Star Wars Character Cafe - Interrogated Sociopath Chapters 21

INTERROGATED SOCIOPATH

CHAPTER 21

Alone after Shiba had gone in search of Kat, Flik waited a moment before pressing on. He had no idea where Azet could be in the complex, but that didn’t mean he lacked the means to find her. She wanted him to confront her, that much was evident via the Sith holocron she had sent him, so finding her shouldn’t be too difficult.

He wondered not for the first time since learning of her survival what could have changed her so much, but having not seen her for more than twenty years, he figured that much would have changed in that time. If two governments could have risen and fallen in that time, then almost anything was possible. He himself was testament for that as well, having falling so far from being a Jedi that he became a bounty hunter after the loss of Auoura and Tek, and then taking up the mantle of being a Jedi again.

Even before he and Shiba embarked on their mission to rescue Kat, he had closed off his sensitivity to the Force to hide his presence from Azet as he’d been sure she would send troopers at them the second they entered the complex. Having not received the reception he’d anticipated, Flik decided that there was little point in maintaining his defences. The reason for this was because using the technique of hiding his presence from her also closed off her presence from him.

Azet, having disposing of the stormtroopers, had no guards to send at him. He didn’t need the Force to suspect that it was a trap, but if he succeeded in dealing with her now, it would lessen the difficulty in freeing the Uvena System and prevent the rise of another Palpatine. That he figured was a risk worth taking, even if the action was more impulsive compared to what a Jedi would normally do.

Dwelling at the back of his mind was the faint hope that he could turn her back from the Darkside.

He opened himself up to the Force. As soon as he did this, he was hit with what could only be described as a wave of malevolent darkness. It was alien at first, because he’d never expected Azet’s presence to feel like that. It was blacker than Tek’s had been at the confrontation that had cost his son’s life.

It took him a few minutes for him to recognise that it was Azet underneath the façade of malevolence, as she was so distorted compared with the Azet that he had known that he’d considered that until that moment of recognition that a being was masquerading as her.

Azet, the last time he had seen her in the flesh had been shortly after Auoura had left Coruscant, a few months after the Battle of Geonosis. For his conduct during that battle, he had been made a knight. Azet had looked up to him with admiration after that battle because he had saved her life at the skirmish in the arena and had prevented her from being left behind. Azet had been no more than a child then, being only twelve years of age. In better circumstances, a child Padawan wouldn’t have been there, but her Master had responded to the urgent call from the Jedi Council for all available Jedi to go to Geonosis. Flik shook off the memory of Geonosis. That battle had been a lifetime ago.

He proceeded towards what he perceived to be the centre of the darkness, rather like someone seeking the eye of the storm to gain temporary shelter from its wrath; only the eye of this storm was far from calm.

Even though he had resolved not to let the past intrude into the present, his last memory of Azet came to him unbidden, as if it refused to stay buried…

CHAPTER 22

It was late in the evening and Flik, knowing that sleep would elude him, had decided that it would be useless to even attempt it, and headed for the Thousand Fountains, the most tranquil room within the Jedi Temple. He would at least get some peace there, even if to do so he would have to meditate. Once he’d arrived at his favourite spot, a sand stone bench flanked with shrubs from his mother’s homeworld at the edge of a pond with a fountain at its centre, Flik removed his outer robes. He draped them over the back of the bench before circling it and sitting down.

It was ironic, Flik thought, that even though the Jedi made their home at what was thought by many to be the galaxy’s centre of civilisation, that they still sought out nature to bring calmness and serenity. If he took that thought further, he would have had to acknowledge that the reason he was there in the first place was that he’d surrendered to a facet of nature himself that was forbidden for the Jedi to even consider doing, but he was not in the mood at that moment to contemplate on the hypocrisy of the Jedi Order, so the concept remained unexplored.

Flik tried to clear his mind of its turmoil in preparation for meditation, as a Knight should have been easy for him, but then as a Knight, he should have had more control over his base emotions, over his instinct, but he hadn’t. He wondered if he should have gone to the training room instead, but battling remotes wouldn’t have set his mind at ease either as it would have led to him wanting to strike out at something more real, even if that impulse was rooted in the Darkside.

Knowing that meditation at the moment was about as constructive as slicing through all the remotes in the Temple, he retrieved and unfolded the parchment from inside his trouser pocket, the thing that was the course of his unsettled state of mind. He began to read her words for the thousandth time that day, hoping that by rereading it, he would have become insensitive to the words, but they just stung as badly as the first time he’d read them that morning when he’d found it lying on Auoura’s coffee table when he’d gone round to visit her.

My Dearest Flik

It began, not Jedi Shirak, or Dear Flik, but My Dearest Flik, and it was those words that wounded him the most, because deep down the wolfman knew that Auoura didn’t want to leave him, but had to, that neither of them had any free will of their own. It was that paradox that annoyed him most about the Jedi Order, they wanted its initiates to be the Guardians of the Republic, but they weren’t supposed to care about whether its people survived or not and expected them to have no life of their own while they protected it. Flik pushed that frustration away as he read the rest of the letter. As he read the words, he could almost hear Auoura’s voice reading them with him.

I regret to inform you that I must leave Coruscant and go back home to Uvena III. Please don’t think any less of me, my heart. If the Jedi Council should ever find out about our relationship, they would force you to choose between your career and our hope for a family. I know that making you choose would destroy you. At least this way you won’t have to make that fateful choice.
<>
Auoura

In pain, more than anger, Flik screwed up the parchment that crushed his heart and held it in his claws.

“Is there something wrong, Jedi Shirak?” a small, uncertain voice asked behind him.

“It is none of your concern, Azet,” Flik replied.

Azet saw the parchment screwed up in his claws and guessed that it was the source of the Knight’s trouble.

“Can I see?” she enquired, as she sat down beside him. Flik glanced across at the female pup and suppressed the desire to shoo her away when he saw that something was bothering her.

“It is late,” Flik said brusquely. “Young Padawans should be in their quarters.”

Fearful yellow lupine eyes regarded him and Flik knew he’d been successful at distracting her attention from the parchment.

Then she said, “I couldn’t sleep. Bad dreams.”
Flik nodded his understanding. Azet had been unsettled ever since Geonosis and the beginning of the Clone Wars. She had spoken about it to him before.

“Geonosis?” he asked.

“Yes,” the pup replied. “It’s always the same. I keep being left behind.”

“Have you told Master Boda about your dream?” he asked.

“I have. Master Boda just keeps telling me that it’s just that, a dream.”

“Then you should listen to her, Azet.”

“I know, but I don’t think it is a dream. It’s - ”

“It was a bad experience for one so young, Azet. You were never ready to face battle at Geonosis. Fear, however, is an insidious foe. You must learn to control it and then the dreams will go away. They aren’t real, Azet, and cannot harm you.”

Her yellow eyes flashed as she gazed at him. “You intend to go away.”

Flik looked at her in return, taken aback by her pronouncement. He didn’t want to reply to that. He had considered following Auoura, to convince her to return to Coruscant with him, but doing so would have serious implications on his station as Jedi Knight if he did so.

“I don’t want you to leave me behind, Jedi Shirak.”

Being a Knight brought with it more freedom than being a Padawan, but he couldn’t take another Jedi’s Padawan Learner with him and he’d not been assigned one since he’d been made a Knight. Even if he had, he would have been disinclined to take that Padawan with him, as he would be risking their career as well as his own if he did go in search of Auoura, and that was something he could not do.

“If I do go, it will only be for a short time, Azet. Master Boda will make sure nothing happens to you while I’m away.”

She looked at him with hopeful eyes. “But you will be back?”

“I will return, Azet. I promise you that. You won’t be left behind.”

CHAPTER 23

“I will return, Azet. I promise you that. You won’t be left behind.”

Those fateful words lingered in Flik’s mind when he realised that he’d failed Azet. Was this what all the trouble was about? A promise he’d never intended to break more than twenty years ago? Those were the last words he’d spoken to her. Perhaps, in hindsight, he should have done as Azet’d asked him, and taken her with him.

Shortly after he had found Auoura, Palpatine had declared his mother and her family outlaws, as she had objected to his polices, one of the first politicians to do so. He’d never gotten the chance to go back and collect Azet, even if she had been his Padawan. Just as his mother’s life as a politician had been over when Palpatine made that announcement, so had his career being a Jedi, though that point was mote has he’d done enough to warrant his expulsion from the Order anyway because of his relationship with Auoura. Branded as supporters of the Separatists, even though they’d never been in contact with any of them, Palpatine had perpetuated that lie to be rid of an opponent and possibly prevent his unmasking as being the Sith Master until he chose it.

Besides, he thought Azet safe at the time, and had no reason to go back for her. Back then, he’d thought a life on the run was no place for her, just as it had never really been right for Auoura and his son, Tek. If only he had known that it would have occurred anyway, perhaps taking her with him would have been the lesser of the two evils and now she would be a Jedi.

Flik reasoned that he had to be optimistic, however. Anther Force user could build up the ranks of the decimated Jedi, if she hadn’t gone too far into the Darkside.

He entered the room where he sensed the centre of darkness. It seemed deserted, if he relied on his eyes alone, but something was there. He could sense its malevolence, which seemed alien at first, but after a few moments he discovered that it was a layer of protection to keep him from sensing the familiar, from knowing it was her, from knowing that it was Azet.

Flik grew weary of the charade, so he called out her name, “Azet!”

A moment or two later, Azet emerged to stand a metre or so away from him. It was not until he saw her in the flesh that the belief in her demise finally faded away completely. Not even the discipline installed in him during his Jedi training could have stopped the next words that came out of his mouth.

“I thought you were dead,” Flik said. “It’s good to see that you are alive after all this time.”

“So too, did many think the same of you, Jedi Shirak,” Azet said. “I wish that I could be as joyous at learning of your survival, Mizet’s heir, but now I’m going to have to kill you.”

Without any further warning, Azet hurled Force-lightening at him, which he barely had chance to block with his lightsabre.

“As you can see Jedi,” Azet put a sarcastic emphasis on the word Jedi, “I have grown more powerful since your abandonment of me, and your duty to the galaxy.”

“I had no choice, since Palpatine outlawed me and my family,” Flik bit back. “Even if the other Jedi had been in a position to protect us, Coruscant would have been no place for us. Besides, our presence there would have given Palpatine reason to make his move against the Jedi that much sooner than he did. My father and I exiled ourselves to prevent that.”

Azet’s yellow eyes blazed in anger. “You lie!” she barked, then more quietly but with no less venom. she added, “You left to be with that other female.”

Flik was taken aback by that pronouncement, but then looking back on events, he should have seen the signs. After his rescue of her at Geonosis, Azet must have developed a crush on him. It explained why she’d always hung around him and confided in him instead of her Master, as she should have done, as he should have encouraged her to do. The resentment she bore because of his rejection of her and fear in a time of war had been the foundations for this hatred, this need for vengeance.

“I smell human all over you!” she snarled. “So the rumours are true: you have taken a human lover. You are not only a traitor to the Jedi, but you are to your own kind too. She will have to die as well!”

Anger exploded inside Flik as the threat to his mate was revealed. “Leave Shiba out of this!”

CHAPTER 24

Kat almost collided with Shiba as she turned around the bend in the corridor.

Her first words upon meeting Shiba were, “What happened here? Why are all the Stormtroopers dead?”

Her questions made it clear that Kat didn’t think she and Flik were responsible for the slaughter. Shiba shrugged her shoulders.

“My guess is that Sith is responsible,” Shiba replied, as she automatically checked Kat for injuries.

“I’m ok,” the human girl protested.

Shiba raised an eyebrow. “Who’s the doctor here?”

Kat made no further protest as she submitted to the examination: she figured Shiba wouldn’t relent anyway, her stubbornness born out of dealing with a sometimes uncooperative wolfman and children, and more importantly, that they would get back to Riv more quickly if there was no more arguing. Just as Shiba finished her examination, a loud, high-pitched cry cut through the air.

“What was that?” Shiba asked, glancing around in an attempt to find the source of the howl. Kat provided her with an answer.

“It must be Riv,” Kat said, gripping Shiba’s arm. “Come on, he’s in worse shape than I am.”

An amused smile crossed Shiba’s face. “Your friend that you picked up in the bar?” Shiba asked as Kat led her back the way Kat had come from.

Shiba’s query almost brought Kat to a halt. “Err, yes,” Kat answered, shooting her a quizzical look. “How did you know?”

“Long story: Flik and I have been doing our best to find you. Which way?” she asked, as they came to a fork in the corridor.

“This way,” Kat said, pointing to the right.

“Let’s go then.”

Knowing that the way was clear, Kat used little caution in leading the way back to the cell she and Riv had been imprisoned. On the way, they passed the interrogation room, and Kat winced at the memory of what had occurred in there. Shiba noticed her discomfort.

“Are you alright, Kaitlin?” she asked.

Kat waved the other woman’s concern away.

“Nothing I won’t get over,” she replied. Couldn’t say the same about Riv, though, she thought, but she kept that line of thought to herself. Instead of voicing her fears about Riv, she said, “We must hurry.”

As they neared their goal, Kat wondered if Shiel was even still alive. The thought of him dead caused her throat to constrict, almost as much as the thought of her family gone would. It amazed her that the wolfman had come to mean so much to her in the short time that they had known each other.

Her first sight of him almost confirmed her fears and she almost slipped on the floor made slick by all the blood in her careless effort to be at his side. She found herself staring at the blood before turning her gaze to Riv. There was so much of it.

“This one’s dead,” Shiba announced, causing Kat to raise her head. Shiba was stood in a half-crouch over the body of Fenrir. Kat had to suppress a feeling of satisfaction at the news. She could feel no pity for the dead Shistavanen that had tortured Riv. Instead of focusing on that, she looked over Riv’s injuries. He sported a new wound to the shoulder and one gash across his chest, in addition to all the others, but the shoulder wound was the worst.

“Riv has a deep wound to his shoulder,” Kat reported as Shiba made her way over to them. Riv’s eyes flicked open and he tried to murmur the words, “Little lupa,” but failed as the words only came out as an unintelligible growl.

“Don’t try to speak,” Shiba said.

“Don’t worry, Riv. My friend’s a doctor; she knows how to help you,” Kat said, stroking the fur on his head with one hand and gripping one of his with the other.

Shiba worked methodically to deal with the worst of Riv’s wounds as best she could with the little medical equipment she possessed.

“We’ll have to get Lobo to bring the Warrior in,” Shiba said as she paused in her work. There’s no way we could get him out of here the way Flik and I got in, but even with this facility’s personnel dead, its defence systems could still be live and I have better equipment on the Warrior.”

Kat nodded her understanding.

“I can sort that out. Where’s the command centre?”

“According to the map Lobo got, it’s two levels up.”

Riv had drifted back into unconsciousness during that exchange.

“We’re going to need a gurney,” Shiba said.

Kat suppressed a shudder. “There should be one in the interrogation room we just passed.”

CHAPTER 25

“So, the darkness is close to the surface within you, Shirak,” Azet gloated as she deflected his green hued lightsabre attack with her own ruby-red bladed one.

Flik responded to her gloat, designed to raise his ire, with a laugh, a low, mocking growl. The Azet he’d known would never have acted like this. He let the bounty hunter rise to the surface as he said, “Can we fight? That’s what you lured me here for wasn’t it? Or are we going to trade insults all night?”

Azet deactivated her lightsabre and took a step back from him, feigning calm level-headedness. Flik followed suit, but refrained from returning his lightsabre to his belt.

“Fight?” If you join with me, Shirak, we could use our combined might to conquer the human ruled planets in the galaxy and free our people from their oppression forever.”

“That’s where your argument is flawed, Padawan,” Flik answered, using the opportunity to remind her that she had been an apprentice when the Jedi Order fell. “Our people are already free from the tyranny of Palpatine and Vader now that they are dead. Freedom from your attempt to replace one set of dictators with another, now that’s another matter.”

Azet’s muzzle wrinkled in a snarl as she replied, “I use them like your mother did, Jedi,” she somehow managed to keep the growl out of her voice. “The Archetype Warriors are in my service.”

Anger rouse within Flik, but he suppressed it as he said, “My mother never ordered the deaths of innocent children, pregnant and elderly women and the torture of men. If that is what you mean by service, Padawan, then you insult my mother and are lacking in temple education.”

He deliberately used the human terms, as a way of trying to make her see her error in judgement, but all it did was antagonise Azet further.

“You have been around humans too long, Jedi,” Azet snapped back. “I have gained much knowledge since the destruction of the temple, knowledge that never would have come into my possession had I remained a student there.”

She was hinting at the forbidden knowledge of the Sith, and that she was willing to share it with him if he came over to her side. He also got the feeling that she wanted him there, that Shistavanens would more readily support her if he were on her side. He could never betray the Jedi, or the memory of his mother by partaking in such an endeavour.

“Only knowledge of evil, Azet,” he said, without the hint of sarcasm that had been in his earlier replies. “There is nothing that you posses that I could possibly covet.”

“Given time you will, Flik Sivrak, when I have taken from you everything you hold dear,” Azet said with a smile that was a good imitation of a Krayt Dragon’s and adding, “Or would you once again allow yourself to become a lowly bounty hunter?”

She was threatening Flik’s family and reminding him of his time as a bounty hunter, a time when he’d committed many actions that he was not proud of, to goad Flik into losing his temper again. The use of his family name rather than the one he had taken as a Jedi indicated that she knew about his life as a bounty hunter. This time, he refused to take the bait.

Calmly, he said, “Even becoming a bounty hunter is better than being what you are, Azet. You accuse me of betraying the Jedi by falling in love with Auoura and by choosing exile.

“I have often wondered if I’d stayed with the Jedi if it would have helped or hindered them in their struggle, or if it would have made no difference. Now, it doesn’t matter. I made my choice and there is nothing I can do to change what has passed.

“What I can do is change the future by the actions that I do now. Azet, if there is anything left of the Jedi within you, you would help the galaxy better by helping me rebuild the Jedi Order.”

For a moment, it looked as though Azet was going to consider his offer, but she shook her head, like a vornskyr would to discourage irritating flies bothering it as they buzzed around its head.

“You can’t seduce me with your lies as you once did, Jedi.”

Flik only had enough time to re-ignite his lightsabre before Azet attacked.