Chain Reaction

Chapter 14 - Darth

Paige

"How can I concentrate when I'm about to fall from a hundred feet?!" She yelled.

They were both on top of the tall rock, Dooku was in the middle, while Paige was clinging onto the edge for dear life. She had been practicing her Force lightning up here for two days already. She had gotten the hang of zapping, but with low levels of lightning, a small amount of power. Today, she had zapped a rock so hard that she felt a recoil and got pushed back, she'd slipped and fell down, her legs found the edge of the rock and she fell over, her hands grabbing a ledge from the rock at the last minute.

"You're not focusing enough." Dooku replied, calmly.

Paige blew off a stray strand of hair from her forehead. She ignored the fast beating of her heart and closed her eyes. Taking in a deep breath then exhaling, she used her anger, and when she opened her eyes she then pushed up off the floor and used the momentum to wield the Force and have her ascend a tall height after she pushed upwards, she then dropped to the center of the rock. Straightening herself, she dusted off her hands against themselves.

"Now, concentrate the lightning on your palms. Feel it from your body. Use your anger. Use your hate. Fuel yourself, and release."

Paige nodded then clenched her fists. She closed her eyes and started to fuel herself with her emotion. Her eyebrows furrowed. She took in deep breaths. She felt for the Force. At first it came as a tingle in her fingers, this was how it began, she wanted to make it stronger, more powerful. Her knuckles were white, from the cold or from the pressure on her hands, she did not know. She felt it getting stronger.

A spark.

All of a sudden she saw a vision of Rey in her mind. It was just a flash, and then... nothing. She opened her eyes in surprise and lost all concentration as she tried to make sense of what just happened. It was not a memory, she realized as she tried to remember the vision, behind Rey was water. Just water. And she wondered if it had been a glimpse of Rey in the current time. If it was, then Paige was relieved her friend was alive.

"What is it? What made you stop?" Dooku asked.

Paige shook her head.

"Nothing. I got distracted." She mumbled.

Again, she closed her eyes. Slowly, she decided to open her hands, facing her palms forward. Feeling the Force, she took deep breaths, it was like meditating, except it was not. Her thoughts raged inside her mind, rage building from within her once again. Images of people she had met flashed in her mind's eye. Snoke, Phasma, Hux, Kylo, Poe, Leia... and she got angrier. There was a voice in her mind, it was hers, and it kept telling her she was a tool, not a person, it started to scream at her. Then other voices joined in her mind, voices of the people she had seen, and they all joined in the chorus of mocking her, taunting her. Just when Paige was feeling it all to be too much... they stopped.

She heard the sounds of faint laughter, it was not in her mind. It was from the real world. Paige opened her eyes and saw Dooku laughing with glee and pride.

"This is your power." He exclaimed, gesturing at her hands.

When she looked down, she finally noticed it, what he said. Her power. Her palms were filled with electricity, and bolts of lightning reached from her hands up to her forearms, stopping and sometimes overlapping at her elbow. She let out a breath of relief and held up one hand, astonished with the power that emanated from it. Her hands weren't sustaining damage, even though they were currently wrapped in electricity. She felt it, her power was stronger.

She held her head up as she noticed dark clouds starting to form in the sky again. A storm was brewing once again. Paige squinted at the sky, she sensed something was coming, and she was right. It had happened quick, lightning struck her, but before it could reach her or the ground, she had held her hand up, and she caught it. A bolt of lightning. At first it was as if she was battling the sky, for a moment she felt like it was pulling her up, like a tug-of-war of lightning, and in the end she had won. Dooku watched the scene unfold in front of him, as his daughter pulled the lightning bolt that struck her and was now holding it as if it were a rod in her hand. Thunder roared overhead and the sky darkened even more. She twirled the newfound weapon in her hand, feeling proud and shocked at the same time.