I wanted to apologize for the long break between posts--I went on a family vacation, then came back to a crashed harddrive and a busy job. I did recover all my work, however, so there shouldn't be any further problems.
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Chapter Thirty-Nine: The Truth, Part Two
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And this is how, you remind me
Of what I really am
This is how, you remind me
Of what I really am
It's not like you to say sorry
I was waiting on a different story
This time I'm mistaken
For handing you a heart worth breaking
And I've been wrong, I've been down,
Been to the bottom of every bottle
These five words in my head
Scream "are we having fun yet?"
-Nickleback
---
He became used to it – what other choice did he have?
Devnos became accustomed to the glares Sanar sent his way, to sometimes forgetting how light Clayra's voice became when she was happy. He even grew desensitized to his mother's continued grief – and hatred, for Jarran had left her – for his father.
He learned how much pain IT demanded he inflict – how much hatred IT wanted him to portray.
//"If you can't do it…you know who can, Devnos. Trust your sister."//
His father's final words before he had left for Carida. Devnos couldn't think too long on such things – IT tried to corrupt them, or pick them apart – but sometimes, when he couldn't sleep, when Sanar slipped and sent him a terrified look…
He wondered –
If Jarran had known about the prophecy (how could he have?).
If there was some way Devnos could save Sanar, even with whatever Gaffil Jir had put in his head.
If…
If he was crazy.
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Sanar came.
For a moment, all Devnos could take in was that simple proof that she still cared, if just a little. That not all was lost.
That he might be able to warn her.
But then her expression sank in, and he realized with a pang that she knew, somehow, that this was it. The end – for him, anyway. IT wasn't there to silence his cracking heart, but now that he was free he had no time to try to make up for lost time.
Best to be blunt, to say it all quickly, and get it out of the way.
"I'm a statistic, aren't I?" he remarked, trying to be gentle.
She nodded.
He doubted she meant for him to see her tremble, and he reached out a hand, hoping she would take it, even though – had their places been reversed – he doubted he would have. When her hand slipped into his grasp, he closed his eyes, and his face tightened in resignation. "Well, then, I suppose there isn't much time, is there?"
Sanar sat down. He appreciated that she knew this would take a long time, but he wished the content of their final conversation could be very different.
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Jaina needed to work off the nervous energy that came from knowing that her sister was alone – unprotected – with Devnos. The news that Kip had collapsed, and had yet to wake up, was Force-sent, if not completely bemusing. Encouraging Zekk to talk to Krista, both in comfort and about his work, Jaina set off for the clone's section of the General Illnesses Ward.
Peering past the curtains, she noted that he slept still, with sweat beading his brow, and something distinctly wrong in his Force aura.
Slipping into his only partially private area, Jaina sat on the nearby stool and considered Kip, who, she saw now, was not asleep but staring straight ahead, unmoving. She thought about the only known warning sign of Kip's collapse: the curious lack of which Kip had spoken. Kip was a clone; true, he seemed to possess a soul, but there had always been something distinctly inhuman – almost robotic – about him.
A soul.
Could the Empire manufacture such an ambiguous, mortal thing? Was that possible? Jaina had thought so, but she had never devoted much time to the idea, or even to the morality of such a thing.
Kip had insisted that he was physically and mentally well.
Did he have a healthy spiritual side, though?
Jaina scrutinized the face she knew so well, that she had always connected to another being completely.
Kyp Durron. Kip.
Fire. Ice.
The clone was so very little like its original matter, but there had always been a likeness, even in the difference. So Kip must have a soul, because if he hadn't, he would have been little more than a droid.
Droids didn't rebel against their makers; Kip and his brother clones had.
Jaina studied Kip, and began to understand.
Losing one's soul must create a Sarlacc's pit of lack.
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Devnos didn't know where to begin. Perhaps some of this inability could be blamed on IT, which hadn't allowed him to even think such things with privacy, and without pain. But…
Sanar watched and waited, and tried to hide the desperate longing she felt. Devnos saw it, anyway, and impulsively embraced her. "I'm sorry, Brownie," he whispered into her shoulder.
She had instinctively tensed, but just as quickly threw her arms around him. "I knew something was wrong; I should have…I…"
He pulled back reluctantly. "There was nothing you could have done. Believe me: nothing. Gaffil – "
"Gaffil?" Sanar's expression was furious. "What does that warftha have to do with this?"
Devnos grimaced. "The snake – " Oh, he was going to enjoy being able to insult the Jir dynasty again " – and his brother were the ones who did this."
"I will kill them," Sanar hissed. "I'll rip them apart, tissue by tissue, until they can't even scream, and – "
He shook his head, sobering quickly at the reminder. "Rafintair and Gaffil will get exactly what's coming to them, Sanar, but it can't be at your hands."
She scowled, standing so abruptly that her chair fell to the ground. "I think the past years have given me more than the right to disobey you, Devnos."
"Sanar…" His tone had become warning, exasperated, instinctively hard, and he corrected it quickly. "You can't."
"Why not?" she demanded, jutting her chin out defiantly.
"Because – " He stopped and shook his head. "Later. I'll explain everything, but…let me set this up, or it'll all come out palooza."
Sanar grinned brilliantly, her smile almost blinding him. "'Palooza,'" she echoed, and her eyes shone. "A big mess."
"Yeah, yeah, ploza," he corrected painstakingly, "but you know I can't – "
"You've said it right for the past fifteen years, Devnos," she reminded him. "I haven't heard you say 'palooza' since the last time you tried to explain the state of your room to Mom, before Daddy – " she faltered " – before they took Daddy away."
Devnos stared at his hands, unable even to watch the grief that still laced her every breath. He wanted to grieve with her, to miss his father the way she did, but he had lost that right. He wasn't worthy of untainted emotion.
"Devnos," Sanar whispered, drawing his eyes back up to her. Her eyes were dark, wide and unusually vulnerable. "You are…normal again, right? I mean, if this is some nightmare technique to break me, my hopes aren't going to get any higher than they are, so you may as well crow 'joke's on you' right now."
Devnos' face turned pale, and his eyes clouded into a dark, dirty grey with pain. "I swear I'm not."
She fidgeted with the edge of his crisp white sheets, then seemed to come to a decision. "Then you have a lot of explaining to do."
He sighed. "I know."
"A lot," she insisted stubbornly.
"More than you know," he told her, sitting back in his bed. "But I'll start with the stuff you expect."
Sanar crossed her legs and folded her arms over her chest – protective.
Devnos wondered if she knew, somehow. Shaking the thought out of his head, he found a thread and began. "How much do you remember from when Father was…taken?"
Sanar's eyes darkened. "Our town had rejected Pucijir's Order, but then Rafintair and his goons found out about us, and moved in, waiting for us to slip up. Everything changed. There were so many raids…and people kept disappearing…and then, one day, they cut down our door." She rubbed her eyes viciously, as if trying to cut out the memories. "They said Daddy was a heretic, but for some reason they didn't kill him – just exiled him. At first we were allowed to stay in the town Correction Centre, but when Daddy was killed…" Her face became hard. "Mama, Clayra and I were moved to Quatroc, and placed under Horaire's care. You got sent to some 'proper' family, away from us."
Devnos chewed on the inside of his cheek, drawing in her spotty explanation. "Our town was the centre of Mujir's Resistance, Sanar."
"Mujir's Resistance?" Sanar repeated, surprised. "But…that's in Quatroc. I know." She paused. "I was part of it, when possible."
Of course she had been; Sanar needed to know those people. You just planned everything so perfectly, didn't you, Strings? "It was moved when discovered in Brin. But it was started right at home – by Father."
"Daddy?"
"Yes. Father created perhaps the first organized, long-enduring resistance in the history of Pucijir's Order." Devnos allowed himself a victorious smirk. "When Father was going to university, he befriended a Jedi, who had come to scout out NLY."
"Jaina hadn't even heard of Na'Lein'yhpaon before I saved her butt," Sanar interrupted. "It might not even be on a map."
"A Jedi from the Old Republic," Devnos clarified. "I think he was looking for a place to hide fellow Jedi after the Clone Wars. But that isn't important.
"Father learned about organized defence tactics and moral codes from that guy, I guess, because when he left the university, he had already persuaded several of his friends – students – of the immorality of Pucijir's Order. They set up at Brin, where they could plan treason and protect their families at the same time. Their numbers grew surprisingly quickly. The Force wanted Father to succeed."
Sanar didn't even blink at the last statement, and Devnos winced; that she didn't hear the foreshadowing in it showed how little idea she had of what was coming. "But the Force couldn't protect the Resistance from traitors. A woman from our village was captured when she travelled to the Quatroc; she had been too brash in the marketplace, acting 'above herself'."
"Harras," Sanar realized. "She was the mother of one of my friends. They disappeared first."
He sighed wearily. "Yes. Harras. She betrayed our secret and our location. The Holy Brothers must have tortured her, because she loved freedom too much to give up information easily. It wasn't long before Holy Brothers swarmed into Brin."
"Why did Daddy survive discovery? As the leader…"
"That's the thing. Father was discovered because he defended Mama from public humiliation when she didn't wear her hair veil. The Brothers told him that Pucijir demanded punishment. Father drew a sword on them. They never found out that he was the head of their snake until they had already shipped him to Carida."
"Oh, Larifx," Sanar muttered. "Now I know why we have no luck; Daddy spent the Klis quota for generations to come."
Devnos forced a smile. "Their discovery of Father's importance is why we were moved to Horaire's care. Even for a High Priest, Horaire was sadistic and fanatical. They were counting on him to break us all." Devnos looked down. "You especially, though."
"Obviously." Sanar's voice was hollow.
"I wasn't a problem, with the chip," Devnos explained. "And Clayra and Mama…" He laughed bitterly. "What trouble did they ever cause? Mama wilted the second Father disappeared, and Clayra became more introverted and terrified with each second. You were the only one who fought it."
"Why did they move you?"
"To that other family?" Devnos shrugged. "I kept quiet, mostly, but they knew I'd kill them if I had half a chance. They tried to be subtle with my brainwashing though; they didn't want to waste time on me, I guess." He paused. "Besides separating me from you, Mama and Clayra, and placing me with a 'proper' family, they made sure I had a healthy dose of altered water."
"Huh?"
"That river that ran through our village? It was special. Very much so. Because of some of the plants that combined in its waters, a…chemical of sorts was created, which encouraged midi-chlorian growth. It's why so many villagers were Force-sensitive, if only a little, even if they wouldn't normally even be able to feel a loved one die. When Rafintair and Gaffil got their hands on it, they added some more chemicals that make the drinker susceptible to persuasion, and which encourages loyalty, even while it gave their allies strength.
"When they thought I was tamed, they sent me back. It didn't last as long as they hoped," Devnos added. "And they got a little worried." His face closed, darkening. "So they created an extreme, something that I couldn't possibly fight." Quiet for several moments, he stared at his hands.
How much longer did he have?
"I knew something was wrong," Sanar murmured. "I can even pinpoint the exact day that they took you away – maybe even the day they put it in. But I was just so mad – " She growled. "My temper is always getting the better of me."
He looked up to see tears in her eyes, and another part of his heart broke. He had so little of it left, now. "I deserved your silence. Don't regret it."
"I can't help it," she replied miserably. Her weakness lasted only a second in the open. "I'm better than you; I've always been better than you. It's my job to protect this family, and I always screw it up."
"I'm the oldest," he countered. "Looking out for the pip squeaks is my responsibility."
"Oh, because you've done such a bang up job of protecting us," she sneered.
Devnos flinched. "Point for Miss Obvious." Sighing, he added, "I'm too tired to argue with you."
Sanar, who had been preening at victory, plummeted back to the Hapes Medical Centre. "Are you okay?"
"Ironic, isn't it, how just a few days ago I was asking you the same thing?"
She stared at him, and he wondered if she knew how much the expression on her face multiplied his guilt.
"I've felt worse, if it's any consolation," he said. "Really, I'm just run down."
Her face seemed to crumble. "It's all my fault. If I had just left the whole chip thing alone, you – "
" – would still be living in a nightmare," Devnos finished. "Brownie, if I had had even half a doubt about the surgery, the chip would have been quite vocal about its disapproval."
"It's not fair," he thought he heard Sanar whisper.
Nothing is, he added silently, but he rubbed her arm comfortingly.
"You didn't do so bad as a protector, I guess."
"Oh, no," Devnos snorted, "I only made your life Hell, and turned into something that terrified Clayra."
"Yeah, for the most part you blew it," Sanar agreed. "But considering the circumstances…we're all alive, still, aren't we? And you saved my life with that Holy Brother on Ennth."
Devnos grimaced. "It's probably my fault that Holy Brothers are after you in the first place."
"You can't take all the blame." Sanar appeared to be in a very forgiving mood; Devnos wondered if she had really grown so much, or if the Strings were orchestrating this, too. "I'm a Klis," she continued practically. "I mean, our father was the chief of the Resistance. It's a compliment that they're after me, I guess, in a very twisted way."
"I might have…said something to Gaffil that implied the Jir dynasty would fall," Devnos confessed.
Sanar gaped. "Although I'll never know what possessed you to say such a stupid thing to Gaffil, of all people, I still don't see how it's your fault."
He flushed. "It was before I knew they planned to use a chip; Gaffil had told me that Horaire ratted my softness out, and I thought they were going to execute me. So…I decided to express my opinion of them."
"What did you say?" she demanded. "What did you tell them that implicated me as a threat?"
"Maybe something like… 'We aren't done with you yet'?" he offered in a rush, wincing.
Sanar cursed. "You and Daddy were out of the way, so that left me to rip apart their dynasty. Larifx, Devnos! Do you really hate me that much, or are you just plain stupid?"
"Very stupid," he agreed pathetically. "I was scared, and since I couldn't see them torn down, I wanted to unnerve them, get my own blow in for everything they'd done."
"But why say something like that? If you're going to threaten them, at least use reality!"
Devnos' eyes connected with hers. "I told Gaffil that because it is true. You can't imagine the role you will play in the downfall of Pucijir's Order," he finally told her. "Without you, it will all fail."
She stood, beginning to edge away, wary now. "I do revenge, Devnos, not salvation, and I refuse to play hero."
He didn't speak.
"Besides," she continued quickly, desperately, "I don't believe you. You couldn't possibly know that sort of thing."
Devnos watched her denial in silence.
"I'm the seer, not you!"
Finally he spoke. "No one is allowed to know his or her full destiny, Sanar."
Then he doubled over.
---
It's not like you didn't know that
I said I love you and I swear I still do
And it must have been so bad
Cause living with me must have damn near killed you
It's not like you to say sorry
I was waiting on a different story
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Please R&R :)
.Tjz