The Old Republic Series

by Sean Williams

  It had crashed down in one of the handful of cities that dotted the world, leaving a path of damaged buildings and mangled speeders in its wake. The ship itself still seemed to be relatively intact; it lay wedged against the base of a skyscraper at the end of a main thoroughfare.

  Nyriss brought the shuttle in cautiously, wary of return fire as she scanned the enemy vessel.

  “Anybody alive in there?” Scourge asked.

  Anywhere else in the galaxy he would have been able to sense the survivors through the Force. Here on Nathema, however, the aftermath of the Emperor’s grim ritual blinded his abilities.

  “I’m picking up readings of an organic life-form on board,” Nyriss confirmed.

  They brought the shuttle in for a landing roughly fifty meters from the other vessel. There had been no reaction of any kind from the enemy craft as they approached.

  “Search the interior,” Nyriss ordered. “I’ll wait here.”

  Disembarking, Scourge got his first good look at the ship. It was an unusual shape—flat and circular, like a disk. He approached it cautiously, his heart pounding. Normally he relied on the Force to warn him of potential danger; without it he felt vulnerable and almost helpless. It was a feeling he most definitely did not like.

  He was halfway to the vessel when another thought struck him. What if Nyriss simply decided to take off in her shuttle and leave him here? The thought froze him for a moment, until he realized how ridiculous the idea was. If Nyriss had wanted to get rid of him, she could have done so a dozen different ways already. There was no reason to abandon him on Nathema—not after risking her own life to bring him here in the first place.

  Scourge steeled himself and continued his advance until he reached the strange ship’s underbelly. He pushed the access panel on the hull, and the boarding ramp slowly descended. He wasn’t surprised to find it unlocked; most ships had emergency overrides on their security systems in case of a crash, in order to allow rescue workers to get inside and help the injured.

  Scourge activated his lightsaber. The familiar hum and hiss of the blade springing to life sounded weak and distant, and the crimson blade appeared faded—even his weapon was not immune to the effects of the dead planet. But he suspected it would still get the job done if he encountered any resistance.

  He climbed up the boarding ramp and into the hull of the ship. He followed the circular layout, briefly glancing into storage rooms and passenger bunks in his search for whoever might be on board. He found nothing until he reached the cockpit.

  Strapped into the chair was an unconscious—or dead—human male clad in simple brown robes. He appeared to be about forty standard years old. He was thin and wiry, with dark, shoulder-length hair and rough black stubble on his cheeks and chin. Blood poured from a deep gash on his forehead and covered his face; during the crash something that wasn’t strapped down must have struck him.

  Coming closer, Scourge put two fingers on the side of the man’s neck, checking for a pulse. He had barely registered the faint flutter of life when his gaze fell on the hilt hooked to the man’s belt: a lightsaber. Instinctively he tried to reach out with the Force to get some sense of the man’s power, but he felt only the emptiness of Nathema.

  Grabbing the lightsaber and clipping it onto his own belt, he unbuckled the man, slung him over his shoulder, and carried him off the vessel.

  The weight of the unconscious man made it difficult to move any faster than a brisk walk, but Scourge pressed the pace. He was eager to leave Nathema behind him for good this time. Nyriss was waiting for him back at the shuttle, standing just inside the boarding ramp. Scourge strode past her and onto the ship, where he tossed the unconscious man roughly onto the floor. He was about to mention the lightsaber, but Nyriss spoke before he had a chance.

  “I know this man,” she said, her voice grim. “His name is Revan. He’s a Jedi and a Republic spy.”

  “A Republic spy?” Scourge’s brain took the news and jumped to the next logical conclusion. “If the Jedi know we exist, they will come for us. They will try to finish the extermination of our species that they began in the Great Hyperspace War!”

  “Our existence is still hidden,” she assured him. “Revan and another Jedi—a man named Malak—discovered Dromund Kaas by accident. They were captured before they could return and report their findings to the Republic.”

  “When did all this happen?”

  “Five years ago. The Emperor sentenced Revan to death.”

  “Then what’s he doing here?”

  “I don’t know,” Nyriss admitted. “But he couldn’t have escaped the citadel’s dungeons unless the Emperor allowed it. It stands to reason that he wouldn’t still be alive unless he was working for the Emperor.”

  “How is that possible?” Scourge countered. “The Jedi are our sworn enemies.”

  Nyriss didn’t answer. “Watch him closely,” she said, returning to the pilot’s seat. “He is powerful and extremely dangerous.”

  “Why don’t we just kill him?”

  “Not yet. Not until we know why he is here. We’ll take him back to my stronghold for questioning.”

  “I’ve never interrogated a Jedi,” Scourge said after a moment. He smiled. “I’m looking forward to it.”

  REVAN HAD NO IDEA where he was when he awoke, though it was obviously some kind of prison cell. He was propped up in a cold metal chair. His hands were bound to the arms, his ankles tied to the legs. For the moment, he was alone.

  His mind felt slow and dull, and he knew he’d been drugged. It was difficult to concentrate; impossible to focus his thoughts enough to use the Force. It took all his willpower just to recall the last moments of the Ebon Hawk crashing on Nathema.

  He struggled to take stock of his situation, but he couldn’t pierce the haze of the drugs.

  The door to his cell slid open and two figures entered, one male and one female. The sight of their red skin tweaked something in his addled brain, but it took several seconds before he could make the connection.

  “Sith,” he whispered, his throat dry and his voice hoarse.

  “Welcome back, Revan,” the female said in Basic.

  He stared at her withered, wrinkled face, trying and failing to dredge up her name. “Do I know you?”

  The tall male Sith beside her reached out with a hand and casually delivered a backhanded slap across Revan’s cheek. “We don’t have time to play games,” he said. His voice wasn’t angry or threatening; it was calm and completely matter-of-fact.

  Revan tasted blood; the smack had cut the inside of his mouth. He could feel the sting of the wound and the swelling of his lip. Apparently the drugs used to dull his mind had been carefully selected so they would not interfere with the sensation of physical pain.

  “I don’t think this is a game,” the female said, raising an eyebrow. “I think he’s actually forgotten me.”

  She leaned in close beside him and whispered in his ear: “What happened to you, Revan? Where did you go? Why did you return?”

  When he didn’t answer, she stepped back and nodded. Then she waved a hand and an interrogator droid—Revan hadn’t even noticed it hovering behind the two Sith—floated over and extended a long, thin needle into his neck.

  He grimaced in pain as the needle punctured his skin, then screamed as it discharged a powerful electrical burst, setting his nerves on fire.

  The Sith male waved a hand and the interrogator droid retreated.

  “What happened to your partner?” he asked. “Malak?”

  “I killed him,” Revan said.

  “Why?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  The male’s expression didn’t change, but the female smiled in amusement, the expression transforming her wrinkled features into those of a grinning skull.

  “Eventually you’ll tell us everything we want to know,” the male assured him.

  “Maybe so,” Revan conceded. “But I’m going to make you work for it.”

  AFTER FOUR HOUR
S of questioning the prisoner, Nyriss ordered Scourge to take a break. They left him in his cell, tied to his chair, neither of them speaking until they were outside in the hall and the door to his cell had closed behind them.

  “How much longer will it take to break him?” Nyriss asked.

  Scourge considered the question carefully before answering. Early in his training, he had shown a knack for torture and interrogation, skills the instructors had encouraged during his years at the Academy. He was an expert in the field; he knew that wringing information out of an unwilling source was about far more than just inflicting pain.

  Apply enough punishment and everyone would talk, but most of what they said would be desperately babbled lies, evasions, and half truths. Without any way to verify accuracy, information gathered through torture was often unreliable and even worthless.

  Effective interrogation was an art, and Scourge had an innate ability to parse fact from fiction. He knew what questions to ask and in what order; he understood when to ratchet up the intensity and when to pull back. He knew how to use the threat of pain and the reward of mercy to control his subjects.

  His advanced techniques, combined with his ability to draw upon the dark side, allowed him to quickly dominate weak minds. Strong-willed subjects were more of a challenge, yet in the end he always got results. Until now.

  Interrogating the Jedi had resulted in nothing but frustration and dead ends. His will was strong, as was his command of the Force. Even drugged to the edge of unconsciousness he was able to draw on it to help him endure the pain and the relentless barrage of questions. But there was something else, as well.

  Nyriss wanted to know how he had escaped the dungeons of the citadel. She wanted to know about his relationship with the Emperor. She wanted to know why he had come to Nathema. On all those counts, Scourge had come up empty. Revan was resisting him, true, but at some times it almost seemed as if Revan himself didn’t know—as if the information had been wiped from his mind.

  “We might be wasting our time,” he finally admitted. “His pain threshold is high, but we’re already at the limits of what a human can endure. If I press any harder, we risk killing him.” Scourge had seen it happen many times. Unskilled or overeager interrogators could easily push their subjects too far. In his mind this was the ultimate failure: you couldn’t get answers from a corpse.

  With difficult subjects you had to be patient. It might take multiple sessions over several days to get anything useful. But even knowing this, Scourge didn’t hold out much hope for his chances with Revan.

  “I could question him for months, but the information you want just isn’t there.”

  “That is unfortunate.” Nyriss sighed. “I was hoping to verify my theory.”

  “What theory?”

  “The Emperor has the ability to dominate and enslave the minds of those who serve him,” she explained. “It’s one of the reasons he has ruled for so long. Those that are transformed become fanatical zealots who live to serve; they are not capable of betraying him.” She glanced back at the door behind which they had left the Jedi. “I suspect that instead of executing Revan as he publicly proclaimed, the Emperor turned him into a puppet of his will and sent him back to the Republic to gather information.”

  “If he’s been gathering intel on the Republic for five years, the Emperor must be closer to launching his invasion than we thought,” Scourge noted, alarmed at how close their mad ruler had already come to exposing them to the Jedi.

  Nyriss shook her head. “The Emperor is more patient and careful than any being in the galaxy. He has lived for nearly a thousand years; he might live for ten thousand more. He leaves nothing to chance. If necessary, he will spend decades, maybe even centuries, preparing. No, we still have time. And Revan may still be of use to us.”

  “How so?”

  “You said it yourself: something happened to his mind. His memories are lost, but so is his knowledge of and loyalty to the Emperor. Whatever was done to him, it freed him from the Emperor’s domination. If we can learn how this happened, we might be able to use it to bring the Emperor down. Remember that all those who have direct access to the Emperor—the Emperor’s Voice, the Emperor’s Hand, the soldiers in the Imperial Guard—are under his spell. Breaking that spell, turning his most loyal followers against him, is our best chance of defeating him and saving the Empire from his mad plan to attack the Republic.

  “We need Revan alive so we can study him,” she concluded. “He is too valuable a resource to throw away.”

  What she said made sense, but Scourge knew it would be far more difficult and complicated than she made it sound. “It might take years before you understand what happened to him,” he warned her.

  “The Emperor is not the only one who can be patient,” she replied.

  PART TWO

  CHAPTER 17

  BASTILA TUCKED HER SON into bed and leaned down to kiss him on the cheek. At the door of his room she turned and looked back at him, marveling at how much the three-year-old boy already looked like his father. He had the same dark, shoulder-length hair and the thin, angular face. His eyes were closed now, but she knew they were dark and brooding … just like Revan’s. And though he was already drifting off to sleep, his expression was still unusually serious and intense for a child his age.

  She sighed and turned away. Bastila often worried about the effect her son’s turbulent childhood would have on him. Growing up without a father was difficult enough, but the first few years of his life had been scarred by war and terror.

  After Malak had been defeated, Bastila, like most other citizens of the Republic, had hoped to enjoy many decades of peace. Instead, a group of rogue Jedi had broken away from the Order, plunging the galaxy once more into civil war.

  Led by a woman named Kreia, the rogue Jedi turned to the dark side teachings uncovered by Malak and Revan. Kreia took the name Darth Traya, and her followers called themselves the Sith after the long-lost species that had invaded the Republic a millennium before. They began a systemic purge of the galaxy, hunting down those who still held fast to the Jedi Code, killing them by the tens of thousands. Their relentless pursuit virtually wiped out the Order, and only those few who managed to flee or hide survived.

  Had Revan returned to face this new threat, Bastila would have eagerly fought by his side. Together they might have been able to quell the uprising, ending it before the horrors of war enveloped the Republic and millions lost their lives. But she had heard nothing of her husband since he had set off with Canderous four years earlier.

  Alone, she dared not challenge Darth Traya and her followers. Instead, she had focused on keeping her son alive. It had been the Exile—Meetra Surik—who had taken up the fight against the rogue Jedi. Three years after Revan’s unsuccessful attempt to locate her, she had emerged on her own to oppose and eventually defeat Darth Traya. Like Revan before her, she became the savior of the galaxy. And also as with Revan, there were many who felt her recent actions could not atone for the sins of her past.

  And now this woman—hero to some, villain to so many others—was sitting in the living room of Bastila’s apartment, patiently waiting for her to finish putting her son to bed.

  “He’s asleep,” Bastila said as she returned, speaking softly.

  “He’s beautiful,” Meetra answered, adding, “He looks like his father.”

  Bastila nodded at the compliment. She wasn’t sure what to make of the woman before her. Meetra had short brown hair, pale white skin, and piercing blue eyes. She was taller than Bastila, and almost a decade older, though she would still be considered beautiful by any empirical measure. She possessed a presence and confidence, along with an enviable natural grace. She was clad in the simple robes of a Jedi Master, but somehow she managed to make even the drab brown cloth seem stylish.

  Foolish as it was, Bastila couldn’t help but feel some hint of jealousy. Meetra had known Revan long before Bastila; she had answered his call to go to war against the Mandalori
ans, and in doing so she became one of his most trusted advisers and closest friends. Bastila knew they had shared a special bond not unlike that of Padawan and Master. Worst of all, Meetra was an integral part of Revan’s lost past—a past he had felt compelled to go in search of, even though it meant leaving his pregnant wife behind.

  There is no emotion, there is peace, she thought. The familiar words of the Jedi mantra were easy to recite, but much more difficult to follow.

  “You said we needed to speak,” Bastila said.

  “I wasn’t sure if we should come,” Meetra admitted. “I understand this might be difficult for you. But Tee-Three insisted.” She reached out and patted the little astromech accompanying her on the head.

  The last time Bastila had seen T3-M4 he had been boarding the Ebon Hawk with Revan and Canderous. Her husband was still missing, but the droid had returned. Clearly he had latched on to Meetra, following at her heel as he had once followed Revan … one more small detail to feed Bastila’s irrational jealousy.

  “As much as I tried, I couldn’t get him to tell me anything,” Meetra added.

  Bastila smiled faintly. “I gave him special instructions the night before he left with Revan. I told Tee-Three if they ever became separated, he had to come find me. I programmed him so he wouldn’t tell anyone else what had happened until I heard it first.”

  Meetra nodded. “A wise move. We’ve both experienced enough betrayal to understand you never know whom to trust.”

  “I never imagined I’d be in hiding when he returned,” Bastila continued. “I’m sorry about that, Tee-Three. If I’d known you were back, I would have tried to contact you.”

  The droid beeped in acceptance of her apology.

  “Fortunately he found me,” Meetra said. “I guess he thought I was the next best thing, given my history with Revan.”

  Bastila bit her lip to keep from saying anything. She knew her feelings of resentment were neither justified nor fair, but even her Jedi training couldn’t quell her emotions.