Chapter

3

INFIRMARY, JEDI PRAXEUM; YAVIN 4

The black material of Zak's robe swished gently as he slipped into it, noticing that it was a little tighter since the last time he had worn it. He walked slowly toward the door separating the observation ward from the recovery ward and stopped.

It had been eight months since he and Jaina had fled from the clutches of the self-styled Sith Lord, Darth Pravus. Eight months since they had arrived at the galactic capital world of Coruscant and met up with Luke Skywalker, who had taken them straight back to the Praxeum on Yavin 4.

For most of those eight months, Zak had been a prisoner. He wasn't a prisoner in the way that indicated that he was treated with overt hostility, or that he'd been bound, or thrown into the Praxeum's detention cell. He'd been a prisoner in that he'd been in total isolation for roughly seven of those eight months back on the moon.

What little he knew; he had been … unwell.

Luke Skywalker, Rebekah Jordon, the resident Shi'ido Wanom Catoxle, and Jacen Solo had frequently visited him during his indisposition, and during the subsequent recovery, and eventually some of what had happened had been explained to him.

From what they'd told him, when Zak and Jaina had arrived on Coruscant, they'd been set upon by Pravus, who had followed them. Jaina had fought him off for a few moments until she'd been incapacitated.

But that much Zak was able to remember on his own. It was the rest that he couldn't recall.

According to the recount, Luke Skywalker arrived in a timely manner to distract the Sith from killing Jaina while Zak took her unconscious form back into the ship they had stolen. After doing so, apparently he had then left the ship and duelled not only Pravus, but Skywalker as well.

Though the elder Jedi did not want to get into it in much detail, he did say that it had ended with the death of the Sith at the hands of Zak—which surprised everyone that heard about it, even Zak—and that he had lapsed into a micro-coma.

Zak knew that he wasn't being given a full explanation of the events that followed.

All Luke and Jacen would tell him was that he had woken less than a week after arriving back on Yavin 4 and proceeded to act quite out of character. Luke had ordered Geesev, the Praxeum's GH-7 model medical droid, to induce a medical coma in Zak so that they could detect what was wrong with him and what they could do to fix it.

After several operations and bacta treatments, and a further month in coma for restorative recovery, he had been revived, and instructed that he would remain under observation for many more months in case of a relapse.

But Zak had been fine with that. He knew that if Luke Skywalker had a reason to detain him for observation, then it was a good reason. Who was he to argue with the judgement of the Jedi Grand Master—a friend?

Now, almost six months after that, Zak was finally being given permission to leave.

Luke Skywalker had come to see him the previous day and told him that while there were some irreversible effects of what had happened to him, there had been no observed evidence that he posed a threat to anyone else at the academy. Jacen had been with his uncle then, and had told Zak that he would meet him in his room later to talk to him some more.

Zak hoped that what Jacen had to talk about would shed more light on what Zak had been through. Not having his memories was more than just inconvenient, it was frustrating.

He turned around, hearing the familiar hum of tiny repulsors behind him, and saw Geesev floating towards him from the other side of the room. It blinked at Zak, an action that had been puzzling the first time Zak had witnessed it over a standard year ago, and now only seemed natural in the time he had spent around the droid.

Zak reached out and placed a hand firmly on the droid's left shoulder joint. "Thank you," Zak said, adding to the list of thankyous he had given the droid over the past several months.

It blinked again, and bobbed its head in its own almost-comical version of a humanoid nod. He slipped his hand from the cold metal shoulder and turned back around to face the door. Geesev entered a code into the locking mechanism nearby and the doors hissed open.

Zak stepped through, taking a final look at the droid before the doors closed behind him.

Zak's robes continued to swish behind him after he left the infirmary altogether. He stopped at the lift tubes at the end of the eastern corridor and waited for one to open.

While he waited, he flexed his hand, feeling the tough black leather gloves stretch tightly across his hand as he did so.

Like the rest of his clothes, they were too small for him now, for he had grown a little in his confinement.

The centre lift opened. It was empty, so Zak stepped inside before it closed again. It was a short trip down to the next level and he stepped out without hesitation and waited as a group of students walked past him.

The group consisted of two students he knew—Raynar Thul and another whose name escaped him—and three others that he didn't recognise. Zak had a good memory when it came to remembering faces, so logically, he assumed that they had been brought to the Praxeum sometime during Zak's confinement.

When Raynar saw Zak standing there, he nodded in recognition—getting a nod in return—and continued to lead the small group down the corridor toward the recreational rooms. No doubt, they had come from the ground level, as they had rounded the blind corner the lift tubes were tucked against.

When they entered the rec room and left Zak's sight, he ducked around the corner they had come from and proceeded to the next set of lifts, where he again waited. He stood patiently, leaning against the wall as he waited for one of the lifts to arrive for him, thinking on his condition.

Though physically, he was completely healed, he had been suffering recurring headaches for most of his incarceration. While they'd been getting progressively weaker now than the intense migraines they'd started off as, they were still present, still a hindrance to attempts to actively reach out for the Force. He could have blocked out the stabbing pains, but that in itself would require a connection to the Force, and a level of concentration he didn't think he could muster quite yet. So he was left with the throbbing pain for however long until it dissipated entirely.

When the lift closest to him finally opened, a group of his peers stepped out, people he hadn't had the chance to meet when he had first arrived at the Praxeum before he and Jaina had been whisked away, but whom he knew had been around at the time. They were talking casually amongst themselves as they stepped out of the lift tube.

Zak stepped around them, not entirely missing the fact that they went completely silent upon spotting him, and into the lift. He didn't turn around just yet, as he could feel their eyes upon him; hear the harsh, hurried whispers filled with distrust and scorn.

The lift doors closed, cutting off the whispers, and he turned around, sighing in relief.

He still didn't have any memory of what had transpired from after seeing Jaina being knocked unconscious by Pravus on Coruscant to waking up in the infirmary for the first time during his post-op recovery. All he had were the recounts of Jacen and Luke to sustain his curiosity. They'd both insisted that his memories would return, and he believed them. He just wished they would return sooner.

The lift doors opened again to admit him to the ground level—the hanger bay—and he stepped out with a little hesitation and proceeded to cross the hangar towards the blast doors which were currently entirely open.

Sunlight streamed through the opening, lighting half the ground beneath him and tempting him out into the open.

He obliged, stepping through the wide entrance and into the open space of the landing pad and courtyard beyond.

It was warm outside, and by the position of Yavin high above, when he looked up, he guessed that it was around midday local time. There was little in the way of clouds overhead, leaving the sky mostly blue. The giant Massassi trees reached skyward, a thick, tall layer of dark purple trunks topped with a thinner, but still thick, layer of varying shades of green and the occasional spot of brown or yellow.

The landing pad before him, and the courtyard off to the side, were both littered with his peers, formed into individual social gatherings that numbered between two and six students. There were a couple off by themselves on the edge of the courtyard, either deep in meditation or practicing their mental abilities on nearby forest litter.

Zak saw a lot of familiar faces as he slowly started to walk across the landing pad to its outer edge. He was intercepted a few times by those who were eager to find out the end result of his operation and recovery, and to wish him well.

All he could tell them was that whatever Geesev had done had worked, and that after so long in recovery, Master Skywalker had finally deemed him well enough to resume attending regular lessons in a few days. This seemed to satisfy them enough that they would continue on with whatever they were doing.

No one else stopped him on his way across the pad, and he stopped just short of its edge and stared into the forest, trying to dredge up any of the memories he had lost.

Footsteps behind him alerted him to the approach of a pair of his peers and he turned around to see Rebekah Jordan and Wanom Catoxle standing behind him with smiles upon their faces.

He couldn't forget how attractive Rebekah was, for someone that had been living in the dense jungles of Yavin 4 for most, if not all, of her entire life. It was enough to make even the most devoutly sour man smile with appreciation.

She had tanned skin, a result of the amount of time that she spent outdoors in her free time as well as reflecting her life in the jungle. She also had blonde hair, almost the colour of Tash's with a streak of brown like Jaina's starting at the front on the left side and pulling backwards. It was natural; at least that's the way it had looked to Zak at first, and he smiled to see that she had not changed it. Her eyes were brown, much like his, which he saw were in an almost constant state of movement.

In the month she had spent following him and his friends before his kidnapping, he had noticed that Rebekah's eyes were always on the move, always seeking out potential threats and dangers.

A result of living so long in the wild, he had guessed, and it seemed that in the months since then, she had calmed some; come to see that she wasn't always at risk of danger.

She had a lithe figure, which served her well for hiding, as he had seen, and would serve her just as well if she was ever in a serious combat situation where she would require agility and speed over brute force. Zak had seen evidence that she could by far be the fastest runner out of all of the pupils attending Skywalker's Praxeum. She was dressed in the Jedi standard tunic and robes; her robes opened all the way down the middle, the hem stained with morning dew and the odd bit of grass.

Catoxle, on the other hand, was an entirely different, though equally puzzling, entity.

He was in his natural form, or what he insisted was his natural form, though for a Shi'ido no outsider could be entirely sure. His skin was a light grey colour, closer to the white-side of the spectrum, which contrasted the darker grey irises of his eyes. His hair was bleach-white—too white in Zak's opinion.

He was of average height and build in this form, and wasn't quite as fast or agile as Rebekah. Though, what he lacked in agility he more than made up for in his skill as a skinshifter.

Zak knew that he would have to have been somewhere around a century in age to be as skilled as he was at the art of shifting, and though he hadn't witnessed it for himself as yet, Jacen and Jaina's recounts would hardly be exaggeration.

His dark eyes, calmer than Rebekah's were locked onto Zak's as they stood there. He was dressed much the same as the young woman at his side, but with darker robes and a dark blue tunic underneath.

"Good afternoon, Zak Arranda," Catoxle greeted. "It's good to see that you have recovered from your ordeal in such a short length of time."

"Short isn't quite the way I'd describe it. But thank you all the time," Zak replied with a smile. He'd formed a close friendship with the shape-shifter during his incarceration, and had a lot of respect for his opinions. "And I would much prefer it if you didn't use my full name. It's not really necessary."

"I apologise." The Shi'ido bowed his head.

Zak looked around the courtyard and landing pad again, hoping to catch a glimpse of Jaina Solo or his sister Tash. Neither of them had visited him even once in the recovery ward and he thought that strange—especially considering the psychic bond he and Jaina had formed during their captivity.

He could sense her presence through the bond, but could not determine anything from it, such as thought or location. If anything, it felt like she was actively blocking him out.

He saw neither Jaina nor Tash anywhere in sight, nor did he see their friends Lowbacca the Wookiee, nephew of Chewbacca, or Tenel Ka the Hapan princess from Dathomir. He assumed that they were more than likely in the hangar bay, working on the Sentinel that Zak had found in the ruins of the Rebel cruiser in the forest the previous year, or they were otherwise occupied.

Rebekah coughed to draw his attention, and as if she had read his thoughts, she nodded with a grim smile and turned around.

Zak followed her gaze to see that Luke Skywalker had just stepped out of the hangar and was approaching them rather quickly, waving to several students as he passed them. He stopped before the trio, and Rebekah took a small sidestep so that Luke could see all three of them equally. Catoxle had turned around now to look upon his teacher, the warm smile still present on his face.

Zak bowed at once to Luke out of respect, and the other two followed. Though, he could not bow as far as he had once been able, due to the constricting of the robes.

"I'll see to it that you are tailored new clothes," Luke stated after nodding his head in response to the bows of his students. "You should have them by tonight."

"Thank you," Zak said, "I guess."

"How are you doing, Zak? I just heard that you'd left the infirmary. I was planning to meet you there before you left," the elder Jedi said.

"I'm fine," Zak replied with a small smile. "Thanks for asking. According to Geesev, I'm in perfect, if not better than perfect, health. Geesev says I should give it a day or two before I start back into my studies, or anything else strenuous on either mind or body."

"What about the headaches?"

Zak winced as a surge of pain throbbed through his head as a reminder. "They're getting better … slowly."

Luke nodded his understanding. He'd been one of the few that had visited Zak frequently throughout his ordeal. "Taking a few days to yourself so that the headaches subside some more is alright by me," he said simply, "but I would really like you back in classes as soon as you can possibly manage it. I don't think that it would be … pertinent for you to miss too much of your study."

"I haven't missed any as it is," Zak said sheepishly.

Luke blinked, and then understanding dawned on his face. "Jacen?" he said with a frown. Zak nodded. "Hmm. I shall have words with him about that. I specifically told him to do no such thing until you were more recovered."

"Don't be too harsh, Luke," Zak said apologetically. "It was at my insistence he kept me up to date with the teachings. I didn't want to fall behind."

"Does Geesev know?"

"I should think not," Zak said with a grin.

Luke nodded and then turned to the other two. "Rebekah, Wanom; can I have a moment with Zak?" Both of them nodded and walked off to the side and started to chatter excitedly amongst themselves about Zak's condition. He listened for only a moment before refocussing his attention on the Jedi Master.

"Problem?" he asked.

"Walk with me," the Jedi said, and turned in the opposite direction to Zak's friends and began to walk.

He followed the edge of the landing platform, Zak by his side, in silence for a moment before he spoke again. "Mara has made a rather unexpected request of me," he started. When Zak didn't respond, he continued. "She has asked for your assistance—by name."

Zak's eyes shot open in surprise, but he continued to walk. "Me?"

"You," Luke said. "As you know, she heads the physical combat classes here at the academy, and after seeing your skills in unarmed combat last year, regardless of how malicious the intent behind that skill was"—Zak cringed at the thought that he could have acted maliciously; the first time someone had even hinted at the intent of actions he could not remember—"she is convinced that you should assist her."

"My … skills?" Zak said uncertainly. He was sure that Luke would have passed on the fact of Zak's memory loss to his wife.

He still couldn't wrap his head around the word Luke had used to describe his actions the past year—malicious. Not when he was sure that he was incapable of acting in such a heinous manner.

"Your memory of the events following Coruscant will return," Luke insisted again. "I suspect that perhaps your subconscious will attempt to block some of the more traumatic ones out, but you will recover them all if you search yourself thoroughly enough, and continue to possess the same stubborn drive I remember from so many years ago," he added with a chuckle.

Zak smiled weakly at the thought, but nodded. "If I accept this proposal of hers, will it take any time off any of my other studies?"

"Five to ten minutes at most," Luke assured him quickly. "But that's a necessary sacrifice in order for you to reach the class and for you and Mara to discuss the lesson plan. You will be assisting her only in your own defence lessons, so you don't miss out on any of your other lessons entirely. She believes that the classes she has between each of yours will learn from the same lesson plan, so as not to draw you away from your other studies and it would provide more structure to the lessons."

"And if I should miss something of importance in those five or ten minutes?" Zak asked.

Skywalker chuckled lightly at the comment as they passed the edge of the landing pad and walked upon soft grass. "I will have one of your peers inform you of anything important that they feel you would wish to know, should you miss it—perhaps Jacen would like to continue in that role." He smiled. "As I have said many times before, Zak; 'do not take a course of action unless you have considered all the possible rewards and ramifications of that act'."

"Thank you, Master Skywalker." Zak bowed again.

"Formality isn't something that should exist between old friends, Zak," Luke said with a sly smile. "I'll go and inform Mara of your acceptance then, shall I?" Luke said. With another nod, he departed back towards the towering building. Rebekah and Catoxle caught up to Zak a second later, having been trailing behind them.

Zak turned to face them. "Well, that was productive now, wasn't it?" he said with a grin. Rebekah smiled back. "I don't mean to be an ignorant so-and-so, but I wouldn't mind going for a quiet walk."

"Oh?" Rebekah said inquiringly. A curious, suspicious look formed on her features. "Off for a stroll all by yourself, with a headache the size of the Boonta Eve run, with no one to keep you company?"

"Yes," Zak replied. "To clear my head, hopefully help get rid of this pounding headache."

"Take a pain killer and sleep it off," Rebekah suggested.

"It's not as simple as that, Bek. Geesev said it's going to be persistent for a while until it wears off altogether. Pain nullifiers aren't going to help. Side-effect of whatever operations he had to put me through to fix whatever was wrong with me."

"Rebekah is right, Zak," Catoxle added. "A simple walk could escalate the seriousness of this headache."

"With how strong I feel right now otherwise?" Zak replied, flexing his left arm. "I think I can handle a simple headache."

"And if you cannot?" Catoxle quizzed.

"I'll turn around and come right back home," Zak assured the shape-shifter.

The Shi'ido and the human girl were both silent for a moment as they each considered the odds of Zak ever actually following through with that. Zak saw Rebekah's thoughts, without actively reaching into her mind, and saw that she knew what he had planned, and was not going to let him go alone if she had a say in it.

"Which direction are you heading?" Rebekah asked after a pause. "I'll come and check up on you in an hour if you haven't returned by then, just in case."

Zak clicked his tongue. "North west," he said.

He saw the look on Rebekah's face become hard and disapproving as her suspicions of his motives were confirmed. She knew exactly what lay in that direction. She'd lived there for most, if not all, of her life until Zak's first year at the Praxeum when he had stumbled across her home.

"Be careful, Zak Arranda," Catoxle said.

Be very careful, Rebekah thought-spoke, her words echoing in his mind, inciting a stabbing pain that lasted for only a second.

With that, both of them nodded and stepped around him to continue onwards.

Zak watched them walk across the courtyard and merge into a group of students practicing their abilities on each other, and then turned towards the jungle. He started to walk, and no one made to intercept him, though he unknowingly ignored a small group of his peers that were trying to get his attention.

Within moments, he'd entered the jungle and left it all behind.