Senator of Naboo
// Praxon Estate
// Naboo
// Evening
The sun was dying over Naboo. Deep violet and bruised amber bled across the horizon, casting long, skeletal shadows through the high stone archways.
Dominic sat frozen on the terrace. He had not blinked in minutes.
Around him, the estate grounds stretched out in severe, geometric perfection. Manicured boxwood hedges formed sharp, green labyrinths. Tiered marble fountains spilled water with a rhythmic, heavy splash that only amplified the silence. White stone colonnades framed the horizon, looking less like a home and more like a classical tomb.
Seven days of this. Three weeks since the dark sider tore his mind apart.
His face was a ruined sculpture of hollows and sharp bone. A week of near-total starvation had left his skin pale, almost translucent under the fading twilight. When they forced food between his lips, he chewed with a slow, mechanical detachment. Just enough to keep the heart beating. Just enough to stay trapped in his own head.
The doctors had given up. Neuro-scans couldn't fix a soul shattered by a force mind probe.
So the family turned to a gamble. They called upon his obsession: the Outbound Flight project. They called on them to send someone, a volunteer who could update him on the mission's progress.
The iron gate groaned.
The aged family caretaker led the visitor down the gravel path, past the sculpted cypress trees. The old woman's shoulders were hunched with grief. She stopped at the edge of the stone terrace, her eyes wet as she turned to the younger woman.
"Thank you for coming, Miss Sah," she whispered. The fountain drowned out her trembling voice. "Seven days. Not a word. We think... if he sees some mission reports, if he hears about the work...it might spark something. Please. The open sky is the only thing that keeps the terror out of his eyes."
The caretaker stepped back.
Tatiana was left alone on the stone terrace, facing a man who looked exactly like the statues around him.
// Naboo
// Evening
The sun was dying over Naboo. Deep violet and bruised amber bled across the horizon, casting long, skeletal shadows through the high stone archways.
Dominic sat frozen on the terrace. He had not blinked in minutes.
Around him, the estate grounds stretched out in severe, geometric perfection. Manicured boxwood hedges formed sharp, green labyrinths. Tiered marble fountains spilled water with a rhythmic, heavy splash that only amplified the silence. White stone colonnades framed the horizon, looking less like a home and more like a classical tomb.
Seven days of this. Three weeks since the dark sider tore his mind apart.
His face was a ruined sculpture of hollows and sharp bone. A week of near-total starvation had left his skin pale, almost translucent under the fading twilight. When they forced food between his lips, he chewed with a slow, mechanical detachment. Just enough to keep the heart beating. Just enough to stay trapped in his own head.
The doctors had given up. Neuro-scans couldn't fix a soul shattered by a force mind probe.
So the family turned to a gamble. They called upon his obsession: the Outbound Flight project. They called on them to send someone, a volunteer who could update him on the mission's progress.
The iron gate groaned.
The aged family caretaker led the visitor down the gravel path, past the sculpted cypress trees. The old woman's shoulders were hunched with grief. She stopped at the edge of the stone terrace, her eyes wet as she turned to the younger woman.
"Thank you for coming, Miss Sah," she whispered. The fountain drowned out her trembling voice. "Seven days. Not a word. We think... if he sees some mission reports, if he hears about the work...it might spark something. Please. The open sky is the only thing that keeps the terror out of his eyes."
The caretaker stepped back.
Tatiana was left alone on the stone terrace, facing a man who looked exactly like the statues around him.
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