The Lie (Captain Rex)

(IV) - Across the Mirror

You are falling.

Wind whips past you in an endless void as you fall...and fall...and fall. Some primal part of you is scared of breaking your bones when you reach the ground; but all you can focus on is how odd the landscape looks.

Grey. Barren. Blank. You float gently down onto the shiny, mirror-like ground, which ripples like water beneath your feet. There's no sky here, only that grey blank canvas of an environment. It smells like nothing. It feels like fear.

"You're here. At last."

The voice rings out behind you, echoing through the desolate expanse. You whirl around unto another figure, several meters ahead of you. Somewhat taller, more scarcely shaped; he is a horned Dathomirian male--a Nightbrother. Black tattoos run in whorls all over his scarlet face and body, and his sickly-yellow eyes glisten in anticipation.

It's him. The voice that rang through your head seemingly at random, since you'd left the Battle of Dathomir. The one that haunted your dreams, clawed his way into them; who took what wasn't his. And now he was here, merely a man. Just any old life-form. Nobody to fear.

I am not afraid. The Force is with me, you tell yourself, fighting down a bolt of terror. What would Master Obi-Wan do?

"Who are you?" you call back. Ask questions; Obi-Wan would be practical. This man might be a Sith.

It's only when you approach to be a few feet away from him that you see his droid legs, clanking against the brittle mirror floor. He grins at you with his stained teeth.

"Who am I?" he responds. "Only but another force-wielder, somewhere far in the galaxy..." He sounds a little melodramatic, especially when he stretches his hand out to indicate the distance.

"Are you a Jedi?" you ask, not entirely friendly. "Why haven't I seen you in the Order?"

"I am no Jedi." He cuts you a baleful look.

You narrow your eyes. "Are you evil?"

At this, he chuckles--a creaking, almost mournful sound that sets your hairs on end. "Evil is in the eye of the beholder, young one. In my eyes? No, I am not evil."

"That's what evil people say. Do you wield the darkside?" you shoot back at him.

He raises a thoughtful finger to his lips. "So afraid...so cautious, of something that only you can control the use of. Something harmless towards the user. The darkside," he snarls derisively, wry eyes glancing away from yours.

You set your jaw, Obi-Wan's teachings resonating through your head: Be wary of the darkside, of its temptation. Those who speak of it know not of its dangers.

"The darkside..." The Dathomirian seems to sound the word out. Test it. "It is laughable, your fear. I'd laugh now, to further prove my point; but this is not a very funny situation we are in, right now, so, ah..." He makes a noncommittal hmph.

"That's a yes, isn't it?" you reply. Your arm almost instinctively reaches for your lightsaber, but it is gone. "You use the darkside. You're a Sith! You're evil!"

"I am not evil, Padawan," he reasons. "From my eyes. I seek only to restore balance. I helped you rescue Satine. Were it not for my warning, you would be with a grieving Master...Kenobi, was it?"

"My master was fine. It was Satine that you-"

"Yes...Kenobi...him. I remember now," he growls, mostly to himself. His lip curls in distaste. His gaze seems to fall into a much, much deeper level of thought, even ignoring your presence altogether, for some time.

"Why are you even here?" you cry out. Your composure is beginning to fray; and fear seeps in through the cracks, no matter how much you deny it.

"I told you already. I seek to use this connection to help you. Nothing more, nothing less; I mean you no harm," he says.

That hungry, sharklike gleam in his eye says otherwise.

Stay calm, you tell yourself. But all that you see in those glaring yellow slits are the eyes of the people killed on Dathomir. The campaign. Relentless days upon days of pushing the front. Cracked clone helmets buried in the bloody mud, their visors shattered. The sickening, pallid glisten of snapped bones littering the battlefield--and, worst of all, the people that you had to kill.

And for what? The campaign had failed. The Senate had moved on. Everyone had, and how you tried--but all you could see in your mind's eye was the vast expanse of dead bodies.

Presently, the man's voice cuts through it all. "So you've seen it. You're angry, aren't you?" His tone is level, considering. He knows what you're thinking about.

"How much do you know about the Force?" you ask, throwing caution to the wind.

"I know enough. Ask me the question you have in mind," he says dismissively.

You draw in a deep, steadying breath. "I've found this new ability, this new...skill. I can...reach into people's minds. It's not just mind tricks," you begin. More than simply mind tricks.

"Go on," the man implores. He blinks his innocent eyes, awaiting your response.

"I see things," you blurt out. "I reach in, and I can see their thoughts, their memories, almost like I'm digging through a cabinet. It scares me. It scares me because I don't know what it means. I want to know if it's the Darkside of the Force, so I can stop using it."

The man starts to say something, but hesitates. "Hmm.." Some odd feeling lit up his face, but he told naught of it to you. Malice, perhaps.

"Interesting. Very interesting. And you fear that this dooms you to the darkside. Unfortunately, I can't say I know anything of this ability." He seems to nearly laugh at that.

You want to say something more, but a strange sound fills your ears--a sound from the real world. The vision begins to shatter, reality bleeding into the cracks like spilled ink.

"Be careful who you trust," he calls out, a voice without a body once more.

* * *

You woke up.