Welcome Back Everyone!
Here is the new chapter! (Delivered in only two weeks! Please, don't stone me!)
No special mention, I've made you wait long enough :3 Please, enjoy discovering the Inquisitor's trump card :3
Have a nice reading time! :3
P.s. I own Nothing!
Chapter 8
-"Arrrgggg!" Ezra threw the Holopad across the room, making it land with a soundly clatter, and angrily brushed his hair with his hands.
It's been what, two days since the Inquisitor locked him in this room? The only distractions had been 3 strict meals per day brought by Stormtroopers. The first times the door opened, Ezra was tempted by his instinct to run again, but the snaring feeling around his heart seemed to increase every time he thought about it and he finally dropped the idea after a while...
It was like the Grand Inquisitor could sense his thoughts the second they were appearing in his mind... and it was most probably the case... He sighed. All this 'Force' thing seemed so overwhelming to the young boy. Everything done by it was incredible compared to his former normal life.
Posing his hands on the edge of the table to push himself back, the chair rattling on the ground, he rose to make the 4 steps that separated him from the bed and let himself fall on his back. He crossed his good arm behind his head, keeping the hurt one on his belly since it was still painful to move it too much, looking at the ceiling for the umpteenth time this day.
He pondered again what would do the Inquisitor if he was to enter now and see he has not advanced far with his reading of the Holopad... Screw that! It was only Imperial's gibberish, protocols and other useless information. Like he would ever learn all that garbage...
He grunted and turned on his side, trying to clear his mind and catch some sleep back.
...
In the corridor, the tall Pau'an was leaning on the wall beside Ezra's door, arms crossed. He grinned when he heard the raging voice and the falling pad, opening his malevolent eyes. Such a lively teen, but with so much anger within... Good! Very good, in fact!
He pushed himself back on his feet and walked away. He could let the boy linger a little more before showing him... well, that wasn't important for now.
He walked until reaching the Destroyer's cockpit and advanced on the center ramp toward the man standing beside a computer.
-"Agent Kallus. Any new intels on the Rebels' movement?"
-"Still nothing, Inquisitor." Answered promptly Kallus, raising up. "But they never stay put for too long. Soon, they'll make another attempt, and we'll be ready for them."
-"Your enthusiasm is remarkable, but ease yourself for now. They won't try anything for the time being. Only fools would do so and that's not the impression they gave me. No, they are thoughtful and wise, that's why you've had such difficulties to catch them."
Kallus took a pondering pose. -"I must admit, they are the most persistent bunch of rebels I had encountered so far. But, if they care for the boy, their haste will make them make mistakes."
-"Although it would be true under normal circumstances, it doesn't apply if your opponent is a Jedi. They don't act on emotions. They plan and then execute. We'll just have to anticipate their next logical move."
Kallus didn't wish to contradict the Grand Inquisitor, but no normal person could ever live without emotion. And, by the way, the old religion was dead. How much of a Jedi could be this Rebel's Leader?
-"Very well, Inquisitor. Please, just keep in mind that apprehending those Rebels is my top priority."
-"And mine too, I assure you." Replied the Inquisitor with a false concern tone before turning back, his hands joined behind him, and going away.
Kallus caught a glimpse of an object the tall grey hands were toying with. It was a tiny Holoprojector. Frowning, he had the feeling the Inquisitor was more focus on the new 'Cadet' than with anything else. He was most probably walking back to play a little more with the boy...
...
Ezra's door opened again. He didn't even look at it, having lost the will to cross it.
-"I thought I asked you to read, not sleep."
The authoritarian voice made him jolt, turning so fast on the small bed that he fell on the floor.
-"Ouch, I-I..."
-"Don't search excuses. I'll never accept them." The Grand Inquisitor closed the door and joined his hands again in his back. His voice became colder. "Page 17, Paragraph 2. Attack tactic. What's the maneuver?"
The boy's eye widened. -"I... I don't remember."
The Inquisitor frowned and Ezra felt his heart tightening. Still on the ground, he reached a hand to his chest, a new kind of fright filling his eyes.
-"Page 43, Paragraphe 7. What's the emergency steps, in order?"
The boy winced under the pressure and the fear, clenching his fingers on his cloth. -"I-I don't know." His breathing was sporadic, more and more hindered by the invisible force tightening his organs.
-"And yet, you're still disappointing me." Sighed the Inquisitor.
The Pau'an released his mental grasp, letting the kid breath, and turned his sight to the other corner of the room. Tending a hand, he made the Holopad float toward him to catch it, not without noticing the glance of curiosity thrown by the teen. No kid could not be amazed by such display.
-"This easy trick could be within your grasp, if you would accept to learn it. I could teach it to you, but only after you learn everything from this Holopad." He was displaying it with a smirk, moving his hand to show both sides in turn.
Ezra frowned again, hardening his tone. -"I won't learn anything from you."
The Inquisitor regained his stern composure. -"You were right. I can't shove information in your head." He walked toward the table, motioning that he wanted the boy on the chair. "But I can give you the motivation to learn." And deposed an Holoprojector on the metallic surface.
Stooding up, approaching half-curious and half-cautious, Ezra sat and reached a hand under the silent order from the Pau'an's hand toward the device. Pressing a button, his eyes widened before the projection.
-"I see you still remember them. How could you ever forget... Ephraim and Mira Bridger."
The device was projecting a video record of his parents! They were kept in a cell similar to the one he was while he stayed under Kallus's custody! His mouth opened, mute with stupor, as a fine line of tears was appearing on his eyelid.
The inquisitor continued, leaning a hand on the boy's shoulder. -"I couldn't resist while I was in your head. Searching in your memories to understand how you made us exchange our bodies, I remembered it was triggered by some kind of souvenir. How amused I was when I went by the old Lothal prisoners' files to discover what have been their fate."
Ezra couldn't believe it. -"They're still..."
-"Yes, my boy. They're still alive."
He just couldn't. -"It... it can't be. They... They're..."
The Inquisitor stooped to talk in the boy's ear. -"They were kept in an Imperial prison for 7 years."
The fact hurt Ezra harder than any wound he ever had in his entire life.
-"Ever since their capture, their lives have been held within the Empire's hand." The Inquisitor's voice changed subtly into something sweet, tempting. "But, now, it can be changed."
-"How?"
The Inquisitor stood up. -"The Empire took away their freedom, and it can give it back... under the right conditions."
Ezra turned to lock his look with the yellow eyes, his blue sapphires mixed with a strange blend of pleading and conviction. -"HOW?!"
The Grand Inquisitor deposed the Holopad on the table, right beside the Holoprojector. -"The answer is within those files. Find it."
And he moved toward the door, stopping when he heard the grunting voice of the kid. -"This is not the same Holopad!"
The man looked above his shoulder. -"I see you've at least given it a look, but you still disobeyed my order. Now, you must earn the right to look at it again. Read this Holopad thoroughly and, if your answers satisfy me, I'll give you back the one you need."
Ezra glared at him with a deep hateful look, before turning a sad sight to the projection. He closed his eyes tightly, clenching his fists, and grabbed the Holopad with anger, beginning his reading.
Smirking, the Grand Inquisitor exited the room, letting the door intentionally opened.
As he was walking away, he felt the turmoil inside the kid's emotion from the bond connecting them and sneered. -"Yes, my boy. Let your emotions flow freely. More fear, more anger, more hate. I'll fill you with these until you can no longer divert from the right Path."