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| {{WIP}}
| | #REDIRECT [[Revan Saga]] |
| {{Universe|Xanadu}}
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| {{title
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| |name=Revan Saga Part Two
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| |author=Joysweeper
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| |user=Joysweeper}}
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| For the moment, things were calm. Calm enough, at least, to ask a mildly important question as we walked. I turned my masked and hooded head to face my tall, pale companion and asked, mildly, "What do you want me to call you?"
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| The young man who looked like Malak blinked, uncertain both in the narrow strip of view afforded by my visor and in the Force. "Um. I was... don’t laugh, okay?"
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| I smiled invisibly. ''This ought to be good.'' "I won’t."
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| "I was... ‘Cheryl.’ I ''told'' you not to laugh," he - or she? said rather stiffly. A quick, involuntary exhalation had escaped me- not quite a laugh, no, but not far from it. I waved a gloved, armored hand at him- sorry, continue- and he did. "But I think I prefer Malak. What about you?"
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| "What about me?"
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| ''I can’t handle this. Really, I can’t.''
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| "What do you want me to call you? Do you respond to Revan, or...?"
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| ''Ah. I can’t believe I forgot that.'' "Revan will do nicely." I hesitated as something niggled at me, then added, "I would also respond to... Hailey... but Revan works better." One more thing- "And I stayed female."
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| "...Okay."
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| I hesitated again, then shrugged. ''Might as well. Other than the two of us, this hall is deserted. I don’t think anything is about to happen in the next thirty seconds. Nothing I could prevent, anyway.'' "This is what I look like." I stopped walking and turned towards my companion. Carefully, I slid both armored hands into the face of my deep, concealing hood, felt for the clasps, and pulled the masklike front half of my helmet down and away from my face.
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| My vision was restricted by the hood itself, cutting off everything on either side, but it was still astonishing how much more I could see. If not for the Force, maneuvering would have been a great trial wearing that mask. How had I managed before?
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| Malak peered into my face with a slight frown around his eyes, then nodded, not saying a word. I replaced the mask and we resumed walking in a rather awkward silence. What ''do'' you say to someone who looks like a younger version of your best friend since childhood, who later set a trap for you and left you for dead so that he could grab the title of Dark Lord of the Sith?
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| ''I can’t handle this.''
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| Ahead was chaos. Perhaps deterred by the knot of clones outside, hysterical people had run ''away'' from the room I had found Malak in, but here there was nothing to stop them from doing all the things panicked people do. Running in circles. Trampling one another. Bashing themselves into walls. And screaming, of course. Lots and lots of screaming.
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| Most of them appeared fairly human in their physiology, though frequently sporting strange furred features like ears or snouts or tails which didn’t really match their bodies. Interestingly enough, it was mostly the ones ''without'' the odd ears-or-snouts-or-tails who had peculiar skin coloration, truly outlandish garb, or bizarre hair. Some appeared to be humanized animals. There were also a number of oddities in that crowd, things which really didn’t look humanoid. I didn’t bother looking too closely.
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| A panicked human with lips that curved out into a brightly-colored beak produced a shrieking cry that was so loud and so highly pitched that it seemed to bite through my eardrums and pass ''through'' my head, completely ignoring the sound-dampening features in my mask. Shuddering, I winced and resisted the urge to clap my hands over my ears.
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| The crowd members who were not running in circles were trying to escape the room. There were several doors leading outside, all fronted with glass and opened by means of shoving at a bar in the approximate center. Naturally, in the way of all panicked humans, these were ignoring most of the doors to press around one and only one. Clearly, Bastila’s calming Battle Meditation had not reached them. Or if it had, they were too excited to feel the effect.
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| "I don’t think we can do anything here!" I said to my follower, shouting over the noise of the crowd. Even if I opened another door, the small mob would continue trying to surge through the first one. Panicked people were like that. "Let’s just get out!" I winced again as the beaked human produced another painful shriek.
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| ''I can’t handle this.''
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| "Yeah! Good idea!" Malak followed as I worked my way along the edge of the room. The crush of people here was not so tight; the wreckage of various small stands and booths disrupted them, and a hysterical mass of humans generally prefers more open spaces. The beaked human shrieked twice more before we were able to find our way into a different corridor.
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| There was still a great deal of noise, but the corridor was much less crowded and had less of a hysterical feel to it. The handful of people here were grim-faced or wide-eyed with fear, but they hadn’t whipped themselves into a frenzy. What appeared to be a bipedal dog was holding two cloaked figures away from each other and speaking rapidly.
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| I felt the Force twinge again. I was running out of time. Sweat started to form on my skin; it was instantly absorbed by the lining of my armor, but what I wore could do nothing about the way my stomach was starting to flutter. ''I can’t run out of time. I won’t.'' Running or allowing myself to draw upon the Force to move more quickly would use energy that I would need later. I settled for walking very fast, fast enough that people ahead moved to either side of the corridor to let me by.
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| "Revan, what do you think’s happened?" Longer legs meant that Malak had little trouble keeping up with me.
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| "I have no idea," I told him shortly. We were passing people that I knew I could help, but to do so I would be forced to use precious time and energy. ''I need both for what’s ahead. Let me be there in time.'' "It’s obviously something big. You can touch the Force, right?"
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| "Yes," he said uncertainly, as if he suspected a trick question.
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| "And you couldn’t this morning, could you?" I pressed. He shook his head, bewildered. "Now, what have you done between this morning and... sixteen minutes ago? ''Seventeen'' minutes ago, how were you different from this morning?"
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| He still did not understand. I wasn’t quite sure how to phrase it... Sighing inwardly, I sent a thought into his head, a hint. Just a quick thought-pulse, nothing major.
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| ''I can’t handle this at all.''
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| "I’m not sure what you- ''oh.'' Costumes. You mean... they became real?"
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| ''Well, that’s as good a way to say it as any other.'' I inclined my head and then, realizing that it was hard to see, told him "Yes. It’s the only explanation that makes any sense. Not much, admittedly, but it’s all we have. When straws are all that is left, grasp at them."
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| I did not turn my head to look at him, but in the Force I could feel a bit of his confusion. "How did you ''do'' that?"
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| Sensing that he didn’t mean my deduction, I let a wry tone creep into my voice. I should have known he would feel my thought-pulse. "I’m the player character in an RPG. I have to be able to communicate without words at least part of the time."
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| ''I can’t handle this. It’s just too weird.''
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| "Oh." There were doors set into the corridor. Some were closed, others were not. Malak stopped quite abruptly; something in one of them had caught his eye. "Revan-"
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| The tone of his voice made me stop, turn. "What is it? What’s wrong?" I didn’t feel any local disturbance in the Force. While there were plenty of unpleasant things happening around us, they could be taken care of by others. All but one. And that was mine. I was running out of time.
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| "That’s- I think that’s... David?" His explanation became a question, in a voice that sounded almost plaintive.
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| A boy in the room, teenaged by his rather nasal voice, demanded, "What?! Who are you? How do you know my name? What’s going on?" He sounded rather freaked out.
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| ''Join the club. I can’t handle this.''
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| "Who is David?" I asked. My voice displayed a patience that I did not feel.
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| Malak hesitated. "He’s my... he’s my brother. Cheryl’s brother. I have to-"
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| In the room off the corridor, David yelped "'''''What?!'''''" again, his voice breaking.
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| I didn’t have time for this! Couldn’t he ''feel'' that urgency in the Force? Something clicked together. He couldn’t feel it because handling it was a task meant for ''me.'' Alone. Without any help whatsoever. It might well be that, in the impending incident, any companions of mine would be killed or prove untrustworthy.
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| Better if there was only one.
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| Almost I could feel responsibility settling over my shoulders like a new cloak lined with lead. Heavily, I accepted it. ''Very well. I will go it alone from here.''
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| "I’ll find you later," I told my follower, unsure if I really ''could.'' He nodded, preoccupied with the puzzle of trying to explain things to David. I could only hope that he would remember my not-quite-promise later- but then again, perhaps it would be better if he did not. I was running short on time. We all were.
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| ''I can’t handle this.''
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| Not looking back, I finally succumbed to the urgency I felt in the Force and broke into a loping run.
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| [[Category:Xanadu]] [[Category:Story]] [[Categor:Joysweeper]] [[Category:Alien]]
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