Dear very faithful readers… With this chapter, the story edges from EU territory over into one better described as AU, and that'll be because I'll be deliberately altering certain aspects of Grievous's 'official' background from now on. I've still got copies of most of what was written (and drawn) to flesh out the character when he first appeared on the scene, and while I still think it all amounts to a good, well-crafted background the majority of Star Wars fans can relate to, for me, it's never been quite…alien enough. In other words, if you start noticing certain 'mistakes' insofar as our dear General is concerned, well, it's likely not a mistake so much as it's me being stubborn and asserting my fanfic-given right to change the character to my liking. Hopefully, you'll like my version too. And yes, I'll still be referencing Genndy Tartakovsky's Clone Wars and ROTS for my battle background. I know some of you will be happy about that.
My continued thanks also to each and every one of you who have commented on this story. I read each review carefully, try to incorporate what I think will work and make for better reading, and am happy to pass on at this point that several of you in particular will get what you want in the future. Nuff said about that! Take it as a teaser for things to come.
Anyway, onward! And thank you again for sticking with this story for so very long…
THE ESSENCES OF LIFE
Chapter 22 – On The Brink
Lissa Veleroko got a taste of what her new posting was going to be like when she got called upon within minutes of officially reporting aboard the Invisible Hand. The ship's captain, Lushros Dofine, requested that she visit with him in his ready room in order to discuss a rather delicate matter, a matter involving General Grievous. The cyborg, it seemed, had snapped during the ship's most recent firing exercise and killed one of the Neimoidian bridge officers.
It was a serious development. Grievous, even in the midst of his worst rages, normally refrained from damaging anything of real value to him. It was true, yes, that the officer in question, a fairly new transfer-in who was still settling into his duties, had made an error in calculating a weapon's trajectory, but that was hardly reason enough to warrant being slapped so hard that his brains had splattered all over his console. One poor helmsman had been so frightened by the sight that he'd jumped up and bolted right off the bridge and another had vomited into his lap, and Lushros was not about to discipline either of them, he opined stiffly; there was a limit to what even his long-suffering staff should have to endure. What he did want was something done about Grievous. Couldn't Lissa adjust his programming or give the cyborg a sedative or something to calm him down?
The thought of trying to drug Grievous into submission was enough to make Lissa bite the inside of her lip, not out of anxiety but to keep herself from stupidly laughing out loud. Murder was nothing to make fun of and she liked Captain Dofine too much to belittle his concerns. She adopted a sombre expression and muttered something about seeing what she could do, which seemed to mollify Lushros enough for him to let her go. Lissa slunk off, feeling bad for having just lied to the Neimoidian. She had no real idea of what she could have done anyway.
Within the hour, she had reason to smile again though. Attenbro the Citizen, her favourite Geonosian, showed up at the office which now doubled as her permanent living quarters and informed her with much glee that he was being transferred over too, that the insectoids' shop down below was also being activated on a full-time basis within the next few days. His announcement made Lissa fling her arms about his bony neck with an impromptu squeal of equal glee, then she pulled him inside and put him straight to work at helping her finish unpacking. A Geo had helped pack up her belongings when she'd been booted off the droid tender. It seemed only right and a welcome twist of fate that one should help her set up again aboard her new posting as well.
As usual, Attenbro only laughed when she told him about Grievous flipping out and killing one of his new weapons officers, and the bit about Lushros wanting her to sedate the cyborg had him in stitches.
"Tell Captain Idiot he must discipline himself next time," Attenbro advised between chortles. "Whack Grievous behind with his hand and cry NO!"
"Oh, great. I'm sure Dofine always wanted to be a pile of steaks a la lightsabre."
"It work good for massif," Attenbro said, and blew a quite ridiculous attempt to wink at her by closing both of his eyes together instead of just closing the one. Lissa reached out one hand and affectionately squeezed his muzzle. She couldn't even begin to express how relieved she was to find out that she'd have a real friend nearby after all and would have full-time expert help available to care for Grievous anytime only an intercom's call away.
Once done with the unpacking, Lissa and Attenbro went up to the officers' mess to take their equivalent of a coffee break and found the other Geos assigned to their workshop already there ahead of them. The chief mess steward was hanging about too, and as soon as he spotted the human woman coming in, he ran off, then returned with a cup of hot steaming java in hand already done up to her liking. Lissa, surprised and touched by his kind gesture, favoured him with an enormous smile as she accepted his offering. There was no need to tell the Neimoidian steward that they'd all just been posted aboard. He already knew, of course. Lissa felt the last of her tension oozing away as they all sat around together enjoying their break, chattering away in variously accented Basic, the steward hovering behind her throughout and letting his hands droop at times to trail his fingertips through her hair as he happily remained at their beck and call. They were all in danger—terrible danger which was increasing exponentially as the war's end loomed—yet their knowledge of it didn't seem to matter very much just then. All of them had become masters of seizing the moment and squeezing what enjoyment could be had out of the most innocuous happenings by now.
It was a good thing for Lissa that she returned to her quarters later with her inner sense of peace and balance restored for Grievous dropped in without warning a scant hour further along and she could tell at once that he was in a towering rage. Not at her, though. Luckily.
"I need to be fully maintained. Now!" he snarled.
Lissa obediently called down to the medical bay to give the staff there full warning, grabbed up her cleaning kit and apron, and led the General down to the bay for a preliminary wash, keeping her eyes carefully averted away from him the whole time. He remained quivering and crazy-tense, his hands sporadically clenching into fists, even while stooped over with the steaming hot cleansing water sluicing over him, and it wasn't until his physician got down to start working on his lower legs before she heard Grievous sigh and his ominous air of menace began to dissipate. It seemed safe after that for her to start glancing at his face to try and assess his mood. She also started to breathe again. Lissa, above all people, knew exactly how much strength resided in that wet and glistening cyborg body she was tending at that very moment. The slightest flick of one of those elegant hands and it could be her brains being splattered all over the deck of the Neimoidians' autopsy washdown room.
On this day, Lissa took the time to lubricate those dangerous, elegant hands even so. Grievous didn't really need it done any more than he'd needed his body washed. She just did it because she knew it was one of those routines he'd come to find calming, and if there was one thing he needed just then, it was to calm down. And it worked, seemingly. By the time the two were ready to return to Lissa's office quarters, they were talking again.
"A full bacta change while we're at it, sir?" she asked, just to confirm her guess and make conversation.
"Please," he replied.
Yet another breathtaking (or rather breath-withholding) example of the complete one-eighties he was still capable of, she thought with relief and some sadness. For her own safety, she must never forget that there was still a portion of his brain which had been profoundly damaged and over which he had only the most tenuous control.
The rest of their session went very well after that. Having his internal fluids replaced using simple thermal dynamics was another routine which Grievous found relaxing and it was also the perfect time to check and treat some of the few remaining bits of organic self left to him. Everything looked good and his lung function was still improving. She'd finally gotten a handle on how to best manage all of him, inside and out; it made her feel good. She would have felt even better if she'd had the slightest idea of what had just set him off when he left later on, but sensed that it was something work-related.
Grievous, of course, had no intention of explaining himself, but might have reconsidered had he known of Lissa's suspicions. For she was right. It was indeed a work-related matter driving his recent appalling temper. After initially praising his strategy and giving him the go-ahead to amass and position his forces as he saw fit during his final campaign, Count Dooku had recently contacted Grievous to inform him that he needed to remain flexible in order to accommodate some possible new military maneuvering being orchestrated elsewhere by Dooku himself. Then the man had told him that he might have a special task in store for his Supreme Commander before they reached Coruscant and that he'd take command of the final offensive himself during the cyborg's absence should it prove necessary. Grievous had almost gone ballistic. He'd tried to argue that the success of his plans were dependent on the almost instantaneous communications only an enhanced being such as himself could exercise when controlling a largely droid army. Dooku had heard him out, remarked that he might be correct, and then overrode him anyway. The General had next tried a few more arguments, all carefully based on similar logical concerns, but his superior had stopped listening. The man's stubbornness was infuriating. It was, Grievous thought, as if he meant to sabotage the coming battle, for he seemed unable to comprehend that only he—he! Grievous!—would be capable of directing all the myriad nuances of the vast campaign which he'd planned so carefully. The worst part was that there was nothing more he could say in protest without betraying himself; he was supposed to be a servant, broken and remade to serve his masters exactly as they directed, and any personal feelings he might have about such matters beyond his driving rage and need to destroy his enemies were not even supposed to exist. As it was, he'd barely managed to hold it together during his last conversation with the Count and had been in a monstrously foul mood ever since.
Grievous felt trapped. He was supposed to have led the last glorious victory for the Separatists by himself, after which the war would be won and he would be released from his servitude as had been agreed upon. He would collect his physician, she would finish repairing his mind, and then they would both be free to go their separate ways and he would go back to his family on Kalee. That was how it was supposed to happen. Instead, Dooku's stupid whims and interference were about to ruin everything and Grievous could do nothing about it. He had to obey and he had no faith in the man's ability to lead his troops. Dooku was a politician, not a war lord.
The situation was intolerable. Grievous seethed. And when he wasn't seething, he was wracked by stress and anxiety which compounded by the minute. With his expectations on hold, with no other outlet available to him, he was soon driven back to the one place where he had some hope of finding relief. His personal physician's office.
The second time he showed up at Lissa's door, a mere day after he'd blown through before, Grievous was already right back to looking so angry that the poor woman actually cowered a little in her seat in anticipation of being snapped at again.
"More maintenance, sir?" she asked, hoping beyond hope that pre-emptively engaging him in civil conversation might deflect some of his aggression. Instead, it seemed to stop him in his tracks. He stood there, just stood there for a long, long minute, gripped by something she couldn't identify. When he finally did reply, his voice was surprisingly restrained.
"You said I could work here."
"Oh. Oh! Of c-course you can, sir."
How embarrassing! She'd forgotten all about how she'd encouraged him to use her office as another ready room. But that had been back when Grievous had been behaving fairly reasonably and she'd been entertaining thoughts of trying to befriend him. She wasn't at all sure about whether she wanted him around any more than he had to be in his current state. Still, it wasn't as if she could refuse him admittance. She'd just have to suck it up and try and stay out of slapping range. And excuse herself to go off to the mess to get some java. Lots and lots and lots of java.
Lissa got up to give the General's special reclining chair a quick once-over and ensure that all the equipment and terminals within reach there were on and functional, then stood back and nodded. Grievous swept in and took his seat without a word. Lissa thought about excusing herself immediately to go on one of her java runs, but chickened out. Better wait in case he changed his mind and wanted more of her after all.
The next little while passed with both parties trying to adjust to one another's presence. Lissa had the easier time of it. She had a backlog of material to read through and it was absorbing enough to distract her from overthinking her latest Grievous crisis. He was here. He was mad, but what else was new? He would speak up if he wanted something. So be it. Before long she was able to relax and effectively ignore her guest while studying the material on her viewscreen. Or so it appeared.
Grievous did less well. Getting back to the one place he'd come to think of as a refuge had indeed eased something in him almost the instant he'd stepped through his physician's door. His initial intention had been to demand that she do a full maintenance workup on him again, yet as soon as he looked at Lissa he found himself thinking that it might appear weak of him, to insist on being treated for no real reason. It also seemed all of a sudden unnecessary. Having the woman there in front of him, safe and close at hand, just knowing that calming options were available…it was enough to settle him considerably. Strange… And so he'd decided on the spot to stay and work in her office instead, just as she'd once suggested he should.
The ambiance of his new workspace didn't soothe Grievous for long, however. He could see a portion of his giant fleet through the huge window on the one wall of the woman's office and it reminded him that there were still a couple of Core worlds which his forces needed to take out before he launched his final attack. Or at least he should've been the one launching the attack. Dooku had refused to expand on what the so-called 'special task' he'd mentioned involved and had left Grievous hanging as to where he'd even be anymore or what his role would be as they closed in on the Republicans.
The uncertainty drove the alien cyborg nuts. He'd pulled up the latest intel on the last few planets standing in his way, but couldn't concentrate well enough to study the information. His thoughts skittered back and forth like doomed minnows in a shrinking tidal pool. He stared at his physician, who was seated and dutifully working away at her own terminal and paying no attention whatsoever to him. She was always working, and something about that, that she could remain so blithely centered on her own interests while he was half-crawling the walls and unable to focus, made him angrier than ever. How dare she treat him the way Dooku treated him, oblivious to his needs and wants and unwilling to listen to a single word he said!
Being ignored suddenly became intolerable to him. He aimed one last fiery glare at his physician's back and snapped out, "Veleroko!"
Lissa at once pushed herself away from her terminal, swivelled about in her chair to face him, and obediently asked, "Yes, General?"
Grievous felt a queer melting warmth steal through the remaining organic bits of his body. He knew he was being irrational. It was so strange a sensation, the warmth, that it took him a moment to identify it. Embarrassment.
To cover himself, he made a show of wanting to know about her progress in getting his lung functions up to spec. Lissa punched up the numbers and a graph on a big porta-screen while he furtively observed her, never once commenting on the odd abruptness of his request, then brought the information over to him.
"It's still not perfect, but you can see for yourself, sir, that your levels are really quite decent now. No longer dangerously low at least," she concluded with bland assurance. "We'd have something to work with now should your lungs be injured again."
"Huh," Grievous remarked, and turned his face away to indicate dismissal, still feeling too hot and bothered because of his absurd assumptions to risk any more interaction with the woman just then. She was behaving just as she'd said she would—no hovering and no annoying him, yet attentive nonetheless. He supposed he ought to be happy about that. But he still felt pissed off.
His mood eventually dwindled into something more reasoned and sane and by the time he heaved himself out of his chair and stomped off a good hour later, it had morphed into a sort of grudging relief. Lissa watched him leave. She'd been watching him all along, out of the corner of one eye or as a reflection in her terminal's viewscreen, and had fully expected a spat or two of temperament on his part. She also expected that he'd be back. His lame attempt to test her and then pretend it was something else hadn't fooled her one bit.
Grievous left Lissa alone for two days after that, surprisingly enough, and she wound up having her suspicions again as to why that was. She also felt sorrier than ever for his beleaguered bridge crew, for every time she went up to the mess for a break or a meal, she'd find at least one of the Neimoidian bridge officers there ahead of her, looking harried and scared and desperate for a little respite. The General was evidently back to haunting his flagship's command deck. She had no idea why. His entire fleet was still maintaining station from what she could observe and going nowhere fast. It wasn't as if he had any urgent orders to issue…did he?
Desperation that is great enough sometimes finds its own solutions. Grievous did return shortly after Lissa had hauled herself out of bed, eaten breakfast, and then officially opened up her shop for business on the third morning after she'd seen him last. But his entrance this time was marked by something very, very different. It was his expression. He looked terrified.
It was so shocking a sight that Lissa jumped right up out of her chair without thinking.
"What!" she cried. "What happened?"
"I…fell unconscious," he grated. His eyes stared, wide-open, showing the whites. Lissa could barely believe what she was seeing.
"Unconscious! How? When?" she demanded.
"Just now. On the bridge."
He sounded as scared as he looked, another shocker. She flashed back to the way he'd once wordlessly pleaded for help when he'd lain helpless after a bomb blast had ruptured his gutsack, the last time she'd seen him truly frightened. Was he in life-threatening trouble again? Was his brain shutting down? She had to know!
"Did you actually fall down? Did anyone try to help you?"
"No. No. I went…blank. Lost time. Nine minutes and twenty-eight seconds of time."
"You— You're aware of that exact time loss? You stayed on your feet?"
"Yes! I was standing at the front, by the viewports, looking out at my fleet. And then it was suddenly more than nine minutes later."
"Standing there…" The woman's own apprehension was starting to ease. She regarded him with a degree of puzzlement undercutting her urgent concern. "Please, try and remember exactly what happened, sir. It's very important."
"I do not know how else to explain it. I was restless and went to the bridge to try and distract myself," Grievous said. "Dofine had nothing new for me and I went to the viewport and examined what vessels I could see while I considered tactics. I remember…the stars appeared to dim somewhat. Then the illumination on my ships started to fade. It all went dark. Black. Then the view in front of me suddenly reappeared."
"I see… What made you think that time had passed?"
"The Neimoidians. Two were manning their stations on either side of me where I was standing. At first they tried to remain still and focused on their work. But then, abruptly, they were shrinking away and trying not to stare at me. It correlated exactly with when my vision returned. I consulted my internal readouts, the ones which constantly monitor my mechanical functioning, and that is when I realized that I had just lost a period of time during which I was unaware of my surroundings."
His physician regarded him solemnly, her own expression not revealing a thing. "But you say this period of unawareness came on gradually. That your vision faded out before you lost unconsciousness."
"That is correct."
Grievous waited anxiously for more questions, for the human to continue on with her diagnosis. He felt better already for having shared his disturbing symptoms as best he could, but didn't like that she had no hint about her that she 'd already figured it out, none of her usual brightening or that silly aha look she got when she solved a mystery. She didn't even seem all that concerned anymore, just—
Lissa abruptly smiled. Worse than that, he swore that he heard her chuckle, just a little.
Grievous was still so upset that he reacted to her utterly unexpected response by instantly flipping out again. "This is not a cause for amusement!" he exploded. "I cannot risk falling unconscious on the bridge again!"
"No, no, of course not, sir," Lissa was quick to soothe, although there was still a twinge of good humour mellowing her words. "The reason I laughed, General Grievous, was out of relief, not because I found your situation funny. And I'm relieved because I'm pretty sure I know exactly what just happened and it's a good thing, good for you, I mean. You fell asleep."
"Asleep!" He thought he'd heard wrong. Was this a joke? "I do not sleep! Not ever! You have said so yourself."
"Correction. You didn't sleep. Now you do." She paused to allow herself a broad, far more obvious grin. "And I mean it when I say it's good for you. It's an indication that your brain is still healing and repairing itself, and on a more sophisticated and higher level than I could have hoped for." A degree of wonder began suffusing her happy expression, a measure of professional awe at what he'd just revealed. "Your brain is…normalizing, sir. And part of that involves needing sleep again…periods of relative inactivity during which your mind can rest and process."
The stunned look she got back was priceless. Lissa read in it like astonishment, then acceptance and even pleasure, all intermingled with a growing apprehension. "Even if what you say is true, I cannot risk falling asleep again!" he exclaimed with justifiable concern. "What if it were to happen in the midst of a battle? Or a conversation?"
"True enough," Lissa agreed. She regarded her patient with a critical eye. "I've got an idea… How about we start with you reclining back in your chair, sir? As far back as it goes so you're level?"
Grievous, to his credit, did as he was told, still too absorbed with trying to sort out her diagnosis to come up with any further questions for the moment. His physician lowered the hanging panel which held the bank of lights and the sterile field she typically used when working on him, switched on the infrared thermal option instead, and positioned the unit to radiate primarily on the cyborg's face and chest. "There," she said. "I seem to recall that you once said you enjoyed sunbathing back on Kalee. Does this replicate it to any degree? Too hot? Not enough? Your sun's a big orange one too, isn't it? We can add a bit of lighting, filter it to get the right effect."
"Why are you doing this?" Grievous asked, cocking his head as best as he could in his reclining position. He sounded genuinely curious, another good sign. Lissa smiled down at him.
"Well, it's like you said. We can't very well have you nodding off at the drop of a hat wherever you happen to be whenever the need comes over you. But if we can get you to relax and install some new sleep habits, in a place and at a time when it's safe for you to indulge, maybe we can waylay that need and get ahead of it. And I'd be able to monitor this new development firsthand if we can get you into a routine of sleeping here in my office and only while here." She paused to think some more, then added, "We can always say you're just here to undergo a procedure. No one else has to know exactly what that means or what it involves and you can redirect any urgent calls to my station. I could put anyone that absolutely has to speak to you on hold or get them to contact you again later. I'm pretty good at putting annoying callers off."
"Of that I am certain," Grievous said dryly, his latest show of temper completely dissipated once again. He lifted a hand to the panel hanging down over him to dim the lighting a little more. "And you think recreating the illumination on my home planet will somehow entice my mind into losing consciousness again?"
Lissa shrugged. "I'm guessing it'd be the best way to get you in a relaxed state at least, to think about happier past days back on Kalee, yes. And the heat and the lighting, they'd become cues if it works. Even if you don't sleep again, a spell of relaxation will do you good, sir. You've become, uh…well, I know you've been very busy."
The alien cyborg eyed her, but said nothing more, which she took as his willingness to give her suggestions a try. If nothing else, it would keep him off the ship's bridge for a while. Captain Dofine would probably want to give her a big old slobbery Neimoidian kiss for managing that.
She returned to her own workstation after that and left Grievous in peace to do what he wanted. As usual, she kept a surreptitious eye on him by watching his reflection in her one carefully positioned viewscreen and twice saw him lift a hand to the panel again, to readjust either the heat or the lighting. Then, finally, he just lay there, his body as still as that of a deactivated droid, his forearms and hands stretched out over the length of his armrests. Only the slight tension and occasional movement evident in the fingers he'd curled about the ends of the padded rests betrayed that someone remained awake within the confines of that elegant, machinelike body.
Lissa Veleroko got too involved in untangling an alien-written paper on a subject of great interest to her to monitor Grievous for a time, and when she emerged again was both surprised and pleased to realize that he was still lying in his chair in exactly the same pose as when she'd last taken note of him. Or maybe not. The slender, bone-white fingers sticking out over the ends of the armrests had gone slack.
Quietly, stealthily, she got up out of her own chair and crept closer to her patient. His eyes were closed. She studied the visual readouts of his vitals displayed on a tiny screen on the side of his chair. His brain scan was uncommonly flat and his breathing and his heartbeat were very slow. He was fast asleep.
Lissa returned to her station and her studies, triumphantly.
Grievous slept for over two hours that first time, and when he woke up, the terrible driving pressures which had almost unhinged him as of late had receded to a dull background roar. The relief of it was enormous and for him, life-saving. As the cyborg lay there relishing the temporary feeling of being almost himself, he well realized how perilously close he'd come to losing all control of himself several times during the past few weeks, and if it had happened during his interactions with Count Dooku, he knew he'd already be dead. The Sith Lord had no use for a defective, unmanageable underling, not even his prize general, not even during the eve of winning his war.
Several more peaceful days followed. Grievous lurked up in his own quarters and deck during the long silent hours for the most part, keeping up with the constant flow of Separatist intelligence reaching his command ship, then in the midmornings, he would swing by the bridge to make a brief appearance (blessedly brief, in the viewpoint of the Neimoidians there) before retreating to his personal physician's office to try and sleep again. The routine and cues Lissa had devised for him worked every time. She gathered more intel of her own—medical intel—and confirmed from her readings and direct examinations of his brain that Grievous was indeed experiencing true sleep, although the stages of it appeared to be compressed into a shortened required period of time. Why such a development had happened at all or why it had occurred when it did, that she could not explain yet. The important part was that even if Grievous only averaged an hour of oblivion each time, he always woke up feeling refreshed, with his aggressive drives considerably dampened.
Hugely beneficial though being able to sleep again was for the General's spirits and well-being, it did pose one obvious drawback. It meant that for the first time since he'd been remade that Grievous was no longer available on a full-time basis and neither he nor Lissa thought that his superiors would be happy to learn of such a thing. They agreed that they would stick with the required-maintenance ruse for the time being should it turn out that someone was looking for the cyborg while he was slumbering. Grievous was already in the habit of informing Lushros to have his calls redirected to Lissa's office whenever he was there for a legitimate reason so extending the time he spent in her care or just working in her office shouldn't appear suspicious.
Of course, such a relatively peaceful interlude could not last. Lissa soon picked up a redirected call in her office that was anything but welcome.
"Cybernetics shop," she'd said. "Lissa Veleroko speaking."
A long pause followed her greeting. Then: "I expected to be speaking with General Grievous."
There was no mistaking that low suave voice. Lissa frowned unconsciously, already put off by the obvious coldness underlying the words.
"Hello, Count Dooku, sir. The General is here, but undergoing a procedure just now. May I have him call you back or take a message?"
Another pause. When Dooku finally replied, his words dripped icycles.
"I need to speak with him."
"Understood," Lissa said, working hard to remain civil and professional, "Please hold on, sir. General Grievous will be with you momentarily."
She flipped the intercom into its standby mode without waiting for Dooku's response and frowned again. Poor Grievous. Now she was going to have to wake him up just because his dumb jerk of a boss couldn't wait an extra hour or so. She acknowledged that maybe, just maybe something really pressing had happened and that the Count honestly did need to confer with the cyborg right now, but geez, talk about bad timing!
Lissa approached the General's supine form and regarded him sadly for a few extra seconds. How peaceful he looked just now. Nobody unfamiliar with his history would ever guess what violent potential resided in those long spare limbs and the governing brain contained behind that lovely sculpted mask. He didn't look much like the infamous Knight Slayer at the moment. Gingerly, she reached out and tapped one of his feet and called his name. It seemed safest to approach and try waking him while remaining well out of his arms' reach.
Somewhat to her surprise, he woke up readily and without moving his body in the slightest. He simply opened his eyes, blinked a few times, and shifted his gaze.
"I'm so sorry, General Grievous, to have to interrupt your sleep. But Count Dooku is standing by on my office line and he insisted on speaking with you immediately. I couldn't put him off."
He moved then, slowly rising and swinging his legs over to get up out of his chair. He blinked again as he stared down at her.
"That is all right. I will speak with him," he said.
"I'll, uh, go have a long java break up in the mess."
"That would be wise." He took a few steps towards Lissa's own station while she scuttled out of the way and made to leave, then added, "I will leave your door ajar when I am done here."
"Oh, great," she replied, thinking that it sounded lame even as the words left her mouth, then scooted before she could make any more dumb remarks. She wasn't sure what Grievous had really meant by his comment about being done, whether that meant he'd be gone when she came back or that he was just referring to his call. Either way, at least she wouldn't walk in on his conversation. Hopefully, whatever it was that the two men had to discuss wouldn't make Grievous too crazy again!
As it turned out, Lissa's visit to the ship's officers' mess was as well-timed as Dooku's call was ill-timed. Captain Lushros Dofine was just walking through as she came in and changed his direction to intercept her as soon as he spotted her. What he wanted to do was thank her for having gotten Grievous to spend less time on the bridge.
"Well, um, you're quite welcome, Captain," she said back, at a bit of loss as to how else to respond. "Luckily, he's needed plenty of upgrading and maintenance recently, so…yeah. He's been in my office a lot."
Lushros nodded. "And I and my crew appreciate that. Greatly. Thank you again."
"Anytime, sir," she said softly and watched the Neimoidian nod yet again before turning about and returning to his own duties. As soon as he was gone, she couldn't help uttering a snort of self-depreciating amusement. Ingratiating herself with any members of the hapless crew of the Invisible Hand had never been on her agenda, but what the hell. She'd take any support she could get at this point.
Lissa drank java until her kidneys began to float after that before she thought it might be safe to return to her office quarters. When she did so, she found the door partly open. And Grievous, surprisingly, was still inside, back in his chair, but sitting up and working his terminals. His mood seemed…neutral.
"Okay to come in again, sir?" she asked even so from the door, and Grievous both gestured and said that it was. Lissa slipped inside and regained her own usual seat, glad that the alien cyborg didn't seem to have been too aggravated by his latest interaction with one of Lissa's least favourite fellow humans. And while she knew better than to inquire about the nature of the call itself, she couldn't help expressing her feelings reference the caller.
"I hope Count Dooku was in a better mood when he talked to you than when he talked to me, sir," Lissa remarked. "He was pretty snotty with me. I guess he'll never forgive me for how I argued with him during that dinner we had. Oh well… Not like I'm eager to ever see him again or anything."
Grievous felt that awful hot melting sensation within his chest again. He could just imagine what Dooku had thought when his call had been redirected and Lissa had answered instead. The Count's snotty behaviour, as she put it, had nothing to do with the woman's past insolence. For a second, a second only, he thought about confessing what he'd done to so incur the Sith Lord's disdain, then dropped it as a bad idea. The last thing he wanted was for any alien to start thinking of him in THAT way, aside from Dooku, who'd deserved to be deceived.
Lissa seemed to have dropped it as well. She was already back at work at her station, perusing files, her brief encounter with Dooku shrugged aside. Grievous envied her ability to ignore the Count's very existence. He wished he could do the same.
A sudden, horrific premonition seized the cyborg. He felt that he would not survive the battle to come, or that he would live but that Lissa would die. He began to sink down into his seat, crushed by the intensity of his awful visions, his fingers digging deep into the armrests. Bad enough to lose his life because of his superior's stupid interference. It would be infinitely worse if he made it through, was released from further service after the war's conclusion just as agreed upon, but then had no one he could trust to finish righting the damage that had been done to his brain so he could return home with some hope of being accepted by his family. The thought of living out the remainder of his life as some shunned pariah on his own homeworld was the most terrible possible outcome he could think of, worse than dying himself, worse than any betrayal. What could he have been thinking, to move his personal physician over to his own flagship on the eve of his final campaign? He should have anticipated that his leadership might be usurped, that all his careful plans might be rent asunder and his defenses left bare.
His emotional storm began to fade, leaving him wrung out and worn and in a state of despair. Grievous mournfully regarded his physician. She was still just sitting there, reading, oblivious to the battle he'd just fought within his own mind and to the fate he'd envisioned for her. He tried to tell himself that it would be all right, that she was safe for the moment and that he could always have her sent back behind the lines before the fighting started, but it didn't work. He needed help this time to dispel the gloom, help of a sort he'd never wanted before. What he wanted was comfort. The emotional comfort of connecting with another living being. Comfort to salve his misery and raw nerves and to reassure him that his desperate clinging to life was not utterly hopeless.
"Would you…do something for me?" he asked without preamble, addressing the back of the woman who was still so dutifully ignoring him, his manner oddly halting. "Something of a personal nature?
Lissa turned her head and stared back at him over one shoulder, askance. Something of a personal nature? What was that supposed to mean? Wasn't she already risking herself enough running secret messages for him back to his family? She shifted a little in her seat, uncomfortable, afraid that he was about to ask something of her which she'd have to deny.
"Of course, sir," she replied in as bland a fashion as she could manage, to help cushion any potential refusal. "What is it you want me to do?"
Grievous blinked as though something were irritating his eyes, his gaze becoming narrowed, unfocused. Then he said, "No one ever addresses me using my personal name anymore. My family did…my friends… I would like to hear someone use it at least once more…before the end." And then he sat, just sat, not even looking at her anymore, his head drooping.
Pity and shame (and a certain relief) washed over Lissa in the wake of his extraordinary request. She felt pity for him because she could see for herself that his misery was genuine. The shame came from feeling any sympathy for him at all. He didn't deserve it, he was a monster, her ruthless inner moral judge decreed; he'd forfeited the right to be extended even the slightest hint of empathy long ago. But then her professionalism rose up to do battle and trampled her misgivings underfoot. She was still the General's physician and it was her duty to care for all aspects of his health—physical, mental, and now emotional. She couldn't just let him keep sitting there, hurting, without trying to do something.
"Oh. Um…I guess that would be all right. When we're alone together like this, I could use your personal name if you like…" she offered in a hesitant voice.
Grievous lifted his head, tilted it her way, his focus restored. Lissa, still torn, fought hard not to squirm under his intense golden stare.
"Er, what is your personal name?" she asked.
"Grievous," he answered.
Lissa's own eyes widened. "Really? Grievous is your personal name? There's nothing else?"
"No. Only Grievous."
"Oh." She fell silent again while she regarded the cyborg with genuine puzzlement. There was something nagging at her, something simple… Then it hit her. "Don't you run out of names?"
"Why would we…ah, I understand. No, we also have a lineage name, for better identification. We add the names of our father and our mother and that of our clan to our personal name."
"That makes sense," Lissa remarked, feeling oddly relieved. Grievous was also looking more chipper, his odd mien of melancholy suddenly gone, and that made her feel better too. "What's your full name then?" she asked. "In Basic, if it translates?"
Grievous paused to mentally make the conversion before speaking again. "Grievous Roanquil Laniesta of Shining Cove," he said.
More silence. Lissa stared at Grievous and he stared right back. Slowly, he started to scowl.
"Enough," he growled.
"What? I didn't say anything!"
"You're thinking it."
"Well, I…I…" She gave up with a little laugh and started grinning outright. "I'm sorry, it's just…rather poetic. Unexpected." She regarded him with surprising warmth and the irritation he felt over the perceived slight to his pride began to fade. Then she ruined it by adding, "So, you grew up next to a cove?"
Grievous got out of his chair and stood up with a single rapid uncoiling of his whole body, scowling again. "All right. Out."
"We're in my quarters. I live here now, in case you've forgotten," Lissa retorted, amused.
"Then I will go," he amended, and did so. He gave her a funny sideways glance as he went by, however, and she could tell that he wasn't really mad at all; his eyes were mostly sparking with lively good humour. It gave her confidence enough to call out after him.
"Good bye…Grievous. Don't forget your next appointment. And come by anytime if you need to…you know."
He lifted a hand, half in acknowledgment and half as a farewell wave, and was gone. What a bizarre little conversation, Lissa thought, yet knew she'd just accomplished something major and had ultimately pleased him. And Grievous was his personal Kaleesh name, how very strange! She wondered if it was one of those cases of an alien name having an unintended and completely different meaning when used within the orbit of a different language.
Comfort was needed again for the General only a few days later on when he came back shortly after he'd already visited earlier in the morning to sleep awhile and undergo some genuine routine maintenance. He said nothing to her this time, just barged in and went straight to her panoramic viewport and parked himself there. Lissa saw at once that he'd just received some upsetting news and needed a quiet place where he could stew and nurse his wrath without needing to hide it, and wondered whether it mightn't be safer to take herself elsewhere.
"Grievous? Would you…prefer I stay or is it okay if I go confer with my colleagues for a while?"
He turned a jaundiced eye on her. "Go," he croaked.
Lissa skedaddled. Grievous refocused on his viewport of endless reflection. He knew that Lissa had recognized his anger and that it had made her leery about staying with him, but didn't hold it against her. The surprise was how well he was holding his emotions in check. Dooku had done just what he'd hinted at, taken the battle to overcome the last few Core worlds away from him. The Count had just launched his attack using some of Grievous's own forces to augment his own and ordered his Supreme Commander to do nothing whatsoever but stand by and monitor.
The General's immediate response to his latest orders had been outrage of almost oceanic proportions. He'd barely gotten off the bridge in time and could still feel the shock of it intermingling with his hatred towards Dooku and the augmented, aggressive drives which still ate at him without abatement, all of it roiling through him like gigantic swells, one after the other. But just as the power of true swells lay largely hidden, so too the bulk of his fury remained mostly contained. Grievous, to his surprise, found himself far better able to deal with his emotions than he could in the past and thought that he had his newfound ability to find escape into brief periods of slumber and the soothing relief he felt upon hearing his name spoken again with friendly intent to thank for it. It was a welcome discovery, one which almost justified all the awful aggravation he'd been put through recently. His thoughts swung back to his bete noire. Why—why!—did Dooku have to test him so and steal his glory and his pleasure? To torment him? To try and make himself look good and curry favour with his own Master, the Sith Lord Sidious? Grievous couldn't understand it, but was leaning towards the human's own vindictiveness and simple dislike of him.
Even when Lissa finally did come back, Grievous was still standing by her big office window in grim contemplation and took little notice of her beyond acknowledging her return with a curt nod. She too noted that he'd settled and seemed to be in better control of himself than usual, but didn't try to engage him. It was probably just as well. She didn't realize how deep were the depths of the sea's worth of anger still lurking beneath his surface.
Gradually, bit by slow bit, Grievous came to terms with his new situation. He still hated it, but he would manage. And as far as he knew, he would still lead the charge against Coruscant itself. He looked for his personal physician, expecting to see her perched again before her terminal, and found her—gone.
Lissa wasn't in her usual seat. She was sitting on a stool in her work alcove, holding a droid head in her hands and regarding it; what's more, she'd brought a cupful of something to drink back with her. While Grievous watched, she laid the mechanical head in her lap and then just sat there, staring into the blank wall ahead of her while she sipped her beverage bit by bit. She didn't seem stressed or out of it in any way. Her attitude seemed more like that of someone who was…satisfied.
Grievous shifted his feet a little. He was not used to seeing his personal physician just sitting and doing nothing. For as long as he'd known her, she'd always kept herself busy and she was a prodigious reader. She was almost always reading when she wasn't looking after his needs and he'd confirmed for himself with his past snooping that all her research seemed perfectly legitimate. He reset one foot again, restlessly. The last thing he needed was for the woman to start getting weird and unpredictable on him, not now when he needed her more than ever.
The alien cyborg didn't relax until Lissa finished with her silent communion with the droid head and returned to her terminal, turned it on, and began typing. Even then, he still fought the sense that something had shifted within her, something that was possibly profound and which might ultimately affect his own future. He decided to try and engage her in conversation, both to distract himself from the combat he was missing out on and to ease his more personal misgivings.
"Did you visit with the Geonosians down below?" he asked, addressing the question to her back. Lissa didn't turn around, nor did she stop pecking at her keyboard while she answered.
"Yes, and I'm glad you asked and reminded me. Attenbro wanted me to pass on that they just finished inspecting and maintaining all your MagnaGuards. They're all available now and operating at a hundred percent, he said."
"Good." Then, after a beat, added, "Is that all?"
Lissa smiled, but only to herself. "Well, no. He also passed on that Nagas still misses me." Another beat. "It's nice to be missed."
Grievous didn't know what to make of that one. He almost replied that she needn't worry and that she'd see the Geonosian Patriot sooner than she'd think because he'd already decided to send her back behind the lines before they reached Coruscant. Instead, he turned silently away from the viewport window, torn now between wanting to go up to his own quarters where he could better monitor what was going on with the assault on the Core worlds or remaining in his personal physician's office to continue ferreting out what it was about her which was leaving him uneasy.
His indecision manifested itself in a brief session of slow pacing, back and forth before the huge viewport. But eventually, he began drifting towards the exit door.
Before stepping through, he tried one last time to find some reason to tarry.
"I haven't seen those biodroids of yours for a long time," he remarked. "Are you leaving them with the Geonosians?"
Lissa sucked in her breath. She held it a moment while she kept typing and tried to present an outward picture of complete calm.
"Oh, I sold them some time ago when I was doing one of your message runs. I saw some specialized equipment I wanted and the buyer offered me a good deal."
She held her breath again, bracing herself for the rapid tak-tak of his advancing footfalls, the harsh query and his durasteel grip on her shoulder. But all she heard was the momentary sound of hard breathing, followed by the soft swish of the door to her quarters opening, then closing.
Grievous had gone, leaving the lie hanging in the void between them.
TBC
