then strode past him to approach a teenage girl walking slowly, her arms loaded with some sort of unfinished netting.
"Hello there," Kyran said to her, smiling warmly. "We're looking for Niklas. Do you know where he is?"
The girl shifted the load in her hands as she studied them for a moment. Finally, she asked, "You've almost missed the whole thing. Our Father is almost complete with our Mother. Do you mean to disturb Niklas at this critical time?"
"No," Qui-Gon assured her, smiling at her as well. His heart pounded in his chest and he itched to run down the halls of the city until he found his Obi-Wan. "We want to assist Niklas, not disturb him." He had no idea what he was talking about, but he must have said something right for the girl broke into a smile of her own, her white teeth a reflection of her pearl necklace in its gleam.
"Oh! Then I won't delay you. He's to the right, attending our Father's shell. Balance is near!" she told them joyously.
Qui-Gon looked at Kyran, and they both broke into a run. They ignored the startled faces of the other humans that they passed, some wearing necklaces and others not. Soon, they could see the milky-white bubble of earlier up close. Qui-Gon glanced into it as he drew nearer to it.
He stopped dead in his tracks.
There, inside the pulsing bubble, lay Obi-Wan.
He gasped, and suddenly Kyran was at his side.
"I can't see him well, but he's in there. Right there, at last!" he murmured as his eyes fought to keep Obi-Wan in view through the bubble. The bubble was such an odd consistency that all he could make out was the blurry shape of his padawan laying on the floor of the bubble, his hands stretched above his head and enclosed in a green chain.
"Come on," Kyran urged. "There's got to be a way in. Let's find Niklas; he'll know." He looked nervously up, seeing what Qui-Gon in his preoccupation with his padawan did not: a ring of Pennetians circled around the bubble.
With great reluctance, Qui-Gon let Kyran lead him away from his padawan and to a small room off of a corridor. The room housed six humans, none wearing necklaces. They stared at them, then a woman in her later years, her hands steeped in a kind of seaweed, gestured them to come nearer.
"What is it you want?" she asked them, her hands busy at her work as she watched them.
"We are Jedi," Qui-Gon told them quietly. "We have come for the boy."
What are you doing?! We were warned...
Trust me, Qui-Gon told Kyran. These people can be trusted. He had noticed on their journey in this miniature city that those wearing necklaces had a dreamy, joyful look to their face, and those without necklaces seemed moody and disgusted.
The woman regarded him a moment longer. "You'd be his master then?" she finally asked, her hands stopping their work.
Qui-Gon nodded while Kyran watched silently.
"Niklas!" The woman barked.
A boy about eight years old ran up to her, glancing at the two Jedi. "Yes, Addie?"
Addie nodded to the Jedi. "They're here to rescue the Jedi boy."
Niklas turned his face fully to the Jedi and Qui-Gon was stunned with how much he resembled his mother, except for his hair color. "He's not so good," Niklas told them solemnly.
Qui-Gon wanted to cry at the child's words. Instead he merely waited for someone to tell him what could be done, point him in the right direction, so he could save his Obi-Wan.
A man patted Niklas on the shoulder. "Niklas, go get Teran and Veman in here."
Niklas eagerly ran off to get the two that the man named.
The man gave the Jedi a cold smile. "We have been waiting for his master to come. We have discussed many plans to help, but all of them required his master. Now we will get to save the boy."
"I'm telling you, he can't be saved!" another man sitting in the corner and slicing up smelly herbs said. "They already started it! It's been too long! He's lost."
Addie smacked the man at the herbs with a stained hand. "His master is here. I'm sure he'll be alright now, you pessimist!"
Qui-Gon cleared his throat to regain their attention, uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was going and with being referred to as if he wasn't there. "So what is this plan of yours?"
"Simon needs you!" came Niklas' voice from the hall before anyone could answer.
"Over here!" Addie hissed at the two Jedi and two younger men pulled them into the shadows by the door, stepping in front of them to try to hide them better, though with Qui-Gon's height he had a good view.
Two dark men wearing impressive necklaces of black pearl strode in after a bouncing Niklas. They wore the same green net clothing all the other humans seemed to wear in their water city and they were watching the boy with interest.
"What do you want, Niklas?" One of the men was asking, ignoring the other workers. "Is it something to do with the Father?"
Niklas giggled and drew back into the protection of Addie's arms. The men just then seemed to notice where they were and that there were seven pairs of eyes on them.
"Hey, what are you..."
The older man—Simon, Qui-Gon guessed—walked quickly behind them and hit them hard over the head with a thick rock that he had been using as a plate. The two men with necklaces immediately sank to the ground, unconscious.
Simon grinned at the Jedi. "Now put on their necklaces and garments so that the merfolk won't immediately notice you shouldn't be there and you might have a better chance to save your padawan."