A Father's Blade: Chapter Eight

Tahiri steps out of the motel room, leaving Noelani alone within it. For a second she hesitates, and almost turns around and retrieves the girl, but once again decides against it. The hotel they are staying out is a long low building, with the rooms exposed directly to the outside, the doorways protected only by a covered walkway. Tahiri walks forward, and steps off the sidewalk, her bare feet crunching slightly on marble stones spread at the edge of the sidewalk. Memories of dreams and nightmares flicker through her consciousness, but she quickly shelves them, focusing instead on the sounds of the night around her.

She reaches out with the Force and feels a small rodent scurrying through the brush, a night-time bird of prey flying far overhead and hundreds of insects, then the dry sage brush which the hotel uses as a decorative border around the hotel. All of it creates a web of life which she is both intrinsically a part of, yet because she was not born here, since humans did not first arise on this planet, she is separated from it, she doesn't quite fit into any ecological niche.

The Shaper within her frowns at that, and for a moment she has the desire to rip apart, to twist, the ecology to fit her needs and desires. With the Force and her Shaper's knowledge she sees so many possible ways to make the ecology better suited, to more conform, to her and her sense of aesthetics. With an effort of will, she rips her thoughts away from that path, focusing once more on what she is going to do.

She pulls her outer cloak tighter around her, as the night air is getting definitely colder. Bundled that way, she appears to be another amorphous blob as she moves through the night. For a moment she wonders why there are no street lamps or other forms of exterior illumination in the area, and glances behind her to see the bright floodlights at the corner of the hotel.

Turning back so she once more faces the darkness of the night, she begins walking, allowing the Force to guide her steps, to tell her where she needs to go and what she needs to do. For a moment, doubt floods her mind, as she considers that maybe she's not powerful enough to listen like this, that without Anakin she's not worth enough to the Force, but she dispels those concerns, deciding to trust in the Force and not worry about anything else.

After about a half hour of wandering through the back alleys of the city, Tahiri finds herself stopped and looking up at one of the many cantinas dotting the landscape of the city which surrounds BioTech Industries. She frowns for a moment as she allows the Force to bring impressions of the building and its occupants to her.

When nothing comes she chews on her lips for a moment, and walks towards the door. She pushes in and finds herself confronted with a huge, muscled man, his bald head gleaming slightly from the spotlight which shines on him from overhead. Behind him Tahiri can make out the massive shape and red glowing eyes of an YHV droid.

The man's voice is low and gravely, with just a hint of anger lacing his words. "I think you're in the wrong place missy."

Tahiri looks up at him.

"When did you start being able to think?"

She's staring him in the face, and knows that the strong light is shining slightly on the scars from her shaping. She grins at him, to add a counterpoint to her words, letting him know that she's insulting him.

He reaches out and puts one of his hands on her shoulder, trying to turn her around to march her back out the door. She calls on the Force, keeping herself in place, and calmly looks down at his hand where it covers her slim shoulder. He starts to squeeze, applying more and more pressure.

She casts a single long look up at him, before returning her gaze to his hand.

"I was shaped by the Yuuzhan Vong. I doubt you have the ability to hurt me. Now let me go."

Then she reaches up and pulls back one of his fingers so hard the snap is clearly audible in the foyer of the cantina. The man yelps in surprise and yanks back his hand from her. She shakes her head slightly and brushes past him into the cantina proper, stopping for a second to allow her eyes to adjust to the light of the dim, smoke filled room. Her nose wrinkles slightly at the smell of tobacc and other inhaled intoxicants and she slips through the crowd settling finally on one of the stools at the bar.

She orders a Corellian whisky when the bartender asks, and tosses a few coins on the bar top. She narrows her eyes and watches him fill the glass. He heaps ice-cubes in, and then throws a meager splash of whiskey over them.

When he places the half-filled glass in front of her, he reaches to collect her coins, and her hand shoots out to grab his wrist.

"That's not full."

"We don't serve little girls here," the bartender growls at her as he tries to pull his hand away. She lets go of his hand and balls her fist, slamming it against the bulb of his nose. His hands fly up, clutching it. "That hurt you little witch!"

She answers with a calm, cold smile, and says, "Fill it up."

Tahiri notices that silence has fallen over the cantina, and she curses at herself for drawing a bit too much attention to herself. Yet she doesn't remove her gaze from the bartender as he massages his nose.

Finally, the man grabs her glass, and returns a moment later, setting it in front of her with enough whiskey in it that she could just about say it was full. He swipes the coins and walks to the till, purposefully ignoring her. She takes a swallow of the amber colored liquor, relishing the slight burn as it slides down her throat. She stares into the liquid, watching the golden flecks as she remembers the first time she had ever tasted it - it was on the Falcon and she was with Anakin, back between their first kiss and Mrykr.

She takes another swallow, allowing the memory to slide away as the liquid slides down. Then glances around the cantina once more, noting that the customers had returned to their drinks and conversations.

She glances to the man sitting on the stool next to her; he has wavy brown hair and brown eyes. Scuffed boots poke out from his heavy duty trousers and a tunic cut along Corellian lines hangs loosely on his body. A blaster is nestled in the holster on his thigh, and Tahiri can just make out that the safety is switched turned off.

She frowns for a second, and then faces him fully, putting on a bright smile for his benefit.

"Hello there."

The man glances up from his drink to look at her. She notices as his eyes dart from the mass of blonde curls down her robes to her bared feet. Finally it settles back on her face, flickering between her smile and her eyes.

"Hi, yourself."

She sticks her hand out towards him, "I'm Tahiri"

He briefly shakes her hand, and before turning back to his drink replies, "I'm Rand Shepherd."

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Cere glances at the scientist beside her. A foppish man in his late forties, his prematurely bald head gleams under the florescent lighting of the lab. A smattering of freckles adorn his too-wide nose and his blue eyes appear washed out and lifeless. His name is Thesim Gra, as unsavory in personality as he is a genius in biological technology. She knows that the only reason he has accepted this job is because BioTech Industires turns a blind eye to how he treats the specimens.

She turns back to the specimen in the small cell before them. He's a young human male, about fourteen standard years old. Angry brown eyes stare at them from beneath a mop of unruly reddish-brown hair. A scowl twists his boyish features into a petulance which only young human males are able to produce. He is dressed in a pair of navy trousers, a grey shirt and a navy jacket.

"This is the one that escaped last week?"

"Yes, ma'am. Ru Pollsa retrieved him last night."

She reaches forward and turns on the intercom to the boy's cell. "You've put us in a lot of trouble young man. What do you have to say for yourself?"

"Go rodder yerself."

Cere smiles slightly, and turns back to Thesim as she flicks off the intercom. "And you say he's the best of our test subjects?"

"Yes. He accepted the language implant and we've given him six of the battle upgrades and nine non-battle implants so far. If we give him more, he'll probably be able to escape again and we won't be able to recover him."

"Do you have any suggestions?"

"I used to work for a company called Binring Biomedical out on Saffalore. There was a brilliant woman there named Doctor Edda Gast. She developed a number of…control methods for various species such as Twi'leks, Sullustans and even Bothans. If we can get her research then we should be able to create a way to control him more permanently. The other option is to try using Yuuzhan Vong slave coral."

"I would prefer not using the slave coral. Send out feelers and see if you can find any information on this Doctor Gast or her research. "

"Yes ma'am."

Thesim scurrys away and Cere focuses once more on the boy in the room. She flicks on the intercom. "Tell me why you don't want to behave for us? We took you in and are caring for you."

The boy doesn't answer just stares at the wall, anger and distrust bright embers shining in his eyes.

Cere shrugs and turns off the intercom, turning on her heel to return to her office.

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Ulya Tu walks down the tongue-ramp of the Festering Wound. This is the sixth star system she has visited since her defeat at the hands of the Jeedai whelp, the sixth stop in her attempt to discover more and deeper knowledge of the Jeedai Force. Vjun, Korriban, Malachor IV, Byss, Yavin IV and now Krayiss II. All attempts to hunt for more knowledge, so often met with failure, and twice with planets that no longer exist.

She sniffs the cool air, as she looks around the foliage around her. Immediately before her is an expanse of blue-green grass, which reaches to her waist. Off to the east she can see the start of a forest and to the north the start of foothills leading to a series of mountains – a series of misty blue faces reaching higher and higher.

Ulya reaches into the Force, hunting the source of knowledge which should be here, hunting the ancient Sith library which her Master Lumiya told her once sat on this world. She feels a flicker of something in the foothills north of her. Turning that way she begins walking, intent on finding the knowledge she needs to get her revenge against the Jeedai child. To be able to redeem her honor by destroying the Infidel Jeedai.

She walks for days, the cool wind turning decidedly colder as she gains altitude in the foothills. On the seventh day of her hike, she finds what she has been searching for. Nestled into the mountains is a stone edifice. She reaches out with the Force, getting a feeling for the old temple. It is a building nearly as ancient as the mountains in which it is nestled, a place of dark power. The pall of death and the Dark Side hangs over everything, calling her forward, promising her the power that she needs.

Promising her the knowledge to gain her revenge.