The Fall of the Infinite Empire
Chapter 50
Since making contact with Zhed-Hai, Gran-Nock had seen no Sith. Adas' absence was unsurprising. All the Lord of the Sith wanted to do was kill Gran-Nock, and Zhed-Hai had seen to it that killing Gran-Nock was, for Adas, now unthinkable. Gran-Nock had worried that other Sith would be sent to hurt him, but it turned out that what Adas was afraid to do he would not allow any other to attempt.
So Gran-Nock had gone days without food, without seeing or hearing another living being. But he had found that if he stayed in his secret place, detached from the outside world, the hunger and its normal ill-effects were reduced. He could feel the power of the Gift flowing through him as he sat cross legged in his cell, but at the same time laid floating upon the calm open waters. He could tell that his body was ailing, that its systems were losing functionality over time. But he could also tell that this process was much slower than could have been expected. He had not been fed in so long it was something of a surprise that he was still alive.
He had spent some time thinking about why this was. Why had his injuries and denial of food or water not done him in? The healing trance he had been taught in the Academy could not be the explanation. He had long since gone past what that technique was able to accomplish, for someone of his strength. Gran-Nock had never been exceptionally Gifted. He was not weak by any means. The weak did not survive the Academies. But there had never been any suggestion that he was destined for greater things, for a post as a war-leader or even a battle-leader. He was a warrior and a guardsman. He had the strength necessary for that, and he had been good at those roles. The path laid out before him had been an honorable one. He would serve his decades, and if he survived, one day return home to Lehon. Along the way he would hopefully get a chance to do his other duty for the Empire and sire children who could take up his post when he was gone. The path was set. It was a straight path, and he was asked to do nothing more than walk it.
But in the last few months as a prisoner, it was as though a door had slowly opened revealing another path, and along that path he had found wonderous things, had done wonderous things. Had not the Elder Zhed-Hai said that the creation of his secret place was a thing of wonder? Had he not been surprised, even shocked at what Gran-Nock had done? It seemed to Gran-Nock that he could recreate that scene in his mind effortlessly, that he could almost feel the emotions, a strange mixture of fear and awe, Zhed-Hai had felt at that moment. In fact it felt as though the Elder was still in some way there with him, like Gran-Nock could hear his voice in the distance but not make out his words. He felt as though he was not alone, like he was being watched.
But as time went on it felt more and more like Zhed-Hai was not the only one there with him in his secret place. He remembered from his youth, and his time on Manaan, that sound traveled a long way over the water. Out there, beyond Zhed-Hai's voice, there were others, so many others. A world, a galaxy of voices speaking out there, somewhere beyond the horizon. In his secret place, the ocean within his mind, he could hear them, whereas out there, in the external world, his ears were full of noise. But in that place his mind had created the noise was gone, and all that was left was the power of his Gift. It seemed to him that power was like the ocean on which he floated. An eternal, infinite ocean deep as it was wide. And all other living things floated out there somewhere, all being carried along by the same currents.
And there were currents. There was a direction. At times if felt as if he could see it, where the water was taking him, was taking all of them. He would hear snatches of conversations, not far away, but seeming as though they were happening right next to him. He saw in his mind images. Two beings, one of them a human of Tatooine by the look of it, hairless and pale. The other being might have been a human as well though it was impossible to tell, covered as he was beneath dark robes and a strange helmet. They were talking to each other of dark things, of war and betrayal. Who were they? Where were they, and when? He could not tell. He feared the masked human, for reasons he could not understand. Were there even humans left? There had been few enough when last he had been assigned there, and that was many years prior. And how could a human threaten anyone? But nonetheless in that vision it had seemed the entire galaxy had rested on the shoulders of that dark figure. And that had not been his only vision. He had seen a great city, larger by far than the great capital city on Lehon, so that its edge was not visible, and its towers seemed to reach the sky. And he had seen it burning, consumed by bombardment from space. There was a planet concealed in dark clouds with green forks of lightning traversing it in great huge arcs. There were hundreds, or perhaps thousands of ships falling towards it, smashing into its surface. And there was a battle upon the surface of Korriban, a confused melee that pitted Sith against human and human against human. This last vision puzzled Gran-Nock the most, because while there might be a few humans left somewhere, they certainly did not have the Gift, and could not hope to do battle with the Sith.
Were these visions true? He had heard of some Elders claiming the ability to use the Gift to see through the veil of time, though their claims were usually rejected as the rantings of early senility. And after all how could these visions be of some future, when they made no sense? The future could not contain what could not be. But after thinking this Gran-Nock wondered why he was confident he knew what was possible. The galaxy was a strange and immense place, and it had already shown him more than he could have imagined as a young warrior setting out from Lehon for the first time. He had seen the great forest worlds with trees taller than the Great Temple. He had seen a world covered in one vast ocean, with whole civilizations hidden beneath the waves. Worlds of solid ice, worlds of rolling grasslands, and worlds shrouded in darkness. He had long ago beheld the terrible power of a cornered Celestial, and he had seen the great creature die, taking many of his brothers with it. The world contained more than his mind could, so why should the future be different?
But on that day his peaceful ruminations were finally interrupted by a familiar voice twisted by an unfamiliar fear.
"Can you hear me little Rakatan?" Adas cried out. Deep in meditation Gran-Nock barely heard him. He thought at first it was another of the voices coming to him from over the ocean's horizon. But what Zhed-Hai had done to Adas using the Gift, Adas had done to Gran-Nock in a more traditional way. The voice of the Sith inspired fear in Gran-Nock, which the voices within his secret place did not. It produced in him a moment of dread, of terror, and that was enough to pull him from his meditation, to pull him out of the peaceful world he had made.
"Answer me!" Adas yelled. His voice was muffled and quiet, despite his tone making it clear he was yelling, practically gasping out his words. Reaching out with his mind Gran-Nock found the Lord of the Sith, crouching in a hallway above him, yelling down the passageway to Gran-Nock's cell. In all the warren of tunnels Gran-Nock could sense no one else. The two of them were alone, trapped in fear of the other.
"I hear you," Gran-Nock answered.
"What's that? Speak up!" Adas replied.
"What do you wish of me?" Gran-Nock said again, but this time attempting to make his meaning known through the Gift.
"NO!" Adas bellowed. "Stay out of my mind! You think it is yours to toy with, as you master did?"
"You cannot hear me otherwise," Gran-Nock said, his voice calm and steady. Adas did not respond, not with words. Gran-Nock heard the sound of him walking somewhere above him, though it was not the strong assured footfalls of the past. He could hear Adas dragging his powerful body across the rock wall, taking his time, seeming to think about each step.
"Your voice is weak…like the rest of you. You are dying, little…Rakatan, broken warrior. So I will come…to you," came Adas' halting words. He walked a few more steps and then came the sound of him collapsing against the wall, breathing hard and fast.
"Look at what your master has made of me," Adas finally said after catching his breath. Of course Gran-Nock could not look at him, up the stairs and around the corner as Adas was. But the comment wasn't really meant for him. These conversations were never really meant to communicate with him. They had started as Adas reveling in his victory. Then they had become a way to show his dominance, by keeping a Rakatan as a chained pet. What they were now Gran-Nock could not tell.
"You think me beaten, don't you?" Adas called out from beyond the wall. "You think I can't overcome this? I have overcome everything. When I was born my tribe was broken. What little remained of it was on the run. My uncle ruled us, and he was a fool. I killed him. I ripped his heart out when I was barely more than a boy! I took my tribe back to our home and killed the usurpers who had evicted us. A thousand tribes fighting one another, and I set out to tame them all, to bind them together, to bind them to me! Then you came. You shattered all I had built. You decimated my people. And I endured. I unified them. I made the Sith a people. I made them my people! I gave them one will, and one purpose, something they had never had. I did it in the shadows, in the tunnels beneath your feet, and you never knew. And then I killed every last one of you on my world. I did this! I did all of it! And I will not be defeated by some trick! One day soon I will walk into that cell and crush the life out of you. What do you think of that?"
Gran-Nock thought about the question. He knew his own answer. He would welcome the release. The pain could be kept at bay only so long, and there was no hope he would ever see home again. He knew it was his duty, given to him by perhaps the greatest of the Elders of the Council, to stay alive. He would do it if he could, but he no longer felt shame at the idea of failure.
"Answer, don't answer, it doesn't matter. One day Rakatan, one day soon," Adas said as he stood up again to climb up the stairs, away from his fear.
"I await your return," Gran-Nock said, just loud enough to be heard. The sound of Adas' footfalls stopped for a moment, but the Sith said nothing. After a moment's pause he started climbing again. Gran-Nock listened to his steps grow quieter until they were gone at last. He closed his eyes, and his mind again left his broken body behind, left his cell in the caves beneath Korriban's surface, and found the world he had made. But this time he went not to the water itself, but to the shoreline where he had met Zhed-Hai. He had found that when standing there he could feel the Elder's presence more strongly, and now was no different. He could sense anticipation and anxiety in the Elder. Everywhere he looked, it seemed, there was fear of the future. But Gran-Nock did not fear the future. It would unfold as it would, the current would carry him along, and whether he fought it or not made no difference. Whatever role he had left to play would have to come soon, for his time drew short. But he would do his duty. He would survive if he could, for as long as he could. But the Elder should know what was happening.
This place was not real. It did not exist except for in Gran-Nock's mind, or so it seemed to him. But Zhed-Hai had entered it, and was still there in some way. And so, it seemed to Gran-Nock, a message could be left for him. He reached down, with the hands that he had lost in the real world, and traced out a message in the sand. Then he walked out into the water, leaving his words in the sand.
"He is coming."
