Neither Star Wars, nor any of its characters are owned by me, because if they were I wouldn't be writing this. Oops. Now I did it. I've used Mr. Lucas's characters, so I'll just say Lucas is awesome, and hope he doesn't sue.
(If I get rid of the message will you review?)
The Force Exchange.
Chapter 5.
Rescue.
Falling. Wind, Whipping his robes around, slamming into him sending him off in strange tangents, nearly into various airspeeders around him. Void. Sucking him downward as if it was some kind of hungry beast, pulling him towards it's gaping maw with some invisible force. Death. Tyve knew this to be the end. His chest in great pain, and his arm hung uselessly. The great pain tore at his mind, nearly forcing him to succumb into unconsciousness, where he'd be able to do even less to save himself. The pain also served to silence any control with the force he had. He couldn't focus for anything long enough to help himself, but it didn't matter. He had already accepted that this was the end. The fact that he slammed into a speeder with his broken arm didn't help the pain. In fact he could only manage a smile as he blacked out, the last thing he saw in his fading eyes was grim determination on the face of Jedi Master Kayon-Dur Kenobi, pilot of the speeder.
Black. That was all he thought. It consumed him, ripping his arm, his chest, and his mind. "Help me." It was the black, contacting him through some ethereal grave. Or was it? He thought he perceived color, or a shape, or something not quite living peacefully in the great sea of nothingness. It was a face. It seemed to recognize him, and though it seemed familiar to him, especially the voice, he was completely unable to place where he had heard it. "Save me." That was all it spoke. It's desperate plea for help was ended abruptly as the black faded away. Into pink.
Pink. That was all he could see. There seemed to be shapes moving beyond the total wall of pink, surrounding his world. Suddenly he realized what had happened as he was ripped from his cosmic poetry and pulled, half-naked from the bacta tank. He was gently lifted from the tank, and set down, dripping wet onto a small metallic bench there for exactly that purpose. The metal was freezing cold, and quite a shock to him as he touched it, but he resigned to this feeling, mentally labeling it as good, after being unconscious for so long. He sat there on the cold bench, breathing heavily, and somehow sweating. "For now rest." Yoda. Of course it was Yoda. Yoda, Mace Windu, and Kayon-Dur Kenobi were standing in one corner. Windu and Kenobi were silently conversing, and looked up at Tyve when Yoda spoke. Their presence was comforting, and Tyve was relaxed. It was then Windu who spoke. "How do you feel?" Tyve at silently, contemplating the question, evaluating his health. "I'm definitely better than I was. My arm and chest feel weird, and I have a slight headache, and I'm deadly tired. How long was I in the tank?" Windu visibly surpressed a grimace and softly spoke. "Four Weeks." Tyve nearly jumped up in shock. Bacta healing was slow, but even a broken arm, and ribs would not take a full month to heal. Before Tyve could inquire about this, Kenobi came over. "I'm sorry about your arm Tyve. I couldn't slow your fall with the force. I'm afraid it was completely crushed." "It's okay," said Tyve, "It doesn't feel that bad." As he said this he reached over with his left arm. Cold. His right arm was alive with cold, crawling with it. He looked down, and to he horror was greeted by cold, dull metal where his flesh had been. Somehow he hadn't noticed it before, but his entire arm had transformed into some metal nightmare, cold and unfeeling. "We had no choice, after two weeks you showed no signs of recovery. Your arm hadn't changed at all, neither had your ribs. You wouldn't have made it much father without replacement." As soon as Mace had said this, Tyve felt his chest. It seemed the same, though he could tell that his cracked ribs had been taken out, and replaced with steel. "Signs of recklessness they are," said Yoda, ever wise, "Signs of what you might have done." Tyve knew Yoda spoke of his flirtation with the dark side, and realized just how close he had come to using that horrible power.
It had been a few weeks since Tyve had been released from the bacta tank. He had been training daily with his new arm. It was physically very strong, but he seemed to have no control over the force with it. His control had improved vastly, but he still had trouble tightly focusing his power. He was again in the garden. Durke had seemed to find it peacefully, and though Tyve found it to be mind numbingly boring, he currently sat, meditating, and this was undoubtedly the best place to do this. "Rescue me." Tyve jumped up in shock. It was the same voice as in the tank. He knew it. He knew he knew it, and he knew it was something very important. Very dear to him.
"Errr, do you mind?" This muffled voice was not the same. It was Master Kenobi. Kenobi was lying, face down in the dirt, with Tyve standing over him; one foot on one of his arms. Tyve seemed to awake from his daze, and quickly moved off of the Master.
Kayon-Dur picked himself up, rubbing the Dirt out of his hair.
"I'm sorry, I seemed to have surprised you."
"It's my fault." Said Tyve "I've been hearing these voices asking for help. I know I recognize them, but I can't quite remember who it is."
Kayon-dur contemplated something, and when Tyve inquired with "What is it?" he replied.
"Tyve, I know the past months have not been kind to you, and these voices could be something to do with that. But I don't think so. I believe they are the call of the force. Yoda sent me to help you calm yourself, but I believe other things are needed. Follow me."
Kenobi led Tyve through the temple into the map room, off the main foyer. It was a small room where Yoda generally personally trained the young trainees, but it also held a state of the art device that displayed the galaxy's planets in perfect detail, according to the Jedi archives. Kenobi took a small crystal ball out of a pouch on his belt, and placed it on the small pedestal in the center of the room. Light seemed to shoot out of the walls, becoming stars, planets, and galaxies. It was mesmerizing. The lights twisted in and out of each other until they found balance, and became representative of the exact location of these planets relative to one another. There they hung ling tiny jewels, sparkling as if miniature suns shone through them.
" Now watch this. Although only fifteen Jedi have been taken from our temple, many more have been taken from their duties on other planets. The actual number is near eighty-five."
Tyve was completely aghast at this. Eighty-five was nearly six times as many Jedi missing as the counsel had been telling them.
While Tyve thought of this, Kenobi continued.
" Although some have been taken from outreaching planets, if we discount these we get a pattern."
He typed something into the controls on the wall, and as he did nearly twenty or so planets, all within close proximity of one another was lighted red.
"As you can see, they form a perfect circle. Jedi have been taken from all inhabitable planets within ten light-years of one planet. Ithor."
When he said the name, the galaxy disappeared, and was replaced by A giant glowing ball that was Ithor. Information about the planet was displayed around it.
"Ithor" whispered Tyve, then louder "Ithor? The Ithorians are peaceful! They wouldn't capture Jedi, and they surely wouldn't harbor people who do."
"Hey, don't argue." Said Kayon-dur, "It's Ithor."
"Ithor," whispered Tyve again, thinking hard.
He could do it. If that was their base he could sneak in, he was good at it. His being seen in the casino was a bad mistake. He wouldn't do that again. If he could get permission from one of the counsel to leave, well that was the hard part. The rest would be as easy as making a Correlian spice cake.
"Jedi padawan Tyve?" this was a new person in the room, one of the couple of Jedi who never seemed to do anything but help the counsel, though no one ever knew who they were.
"The counsel have requested your presence," and then, turning to Kayon-Dur, "and that of Master Kenobi."
He then turned and left.
"Time to tell," said Kenobi to Tyve, following the man out.
Tyve had been putting it off, but they needed to know. He just didn't want to tell. Tell them what had happened in that horrible ersatz Casino.