Hey guys! Sorry for the long hiatus. I've been dealing with my parents' divorce and trying to get my first apartment so life is a little hectic. Plus, with all this coronavirus stuff my job has been a bit precarious as well. But, I'm sure it'll all work itself out! I'm working hard to write the fourth book and I honestly have really big plans for it. If anyone has anything to add, ask, or suggest for future installments or even guesses about what happens in this book, please comment or DM me!

Without further adieu, here's the next chapter!


Chapter 3:

Intuition

The morning that followed the monthly update by Maltus was one that had transpired for years now. It started out with the family waking up in unison. We all came together in the kitchen where Ahsoka and I made a feast fit for kings. After breakfast, everyone got into their respective clothing choices.

As I slid on the phrik-titanium armor casing onto my left wrist, I cast a glance up to the mirror. Today, I had chosen to go with black pants, a gray/white Jedi-esqe tunic top, and Corellian leather boots that matched with the combat belt clipped around my waist. I reached over to the nightstand and both lightsabers came flying over to my hands.

However, I clipped only the darksaber to my waist. With my Jedi lightsaber tightly gripped in my right hand, I walked over to a small panel on the wall by the closet mechanism. I held a hand out and the Force washed over the device, the soft red light turning green before opening up to reveal a small box chamber. In the small wall insert, I held the lightsaber up in front of it. Within a single instant, the lightsaber flung itself into a dozen pieces, floating in front of my face.

The crystal, the blue Kyber Shard, hummed with the tune of kyber. The song could only be heard by the one it chose. That being myself. I reached deep into the Force for a moment and let the crystal slide into the chamber. Once inside, four metal prongs extended from the sides of the chamber, creating an electro-magnetic barrier around the crystal. The device hummed in the same tune of the Kyber Shard itself before sealing back into the wall. Immediately, I felt the Force surround the entire Temple and all the houses that were around.

Many years previous, Ahsoka, David, and myself had come up with the blueprints for a shield generator that ran off the power of a Kyber Shard. This allowed for maximum protection in the event that someone was to find out the location of the base and try to invade or destroy it. The Kyber Shard was completely synced up with my Force signature, allowing no one entry unless the Shard communicated with me through the Force that the being was not hostile. For those deemed a threat, the shield would let none pass and nothing could penetrate it.

I reassembled the lightsaber and held the empty hilt in my hand. I reached my other hand out to the nightstand where another kyber crystal laid, singing softly in anticipation. I had been to Illum soon after my resurrection to obtain my very own – and first – kyber crystal. No surprise, but the crystal happened to turn blue as well.

I inserted the crystal into the chamber and closed it. After a test ignition, I was satisfied.

I made my way out into the main room where Ahsoka was waiting with by herself. I took a look around and saw that she was indeed alone before speaking, "Where did the kids go?"

Ahsoka turned around, sporting a gray and white combat suit with matching gloves, boots, and belt. She tied the wedding ring given by myself years prior around her neck and caught my eye.

"They have already decided what to do with their day." Ahsoka said casually, "Which for some of them will be quite interesting."

I raised an eyebrow, "Which is?"

Ahsoka turned, "Mara said she was going to meditate on where to go for her first mission as a Knight. Max and Lexiah made plans with some of the other Padawans to run the Forest Training Run that you set up in the Cortak Forest."

I chuckled, "Well, that's going to be tough. I designed that training course to be gruesome. They won't get seriously hurt if they fail, but it isn't going to be just a sting."

Ahsoka grinned, "I think that's what has them excited." She made her way over to the edge of the room and opened the door leading to the hallway.

"Makes sense. They are my kids after all." I said as we made our way through the halls to the landing platform. There sat the custom made Mandalorian XRS attack shuttle. It had eight fully stocked crew compartments with a master one for the pilot. It could store more tons of storage than I ever actually carried at one given time. Weapons were state of the art with focal point turbo lasers, gun emplacements for analog use, proton torpedoes, a stealth crystal field generator that was once a part of a mission that Anakin partook in at the Battle of Christophsis against Admiral Trench, and even some built in seat warmers. It was one of most comfortable and deadly ships in the galaxy.

Within half a minute, we were in the pilot and co-pilot's seats respectively. I tapped a few keys and took the controls. We lifted noiselessly up off the landing platform and into the air. Seconds later, we broke the atmosphere and jumped into hyperspace for the short trip that was panned out in front of us.


"Hey, Lexiah?"

"Yeah, Max?"

"If you knew that someone you cared about was about to do something dumb, would you follow them to try to help?"

Lexiah Marko, clad in a very similar rendition of her mother's classic Jedi garb from the start of the Clone War, swung down from the tree she had been perched on. Instead of the maroon coloration that represented a part of her mother's old clan from before the Jedi found her, Lexiah's cut off top that started from a few inches above the navel to nearly completely covering the womanly figure she was starting to gain was a blue coloration. At this age, her mother was very thin, but she had muscle that helped complete her form. Lexiah was slightly more filled out but she had muscle as well, a good but thinly muscled stomach that allowed her core to be as tight as a triple top knot.

She landed with the grace of a dancer and fixed her brother with a confused glance, "Depends if I thought they needed it."

Max took a ready stance, "I don't know if she will."

"Is it Mara?" Lexiah asked, raising an eye tattoo, "I could feel her emotions last night through the sibling bond we all share. It was for a moment and you beat me to the punch about confronting her, but I thought something might be up."

Max nodded and dove forward, punching at Lexiah's face. She dodged the attack and drove her knee right into his right side. Just before impact, Max used the Force to create a small shield before she bruised his ribs. The block was unforeseen to Lexiah and it caught her off guard for a single half second.

Max barely needed half of that. He swung out his own leg and swept her left one, the one she had been using as the sole source of balance. Max followed through with the kick, spinning through the air until he landed behind his sister. He unclipped his lightsaber and ignited the cyan colored blade, holding it to the side of her neck.

"Point." Max said, then he took a step back. "Mara said she felt like something was trying to talk to her through the Force."

Lexiah got to her feet and dusted herself off, "Something? Or someone?"

Max felt something prickled across his neck, "She also said that might be a possibility."

Lexiah unclipped her own blade, holding it out in front of her before an emerald blade flashed to life, "And, she didn't tell dad."

Max shook his head, "She wanted to find it by herself."

"So, Skywalker will go with her." Lexiah smirked. "They always go places together."

"She seemed pretty adamant about being alone for this mission." Max said, switching into a defensive form as she came at him, lightsaber blazing through the air. As they fought back and forth through the jungle, they continued to talk.

"So, what are you getting at?" Lexiah asked as she blocked a sideways blow.

Max leaped high above as she brought up her lightsaber in an overhead arc. He spun around until his feet hit the floor, "Part of me wants to follow her."

"If you think this is a large enough threat for us to follow her, then maybe we need to tell Dad about it." Lexiah remarked as they crossed blades at the chest.

Max gave a shrug as he pushed back, "If there are four of us and it's a real threat, I think we could handle it."

"Careful, dear brother." Lexiah smirked, falling back onto her back, taking Max with her. She kicked her left leg up, sending him flying overhead. "Pride comes before the fall."

And, that was true. Pride did indeed come before the fall. It was the hubris of the Sith of old. That caused them to fall. They always believed that it was the power of the Dark Side that could bring victory over the Jedi Order.

But, there in lied the secret to defeating one's own pride. If one could master the ability to understand why they sought the power they weren't given access to, then they could understand how to embrace what lied before them. True victory only came at the right time when deemed so by the Force.

However, the Markos were never ones to just rely on timing and the Force. There was a time to stand back and let the Force move in its ways, but there was also a time for action. And, Max and Lexiah both knew that action was near.

The question was this: who would take action and what would be that action?

As Max Marko hit the tree behind his sister, only to look up into the waiting blade of his twin, he realized that action had to be taken to prevent problems that didn't need to be solved alone.

Lexiah deactivated her lightsaber, offering him a hand up. Once he was up, Lexiah gave him a smirk, "I don't know how much help you'll actually be if that's all it took to defeat you."

"Oh, shut up." Max grumbled. "You know my mind isn't here."

"It's with wherever Mara is going." Lexiah pointed out, clipping her saber to her sash. "It does beg the question though: where is she actually going to go?"

Max shrugged, "That voice could be from anything or anyone across the galaxy. But, Lex, have you ever stopped to think about the fact that no one else can hear the voice besides her?"

Lexiah frowned, considering, "You have a point."

Max nodded furiously, "A big point."

Placing a hand up to her chin, Lexiah said, "That would also mean that whoever is calling to her through the Force has some type of connection to her…but not in a good way."

"I think she'd let us know if she was making friends who didn't just dabble in the dark arts." Max quipped, dusting himself off. "Whoever is reaching out to Mara through the Force is making sure that no one else besides her can hear them. I sense a trap."

"Me too." Lexiah said, her demeanor turning from inquisitive to serious. Max could see the blacks of her eyes shrink with intense focus, her iris colors starting to darken with the emotions rising inside her. "That person is trying to lure our sister into a trap and Mara might just fall for it."

"Mara is smart enough to realize that this is all wrong, right?" Max asked, genuinely confused. "It seems almost like a bad holo-drama."

They were silent for a moment before Lexiah softly said, "What if they are using the Force to influence her from a great distance?"

"She's far too strong in the Force to fall for such a level one move." Max scoffed.

Lexiah shook her head, her head tails swinging slightly with the movement, "I'm not talking about a mind trick. I'm talking about just using the Force to influence emotions. This person might have called out to her and is using the Force to make her curiouser by the minute until she feels like she has to find it without telling those she should."

"Like she's doing right now." Max turned to his sibling, fire in his eyes. "We need to get to the landing pad."

Lexiah smirked, "I'll race ya."

"You're on, Lex."


Mara Jade Marko had been standing in front of her attack shuttle for almost twenty minutes straight. She had been contemplating whether or not the journey she envisioned in her mind was one that she needed to embark alone on. Or, rather, one that she didn't know if she needed to partake in at all.

The voice inside her mind had been calling out to her for weeks now, but it was only at that moment did she feel like she needed to search it out. She told Max that. She had told him that she felt like it was calling out to her from a far distance and she needed to understand why and where it was.

Yet, as she stood there, she could feel her heart weigh upon her chest. There was a sort of guilt in her belly, but she had to push that down. A Jedi Knight of the Rebirth had to be strong and ready to find out all the secrets that the Force held for her. She knew that whatever was out there would only deceiver her if she let it.

She couldn't tell whether the voice was truly evil or not, but the command that it seemed to speak to her definitely was.

"…you will kill Luke Skywalker."

It demanded Luke's death, but why?

Why? She thought out into the Force in a direct line from the thought of the voice's signal. She realized, in that moment, that she had questioned the voice for the first time since hearing it.

For a single instant, there was silence, then the voice spoke back.

"Come."

In the back of her mind, she could feel the underlying message behind that word. It was telling her to seek it out so that it might explain why it continued to tell her to end the life of her dearest friend…and the one who her heart had grown fond of. Her father had always loved the idea of Mara being involved with Luke, though he hadn't ever given a reason for it. She just suspected it was one of the things he just felt was right in his soul and within the Force.

And, more often than not, he was right about such feelings.

Mara reflected. Then, why did I not tell him before he left?

The question struck Mara with a sense of guilt. She felt guilty that she didn't involve him, or at least let him know, about the presence she felt. Perhaps, she mused, her subconscious didn't allow it because she knew what he would say.

She wasn't some rebellious teenager who wanted to hide things from her father, but if she didn't branch out to find out who she really was and what her place was in the galaxy, then she could never truly be a Jedi. And, funny thing was, her father knew that exact fact. How many times had he run out on Master Skywalker or Master Kenobi to galivant to what he believed was his destiny?

The stories of her father she had been told of since she was a child. She had endured a war and believed her father to be dead for two years before he came back to life. During those two years, and the years after, she learned all about who Blaze Marko truly was. She had visited his home planet. She had met his sister, effectively her aunt. She had seen who he was a child. She had walked his steps during a Flow Walk. There was no doubt in her mind that her father was one of the purest and most righteous souls in existence, but even he was not without his fair share of hard learning. His lifetime had shown him much sorrow and pain but also much compassion and strength. Through his trials he gained the power to protect those he cared about, and through the discipline that followed he learned how to create that balance within the Force. The balance that was the basis for the Rebirth. No politics. No squabbling. Just the will to do what was right and to follow the guidance of the Force.

She took a deep breath and reached a hand out toward the hatch that led into the shuttle.

"Mara!"

Mara froze, lowering her hand in the same instant she pivoted her feet to turn the opposite direction, right into the waiting gaze of Luke Skywalker.

He was dressed in his normal Jedi blacks. His silver belt was fastened tightly around his waist and his lightsaber – modeled after Obi Wan, his master – hung loosely by the connector ring at the base. His hair was slightly tousled by the wind. And, yet again, she had to admit that his timing was always the worst.

He strode up to her, smiling, "Did I catch you at a bad time?" He looked at the shuttle with curious eyes, "Planning on taking a trip?"

Mara's face flushed slightly, but she used the Force to cool the temperature of her face. She gave a short nod, "As a matter of fact, I am. I was thinking about heading out to check on the Crucible along the Hydian Way."

Luke gave her a look, "I thought that we sent a contingent out to them just a week ago."

Mara shrugged, "Just a routine check. The contingent was just a formality. They should be back any day now."

Luke fixed Mara with a sharper look, then his stare melted into a laugh, "You almost got me. Good try Mara."

Perspiration started to form at Mara's hairline, but she smiled back all the same, "I can't get anything past you, Luke." She went along with what he was thinking. Then, she took a breath, "I was just going to take her for a run through the Tarzill Valley. There's that one curve that gets me every time."

"And, you need to take the Marwak to do it?" Luke asked, his Force aura showing nothing but acceptance of the lie. "I thought you would use your speeder to do that."

"If I only use the speeder for the valley, then I'll never get used to making those twists and turns in different vehicles. There's gonna be a moment when I need to make a turn like that with a ship that isn't a speeder bike." Mara said, crossing her arms.

"That's fair." Luke said, nodding his head. "Well, when you get back, do you want to grab some food?"

"Are you cooking?" Mara joked.

Luke's face fell slightly, "I've been practicing since the incident with the burned Cari Cari fish."

Mara smiled a wide, genuine smile as she remember the last time he had attempted to make food for the two. He had made the vegetables and appetizers well and good, but when he had pulled out the Cari Cari fish, it was nearly burnt to a crisp. The problem with the fish is that it didn't give off an odor when burnt, so Luke hadn't realized it until it was too late.

"Well, then yes." Mara smiled, her stomach clenching as she concluded the lie. "I will."

Luke leaned forward and wrapped his arms around her in a hug. She hugged back, but the two stood there for more time than necessary. Then, they leaned back, looking into each other's eyes. Blue met green in a dazzling display of electricity and chemistry, as if they had clashed lightsabers together to form a wonderful connection of power, loyalty, and warm emotions.

"Luke…"

"DON'T LET HER GO, LUKE!"

Mara's eyes widened as she looked beyond Luke's form at the entrance to the landing pad. Bursting through the door were the bodies of her siblings, Max and Lexiah. Both had sweat dripping from their heads and they dropped into a fighting stance, causing her heart to flip in her chest with surprise.

"Guys?" Mara questioned, feeling a twinge of confusion mixed with fear that they might know something she hadn't told them.

"Sorry, Mara." Max said, slightly out of breath. "Can't let you do that alone."

"Do what alone?" Luke looked back to Mara, confused.

Mara's veins turned to ice.

Lexiah frowned slightly, "She's planning on searching out a voice that's been calling out to her through the Force. One that we can't hear on purpose because it is specifically targeting her."

"Mara." Max started. "We think that whoever is calling to you is using the Force to subtly influence your thoughts and emotions. A slyer way of using a mind trick without trying to change your thoughts directly. It's giving you a slight nudge."

Mara pondered that for a moment and realized that it would make sense. In the weeks since she started hearing the voice, the want and need to find out what it was grew by the day.

"Mara." Luke said, "I don't care that you lied but you have to be truthful now."

Without a word, Mara nodded.

Luke took a breath, not even realizing that he was holding it in, "What has the voice been saying?"

Mara turned to Luke fully, her hands down at her sides, but her eyes were blazing with determination. She already knew exactly what to say because that was the truth.

"I am curious about who it is. I feel like part of me knows what or who it is." Mara said, her voice then turning to steel, "It told me you needed to die, Luke. So, I was going to find it and find out why. Then, I was going to call in reinforcements to deal with whatever or whoever it was." Her eyes softened with her tone, "I don't want anything happening to you, Luke. And, whatever this is wants you dead."

Luke was stunned. He didn't believe that he had done anything in the recent years that had earned him a death notice. Especially not by someone who could reach through the Force and slowly manipulate Mara into…

But, it wasn't manipulating Mara. Mara was manipulating it!

"Mara." Luke said. "You shouldn't go alone."

Max and Lexiah stepped towards them, and Lexiah smiled, "That's why we are here. We aren't going to let you go alone."

Max took his saber in hand and ignited the blue blade, "We are family. We look after each other. Dad and Mom might not be here, but we are."

"I'm going too." Luke said suddenly. "If this turns out to be too much for you three, you'll need some backup. And, I'd much rather it be me that has your back."

For another instant, their eyes locked and Mara could on es gain see what her father seemed to always see. She gave an exaggerated sigh and then threw her hands up, "Fine. Fine."

Max smirked, "She thought she had a choice."

Within minutes, the four of them were in the shuttle and blasting off into hyperspace with the Force as their guide. With any luck, they wouldn't find anything and it would have just been a trick of the mind. However, as they saw the stars stretch into lines of white plasma, Maxwell Marko knew in his bones that the journey they would embark on would change them for the rest of their lives.

For the first time in his life, Max hoped that his feeling was wrong.

He prayed he was wrong. If he wasn't, then there would be disasters that followed. It wasn't his anxieties talking, but it was the wisdom of the Force speaking and thinking through him.

He gripped the handle of his lightsaber tightly in his right hand, feeling the grip of the body shape. He had to have confidence in himself, in his team, in the mission. He had to remember that he was the son of Blaze Marko. He had to remember that he was an extension of the Force. He had to remember…

I am Jedi.