Two chapters in two days? Wow! Well Enjoy!;p And leave reviews, they make me very happy.
CH 22
I stand in the cockpit securing a transmission from the holo Anakin has provided for me, as my current master sleeps in one of those standard pull down back aching slabs called beds. The holo was built based on my own instructions and possess no memory capacity making it the perfect shadow transmitter. The boy is a prodigy when it comes to anything mechanical. It wasn't hard to secure his unwavering trust and loyalty. Heck I think the boy hangs on my every word. The Jedi are blind it seems when it comes to the child. They think he is a divergent in the force, different from the initiates. What I see is a very normal kid. One who was torn from his home too early because he had no other choice. He misses his mother as all normal kids would when separated at a young age and he seeks approval and attention as he gets so little of it here at the Jedi temple. Now I am not saying he wants blatant flattery. What he truly wants I think is a replacement for his mother so he wouldn't miss her so much. That I can easily give. When wanting to gain the respect of a little boy you have to be a good story teller and include all sorts of gruesome horrors so that the kid has a man to man respect for you. Those aren't hard to provide as my master held little back in his brutal training of myself as sith are born from pain and suffering.
Mace is too observant for my liking. Today he sniffed out my shields. It would have happened eventually but I had not thought it would be him who would notice more so Yoda or Dooku. He knows I do not enter the force fully. In truth the force burns, it knows that I am not of the light. How Darth Revan balanced both the light and dark is beyond me. The holo chimes and it is not my master but Maul who answers.
"Kenobi!" His stoic face gives the closest thing it ever does to a smile.
"I am en route to Almas. Are you the one I should thank for this chance to commune with the darkness once more?"
"Sadly no, however more relics were required after the incident. It is possible that our master is shaking up that dump to cause the Jedi to look the other way when he pays a visit to more fruitful ones. Kenobi…"
A lengthy pause ensued. "Have you considered that we may be on the wrong side?"
An eyebrow rose. Usually it was Obi Wan who suggested these things. Was Maul acting on Sideous's orders to measure his loyalty? As if reading his mind Maul snickered or the closest thing he usually gave to a laugh.
"No need to be so paranoid. Sense my intent through the force if you will."
"And what brought about such rebellious thoughts?"
A frown answered his question. "It is merely that Darth Plagues was twice the Sith our master will ever be."
To this Obi Wan heartily agreed. But it surprised him that Maul would consider coming to him with this after all what if he was loyal through and through to Palpatine?
"Why ask?"
"It is simply together we would be safer." Interesting, but not surprising. Xanatos must really be grating on Maul's nerves. Before Xanatos's presence Maul had practically worshipped Sideous but perhaps he realized how easily replaceable he was. No matter.
"We will wait. And join when we have a clear view of a victor." Maul nodded in assent.
"Try not to get yourself killed anytime soon." Kenobi quipped smirking.
"Likewise Kenobi Maul out." The holo was placed at the bottom of his bag close to his datapad. Better to keep it with his other devices and pass it off as a gift from a friend then have it "discovered."
He could hear Mace stir. They were only minutes away from the planet but Obi Wan could already hear it calling to him in the force. Its cool confines and darkness promised refuge from his current charade.
"Do you sense it?" Master Windu approached from behind as Obi Wan pressed a few buttons on the control pad and prepared for a descent.
"Yes." He pressed his lips into a thin line to project that he too was succumbing to the pain the dark side was radiating.
They landed on flat piece of metal. The only thing not completely covered in the strange green moss and grass that gave faint ethereal glows. He followed his master out and they were greeted by a short thin man in what looked like gardening clothes and an odd looking rebreather around his neck.
"My apologieze Maste Jedi for the lack of a prope entourage an all that but we're really shorthanded with the sickness going around. I'm Jas by the way."
Interesting…. "No need for formalities. We come to serve. Master Windu, Padawan Kenobi. How bad is it?" Mace inquired.
"I ain't the political sort so I ain't gonna give ye flowers when there ar none. It's bad. Here ya gonna need these if you don't wana come down with a bad case of shivers." The extra rebreathers were accepted with a bow. The man scratched at his stubble the look of intense seriousness etched on his face as he led the two Jedi from the landing pad into the small village guarded on all sides by a high wooden fence.
"We need details how did the malady begin?" Obi Wan inquired. The darkness was here. He could sense it licking at his burns from attempting to commune with the light side. Not here not now he whispered back and it retreated like the tide waiting for the right phase of the moon to rise again. Mace shot him a look as both listened to the man scratch his beard some more trying to wrack his mind for an answer.
"I ain't sure." He replied at length. "But speak to Lizzy, she's the healer around here. You'll find her in that house with the blue symbol over there.
Master and apprentice bowed their thanks and made their way to the house marked for plague.
My apprentice is at my heels. I wonder if he senses the dark as I do or if he perhaps is shielding himself well from it. Earlier I sensed it close to him. Too close for my liking. The darkness is heavy here. And it is far stronger in the cabin. Obi Wan is reacting too well for someone who has never brushed against the dark side or brushed only fleetingly. But perhaps he is stronger then I give him credit for. He grips the wall when we enter the sick house. It is a simple structure built by hand out of wood. I don't blame the boy. The cabin is littered with those of all ages sparing neither the young nor the healthy nor the old.
A woman with iron grey hair wound tightly in a bun and dull brown eyes scurried here and there a grey mask obscuring her face and black gloves protecting her hands. She notices us after Kenobi clears his throat politely.
"You here for the… no wait your new aren't you?"
"We're here to help." Kenobi quipped diplomatically as he gave her a roguish smile. Normally I would proceed to lecture my padawan on such use of their person but it is better that the locals accept our help freely then fear us and our "mystical powers" as some technologically backward planets do.
She frowned beneath the mask, in all truth it is hard to sense her in the force, she must be force opaque then. Especially since the malady isn't effecting her. "You're a bit young for a Jedi…"
"Here with supervision." So Mace was demoted from Master to simply acquaintance. Well young one if you think this will not cost you a good whacking at the dojo you are greatly mistaken.
"Yes," Mace cleared his throat. "How did the malady begin? It would be easier if we knew what began this."
She sighed as she removed a cool pad from one of the men lying on a cot and felt his pulse. I sense nothing he has passed on.
"Yaso! Yaso! This one's gone!" Two well-built men entered fully garbed in black and hauled the body away.
"Sorry about that," she waved them outside and pulled off her mask and gloves leaving them on a small table outside the entrance revealing a middle aged face marked with great sorrows.
"It all started about three weeks ago. Yaso and a group of men went hunting as they always do. We grow what we need here. Buy what we can't from the republic trading post a few parsecs from here. Meats cheaper when we catch it ourselves so hunting is a common thing. They come back and Rilsen is sick got bitten by one of those lizards nasty things. Usually prefer to sleep rather than bite. Their only dangerous during mating season you see."
Kenobi frowned. "How'd a lizard get so close to a hunter? Surely it's not that hard to kill them before they get a good chunk out of you?"
The elderly woman laughed darkly to his statement. "Oh but they can go invisible you see. In and out, blend with the trees and grass. One bite and you start raving mad. Usually a bite meant fever and pain for a few days sometimes death. Usually you drank mixed herbs and you went on with your daily life. Now one bite and you can go either raving like a lunatic, start attacking others or die."
"Thank you." Mace gave a slight bow in gratitude.
"Well told you all I could have to go back and try to see if anyone can still be saved, good luck Masters Jedi."
The revelation strongly implied that the dark side that had been sealed in the swamps was waking once more. Poison was curable with local remedies. The dark side was not. This was troubling.
"What now?" Obi Wan started him from his thoughts.
"Now I pay a visit to the Jedi temple, and you will assist the locals until I return."
Master and Padawan parted full of purpose. One who shielded himself from the darkness one shielded himself from the light.
