Chapter 61: Come the Gathering Rain (Part 6)
Yoda and Rain are at it again.
Siri finishes her shower and garbs herself in her dark robes, sighing. She opens the door and peers out at them skeptically, wondering if she should slink back to her bedroom and wait it out... and why is Yoda sitting on her table with Rain instead of the couch? She eats off that damn thing!
"...and you're being ridiculous, even more so for a Jedi," snarled Rain, "What you're asking me is asinine, especially when you're not even offering anything in return. I am not Siri, I have no motivation to help any of you, especially about revealing information on ANY part of my line, even if they're long dead."
"Oh ho? A price is there on this information, hmm?" posed Yoda.
Rain's gatekeeper narrowed her eyes and crossed her little arms. "...I want to go offworld. To two separate locations that... that were important to me, once upon a time."
Yoda's ears flicker, and perceptive as always, he poses, "Before you became Sith?"
Rain gritted her teeth. "Yes."
"Why?"
"I believe its called closure?" said Rain snidely.
"Hmm," mused Yoda, "Why want that, would a Sith?"
Rain scowled darkly at him. "Ever since you assaulted my Holocron, I've had the nagging sensation to go back. I want it over and done with so I can have some blasted peace in my mind."
"Hmm, told we were, that peace there was not, only passion."
Rain gave him an incredulous look. "Do not ever, joke about or mock my Order's code."
He grunted. "Discuss your price with the council I will, assume I do that wish for Tachi to carry you, you do?"
"Yes."
"The name of these planets, will you give?"
Her jaw clenches for a long moment. "Somov Rit, and Ruusan."
Siri does not know how the Jedi got clearance for this considering Siri's last jaunt off planet. In the event that they didn't, and are doing this anyway, she's not going to stick her nose into it. After all, much easier to claim ignorance and blame the Jedi. Speaking of which, she doesn't quite appreciate the tight quarters with a handful of them. Yoda, Dooku, Windu, and Tholme. The last is... curious to her, not quite sure why a shadow would be so interested in coming along for two graveyard worlds. She knew of Ruusan, a world devastated by the thought bomb a thousand years ago, the ignition of the Rule of Two, where Rain started her path in becoming Darth Zannah. Somov Rit... well, call Siri surprised, she thought Rain wouldn't give a second thought about her homeworld. Siri had done a quick search on the holonet before take off for information on it, which revealed it to be a swamp world devoid of sentient life for most of the last thousand years after some major flooding from their polar icecaps overwhelmed the already water ridden world.
"You are aware," said Dooku dryly, "That the path to Ruusan was swallowed by many a shifting nebula."
The gatekeeper shrugs, disinterest in her eyes. "The Sith have their ways. We're doing Somov Rit first."
"Is there any particular reason why we're going to this world?" poses Windu, ever suspicious.
Rain didn't answer.
The trip through hyperspace is long and tense, Rain stays active the entire time, relatively. She mostly just stares off into hyperspace, brooding. Siri stands at her side, not saying anything, but offering her presence none the less. When they come out of hyperspace, Siri goes very, very still. She knows this planet, Zannah had taken her here...
This is the planet with their secret base on it.
Zannah's secret base.
Why...
"Speak the corporal incantation," said Rain distantly, "I'll guide us in."
Windu looks skeptical about letting her take controls, but Yoda waves him off. Tholme pays a very unsettling amount of attention to the quick Sith Sorcery to make Rain's form somewhat physical. Its a little comical to see tiny Rain at the controls of the ship, but she guides them, as if on instinct, down into the atmosphere, towards one of the few patches of land visible that isn't swamp muck. Its large enough to land their ship on, but not by much. Rain gets out of the seat after landing and makes for the exit, her face solemn.
Its a little grassland, some kind of reptile animals are sunbathing on the edges. Rain finds a spot away from the ship and sits down, staring off into the distance. Siri stands a way behind her, the Jedi a bit further back, watching and waiting.
Rain is quiet for a long while before she speaks. "Home sweat home."
She shook her head, "Did I ever tell you about our naming customs?"
"Something about it being a homeworld superstition?"
"We feared the Swamp Demon," admitted Rain, fondness, grief, in her tone, "That if your name was ever spoke aloud, it might notice and come to claim you, never to be seen again. So, we lived our entire lives under nicknames. The men named their sons, the woman their daughters. It wasn't uncommon for you to go your entire lives with your friends and other family members never knowing your real name, or knowing theirs. It... it was considered the ultimate act of trust to ever speak your name to another. Not that that lasted long after leaving the planet..."
Siri moves and sits down next to her. "What else?"
"I... I was one of the best spear fishers we had, despite being so young. Me and... and B-bug, we made a competition out of it," said Rain shakily, "Kriff, I never... I never even learned Bug's real name. Never told him mine."
Siri gazes out into the ocean, there's nothing she can say.
"I'm all that's left Siri," said Rain quietly, "I'm all that's left of my home. Everyone else is long dead, our people long forgotten, our ways lost."
"You're still alive."
"If you can call this living," said Rain bitterly, "A small fragment ripped from the whole, bound in the holocron unable to feel the world around her."
She digs a hand into the grass, brings it up, and lets the dirt fall from her finger. "I can't feel the dirt, can't run my hand along and feel the blades of grass. I know there is wind, but I don't feel it blowing across my face. I can't eat. I can't drink. I can't really sleep or dream, can't find pleasure, nor physical pain. Nothing."
Siri decides she's never going to consider making a Holocron with part of her soul. She's not ever condemning part of herself to this.
"I'm still existing," admits Rain, "But... sometimes at my worst I wonder if this is worth it."
"Let me know when you figure it out," said Siri before quietly asking, "Rain... why this world? For the... you know."
The base.
Rain smiled bitterly. "I guess... even with the Sith I had become, some part of the little girl remained that always wanted to come home..."
They stay a day.
In which, Siri gets a crash course in being a swamp dweller. She's not sure she's ever going to find a use for spear fishing, root hunting, tips and tricks on building/preparing a little wooden boat she's never going to have nor use even if she had one. Good ways and places to hang her clothes if she needs them to dry that are easy to take down if a storm comes. Its useless things, but she listens and learns all the same. Zannah taught her parts of being a Sith, so she will do the courtesy of learning what it meant to be of the Rit, to insure something of Rain's people lives on, is passed on.
"So, what do you think I would have been named?"
"Cockroach?" posed Rain.
Siri snorted and swatted at her. "Did you even have those on this planet?"
Rain smiles mirthlessly for a moment before shrugging. "Don't remember."
Siri goes silent.
"You know, the Force mocked me once, about my home," said Rain quietly, "When I learned of the death of my people several hundred years ago. I brooded in my holocron, and in a moment of weakness, wondered if I could have done anything for what was once mine."
"What did the Force say?"
"It showed me an evacuation," Rain answered bitterly, "It was foggy and translucent, I could tell it hadn't actually happened. But it could of. I asked how, and it showed me that old dream of me fighting Bane as a Jedi, or me living alongside Tomcat on Ruusan as neither. Somehow, someway, even though I would have been long dead by then, it would have changed things had I not been Sith."
"You did say that you were always destined to kill Bane," said Siri quietly, "Truly wiping out the Sith might have gotten you and your people recognition, and made someone perhaps actually give a damn to keep an eye on this planet and its people. Or hell, maybe you would have had a kid, and one of your blood descendants would have done something."
"Maybe," admits Rain softly, "I suppose we'll never know."
She gets up and leaves, making for the ship. Siri takes one last look at this place, and then boards the ship to leave.
Rain guides them through the hyperspace nebula to Ruusan. The trip is... bumpy, but they make it.
"You ever come back here while you were alive?" posed Siri as the ship moves into the atmosphere.
"My last was a bit before the creation of my holocron," half-answered Rain, "To explain to my apprentice the follies of the Brotherhood of Darkness and why we switched to the Rule of Two. We didn't stay long."
Siri nods.
Rain frowns and slows the ships descent, her eyebrows furrowing. She abruptly changes the ships course.
"Rain?" Siri asks.
"I feel something from the Force," Rain muttered.
Yoda waddles up to the front. "Hmm? Feel what, do you?"
"A pull, its not being very subtle at the moment, what it wants with me I don't know."
Yoda hums. "Mysterious are the ways of the Force."
Rain pointedly ignores the Jedi and continues on until they set down. Siri whistles when she looks out the window. "I thought Ruusan was a temperate, livable world."
Rain snorted. "That was before the thought bomb turned most of the planet into either a desert or snowy wasteland. I'd be surprised if survives here these days..."
She cuts off when something bounces off the front of the ship, and for a moment, something furry and flying zips by the window.
"It can't be," whispered Rain, "How would they have survived all this time on this hellhole?"
"How would what?" asked Siri.
But Rain is gone, the Gatekeeper dashing out, shoving past the Jedi, and making for the exit. Siri and the Jedi follow, the sight they are greeted to when they find Rain standing pale at the bottom of the ramp is... fuzzy. She recognizes the green floating blobs with tentacles as Bouncers, like the image Rain showed her of Laa. They are flying about in droves, energetic and oddly excited. Their words seem part spoken aloud, part projected through the Force, part spoken into their minds, like a hushed whisper on the wind...
"Come the gathering Rain."
One of them swooshes through the air, coming to fly in circles around Rain.
"A verse rewrote."
It bumps Rain gently forward, making the Gatekeeper stumble a bit, but she shakily moves forward out into the desert clearing.
"The storm is coming."
They rush in and surround Rain, and Siri feels a very odd amount of affection and eagerness from them, for Rain. Who they couldn't possibly have met yet, but they nudge and nestle against her all the same...
"Laa's Rain returns."
Okay... apparently she's wrong. How the hell...?
"The prisoner's go free!"
Rain swallows. "How... how do you know of me?"
"We speak of you, in our Poem of Ages," whispered a Bouncer, "Laa's Rain, so lost, thought forever lost. Sad story, of one who cared too much, lost in pain."
Rain closed her eyes. "I... why?"
"Laa loved you, we remember what we love, gives us strength so bad dreams don't take us."
Rain says nothing, but her form is rigged.
"Laa would be happy, to see you you again."
"Laa is dead," snapped Rain, "She's gone."
"Never gone, always here, always around us," countered a Bouncer, "Come come, we show."
One of the Bouncers flies over to Siri. "Give Rain, give Rain."
Siri frowned, hesitant. "...why?"
"Come the gathering Rain."
"That doesn't answer anything," said Siri flatly.
"Just do it Siri," ordered Rain.
Siri sighed, reached into her robes, and pulled out the Holocron, watching critically as the Bouncer handled it with its tentacles almost with reverence. It swooped down to Rain's Gatekeeper, and let her climb on. Surprisingly, they're all given Bouncers to ride, and with that, they're off on a semi-terrifying flight through the desert. Apparently, Bouncer is a very apt name for them considering they bounce off the ground into the air for awhile then come back down to bounce again when they lose momentum or wind to carry them forward.
"Sad Siri sad," whispered the Bouncer.
"Hmm?" posed Siri back. How did it know her name?
"Loved her so much, but found sadness in return."
"Rain isn't always sad."
"Not Rain," answered the Bouncer, "Not Rain."
Siri frowned. "Who then?"
"You will give her love. She will give you ruin."
"Who?"
"The last lesson you try to teach her will be the lesson she gives in turn."
Siri narrowed her eyes. "I don't appreciate cryptic warnings. They tend to be useless except for in hindsight."
"You may blame yourself, in part may be right, but remember, all make own choices, even her."
The Bouncer decided after that it was done with its infuriating warnings. Siri doesn't quite know what to make of it. Part of it is obvious, someone she loved is going to betray her. But honestly, Siri really doesn't love. Well, anyone that isn't Kenobi, and what she feels might not be defined as love to many a culture, far to much possession for that. Still though... she's mildly curious. She has a hard time believing she'd eventually have a daughter, as that's the only one she thinks she'd come to love otherwise. Its hard to believe if only because she doesn't think she and Obi-Wan are ever going to get anywhere in what they have considering how platonic about the whole thing he is...
She'd stab herself before she ever considering rape as solution to that. Not again. Never again. Crossing that line once was once to many as it is.
She shoves the thoughts and the warning aside and instead focuses on Rain. The Gatekeeper seems... offbalanced from what Siri can tell and sense. Whatever she is speaking about with the Bouncer is making her unnerved. On that point, all of the Jedi also seem a bit unnerved. Good, at least she's not the only one being pestered by these fuzzballs.
They eventually land in a nondescript location, just desert for miles. She's not sure why they came here, but then again... considering how Rain is literally shaking, she has to know.
Siri jumps off her Bouncer and approaches the girl whose know kneeling in the dust, Holocron in her hands. "Rain."
"She died here," said Rain quietly, "Laa."
Siri nods in understanding, "You Fell here."
Silence is her answer.
"How can you tell it was here?"
"I will always know."
Fair point. Siri would likely be able to pick out where Master Galia died if she ever went back to Rondai-2.
One of the Bouncers comes and nestles beside Rain. "Feel her?"
Rain sets her Holocron down in the sand and stares down at it. "..."
"In the sand, on the wind, breathed by dust," whispered the Bouncer, "Laa always here. Happy to see you again. Wishes for you to meet another."
"Another...?" poses Rain before she looks away.
There are another group of Bouncers approaching from the other direction. They stop a little ways away, and the smallest Bouncer comes forward and lays itself in Rain's lap.
"Laa's Rain?" it squeaks out.
Rain hesitated before gently running a hand along its fur. "Laa's Rain."
It squeaks in delight. "Yosha, I Yosha, youngest of tribe, youngest of Laa's legacy."
Rain takes in a sharp breath, eyes wide. "I didn't... I hadn't known Laa even had any children to continue..."
Siri startles when one of the Bouncer's begins to nudge her away. "Come the Gathering Rain."
"Again, that doesn't explain anything."
"The Storm needs time to grow."
Okay, that she could at least guess they wanted Rain to have some alone time with Laa's descendant. She allows herself to be herded away to the Jedi who are sitting in a circle.
"...and apparently," said Dooku dryly, "I'm going to ask someone to kill me, if I understand what it was implying correctly."
"Did it say why?" posed Tholme.
Dooku shook his head. "Rather vague with its warnings. I can make a few guesses as to why I'd make such a request to be put out of my misery if its not medical related, but the future is always in motion."
Yoda grunted. "Hmm, true it is."
"What of you, my Master?"
"My greatest revelation will be one I never get to share," quoted Yoda, looking ever so disgruntled.
Tholme huffed. "These creatures are morbid with their foresight, aren't they?"
"Oh? Are we sharing our doom and gloom predictions?" said Siri mockingly, sitting down and butting in, "What did it say to you, Shadow?"
Tholme smiled. "I'll complete my task, I'll die for it, but I'll complete it none the less."
Siri raised an eyebrow.
He didn't elaborate, just kept on smiling.
She glances at Windu, who stared her down with his own imposing look.
So she offered. "I'm going to likely be betrayed and killed by someone I come to love."
Windu blinks. "...I see."
"What of you?"
He frowns thoughtfully. "I will face the Sith I seek in battle, but it will not be me who decides how the outcome turns."
"I'd pay good money to see you and Sidious go toe to toe," mused Siri, "So... Bouncer predictions, full of Bantha shit?"
Yoda hums. "Always in motion, the future is. Sensitive to those currents, these Bouncers are. Likely outcomes now, they are, but shift a stream can. Hope it shifts, I do."
The Jedi delve into a quiet joint meditation while Siri merely lays back in the sand and stares up into the clouds, humming quietly to herself. She glanes over at Rain in the distance every now and then, the girl surrounded by Bouncers... she almost looks... happy, for once. It makes her realize just how few times she'd seen legitimate happiness ever from her. And yet...
Something is building.
The Bouncer's called it a storm.
In the Force, it's centered around Rain.
Something is going to happen, she just doesn't know what. Slowly, as it builds and builds, the Jedi come out of their meditation and gaze out at Rain curiously. Eventually, the girl stands, and when she turns, there is nothing but determination on her face. She takes her Holocron and approaches, "Siri, I'm going to need your help for something."
"For what?"
"It's going to involve me needed to... hijack your body for a bit."
Siri slow blinks. "Umm... pretty sure we've been over this before."
Rain sets her jaw. "Not permanently."
Siri crosses her arms. "And what exactly do you need to 'hijack' me for?"
"I'm going to see Bug."
"Your cousin? Isn't he dead?"
Rain smiled grimly. "Yeah, dead, but not gone."
The hell was that supposed to mean?
They mount their bouncers again and are off without further explanation. Siri has... misgivings, and yet... the Force is nudging her along, to agree. She doesn't know why, but she'll reserve judgement until she gets an actual answer. This journey is much longer than the last, over the vast long desert, fortunately, they brought food and water with them. Its hours later as they start to descend into a valley, mountains in the distance.
A shiver runs down Siri's spine. There was power here. Incredible power. A Force Nexus. And statues. A lot of statues. Why were there so many damn statues? She files the thought away as the Bouncers fly over said statues and towards the center of the Force Nexus. Her skin feels cold and yet on fire, hotter and colder the closer they get until they reach it. Dead center, almost glowing with power, embedded in the ground, is...
"The Thought Bomb," muttered Siri.
Even crusted over with dirt and rock as it was, she could feel it, see the outline black-gray and smooth underneath it all, power begging to be used... dangerous power. Even without touching it, she could feel it, hear it, hear them. Whispers, tormented whispers. The Thought Bomb makes her all kinds of uneasy. Yet closer they come until they set down. The Jedi stand a bit from the bomb, faces solemn, Rain... her Gatekeeper approaches the bomb and rests a hand against it.
"Rain, what are we doing here?" asked Siri, "Why did we come to Ruusan?"
"I didn't intend this originally, didn't even think of it," admits Rain, "But... I think Bug's been waiting long enough. He was my family. That didn't mean nearly enough to me before. He needs his release."
Release...
Was she implying she was going to...
"How?" demanded Siri.
"You forget," said Rain mockingly, "I was the Dark Lord of the Sith of my time, and the apprentice of Darth Bane, who taught Kaan the ritual. I am intimately familiar with its designs, and its weakness. There is a reason, that no Jedi could destroy the bomb on their own, because it requires someone of the Dark to pave the way."
She turns to Siri. "To break the completed, detonated, and formed Thought Bomb, one must awaken and use it, use the Force Nexus it created, which in turn makes it vulnerable. Then, there are two ways to destroy the bomb, either the user does so, or the user is killed, and their death fractures the Thought Bomb. One would think, since it requires the Dark Side to even manipulate it, that the latter would always be the only available way. But..."
She holds out a hand to Siri.
Siri walks over and takes it, taking the Holocron with the other hand...
Rain's presence presses against her mind, not the sharp pinprick of malice and greed Zannah had been, no, Rain was a storm. A small storm considering she was but a fragment, yet... Siri wonders. What would Rain have been like at her peak? As Darth Zannah? As a Jedi Master? As just Rain? No Supernova of course, but she has little doubt she could have given the current best of the Jedi a good show.
Siri lets the storm into her mind. Its an uncomfortable pressure, two are not meant to inhabit one body, even if one presence is small. She has to pull back her sense of self enough for Rain to take the reigns. She watches, like from a distance out of her own eyes, as Rain takes a shuddering gasp. Briefly overwhelmed by physical sensations. She shakes Siri's head and blocks it out before jerkily moving Siri's body to the bomb.
She presses Siri's hand against it along with the Gatekeeper's and the press into it. Voices assault their mind almost immediately, but Rain appeared already prepared, pushing Siri into tapping into her own Darkness to subdue and pressure them into obedience. Siri grits her teeth and has to half take the reigns to not let herself be dragged down into the tormented mass. She grips the power, and follows Rain's awareness as she feels fault lines within the bomb. So many souls offering so much power. Its... its intoxicating...
She forces through it, takes those lines, then pulls and rips it apart.
The bomb blows, thankfully not like a real bomb. Still hurts when she's send flying and landing on her ass. Rain abandons her to return fully to the Holocron and Gatekeeper as the Thought Bomb cracks, lights billowing out of it as it ruptures. It splits apart, and little streams of light and dark rush out of the bomb. Each carrying a faint, agonized but relieved presence. They flow into the sky and begin to fade, one by one...
"Bug!" cries out Rain.
One of them stops, turns, and comes back down, an orb of light that slowly begins to take the form of a young blond shoeless boy in raggedy teal clothing. He looks sickly, his face gaunt, eyes hollowed out, yet... he smiles weakly when he see's the Gatekeeper. Even having seen and heard enough lingering things on Korriban... its still a little unsettling to see.
"Rain..."
"Zannah," she answers, "I... my name was... is... Zannah."
Bug nods. "Hardin."
"I'm... I'm sorry Bug... Hardin, I'm sorry I made you wait so long, and... I'm sorry about Tomcat."
"He made his choice," said Hardin sadly.
"He did, and he... he came back from it, only for me to go down the same road," said Rain, swallowing, "There is a lot I do and don't regret in my life, I'm... I'm still not sure I would have walked a different path. But that... I... I might as well have killed him, I in essence did kill him. He tried to help me and I killed him for it."
Hardin studied her for a moment before nodding. "If I see him... I'll tell him you're sorry."
"I'm not sure there really is anything after this," admits Rain quietly, "I'm not sure either of us will have the chance."
"The Jedi told me... taught me... there is no death, there is the Force," chided Hardin gently, "One way or another, he'll know."
Rain groaned. "Not even a month and the Jedi corrupted you."
Hardin grinned sheepishly. "I tried my hardest."
"You always did," she said quietly, "If... I mean... maybe I could figure out how to alter my Holocron... you could stay? With me?"
He shakes his head. "I'm tired Zannah, I'm so tired."
"I... I figured, but... I had to ask, just incase," admitted Rain, she takes in a breath, and likely does one of the hardest things she'd ever done, "Go find your release, Hardin."
He smiles warmly at her, closes his eyes, and fades away.
She stands there, unmoving, watching the lights fade away, hands limp at her side, the physical incantation starting to fade. Siri moves to stand next to her, and as much as she doesn't want it... "Do... do you want your own release?"
Rain doesn't answer for a long, long series of agonizing minutes. "No. Not yet. I still have to meet myself again before my time comes."
"...come again?"
"I was told, I'd meet myself again sooner than I think, for good or for ill," said Rain, a frown on her face, "Whatever that means."
Rain sighed and sat down on the ground. "I do feel tired though. I... I don't regret being Zannah, being Sith. But I wish... I wish I had the chance to live a different life."
"I'll do my best to live for the both of us," said Siri quietly, nestling the Holocron in her robes. "Take a rest Rain."
Rain gives a nod and her Gatekeeper fades, the Holocron shutting itself for the time being. Siri adjusts her robes and turns, pausing briefly to see the Jedi full on staring at her. She purses her lips, not quite comfortable with what she sees in their eyes, before moving past them back to the Bouncers. The ride back to their ship is long and quiet, the Bouncers are silent. Pleased and feeling fulfilled, but silent.
There are no goodbyes. The Bouncer's don't ask, and Rain doesn't come back out. They board the ship and liftoff. Tholme apparently had paid enough attention to how Rain got them to Ruusan to get them out of the nebula, and back towards Coruscant...