This chapter is an interlude. It is not essential for either the plot, or the continuity of the story. It is, however, something the children experience and a part of what helps shape them in future chapters.
"I can't sleep." Thema exclaimed, for the third time in half an hour. She flailed her arms a little, and threw off part of her sleeping bag, huffing in indignation.
"Stop interrupting those of us who can!" Beriven rasped, throwing his hands over his ears. He sat up, and glared over at her.
"Same to you." Tha'varr said after a low groan, and sighed in exasperation. "We've been trying to sleep for, what, ten hours now?"
"Forty minutes." Bug answered. "It says so on the clock."
"When did you learn to read a clock?" Beriven asked, forgetting his anger.
"Marius taught me yesterday." Bug answered.
Anita stood up, and stretched, saying "well, what are we going to do now?"
"We have to sleep!" Thema said plaintively. "Bug and I have work tomorrow."
"I could punch all of you, that would put you to sleep." Thug offered.
Most of the group laughed.
"Hey, where's Merry?" Tha'varr asked. Even in the low gloom of the night-lights, she could see that neither Marius, nor his bag, were there.
A few quick glances around the room confirmed that Marius wasn't with them. Anita stood up and opened a door, looking into the smaller room that was probably once used as an office. It was too small to use as a sleeping room, which is why it was rarely occupied.
"Ah, he's over here!" Anita said. She pointed inside, and the others climbed out of their beds to look inside.
Marius was curled up in his sleeping bag, the lights were on, and he had a book in his hands.
"Merry, what'cha doing?" Thema asked.
"Reading." Marius replied sardonically, holding the book up a bit.
Beriven read the title, 'Exiles of Tython,' but it didn't mean anything to him."
"Where's Tython?" Beriven asked.
"What's Tython?" Anita asked.
"Python?" Bug asked.
"No, Tython. I think it starts with a T." Thema said.
"Like title, or turtle." Bug exclaimed.
"Exactly." Marius said, pointing to bug, and smiling. "Tython is the name of a planet, far away from here."
"What's an exile?" Bug asked.
"You read that off the book?" Thema exclaimed.
"Yeah." Bug said, with a snicker.
"An exile is someone who's been sent away from a place." Marius said. "It's about someone who was sent away from Tython."
"Is it a true story?" Tha'varr asked.
"Sort of. It's based off someone's real adventures, but it's almost a thousand years old." Marius said.
"So it's been changed a few times." Beriven said.
"Of course. Real life is too boring to be made into a story." Marius agreed.
"So it's not boring." Anita said, settling down beside Marius.
"If it were, he wouldn't be reading it." Beriven noted.
Everyone turned their heads, suddenly, when Thug asked in a voice quivering with emotion. "Would you read it to us?"
"Thug?" Thema asked.
The others waited, as Thug took a few deep breaths. "It's the last thing I remember, about my parents. They used to read to me. In bed."
Every one of the children found something interesting on the floor to stare at.
"It is for me, too." Tha'varr said, after a moment. Her voice, not quite as strained as Thug's, still had a distinctive hitch where she struggled with surging emotions.
"I, uh..." Marius began, but Mystery sat down, and stared attentively in his direction. The others, seeing this, slowly followed suit, until they sat in a semicircle around him.
"As if I was going to say no." Marius said. He flipped back to the front of the book, and asked "It's not just one story. It's about a bunch of people who left Tython, after something called the Bogan wars."
"Bogan wars?" Thema asked.
"Part of this story says there's some mysterious power in the universe. And it has two sides, the Ashla and the Bogan. The Ashla is a kind power, and the Bogan is a hurtful one." Marius explained.
"What happened in the war?" Beriven asked.
"It doesn't say. It's just about some people who left. According to the book, hardly anyone stayed on Tython after that war."
"Oh." Beriven said, sadly.
"Just pick one at random, Merry." Bug said.
"Okay." Marius scanned the page for a moment, and then exclaimed with a start, pointing at one. "Tonight's story is called 'Pali Trivish and Mandalore.' He flipped through over half the book, stopped, flipped back a few pages, and stopped.
"No soldier wins a war," Marius began, settling his back into the wall a little. "and the Force War of Tython was made only of soldiers. Pali Trivish, a mercenary who had only recently found her connection to the Ashla, and had long denied the influence of the Bogan, quickly emerged as one of the fiercest voices against any study of that dark path of learning. She, like few others, claimed it corrupted the essence of a person, damaging their true desires as it gave them power. In the end, she lost most, as those who learned of the Ashla were ill-inclined to violence of any sort. They depended on her, and the burden of her tasks had broken her heart."
"Oh, this is a sad story." Anita said.
"No." Marius disagreed. "As far as I can tell, it's not. It's just telling us she's sad, and why."
"So it gets happier?" Thema asked.
"I think so." Marius said. "I haven't read this story yet."
"Stop interrupting." Beriven hissed.
"Anyway," Marius began. "She left Tython, once her duty to her friends was finished, and the safety of their temples and libraries was assured. She took to the stars, uncaring of where they took her, and followed paths of hyperspace that will stay unmapped for thousands of years.
"Her travels took her, eventually, to a large, dark and foreboding world. From deep space, with the world still unable to fill her view screen, she could see bright flashes from the surface of the planet.
She stopped for a time, turning the lights off in her cabin and leaving the ship in complete darkness. For hours at a time, the depth of space was so dark that she couldn't see her hand, but each time one of those lights shone, for the brief moment they lived, she could see every part of the cockpit.
"From her days as a mercenary, she had seen the brilliant bright flares of Ion bombs. Only twice, in nearly twelve years of war, and each time burned brightly in her memory. Each time, she had heard the sudden, terrified screams from those caught up in the explosions, the cascade of voices that were stifled with sudden, terrible finality.
The second time she saw the flash of an Ion bomb, and the screams she remembered accompanying it, she abandoned her life to find out why she heard those screams. It was an Ion bomb, that forced her to find Tython.
As she sat and stared, as the planet turned and she saw those explosions, she did not hear a single scream. She could feel, instead of the gut churning terror or the victims begging with every part of their being to escape death, she felt grim resignation, and steeled resolve. She could feel grief from those who survived in witness, and the rage that followed, but it was those victims, those caught up in the explosions, that kept her attention locked on the planet.
They were not afraid, even as they died."
"That's impossible." Thug spat, disbelieving.
"Shush." Anita rasped.
"She turned her ship on and drew closer, scanning through her radio for a transmission that might be meant for her. She knew, instinctively, that she had already been noticed." Marius continued.
"Identify yourself." A voice suddenly blared out, moments after she started her engines.
She tuned the transmitter and said "Pali Trivish."
"Why have you entered Amdor space?" The voice asked, harsher than before.
"I wasn't aware this planet was called Amdor." She replied."
"Neither was I." Bug said.
"It isn't. I think it's a country or something." Beriven replied.
"The space you're in is part of Clan Amdor, warrior clan of Mandalore." The voice replied, impatiently. "Power down your engines, and prepare to be boarded."
As the voice spoke a command, a destroyer came into view from the dark side of the planet. Its stained grey hull sported deep gouges in its sides, and a few parts of its hull were blown open. Its guns, which seemed to bristle from every side of the ship, were all pointed at her small freighter.
A warning light flared, and the ship lurched towards the destroyer suddenly, nearly sending her sprawling to the ground. She sighed in resignation, knowing her ship was caught in a tractor beam, and killed the power to her engines. She flipped a few switches, engaging the spare batteries for the energy shields, and hoped that they weren't inclined to simply blow her ship up.
"Great time to not have blasters on my ship." She muttered to herself.
"Wait, wouldn't having weapons be good?" Thema asked.
"It's sarcasm." Thug said. "Berry uses it all the time."
"Like this." Beriven added. "I really, really like it when you interrupt this story."
"Hush." Tha'varr hissed.
"Were you the ones using those Ion bombs?" Pali asked over the intercom.
"Just wait near the airlock with your hands on your head."
"Because you need a destroyer to detain traders and travelers, I'm guessing you are the side using the Ion bombs. Does any other side have them, or are you free about it because you're the only one?" She asked again.
"Do you want to be blown to bits right now?" Someone else asked.
Pali smiled to herself, and set the intercom to receive throughout the ship. "And who are you, to have the authority to threaten me so readily?" She asked, as she unbuckled her safety harness and left the cockpit.
"The highest authority needed to follow up on that threat." The voice answered.
"A distant relative of the ruler of clan Amdor?" She asked.
"The head of clan Amdor." The voice responded, quickly.
"You're pretty free with those Ion bombs. Did you develop the technology yourselves? You haven't used any in a little while."
"We're concerned about their effects." The voice responded.
Pali grinned as he spoke, setting her blaster to a holster on her leg. "Then why did you use them in the first place?"
"We're deterring aggression."
"On a planet with a long history of warrior-culture? I've known of mercenaries from Mandalore. I was told the warrior caste made up most of the population."
"That isn't for you to know. Cease transmissions and lower your shields." The voice responded. Pali finished belting on her small vibroblade, and started towards the escape pod.
"No. There's only one reason you're not using those Ion bombs anymore. You ran out." Pali responded, as she opened the escape pod doors.
Out the window, the destroyer was lit with a bright red hue, as the energy blasters came to life. Lazer fire crashed into the shields, ripping the ship in a brilliant white glare as the ship's shields tried to hold against the barrage that pummeled against her hull.
Pali slipped inside of the escape pod, put her hand against the launch switch, and waited."
"Waited, why?" Bug asked.
"The story will explain." Marius assured him. "She stared outside and scanned the shields, as they lit up to reflect and diffuse the blaster fire. The strain, as they went from bright white to blue, and eventually darkened, showed how quickly her shields were being exhausted.
She had seen this before, a long time ago. Shields that should have lasted hours fell in minutes to Mandalorian guns.
At the moment the shields failed, she engaged the escape pod, and only strapped herself in as it detached from the ship, and its engines thrust it away.
The escape pod was hardly out of range as the Mandalorian blasters ripped through her ship's hull, punching straight through the entire length of the ship, and almost immediately ignited the thrusters and hyperdrive. The ship turned, for a moment, into brilliant white light as the hyperdrive blew apart, and vaporized the ship.
As the darkness returned, she disengaged the escape pod's engines, and let the ship drift towards the surface, to escape detection from the destroyer and those fearsome guns.
The ship lingered nearby for hours, without moving, continuing its silent vigil. Pali was forced to sit in the darkness, strapped into the escape pod, unable to even let herself correct her course, as she felt her weightlessness fade. The escape pod, creeping closer to the planet, was now close enough for its gravity to pull on her.
The ship drifted closer to the atmosphere, where unless she intervened, engaged the pod's shields and corrected her course, she and her small ship would burn. Though if she engaged her shields, and the Mandalorians noticed, those guns were certain to deliver the same fate.
Instead, she set the engines to life, and flew towards the planet as fast as the escape pod would let her."
"Why did she do that?" Bug asked. "Won't she burn up?"
"Shush already!" Beriven exclaimed.
"She sighed in relief as the destroyer's guns stayed silent, and turned her attention to her descent.
Without the shields, the hull temperature was already showing signs of the strain reentry was putting the escape pod under. The Hull temperature was climbing, the internal coolant system sounded its warnings, and the air inside began to get warmer.
Lacking the machinery most ships have, Pali listened carefully as the walls of the pod began to stretch, wrenching as the metals heated and cooled, and the observation port cracked slightly under the strain.
It took a while, but she was willing to risk the shields. The escape pod, she hoped, would look like a small meteor, and the warriors monitoring the sensors would ignore her.
She turned on the shields, grinned as the hull temperature suddenly plummeted, and turned back to look at the destroyer.
She remembered a saying, from an old scholar and a former soldier. He had said that there was no such thing as luck.
The destroyer lit up, and red bolts began streaking past her escape pod.
If the old scholar was right, she ruefully wondered what would explain why her luck was so bad.
She quickly readjusted the power output on the shields, and as soon as the engines had slowed her descent enough, dropped the power to the engines and put everything she could into the shields.
Which saved her life, as a brilliant red bolt collided with the pod.
The hit sent the ship into a dizzying whirl, spinning so quickly that Pali nearly blacked out from the sudden surge of gravity. She pointed her hand at the escape pod door and pushed at it, breaking it off its hinges and sending it careening away. She unbuckled her seat belt, which flung her against the walls of the escape pod.
She grasped at the parachute under her seat, and managed to grasp it long enough that a sudden lurch in the pod allowed her to hold onto it as she rolled along the escape pod, and out the open door.
In free-fall, she managed to strap on the parachute and deploy it, but quickly found that she wasn't out of danger. Even with the parachute, she was falling too quickly." Marius read.
"What?" Tha'varr asked.
"Is something wrong with the parachute?" Beriven asked.
"No. The next line says she thinks the gravity of Mandalore is stronger than on most worlds."
"Really? How is that possible?" Thug asked.
"Mandalore must be heavier." Beriven explained.
"Why does that matter?"
"Think about it. Heavier things have more mass. Which must relate to gravity, because this moon goes around a planet. The planet it bigger, so we orbit it. That planet orbits the star because the star is bigger."
"But that would mean the gravity here is much weaker than on Courescant." Tha'varr pointed out.
"I heard space traders say that this moon was terraformed to make mines for some metal. Zersium, I think it was. There's supposed to be a lot of it, which makes this moon really heavy. They said the gravity was really similar." Marius said.
"What about black holes?" Tha'varr asked.
"They're small, but they have way more matter. They're super something..." Marius started.
"Super compressed." Beriven added.
"What's compressed? Bug asked.
"Squished."
"Then why not say super squished?"
Bug got a few laughs from that.
"So she's falling too quickly for the parachute. What does she do?" Anita asked.
Marius turned his eyes back to the book, and said "Pali scanned the now visible surface, and knowing she could not slow her descent, aimed her descent towards a small lake in the mountains.
A few harrowing minutes, spent second guessing her decision, and hoping that a sudden gust of wind wouldn't blow her off course, she plunged into the lake and quickly tore off her parachute, diving a little to escape the ropes.
She broke to the surface and breathed her first real, safe breath on Mandalore. She sighed, saying "feels like swimming with a durasteel suit of armor. No wonder those Mandalorians were so dangerous."
She swam to the shore, struggling with her now very heavy body to stand. She climbed out and looked around, slowly.
Just on the crest of a nearby hill, hardly more than a hundred feet away, were three men in full suits of ballistic resistant heavy armor and large carbine disruptors, all of whom were pointing those weapons straight at her.
The armor covered them from head to toe, with helmets that passed over their eyes and covered their faces completely. The armor looked to be made of durasteel plating, which while already heavy, would make it extremely heavy with this gravity. These three men were obviously very strong, to be doing woodland recon in it.
She sighed and held her hands in the air, surprised by how heavy her own arms felt in this gravity. A few deep breaths to steady herself, and she kept as still as she could while she waited for the three armored figures to walk to her.
One of them looked her up and down for a moment, then said "Most off-worlders don't do very well with our gravity."
"I wasn't left with much of an option." Pali replied, her hands still in the air.
"Any other weapons?" The same figure asked. She marked the voice as distinctly male, probably an officer.
"No. Just the vibroblade."
"Vibroblade?" One of the others asked.
"A high frequency vibration is passed through the blade, which is nanotube reinforced durasteel. It would take a while, but it could cut through a starship hull."
One of the two others, not the officer, took the blade out of her hip holster and examined it closely.
The officer turned and set his hand on the side of his helmet. "HQ, we found someone from the escape pod. She's an off-worlder. I haven't confirmed if she's from the ship the Interdiction vaporized, but the chances are pretty good. Did you pick up any other escape pods?"
"There won't be. I was the only occupant on that ship." Pali responded.
The officer took off his helmet, and regarded Pali carefully. "Any way you can confirm that?"
"No. All I can offer is the idea that if there were more passengers, we would have used more escape pods." Pali offered.
"What are you doing in Mandalorian space?" He asked.
"You're not part of clan Amdor, are you?" Pali asked, ignoring the question.
"Are you a trader, smuggler, or potential mercenary?" he asked, ignoring her question in turn.
"I have a valuable piece of information to offer in exchange for my safety." She stated carefully, her eyes not leaving the officer's face.
It hurt her heart, to look at him. He was too young, far too young, to have such fierce, harsh eyes.
"Will you let us judge the value of it? That on our honor, we will judge it's value fairly?" He asked, softly.
"I will." She answered. "Clan Amdor has no more Ion bombs."
"How did you come by this?"
"My ship was originally supposed to be detained. They held it in a tractor beam, and were preparing to board and search my ship. I had been in orbit for about twenty hours before, watching as the Ion bombs were used."
"Why?"
"Because from the victims of those bombs, I felt no fear." Pali admitted.
The three soldiers were shaken silent for a long moment. The officer, eventually, said "fallen soldiers. Not victims. They died in battle, with honor."
"Agreed, forgive me. To have died so fearlessly, despite the horror of something you cannot fight back against, I should not call them victims." Pali apologized.
"You understand something of honor. A great deal, for an off-worlder. But who are you, to know when someone is feeling fear?" The officer asked.
"I'm a practitioner of the Ashla, from Tython."
"That planet where they gathered sorcerers? Wasn't there a war there?" One of the others asked.
"There was, one that ruined much of the planet, and perhaps suggests that the Ashla and the Bogan should not be taught to anyone." Pali explained. "But when I was being towed to that ship, I spoke with the officer on the watch asking him if his clan were the ones using the Ion bombs. I deduced that the only reason they had stopped using those Ion bombs was because they ran out. After I asked them that, they destroyed my ship."
"So you're a warrior. For that, and your words, you hold some honor in our eyes. Enough that I'll speak for you when we take you to our commanders."
"I'm to be a prisoner then?" Pali asked.
"You are. You are a foreigner no one expected on a world at war. However, for your information, you'll be treated with less suspicion by those we serve. More importantly, you'll be treated well for a prisoner." The young officer informed her.
Neither of the other two soldiers moved to detain her, and when the officer gestured for her to start walking, the others moved to points on the perimiter, rather than moving to restrain her. A sign of respect that Pali, a longtime mercenary, understood.
"Is this respect for my information?" Pali asked the officer.
He turned to her, and shook his head. "No. I've heard that the practitioners of the Ashla cannot lie. Is that true?"
She shook her head, sadly. "No."
"More truth, at least. But we have heard something of the abilities of you sorcerers. Sensing emotions, seeing far distances, knowing things before they happen. When you say you knew the emotions of those who died in those explosions, we believe it."
He stopped, and turned to her. "Swear to me you're telling the truth. That when you say you knew what they felt when they died, you tell the truth."
Pali struggled for a long moment to find the words to reply. "I swear by my fallen comrades, that those felled by the Ion bombs were beyond fear."
Pali was startled when the other two soldiers turned to her, and took off their helmets. Their eyes, as harsh and fierce as their commander's, were watery. Their faces clenched in a grimace, each one of them, in turn, brought their hands to their chests sharply, in salute.
The commander, too, struggled to keep his emotions in check. "A warrior's vow. You, indeed, know much of honor. I am Taramon, Alturion of Clan Gladia. With me are Radvan and Estan, both warriors who have undergone the right of the Vanguard. We will vouch for you, and defend your honor, should it be necessary."
"I am Pali Travish, practitioner of the Ashla, and I swear to you my aid in removing the coward willing to use Ion bombs for political gain." Pali said, in turn. All three soldiers, nodded and smiled as she spoke. "But if I may ask, do warriors rule Mandalore?"
Taramon hesitated, long enough for Radavan to speak instead. "No. The clans are made of warriors, but we are ruled by a caste of those that own. Land, and the clans that inhabit them."
"But those that attacked me claimed to have the authority to use the Ion bombs. Was that actually clan Amdor?"
"Those that rule clan Amdor claim to be a part of it. They wear armor and medals of valor. They have not earned them." Taramon said, quietly.
"I am glad to hear that. From someone on that destroyer, just before they started firing, I felt fear. It seemed out of place for a people who face death with such courage." Pali explained.
"When you said they have no Ion bombs left?" Taramon asked, perceptively.
"Yes."
"How did clan Amdor come to be ruled by this caste of owners?" Pali asked.
"It was fairly recent. Ertius Polban came to acquire the land clan Amdor inhabited, and demanded the right to challenge to head the clan. Despite the lack of honor, the head of clan Amdor agreed."
"How did he win?"
"He didn't. Ertius demanded the right to use a champion, a proxy. He claimed the obviously infirm deserved the right. Caught by the demands of honor, he agreed. The man he fought, was a black-cloaked foreigner. I'm told the duel lasted almost an hour, but the foreigner won."
"That would be the other thing I sensed. A presence, similar to the presence of many sorcerer emperors on many other worlds. The presence of those who submit to the Bogan."
"This foreigner is a sorcerer?" Estan asked.
"Honor for Landon Amdor, to have faced such an enemy." Taramon said.
"I have fought practitioners of the Bogan who could fight a duel with a dozen enemies and walk away unscathed. Others who could conjure lightning from their fingertips, or make grown men cower with a glance. A company of soldiers may not have done as well as Landon Amdor." Pali said.
"A dozen men?" Radvan asked.
"Not Mandalorians, obviously." Estan replied, with a smirk.
"No. We'd use distruptors, concussion rockets and grenades. Unless it's a formal combat, you never engage in a fair fight." Taramon insisted.
"Then where is the glory of combat?" Estan asked.
"The glory of combat is in being able to win against any foe, no matter what they're capable of." Taramon replied. "The more capable the foe, the better. And if you loose, may it only be because your foe is that powerful."
The other two saluted crisply. "The way of the warrior."
"The way of the warrior." Taramon replied.
"So these Ion bombs are merely the weapons of a warrior?" Pali asked.
"Only if your enemy has something of a similar calibre. You would not pull a blaster on a small child with a stick, after all. There is no honor in battle against an opponent who is not a danger to you."
"And if your enemy also had Ion bombs?" Pali asked.
"Then the conflict is a challenge no Mandalorian warrior could ignore."
"Wow, they're really crazy." Bug said.
"How do you like battle? Being in danger sucks." Thug said.
"Don't you like fighting, thug?" Beriven asked.
"Sort of. Fighting someone is exciting, especially when you don't know if you can win. If you know you'll beat them, or that you'll loose, it's no fun."
"It's how these Mandalorians feel, too. They're just so big and strong they can use bombs and ships to fight." Marius said. "Anyway,
"What of those who do not fight? Do not wish to?" Pali asked.
"There is no honor in fighting them. Unless they seek to attack or undermine us, why bother?" Taramon asked in turn.
"So other worlds, who wish for peace, have nothing to fear from you?"
"In of themselves, no." Taramon answered.
"Do you feel the same way?" Pali asked the other two.
They both answered "Combat makes us alive," Estan answered. "Alturion Taramon understands the philosophy of it better, but we are at our best when our lives are in danger, when our lives or honor are at stake. We seek it, in whatever form we can find. Against primitives who wished to fight, we would fight with swords and without durasteel armor. Against foes with fleets, we fight with dreadnoughts and laser batteries."
"And against that sorcerer, who can cut down a dozen men in a duel?"
"Disruptor rifles and grenades, like the Alturion said." Estan answered.
"So why don't you?" Pali asked.
"Because he has Ion bombs and clans under his thumb. And in this war, we are not in a position of strength enough to challenge him. Even if we were, if we challenge Eritus Amdor, his champion is allowed to pick the weapons. If he is a practitioner of the Bogan, that combat would allow him to use those powers. None of us could fight against that."
"Then I need to be able to earn enough honor to meet that challenge. We would fight on even terms. I don't need to earn enough honor to make that challenge, though." Pali speculated.
"No. The condition of a champion has already been invoked. He could not deny our use of it." Taramon said. "A cunning plan, sorcerer."
"Wait a minute." Radvan exclaimed, holding up a hand. "Did we really just discover our enemy has run out of their best weapon, and find a way to depose their champion? That quickly?"
"The Ashla has a tendency to guide. You get used to it." Pali said with a shrug.
"Well, let's go give the clan the good news." Estan said. "Saddle up, commander?"
Taramon donned his helmet, and slung the disruptor blaster over his shoulder. "Let's go."
"And I'll leave it at that for tonight. We shouldn't be up too late." Marius finished, closing the book.
"Ah. It was getting good." Anita said.
"Thema and Bug have to work tomorrow. They might get fired if they're too cranky." Beriven agreed, opening the door. "Anyway, I'm kinda tired now."
"Me too." Tha'varr agreed. "Good story, Merry."
"Yeah, thanks." Thug agreed. "You'll do it again?"
"Of course. Though I'm gonna work harder on getting more of you to read."
"Why?" Thema asked.
"So that someone else can tell the story. My throat hurts." Merry said, with a silly grin. The others laughed a little, and Mystery held out a glass of water in his hands.
No one knew when he went and got it. It was one of those things about Mystery that the others simply lived with.