The Abiding Force: A Knight of the Empire (Star Wars)

15

Aella was nearby, he sensed. Jae was as well, though at a greater distance. It was cold and wet, his eyes slow to open. Green-blue liquid surrounded him as a single tube connected to his respirator. There was a light numbness to the afflicted region, the bacta already healing the blackened skin. It should have been worse save for his armor. A flash of Chiko's face entered his mind, he hadn't said goodbye.

Aella was asleep in the corner, covered by a thin blanket. The healing cuff lay discarded nearby. Two days at least. He reasoned, his senses slowly returning. There was a dull ache from his chest, curiosity driving his attention in that direction. A star pattern of scarred skin of a hand's width was imprinted across his left pectoral. The external damage was nearly healed, but the internal would linger as the bacta coursed through his body.

He closed his eyes again, allowing his mind to wander. His uncle's mind was closed to him. A screen of seemingly random thoughts acting as chaff. Val had known this of Jae, but the presence of Aella had intensified his uncle's efforts. Shoj was sleeping as well, but lightly and without dreams. Val supposed it was closer to meditation than true sleep. He'd attempted such a state under Korta's instruction but had yet to have great success in attaining the peace of mind and singular focus required to enter the trance.

His mind returned to Aella, her thoughts unguarded, flowing freely like a fine mist. Curious, Val approached, not intending to go beyond a brief glimpse into her emotional state. Flashes of faces, places and events from a life not his own, a warm glow of fondness for these things and the cold of their absence, lost forever. She was dreaming deeply of the past, which he was content to leave her to, were it not for the briefest flash of something else. A world on fire, the screams of billions and a figure that watched solemnly over the destruction. The ship was of alien make, the figure clad in armor of red like blood. They seethed with dispassion and foulness that sparked vicious anger in Val even so divorced from this imagined event.

There was a familiarity to it. He knew this being, this aura. It was like Chiko, what Chiko may have become had she continued along that path. Aella stirred, the nightmare awakening some part of her, forcing Val to withdraw. She did not awaken fully, however, mumbling softly as the terror within her grew. Desperation mounted as she fought to escape the dream. "PRU'D GA'AN!" She screamed, beginning to convulse violently. Val opened his eyes, clawing toward the glass of the bacta tank. The lights in the----- medical bay flickered as power began to fail across the ship. Aella lifting herself slowly into the air, still convulsing as the dream manifested within her mind.

Her left hand shot out suddenly, a durasteel hull plate bending as she grasped for some invisible foe. "NO!" She howled, her voice thick with desperation, tears streaming from her eyes as she pleaded with the phantoms. Val hardly felt his wound at all, panic driving him to search for the emergency release. It was an old pod, the release was a manual lever resting near his feet. He pulled himself down, wrenching the control up and popping the seal with a hiss of inrushing air. Aella was spinning about the room, her convulsions and attacks crushing equipment and threatening to rip the ship itself apart.

Val leapt from the tank, feeling something freshly healed tear open as he did so. With scarcely a moment to react, he evaded a medical drone destroyed and tossed toward him by Aella's fit. He ran toward her, hoping to catch and wake her, but she resisted, sending him flying back into a bulkhead. "Aella!" He yelled, an invisible weight pinning him to the bulkhead. "Vax! It's not real!" He reasoned, hoping to break through but Aella paid no heed. Val breathed deeply, focusing himself before reaching out, his hands outstretched as if to push away the invisible barrier. With great effort, he managed to free himself, but the maintenance of that foothold drained him quickly. He had to reach her somehow.