A/N: Hello everyone! First off, I'm soooo sorry that it's been this long since my last update. Darth Real Life has been especially merciless. My one brother spent a week in the hospital and we nearly lost him; he had a terrible colon infection which wasn't diagnosed correctly at first and so that cost us valuable time in getting him well—which he still isn't; though he's out of the hospital now. Also, I ended up getting a new job! I was recruited by an agency and now am back to Square 1 in the training and all that. It's overall been a crazy rollercoaster ride with this and other things, but I think you get the idea. Anyhow, it's great to be back; so let's not delay: onward!

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SW Ep. V: Jedi Assassin Ch.11— Illusionists

"So, where is Luke?" Leia asked, sitting beside Han.

The party was going well into the night; Mon and the rest of the leadership were only too happy to supply this 'much needed morale booster' after all of the stress of packing the Yavin base, moving everything first to Dantooine—one of Luke's more clever ideas; after all, he had rightly guessed the Empire would never expect them to 'double back' to an old base for the interim- and now the daunting task of adapting to this mercilessly harsh world.

Han grinned over a mouthful of bantha stew. "The kid? Well, we met up with some old buddies of his on the way back, some guys and an old lady friend of his. He decided to stay with them for a few days; but he'll be back."

Biggs watched the surprise—and jealousy?—flit across the princess's face as he sat across from Han—and how Han caught both and clearly enjoyed her reaction.

Hmm, brooming Luke aside as possible competition, are we Han? He thought.

"Oh," Leia neutrally said at length, playing with her food, "so, are they…professional friends?"

Han twisted his lips and Biggs smirked. Oh, busted.

"Yes," he cut in before Han could try again, "I'm sure Han means Pru; Luke met her way back, she's a private contractor of sorts, really talented. They've had a business liaison going for some time now."

Han threw him a glower that Biggs only rolled his eyes at.

Poor Han, wanting Leia's attention all for himself, the pilot though wryly.

Leia sat on Han's right, Chewie on his left. He harned a question, which Han only shrugged at.

"Hey, what the kid does is his concern Chewie; I wasn't gonna stick around to hold his hand."

Biggs' insides twisted in warning. He'd assumed Luke was going to remain at Solidarity for a while and hash things out with the team; so why did Han's words imply that wasn't the case?

He caught Han's gaze and looked at him in question; Han only offered a tiny, warning shake of the head.

Don't ask, at least not now, was what he was saying.

Leia, in Biggs' peripherals, looked up, feeling the sudden tension no doubt. He eyes passed between the two of them, but she said nothing.

"Well, I'm sure he'll be back soon," she casually—to casually—noted, watching their reactions carefully.

Biggs did nothing but look back down at his plate; Han stirred his already cooled stew.

Neither of them caught the meaningful expression she threw down at Fade, sitting on her lap.

Obi-Wan and Mace came up the next moment, each bearing a plate. Biggs waved them to his side, where two spots were open on his right.

Han took the cue and waved to them with his spoon. "C'mon join us; the party's right here."

Ben chuckled and Mace shook his head with a humored grin.

"It'd be a pleasure," Mace dryly avowed to Han's showboating.

Han shrugged dramatically. "Of course it would!"

Ben only shook his head with a tolerant grin as he and Mace sat down.

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Ghost stood before the full-length gilt mirror as her fellow agents (aka her 'handmaidens') put the finishing touches on her gown while another pinned up her hair in lavish curls, fastening them with ornate jeweled clips.

Her garb was perfect for this season; the fuller, rippled sleeves had made a come-back, and the tiered, shaped skirts were in again. Of course she had noticed the sweet-heart necklines were about to recapture the scene, so she was being preemptive by having this silver-azure dress refitted with one; just as any fashionable noblewoman of her status would.

An airtight cover.

At least it will be, so long as Luke didn't jeopardize their mission with any rash moves.

Ghost held in a sigh as her 'servants' completed their work and one went to fetch her wrap as the others put away her makeup and styling utensils.

She quietly moved to the wall of windows to afford them more room and let her thoughts be carried away as she half-listened to the clanking of equipment and the opening and shutting of drawers.

The fact was, she could see despair growing in her 'cousin.' Luke tried to hide it, but everyone knew on some level his parents were the driving force of not only Solidarity, but everything he did. Every mission he'd scour for clues of not only his father's location, but the true cause of his mother's death. None of them believed it was the Jedi; ergo the exact reason for Padme Amidala's passing was a mystery. For a long time Luke had believed she simply perished from child-birth, until Fade assured him the Force had revealed to her that it was not so.

Needless to say knowing his birth hadn't killed his mother had brought Luke immeasurable relief; as for many years he'd struggled with the 'what if' of his possibly killing her—at least until Fade's vision.

Unfortunately, Fade's revelation had not included the true source; only that it had not been Luke. When Luke had pressed her, Fade had simply told him the Force did not want him to be tormented with the belief that his birth had cost his mother her life.

When Luke had bitterly asked why then the Force seemed okay with his being tormented though over his father's whereabouts and his mother's true cause of death, Fade had very gently informed him the Force took no pleasure in any pain, but it had a reason for all it revealed—and concealed.

Luke had stayed alone for many days after that conversation—struggling to cope, Ghost knew.

The difficulty was coaxing him to confide in them was such an ordeal. Luke was so obsessively secretive, he at times forgot it was unnecessary with his friends.

He knew they wanted to help him; and yet he still kept them at arm's length.

Ghost repressed a sigh as one of the girls helped her don her lavish silk wrap and another handed her a beaded purslet.

The quandary was, she was all too aware as a fellow assassin what compelled him to recoil: the assassins' code. It made canvased warnings from start to finish of emotions, of emotional ties—

It forbade attachments; much like the Jedi Code of old, Ghost mused. And the reason was also the same: both societies saw attachment as a breach in the armor; the beginning of the end.

However, assassins took it one step further, forbidding any emotion at all: compassion, empathy, even anger and hate. Assassins saw their work as emotionless; efficiency and expertise was their path, emotion was only an obstruction, a distraction. They didn't hone anger as the Sith did; anger clouded clarity to their kind.

Knowing one's self was the first step for an assassin; knowing one's target as well as one's self was the second.

And knowing know emotion was a facet of both.

But Luke, much like Han, played with fire and tempted fate. Ghost chewed her lip in worry.

But, worry was an emotion too; ergo she also danced beside the flame.

But not nearly to the extent that the other two did.

She had no family; she had let of her past long ago, for her good and Luke's. She had vague recollections of a father being dragged away by the Empire, a kindly faced man that she could almost see, and the screams of a woman who she assumed had been her mother, but nothing more.

No; she was Ghost now, Assassin of Solidarity and ally of the Specter. Her family was them. The past was no more, and whoever she had been then, whatever her birth name was, she had no inkling.

What she did know was, if she, Luke and their team failed, there would be more like them: people lost, without a past, if they didn't overthrow the Empire.

Her pale eyes narrowed.

Speaking of which, where was Luke?

She waved a fellow agent over, and quietly asked. Another re-smoothed the curls of her long hair while the first sought him out.

When she returned, her face was pale.

Not a good sign, considering she was a trained killer as well.

"What is it, Amilee?"

Amilee handed her a note. "It's from Specter, my lady."

Ghost opened the flimsy and scanned through it.

She saw red a second later. She handed the note back to the first. "Please, tell me I didn't just read that," she said in a low, deathly voice.

Amilee shook her head. "I wish I could; but it's true. He's gone to the Jedi Temple."

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Luke strode in the group as they drew near to the fabled Jedi Temple—now the Sith headquarters from what Link and Mouse had uncovered as well as the thick shroud of evil that festered in a putrid veil all over the Temple.

Luke resisted the urge to gag, instead mulling over his plan one more time.

Upon finishing his disguise and 'clearing' his façade with Ghost, he'd plunged into the Holo-net to uncover some discreet ways to move around Coruscant and get close to vital Intel.

There were no 'discreet' ways, per se, that he'd come across, he'd discovered instead that a select group of elitists who'd "made a donation to cleared Imperial charities" (aka a bribe), had been permission to enjoy an almost-unheard-of tour of the Jedi Temple, well, how could he pass that up?

So, after he'd "made a donation" (which he'd have Link and Mouse withdrawal later on) himself, he put on a cloak and had Ghost's driver take him to the Temple.

Link and Mouse's "papers" for him were easily cleared by the Imperial tour guide, who once he pulled up Luke's cover identity, just about fell over in shock. He stammered a greeting to Luke and thanked him for joining them "on such short notice," but assured Luke it was hardly an inconvenience and he was delighted Luke could come.

And so he and a group of a dozen or so, approached the great double doors, and Luke silently wished Fade had come after all—because he was so tempted to reach out with the Force.

Noc nudged his head with his hard beak. Luke glanced to his shoulder where the bird sat.

Noc's one eye was slick with knowing. He gave a tiny head shake.

Don't even think about it, he seemed to warn.

Luke pursed his lips, acquiescing. But it wasn't easy.

There was no telling just how much time his father had spent in the Temple; for years Luke hadn't dared venture here for fear of discovery. But now, he could feel the walls closing in, crushing him on all sides.

Time was running out; and options. He had to find his father, and soon.

And so, he'd dared it now: coming here. The massive, heavy doors slid open for them soundlessly and Luke stepped forward.

The smell of death was everywhere. And then Luke saw them:

The bodies.

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When her driver returned, Ghost restrained her fury.

It wasn't the man's fault; he didn't know 'the lady's cousin' was forbidden to go anywhere without her knowing. Firstly, that would be hard to explain to the chauffer.

Secondly, she couldn't exactly prohibit Luke; he'd never go for it.

But still; what was he thinking!?

Ghost sighed; the fact was, he wasn't thinking. It was that simple.

"Take me to the Temple," she evenly told him, and seated herself into the back seat of the limo. The driver blinked at her non-chalant attitude, but bowed and hurried towards the driver's seat.

Ghost smoothed her gown to settle her shaky hands.

Luke had better be alive when she got to the Temple, she angrily told herself, or she'd kill him.

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Luke froze mid-step as they were ushered into large, polished threshold.

They were everywhere; phantasms of dead Jedi: men, women, aliens—

Children.

There was little blood, most of them were either blasted, but Luke's stomach twisted when he realized some of them had been executed another way:

Lightsaber.

He recognized the cauterized slashes of a lightsaber blade.

Boba Fett used one occasionally, after all.

As the tour guide gestured overhead and began his litany of the architectural design and some very propaganda-enhanced 'history' of the Temple, Luke shrank to the back of the group. None of the other elitists paid him any mind, he knew how to vanish even without using the Force.

They moved slowly from the threshold near a very grand staircase that ascended to the next level where Luke spied several training chambers, meditation rooms and study niches. He glanced around him.

The dead were everywhere, hanging over railings, sprawled on the staircase…but it wasn't just Jedi.

There were dead clone troopers as well; their bodies more washed out than the Jedi, the Jedi translucent but still colored more so than the clones.

There had been a battle; Luke could sense even without reaching for the Force that the troopers and Jedi had fought—but as opponents.

Why? Luke knew the official story: the Jedi had attempted to overthrow the Republic and so the then Supreme Chancellor had sent the clone troopers to 'stop them.'

No, Luke knew what assassination looked like and this was it: they'd been assassinated before they could rise up against the Sith who became Emperor.

But…there had been no record of Palpatine coming to the Temple himself. Dooku had been killed—by Luke's father no less—and Vader hadn't made the scene yet.

So, who had murdered the Jedi by lightsaber?

Link and Mouse hadn't been able to uncover it, the Jedi Temple holo-vids had all been taken and probably destroyed long before the pair old enough to hack anything. And there were no copies.

The Jedi had been a painfully secretive society. It had in part played a role in their downfall.

It's hard for a galaxy to trust in a people whose entire lives are wrapped up in rumor and mystery, especially at wartime. Palpatine had known that and had easily played it to advantage, using that mystery to convince a stressed, fractured and fatigued galaxy that their generals had been plotting to use the war as a means to take over.

It had been easy for them to believe, in the end. Palpatine had been viewed by all as the beloved leader striving against all odds to keep the galaxy intact.

No one really knew what the Jedi had been doing after all; they'd been at the warfront—

Or the Temple: the sight of the supposed coup—which Palpatine had 'thankfully' been able to thwart.

It was nearly two decades before the galaxy began to realize Palpatine had played them all for fools.

And so many still either didn't care, or knew and cared, but were too fearful to act.

And billions more still had not the slightest inkling.

Luke stared down at the body of a small boy, no older than six, and wondered if his father had survived this.

He stilled as a thought occurred to him: if his father had been killed, his body would be here, among the fallen. Luke only let his head move as he glimpsed the tour begin to move away.

He'd have to search every single body, and that would take a full sweep of the Temple—more than any tour would allow.

Oh well; he'd have his own private tour then.

He quietly ducked behind a pillar and waited for the group to walk on. And then he spotted the little side room—complete with terminal.

He grinned. Hello, opportunity.

He slipped into the chamber and let Noc plug in.

"Have a good time, Noc," he whispered with a grin, "I'll bring you back a souvenir."

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"Boss, are you there?"

Luke flinched out of his reverie, and murmured a reply, "Yeah. What's going on?"

"Well," Link replied, "we've got some good news."

Luke held back the sigh. "I could use some."

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing; you have a report?"

"Yep!" Mouse. "We've already found some vulnerable Hutt accounts that we're…tapping into now. It should give us at least 10 billion credits, easy; probably more."

"Good."

"Uh huh!" was the exuberant response. "But, that's not the best part."

"And the best part is…?"

"We've found some Imperial records about a lost set of ships—a whole fleet of them!"

"And why is that a good thing?"

"C'mon boss!" Mouse sputtered over what was probably a sandwich. "A lost fleet of ships? How can it get any better than that?"

"Umm, if they weren't lost?"

Luke could practically hear Link's head shake. "Boss, we're gonna find this fleet. We've got enough clues to make it work. And if you promise us you won't get Solo involved; I'm sure there'll be no problems."

Luke snickered, in spite of himself. "I promise. What's this fleet called?"

"The Katana Fleet."

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As Link gave Luke an overview of why the fleet was made, how it became lost and so forth, Luke was only half-listening. Frankly, he didn't care about the details just so long as Link and Mouse could in fact find this fleet and get them functional again.

Details didn't matter; results did.

As Link completed his exposé and overviewed the next step of refurbishing and what they've gotten ready on that front so far, Luke stared out the window he stood before.

After his thorough search of the Jedi Temple, Luke found himself in the Council's meeting chamber—where a group of young children had come to hide from the troops.

Whoever the Jedi had been, he'd found them here—and killed every one of them.

Not a single child bore a blaster wound; they were all cut down by a lightsaber.

A sudden pain stabbed into Luke's head. "That sounds great guys," he cut in, "I'll let you get back to it, there are some things here I need to do."

"Uh, oh; okay boss, we'll be in touch," Mouse sounded hurt.

"Thanks; call me later."

And the contact ended.

Luke sighed. Evening was falling and the elitist party would begin soon. Ghost was probably already at the Palace, sifting for information so flawlessly that her tracks would never be uncovered.

Because she wouldn't leave any.

Luke wasn't ready for it yet. He needed time to come to terms with what he'd seen.

For all the bodies scattered across the Temple, none of them had been his father.

But nonetheless, his father had been here that fateful night.

Luke was certain of it. He had sensed his father's presence, burning like lava but black with despair cutting through the very air around him like acid.

His father had been lost that night, frantic in an ocean of pain, anger and borderline hysteria.

Luke had glimpsed peaks of his father fighting, flickers of his phantom-image here and there, though never clear enough to see who he had been battling.

Luke sighed. He plunged the depths of the Force then, trusting to the fact that Link and Mouse had augmented all his new disguises with upgraded Force-concealment tech.

Without Fade around, it was the next best thing.

The logical reason was his father was watching the Order he'd pledged himself to falling apart before his eyes. That would put anyone into a panic-stricken state; Jedi or not.

But Luke had felt another dimension. He'd picked up traces in his father of losing 'her.'

Her, her, her, her, her. It repeated in his father's mind like a tortured mantra, clawing at his senses, making his father fanatical with determination.

But, who was 'her.' Had it been his mother? Had his father, for some reason, feared losing her?

It was wartime; but while a Senator should have been safe, Coruscant had been attacked, and breached. Though now it was clear that had all been a ruse of Palpatine's, a way to get rid of Dooku. It was hardly a coincidence that a few weeks after Dooku's death Vader made his first appearance on a star destroyer.

Luke froze. No; that wasn't true, he had also felt tiny hints of Vader's presence someplace else:

Here; in the Temple. Always very near to his father.

Luke cringed. There was no doubt now that his father and Vader had both been in the Temple that night. He wouldn't chance delving more into the Force to clarify his visions; he hadn't seen Vader after all, but the Sith had been there.

He could hear the Force whispering it to him, near places where he'd seen his father battle…some adversary unknown.

Had it been Vader?

Luke wrapped his arms around his thin waist as a chill gnawed through him. He didn't want to assume the worst, he hadn't seen his father's body, after all, nor had he felt the impression of his father's death.

He clung to the hope that it meant his father had somehow survived, had escaped Vader. But still….

There was another possibility: Vader had captured him, not slain him. After all, the Hero With No Fear would make quite an Imperial prize. And it was no secret—at least in Luke's part of the galaxy—that many Jedi had been taken and experimented on after the wars.

Per the Emperor's command, no less.

There had been rumors, in the underworld, that Palpatine was seeking a means to make himself immortal, to conquer the final adversary: death.

Luke let his brow lean against the cool transparisteel windows. Why? Why had nothing lead to any solid—

And then he jolted upright, cursing himself for being so careless. How had the man come so close without Luke's sensing?

He spun around to see someone had entered the chamber and was standing opposite him, his lightsaber drawn.

Vader.

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Luke wondered again how it was the Sith Lord had drawn so close undetected.

It didn't matter in any case as the other stepped closer, but Luke still wondered.

"What are you doing here?" the rumbling voice demanded, testing the weight of his weapon.

In stark contrast to his menacing voice, his gesture with the saber seemed quite casual.

Luke supposed it would be, with a kill-tally as mind-bogglingly high as Vader's.

"I was with the tour," Luke softly, non-threateningly said, not moving even an iota.

He couldn't blow his cover; he was the 'son' of some unnamed elitist now, not an assassin.

Most definitely not the Specter. One aggressive pose and Vader would know.

Vader took two more steps. "Yes, I met the former tour-guide on my way in."

His tone was too indifferent. And "former" tour guide? That only meant one thing.

"He's dead," Luke whispered, backing up against the glass.

"As are four of those fools who came in with him."

Luke gaped in spite of himself. A helpless tour guide and some harmless snobs? "But…why?"

And invisible talons seized his throat. Luke crumbled to the floor as he felt other unseen claws grab his heart and stop its beating.

Spots danced before his eyes.

"Because, boy," the dark lord spat, "the Temple is mine. And I gave no permission for perfumed elitists to prance through it as though it were some common diversion."

Luke could feel the anger saturating each of Vader's words as a single link in some spectral chain wrapped around his neck.

Whatever it was dug deeper. Luke could go for a long time without air, but he wondered how long he'd last with no heartbeat.

There was no choice. He had to summon the Force and fight back.

But then he heard a girl gasping and the talons were gone. His vision, now bleary, turned to the doorway.

Ghost stood there, one hand over her mouth in dismay—

The other reaching for the hidden weapon concealed in her sash.

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A/N: Well, I hope you guys like! I made it extra-long because of the long break between chapters! Plz R the author loves love! LOL; till next time friends.