Chapter 4

The Enemy of my Enemy is not my Ally

James stood a few feet away from Tahiri, his eyes dangerously intense.

Tahiri watched him and then sighed. "I'm not going to hurt you."

"Yeah right. You Jedi always say that and then another planet gets destroyed or something. Don't come near me. It's your fault the Vong are here. You should go die like all your friends!"

She felt herself growing irritated as she steered the ship down to the docking bay, while they landed, she turned to face James who had picked up a blaster from the shelf and was aiming it at her.

"Even if I am a Jedi, I just saved your butt, so you're stuck with me." She said pointedly. His gaze didn't waver.

"You caused those Vong to blow my ship up. They knew you were coming! You- You killed them!" He gulped and licked his lips. Tahiri suddenly figured it out. Those weren't just refugee ships, they were Peace Brigade Ships.

"Peace Brigade." She nearly swore. They were the reason everyone hated Jedi and were trying to sell them out to the Yuuzhan Vong.

"You better surrender, the minute this ship lands, I'm turning you over."

She had had enough and stood up. "Look, I don't care who you are, but I've about had it up to here with Peace Brigade nonsense. We haven't done anything to you, and we won't unless you try something stupid." She eyed his gun and made sure he could see her lightsaber by pulling back her robe.

"Your choice." She waited, she did not intended to move to attack or defend unless James became violent. It was taking all of her patience but she had to try to reason with him. She didn't come to Bastion to mess around with a Peace Brigade supporter. Tahiri briefly considered the idea of knocking him out and taking him unconscious to the med-squad but brushed the idea aside since she'd have to explain how her charge had gotten a bruise from where she would end up hitting him.

"Like I'd believe you." James snapped, "The Jedi have done nothing to save people!" She could feel the shaking in his voice and the conflicting emotions floating around.

"Oh? And what have the Peace Brigade done differently?" She folded her arms and stared James down. She could hear the people outside shouting. They would have to come out to meet the med-squad soon, but she had to finish this first. Or James would probably sell her out, and she'd never get to help Anakin.

He spat at her feet. "You don't know anything." He scowled so deeply she could feel his exact emotions roiling around then a direct thought, or more precisely, a memory. She felt her own feelings become mixed then she sighed. There was no way she could hurt him now that she knew what he was bothered by. Tahiri wasn't really a violent person anyways, not physically anyway. Her best weapons, as many would frequently tell her, were her words.

"I understand more than you think, James." She gave him a knowing look. "My parents are gone too."

James shook his head. "No, you're just using a Jedi trick to get me to trust you!" She then heard an official call for them to unload. She had to make this quick.

"You can choose whether or not to believe me. But I'll tell you this: I don't go around blaming people for what's happened to my family when I already know it won't do any good." She strode past him to get to the ramp. "It won't bring my mom and dad back."

James' hands grew limp and the blaster slipped from his hands, and he slumped to his knees just as Tahiri opened the hatch and lowered the ramp. A medical team came in, and Tahiri pulled her robe over her lightsaber and picked up the blaster. The medical team helped James to his feet.

"Are you injured as well?" One medic asked. She shook her head and they put James on a stretcher, he watched her as they carried him away. Her eyes were cast in shadows, he couldn't tell what she was feeling, but he could sense something, but what that something was, he didn't know.

Anakin blinked his eyes open. He was lying on a cold floor, and noticed that his prison had Yuuzhan Vong standing outside the cell door, he could hear them talking. In a few moments the door opened and a more scarred Yuuzhan Vong entered.

"A Jeedai. How pleasant." The Vong snarled in basic. Anakin was roughly grabbed and pushed in a kneeling position before the Vong, who by the amount of scarring, Anakin could tell was some high level officer.

"You will tell us where your fellow Jeedai are." He stated as he eyed Anakin. Anakin said nothing and used the force to reduce the pain as the officer struck him with his staff. Anakin's lip now bled and the right side of his face was beginning to bruise from the eye down.

"Infidel! Speak!" He jabbed Anakin this time in his chest, and Anakin fell over, unable to take the added pain to his already existing injury in his abdomen.

"Ah, so you are already in pain?" The officer seemed more than delighted. Anakin looked up at his captor and said nothing. He fixed the officer with a defiant stare before picking himself up.

"I am impressed, Jeedai. You will go to see my superior. He will be pleased that you are able to endure." He left his emphasis on the last word and signaled to the guards who jerked Anakin up on his feet and half led, half dragged him down the infested hallways to a much larger chamber.

As soon as the doors opened, they threw Anakin down face first and Anakin heard a crack and saw the blood in front of him. Blinding pain surged from his face. It took him no time to know that his nose was broken. He glanced up at the higher official before him. He was scarred so badly that his face almost had no shape.

The officer behind Anakin bowed low. "Great One, this infidel is a Jeedai, he is able to endure much pain."

The higher official rose from where he was sitting in what looked like the Yuuzhan Vong command center. He strode over and looked down at Anakin.

"You are able to endure pain, that is what makes a warrior, Jeedai." He waved his hand and a Yuuzhan Vong brought a staff. "We shall see how much of a warrior you are, before we decide the half that is infidel." He smiled in the only way a Yuuzhan Vong could, which was in no way, the kind of joy humans or other species would describe.

It didn't take Kirk but a minute to notice that the ship hovering over Bastion, was the same one that Luke had described as the ship missing from the docking bay at the Academy. Finally. Kirk sighed and lowered his own ship into the docking bay after getting clearance.

As he stepped out and looked around, he saw the other ship and approached it without bothering to look as a blue beam blocked his path up the ramp.

"Unless you want murder on your hands, I suggest you lower your lightsaber." He eyed the blonde haired girl in front of him. She didn't lower it.

"Who are you?" She glanced around to see if anyone else was watching, but everyone minded their own business around the docking bay.

"I'd like to ask you the same thing." He raised an eyebrow. She didn't lower her guard.

"I can see why Master Skywalker worries about you, you've got way too much distrust."

Tahiri watched the stranger for a moment, then after feeling around in the force and sensing nothing off about him, she lowered her lightsaber, switching it off.

"Good, now I can answer your question." He straightened his own tunic and jacket. "I'm Kirk Dekim, an old student of Luke's."

Tahiri folded her arms. That didn't give her any comfort. Her experience with Luke's students that hadn't been to the Academy in years was that they were usually dark Jedi who'd rather take over the galaxy or sell Master Skywalker out to the Yuuzhan Vong.

"Master Skywalker sent you?" She asked, still giving Kirk a suspicious eye, her initial shock was wearing off and now she was more wary than anything else.

"Yes, to retrieve the two runaways. Now where's the second one?"

Tahiri felt herself grow cold at that question. "I don't know."

Kirk looked somewhat bemused, "Huh, and I'd thought you two would already have met up."

She felt herself get hot. "I ran into some obstacles."

"Such as?"

"Shut up."

She ignored Kirk before he started laughing. She turned to face him. "What?"

"You're stubborn and spunky. I didn't know Luke still took students like that."

"I guess you haven't been around in a while."

Kirk raised an eyebrow this time. "Good intuition." He thought for a moment, "So what brings you here? It must be important if you left off your search."

She debated how much she should tell this, as far as she could tell, stranger. Then decided she could always ditch him if she needed to. "I ran across a refugee ship that had been destroyed by the Yuuzhan Vong. There was a survivor so I brought him here."

This made Kirk change his mind from his originally intended response, "Quite noble. Did a medical squad already pick him up?"

"Yeah. About ten minutes before you showed up."

"So, why not up and leave, hmm?"

"I don't know." She said. In truth she did know and she felt Kirk's gaze on her. If he really was a Jedi he would have already been able to tell that she was lying. If he had noticed her lie, Kirk didn't say anything about it, which surprised Tahiri. He certainly seemed like the type who would be nosy but he wasn't. He cocked a smile at her. "I'm not your parents, you know. I don't need to know everything about your life."

"Well, get used to it because you're not going to learn anything except my name. It's Tahiri." Kirk's expression became strange. She wasn't really sure why. She could feel that he was thinking about something intensely, but he was good at hiding what it was. She couldn't read him like Anakin. Though, she thought, I can't really read anyone like I can read Anakin.

"You're Kam and Tionne's daughter?" He blurted suddenly, pointing a hesitant finger at her. Tahiri could only stare as a million and one questions flooded into her head.