Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 07_ Conviction - Aaron Allston [38]
When all were seated, Taru continued. “Thei is currently in a mesmeric state, one that enhances her mental connection to the Force. She will hear only me … I hope. Thei, can you hear me?”
The young woman spoke, her voice very quiet. “Yes.”
“You know where you are. Safe, surrounded by friends and protectors.”
“Yes.”
“We are going to recall an earlier time, but you will remember always that you are here, that there is no danger to you.”
“I’ll remember.”
“It’s just past the spring planting. You’re five years old. You and your mother are going in to Ruby Gulch. Why?”
“Cloth … There are bolts of cloth to pick up. I’m going to have a dress …”
“You ride out on your cu-pa.”
“Her name is Sparkle.”
“Yes, Sparkle. Can you see Sparkle for me?”
The young woman did not answer, but glints of light appeared at points on the geode’s interior, then flashed from crystal to crystal. In moments the glows resolved themselves into a wavering image of one of the two-legged beasts, this one long-furred, young, unusually long-legged. It turned its head to look at the viewers.
“Good. Now you’re on Sparkle, heading to Ruby Gulch.”
The image wavered, and abruptly the cu-pa was saddled, with an adult woman and a little girl, both brown-haired and similarly bundled against cold weather, in the saddle. The cu-pa vanished, replaced by a view of its neck and head from directly behind, a child’s-eye view from the back of the riding creature. Now there was noise, too, vibrating from the geode as though it were a speaker of ancient design, the thup-thup-thup of the cu-pa’s stride in the dust.
But the image would not stay consistent. First it showed a bleak gravel-encrusted wasteland ahead, then a woman’s face from below, then views of Sparkle without riders, with or without saddle, from the side, all in a swirling kaleidoscope of brief glimpses.
The images began to cycle, repeating themselves with variations.
Taru glanced at Luke. “She doesn’t want to go forward.”
“Ah.”
“It’s here we define and insulate the first memory vein.” Taru reached a hand, flat, palm down, over Thei’s forehead and closed his own eyes.
Luke felt something, a tenuous vibration in the Force. The image in the geode contracted just slightly, was outlined in a faint golden glow.
Taru opened his eyes. “Now we have identified a specific set of memories—with some patients, they could be hallucinations instead—that abut the ones that truly cause trouble. We surround them with our own identities, our own projections in the Force, like sheathing them in a flimsiplast casing.”
Luke glanced at the youngsters. Both were rapt, their attention on the geode images and Thei’s face.
“Thei, you need to go on.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re safe. I’m here. There are Jedi here to protect you. Nothing will hurt you.”
Thei whimpered. But she did go on. Suddenly the image’s surroundings were foothills, crags of stone and spurs of crystal, as night fell.
Then they were in a cave, deep within it, the outside suggested only by a distant patch of stars at ground level—the cave mouth. Much closer, Thei’s mother had set up a little grill—a stainless-durasteel grating, half a meter square, atop a rectangular pan just smaller than that. In the pan was a can of heating fuel, ignited, and atop was a good-sized saucepan with liquid in it, beginning to simmer.
Taru gestured at the geode, a complex series of hand motions that reminded Luke of the sort of signed Basic used by elite military forces and deaf species.
A smell flowed through the room. Luke saw the others react to it, too. Topato soup, thick and heavy, flavored with spices. It startled Luke to be smelling a meal from fifteen years earlier. He could sometimes do that within his own memory, but to experience it from someone else’s was a novelty.
The image changed again. It had to be showing a later hour, still within the cave. Thei’s mother was