The Key, Part Two

Posted on Wed Jun 6th, 2018 @ 10:11pm by Bomoor Thort & Thane & Amare & 2-1BH "Useless"
Edited on on Tue May 11th, 2021 @ 12:43pm

3,371 words; about a 17 minute read

Chapter: Chapter V: Unbound
Location: Red Raptor, Sheva
Timeline: After "The Key"
Tags: Sith, key, Caanus, Vaa-Thaalda

OLD

As if hanging on an invisible string, the key hovered perfectly still in the air before them and began to spin faster and faster in place as it conducted the Force lightning into the red gem embedded in its bow. G2 began nervously bleep-blooping at the light show as it went on. There was a quick feedback bolt that arced out and mildly stung Thane in return for starting the process, then the spinning gradually slowed. When it settled, the group beheld a transformed artifact. It was still a key with a bright blood red gem, but it wasn't the strange forked object it was before. It was more golden-hued rather than its previous fading bronze colour, and had a particular craftsmanship to it; an almost classical Caanan flair in its design. It hung in place in the air surging with small arcs of electric power along its short length awaiting the one brave enough to take hold of it first...

NEW

The nautolan was completely astonished by the display of Sith sorcery. Her mouth hung open in awe, and, if it were possible, her jaw would have popped off her temporomandibular joints and fallen to the floor.

"Masters," Coda began to ask both men in a low concerned voice, almost too afraid to speak up for fear it could make something bad happen as the spirit in her head had warned her, "is it safe? Maybe we should leave. Give it some 'alone' time to cook?"

"Kriff that," Thane abruptly dismissed, although the tingling in his hand where the object had arced some electricity back at him had yet to subside. "Patience is a virtue, Coda," he said, not quite able to peel his eyes away from the spectacle before them, "but only for those with nothing to do." Not wasting any more time with preamble, he extended his hand once again and clasped the key triumphantly.

Instantly, a darkness consumed him, shadows stretching out from the key - shaking uncontrollably now in Thane's weakening grip - consuming Bomoor, Coda, the Red Raptor, and indeed all else about him, leaving him abandoned within the endless darkness of whatever incantations had erupted from the artefact to claim him.

Dizzied from the perplexing sensation that had claimed him, the Sith aspirant looked down to where he could feel his hand was outstretched, and despite the unsettling cosmic maw he now found himself in, devoid of light as it was, he found his hand vacant of the key. Indeed, the rest of his person was now visible.

Glancing down, he was no longer garbed in his old crimson spacer's jacket. Instead, a peculiar regalia of gleaming polished metals, slated across an ostentatious ensemble of a doublet and cape in gold-and-mauve tones had replaced it, in a classical Human style he found incredibly reminiscent of the scattered nobility that populated several scarce worlds outside of the Core Worlds.

Gone also was his lightsaber.

As opposed to indulging his simmering instinct to strike out at the unwelcome shift, Thane kept his calm, reasoning that whatever power contained within the Givin's cursed key was working its magic upon him. Despite the miasma that had replaced what he perceived to be his genuine surroundings, he was certain he could sense the faint presence of both his friend and his apprentice within the Force.

Not a novitiate to the mystical fancies of the Force and the effects its masters could have upon otherwise-mundane objects and their ultimate plunderers and tinkerers, the Caanan turned on the spot, seeking to inflict any sort of prompt upon the vision's possible narrative, but he was met only with an infinite, extending darkness, when suddenly he was certain he could hear a rumbling, stereo-esque voice calling to him.

"Bomoor?" He queried, not really believing it was really his friend as he turned once again, still finding nothing but the maw greeting him. Eyes narrowed, despite the complete lack of effect the motion had, he concentrated on the muffled voice. As Thane focused, he noticed the voice's timbre and pitch shifting, morphing unnaturally from the baritone echo it was before into something more stilted and more sudden, with sharp pauses interrupting the noise periodically.

It took Thane only a moment to realise it was a cackle, assaulting his hearing from all about him, with no amount of twisting and turning helping him to locate its source, as the sound grew louder and more oppressive. Within just a few seconds, he had clenched his eyes shut, was gritting his teeth, clasping his ears and calling upon the Force in a vain effort to dispel the maniacal cackling, although he was rewarded with no comfort; the sound was crawling within his own skull, having mystically cracked into his mind.

As the laughter seemed to mercifully subside, Thane was once again able to risk unsealing his eyes, although the ringing in his head, a sound not unlike the bell used by the Jedi instructors at the Temple, calling the younglings to the much-maligned morning drill, did not offer him the same kindness.

As the fog lifted from his vision, grey clouds were now swirling about him, not that he could feel any such gust or moisture from the conjured image. Within the mystical vortex stood, finally, the source of the laughter; it was a hunched over, decrepit Human male, ancient in his bedraggled features with eyes glowing like golden whirling disks within the husk of his desiccated face.

Tattered and torn black robes concealed his emaciated template of a body, with an unseemly collection of teeth and bones stolen from a variety of species adorning the unsettling garments strewn over his frame. A hood barely covered the aged bald scalp of the figure as he continued to laugh, yellowed and jagged teeth greeting Thane's sight as he regarded the ghastly creature with disdain and trepidation.

Although the alien fog obscured nearly all but the old man's form, Thane could spy alchemical bottles, scripts and even woven tapestries about him, as well as an even more startling image of what could only possibly be a casket, apparently smashed open to reveal a pathetic collection of greying Human bones barely nestled inside. It was then he realised that the old man was in fact clasping a skull, itself appearing to be caught in an infinite undying smile of great humour, in his left hand, whilst a lightsaber hilt was nestled firmly in his right.

Scowling, Thane took a step forward, but felt his stomach churn as he then fell into an unseen chasm, slipping through nothingness once more with a shallow sensation of horror coursing through him for what felt like several minutes.

Eventually, he hit a stone floor, knocking the wind from his gut and forcing him to groan in pain. Stretching out, noticing now how his arm appeared garbed in simple beige robes, he pulled forwards and looked upwards. Whilst the fog continued to swirl about him, claiming all but the merest of images from his sight, he could make out several tall and thin objects stretching up into a star-riddled sky. Cracked and as white as the bones he had just seen, Thane noticed the objects were petrified trees, reaching as far as he could see within the mists of the apparition before him. As his blue eyes continued to struggle to gain focus, he noticed that wherever he was, it was nighttime; the stars sparkled with a brilliant vigour, but were easily outmatched by another, far more impressive object.

Nestled directly above him alongside its stellar companions was a great globe, glimmering a brilliant violet and appearing so large, it did not seem beyond reason that it might crash into the lifeless forest that engulfed him. Sighting it, Thane felt his stomach clench once more and his chest tighten, only this time it was not because of any great physical sensation, but because of the creeping familiarity of the image.

However, the former Jedi Guardian's reverie was interrupted by a bloodcurdling hiss and an entirely animalistic screech that resonated throughout the artificial forest. Instinctively, Thane rolled onto his back to face the source of this new threat, his eyes now wide and his fists clenched, despite his prone and vulnerable position. Within just a few moments, several more calls and cries joined the first in a horrific chorus, carried impenetrably by the petrified woods' oddly-warm winds.

Looking into the abysm, Thane spied nothing for the first few moments, and his breathing became shallow in the new silence that grew. This lasted only a few ominous seconds however, as he heard branches snap and long-dead trees shudder, the sound carried perfectly in the afore-unmoving forest. Claws scraped almost silently against white bark and surefooted limbs scampered over dusty trails, unnerving Thane further, when finally, and without warning, a gangly-limbed terror fell from high above, soaring directly towards the young Human, glinting yellowed teeth bared, slick with saliva and paired with hateful, hungry eyes.

With a gasp of fear, Thane rolled away quickly, but instead of feeling the weight of his attacker or the chalky ground of the petrified forest, he instead felt a chilled, hard surface beneath him. Looking down at this new terrain, he noticed great marble tiles beneath his weight, entirely without blemish and lit by the imperfect flickerings of candles held by ancient stone sconces nearby. Beyond that, he realised he was now clad in a suit of classical armour, ceremonial and entirely beyond his needs.

Dazed, Thane slowly brought himself up from the ground of this new environment. Midway through the motion, a cold, sharp piece of metal was thrust beneath his chin, delicately grazing over the apple of his throat. Looking along the golden object towards this new threat, his increasingly bleary eyes followed the weapon across its length, and he noticed it was an ornate sceptre, meticulously detailed and in fact incredibly reminiscent of the key, as if the item had been unnecessarily enlarged and sharpened. At its apex, just a short distance from his eye, glinted a bright red jewel, refracting the candlelight at wonderful angles in a way that was, finally, instantly recognisable to the ailing Caanan.

"The... Bloodfist..." Thane managed in a low and pained whisper.

However, before he had even the chance to glimpse the barest hint of his new foe's visage, the ashen mist that had whisked him across this esoteric journey began to gust up about him yet again in a great flurry, obscuring the wielder of the the sceptre and drowning Thane's senses.

Once more, he was dragged into an endless darkness.

---

"His vital signs are stabilizing," 2-1BH - "Useless" - noted. "I am detecting a pattern here."

"What is it?" Coda anxiously queried the medical hologram.

"First you," Useless replied, "then Master Thane... I wonder if Master Bomoor is the next one on my table. I should update my database on ithorian physiology."

A low moan rumbled in Thane's sweat-slicked throat as he shifted on the medbay's primary bed, followed soon by reddened eyes flickering open to regard his surroundings with momentary confusion. That expression quickly gave way to a more settled one, as their blue intensity settled first on the hologram and then his apprentice.

"How long was I like this for?" He managed to ask slowly, swinging his legs over the side of the bed, but quickly finding he had to use his hands to steady himself after the motion. Looking down, he saw his jacket had been removed and his undershirt parted to allow some of the medbay's equipment access to his torso. "And where is the key?"

“The key is safe in the vault but remains in a somewhat active state,” echoed the voice of Bomoor, just returning to the medbay after securing with the artefact that had led to Thane’s collapse in the strategy room and subsequent instalment in the medical bed, where he now sat, “You have not been out for long, but what concerned us more was the time you spent clutching that key. You just stood there, unresponsive for the better part of a minute.”

Now standing before his friend, the Ithorian observed the various monitoring cables that adorned Thane's body, which Coda must have placed under the instruction of the holodroid, "As to your condition now..." he added, turning expectantly towards where Useless was currently being projected.

"As I was just saying to Mistress Wolph, the patient's vital signs are stabilising and, as you can observe, he has regained consciousness. I would postulate that the syncope was a result of a sudden elevation in heart rate and a subsequent inability to supply enough oxygen to the brain."

There was a slight pause as everyone waited for the inevitable conclusion to the diagnosis, "But I would recommend confirming this diagnosis with an actual doctor at your earliest convenience."

"I have an additional diagnosis," Bomoor spoke, turning back towards Thane, "You allowed whatever possesses that key in."

"Risk has always been an essential part of our enterprise," the Human responded but not unkindly and partly for Coda's benefit, his voice having rediscovered most of its former strength. "And I can safely say I am certain a mere key, enchanted as it may be, has not claimed my soul this day."

Pulling the equipment away from his exposed pale flesh, Thane rose carefully from the bed and waved his offhand towards Useless in a gesture the holodroid took as a dismissal, deactivating himself dutifully.

"And it was not without reward," he went on, closing up his undershirt. "An array of visions assaulted me, but unlike so many you and I have previously been party to in varying degrees, this one genuinely made me feel as though I were present in each of the locations, feeling every surface and each sound as though the images were my own memories."

Thane ran a hand through his hair, clumped in places from the cold sweats he could feel had claimed him before, prompting the appealing notion of a shower to occur to him. "The key is Caanan."

"Truly?" Bomoor asked, not hiding his surprise at yet another coincidence the Force had led them to, "How can you be certain that the key was not manipulating you with images from within your own mind?"

There were things there I recognised, and things I did not," Thane replied, although he shared in his friend's healthy doubt. In truth, he was unsure of whether he considered the development to be particularly positive. A period of meditation would not be uncalled for. "And even if it is manipulating me... I cannot pretend I am not curious about the call of home."

Struck once again with second-hand fondness for the planet, acquired after many years of Thane's detailed accounts to his Ithorian friend, Bomoor turned to Coda, "There is great strength to be found in one's home. I presume you know something of Thane's world of Caanus. What do you think this could mean, now you have become awakened to the Force and its many ties?"

"I've heard very little about Caanus before," Coda admitted. Her education on the galaxy at large was limited at best. She might have heard in passing from smugglers and and other patrons mention it in the club where she used to work, but she was not sure. She turned to Thane and added, "But if you are sure of those things that you saw, then it must be proof that it belongs to you. My father used to tell me that sometimes in order to move forward, you have to go back to the beginning. Maybe the Force wants you to go back to your homeworld?"

It was the obvious conclusion, she realized. However, she still knew so little about Thane, let alone Bomoor, and this was an opportunity too good to pass up to learn more about at least one of them.

"Maybe the Force wants a great deal of things, as do we all," her master mused, although he was enthused by the young Nautolan's curiosity and eagerness.

To revisit Caanus was something that had long occupied his thoughts and feelings, having spent so many years as a Jedi apprentice, and later as Knight, discouraging such inner turmoil. There were a great deal of questions he wanted answered, and a great deal of demons he was sure he needed to face. Whether it was in fact suitable, however, Thane was not so sure, and his dark brow furrowed without his meaning it to.

"Whatever this key might be," he went on, "it is clearly an object of great power, or is tied to something with a power generally unseen outside of the Jedi or Sith of old. Its links to Caanus, ergo myself, cannot be ignored, even though Bomoor is right to be wary; this could easily be a trap laid specifically for us, albeit with greater alacrity than the bumbling fools we encountered on the streets."

Thane's blue eyes continued to move between his two companions as he spoke. "Even so, ofttimes, springing a trap is a good means by which to take control of a situation, and I'd much rather take charge of whatever this twist of fate might be than let it manipulate us. It could lead us to some wellspring or font of brilliant power, or even some kernel of knowledge we could use in our fight against the cult."

Or, he added silently, making a point of not eyeing Zaracoda, some secreted Sith lore.

"From what I could decipher in the images I saw, I'm not convinced Caanus is the ultimate destination, though." Thane's mind's eye flickered back to the slobbering beast that had assaulted him, the sickly-sweet stench of its flesh-ridden breath and decaying incisors still present, even though he had in fact not been subjected to it in reality. "Although I have never been there myself, I saw... beasts - the abominations that dwell on one of Caanus' moons: the Vaa-Thaalda."

As a child, like most children on Caanus, regardless of birth or nobility, Thane had been raised with foreboding tales of the creeping monstrosities that crept across the petrified forests and lifeless deserts of Vaa. Typically used as a means to ward off and control petulant young children, Thane had always known there was truth to the fairytales, and even as an infant, he recalled the grim sense of dread he had experienced every time he had regarded the dead orb in the night's sky. That grim sense he had felt when the key had shown him the vision.

“Caanus’ cursed moon…” pondered Bomoor, rubbing his elongated neck in thought, “That seems about the right mixture of eerie and deadly for our current course. Still, the twisted creatures should not dissuade us should this truly be the correct destination for us. We have no other leads at this time.”

Looking to Coda, unknowing of her recent back alley encounter the day before, the Ithorian added, “Perhaps a good chance to practice combat against a humanoid.”

Had it only been just twenty-four hours ago, the prospect of getting into another fight with anyone would have filled their nautolan stowaway-turned-companion with dread. Instead, that dark blood-soaked alleyway in the Shevan city changed Coda, and she knew it...embraced it, even. She came away from that filthy urban nook feeling refreshed, alive, and more like an adult. She learned a harsh lesson that rushing in trying to be a hero was for fools, and that there was no room for mercy when there was nothing to be gained from it. She had torn her way deep into that selfish woman's mind and saw nothing but a contemptuous history that deserved to be crushed out of existence; killing her softly was the real act of mercy.

Coda's trigger fingers in both hands started to itch, and she gave Bomoor a curt nod of acceptance. She still felt nervousness cloud her desire to feel confident, but she craved another adventure. She was eager to prove herself to her fallen Jedi masters.

END

 

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