Hellbound

[Ashin Varanin]

It's possible that I'm a coward. I mean, I've always had better self-preservation instincts than most Mandalorians, but I look at an opportunity like this and I get goose bumps. Not in a good way.

Grandpa shows up after a long time gone, after I've been acting aliit'buir for weeks. He arrives in a vanilla shuttle from Corellia. He tells me a story that even I don't really believe, until he takes me to a stone archway on Dathomir. I walk through from noon to pitch black. No, there's a single bit of light, far away. Helmet sensors show the ground is rocky, uneven. Life-sign detectors are wonky, to say the least. This is the Netherworld, and I'm here in the flesh. My first instinct is to bail back through the gate, so I do.

Then Grandpa leads me around to the other side of the Dathomir gate. I walk through, and I find myself in what you might call an amplified version of the Dathomiri landscape. Higher peaks, steeper slopes, more colorful vegetation, larger animals, creatures and entities that I don't recognize.

"This," Grandpa says, "puts you on a level with the strongest Witches. Direct access to the Dathomiri spirit plane opens a lot of doors. It guarantees respect if you can hold onto it."

Something like a tornado crossed with a rotten log ambles past.

"That's a Woodrot," Grandpa says. "Elemental spirit."

I go back through the gate. After a minute, Grandpa joins me and I see disappointment in his eyes. "I'll have to look into this," I say lamely. Maybe I'm a coward. I don't like the Force.

"Well," he says, "tell me what you're thinking."

"I'm thinking I want to build a train from Dathomir to Coruscant, bust open the old rift, and drop a strike force on the One Sith capital while circumventing all defenses."

He nods tiredly; the idea clearly isn't new to him. "But?"

"But what we pioneer, someone else will rip off. Always. And then they have a direct line from Coruscant to-" I gesture around at real-world Dathomir. "Along with all those other worlds that had rifts during the Second Akala Crisis."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

"I agree," Grandpa says. "It's an insoluble problem for me. I want to destroy them and preserve us, and this opportunity puts those priorities directly at odds."

"Yup."

"Call me a coward, but I'm not about to make that decision for the entire Clan when I'm not long for this 'verse. It'd be like an outgoing chancellor making sweeping changes that would affect everything for everyone in his nation long after he was gone. I'm not comfortable with that."

"Grandpa, you created a witchy space mafia that owns a sector. You've declared one-man wars on the Sith and the Republic."

"And how many of our cousins have died for my audacity?"

"How many have lived better because of it? We can't roll over. We get hit, we reposition and we hit back and we keep hitting."

"But the key word is 'we.' I've made too many decisions for the Clan based on my own prejudices and grudges and opinions and judgment. I've tried to shape the self-image of millions of people, re-form them in my own image. I saw your father while I swam in the oasis. I saw him wandering, and knew he was wandering for the same reasons I'll wander. I knew I deserved it as much as he did, or was equally fitted to that state of existence. It's time for others to make decisions, Alec. You, Oren, all the rest."

"No."

"You studied at the Levantine Astronautical Academy."

"I dropped out."

"You explored the Kathol Outback all the way to Demonsgate."

"I lost my ship and half my crew."

"You raided Sith-occupied Coruscant."

"And blew up one tiny airspeeder base. A police station, basically."

"You've represented us on the alor council."

"And made bad decisions there."

"You ran the Theed Palace Space Vessel Corps of Engineers."

"I was ousted in a hostile takeover."

"You ran our most successful subsidiary."

"And promptly neglected it trying to kark someone else's girlfriend."

Grandpa blinks. "That one, I didn't know. My point is that for all your mistakes, you've learned. You've retained respect. You've been groomed, and it's worked; you're not the person you were, and that's known."

"I'm not ready."

"I spent three-quarters of my life buried under false humility. Don't make my mistake." He draws the sword he took from the Field of Blades. "I soaked this sword in the deadly river that winds through all the known Netherworld. You know which way to step, and when. You'll find a use for it, and it'll be one of many decisions you make. Find a way to balance preservation of the clan and annihilation of -- no, you know what? Find the clan's priorities. Be their leader, be one of them, listen better than I did. Make your own decisions, aliit'buir."

He hands me the sword, clacks his helmet against mine in a Keldabe kiss, and backs through the portal. And then he's gone.