I Want To Be Your Knight: Chapter Eight

We got through our first night on Myrkr without any problems, with each of us taking a three hour shift as a watch, standing guard while the other two slept. I volunteered for the middle shift, so that both girls would be able to have an uninterrupted six hours of sleep. Surprisingly, I found myself happy, in a way that I had not been in a year or more. I traced it to the fact that it was a type of camaraderie that I hadn't felt since I had left the Guard. For the moment, I belonged with these two girls. I trusted them and they trusted me. I hadn't realized just how much I had missed that.

The next morning, it started raining-which slowed our travel speed down considerably. Both of the girls trudged on behind me as I found what I thought was the best passage through the undergrowth.

By noon, I was tired and hurting, and sporting numerous scratches from some type of thorned bush down one side of my face. My left hand had also touched some stinging plant, and I had an extreme topical allergic reaction to the contact-basically painful blisters covered it, turning the skin red, mangled and inflamed. That hand looked as if I'd let an acklay chew on it. Fortunately, as long as I didn't pop one of the blisters, there was very little discomfort after the initial burst of pain.

I felt the rain slacken slightly, almost stopping. I glanced up into the grey sky and then I turned to face the other two. "Are you both ready for lunch?"

Seha silently nodded her head, and dropped down, collapsing against a tree. Jysella frowned at me, "'Bout time you decided on a break."

I sat heavily onto a nearby stone, and arched an eyebrow, a smirk coming to my lips. "You could have called for one at any time, Jys."

She stared at me for a moment more before settling herself into a cranny formed by two tree roots.

I lifted my arm and activated my map. It glowed a bright orange in the dim, almost twilight light of the rainy forest. I pressed a few buttons, tracking our progress and determining how much further we had to go. I sighed and looked back at the girls. "We've still got 102.8 klicks to go."

I pulled my bag to me, and dug around in it until I found one of the ration packs. I opened it up and snapped half of it off. I then proceeded to slowly eat it. Staring at the ground next to my feet, I chewed mechanically, wishing that I didn't have taste buds.

"Hey, Skywalker."

I looked up from the ground over towards Jys. "Yeah?"

"Where do you think the vornskrs are?"

I shook my head, and slowly looked around us at the trees. "I'm not sure, but I'd be perfectly happy if they stayed wherever it is that they are. Rather not have to deal with any of the things."

She rubbed her forehead with the back of her hand, and I realized how muddy she was. A streak of it was across her cheek, and it coated one side of her jumpsuit from when she had slipped and fell during our hike. Her hair hung limp against her head and was matted with more mud.

Seeing her hair plastered to her face like that brought back memories. Bad ones.

They were very specific memories of another blue-eyed brunette who's hair was plastered to her head in much the same manner. Jys' mom.

It was fifty-two hours after my squad had arrested Mirax Horn, and it had just been announced that she had had a brain aneurysm while in protective custody of the Galactic Alliance Guard.

For some reason, I had not really believed the official story. Maybe it was just because I still remembered sitting outside the door of the cell where Jacen had tortured that bounty-hunter, Ailyn Vel, to death. Maybe it was because I remembered all the other Corellians who had died under mysterious circumstances while in GAG custody. In the end, it didn't really matter, all I knew, all I needed to know, was that it just did not feel like the truth.

So I hacked into the archival video footage of her interrogation by Jacen.

I had watched the seven hours of torture. The first four hours were physical. He mangled her, using knives, cords, a stick, his fists and a brand. The last three, he just leaned against the wall as she writhed and screamed. By the end, her voice had been used so hard, for so long, that it was just a breathless wheeze that could barely be heard over the audio pickup.

But the image I was thinking of, the scene which seeing Jys with her hair plastered by mud like that reminded me of, was right at the time when Jacen switched from physically hurting her to standing against the wall and really torturing her. He had asked her his last question: "Where are Corran and your children hiding?"

She had spat a mouth full of blood at him, and snarled, "I'll never tell you."

That scene was burned into my memory at that moment. Mirax's defiance and righteousness burned through me. She had been abused, her body sliced and burned. Her hair hung limp against her head, held there by sweat and blood from where Jacen had bludgeoned her early on in the torture. Yet she was still defiant. She defied him. In the end, I think that defiance was why he really tortured her.

I just wish...

"What are you staring at Skywalker?"

Jys' voice sliced through my memories and I blinked my eyes, pushing those memories back into the depths of my subconscious, back into that dark hole in the back of my mind where I stored all of those horrible things I had learned and seen and did under Jacen's tutelage.

"N-n-nothing," I stammered, noticing the flush on her cheeks as she quickly averted her face, to stare out at the woods.

The rain began to pick up again, so I stood up, lifting my face to the rain. Then I lowered it, and smiled at the girls. "You two ready to get started again?"

Jysella harrumphed and leveraged herself into a standing position. Seha slowly nodded her head and began to stand as well.

And that was when disaster struck. In the form of a 115 kilogram vornskr.

Seha had just stood, when it dropped out of a tree and slammed onto her shoulders, driving her to the ground as she screamed.

I had my saber in my hand in an instant, and was running forward. The tail slashed in, and I dove, shoving my blade forward, catching the venomous spikes in mid-blade.

The creature snarled, and twisted to stare at me, as the three claws of its front right paw rotated deeper into Seha's shoulder.

Slowly I stood, and snapped forward with the blade, touching its tip to the vornskr's nose. It released Seha and backed up a step.

I tapped it again, and it snapped at my blade. When it did so, I lunged, shoving my saber through the creature's throat. It's snarl was cut off into a gurgling groan, and its tail slashed forward towards me.

I closed my eyes, bracing myself for impact, knowing I wouldn't have time to move, not without the Force.

The snap-hiss of another saber igniting caused me to open my eyes, and I saw Jys' silver blade as it sliced through the creature's tail.

Grinning, I thrust my saber in deeper, sawing down, then up. The head plopped off, and rolled away.

Turning from the vornskr, I took the two steps which separated me from Seha and knelt down beside her. I reached out and brushed my hand down the side of her face. Her eyelids fluttered open, and as they did she cried out in pain.

I inspected her wounds, and discovered that in the scheme of things, they weren't that bad. The worse for Seha was the group of puncture wounds on her right shoulder. They were deep, when I cleaned them, I could see the white hint of her collar bone, though I didn't tell her that. The worse for our group was the fact that her right femur was broken. Luckily, it didn't rupture the skin, but it was close. In between those two extremes she had two broken ribs and a greenstick fracture in her right arm.

I told them both about most her injuries, and Seha started crying slightly, saying over and over again, "I'm sorry."

Jys frowned and dropped onto a rock, holding her head in her hands.

I pulled out my knife and my blanket and quickly cut it into strips. I then used those to bandage her wounds. I then field-dressed the vornskr, stripping the meat from its femurs to create splints for her leg and her arm.

Jysella looked up at me. "We've got to ask for a recall. We can't go on like this."

Seha sobbed, and said, "But that means we fail."

I leaned back against the tree and grabbed at the bridge of my nose.

Jysella sighed. "I know, Seha. But what other option do we have? The practical is all or none, and you need to go back to get medical treatment."

Seha looked between us both, a stubborn light appearing in her eyes. "I don't want to be the reason we failed."

I turned away. This discussion on failure rankled. Reminded me of the past. An occurrence that had been happening too often lately for my own piece of mind.

Then, I surprised myself. I reached out and grabbed Seha's hand, giving it a gentle squeeze as I said, "You won't be the reason we fail, if we do."

"What are you saying, Skywalker?" Jysella yelled at me. "We have to do a recall so she can get checked by the medics."

I shook my head. "She's in no serious danger. We got those wide-spectrum antibiotic shots before we came on this stupid camping trip so the scratches shouldn't pick up an infection, and as long as she doesn't walk on that leg, then it won't get any worse either."

Seha looked at me, a frown coming to her lips. "If I don't walk, then how would we get to Hyllard City?"

Jys smirked at me. "Yeah, Skywalker. Answer that. It's not like we can use the Force to carry her."

I sighed. "I... I don't know yet. I'm still working on it."

Standing up, Jysella began pacing. "It doesn't really matter if we fail. We'll get to try again."

"No!" I yelled at her, with more force than I had meant to. Jys' eyes snapped open wide as she looked towards me. A look of shock was on her face, one which mirrored my own emotions rather perfectly. I gave my head another quick shake, and in a more reasonable voice, continued speaking. "No, I'm not going to let us fail. I've already failed too many people, too many times. I, I don't want to fail again."

Jysella sat down next to Seha again, staring at me. "Skyw... Ben, it's okay. I know you don't want to fail. Kriff, neither do I. Neither does Seha. But how are we going to get her to Hyllard City? It's a 100 klicks from here.

I slammed my hand down into the ground next to me. "I know, I'll carry her."

Jys arched an eyebrow. "You'll carry her a 100 klicks?"

I nodded my head. "Yep. We'll all get to Hyllard City, and if we do end up having to use the recall, then it wouldn't be Seha's fault, but mine."

Jys rubbed at her temples, and Seha quietly looked between the two of us.

I moved to kneel in front of Jysella. "I know you hate me, Jys, but I'm not going to fail you again."