The fog in his head slowly cleared twelve hours later as Jorec awoke in the detention cell of the Banesclaw. The cold slab of durasteel that served as a poor excuse for a bed added to the pounding in his head. He sat up slowly, afraid that one false move could send him back into unconsciousness. He blinked his eyes to adjust them to the dim light of the small room, rubbing his temples with his right hand.
Jorec looked around the rectangular room, noticing the dull gray walls that extended less than two meters from the middle of the room and the seams of the door that occupied a corner. Opposite of the door was a small refresher unit, one seemingly designed for discomfort.
After focusing on the world around him, Jorec quickly took a small inventory of himself. He was dressed in a bright orange jumpsuit, a horrendous outfit that was probably used to quickly find prisoners in case of a mass escape. Although the metal wristband around his right wrist probably served the same purpose. He swung his body to the edge of the cot, allowing his legs to hit the ground and feeling the cold durasteel of the floor on his bare feet.
He tried to stand, using his arms to push off of the confines of the bed. His head once again began to swim as he moved to his feet. Halfway up, his knees buckled under his weight, sending Jorec falling to the ground. He attempted to catch himself on the wall, but his hands could find no purchase on the hard wall. Pain rushed up from his left side as he hit the floor.
The monitors inside of the control room flared to life as Prisoner #22043 awoke from his long slumber, causing the two young officers inside to glance up from their card game. The older officer, only 27 years old, glanced at the monitors as a small alarm blared throughout the room.
"Looks like our most recent addition has regained consciousness," he said as he walked over to the consoles. He sat down in the chair and brought up the profile.
"What's the alarm for then?" asked the younger officer as he placed his cards on the table. He walked toward the consoles, but not before taking a quick peek at his commanding officer's cards on the table. He smiled at the hand and then continued to the computers on the far wall.
"They normalize the readings for when they're stunned," the older officer explained. "When they regain consciousness, the computer registers a change far beyond the norm. A little security precaution."
A few quick keystrokes later, the alarms were silenced.
"Well, I notified the captain and the ship's medical officer about his condition. They should down here shortly."
"So, what do you think?" the younger officer asked. "Is he really a Jedi?"
The older officer shrugged his shoulders at the question. "To tell the truth, I really don't know. That's up for the others to decide."
Jorec watched as the doors of his cell opened extremely quickly, and watched as two gray-clad officers walked into the room. The blank expressions on their faces filled Jorec with a sense of dread, and the humming sound of the interrogation droid floating into the room didn't help matters much either. As all three of his interrogators entered the room, the gray door quickly snapped shut.
He gradually opened his eyes, body still ringing from the pain and his mind still filled with the shame of having given in so quickly. He had hoped to hold out as long as he could, hoped that if he just kept repeating the lies he had used a background story they would eventually believe him. He had failed…
"You did not fail," came a familiar voice from somewhere in the room. "After all, who were you really hiding your Jedi heritage from? Was it the Empire, or was it yourself?"
Jorec didn't even bother looking for the owner of the voice, knowing that doing so would only result in failure. "You knew about this didn't you? You knew that I would be captured!" he weakly exclaimed.
"Yes, I did," The Voice replied, a hint of sadness in his voice. "And if I had tried to tell you, would you have even listened?"
"Probably not," Jorec whispered. "What… What are they going to do with me? Kill me like the others?"
"Something worse, they plan on making you one of them."
"Like that would ever happen," Jorec spit out. "I remember what they did!"
"So did many others, but they fell to the Dark Side just to save their own lives." The Voice now came from Jorec's right side, as if the owner had walked around the room. "I tried to help them, advise them, but they would not listen."
"They're going to do something to make me angry, angry enough to reach out to the Dark Side of the Force," Jorec said. He began to think about how they would do this, and then found the answer. "Lia! Is she safe, have they found her?"
"She will be fine. They don't even know of her existence."
"How is that possible? There were holos of her and I in my apartment, they couldn't have missed those!"
"Those holos are now destroyed. One lone Stormtrooper apparently had a heart and knew what they were going to do. There is no evidence of your relationship that currently exists."
"What do you know," Jorec said. "Some of them are actually human…"
"All of them are human," The Voice replied. "Even the clones."
"So, they'll try to turn me into what Vader is and they'll fail. I assume that they would kill me after that?" Jorec asked The Voice.
"More than likely, they will."
"Just tell me one thing," Jorec said as the pain began to dim. "Will she have a good life?"
"To tell you the truth, I really don't know about that."
"Now I know for sure you're not a product of my imagination," Jorec joked.
He once again sat up on the durasteel cot, rubbing his head with his hands. He looked in the general direction of where The Voice seemed to be coming from, and continued to see nothing but the blank wall.
Five days later, the slight shudder of the Banesclaw reverting out of hyperspace wakened the lightly sleeping Jorec. As he stared up at the ceiling of the cell that he was in, thinking that his end would soon come. In his mind, he darkly thought that it would be nice to see Coruscant again after ten years of living on Selvernos. Yet he knew that he wouldn't be able to take the grand tour of what was now called Imperial Center, and that nothing on that planet would probably be familiar.
When they dragged him out of his cell, Jorec was able to see that the planet the Star Destroyer was orbiting was certainly not Coruscant. The planet was decidedly less urban, with only small specks of lights coming off of the surface. Otherwise, the planet was a mixture of different climate zones. Off in the distance he could see the blocky shape of a prison ship also orbiting the planet.
The warden of cellblock #5220 on the Imperial prison ship Interrogator looked over his list of prisoners as his assistants put away all of the seized evidence. The list was composed mainly of political prisoners; a few rebels, collaborators, dissidents and the like. One entry was particularly intriguing however, the prisoner called Jorec Merridon had only a brief description of the crime committed. He was simply charged with conspiracy, yet his record was heavily classified. Only an officer with a Code R security clearance could fully unlock his file, and the only piece of evidence was also classified as well. The evidence had been placed in a solid bag, and placed in the evidence room under strict supervision by Imperial guards. Of all of the people in his staff, only he could actually open the evidence locker containing it.
He checked the chronometer on the computer terminal he was working on, finally checking off the final pre-flight checks on his section. It was getting close to launch time, and if he had timed the sedative right the humanoid prisoners would be awakening in about another 30 minutes. He took a quick sip from the mug near the terminal and readied himself for another routine flight.