Fated Origins: Chapter 3: Renegade Dimension Traveler

A/N: I would like to thank my first two reviewers for reading the story and commenting on it. This chapter is dedicated to them.

Enjoy!

38 BBY- Senator Palpatine's/Darth Sidious' Chambers

There.

He had felt it again.

An intense disturbance in the Force. More or less a spike, like if one had completed something magnificent with their powers, or perhaps, a heralded birth. This sensation usually followed either one of the two happenings.

Darth Sidious, deep in shadowed meditation, reached out with his mind to the blip in the Force. He caressed it with his psyche's arm, coaxing the information out of it. The specifics came to him in bits and pieces.

Korriban. A human male. Force-sensitive, obviously. A birth. No. Not a birth. An appearance. Unlike any before. But what exactly was it?

He streamlined his consciousness, harnessing his focus upon the disturbance, gazing hard through the Veil that covered it with his mind's eye…

He pushed his will lightly and broke through it. And behold, in his vision, was a cart of some sort, with a wailing baby boy lying in the center amidst blankets, both smack dab in the middle of the desert.

Suddenly, and much to his vexation, Sidious was expelled from the Force Blip-Vision of the boy, and found himself knocked backwards. He lay on his back, stunned, but not wounded, wondering with incensed curiosity of what had just occurred.

The boy, he deduced. He must be powerful. To generate such a disturbance in the Force, his innate abilities must be great. He hadn't seen such inherent power like this since his master, Plagueis, who had utilized Sith Alchemy to create life. How foolish is seemed, comparing an infant to his former master...

But it was like the child radiated an aura, and the Force had instinctively responded to it. And to mentally reject a Sith Master, trained and conditioned for years upon years, from his, a child's, own Force Signature? A massively impressive deed; it both terrified and astounded the aged Sith. But where had the boy come from? No mother was present, and that was a strange sign indeed. Even odder was his location. Perhaps he was abandoned?

Sidious re-entered his meditative state in the Shadow. With a tiny bit of force, he broke the Veil of the Blip once more. When he infiltrated presently, however, the child was somehow floating, suspended at least a foot above the cart. Now the Darth was sure of the child's power.

Sidious had been waiting for the opportunity to find a fresh apprentice, for he despised Maul, his current tyro. Maul was strong, that could not be disputed, but he was obstinate, a flaw that would surely be his downfall. Sidious could not shunt aside this prospect of a prime, malleable boy with great, latent powers. A chance to begin anew.

A plot forming within his mind, he released himself from his reflection and rose to his feet. Donning his ceremonial garb, he walked to a comm-system to this left. He pressed a small, red button and spoke into a speaker:

"Send Maul to my chambers at once."

oOoOoOo

Unknown Date-St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, London

Darkness.

Total, enveloping obscurity.

A flash of white emerged. Growing brighter, and brighter, and brighter, until it burst. A plethora of crimson followed, shooting out in all directions, subduing the darkness, loosing the bonds of unconsciousness. A subtle hum echoed as the Force brought its user back to cognizance.

His mind slowly reacted to the stimulation. Darth Cadmus, Dark Lord of the Sith, felt the brilliant aura of the Force surround him, stirring his mind, awakening him from his involuntary-slumber. Aware of himself, and yet not his surroundings, Cadmus used his mind, coupled with the Force, to evaluate his internal conditions. His injuries were somewhat grievous, to his chagrin, and the Sith utilized the Ethereal Energy as a stabilizer, halting detrimental processes his body was undertaking and placing bonds upon his broken bones. They would not last, but he was going to need them for the transition.

The Force gave him temporary vision, and he saw as if he were a camera above himself. Force spirit-sight. He felt a pinprick of anger at his body's state, battered and sullied. But, he knew it was nothing but a minor barrier; he would recover quickly. An estimated three to four days, with the assistance of life energy.

He also felt confusion at the fact that he was in a small, white room with various machines connected to his body and wearing some sort of shabby, white robe. Was this what Vader had done to him? Sent him to an infirmary?

He dismissed the thought immediately. Preposterous. His Master, Sidious, must have discovered him, and was keeping him alive. Yet, he still could not explain the anomaly Vader had created and cast him into. Where had it sent him? Where had be gone from there? His mind was disconcertingly blank from that time to the present.

Suddenly, a group of individuals, unknown by their Force Signatures, though they definitely did possess Signatures, appeared in the room. Humans. A young girl dressed in colorless robes, at the request of her superior, began to speak. She listed injuries and began to describe-

The knowledge suddenly struck him. They were discussing him. Of course, this must mean they were healers of some sort, as he was obviously in a sickbay. Perhaps he was on Byss? He listened with attentiveness as the woman expressed that a DNA test had proven his relations to some unknown individuals (Black? Riddle? You-Know-Who?), how he had been located (a squib? an up-stairs tea room?), and began to depict his treatment process. But the physician-girl was abruptly interrupted by her superior, concluding her account, and the room began to clear, leaving only the girl and her elder.

She turned to leave, but the superior, apparently named Aeschylus, stopped her and said something. "Keep this bloke unidentified. Don't release to anyone his relation to You-Know-Who. We need to keep his down low in order to stop any panic from breaking out because some idiots got wind that You-Know-Who's relative appeared out of nowhere."

Bloke? The term, perceived as a native, common one, was used to refer to himself, undoubtedly. But who exactly was this 'You-Know-Who'? Must be a joke of some sort, or perhaps an overtly notorious individual, who had his name banned from usage. This man, Aeschylus, must know something. Whatever they were discussing or planning sounded suspiciously like sedition.

Cadmus took the initiative. Using his spirit-Force, and lightly at first, he began to apply a burning to the man's brain and the nerve endings of his skull, inflaming them, simulating a minor headache. He increased the pain in steps, making sure not to damage the man's mind by overloading it with agony, until he had reduced the doctor-superior to a quivering pile on the floor. Pain was extremely useful, and his Master had taught him a surfeit of techniques by which it could be utilized. This was a very effective method, used to retrieve information from a person, usually unwilling. Aeschylus, in this case, would be much, much easier to conquer.

Aeschylus' Force Signature exploded into panic when Cadmus had increased the burning twofold, and he could feel the man's endocrine system begin to fight back. Quickly, the scorching had been upped to threefold, and the man dropped to a knee. Aeschylus was surprisingly durable to the suffering he was experiencing; no doubt the man possessed a high pain tolerance. Effortlessly, Cadmus had pushed it to fourfold, and the man went limp, his systems shutting down, putting him into an unconscious state.

Good. While Cadmus did not take explicit pleasure from inducing pain, he would need this man to hold nothing back from him, and the anguish was necessary to secure this.

Cadmus channeled the Force back into his body, which was now somewhat stable, and he began to slowly pull himself from the coma. He had done this in his training countless times, as it was invaluable if was to ever be taken prisoner. Fastidiously, he cracked loose the chains of his coma, and felt his eyelids pull open of his own accord.

Indolently, making sure not to progress too quickly, he moved both of his legs from their prostrate position and over the edge of the bed. Grasping the bar on the cot's side, he righted himself. Immediately, he felt his leg's weakness, but remained unfaltering. With the Force, he channeled energy to his leg muscles, warming them, stretching them out for his impending use. He took a step, forward, and then another, until he reached a few paces before the door. Before he reached that destination, however, he passed a mirror, and again felt anger at his weakened form. He gazed over his body, noting the remnants of his encounter with Vader, and then looked to his face. His orange eyes stared firmly back, his high, regal cheekbones standing proudly, his sculpted jaw set in determination. He would dominate his enemy after his full revival.

Upon reaching the door, he turned and looked out a window to get some form of bearings of his locale. What met his eyes what not Byss or Kamino or any familiar planet. It was an archaic-looking city, with dirty, old buildings beneath a pale blue sky. Streets ran through the city, and he saw primitive vehicles upon them, decisively on the ground and moving rather slowly. Somewhere, he had read of primordial inventions such as these. Normally, they characterized a planet with a small degree of technological advancement. But Cadmus was clueless as to any planet such as this near his Galaxy. Perhaps it was the Unknown Regions?

He turned from the window and to the door, pulling it open. The light from beyond stunned him momentarily as he stepped out.

His entrance to the outside was met with an alarmed shout.

"Freeze! Hands over your head! Drop your wand!"