Star Wars_ Darth Bane 02_ Rule of Two - Drew Karpyshyn [44]
In the moments after his escape from the orbalisk chamber, he’d tried prying the one on his chest loose with the hunting knife from his boot, to no avail. Failing that, he had tried to dig it out by carving away the surrounding flesh. He’d drawn the knife across his chest in a long, straight line, feeling the agony of the blade slicing deep enough to cut through skin and muscle. And then he’d watched in amazement as the wound healed itself almost instantly, the creature having somehow caused his tissue to regenerate.
Bane had tried the Force next, probing deep inside to better understand what was happening to him. He could sense the creatures feeding on his power, gorging themselves on the dark side energies coursing through every fiber and cell of his being. But though they were parasites, they were also giving something back. As they fed, they pumped a constant stream of chemicals into his body. The alien fluids burned like acid as they were absorbed into his circulatory system; it felt as if every drop of blood were boiling … but the benefits were too powerful to be ignored. In addition to his miraculous healing abilities, he felt stronger than he ever had. His senses were keener, his reflexes quicker. And on his chest and back where the creatures had latched on, their virtually impenetrable shells would serve as armor plates capable of withstanding even a direct strike from a lightsaber.
The relationship, he had finally realized, was symbiotic—as long as he could endure the constant searing pain of the alien fluids being absorbed and metabolized in his bloodstream. A small price to pay, Bane had decided before turning his attention to the Holocron. Sitting cross-legged on the hard floor of the antechamber inside Nadd’s crypt, he reached out tentatively with the dark side and brushed his hand against the small, crystal pyramid. Responding to his caress, it began to glow.
For the next four days and nights he lost himself in the secrets of the ancient artifact. As he suspected, it had been created by Freedon Nadd. Bane delved into the Holocron’s secrets with the aid of the gatekeeper: a miniature hologrammic projection of the long-dead Sith Master responsible for its creation. The gatekeeper guided and directed his studies, serving as a virtual mentor to those who sought out Nadd’s lost secrets inside the sinister pyramid.
Though Nadd had been human, his avatar was the image of a man who had succumbed to the physical corruption that sometimes affected those who delved too deeply into the power of the dark side. His skin was pallid, the flesh withered and sunken, and his eyes were glowing yellow orbs devoid of iris or pupil. Despite this, he still appeared as a formidable warrior: broad-shouldered, clad in heavy battle armor and the helm that had doubled as his crown when he had proclaimed himself king over the nearby world of Onderon.
Through the gatekeeper, Bane learned of the Dark Master’s experiments with the orbalisks, and his only partly successful efforts to control their power. He discovered not only what they were called, but also all the details of their ecology. Some of the information merely confirmed what he already knew: once attached to a host the orbalisks could not be removed. But he also learned that, in addition to boosting a host’s physical abilities, it was possible to tap into the parasites’ ability to feed on the dark side to greatly increase one’s own command of the Force.
However, Nadd’s research also warned of several dangerous side effects of infestation that went beyond the constant physical pain. Should one of the organisms somehow be killed, it would release rapidly increasing levels of toxins, killing its host in a matter of days. The orbalisks would also grow over time, slowly spreading until they covered his entire body from head to toe. Fortunately, along with this disturbing