Crossroads

Pain

Warning: This chapter contains scenes of torture (force torture, physical torture, etc) 

Read at your own risk.

I was dreaming.  I know I was, because I was reliving that nightmare of a day. The day the Clones turned on me, the day my world shattered for good. Only, in the dream, I couldn't get away. I was somehow tugged back to the shooting, where the clones and Fox stood over me and continued to pelt me with bullets.

I awoke in a sweat, and when I reached to wipe the cold sweat from my brow, chains clanked in my ears. Blinking away the terror, I took in my unfamiliar surroundings. I was chained to a wall, feet and hands shackled, in a dark chamber. Small lights lined the ceiling, but there was no light in the room other wise. There were no windows, no chairs- nothing. 

I could sense darkness here. Many Jedi had died in this very room; I could hear their pain, their screams of panic and desperation through the Force, echoing in my ears. They had perished here, in this room, at the hands of someone who was surely going to kill me as well.  

My existence wasn't exactly sunshine and rainbows. My life the past few years couldn't even be called a life. It was hiding, running, living as a fugitive in the vain hope that someday, I would no longer be hunted like an animal. If I was to be killed here, at least I would join my fallen Jedi and become a part of the living Force. 

"Don't bank on it." 

 A deep voice made me jump slightly in the chains. I winced at the positon-- I was spreadlike a starfish against the wall. At leats my garments and clothes were intact, though I could feel that my saber was no longer at my hip.

"We took that from you when you arrived."

I couldn't find out where the voice was coing from. The room was too dark, and my eyes had not yet adjusted to the darkness. My head also throbbed from the stun gun, my brain still fuzzy from sleep and my nightmare. 

"Where am I?" My voice was hoarse and raspy. I didn't even sound like myself. Then again, I likely didn't look the best either. 

"What were you doing on Takodana?" The voice had an edge to it, an edge of anger and impatience. I would rather my question be answered before I was asked one in return.

"I shall answer your question once you are done answering mine." 

Oh, crap. 

Whoever had me trapped in here, whoever this as, was most definetly a Force user. I could read one's thoughts, but never so quickly. This was a skilled Force user. I had to be careful with my thoughts -- they could betray me even if I did not utter a word. 

"I have lived on Takodana for years." 

"Are there more of you?" The Empire must somehow believe I was in contact with other surviving Jedi, or I was protecting the whereabouts of them. This was one area where I didn't have to lie in. 

"I haven't had any contact with Jedi in years." Again, the truth.

"Somehow, I do not believe that answer." The man hissed. I could still see nothing of him except his eyes. Even shrouded in darkness, they gleamed-- a bright yellow and red mixed together. A Sith Lord, no doubt. I had read about them at the Temple-- their power, their emotions that drove their abilities. And their eyes-- how, when the Dark Side took over, their eyes would morph into a bright amber.

I couldn't breathe as the man constricted by throat with the Force. A few gasps squeaked out, but I tried to save my breath. My throat burned, as did my lungs. Stars dotted my vision as he increased the pressure-- it was as if his hand itself had a vice grip around my small throat.  I moved against the chains, desperate for any sort of air. My legs could barely move from where they were constrained, and my wrists ached from the friction. 

"How many Jedi are stil out there!?" He yelled. 

The pressure softened on my throat enough for me to answer-- "None, I don't know. There aren't many left." 

He slammed my head agaisnt the wall, a whip of pain blossoming from the back of my skull. My head throbbed, my throat ached again as he increased the pressure. 

This was what so many before me had endured; this torture, this pain.

"My sources tell me there are only two surviving Jedi left. You weren't accounted for. Now, who are you?!" His voiced thundered through the chamber. 

"Takodana...since...Clones." I rasped. My head was aching so much so that I could barely see anymore. My eyes could not stay open, and my brain was rapidly losing oxygen. This man could suffocate me within a matter of seconds. I would likely die in here if he kept up with this. 

The pressure dissapeared from my throat and I gasped for breath as if I had been underwater for a millenia. I cough and sputtered, my lungs screaming in relief. But the relief did not last long. With a few strides that echoed, he stood in front of me now. He was shoruded in darkness, and his eyes were the only part I could still see. 

A gloved hand wrapped around my throat--again??- and slammed me back into the metal wall. I held back a wince.

"Now, I am going to ask you this again, so I don't have to take apart your mind-- who else is out there??"  

I could feel the anger radiating off of him in waves-- I could sense the rage, the anger, the annoyance. The power. I met his amber eyes and shook my head again. I didn't know anything about what this man wanted. As far as I knew these past few years, I had been alone in the galaxy. The last remaning Jedi. Thankfully, I had been wrong.

The man growled under his breath. 

And then the pain came again. Mental pain now. He kept his hand around my throat, but applied very little pressure as he sifted through my mind, my memories. He could see my past, the past I still knew very little about since I somehow could not remember. He could see my training, my time with Master Windu and Yoda and Ashoka. 

"Stop, please." I begged as tears sprung into my eyes. I felt violated as he sorted through my mind, feeling my emotions and thoughts. Being physically hurt was one thing. Being psychologically tortured was another. 

"Please, please.  I don't know anything!" I yelled. 

He could see that fateful day on Naboo, my fear, my panic, when my friends and comrades turned against me. The sheer weight of defeat as I fled into the galaxy, searching for a remote planet. Those firts few months of cold, lonely nights. My fear, my lonliness, my heartache.

I felt angry, hurt, betrayed. Violated. Emotions I had been taught for so long to not have, to repress if I felt them blossoming, bubbled within me like an active volcano. 

"STOP!" I screamed. In a flash, his hand disapeared from my throat, the pain gone from my mind, as the man was thrown back a few feet. I was breathinhg heavy, and for a moment, I felt a spark within me. A spark that threatened to grow into a blazing inferno. What it powered and what it was, I did not know. 

But I had just pushed this Sith Lord, this powerful Lord, away from me. I had tapped into something in me I had never known existed. 

The man was silent. I wished I could read his thoughts, but I felt confusion coming off of him. And what I could only describe as... surprise? 

He waved his gloved hand in front of me. But this time, instead of pain, darkness and sleep overtook me.