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Chapter 43
The first thing Revan felt after retrieving his consciousness was the pain. A throbbing pain coursing through his entire body that was escalating in the area of his chest.
After waiting for few moments for the pain to subside, he opened slowly his eyes, risking a glance at his surroundings.
It was a mistake.
The world around him spun violently, making him shut his eyes. He tried to calm down the spinning by taking in a few deep breaths. He risked taking yet another glance.
This time, though, the effect was much better. Nothing was spinning so violently around him anymore and that was certainly a good sign. Revan was able to distinguish the details of his sleeping quarters on the Ebon Hawk. Pressing the fabric beneath him, he realized that he was in bed. He took a few more calming breaths before trying something that could turn out terribly wrong for him.
He tried to get up.
First, Revan tried to move up on the bed, supporting himself on his elbows. His chest, the right part specifically, was screaming in pain. He clenched his teeth and pushed himself almost to the sitting position, ignoring the loud protest from his body. His arms were trembling as he was struggling to get himself into a full sitting position, aiming to rest his back against the wall.
He ended up panting heavily. Such simple action as that one took away all of his strength and left him breathless. But Revan was sure that it would go by. He used to recover from many injuries and the worst were the first few moments after waking up. Later, as the time was passing by and he was trying to do more and more complex activities, all the symptoms were disappearing.
Looking down at his body, he saw a large bandage wrapped around his torso. It looked fresh, though the part that covered his right breast had a circular stain, most probably left there by his blood. He could clearly feel that the source of his pain was covered under that stain.
It took him a while to calm his breathing and recover some of his strength but nevertheless, he managed to do so. It cost him yet another few deep breaths to gather himself and to do something many would not dare to do in his current state.
He tried to get up from the bed.
As soon as Revan rested the weight of his body fully on his legs, the world around him started spinning violently again. He used the nearby wall for support, resting his hand on it. He brought his second palm to his temples as if in a futile attempt to make the spinning stop. It took a second or so but the area around him has finally calmed. He risked a step forward.
Never before did Revan have such troubles with retrieving his strength as now. His leg collapsed when he rested the entire weight of his body only on one limb. It was difficult for him to keep on walking, but he kept on trying. With his hand against the wall, he continued to limp towards the exit of his sleeping quarters.
The first thing that he noticed after walking into the corridors of the Ebon Hawk was how silent it was. Not only was it silent – he couldn't sense anyone as well. Mission's usual cheerful attitude and her chattering were absent. Similarly the never-ending argument between HK and T3. The two droids fell into a habit of arguing about anything; usually, HK being the one who started it. It amused Revan how human-like the droids have become after spending so much time with them. But their metallic voices weren't there. The ship was deadly silent.
He walked into the main part of the Ebon Hawk. The holoprojector was turned off; as for once, no one was using it.
Revan's thoughts were interrupted when a cough forced him to bend forward. He rested his hand on the holoprojector for the support as he continued to cough violently. Just as back on Leviathan, also now he ended up spitting blood. This entire action would make him scream in pain if it wasn't for the coughing that forbade it.
It took Revan a while to get over it, but eventually, he was able to straighten himself back up.
"Onasi" Revan spoke with a small smile. He didn't have to use the Force or to turn around to know it was the Republic pilot. After all, who could be so stupid as to take an aim at him from behind.
"What I said on Leviathan is still accurate," he said. "I should shove the bullet into your head here and now!"
"Oh, you can try it," Revan said, still not turning around. "But, if I were you, I would watch my back"
Carth would be puzzled by that if he didn't feel a blaster rifle against his own head. The Republic pilot risked taking a look behind himself. It was Rex.
"And just as what I said back on Leviathan is still accurate" Revan mimicked him. "You're outnumbered. You kill me now and you end up with a bullet in your occipital bone and the Galaxy burns under Malak's assault. Or, you can pocket your own pride, kick yourself in the ass and follow my lead."
"I recommend choosing the second option," Rex said, taking a better aim.
"Even if I end up with a bullet in my head, I won't just simply let go such an occasion" Carth replied, taking a better aim as well. "Millions if not billions will be grateful to me for killing you."
"And the entire Galaxy will be cursing the one who killed me. You won't be able to stop Malak. The Star Forge is too well fortified and can deliver an infinite supply of resources." He turned around slowly what caused Carth to reinforce his grip on the blaster pistol.
"You killed my family," he said with a trembling voice. "You turned my homeworld into nothing. I don't care what will happen if I kill you. I only know that I will die a peaceful death, knowing that I avenged Telos."
"And here we go again, Onasi," Revan said, still using his left hand to support against the holoprojector. "I think you are the most shortsighted and ignorant person in the Galaxy, second only to the Jedi Council." Slowly, the rest of the crew was making their way to the interior of the Ebon Hawk. "I haven't killed your family nor have I bombarded Telos. As you know, it was Saul Karath who, as I might remind you, you have killed on the bridge of the Leviathan. He did it out of Malak's order who was also punished for that."
"Like how? I saw him on the Leviathan safe and sound!"
"Safe and sound you say? Haven't you ever wondered how Malak has lost his jaw? I'll tell you how. I took it away from him for disobedience. I cut it off with my own lightsaber and watched him bleed out beneath my feet. Perhaps it wasn't a fitting penalty, but I will make him pay with his life for everything he had done. But in order to do so, I must live a little bit longer so I would be immensely grateful if you lower down your weapon."
"And I would recommend you to hurry up," Rex said, pushing Carth slightly at the back of his head with the barrel.
"You are the Republic soldier," Carth said, addressing the man behind him. "You are supposed to be loyal to the Republic!"
"The Republic?" Rex asked with a small chuckle. "I used to be loyal to it, just as Fox and Wolfie. But these times are long gone now."
"Why?" was all Carth could cough up.
"Because we're loyal to Revan and to Revan alone." Fox. "He led us to victory after victory in the Mandalorian Wars and later in the Jedi Civil War as well. We pledged ourselves to him and we fight for those who he fights for. If he's on the Republic side, we are as well. If he is against, so are we."
"Traitors" Carth spat out. Rex, Fox, and Wolfie chuckled at that.
"Not traitors." Wolfie. "We vowed to be on Revan's side until the end of our lives. And so we are keeping that vow."
"Put down your weapon, Carth." This caught everyone's interest since it wasn't any manly voice, no. It was Mission.
"Are you mad?! The Sith have destroyed Taris, your homeworld!"
"Yes, the Sith, but I see none in here, Carth" the blue Twi'lek replied, crossing her arms over her chest. "All I see is a friend who helped me more than anyone on Taris. He helped me to move on after it was destroyed, he made sure that I remain safe when we were pulled out from the hyperspace. Even if he used to be Darth Revan, I don't see the Dark Lord in front of me, I see the friend who's been with us through thick and thin!"
"As you see, Carth, there are people who can trust me, and that's all I'm asking for. You don't have to fight for me. I only ask you to trust my judgment, as countless have."
The Republic pilot had an inner turmoil going on inside of his head, it was as clear as day. Revan continued to speak as he saw that Carth wasn't coming up with any reply.
"If this comforts you somehow, I can assure you that your son is not dead." This caused Carth to look at him with bewilderment. "Your son has survived the destruction of Telos IV."
"Dustil" Carth muttered on the edge of tears.
"If you trust me, I will return him to you. But, as I've said, you must trust me."
This seemed to break the spell as Carth lowered his pistol. Rex did likewise.
"Now, how long have I been out?" Revan queried, looking at the rest of the crew.
"Six days" Rex replied, putting aside the blaster rifle.
"Six days" Revan repeated quietly. "That's far too long. Doesn't matter now. Set the course to the Lehon System" he said and proceeded to leave the room. He stopped in his tracks when no one moved. "Are you deaf? Set the course to the Lehon System, right now!"
"There is a problem, though," Rex said, moving his feet nervously.
"What problem?" Revan queried; his irritation was growing fast.
"We haven't been to Korriban, yet" Fox replied. "We don't have the last Star Map."
"What? You mean you've wasted six fucking days?!" Revan yelled, returning to the gathered crew.
"We were waiting for you to retrieve your consciousness," Fox said in a self-defense.
"And why the hell?!" he yelled again. "You've been previously to the Naga Sadow's tomb. You know exactly how to get past the securities. You know perfectly well how to reach the Star Map, so why haven't you done it, for fuck's sake?!" The silence was the only response he received. "You're bloody idiots! You should have stopped waiting for me to recover after one day! And now Bastila is in Malak's hands for six days already! We could have saved her by now, but no, you had to act like fucking imbeciles and do nothing for six days!" He would have continued to yell at them if it wasn't for a cough that erupted in his chest again. Rex and Fox hurried to him, lifting him up as the coughing made him bow down again.
"There is a reason why we were waiting for those six days," Fox said when Revan's coughing subsided. "We've noticed the poison in your body a long time ago and now we took our time to examine you."
"The venom that's coursing through your veins is a pretty nasty one," Jolee said, joining the conversation. "The Rakghoul poison is something that we still can't fully understand as it is something that appeared relatively not long time ago and we still don't have full information on how it behaves. Apparently, it can mutate."
"That's something I found out in the Jedi archives on Dantooine" Revan replied, sitting at the holoprojector. "You haven't surprised me with that."
Jolee shook his head. "I didn't mean that it can mutate the infected one but that it can mutate itself in the one's body. And that's exactly your case."
"What?" Revan asked quietly, not fully comprehending what he's just heard.
"The venom that you acquired back on Taris has mutated inside you" Fox explained. "Apparently, your immune system was fighting for far too long and so the poison has adapted and overcame this obstacle. Instead of turning your human cells into the Rakghoul cells, it's killing them."
"What do you mean?"
"The poison is not going for the change anymore. It's going for the kill" Jolee clarified. "The blackness in your veins shows the progress of the venom. This was the main reason why that coughing appeared. Your right lung is already dead, eaten by the poison."
"What's worse, we can't find a way to stop it," Wolfie said. "We've only managed to slow down its progress temporarily, by putting a thickener into your blood. It will slow down the venom's assault, but it will also affect your physical abilities as your blood is not coursing through your body at its normal speed."
"How much time do I have?"
"Difficult to say" Rex replied. "Few days, or so. The thickener will slow it down only that much. We can't put any more of it into your body since we've already crossed the permitted dose."
"Is there nothing I can do about it?" Revan queried. He would have laughed if it wasn't such serious matter. Defeated by poison, who would have guessed?
"From the medical point of view, no, there is nothing you can do. We know nothing about this type of mutation and since its undetectable in the Force, you can't just get rid of it" Fox replied. "There is a chance, though, a minor one. More like our guess, but it may actually work."
"And what is that?"
"Your armor was capable of protecting you from injuries and even heal you from ones. We suspect that the same technology can erase the poison from your body and reverse the damages it caused."
"My armor was destroyed" Revan replied, comprehending what he just heard.
"But the Star Forge wasn't" Fox countered. "If you retake control over the Star Forge, there is a chance that it will be able to heal you, but you have to hurry. The thickener will soon disappear from your blood circulation system and then the poison will strike again with full strength and we won't be able to repeat what we did. As Rex said, we've already crossed the permitted dose."
"Where are we even?" Revan asked, changing the topic.
"On the station above Yavin IV," Rex replied. "It was the safest place we could go to while still remaining on our way to Korriban. If we jump into the hyperspace now, we should reach that planet in an hour or so." Revan shook his head.
"Nevertheless we've lost too much time. I'm sure that all of you weren't watching over me for the past few days. You should have set the course to Korriban and few of you should have gone for the Star Map. And now we lost six days." There was no anger in his voice anymore, only resignation. "Bastila is in Malak's hands for six days now."
"But we'll rescue her, won't we?" Mission queried, ever optimistic. "I mean, he won't kill her. We still can recapture her." Revan shook his head again.
"While you are correct when it comes to Malak not killing her, you are wrong if it comes to saving her now."
"What do you mean?"
"If we went for the last Star Map immediately after escaping the Leviathan, we might have been able to save her. But now, after six days when we don't have the Star Forge's exact coordinates, she is beyond saving. Back when I was the Dark Lord, I've created a way of converting the captured Jedi to my side. With time it earned the name of One Week."
"But Malak won't turn her, will he? I mean, she's one of the strongest Jedi in the Order." Again, Revan shook his head.
"It doesn't matter. With this technique, we were able to turn even the most resisting Jedi Knights and Bastila is still just a Padawan. It doesn't matter how long she will be fighting, eventually, she will fall. For the first three days, Malak would be torturing her physically. For most of the time, it would be a Force Lightning as it is the easiest way to deliver pain. But he wouldn't stop just at that. He hates me for what I've done to him in the past and he will use Bastila as a vengeance on me. He knows that she's close to me and he'll exploit it to the fullest. While I was forbidding my men to rape our prisoners, Malak wouldn't withhold from that. He would do anything to torture her, including raping her. As the proverb says, a sound mind in a sound body. Those three days are supposed to break one's physical resilience. When it's done, turning one to the Dark Side is a childish play."
"For the next three days, our captive is to be put through the mental torture. There are dark techniques in the Force that allow delivering nightmares. The victim doesn't know anymore what's the reality and what is just the mind's projection. Bastila would also be exposed to the influence of the Sith Holocrons. The ancient spirits contained inside of them will make her question the Jedi ways. She'll begin doubting the Code and will be finding more and more sense in the teachings of the Sith. Her mind will be waging an inner war between the Light and the Dark Side of the Force."
"The last day is the worst, however. It is then that the captive gets what he wanted since the beginning: freedom. Or rather a taste of it. We were always making sure that the securities were lower on the seventh day. The neural disruptors are weaker, the guards less accurate in their job. In the seventh day, the captive can feel the Force again. After six days of being blind to it, it's like receiving a bucket of water on the dessert. Bastila will be able to set herself free. She will get past the guards and make her way to the way out. Then, when she will see the world outside her prison, Malak will be waiting for her, standing directly in between her and her freedom, surrounded by dozens upon dozens of other Dark Jedi. Driven by the despair, Bastila won't hesitate to use anything in order to defeat him. But she will fail. Six days of constant tortures make it impossible for one to fight for long. Malak will crush her, urging her to reach for the Dark Side that kept on building inside of her since the beginning of her imprisonment. But it won't be enough. She will lose against him. It will be her final lecture; after willingly reaching for the Dark Side, there is nothing one can do to resist it. Once Malak beats her in the single combat, her downfall will be complete."
No one dared to say anything. Rex, Fox, Wolfie, and Atton were already familiar with this technique so its description didn't affect them so much. But the others were horrified. Of course, there were a few Jedi who were released by Revan in his time as the Dark Lord in order to tell the tale about his methods, but no one was willing to believe them. But now, hearing it directly from the source, seeing Revan's expression as he was describing specifically what will happen to Bastila, made them change their minds.
It took Revan a solid two minutes to get over it. When he did, his previous anger returned with full strength, turning his eyes gold.
"And it's all because of you" he spat through his clenched teeth, looking directly at Juhani who was speechless at that moment. Revan's description made her lose her words. "It is because of you that we were pulled out from the hyperspace. It is because of you that Malak was able to capture Bastila. It is because of you that tomorrow she will be turned to the Dark Side!"
"Revan, I…" she tried to say something but he quickly silenced her, catching her in the Force Choke.
"No, there is nothing you can say now to justify yourself. I gave you a second chance on Dantooine. I could have killed you right there and I should have done it. You were fully aware of what you were doing when you were sending the message to Coruscant." Juhani's face turned red as she was struggling to release herself from the invisible hold. "I let you live once and I won't make the same mistake again."
"What?! Revan, no!" Jolee interjected, trying to make Revan lessen his grip on Juhani.
"Shut up, old man!" Revan snapped at him, pushing him at the further wall of the ship. "Don't intermeddle unless you want to share her fate." Eventually, Revan released Juhani, causing her to fall on the floor of the Ebon Hawk, struggling to breathe. "HK" the former Dark Lord called for his favorite killing machine. "You can have your fun with her. I don't want to see her on this ship anymore."
"Gleeful statement: Thank you, Master. Commentary: This should be fun."
Before Juhani could say or do anything, she was dragged out from the ship, being pulled by HK who was holding her by her ponytail. It was the last time the crew of the Ebon Hawk ever saw the Cathar Jedi.
"What are you waiting for?" Revan asked, looking at the others gathered around him. "Start the engines and set the course to Korriban. Once HK returns to the ship, we leave this place."
He wasn't waiting for anyone of them to reply. He returned to his quarters, indicating that their talk was over. Soon, he felt the Ebon Hawk's engines springing to life. He sat on the bed in which he was sleeping for the past six days.
He was surprised when something issued a familiar sound. He stood up and looked what it was. His entire anger has vanished, replaced with a despair.
The object that created that sound was a teddy bear that he gave Bastila in her early days in the Jedi Order.
He picked it up and traced his fingers alongside its features. His eyes returned to the normal green color and glazed over.
I'm coming for you, Bas. Hold on, he said more to himself. He knew that Bastila at this point wasn't able to hear him. In fact, there was nothing he could do now, other than wait. Wait to reach the Korriban and then wait to reach the Star Forge.
But by then, the Bastila he knew would be dead.
Hey, hey that's it for today! Let me know what you thought about this chapter by leaving a comment and see you soon!
