It was a Sith artifact. Now Anakin knew the origin of the disturbance he had detected. It grew stronger, and he felt nausea rise in his throat.
He tried to sit up, but the chair now seemed to hold him down.
Mellora turned the cube in her hands. "At first I found the images disturbing. But Granta talked to me about them. Power can be disturbing.
That's where its beauty lies. Do you understand?"
Anakin's tongue felt thick. "No." He had been so foolish.
So incredibly foolish and na?ve. He saw the mug on the table in front of him.
He had drained every drop. He wasn't tired. He was drugged.
"Don't worry, we didn't poison you," Tic said. "It's because we have respect for the Jedi that we did this. We know it's the only way to slow you down."
Tic's voice had not changed. He still sounded friendly and warm.
"We've immobilized you in order to talk to you. We don't wish to harm you."
"We only wish to discuss the Force," Mellora said.
The other faces turned to him. Now their bright interest, he saw, was not interest at all. It was not so simple. It was greed. They were ravenous for information about him. He had thought he was learning from them, but all the time, they were studying him.
"Mellora and I are the only scientists here," Tic said. "I'm afraid I lied to you about my friends. We are simply a group of ordinary beings who are interested in the extraordinary. We have a common interest in the Force."
"We wanted to find a Force-sensitive being to talk to about it,"
Mellora said.
In other words, Anakin thought, they were a Sith cult. No matter how friendly they seemed. No matter how much they wanted him to think they were harmless. He had tangled with a Sith cult before. Although they weren't Force-sensitive, they were drawn to the dark side and they could be dangerous.
But why Tic Verdun? He was a respected scientist.
And how do you know that? You don't know anything about him except that you liked him.
Anakin thought back to the mission on Haariden. He had liked Tic because Tic had seemed to understand him. He had been the bravest of the scientists, too. He had been the one to go off and scout for patrols. He had risked his life, they said..
He had been gone for hours, they said..
"Do you understand?" Tic asked him softly. "Do you, Anakin Skywalker?"
"You are Granta Omega," he said.
"Very good." Tic turned to the others, pleased. "You see how his mind continues to work? On an ordinary being, that drug would immobilize his thoughts as well as his legs."
Anakin thought about trying to rise. He thought he would have enough strength to reach the door. He had not begun to tap into the Force yet.
Wait. That's what Obi-Wan would say. He had enough strength for one try. He knew that. And if he had enough strength for only that, he had better plan it.
"Back on Haariden, you said the Force frustrates you," Tic said.
No. l spoke hastily. It was because of what happened with Darra. But Anakin said nothing. He did not want to have a conversation with Tic.
Omega. He found it unnerving to see the same friendly look in his bright eyes, the good humor on his face.
"That interested me," Omega said. "I thought, this Jedi is different.
He recognizes not only what power is, but what it isn't. What it can be.
Power is protection. It is what stands between you and losing what you have. I'm not talking about material things, either. I'm talking about
everything."
Anakin didn't understand. But then, he didn't want to.
Tic leaned forward. His warm eyes met Anakin's.
Not Tic. Granta Omega. He is not your friend.
The words Tic and Omega blurred in his mind. He remembered a man sitting on a snowy mountainside, his skin knitted together with synth- flesh. He could not reconcile the two images, the two men. It all seemed unreal.
"I've asked about you," Omega said. "I know you. I know you because I grew up like you. I wasn't a slave, but I might well have been. My mother worked at things she should not have, harder than she should have, longer than she should have just for me."
My mother did the same.
"My mother worked herself to death for me," Omega said.
I can only hope that Shmi is well and safe.
"What is the Force for, if not to protect what you have? Why should you give that up because you are a Jedi? The Force can bring you all the power you need. Yet the Jedi tell you that you must have nothing. Why is that?"
"Ours is a path of service," Anakin said.
"And who do you serve? The Senate?" Omega laughed softly. "A group of fools who can be bought?" "We serve justice."
"Whose?"
"Justice does not have a master."
"Shouldn't it?" Omega leaned back again, resting against the pillows.
"I am just a seeker, as you are. You have been told that the Sith belong to the dark side. Yet the Jedi know little of the Sith. What you don't know could fill galaxies. Well, you do know one thing that there is one Sith still alive. I know this, too. I wanted to be rich enough to find that Sith. Then one day I realized that was wrong. The only way I would find a Sith is if I was rich enough,