The Fall of the Infinite Empire

Chapter 16

Tytus did not understand why Myra had chosen the spot she had for their home. Or at least he did not understand it at first, now he just disagreed with it. They were on what passed for high ground in this odd place. The area on which they had built their little shack was a few feet higher than any other point in the enclosure. The grassy land rolled a bit, so there were high points and low points, but Myra had chosen the highest of the high points. She said she wanted to be able to see what was going on. It all came back to her distrust of the other people here, a distrust she had told him about when he first arrived with the children. She told him the northerners were dangerous and she did not think the Rakatans would protect any of the people from each other. She didn't want them to get close without her knowing they were coming. That one of them had managed to talk to Brun without her present had both enraged and terrified her.

Tytus suspected something about Halvor in particular troubled Myra. She had a general distrust of the northerners, who, she claimed, were violent and not to be trusted. But Halvor made her more agitated than the others. Something had happened in the weeks when Myra had been here alone that explained her attitude. Something had happened between the two of them. And so now Myra wouldn't let the children out of her sight, and that meant Tytus was left watching their home when she took the children for water or food, or even just to take a walk. Myra seemed strangely confident that their little shack would not be disturbed if he went with them, and had encouraged Tytus to come along with them on this latest trip. But as she had been unwilling to explain why she thought it was safe, Tytus followed his own instincts and stayed behind to ward off any who might come snooping.

He wasn't really sure what he would do if someone did show up. He didn't even really know what they wanted. Brun had told him that Myra had intervened before Halvor said much. Tytus couldn't figure out what he wanted with the boy. But then again he had no idea how things worked in this place. They had been given the materials to make their shelter. They were given food. They had easy access to water. What were the northerners after that the Rakatans did not provide? They were so well provided for that there wasn't really anything to do all day. That was the source of it Tytus figured. With nothing to do the northerners had decided to just get into each other people's business. Perhaps they wanted to be in charge, but in charge of what? They were all powerless. Slaves who have been given no work. And even if that pathetic aim was it, what did Brun have to do with it? What could Brun do for them?

What could Brun do at all? What could any of them do? What were any of them doing here? Tytus had tried to talk to Myra about it. She had travelled with the Rakatan in charge of this place, and the city back home, or so she said. Whenever Tytus asked her what her journey had been like, she gave vague answers. Had she spoken to the Rakatan in charge? Yes, she said. What had he told her? Nothing, she said. Tytus had not asked about what had happened after she arrived here, and he did not intend to. The closest he had gotten was asking whether she knew anything about the levels below them, where, she told him, the rest of their family was living. They had been separated the first day on this planet, and at first Tytus assumed his parents and Myra's sister's and her mate would be brought to them. It had been Myra who told him that most of the people brought to this place lived beneath them, that this place was, in its own way, like a cave. Most of it was underground and hidden from the sky. There were hundreds of people living on the various levels of this compound, and their family members were among them. When Tytus asked why they had been separated from them Myra claimed she did not know, and Tytus knew she was hiding something.

These evasions had contributed to Tytus' mood, as he well appreciated. His refusal to go with Myra and the children today had been an expression of it. If she had things she wanted to keep from him there was nothing he could do about it. And when he wasn't actively getting himself worked up over it he could admit that if she was keeping things from him then she probably had good reason, or at least a reason she thought was good. But the knowledge that she was probably right didn't make her management of him less galling. It was rather the opposite.

Tytus looked out over the false grassland as he brooded and noticed a group of northerners, including Halvor, standing not so far away. Tytus watched them as they spoke to each other, and noticed that Halvor was, while continuing to speak to his companions, looking right back at him in return. Something about the look on his face irked Tytus. It was the grin. What, Tytus thought, did this pale, lanky man have to be grinning at him about? It was with this question in his mind that Tytus started walking towards the northerners. He wasn't doing any good sitting on that little rock playing at being a guard, so why not go have a chat? As he approached their little group Tytus saw Halvor quiet those he was speaking to with a quick, sharp movement of his hand. The obedient companions turned to face Tytus, who had the unpleasant feeling that he was doing exactly what had been expected of him.

Halvor opened the discussion pleasantly enough, saying, "Hello there Tytus! Are you enjoying our little world yet?"

"You say my name, but I don't recall telling it to you."

"Oh, Myra and I talked about you." Halvor's grin seemed to grow even more smug as he said this.

"What do you want with my son?" Tytus forced himself to keep the discussion focused on what mattered and not the feelings Halvor had no doubt meant to call up in him with his answer.

"Just to give him an opportunity, as a man, to join us. For our competitions I mean."

"My son is not a man yet," Tytus said.

"Near enough. And we need all the men we can get. There are so few of them about," Halvor said with a smirk. Tytus ignored the implication.

"Well you are not to make such offers again."

Halvor's smile faded slowly before he responded, "Yes, Myra already made that clear."

Tytus nodded, wanting to say more but knowing it could lead nowhere good. Halvor considered him for a moment before asking, "And what about you Tytus? Would you care to join the other men, and take your turn in the Circle?"

"What are you talking about?" Tytus genuinely did not know what he was being asked to do.

"Is this something you southerners did not do? Or did you forget?"

"Forget what?"

"The Circle. Surely you have seen us do it here. We do it most nights, though it is a small affair compared to what we had back home."

Tytus' frustration was apparent as he responded, "What do you do most nights? Make a circle? Sit around and hold hands?"

"We fight," one of Halvor's companions said. He did not seem to find the whole discussion as amusing as Halvor.

"Fight who?"

Halvor took the conversation back over from his friend. "We fight each other Tytus. We fight to see who is strongest."

"And what do you do with this knowledge? What is the point of it?" Halvor's friends seemed taken aback by Tytus' questions, as though the idea that knowing who was strongest was not worth knowing for its own sake was entirely foreign to them.

Halvor, on the other hand, seemed to have given the matter at least some thought, for he had his answer ready. "There has to be a strongest, and the group has to know who it is."

"Why?"

"It is what keeps the group together. Everyone knows their place, their role. It allows the group to be as one, to act as one. We learned this during the Great War."

Tytus, shaking his head, responded, "Maybe a war you lost isn't the place to find lessons for the future."

"We lost the war brother. All of us. But we fought. And the enemy paid."

"Our people paid more, and they will pay forever," Tytus replied. "The Rakatan in charge, he told Myra our world is going to die. They are going to make it so that nothing can live there."

Another of Halvor's companions chimed in at this point, "Better to die than live as slaves!"

Tytus looked the young man in the eyes. He was only a few years older than Sani, but had, Tytus guessed, less sense. That was a predicament likely not helped by the company he kept.

"No it isn't. A slave can one day be free. Or maybe their children can. Or their children's children," Tytus replied. "There's a future. Something to work for. People you can work to help. But now our people have no future. They won't be free; they will just be dead."

Halvor seemed tired of letting his friend direct the conversation and cut the young man off as he opened his mouth to respond. "Well said Tytus. You are right, we do need to think about the future of our people. And it is true what the old man says, our people have no future back home. Our future is among the stars. And to claim it we need to stick together. We need to do the things that bind us, one to the other."

"What are you talking about? We are trapped here, underground. And it's nice. It's a pleasant way to be trapped. Better than the caves. But we aren't going anywhere."

Halvor's knowing smile came back, and was obnoxiously matched by those of his young friends.

"You are new here Tytus, and there is much for you to learn. The old man has been bringing our people here for a long time. Maybe since the war. And for every batch he brings in others are sent away. There were some who had to leave to make room for your lot."

"Sent away where?" asked Tytus.

"To the stars, as I said. They have many worlds, the Rakatans. Worlds they have taken from others as they did ours. Worlds they found empty. They send us to all of them."

Tytus thought about this for a moment before asking, "How do you know? What makes you think he isn't just killing them?"

Halvor's smile grew even wider at this in a way that made Tytus feel as though he had fallen into a trap.

"Well it hardly seems worth the effort to bring us all the way here when he could have killed us on Tatooine. That is why we always thought he was sending them to other worlds. But it was always something of a guess, until recently."

Tytus warily asked, "What happened to make you so sure?"

Halvor voice was full of affected puzzlement when he replied, "Myra. The old man told her, and she told us. Well, she told me. I would have thought she would have told you. Once you got here that is."

Tytus could feel the heat in his cheeks, and hoped that the pale northerners couldn't tell that he was blushing. Myra hadn't said a thing about this to him, and now Halvor knew it. And there was nothing he could say to change that.

"Anyway, Tytus, we hope you will join us in the circle. All the men on this level take part, since they moved the old men down below. It would be a shame if you couldn't find your place with us as well. It will be a chance to show what you can do. For us all to see what you can do. Don't you want to know where you stand, now that you are here?"

Tytus couldn't tell whether Halvor was failing to be subtle or not even trying.

"You want me to show what I can do? How am I going to show that, in your little circle? A fight? That shows what I can do? That's all you think there is to a man? Is that all you can do? Grapple like animals?

"I don't fight Tytus. I know my place and so does everyone else. And we don't fight like animals. We don't grapple. Our fight is about will, about focus."

Tytus snorted derisively, "What are you talking about?"

"The Force."

Tytus stared uncomprehendingly at Halvor. In response Halvor held out his hand, opened in the air, and waited for a moment. Just before Tytus was going to ask what he was doing, a small stone from the ground suddenly flew up into Halvor's waiting grasp. Tytus took a step backward before getting control of himself. He stared at stone now located within Halvor's fist before looking up to see that Halvor had his own surprised look on his face.

"Surely you have seen Myra do such things. Here? Back in those caves you lived in?"

Tytus found he had no answer. He had just been showed magic and now he felt he was being mocked for treating it as the astounding thing it was. Of course Myra had not done such things. No one could do such things except the Rakatans. But here was Halvor, with the stone in his hand.

"It seems, Tytus, as though you have much to discuss. I will let you…get on with that."

At that Halvor turned and walked away, followed closely by his young friends, neither of whom had seemed shocked at what Halvor had just done. Tytus looked around, feeling scared for no reason he could express. In the distance he could see Myra and the children. Corus was running around in seemingly aimless circles. Sani was walking closer to her mother, trying to copy her gait and her manner as much as possible. Brun walked behind them, looking like he was trying to appear as nonchalant as he could. Tytus could do nothing but stand in place, waiting for them to arrive.

At some point Myra looked up and saw him, and the smile her children had put on her face faded away. She looked around and, seeing Halvor and his friends walking away, her face hardened into a grimace. Tytus could see her mouth something to Sani, who ran to grab her little sister's hand in response. Myra then turned to Brun and sent him on ahead as well. The children made for the newly built shack, and Myra made for Tytus. Tytus in turn started to walk to her.

When they reached other they could at first do nothing but look at each other in silence. It was Myra who spoke first, asking "What did he…what were you talking about?"

The first question she had meant to ask, and the guilt it suggested, hung in the air as Tytus considered his response. Unable to figure out another approach, he settled on simply answering the question she had actually finished.

"He wanted me to join the fights."

Myra looked worried as she said, "You can't."

"Yes I can," Tytus insisted coldly, "and I might have to."

"Why would you have to?"

"The northerners are in charge. This is their place…" Tytus began before being interrupted.

"It's the Rakatans' place," Myra insisted.

"The Rakatans are not interfering. They aren't getting involved. They aren't stopping the northerners from bringing everyone under their thumb."

"So what?" Myra asked apprehensively.

"So if this is their place we can't afford to be on the outside forever. Most of the other people who came here on our ship spend their time with the northerners now. It's no good being on the outside."

"If you join the circle you have to fight," Myra said flatly.

"You know about it?" Tytus asked softly.

"Yes," Myra said.

"You learned about it while you were here, alone." Myra could not tell whether Tytus' response was question or declaration. Whichever it was she knew what he was trying to get her talk about, and she knew he couldn't bring himself to ask her. If he isn't strong enough to ask the question, she thought to herself, then he isn't strong enough for the answer. Anyway, none of that mattered at this moment. So she tried to bring him back to what was important.

"If you fight in the circle they might kill you. They probably will."

Tytus studied Myra's face for a moment before responding, considering all the things she might have said and wondering whether he wanted to hear them or not. To put a stop to his own reflection he asked, "Because of the Force?"

"Yes," Myra replied. It took her only a moment to figure out where Tytus had heard of it.

"You know about that too," Tytus stated flatly.

"I do."

Tytus nodded without looking away before continuing, "You have it right? You can do those things."

"So can you," Myra said gently.

Tytus was taken aback by this revelation, and it briefly brought a halt to his line of questioning. Myra saw the softening of his expression, the look of doubt that replaced the suspicion, and allowed herself a moment of hope, a hope for repair and restoration, a hope soon dashed.

"No I can't," Tytus eventually said.

"You can, or at least you will be able to if you practice," Myra said.

"If that is true, if I can do those things, then why can't I fight them? Why do you think I would die?"

There was no way Myra could see that an honest answer to Tytus' question would go well, but seeing no alternative, the honest answer is what she gave him. "Because you aren't as strong as they are."

"Not as strong as Halvor and his friends. Right?"

"Yes, that's right."

"He would kill me, or his friends would, that is what you mean, isn't it?"

"I think so."

"You know a lot about Halvor. You know what he can do. You know what he wants."

"I do."

Tytus and Myra stood together quietly for a while. They could both hear Sani playing some game with Corus in the middle distance. After a few moments Tytus looked up, through the great glass dome into the daylight which still had the ability to amaze. Without looking down he began his questions again, "The Force…what is it?"

Myra felt relieved at the slight change of direction. "The magic of the Rakatans that all the old stories told about."

"If it is Rakatan magic, then how do we have it?" Tytus asked this as his eyes slowly moved down and around the walls of the enclosure.

"It's not really magic and it's not Rakatan. They weren't the first to have it, and they aren't the only ones. There are other species across the galaxy that can use it, but not many. Apparently ours is one." Myra wondered whether Tytus was interested in what he was looking at, or just interested in looking at anything other than her at the moment.

"Our people can do this? Since when?"

"I don't know. He hasn't told me that."

"He?"

"The Rakatan in charge of this place. The one who brought us here."

"Your old man?"

"Yes. I know his name now at least."

Tytus seemed entirely uninterested in this knowledge. "Do you know what he has planned for us? For our family?"

Myra sat down, resting her arms on her knees which she pulled towards her chest. She sat silent for few seconds, looking out onto the fake grassland in front of her before answering. "He has told me a bit. He won't tell me everything, but I think we are going to be here for a while."

While Myra looked away Tytus was able to bring his gaze back to her. "If we are going to be here a while then we need to make sure we are safe. And that means that we can't just ignore the northerners," he said.

"We don't need to worry about the northerners."

Tytus' frustration with Myra broke through his forced calm a bit as he responded, "How can you be certain about that? You were the one who told me we were in danger. They are dangerous men, as I am sure you have already figured out."

Myra was annoyed at having to explain herself. It angered her that he didn't trust her judgment, as he used to. It angered her more that it was her own fault. She tried to keep her anger and annoyance out of her voice as best she could, but knew that it would come through as she said, "I know I told you that. But the danger is not from the northerners, not really. It is from the Rakatans, from Zhed-Hai." At Tytus' look of incomprehension she added, "That is the old man's name. He controls everything here, and there is no way he would let the northerners hurt us. But even without him, I can say for sure that we do not need to worry about them."

"How can you know that?" Tytus shot back quickly.

"Because I already fought in their little circle. And I know we don't have anything to fear from them."

"You fought…"

"Yes Tytus. I fought. And I won. And they want me to fight again. And all this nonsense about getting you and Brun involved with them is just a way to get that!"

"They want you?" Tytus asked and the followed the question up, after a moment's pause, with another, "Halvor wants you? He wants you in his group?"

Myra edged around the issue answering, "I think he wants everyone in his group. Everyone on this level anyway."

"He doesn't want anyone on the lower levels?"

"Well we can't get to them. We can't leave our level. But even if we could he wouldn't want them. The Rakatans separated us by our strength, by our ability with the Force." Myra suddenly felt wearied and sat down. Tytus remained standing, now looking down on her as he rested, arms on her bent knees, looking at the ground. "I don't think he cares about anything except whether someone has a strong ability with the Force."

"And that is why he is after you?"

Myra looked up at Tytus, made eye contact and held it while responding, "Yes."

Tytus stared into Myra's eyes while weighing whether to ask if that was the only reason he wanted her, the only way he wanted her. He asked himself what he would do with whatever information she gave to him, and realized no good could from it. So he moved on. "Do the children have it, this ability?"

"I don't know. Apparently our people are odd. We don't all have it, only some of us do. All the Rakatans have it. They never had to figure out how it was passed on in people like us, because until now there hadn't been people like us. But apparently Brun and Sani are getting old enough that if he can use the Force it will begin show."

"How is that possible?" Tytus asked. "You say I have this ability, that you have it. You just found out. How could the children be almost old enough?"

Myra thought about it for a moment, then said, "Imagine you had a third arm, but it was invisible. No one else could see it or feel it. You could feel it, but it didn't feel weird or odd because you had always had it. No one ever talked about it, talked about using it. So you never used it, because you didn't know what it was. You didn't know it was the kind of thing you could use to pick things up, to defend yourself with. Even if you did use it, by instinct, would you know that you had? Could you tell the difference between using it and things simply working out your way, by luck?"

As Myra said these things she moved her fingers slightly, and several small stones lifted from the ground and began to rotate around each other.

"But then one day someone tells you it is there, and tells you what it can do. And you can't do much at the start, because it's like anything else, it needs to be used to become strong. You have to know about it to think about using it, but once you do, the whole world opens up."

Tytus looked at her deftly manipulating the stones, which were spinning faster around each other, tracing more elaborate patterns in the air. "If that is true, then how do you know I am not strong enough? Strong enough to fight I mean."

Myra looked at Tytus sadly. The stones dropped back down to the ground gently. "Once you can see your own power you know what to look for in others. I can feel your strength. It is real. It's there. But it's not like the strength of some of the strongest northerners."

Tytus looked off in the direction that Halvor had walked. "Not like yours."

"No."

"What about you and Halvor?" The question hung in the air for a second before Tytus turned to face Myra and made it more precise. "Which one of you is stronger?"

"I am," Myra said.