With everything else that was happening right now, the inside of Starlight Champion should have been Arlen's last reliable refuge. Instead he sat tense in the cockpit and stared at Chance Calrissian's hovering blue holo-image in disbelief.

"What do you mean she wouldn't explain?"

"I mean she wouldn't explain." Chance shrugged. "And yes, I tried. She said she'll be a couple days late to Ossus."

"How did she seem?"

"She insisted that I shouldn't worry about her."

That was the last thing Arlen wanted to hear. He slumped n his seat and wondered whether it would be worth it to try and hail Tamar. If she and Marin were going off on Mando business together she probably wouldn't respond.

"She's a Jedi. I'm sure she'll be okay, especially if she's with Tamar's family," Chance said. He almost sounded like he believed it.

"I just hate it when she goes off like this," Arlen sighed.

"Well she's a grown-up now. You've gotta let her make choices and mistakes."

"Thank you for the original parenting advice."

Chance ignored the sarcasm. "You're welcome. By the way, when can we get our hands on that bit of Soergg's collection you stole?"

"I didn't steal it. Some Imperial Knights did. Anyway, I've got it in the Temple. You can send a courier or someone to pick it up. Where are you now?"

"Inbound for the Core with Volgma."

"And is Volgma a happy Hutt?"

"He will be once we fence that Alderaanian vase and get compensation."

"I thought Volgma was averse to sub-legal business deals. And you, for that matter."

"I am, normally, but this is an exceptional case."

"Well, that works nicely."

"Arlen, don't go piously righteous on me. You helped steal the damned thing."

"Yeah, I know." He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Righteousness was a hard thing to contemplate when you were pondering a pact with a Sith locked in your basement. "Anyway, how did Vedo make out in this? And did Soergg get his droid back?"

"He did. Vedo's slicer got only a partial data-dump from the droid but he still seems satisfied. He's humiliated Soergg and all the other Hutts know it."

"He must be bloated with pride."

"Among other things. Vedo also wanted me to repeat his gratitude and says he wouldn't mind working with Jedi again."

"That was a one-time thing."

"I thought so, but I left the door open anyway." Chance gave a short, satisfied sigh. "I know it's your father's prerogative to worry about Marin, but I'm sure you don't have to. She'll be okay."

"Yeah. I'm sure she will." Arlen faked a smile.

Since there seemed nothing more to say, Chance sketched a quick salute. "Talk to you later, friend."

"Later," Arlen said, and shut off the transmission.

He sunk into his chair, pressed down by worries. It wasn't just questionable ethics, or Marin gone missing, or the great and distant battle his brother was embroiled in. The heaviest thing of all was that Sith in the basement.

He eventually forced himself from his chair, left Champion, and made his way into the lowest levels of the Jedi Temple. He hadn't gone to see the prisoner yet, but Arlen knew where he was being kept. He traced a path down narrow stone hallways until he found the door. A pair of young Jedi guarded it on either side and they stiffened to attention when they saw Arlen come.

"Master Fel!" the one on the right snapped. "Have you come to talk to the prisoner?"

"That's right. Is anyone else with him?"

"No, Master Fel."

Arlen took a deep breath. "Then let me through."

They unlocked the door, then closed it once Arlen stepped through. He found himself looking down on a middle-aged Chiss lying flat on his bench. Stun cuffs bound his ankles and pinned his wrists in front of him. A metal cast encased the lower half of one leg. He seemed to have been sleeping, but when Arlen stood over him his red eyes opened easily and stared upward. Arlen flinched just a little as he looked down on his first apprentice; or rather, what was left of him. When he'd thought Wharn dead in Senex-Juvex he'd gone thorough stages of regret and grief. When he'd learned the Chiss had been captured and turned by the Sith years later, he'd repeated those stages again, more acutely than the first time. Now they'd come back for a third round.

The Sith didn't sit upright. He just kept laying there, looking up at Arlen, until the Jedi said, "I never thought I'd see you again."

"It's mutual," said Terrid.

All the youthful softness on Wharn had been carved away. Terrid's face was gaunt and angular. His lips there a thin joyless line and his eyes were settled harsh over hard cheekbones.

"When Jade told me you were alive, I didn't know what to think. I just wish… it could have been different. If I'd been a little faster back in those tunnels, if I'd have taken out Darth Kheykid before he took you… It could have been different."

"Is that what you came here to say?" asked Terrid, unimpressed.

"I'm not sure exactly," Arlen admitted. He'd avoided seeing the prisoner for days, but if his word was going to decide the future of the Jedi, Arlen knew he couldn't hide forever. "I understand you've been very helpful."

"I tried to oust Darth Krayt's Sith. Perhaps you'll succeed where I failed."

"So you want to make the Jedi an instrument of your revenge?"

Terrid gave a lying-down shrug. It sickened Arlen to think of Jedi fulfilling this renegade Sith's wish, but he'd given them information they couldn't ignore. Some good might come from Terrid's selfishness; from Wharn's fall.

"Can I ask you something personal?"

Terrid shrugged again. "You can ask."

"When the Sith took you… broke you… How much did you resist?"

"Did your teaching matter? Is that what you're asking?"

"I guess I am."

The Sith's head rolled to one side. He stared into the wall, thought, and said, "I struggled. And the things my Jedi teacher taught me were… useful, for a while. But the Sith don't relent. That's why they always win."

Arlen didn't know what he'd expected. That didn't assuage guilt or grief but didn't exacerbate them either. He had one more aching question and decide to be out with it. "Are you a Sith, still?"

Terrid continued to stare into the wall. Arlen let him think, and eventually he said, "What else would I be?"

Arlen didn't have an answer, so he quietly left the room. As the door locked behind him, he walked away quickly, without looking back.

-{}-

It had been eight years since Roan Fel last visited the Jedi Temple on Ossus and he was willing to admit that time and experience may have clouded his memories. He'd remembered it more as some monastic hideaway, suitable for meditation and contemplation, full of wandering brown-robed Masters who never seemed to actually do anything.

His mother always insisted that the Imperial Knights were not rivals or enemies to the Jedi Order but comrades. Those of Roan's generation had never really believed it. Imperial Knights served their Empire and fought and died for it. Though just seventeen, Roan had known too many Knights now killed in the Empire's service. The Jedi, by contrast, swore allegiance no power except a lofty abstraction. He knew most Jedi were probably true and noble enough, but in his view they'd never been tested as hard as his fellow Imperial Knights. They weren't as disciplined, weren't as hard. They'd accomplished less.

He was starting to realize that, while these Jedi didn't keep martial order like the Knights, they had discipline of their own. They weren't soft.

Three Imperial Knights versus one Jedi apprentice had seemed an unfair matchup, even for a sparring match, but Nat Skywalker had seemed game. Roan's cousin was a year and a half younger but already bigger. He'd balled his long blonde hair up before starting and after just ten minutes his whole face was slick with sweat, but he still kept at it. Treis and Roan mostly hung to the sides, taking occasional jabs at the Jedi's flanks, while Mohrgan attacked from the front. The Jedi healers had mended his wounds expertly and his motions were fast and nimble, but Roan could tell he was slightly uncomfortable with the blue-bladed lightsaber he'd been loaned to practice.

The first match ended with Treis slipping his white blade beneath Nat's defenses, nearly poking his stomach. The young Skywalker took the defeat with a red-faced grin and suggested that, for the next match, they fight blue sabers versus white. Two on two would be more fair, after all.

Mohrgan was fine with that. Roan was happy to keep fighting, because he needed something to keep his mind off whatever was happening with Vitor and his parents. It maddened all three young Knights to be kept away like this and they needed an outlet for frustration.

Just as they were starting to spar, an audience joined them in the practice room. Elliah Chalk and her brother Hogrum took spots on the bench next to the sparring mats and started watching without a word. Those two had been wandering the Jedi Temple like the three Knights, lost but less impatient. Normally Roan didn't mind having her around but he found himself wishing she'd leave.

Elliah was the first Hapan he'd met. They'd always said Hapan women were beautiful and they'd been right, but he tried to keep his mind off her and on the match. While Treis sparred with Mohrgan, Roan tried to match Nat. The Skywalker boy had recovered well; his feet were nimble on the mat and he dodged Roan's attacks as often as he blocked them. Being matched so well made Roan frustrated, all the more because the audience, which made his moves all the more sloppy, and it ended when he overbalanced and let Nat get beneath his defenses.

Treis, at least, had bested Mohrgan, so it ended a draw. As the four of them took a break for water, Elliah asked, "Why do you Jedi insist on using lightsabers? Why don't you train with ranged weapons? It would be more practical."

She was full of questions like that. She was ignorant of the wider galaxy like no one he'd ever met, but her curiosity was strangely refreshing.

"Jedi aren't soldiers," Nat told her. "A lightsaber is a defensive weapon, first and foremost. If you get close enough to attack someone you have to look them in the eye."

"So it's a question of honor."

"You could say that."

"Jedi follow antique codes and customs. I've gathered that." Elliah looked to Roan. "What about Imperial Knights? You are soldiers, aren't you?"

"Yes, but that's not all we are. We've been trained to use blasters and explosives too, but our primary weapon is still the lightsaber."

"Because it's honorable?"

"Basically, yes."

She hummed thoughtfully. "On Hapes it was common for daughters of noble families to learn to fight with pikes. It was a way of honoring tradition."

"Did you learn how to fight with one?" asked Mohrgan.

"Some. I remember that Queen Serissa was supposed to be very good with one."

"Yeah, I bet she'd got a lot of talents," grunted Treis.

An awkward silence filled the room. Talk about Hapes drew thoughts to the big battle they'd all narrowly escaped. That in turn drew thoughts back to Ossus; what they were doing here and what was keeping all the seniors Masters busy.

Hogrum was young or bold enough to ask Nat, "Do you know who the prisoner is?"

"Why would I know?" asked Skywalker.

"Your mother captured the prison…. Didn't she?"

Nat looked at the floor with a frown, like someone who knew some things but not everything and was deciding how much to tell. Elliah asked, "Is it a Sith?"

"What do you know about Sith?" asked Treis.

"Only a little. Only what Jade- Master Skywalker- told me. She says they're like Jedi and Imperial Knights but opposite to them both."

"That's a start," admitted Nat.

"So if the Sith are involved, does that mean you're on the same side?"

She was good at those innocent but heavy questions. All four young men passed awkward looks. Treis said, "My father was killed by a Sith."

"I'm sorry," Elliah said. "I saw what they could do at Reboam. It was terrifying."

Beside her, Hogrum scowled at the memory.

"The Sith and Jedi have battled for centuries," Roan explained. "As for us… We know the Sith were involved with the Restorationists at the beginning. That's how Treis' father got killed. But we haven't seen any of them since. And believe me, we've looked very hard."

"But they're still your enemies, aren't they?"

"Absolutely," said Treis.

Treis said what he believed, but as a prince Roan knew it was more complicated. These Jedi here on Ossus saw the Sith as their ultimate foe; for the Empire, it was the Restorationists. If these Jedi did have a captive Sith locked up, and his capture was leading to a greater confrontation between Sith and Jedi, he had no idea how his parents would respond. A lot might depend on the outcome of the battle against the Restorationists happening right now.

"Hapans tell a lot of stories about Jedi," Elliah said. "I see now that they're pretty much all lies. I already suspected that before. But these Sith…. They're worse than the worst Jedi stories I ever heard."

"The Sith are allied with Queen Serissa," Nat said. "Your cousin."

"Serissa's no cousin of mine," she shook her head stubbornly.

Nat looked down at the lightsaber he'd clipped to his belt. "The prisoner is a Sith. My mom told me that much, but not anything else."

"Do you think he's… telling them things? About Hapes?" Hogrum asked like he was afraid of the answer.

"He's telling them something, if they've been locked up with him for days," Treis said.

"There's no point in guessing what," Roan told them. "We'll just have to wait and see."

Treis and Mohrgan nodded grimly. 'Wait and see' was the summary of their days now. Roan didn't know what would come of this captured Sith, but its prospects frightened him as much as his family's distant battle.

-{}-

Allana had left Coruscant uncertain when, if ever, she'd return to the capital. She stopped briefly on New Hapes to pick up Tanith Zel, then headed for Ossus. Jade hadn't been willing to explain much on an open comm channel, but that she'd requested both of them in person meant something major had happened.

When Allana and Tanith sat down in the Jedi Temple to hear the full story, they could hardly believe it. Tanith was nakedly incredulous.

"The ancient Hapans scoured Force-users from their bloodlines," she said. "That the Force should manifest in a queen is…. Unbelievable. Are you sure that Sith isn't lying to you?"

"Very," Jade said. "It's not just Serissa who has the Force. The Chalk siblings, her distant cousins, have it too. We can only assume it was passed unnoticed by some ancestor."

"A Sith Lord, ruling the Hapes Cluster…" K'Kruhk shook his shaggy head. "It's the most power their kind has had since the days of Palpatine."

Allana knew the ancient Whiphid remembered those days all too well. "This is different," she said. "Hapes isn't the old Empire. It's so much smaller and their power is still limited."

"Limited, but greater than anything the Jedi can wield," Tanith said pointedly. "Serissa commands an entire fleet of battle-trained, devoted soldiers. You've just told us the Alliance won't help us."

Allana sighed. "The politics is…. complicated."

"Help us with what?" Jade asked. "Do we, the Jedi Order, want to overthrow the Queen of Hapes?"

"We always suspected there were Sith there," K'Kruhk said. "We knew nothing about them, and so they've festered for forty years, starting wars in Senex-Juvex and the Empire. The damaged they've caused is… incalculable."

"We weren't ignorant for lack of trying," Tanith said defensively. "The Sith hid themselves exceptionally well. The fact that we only heard about them now is-"

A gift, Lowbacca trilled.

"The Grand Master is right," Allana sighed, then added for Tanith, who didn't understand Shyriiwook, "The information Darth Terrid's given us is invaluable. We can't just waste it."

"Then what are we talking about?" Jade looked directly at her cousin. "What exactly?"

Allana felt all their eyes draw to her. Tanith's were hard; she already knew the answer. Allana took a breath and said, "I can't allow a legion of Sith Lords to ravage the Hapes Cluster. Not as a Jedi, not as its rightful queen. We have to remove them, both from Hapes itself and Shedu Maad."

Allana watched their responses. Tanith gave a tiny, firm nod. K'Kruhk's eyes narrowed, as though he were contemplating the problems ahead. Lowbacca was too hard to read, but on Jade's face Allana saw a raw dread.

"You're saying the Jedi Order should overthrow the leader of Hapes," Jade said. "I just want to be clear on that."

"The leader of Hapes is a Sith tyrant. Her fleets protect even worse monsters," Tanith said darkly. "We have to destroy them."

"The difficulty lies in how," said K'Kruhk. "You say we can't count on the Alliance to liberate Hapes."

"Coruscant is a mess right now because they lost a lot of soldiers in one engagement," Allana said. "They're not going to launch a full-scale invasion of a sovereign kingdom."

"Exactly," said Jade. "If the whole Alliance is afraid to do something like that, what can we do?"

"New Hapes will help any way it can," Tanith said. "Though I admit we have limited resources."

Lowbacca growled that they would have to explore other options, including sneaking precise and lethal strike forces onto Shedu Maad and Hapes.

"Assassination teams?" Jade asked.

"Call it what you will. It could be possible," Tanith mused, "But we have no way of predicting what will happen to Hapes if we take out Serissa."

"It can hardly be worse than a genocidal Sith tyrant," said Allana. "The Grand Master is right. We must do whatever we can, even if our capabilities are limited. What these Sith have done so far is monstrous. If what our prisoner says is true, and Darth Krayt is still sleeping on Shedu Maad, it will become so much worse when he wakes."

Jade looked down at her hands, took a breath, and asked the question Allana knew was the real source of her hesitation. "What do we do with Darth Terrid?"

The question hung there for a drawn-out moment. It was Tanith who asked, "Do you think, if we took him back to Shedu Maad, he'd switch sides again?"

"I don't think Krayt's people would take him back if he tried. But that's not to say I trust him."

Lowbacca reminded them that Terrid was the only one of them who'd been to Shedu Maad in forty years. The descriptions he'd given had been helpful. His guidance might be invaluable.

Jade shook her head. "Relying on his information is one thing, but actually taking him with us…"

"It is a huge risk," K'Kruhk said. "But it might also yield great rewards. Tell me, Master Skywalker, what do you believe Terrid would do if he joined us at Shedu Maad?"

They all knew the bond Jade had once shared with a young Chiss apprentice. Whether it made Jade a better or worse judge of Darth Terrid, Allana wasn't sure. Clearly, neither was Jade.

"I don't know," she said weakly.

Lowbacca suggested that another talk with the Sith Lord was in order.

Jade breathed deeply, in then out. Her dread of sitting down with another conversation with Terrid was palpable to them all. The need for it was clear too.

"I'll go," Jade said softly. "I'll talk to him again. After that… I'll decide."

-{}-

It seemed as though Terrid hadn't moved an inch since their last conversation. Even the bacta cast was still on his leg. Once Jade stepped into the cell she sat down on the cot opposite his. Unlike last time, she didn't shrink from the red glow of his eyes. She couldn't afford to. Hard as it was, she needed to know the truth.

"You've come back," Terrid said flatly. "Are you going to explain why?"

"The Jedi have taken their time considering what you've said. And how they'll respond."

"What's to consider? Call on your friends in the Alliance. Muster a fleet. Bomb Shedu Maad to ash and conquer Hapes. Don't leave a single Sith alive."

As he spoke she could tell he wanted it. He'd been left here for days and his spite had only deepened. The idea of enacting some revenge on those who'd beaten him was his only remining desire. She didn't know if that was encouraging, only that it was sad.

"That's not a possibility," Jade said. "We don't have the resources."

He arched a black brow. "No help from the Alliance? That's what you get from staying separate from the government. If the Jedi Order hadn't fled to Ossus you could have stayed on Coruscant and forced the Alliance to do what's needed."

"That's not the Jedi way. We're not made to rule."

"Then you turn your back on the greatest gift the Force can offer."

"The Force can do much more than subjugate people to your will. If that's all you know how to use it for, then I'm sorry for you."

She knew pity would hurt him. His face twisted in a scowl. "I'm not going to debate what the Force is for. The Force simply is and those who can use it, do. So if you don't have the Alliance at your back, who can you call on?"

"Only ourselves. So tell me honestly. How many Sith are there in Hapan Space, all combined?"

"Define Sith. There are acolytes on Shedu Maad. Teenage apprentices. Small children trained in the Dark Side as soon as they can walk. What would you do with them?"

Jade hadn't even considered that. "We'd try to redeem those who could be saved. We're not butchers."

"And if those small children grab lightsabers and try to kill you, what then?"

"We'd defend ourselves and disarm them. I'll say it another way. How many Sith are there capable of putting up a fight on Shedu Maad?"

He only had to think for a moment. "Less than one hundred."

"And how many on Hapes besides the queen?"

"Normally, none. I can't say how it's changed since… the battle."

"And how many Sith on other planets in the Hapes Cluster?"

"None that I know of."

He was telling the truth. The answers all came out easily. Despite his bitterness and occasional desire to parry with her, Terrid wanted the destruction of the One Sith. She was certain of that.

He leaned forward, elbows on knees. "You Jedi have enough to defeat them. It will be bloody, but if you throw the entire Order at them, numbers and attrition will be on your side."

"You're forgetting the Hapan navy."

"Send your Jedi to Hapes and Shedu Maad. Kill every Sith you find. Blast Darth Krayt's sleeping chamber to atoms. And when you're done the Hapans will blast you to atoms. But at least the Sith will be gone."

"Would that please you? Seeing us all annihilated?" Because she had to know, she hunched forward too and looked into his red eyes. "Do you want to see me dead?"

He flinched. His face tilted away. "There's no reason I should."

"But you want to see the One Sith dead more."

"You know I do." He looked back to her. "I will come to Shedu Maad with you. Is that what you came here to ask?"

"Yes. But you don't decide if you come or not."

"I know. The Jedi decide. But you'll let me come. You need me. I can guide you exactly where to go in Shedu Maad."

"They may have changed things since they got rid of you."

"Not everything. Not the chamber where Krayt sleeps. I will show it to you, Jade. We'll go there together."

"Why do you think I'm going there to kill Krayt?"

"Because," he said, utterly serious, "You're a Skywalker."

She scowled. "Is a Sith going to lecture me about destiny now?"

"I don't need to lecture you about anything. You know the power passed down to you. You know what you're capable of, even if you don't want to be."

"You're going to tell me what I want now too?"

"You don't want to be Grand Master like your father. You don't want to die young like your parents or your husband. You want to grow old and be happy and raise your sons to be great Jedi themselves. You want a life of peace."

He was right. She hated that she was so transparent to him when they'd only met a few times in their adult lives. But maybe he wasn't just describing the woman in front of him. Maybe the Jade he described was, at the core, the same Jade he'd known a quarter century ago.

Maybe all the transformations Terrid had gone through made him better at spotting what remained constant in her.

"I can't deny it," she said. "There's nothing wrong with it either. I'll never want to command armies and burn planets."

"You want peace, but destiny finds you," Terrid insisted. "And when the need comes, you rise to the cause. You summon that great Skywalker strength and you use it. You killed Darth Xoran. You destroyed Abeloth forever. Don't lie to me. I was there and I felt that incredible power come out of you. We destroyed Abeloth together and together we'll kill Krayt."

"Jodram killed Abeloth."

"Because you gave him power. Your power. We both know Jodram was too weak a Jedi-"

"Don't you dare call him weak," she snapped. "You could never accomplish what he did. It required strength like you'll never know. Not raw Force power, strength of the heart."

He looked down. She felt something from him she hadn't expected: contrition. "Maybe so," he muttered. "I am what I am. What the One Sith made me."

"You could have been something more."

"These are the only lives we'll have. Regrets get us nowhere." He still didn't look up. "Destiny finds you, Jade. Always. That's what being a Skywalker means. It also means rising to the occasion. You'll do that too."

He said it with plain, simple certainty. She wanted to rebut him but could not. Destiny had found her again. She was sitting across the room from it, looking at its bowed head, and whether she wanted it or not, destiny would carry them together, out of this cell, across the stars, to Shedu Maad and the den of a sleeping dragon.

She knew that, because all he'd said was true.

-{}-

When Kol Skywalker and Nei Rin got the chance to explain their troubling discoveries, they gathered Jaina, Tahiri, and the Master Shaper in the Yuuzhan Vong laboratory. Kol let his friend do most of the talking, and as they watched and listened what began as skepticism in the three adults' eyes became deep concern. The moment Nei Rin finished her explanation, Neshri Yim requested to see the data they'd copied from Rennis' pad.

The Master Shaper was normally loath to work off a lifeless machine, but he surprised Kol by taking the datacard and pad he was offered. He studied the screen intently as Jaina and Tahiri watched over his shoulder. Best Kol knew, his great-aunt was no expert on xenobiology but Tahiri seemed to have a little knowledge. As she read Kol could feel her dread mount in the Force.

"This is most alarming," Neshri Yim said at last.

"Could there be another explanation for this?" asked Jaina. "Something to do with the project?"

The Master Shaper shook his head. "All this data on our biots was assembled from different sources we gave him. And the specifications for all these unique toxins… he must have brought them with him."

"Are all the scientists in their laboratory now?"

"They should be," Tahiri said. "Do you want to talk to Rennis alone?"

"We should talk to all of them." Neshri Yim was firm. "There is no telling who else is involved. You Jeedai can sense if they are telling truth, yes?"

After a tiny hesitation, Jaina nodded. "We'll come with you. Kol, Nei Rin, thank you for bringing this to our attention. We'll handle the rest from here."

Kol started, "But I-"

"Stay here," Jaina insisted and turned for the door. Tahiri followed and then Neshri Yim, and then Kol and Nei Rin were alone.

The girl put a hand on his arm and said, "They are correct. This could… become dangerous."

"It already is dangerous."

"You know what I mean. You are brave, Kol Skywalker, but you are not a Jeedai yet."

-{}-

As they gathered the five members of the Alliance science team in the laboratory, Jaina couldn't help but wonder if this was her fault. She and Tahiri had researched these scientists before allowing them on Zonama Sekot. They'd scoured their histories for any hint of sympathy to the various anti-Yuuzhan Vong extremist groups still out there and found nothing, but she also knew they'd vetted the two senior researchers, Soett and Tlaa, more thoroughly than their assistants. From what Jaina could recall, the young man named Rennis was from Denon, a world that had avoided invasion seventy-five years back, but he may have gained extremist ties another way.

This incident could ruin cooperation with the Alliance for decades to come, and if there was some hint Jaina had missed, she would never forgive herself. In her waning years she'd tried harder than ever to heal the wounds of the war that had damaged her own life so much; it would be intolerable irony if she only caused deeper cuts.

Two younger and more able-bodied Jedi joined Tahiri, Jaina, and Neshri Yim as they gathered the scientists in their lab. When everyone was sealed in the chamber, the Master Shaper got straight to the point.

"We have recently been made aware of some research here that is outside the provisions of our project. At least one of you has been researching Yuuzhan Vong biots and devising potential lethal toxins to use against them."

Jaina stepped up beside Neshri Yim and placed Kol's datapad on the center table. "This is a copy of data found on a pad belonging to Researcher Rennis."

Soett picked up the pad and looked over it quickly. Concern filled her face and she turned on the young human. "What is the meaning of this?"

He glanced at the data on the screen and frowned. "I've never seen this in my life," he said, though Jaina sensed no confusion from him in the Force.

"This information was found on your desk," Jaina told him without explaining who'd made the discovery.

Rennis' frown deepened. "That is not my pad."

"It's a copy from one of yours."

"Another pad…. On my desk…" His eyes darted to the young woman beside him. "Neita let me borrow one of her pads at the end of work yesterday. I haven't had a chance to read it."

Now it was Neita's turn to look confused, and this time Jaina could feel honesty. "I didn't give you a anything yesterday."

"Of course you did," Rennis moved for the desk. "I've got it right here."

The young woman insisted to Soett, "I really don't know what he's talking about. Last night I-"

Rennis spun around from his desk with a little hold-out blaster in his fist. Soett gasped; Neita yelped with surprise. Neshri Yim hissed as the researcher pointed its stubby barrel directly at the Master Shaper's chest.

"Put that down. Now," Jaina said, with a command from the Force. She'd wrest that gun from his hand but it might go off, and he'd killed Neshri Yim at this range.

Rennis backed toward the door but kept his aim on the Yuuzhan Vong. His determination was fierce enough to withstand her Force-command.

"You can't get away," Tahiri said. "There's no place to run."

Rennis kept going until his back was almost at the door. He'd have to turn to tap the controls and open it, and Jaina would pull his gun away then.

But instead of turning he squeezed the trigger. A red blast lanced out at Neshri Yim. Jaina reached out with the Force to block it, erecting an invisible wall in front of the Yuuzhan Vong. As she did so Rennis adjusted his aim and blasted out the light overhead, spreading a shower of sparks across the table, then darkness.

And then he was through the door and out of the room. The second it closed there was the sound of another laser blast in the hallway, and when Yeris Ulara got to the door the Mirialan announced that the controls has been fried from the other side.

"Then use the Force on it!" Tahiri insisted, then told the others, "He can't go far. This is a small compound."

Neshri Yim forced his gaze from the spot a few centimeters from his heart where the killing bolt had fizzled to smoke and disappeared. He looked at Jaina and said, "Thank you, Jeedai. You saved me."

"Not yet," she told him. "Thank us we when it's over."

-{}-

When he heard the shot sound down the hall, Kol felt a surge of anxiety and frustration from Jaina and Tahiri, and he knew that something had gone severely wrong. Next, muffled through several closed doors, he heard someone shout, "The door's stuck! He blasted the controls!"

"Then use the Force on it!" someone else, maybe Tahiri, said.

Kol heard no boots pounding down the hall this way, which meant Rennis must be sprinting in the other direction. In the compound there were few places to run, and the skimmers they used for away missions wouldn't get him far. He could only be making a run for the shuttle he'd arrived on.

"Let's go!" Kol told Nei Rin and broke into a sprint.

The Yuuzhan Vong lagged behind him as he burst out of the shaper's lab. "Jeedai! What are you doing?"

"Someone's gotta stop him!" Kol called back and kept running.

The distance to the landing pad from the scientists' lab and the shapers' one was about the same, and as much as he hated it, Rennis could move faster with longer strides than he could. He didn't even know what he'd do once he got there but he had to do something. He might have been young but he was still a Jedi or becoming one fast and a Jedi didn't just sit around and do nothing. For all Kol knew the man could escape with a copy of his deadly research.

The landing pad was accessed from one central lift shaft, and Kol got there just in time to see the doors close and hear the tube shoot upward. There were still emergency stairs that spiraled up around the tube, and Kol immediately began climbing them. He made long lunges, taking two steps at a time, even though his thighs started to ache and his chest strained for breath.

When he burst onto the pad he saw the shuttle waiting and he saw Rennis' figure bent close to the hull, probably trying to figure out how to extend the landing pad. Kol's legs were about to collapse under him and when he tried to shout at the man no sound came. He planted himself on the deck, took two deep breaths, and found the strength to shout "Stop!"

Rennis jumped and spun. Kol saw the blaster in his hand right before it went off. There was a red flash, and then searing pain spread out from the center of his chest, and then Kol Skywalker knew he was falling backward. The sky filled his vision, a clear blue nothing, but when his back hit the deck he saw nothing and felt nothing at all.

-{}-

The lift carried them up and opened its doors and it was already too late. Ulara rushed out first, lightsaber ignited, and bounded across the landing pad at Rennis, who stood frozen in front of the doors to a shuttle that couldn't open. His pistol twitched in his hand but the Miralian deflected the blast, then used the Force to rip the weapon away. Another shove of invisible energy forced the scientist on his hands and knees and, finally, a boot between shoulder-blades dropped his face hard into the deck.

Jaina barely noticed. She was hurrying toward Kol as fast as her old body would carry her.

The boy was lying face-up with a black scorched hole in his chest. His eyes were open, staring into nothing and seeing nothing. Jaina thought he was already dead, but when she dropped on top of him and placed her hands over his ruined chest she could still feel his presence, so very faint. Tahiri called for a medical kit, but Jaina knew the boy's last embers would burn out in seconds.

She couldn't let it happen. Jaina fell over his body, both hands against the burnt flesh of his wound, called on the Force.

Jaina was no healer, not like Cilghal or Tekli or other great Jedi she'd known. She'd spent too many years being a Sword of the Jedi that killed for peace again and again. She healed the only way she knew how, by giving the strength that was hers so that the boy's body might mend. Just as she'd found faint life in that gnarled bora sprout she found it in Kol and she opened herself as though with a sword so what she had might flow into him. She passed it from the great to the small, the strong to the weak, the old to young, and in bridging their lives she felt Kol in the Force as she never had before.

The life inside him strengthened, grew, began the arduous process of healing its broken flesh cell-by-cell, and as her life-force suffused into his she saw brief, flashing glimpses of the man he'd become: tall and bold, red hair like his grandfather Ben's and a flashing blue sword, green eyes full of wisdom and love for his own son (blonde-haired, she saw, like Jade and Luke) and with love for the entire line of Skywalkers, of which Kol was just one link, neither beginning and nor end, just a carrier of the fire that flared anew from warming embers beneath Jaina's hands.

And as Kol's fire burned warmer, strong enough to keep burning and sustain itself and mend a young body no longer on the brink of death, Jaina felt a deep cold spread from inside. She felt cold and she felt tired, and the fire that was Kol's life seemed distant and separate again. She could no longer see the man he'd become or remember his face. She was tired, only tired.

As Jaina's fire cooled and dimmed her body lost feeling and collapsed atop the boy's. She felt like she was being carried away, peacefully, to a long and well-earned sleep.