Random story for Imperial agent Arvallon, in my attempt to work through what the class storyline has done to him. This takes place a month or so after the agent story ends, but before Makeb. Warnings for disturbing dream stuff and for spoilers, though I tried not to mention anything specific.
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Aftershock-
1. A quake of lesser magnitude, usually one of a series, following a large earthquake in the same area.
2. A further reaction following the shock of a deeply disturbing occurrence or revelation
The dreams all started the same; it was the faces that changed each night. Tonight it was Kaliyo who stood behind his prone body, the vibroknife in her hand dripping his blood onto the floor. “You never should have trusted me, agent,” she told him mockingly. “It just makes it easier to cut you down.” Arvallon’s back was throbbing and he could feel his lungs already filling with blood, but he tried to answer her anyway. “I never did trust you,” he managed. “It was all in your head.”
He gasped in pain, and suddenly it was Keeper looking down at him, her face sorrowful. “You’re not supposed to form attachments,” she said. “Do you remember why?” He couldn’t speak; the blood was filling his throat now, choking him. “Because you never know who you’ll be sending to their death next,” she reminded him sadly.
Abruptly the pain and the blood vanished, though the knife in the Minister’s hand still dripped red. “I tried to do the right thing. I failed,” he said in a monotone. It was surprising he could speak at all, with his throat slit practically from ear to ear. “This is the price of failure, Cipher,” he continued. “Remember that.”
“Arvallon.”
Now the Minister morphed into Hunter, and the knife became a syringe. He - she? he could no longer tell - bent down and stuck him with the needle, and the burning began, the same sensation he’d felt on Quesh when he’d injected himself. “You should have kept your programming, it would have made things a lot easier.” Arvallon wanted to scream, but his body no longer obeyed him. The pain spread with the serum, burning through his brain and spine, then his entire body, every muscle seizing up in agony.
“Arvallon! Wake up, please!”
He sat bolt upright, covered in a cold sweat. Temple’s hand on his shoulder burned; he flinched away from it before he could stop himself, and she snatched her hand back as if afraid she’d hurt him. “You.. you were..” she began hesitantly, then stopped to swallow. “Another dream?”
It must have been bad to frighten her that much. Arvallon took a moment to concentrate on slowing his ragged breathing. The room was dark, but he could feel the bedsheets beneath him and Temple’s warmth beside him. He was in his room, on his ship - he was home, he was safe. Temple touched his shoulder again, lightly, and he reached up to cover her fingers with his own.
“It was just a dream,” he said as gently as he could. “I’m fine. Go back to sleep, Raina.” She lay back down, though he could feel her eyes on him until he stretched out beside her and allowed her to spoon up against his side.
He waited until he was certain she was asleep, then extracted himself from the bed. He left the room and headed to the bridge, pausing only to grab a shirt on his way out. The bridge was still dimly lit, and he had no problem finding his personal holoterminal and flipping it on.
He started going through the latest reports Keeper had sent, trying to drown his nightmares in work... without much success.
I’m fine, he’d said, but he knew that he wasn’t. How much of the changes in himself were from the stress of the last few months, and how much were from the effects of the serum? He’d thought his freedom was worth any price, but now he was no longer sure.
How much damage had the IX serum done to him?
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