Baby Theron learns a hard lesson
This is a shortish piece exploring young 13 year old Theron's thoughts, a few months before Zho leaves him and he gets the final nail in the coffin confirming he has no powers. Enjoy his distress (love him really).
3 months After the signing of the Treaty of Coruscant (ATC) - Mid Rim - Strabin Sector - Silla
Theron Shan had never before been as monumentally anxious, in such a dramatically claustrophobic space, as he was right now. He’d been in tight spaces before, Zho has had him crawling through cave systems, but never with so much on the line. He squeezed his eyes shut - although it was hardly necessary in the utter darkness - and tried counting to ten slowly, just like Master Zho had taught him whenever his nerves had gotten the better of him as a young boy.
1 rolling roach… 2 rolling roaches…
He took deep breaths with each count, focusing on the cool air flowing in and out of his nostrils. He could feel his heart hammering through his chest, threatening to run away from him and escape. He was surprised it wasn’t echoing through the small cargo box he was hiding in.
3 rolling roaches… 4 rolling roaches…
The sweet, earthy scent of freshly ground chak-root drifted from the surrounding crates, smothering him. He wondered if he risked getting high if he kept taking such deep breaths. He’d seen ground chai-root before, all fine and floaty, and definitely bad news. It was used as a snuff after all. He remembered Zho’s stern words on spice and snuff and deathsticks - you keep them at a far distance, or risk letting them haunt you forever. This mission was too important for accidental highs or new addictions, but the deep breaths were helping him too much so he just hoped everything would be fine.
His thoughts veered towards the mission ahead. He was perfectly in place now, it was all up to him. He peeled one eye open and peered through one of the small holes in the cargo box, careful not to make any noise that would alert the slavers to his location. He could see glimpses of the cargo hold, patches of light filtering through the gaps in the cargo boxes stacked in front of him. From this angle he couldn’t create a mental map of the room, but it didn’t matter. He could see the energy switch at the other side and that’s all he needed.
The slavers were keeping their cargo, alive and inanimate, in a cargo hold at the rear end of their compound, a cold, musty dump of a place hidden in the middle of one of Silla’s forests. Zho had been the one to sense panic from where they were trekking through the Sanau plains north west of here. It’d taken them all day and night, but they’d found the compound eventually. It was after scouting the area out that Theron had noticed the smugglers had a faulty generator. Because it could only generate so much power and the idiot genius who’d worked on the compound's wiring had set it up as a series, if they faulted any of the energy switches when the power was down, then the whole system would collapse. The only issue was that all the energy switches were inside, and were each temporarily ‘down’ for seconds at most, before the power returned. So, one of them had to be at the right place at the right time to short one, and since Theron was the only one that could fit into an empty cargo box, he’d volunteered. Zho was hesitant at first but he’d been insistent. After all, this was what a Jedi would do.
He just really wished he hadn’t thrown his slingshot away before he’d crawled into the cargo box. He’d convinced himself he wouldn’t need it, that the stress of the moment would trick him into using his long dormant force powers, but now, sitting here curled up in the dark with nothing but his thoughts to entertain him, he was really regretting that decision. It was his trusty slingshot, crafted with his own hands and tailored to his own needs. He should’ve kept it anyway, even if never ended up using it. He didn’t know if he’d ever see it again. Heck, even just to have it in his hands, to rub the notch in the wood he’d worn away over the years.
He’d hear when the energy switch would turn off. In an effort to save power the smugglers had routed the power so that it would alternate across the compound, leaving one energy switch off until the current returned, and another energy switch turned off. The cycle ran in hours rather than minutes, there were hundreds of switches and he could only see one. All he had to do was wait for the right moment to destroy it, and then Zho could come rushing in to free everyone.
Theron hadn’t seen much of the abducted children, but he could hear them. They were in a cell at the other end of the room, the buzz of a shock field a constant hum separating them from freedom - and a couple dozen armed slavers. Every now and then they’d whisper to each other and a slaver would shout at them to stop.
8 rolling roaches… 9 rolling roaches….
Flexing his hand in lieu of rubbing his slingshot, Theron ignored the sweat beading at his temple. It was freezing in the cargo room, but he was bottling up so much nervous energy he could light explosives with it. His eyes stayed steady on the energy switch, his pulse slowing. It was all he needed to focus on.
He heard distant shouting and a scuffle. The hairs at the back of his neck stood on end. He glued his face to the side of the box, eyes peering out of the holes, trying to get a better look. The shouting got closer and more panicked. He could hear it was a young boy’s voice. The door to the cargo hold burst open, a giant houk slaver marching in dragging a struggling togrutan boy by his montrals. Theron could only see glimpses of them, mostly just shadows on the far wall, the boy slippery in the houk’s grasp.
The houk backhanded him for that. Theron swore the force of that slap rang in his ears for seconds afterwards.
That was the moment the energy switch turned off. The lights in the room went down, the shock field still running on its own generator. This was the moment, he had to act now! Theron closed his eyes and tried reaching out, just like Zho had told him hundreds of times. The force was all around him, beautiful and bright, he should be able to feel it, to hold it, to ask it to help him reach across the room and smash that damn switch.
All he could sense running through his brain was sheer unadulterated panic.
The houk hadn’t finished teaching the boy a lesson. In the darkness Theron couldn’t see, but he could hear the boy begging for mercy and the houk’s violent response. His stomach churned like a whirlpool, his mind screaming ‘run’. He was a coward, a loser, pathetic…
The energy switch turned back on, and the lights in the room flickered on. His chance was over, it wouldn’t turn off again for another few hours and that boy didn’t have hours he had seconds. There was nothing he could do… not without risking his position. He’d failed them all, the boy and the rest of them behind the shock field.
Damn it! He heard the houk laugh, admiring the boy's tears, and something snapped in Theron. He jumped. The lid of his cargo box shattered as he stood up with such force he felt he could shatter mountains. He screamed as he ran at the houk, his small body slamming into the back of him. He landed a kick to his stomach and a punch to his pale, blubbery head, and the ugly thing screamed, disoriented by the young teenage boy who’d thrown himself at him. Theron had only moments to release all his vicious anger, before another slaver ran into the room and thumped him over the head. He was out instantly.
His head pounded like an old iron bell, ringing until his eyes felt like rubber and his temple throbbed. Dazed and aching, he peeled his eyes open ignoring how they burned. He heard hushed whispering to his side, several voices excited and nervous talking over each other.
“He’s crazy. Who runs at a houk like that?”
“Where did he even come from? Have any of you ever seen him before?”
“No, he’s human. Never lived with humans.”
“I don’t care who he is, he wiped that ugly slug’s mug, he’s alright in my books.”
Theron groaned, the voices layering in his head until all he could hear was white noise.
He managed to force out a question, “Where am I?”
“In the cargo hold genius. You’ve been thrown in with all of us.”
That set his mind alight. What? He was here to rescue everyone, not get caught himself. He tried getting up quickly, but his head swam with his movements.
“Careful, you took a nasty blow to the head.”
He shuffled onto his elbows slowly, and then up into a sitting position. He glanced at the kids all staring at him, his hand gingerly rubbing at the back of his head. He felt blood. That wasn’t good. They looked at him like he was about to fall apart, and they looked fragile themselves, all malnourished wide eyed aliens looking at him like he was an opportunity for escape.
He didn’t know how to tell them that he was completely and utterly useless, so he didn’t, instead he just said, “It’s alright, Zho will come to save us.”
But Theron wasn’t so sure about that. Zho was waiting for the energy across the compound to shut down, that was his signal for him to come in and wreck the place. He didn’t know Theron had been caught, he could be waiting out there for hours, all whilst the slavers shipped them offworld discretely. And just like that he’d entered this compound as a free boy, and might leave a slave. Damn it all.
The togrutan boy, the one with a swollen and cuts all over his face, looked at him funny, “Who’s Zho?”
Excited whispers echoed his response, “A Jedi? A Jedi is coming to save us?”
He shouldn’t have said anything. What if he’d given them false hope?
The togrutan boy picked up on the hesitation in his voice, “What do you mean maybe?”
“Maybe if he can find us.”
“You mean he doesn’t know where we are?”
“I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry.”
A pantoran girl, the eldest and biggest of the group, placed her hand on his back and held him gently. He wanted to shrug her off, not because she was ugly, or mean, or smelly, she was none of those things. He wanted to shrug her off because he felt like he didn’t deserve her kindness and sympathy. Instead he just kept very still and willed his anxious breathing into sync. He couldn’t break apart now. They didn’t deserve that.
Hours later when his hope was thin, and his pride in tatters, Zho burst into the cargo hold, lightsaber blazing in his hand, his eyes wild with fear. Theron had never seen Zho look so distraught before, and he’d never seen such sheer relief on his face either, as his eyes locked on him and the other abducted children. Zho bust them out in a flurry of smoke and fire, and they all made it out, free, smuggled child-slaves no more.
Zho had done a thorough job of ransacking the place, but in case any slavers had escaped and called for back up, Zho had taken them all deep into the forests of Silla so that they could lie low for a few days before he could send them off planet to the nearest safe haven for abducted children. From there they could be taken back to their families once the tricky work of identifying them had been done. In celebration of their newfound freedom Zho had created a huge bonfire, barbecuing fish Theron had caught in the nearby river with his net invention he’d scraped together once he’d noticed that some of the fish liked to jump up the rapids upstream. They ate and ate until their faces shone with the oil of the fish, their fingers sticky and stinking. They washed their hands in the cool, sparkling river before the children sang, teaching each other songs, and dancing around the fire, Zho playing his makeshift wooden flute poorly.
It’d be magical, their joy almost infectious, if Theron didn’t hate himself for his failure. He’d skulked away from the festivities in the shadow of the night, so he could sit by the river and brood. He’d failed utterly today. Without Zho he’d be a slave, fated to be shipped off to galaxy knows where alongside the children he was supposed to save. Where was this force, this power that Zho had promised him was out there? Why couldn’t he feel it? What sort of Jedi would he be if he remained so straightforwardly useless?
The crack of a branch snapping broke him out of his funk. He whipped his head around, fearful it was an escaped slaver who’d come to take his revenge. Theron heaved a sigh of relief when he realized it was just the togrutan boy, or Samil as he’d learnt he was called.
“What are you doing here?”
Theron winced, he hadn’t meant to sound so defensive.
Luckily Samil didn’t seem to take any offense, “Looking for you. Noticed you weren’t out there celebrating with the rest of us.”
“Oh, I’ll join the fun later, I just want to be alone for a bit.”
Samil nodded, his one swollen eye still closed and bruised, “Hint taken, I’ll leave in a second. I just wanted to ask you something. If you’re Zho’s apprentice, were you trying to help us escape?”
Theron closed his eyes to the question, the taste of bile thick in the back of his throat. He’d hoped that nobody would ask him that question, but that’d be too easy wouldn’t it.
He opened his eyes, willing his voice to hold steady, “Yes, that was the plan. Didn’t work out.”
“Why not? Aren’t you training to be a Jedi?”
“You’re really rubbing salt in the wound.”
Samil balked at that, “I’m not trying to.”
Theron took a moment to take a deep breath in. His heart was racing as fast as it was in the slaver’s compound.
“I know you aren’t,” he paused for a moment and Samil looked relieved. Then he continued, “I thought I’d be able to connect to the force when it mattered. I’m supposed to close my eyes, feel it binding everything around me, a light so pure, so beautiful, it clears all darkness. I’m supposed to feel it connecting to me and I’m supposed to use it.”
With his eyes squeezed shut he reached his hands out, focusing on a rock by the river bed. He willed it to move, to gently float in the air and spin before settling back down again. He peeled one eye open hoping for a miracle. The rock lay completely still, as unmovable as a mountain.
He looked at Samil like his patheticness was as obvious as the night was dark, “I can’t do it.”
Samil’s gaze lingered on the rock. Theron could only guess what he was thinking. Why was he traveling with a Jedi if he couldn’t even lift a rock? Who did he think he was breaking into that compound and expecting to save them all? It was embarrassing.
Samil said none of that, “What does it matter?”
Theron’s brain short circuited. He hadn’t expected that, “What?”
“You barreled head first into that slug just to save me, what does it matter if you can’t lift a rock?”
Theron didn’t know what to say. Eventually he managed a response, “But I got caught. I saved no one.”
Samil shrugged, “Yeah maybe. You’re still alright in my book.”
The sound of another pair of footsteps pulled both their attention to the trees lining the bank. Zho’s warm face emerged from between them, his stride purposeful and long, “He’s right you know. You are far too hard on yourself, Theron.”
“It will come when the time is right, as long as you keep listening. Your doubts will cloud your ears, you must let them go and listen.”
Theron had heard this all before, he’d been listening since he was practically a newborn. If the sound hadn’t come yet would it ever? He nodded, worn by his disappointment and eager to forget everything.
Zho pulled him in by his shoulders, his large, inviting framing hanging over him, “You’ll be fine my boy, don’t worry. Let’s return to the fire, it’s chilly by the river.”
Samil agreed, eager to get back to the fun and Theron followed along silently. He was quiet the rest of the night but he always smiled whenever anyone glanced at him. They had good reason to be happy, and he knew he should be grateful that everyone was safe and joyful. It was just difficult to convince his heart of the same.
By morning the fire had dwindled and the children had slept cuddled up to each other in a big, warm heap. They’d stayed up late telling each other stories of their homes and the moment they’d been stolen from their families to be slaves. Together they’d comforted each other until they could all sleep soundly.
Leaving them to sleep, Theron had disappeared to the river to fill up his flask with fresh, cool water. On his way back he heard a commotion, the sound of voices yelling, and feet running. He rushed back into the clearing where they’d set up camp to see all the children gathering around something, their voices excited rather than distressed. Heart still thundering from his adrenaline spike he walked up to them gingerly, somehow sensing that something was wrong.
But something wasn’t wrong, quite the opposite in fact. The children parted as he got closer, their eyes pinned to him. In the middle stood Samil, an ear splitting grin stretched across his face, his eyes alight with wonder. His hands were out in front of him and a rock, far bigger than any Theron had ever tried to lift, was floating in the air between them.
Samil burst into a flurry of energy as soon as his eyes locked on Theron, “I followed what you said last night. I closed my eyes, felt this energy around me- I had no idea I could do this!”
Theron’s smile was stiff. He should be happy for Samil, really he should, but instead his stomach sank.
Samil smiled and the ground fell beneath him.
(Want more of this - I've just started a long fic where Theron is one half of a chaotic duo - there'll be a lot more of him. Follow along on Ao3 here - https://archiveofourown.org/works/73954831/chapters/192915106 )
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