Part One: Angel in Disguise.
Ben Skywalker was still amazed at just how much Tahiri Veila's presence affected him. Even though she was more than a decade his senior, she never failed to make his heart beat that little bit faster than was normal for a young man of his age.
There could be no doubt in anyone's mind that she was a very attractive woman: her long, wavy blonde hair framed her delicate face like a golden halo, a perfect compliment to her vivid green eyes and fair complexion. Despite her years spent beneath the scorching suns of countless planets, her skin remained milky white, a feature that added to the angelic portrait she presented to the galaxy.
Not that she was anywhere near as innocent in real life as she looked. Ben knew from past experience that Tahiri Veila was as hard as they came; she was tough, resourceful, and not afraid to get her hands dirty in any way. She was also fearless, an attribute Ben wished he shared with the fiery Jedi.
Her boldness was probably due to the horrors she witnessed in her youth at the hands of the Yuuzhan Vong. Tahiri never spoke about the war much, bar a few sarcastic remarks for the benefit of some of the older GAG members, but Ben could tell that she'd never really recovered from the events of those painful years.
As he gazed across at her diminutive form, curled inside the frame of a wroshyr wood chair, he took in the three raised scars that still rested on her forehead. They were faded now, almost barely visible to the untrained eye, the only physical reminder of just what she went through at the hands of those barbaric aliens. Ben remembered Tahiri telling him once that his late cousin, Anakin, had suggested she remove them. She'd insisted she needed them to stay, and Ben was secretly relived that she'd decided to keep them. He'd never tell her this, but he liked her scars; they made her seem more human, more approachable.
More like his mother than anyone he'd ever met.
He supposed that was part of the reason why he liked her so much. Tahiri was nothing like his mother in appearance, but in attitude, she and Mara were near identical. It was comforting, in a way, to have someone so similar to his mother so close, ready to be there for him whenever he needed. It made him feel as if his mother hadn't really left him at all, like she was still here with him, staring at him from the fathomless depths of Tahiri Veila's dark, emerald pools.
When Tahiri had asked Ben to meet her today, outside a small café just off the main drag, he hadn't even hesitated. He was always glad to see her, so any excuse to do so was a welcome one. He'd arrived early, waiting nearly a full hour before she stood before him in all her ethereal beauty, something that was only slightly marred by a vicious-looking purple bruise surrounding her left eye socket.
Ben had received a dismissive wave in response when he'd asked her about the origins of the violently coloured blemish, so he'd dropped the topic for the time being. If Tahiri Veila didn't want to tell you something, then no amount of pushing or force probing would loosen her tongue. He would just have to hope Tahiri trusted him enough to tell him the truth; force knows he trusted her implicitly.
She glanced his way then and flashed him a small smile as she raised a cup of steaming hot cocoa to her lips. Ben's father had gotten him hooked on the delicious drink back when he was very young, and more recently, Ben had passed his addiction on to Tahiri. She couldn't get enough of the stuff now, and the two Jedi had made it a sort of ritual to drink it whenever they met. It was a nod to Ben's heritage, one that he was sure his cousin, Jacen, would not approve of if he ever found out.
Speaking of Jacen, his name was one that had not yet come up in his conversation with Tahiri so far. It wasn't all that odd; they usually kept any GAG or Jacen-related banter to a bare minimum these days, but today Ben had asked about his cousin a number of times, all of which had been deftly avoided by his blonde companion. She was nervous, too, a feeling one didn't usually associate with Tahiri Veila. Her posture was relaxed enough, but in the confines of the force, she was all over the place. It was almost as if she was afraid, but Ben quickly dismissed that notion. Tahiri didn't feel fear - it wasn't possible.
Nevertheless, Ben knew there was something very wrong about this visit, and if Tahiri wasn't prepared to confide in him, then he'd just have to ask her outright, and hope for the best. Leaning forward on the edge of the table, Ben asked, "What are we doing here, Tahiri?"
Tahiri shifted in her seat and gave a nervous glance over both shoulders before replying, her tone just as agitated as her persona. "I need to know that you're with me, Ben, no matter what."
Ben was alarmed now. He'd never seen his friend act like this, not in all the years he'd known her. Only one thing could be behind her sudden spike of fear – that was the only word for it - Darth Caedus, his cousin.
"Tahiri, what's happened? What has Jacen done?" His brow furrowed with concern as he said this, and as Ben's cool blue eyes searched her face for some kind of sign, they fell on the dark purple bruise that covered nearly one half of her face. Anger flared inside him as his mind put the pieces of the puzzle together. There was no way that bruise was an accident.
He leapt up from his seat outside the café, reaching across the void to clutch at one of Tahiri's hands and tugging hard. "I have to get you out of here. We have to leave, now. My dad will be able to –"
Ben was too busy panicking to hear Tahiri's insistent protests, and only became aware of them when she managed to wrench herself free of his protective grasp.
"Sit down, Ben," she hissed, "You're making a scene."
"But your face," Ben spluttered. "He hit you!"
Tahiri winced at his outburst, her cheeks flushing pink under his regard. "It's nothing. He can do much worse, trust me."
"You mean he's done this before? Why didn't you tell me, I could have helped you?"
Ben let his fingers gently brush against the blonde's bruised skin, tracing the outline of the damaged area as a swarm of violent scenarios swam through his mind; Tahiri laying broken and bloody at his cousin's feet, her perfectly toned body cut and disfigured by a man who'd once considered her family.
It was too much for him to bear. He dropped his hand from her face and looked away, shutting his eyes against the sea of horrible images consuming his thoughts. Soft, warm flesh caught his hand as it fell to the tabletop, and a quivering voice whispered to him, begging for his attention.
"Ben, please, look at me."
He slowly opened his eyes and brought them back to hers, gasping inwardly as he saw the pain etched into her fair features.
"I need to know that you're with me, Ben, no matter what," she repeated, her voice quavering with the effort it took not to cry. "Please; I can't do this alone, I need you."
"Tahiri, I don't understand what you're asking me to do."
"I'm asking you to help me, Ben," the blonde said. Her grip on his hand tightened. "I'm asking you to help me take down Darth Caedus."
Ben sat in stunned silence for a moment, staring ahead at his friend, not wanting to believe he'd just heard her begging for his help to kill his cousin. He knew in his heart that something needed to be done to stop Jacen; the power of his new position as Chief of State of the Galactic Alliance had gone to his head, and he'd done many questionable things during his time as leader, including his apparent abuse of Tahiri Veila. However, Ben wasn't sure if he was prepared to take a stand of that magnitude against a man who was still, despite his more recent flaws, party of the Skywalker family.
His treatment of Tahiri aside (Ben would be speaking to his cousin about that in great detail very soon), many of the things Jacen, under the guise of Darth Caedus, had done had been for the benefit of the Galactic Alliance. While there was some things Ben would have done differently himself, he couldn't really fault his cousin for wanting to bring peace to the galaxy.
Besides that, even, was the fact that killing in cold blood was not the Jedi way. Even though Ben only had limited information on what Tahiri was proposing, he knew that her plan would not be one approved in the ways of the Jedi.
"Tahiri, I'm sorry, but I can't."
Tahiri let go of his hand and leaned back in her chair, her body now as far away from Ben's and the table as was possible. "I thought I could trust you with this, Ben, I really did," she mumbled, her green eyes focused at a point just above his right shoulder blade.
He watched dejectedly as a single tear rolled its way down the length of her face, over the middle of her bruised cheekbone and onto the edge of her finely shaped chin. "You can trust me, Tahiri, you can! I'll talk to Dad, I'll get you out of this nightmare and into safety. We can stop him, just not in the way you're proposing."
Her attention turned back to him then, her expression still as morose as before. "How can you say that, Ben? The man's a monster, he needs to be dealt with accordingly!"
"I know he's done some terrible things in his time," Ben reasoned, "But he's still my cousin, my family, and I can't kill him, no matter what he's done."
Tahiri's eyes hardened, her lips forming a grim line. "You have no idea the things he's done; what he did to Jaina, to me… to your mother."
"What do you mean?" Ben asked, his voice pitching unnaturally. "What did he do to my mother?"
He was almost too afraid to look as Tahiri produced a small object from the pocket of her black utility pants and placed it on the table in front of him. He picked it up between two fingers, slowly rotating it on its axis as he took in its patterned exterior.
It was a dart, painted red, blue and green, with a nib so sharp that it was bound to sting when inserted into the skin. He'd never seen one like this before, which meant that it was a rare one, possibly even a custom-made one unique to just one person. He set it back down on the table and looked back at Tahiri, who was eyeing him with a curious expression on her face.
"What does this have to do with my mother?"
"Everything," she replied. "That dart belongs to Jacen Solo, your cousin. It also happens to be the exact dart that killed your mother."
Ben's eyes widened as he stared at the small weapon, not wanting to believe that his mother's death had come at the hands of a family member, at the hands of her very own nephew. He'd asked Jacen outright if he'd killed Mara, not long after she'd died. His cousin had assured him that it was Lumiya, not he, who had callously murdered Ben's mother, and the evil Lady of the Sith had paid for her crimes at the end of Luke Skywalker's sword.
Jacen couldn't have killed Mara… it wasn't possible.
Tahiri must have sensed his disbelief, because she added: "He told me himself, Ben; it's true. Jacen killed Mara."
Ben shook his head, but it was a half-hearted attempt at denial. He knew in his heart of hearts that Tahiri was telling the truth, and why wouldn't she? She had no reason to lie to him.
"Why?" he asked her. His voice was so thick with unrepressed emotion that the word came out as a low croak, and he had to clear his throat before he could repeat the question. "Why did he kill her?"
"Because she got in the way? Because if he didn't, she would have killed him instead?" Tahiri put the dart back in the safety of her pocket and took hold of his hands once more. "There are many answers to that question, Ben, and none hold any real meaning for you. He killed her because he wanted to: he had a choice, and he chose to kill her rather than spare her life."
This Ben could believe easily, for he'd seen more than once his cousin's solution in dealing with people who got in his way. His mind was reeling with the revelations of the day, and an ocean of dark thoughts was threatening to engulf him, drowning out his usually mellow demeanour.
What he needed to do right now was think long and hard about what he'd just heard, and make decisions on how to deal with his cousin with a clear and concise mind, and not in the heat of the moment. He needed to tell his father the truth about his mother's death, before he did anything else.
"Ben, you know what Jacen's capable of. We can't hesitate on this; we need to stop him. If we don't, there's no telling who he'll target next – me, Jaina, your father…"
He tried to ignore them, but Tahiri's words hit a nerve with him. He'd already lost his mother to Jacen Solo's fury; he couldn't lose his father as well. Ben's pale blue eyes flashed a shade darker as he gazed into Tahiri's forest green ones, his mind coming to a fast conclusion of his next course of action.
"I need to hear you say it, Ben," Tahiri said, leaning so close towards him that their foreheads were almost touching across the table. "I need for you to tell me that you're with me on this."
"I'm with you," he told her confidently. "No matter what."
TBC.