Star Wars: Twist of Destiny

Chapter Three - Nightfall

Dusk on Serenno seems to fall more rapidly than usual, the sun beating a hasty retreat from the chaos of the Capitol into the solitude of the forested hills.  Perhaps, the young Count muses, it is merely an illusion created by the thick smoke still hanging overhead; or perhaps he has simply lost track of time in the heat of battle.  He strongly suspects it is the latter, though, for he is exhausted. 

Up until now, he has not dared think of the lives he has taken already, both directly and indirectly... but now, in a rare moment of rest between waves of attacking troops, reality has time to sink in.  The smell of blood weighs the air with the stench of death, the echo of bombs in the distance resounding with the cries of the dying.  All around him, mangled metal and white-clad flesh litter the once-lush forest floor, oil and blood alike seeping into the ground and staining it dark to match the approaching night.

                     He buries his face in his robes in an attempt to escape the carnage, but it is of little use; for he realizes that the destruction is not just around him but on him, and in him, staining his garments and his very soul with the lifeblood of those lying below. He feels dirty, and he is struck with the sudden realization that he will never truly be clean again, even long after the last of the grime has been scrubbed from his body. For though Dooku is not one to shy from the necessary but unpleasant, he has never liked making a mess, especially where his reputation might be stained... and he is still inexperienced enough in his new role to be overwhelmed by his conscience. Preparation, he is learning, is no substitute for experience; harsh reality of war is incomparable, incomprehensible to the mind of one who has never seen it in person.

Because, in spite of all the hours he'd spent bracing himself for what was to come, justifying the lives he would take, he still cannot help but feel overwhelmed in the aftermath by the very real weight beginning to settle on his shoulders for the first time. Here, he knows, he killed for the first time. Here, he knows, lying somewhere amongst the figures strewn around him, is a different sort of casualty; the purity of a soul, the clarity of a conscience, the naïve conceptions of his old childish self. It almost feels strange to him to be alive when so much of him has perished; he knows, deep down, that the boy who ran so eagerly into the clearing hours before is dead and gone, replaced by a strange man who shares his name and his face and his vision but not his innocence.

A sudden wind stirs the hairs at the nape of his neck, sending a jolt down his spine and shaking him at once from his dark musings. Danger. He can sense it, feel it in the air, hear it in the deep, ominous rumble growing overhead.... Dooku's dark eyes snap open, wide and disoriented at first, but quickly settling into their usual determined focus. It takes him a moment to adjust to the dark; for the sun is gone now, its last determined rays eclipsed by the hulking Imperial cruiser looming above.  He shivers involuntarily as he is struck by an ominous, cold feeling; one that turns his very soul to ice and freezes him to the spot with terrified anticipation. Not good.

His very blood seems to freeze in his veins, his eyes locked upon the sky, as the Imperial ship descends over the city like a dark storm-cloud heavy with rain. He can do nothing but watch, stupefied in horror, as its enormous cannons swivel to aim toward the Capitol city; his outraged scream is the only resistance as thousands of years of prestige and culture are reduced to rubble in a hail of green laser-fire, as hundreds of civilians - his people - are gunned down in mere moments. His family, his home... All gone now, obliterated in the name of the glorious Empire. 

                          Although Dooku was never close to his family, he does still mourn their passing, for the last remaining pieces of his childhood that have died with them. He mourns the loss of so many innocent civilians, for the proud history and culture that has been reduced to little more than rubble.  But worst of all is the feeling of having failed, despite his best efforts - the Count is not a man accustomed to feeling helpless, and he decides that he hates the feeling, almost as much as he hates the Empire for what they have done.

Anger burns hot within him, melting away his fear as it bubbles to the surface in a furious, deadly rush... And then, abruptly, he explodes.  He can feel the power radiating from his body, expanding rapidly outward in the direction of the Imperial craft, pulsing through the air and stirring the debris around him.  Even the great ship above seems to shudder in space, as if it were a mere leaf being blown about in a furious wind.  The currents of the Force flow in him, and around him, as they never have before; his eyes widen in disbelief as he begins to realize his true power for the first time.

To a more experienced Force-user, the use of anger such as he has just displayed could easily be classified as Dark... but Dooku does not make any such distinction.  To his untrained eye, there is only the Force, vast and mysterious and powerful, and his emotions a means of connecting with it.  He is no Sith, and no Jedi, either; the only Code to which he is bound is that which lies in his own heart and mind, that which he chooses for himself with the guidance of the Force.  He is free, in the truest sense of the word - and, he realizes suddenly, for the first time in his eighteen standard years, his emotions are too.

Raised as he was in the strict conventions of Serenno's elite, he had learned the art of burying his feelings at a very early age.  Even as a toddler, his mother would get angry if he cried; as he grew older, nothing but the most impeccable of manners was tolerated.  Anger, sorrow, even joy - all were forbidden if they were deemed unsightly, and so over time all were banished, locked away deep inside him where not even his mother's scrutinizing glare could see them.  There they sat, forgotten, along with his potential, bottled to age like fine wine, growing more and more potent with time... Until at last, in one crucial, planet-shattering moment, they could be unleashed.  He had not thought he had it in him, anymore; he had never thought himself to be capable of such an uncharacteristic outburst. Maybe, he considers, he has changed even more than he had realized.  Maybe, he is someone entirely new.  And maybe, what he becomes next is up to him.

As Dooku looks back up at the Imperial cruiser, at the flames still dancing over his home-city, he resolves that whoever he is becoming, he will be great.

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Author's Note:  Thank you so much to everyone who read!  Please let me know your thoughts - any constructive criticism and/or feedback is very helpful, especially as I am not entirely certain as to the direction of this story.  If there's anything you'd like to see, just let me know, and I'll try to find a way to incorporate it! 

Also, if you enjoy reading about young Dooku, I recommend checking out my other Star Wars fic, which features his early apprenticeship along the canon timeline.  It's a bit of a character study, and includes chapters from his perspective as well as some from those around him as he begins to develop as a Jedi.

Thanks again for reading!
- Shadow