Chapter XXII – Cyborg: A Moment of Understanding
Fett was the first to speak. "Figures."
"What do you mean?" I demanded.
"I had thought Jessa to be fairly intelligent," he growled. "Turns out she's just as brainless as the rest of her fool gender."
"Was that a slur against females I just heard?" inquired Ash, bristling her neck feathers.
"What does she see in him anyhow?" Luke wondered. "From what I've heard, he's a monster, a sadistic killer. I know they're similar in that they're cyborgs, but still…"
"Can we get back to the problem at hand?" Fett snapped.
"You started it," Tuck muttered.
"Enough, you two," I ordered. "The situation is difficult enough without you two fighting."
"What I want to know is exactly what it is Grievous wants to keep secret in that last level of the ship," said Ash. "And why it would bode such ill for us."
"The detention block?" suggested Luke.
"A torture chamber?" offered Tuck.
I shook my head at each suggestion. A prison block would have reeked of fear, anger, pain, and despair, and I had felt none of those things. A torture chamber, likewise, would have radiated agony. The chill dread I had felt down there did not match either description. It was more of… an emptiness. A living death, if such existed…
It was decided – another journey into the lower levels was necessary. We had to know what we faced before we could hope to fight it. Tuck volunteered to go, and I insisted on accompanying him. With Jessa gone, I theorized, it fell on me to accomplish this quest.
"Tomorrow, we try again," I told the others. "Our lives could very well depend on it."
Break…
The next morning, as we gathered in the dining hall for the morning meal, we saw Jessa again. Or rather, Luke saw her and froze, his spoon halfway to his lips.
"What is it?" asked Tuck.
Luke nodded at the head of the room.
Grievous had just entered the mess hall – though why was beyond me, as the cyborg did not partake of food. And just behind him, walking with a slow and graceful step, was a Jessa so transformed I scarcely recognized her. All the scratches and scuffs from the road had been polished away, the dirt and grit cleaned from her joints, the off-white of her faceplate repainted. Her twisted leg from her encounter with the taozin had been repaired, as had the dozens of dents sustained in our journey. Her tattered cape had been discarded, replaced by a rich cloak of shimmering dark green silk fastened at her chestplate with a crystal-and-platinum brooch.
"Well, she seems to have taken to her new life well enough," Fett noted caustically.
I thought otherwise. Jessa seemed uncomfortable, uneasy. Her eyes kept flickering our way, yet the moment she made eye contact with any of us she looked away quickly. I wondered if she knew something I didn't.
"I'm going to have a talk with her," I decided.
Luke gave me an incredulous look. "Now? While she's hanging on Grievous' arm?"
"Not now. But very soon. She needs to talk. I sense it."
Ash looked up from her bowl and gave me a warning look. "Careful, Vader. We don't know where her loyalties lie now. Watch your words and use caution."
"Strange," I remarked, not without a little irony in my voice. "We said that when you first showed up among us as well."
She did not have a reply for that.
As soon as Tuck finished his meal, he and I departed together. We opened the door to our quarters and allowed Nightwind to come out.
"Do what you did last night," I told him. "It seemed to work well enough."
The acklay nodded eagerly. "He's got animals here! One of them's another acklay! Been a long time since I've seen another acklay…" And he scurried away.
Tuck cocked his head at an amused angle. "How much do you wager that it's a female acklay, judging by his actions?"
I was about to argue that Nightwind was only a baby, but I caught myself. This was no hatchling anymore – he was rapidly approaching maturity. And with that, of course, would come everything that went with adulthood, including the urge to reproduce.
Again, down the stairs to the lower levels, we descended. And again I felt the ring constrict and go cold. Biting cold, so cold it burrowed into my bones and slithered down my spine, and it was all I could do not to shiver…
Fourth level – Grievous' menagerie, the smell of animal refuse and old meat, a cacophony of screams and roars and howls, punctuated by the shouts of men as they struggled to control some beast or other. Third level – living quarters, a few maintenance droids, a lone smuggler puffing at a death stick. Second level – dim hallways again, just like last night.
First level…
The door was locked, but it only took a touch of the Force to open it. The moment the doors slid open, a wave of black chill rolled out like the foul breath of an underworld guardian, smothering us and making us gag. What was in here that could be so profoundly evil? No, not evil in and of itself… but it was certainly being used for evil designs…
"Do we dare go in?" asked Tuck.
"We must," I replied, and rested my left hand on his shoulder, as if the touch of the ring could instill some comfort and confidence. It must have had some effect, even if it were only psychological, for he squared back his shoulders and led the way in.
There was no illumination here save the lights of my chestplate, which of course did absolutely nothing. I wished we had thought to bring a light source – a glowrod, even a lightsaber… but of course Grievous had disarmed us on our capture…
As if in response to my desire, the ring took on a luminescence of its own, exuding a white-gold light. I raised my left hand like a torch and began to examine the room.
"Sithspawn!" Tuck swore in a pained yelp. "Ran into something metal… a storage crate? Table?"
I lowered my hand in order to get a good look at what Tuck had hit.
It still chills me to think of it… to remember the light revealing it in its hideous entirety… to hear Tuck gasp in horror, to hear my own disgusted oath…
The light rested upon the still features of a Trandoshan – the very one I had duped with the Force last night. His ugly reptilian features were twisted in agony, his thick claws clenched as if trying to strangle his tormentor. There was life there, I could sense it, but an empty shell of a life, an immortality of nothingness.
He was frozen in carbonite.
"He treats his own men like this…" Tuck said dazedly.
I made a circuit of the chamber, leaving nothing unexamined. There were dozens – no, over a hundred – blocks of carbonite in this chamber, some lying flat on the floor, others hanging from the walls like fine works of art. Embedded in each block was an unlucky being – humans, Twi'lecks, Wookies, Sullustans, Falleen, Zabraks, Grans, Dugs, Quarren, even a bewildered-looking protocol droid. In one corner several of these blocks had been haphazardly stacked in a disorderly pile; an inspection from the ring proved that these were victims who had died during the freezing process. And in another corner of the room… the freezing apparatus, its nozzles still crusted with carbon and its interior still reeking metallically.
"I suspect that this is the fate of any who cross the general," I told Tuck.
Tuck shuddered. "I've heard rumors… people who say they've been frozen like this… they say it's like being killed… but the moment of death goes on forever…"
A flash of memory… a smuggler being lowered into a glowing portal, then emerging in a similar block, his face a mask of terrible agony… my daughter looking on in pain…
Metallic footsteps announced the arrival of another. Immediately the ring's glow winked out.
"Quick, hide!" Tuck pushed me into the carbon-freezing unit, then squeezed in after me.
"Are you sure this is a good idea?" I demanded.
"You got any better ones? Scoot over, I can't breathe…"
"There's no room to move over…"
"Shhh!"
The door hissed open. We heard the quiet tic-tic of claws on the metal floor, the creak of joints as the intruder passed between the slabs of carbonite, a glow rod held aloft. The figure paused, raised its head like an animal scenting its prey, and spoke.
"Y'all can come out of hiding, I know you're in here," Jessa advised.
I hauled myself out of the freezing chamber. "What are you doing down here?"
"When the acklay crashed Grievous' little zoo on the fourth floor, I suspected something was up," she replied. "So I came looking, and here you are." Her gaze swept the room, and her eyes hardened like brown ice. "Who could do this? It's disgusting…"
"Grievous did it," Tuck snapped, brushing himself off. "Don't you get it? General Grievous does this all the time, and he'll do it again…"
She cut him off. "Darth, we need to talk."
"Yes," I told her firmly. "We do."
Break…
Jessa now had her own quarters, not far from Grievous' own chambers. The décor was expensive but very tasteful, with green and silver hues dominating. There were a variety of artifacts from her homeworld in this room, and she spent a few minutes acquainting me with them.
"He says I'm welcome to change anything," she remarked, making an adjustment to a music player. "He wants me to feel at home."
I said nothing.
She glided across the room, to where a deep window-seat had been set into the wall. She curled up, cat-like, beneath the great window and its view of the starscape beyond, then nodded beside her, an invitation to join her.
"Does it feel like home?" I asked her, sitting down next to her.
She shifted position so that her knee joints were tucked against her chestplate, like a teenage girl about to discuss something awkward. "I haven't had a home for so long, it's hard to say."
For several minutes we sat there. I was silent, struggling to find the words. Jessa sang softly along to the music that filled the chamber, eyes closed.
"Is Grievous what you expected him to be?" I said at last.
She opened her eyes and gazed out the window. "No. Not at all. He's… surprising."
"How so?"
She shrugged.
"Perhaps we should speak of something else," I offered.
"Right." She hugged her knees closer to her chest. "Everyone must think I've betrayed them or something."
"We are confused," I told her truthfully. "We have traveled together for so long. I suppose we are simply surprised that you can forget us so quickly."
"I haven't forgotten you," she snapped. "How can I forget? You're all a family to me, more so than my own family… it's been so long I've forgotten what my own family's voices sound like… you're all I have, I can't forget you…"
And she began to weep. Not the hysterical sobs that had seized Tyra on Kruvex, but slow hopeless tears that seeped from the corners of her eyes and traced glassy paths down her faceplate. Her metallic body shuddered as she struggled to keep herself under control.
"Jessa, no!" I urged her, taking her shoulders in my hands. "Let it out. Don't hold it in. It will only hurt you. Let it out."
She collapsed against me, sobbing quietly, her claws grabbing handfuls of my cloak and twisting. I let her release her emotions, holding her, not speaking.
"He knows…" she whimpered. "He knows what it's like… he understands." She buried her faceplate in my shoulder. "Dalzor took him too… dragged him out of a crashed ship… cut him apart and made a beast of him… just like he made a beast of me… he knows how it feels…"
"Oh Jessa," I murmured.
"And I know you know it too… but this is different. This is… I don't know how to say it… it's all mixed-up and I'm not making much sense…"
"Jessa," I interrupted softly, "how old were you when you attempted suicide?"
"What?"
"How old were you? This is important."
She drew a deep shuddering breath. "Fifteen."
"It seems to me," I went on, "that you have put yourself on hold for five years. In your mind, in your heart, you are still fifteen. You are still a teenager, still trying to find your place in the galaxy." I was only speculating at this point, but there was no argument yet, so perhaps I was right. "And I sense that, right now, you are torn – torn between completing the quest and going back home… or remaining here with Grievous."
She nodded, pulling away and setting back on her haunches. "I don't know what to do. Being with you guys, I finally felt like I had a place where I could belong. But I feel that way when I'm with him, too. We're counterparts. We're… alike."
"More alike than you and I can ever be." I touched my own chestplate. "Despite being a cyborg myself, I can still claim to be human. It is difficult for you to say that."
"Exactly." She folded her arms and stared out the window again. "I can talk some sense into him. I can convince him to let everyone down there go…"
"And after that?"
She paused, thoughtful. "I'll get back to you on it."
I stood. "Whatever you decide, Jessa, whether or not I agree with it, I will support your decision." And with that, I turned to go.
"Oh, Darth?"
I faced her again.
"If you tell the others about this, I'll bite you."
"But you don't have a mouth."
Her eyes flashed mischievously. "I can get creative."
I laughed a little. Emotional or not, she was still Jessa.
As I made my way back to our quarters, I sensed something was very wrong. The ring burned ominously, the pain increasing the closer I got to our quarters. What had gone on? Had Grievous reneged on his promise? Had there been a fight, an accident?
My worst fears were realized when I came to the modified storage unit – Nightwind lay sprawled on the floor, drugged insensible, tranquilizing darts bristling from his neck and shoulders like oddly colored spines. Ash, too, had been subdued and drugged, and charred blots on the floor and a hideous stench of vaporized metal marked a titanic struggle between Grievous' droid guards and the powers of the phoenix. Of Luke, Fett, and Tuck there was no sign.
"Ash, where are they?" I demanded, kneeling, lifting the bedraggled bird from the floor, and shaking her. Either her attacker had used too little of the drug or her body was resistant to it, for she was still conscious, if not fully coherent.
"Gone," she moaned, eyes half-lidded and sunken. "Went with the cyborg… head hurts… stop shaking me…"
"Where did he take them?"
"Don't know… his soldiers came, I burned a few… I told you to stop shaking…"
"Why?" I demanded. "What did he want with them?"
"You should know that, pal."
I whirled, dropping Ash. Lieutenant Cleiko stood in the doorway, leaning against the frame with a slim hand on one hip, a smug look on her long flat snout.
"Where are they?" I snarled.
"Oh, around." She pulled a blaster from her belt and leveled it casually at me. "They made a mistake, you see. The mistake of crossing the Boss. The mistake of trying to play the hero."
"What do you mean?"
"Don't be coy, Lord Vader. I know where you were last night. I know where you and the trooper were this morning. I know you've seen where offenders go. Why do you think we have so few fights aboard this ship? What do you think we do with our prisoners? What do you think your friends were up to after you left so conveniently?"
I winced. Of course Luke would take the heroic route. Having heard of Grievous' cruelty, he would want to free the prisoners from their carbonite prison, especially having a friend who had undergone that torment. From what I had heard of his life, he was always like that, helping others at the expense of his own safety.
"Up and at 'em, big guy," she said in a taunting voice. "You want to see your friends one last time, don't you?"
The ring's power coursed through me again, smothering the Force before I could draw on it in defense. Bewildered, I rose to my feet, hands in the air.
"Good choice." She moved behind me and planted the muzzle of her gun against my back. "Move it along, big fella. We have places to be." She chuckled. "And here I thought you'd be difficult to manage."
Again we were brought before Grievous, and this time there was an audience – every soul of Grievous' hired scum, it seemed. Luke, Fett, and Tuck were already before him, forced to their knees and their hands cuffed behind them. Cleiko bound my own wrists similarly and shoved me before her superior, smirking all the while.
"So," snarled the cyborg general, pacing restlessly before us. "I extend my trust to you, I grant you safe passage aboard my vessel, and this is the thanks I get? You dare trespass where it is forbidden? You dare violate my command?"
Luke met his gaze. "Do your men know what you keep in your basement, Grievous?" he asked. "Have you told them what happens to those who cross the line?"
Grievous struck him across the face with the back of a clawed hand. "Hold your tongue, scum," he hissed. "Of course they know. How would I keep them in line if they didn't know?"
Luke glared back, blood streaming from his broken nose.
"You have decided your own fates," he rasped. "And you will join those you have seen on the lowest level… indefinitely. Lieutenant, take them away!"
"Wait!"
Grievous looked up, and his flashing yellow eyes softened as Jessa entered the chamber. She carried herself with the air of a princess, head high, steps slow, and in response everyone unconsciously accorded her respect. Even Cleiko bowed her head respectfully.
"Jessalyn," Grievous purred. "I regret to inform you…"
"I heard," she retorted, none of her counterpart's pleasantness mirrored in her voice. "Your doors aren't soundproof. I know what you plan to do." She approached the general until her faceplate was mere centimeters from him and addressed him in an angry hiss. "And if you do to them what you've done to so many others, you'll have to do it to me as well."
Grievous laughed dismissively. "But you have no part in this…"
"I was down there this morning," she countered. "Don't believe me, ask Vader and Tuck."
His eyes narrowed. "They are a part of your past, Jessalyn. They mean nothing to you now. You belong here. Your future is here. Why worry yourself over them?"
She refused to back down. "You're going to let them go. You're going to let all the people you deep-froze go. And you're going to stop being such a sadistic bastard, you hear me? Otherwise I'm leaving."
The gathered thugs laughed derisively.
"You want I should nuke the tart?" demanded Cleiko, leveling a blaster at Jessa's head.
Grievous raised a clawed hand to stay the Gungan. "No. She speaks her mind. She will not suffer for that." He met her gaze again. "Go to your quarters. You should not have to see this."
She took a step back. "You're really going to go through with this, aren't you?" she said in disbelief.
He did not answer.
Her gaze moved to us, then to Grievous, then to us again. I waited, breathless with anticipation, wondering what her next move would be. Would she cave in?
I could never have predicted her next move – she raised her head, spread her arms, and began to sing.
"Night time sharpens, heightens each sensation – darkness wakes and stirs imagination…"
Stunned, we could only stare at her as she lost herself in the strains of the music. Cleiko gaped as if Jessa had just lost her mind. Grievous stepped back a pace, head cocked animal-like to one side in confusion. The hired scum shifted restlessly, murmuring speculatively.
"What's she doing?" mouthed Tuck.
He might well ask!
The ring pulsed once, and my cuffs loosened. Puzzled, I tugged experimentally, and my hands slid free. What was the ring up to now? Its actions had been so strange of late that I had no idea whether I could trust it or not…
The ring pulsed again, prompting me. I extended the Force, finding that it would once again obey my commands, and unlocked the hand binders of the others. Somehow I knew that they would need their hands in the next few moments. I looked around – everyone was too entranced by Jessa's song to notice that we were breaking free. Was this her plan?
Oblivious to us, she placed a hand to her chest, immersed in her music. "Close your eyes – start a journey to a strange new world – leave all thoughts of the world you knew before – close your eyes, let the music set you FFRRRREEEEEEEEE!"
The high note erupted into pure sonic hell as she activated the audio-attack.
I was instantly grateful that my hands were free, though they did little to muffle the screech when I clapped them over the auditory receptors of my helmet. Grievous, being the closest to her, suffered the worst of it, collapsing from the shock and pain of the blow. Screams and bellows of rage and pain filled the room as Grievous' thugs felt her wrath.
Jessa wasted no time – she bent down, ripped two objects from Grievous' waist, and bolted. Luke, Tuck, Fett, and I were close behind, though still reeling from the pain.
The moment she addressed us, the shriek mercifully silenced. "I got your lightsabers. Thought you'd want 'em back."
"Jessa, we were so sure you weren't coming back…" Luke panted.
"Save the lecture!" she barked. "We gotta get Nightwind and Ash!"
"They're unconscious or close to it," I replied. "Grievous' men drugged them."
"Then we'll drag them out if we have to!" she retorted. "There's a couple good-sized ships in one of the hangars, we can squeeze in there and blow this joint."
When we reached the storage room, we were relieved to see that both creatures had awakened, though Nightwind tottered dangerously on his feet. We had to slow our pace to allow him to keep up.
"Dizzy…" he moaned. "Stupid droids… don't want to see another droid in my life…"
"I don't blame you," Ash replied.
The main hangar was deserted – had the entire ship turned out to see us punished? A variety of ships stood at the ready, including a squat military gunship that looked just large enough to hold our party. It looked as if nothing could halt our escape…
"Leaving so soon?"
Grievous stepped out from behind the gunship, eyes afire with indignation at being bested. His gaze focused on Jessa, and he raised a hand as if commanding her to stop.
Jessa did not even slow down. She was beyond taking orders from the droid general now. Like a panther she sprang, impacting against the general with all her weight. Entangled they fell, cartwheeling over several times before they finally separated into two beings again.
"Jessa!" I slid to a halt.
"Get on the ship, you idiot!" she ordered. "Now!" And she ignited the lightsabers she had stolen back from Grievous.
The two cyborgs circled warily, light swords blazing, eyes locked, joints and servomotors tensed for combat. Despite her command, we did not board the ship – we COULD not board. Despite all that had occurred in the past twenty-four hours, we could not abandon her now, even though it was perfectly clear that she intended to sacrifice herself as a distraction, that we might escape.
Grievous struck, bringing both blades down with frightening force to sever her arms. She blocked the blow, catching both blades with crossed sabers, but just barely. Her arms shook with the force of his strike, and I feared for her life. She was not a fighter, she hadn't Grievous' training, his experience… he would crush her in a heartbeat…
She attacked without warning, her foot catching his right leg in a brutal kick. The limb buckled and bent at a horrible angle, and Grievous rocked dangerously on his feet. Emboldened, she slashed at his vulnerable midsection. He parried the blow but gave up his advantage in the fight. Was I wrong, and she did indeed have a chance at victory?
It was not to be, however. Within seconds the advantage swung in his direction again, and it was the short work of a few more seconds to entangle Jessa in her own blows. A well-placed kick swept her feet out from under her, and she went down hard, knocking the breath from her.
I extended my arm, ready to call a weapon to my hand and defend her.
"Don't!" Jessa shouted. "Get away! Now!"
Grievous stared at Jessa a long moment, panting and coughing, sparks bursting from his damaged leg. He raised his weapons, the tips pointing at her vulnerable neck… and extinguished them.
"A novice fighter," he noted, extending a clawed hand as if to help her up, "but not beyond teaching. Devious little trick, I might add, back in my chamber."
She got to her feet without his help. "You weren't listening to reason. I had to do something to protect my friends."
"I see." He turned to face us, amusement in his eyes. "So your loyalty remains with them."
She nodded. "I have an obligation to them. I'm sorry, but I can't accept your offer. I cannot stay."
He saluted. "Not all can fight this honorably. Go then, Jessalyn, and do what you must do." He chuckled. "I do hope our paths will cross again."
She saluted back. "May the Force be with you, Grievous."
Amazing. So the general had some honor after all. The galaxy never ceased to surprise me.
We boarded the gunship and departed without further incident. While I plotted our course, Jessa retreated to a far corner of the ship, one hand at her throat fingering the crystal brooch Grievous had given her. The others pressed her for answers, demanding to know what had gone on between her and the droid general, but she refused to speak to them. In fact, she was remarkably quiet for the rest of the journey.
"Let her alone," I told them finally. "Suffice it to say that she had her own challenge to face before she could accomplish her quest."
"Still, she could be a little less…" began Fett.
He never finished his sentence. For the ship bucked wildly, and claxons wailed to announce our shields were gone. Something solid hit us, and we tumbled uncontrollably into the atmosphere of a planet, followed down by an attacking ship…
And my quest began.
