Myren Selbek was easily the oldest human that I'd ever seen traverse a Force-guided jump route. Such navigation, which required lightning-quick reflexes as well as inspired piloting, was typically the domain of the young.
But Master Selbek had shook his grizzled grey head most vigorously when I made to take the helm. "The lane to Ilum isn't in the automated records," he croaked, "and it's tricky. Just pay attention and I'll let you fly us home."
It was, in all honesty, the smoothest space flight I could remember. Myren's mind was an open book - and spread out even more when flying - and the comfortable contentment with which he moved was an example to me. I could feel Master Dooku's strong mind in the hold, but otherwise the trip through hyperspace was a peculiar emptiness from the billions of life forms usually abiding in the background of my awareness. Olana was even more tightly shielded than before her recent breakdown.
"So, these Visions of yours," Master Selbek addressed as I felt his mind settle into the pattern of a straight leg, "involved living a full life on an isolated world. And at the same time, knowing details of the fall of the Republic and rise of a Sith Lord?" His curiosity was genuine; I sensed no deeper motive behind the question than to understand.
"There was more to it than that. Do Force Visions ever include a false framing? Experiences that aren't real, but help the Seer make sense of what he sees?"
Myren nodded. "Yes, some Visions are like this. A Jedi will dream that she took a land speeder to overlook a valley where she sees a future battle, or will open a book that explains an event as though it were history. Visions also include allegorical elements rendered into images, like a soldier holding up a shield to imply that a planet needs to mount a defensive. Yours were like this?"
"Far more extensive, but yes." I leaned back in the co-pilot's seat. "I lived almost forty years as a human on a world in a different galaxy. A planet with its own self-contained history and culture - no other worlds or alien intelligences."
Myren's curiosity grew. "How did this result in knowledge of our future, then?"
"Holodramas. Well, the local equivalent."
"Fiction? All of it?" This confused him.
"I lived in a wealthy part of the planet at a time when certain beloved stories were expanded upon ad nauseum. A trilogy of dramas on the fall of the Empire, three decades from now, eventually expanded into a timeline with stories and characters spanning millennia. Novels, sims, tactical modules. Episodics, more full-length dramas, eventually."
Myren was agog. "What planet could possibly have time for all that?"
"I suspect some worlds in the Galaxy do it, but it takes a certain amount of disposable wealth spread out over enough of the population."
The old man nodded. "A Vision doesn't need to be realistic. Like a dream, it needs to be understood by the one who has it. So your knowledge of the future Republic, the Galactic conflicts, is embedded in years of unrelated memories?"
"Yes. It's very fortunate that I now have perfect recall involving every scrap of fictional material I ever processed during that lifetime. If you had asked other-me the specs of the E-11 blaster rifle, or even the name of the Chancellor of the Republic, I would have given you a blank stare."
"That is certainly fortunate," Myrek said. "I will admit, Obi-wan, that what you describe is very different from any other Force Vision I have heard of. I understand why the Council sent you to Ilum."
"I'm still not sure that I do."
"You need to deal with your past." An alarm sounded on the console, and he turned his full attention back to piloting.
After the better part of two hours, he turned to me again, gesturing to the hold. "They are a lot alike."
"Olana and Dooku?" I respected the Master a great deal, but I would never have thought to compare him to my Padawan.
"If given a chance, Olana will become an accomplished diplomat for the Jedi, just as Dooku has been," Myren noted. "She is developing an air of leadership that draws people in. But more importantly, like the Count - and, yes, he will be Count again soon enough. Like the Count, she views loyalty and morality in personal terms. She connects to individuals, and sees her work in terms of how it affects them."
"Have you spoken with her?" I was surprised by the confidence with which he spoke.
"Not with the girl on this ship, no." He shared with me his amusement at my curious confusion. "We know there was some event, a couple of weeks ago, because Master Brienne and I both spoke with Olana in dreams about it. Something about 'a new teacher, a new way.' I just wanted to caution you: if the teacher is Dooku, keep a close eye on what he teaches her."
"Why wasn't I informed?" It surprised me that Seers might receive signs so quickly from a recent change.
"You just were." He made sure he had my full attention. "The Council of Seers isn't like the High Council. There's just the five of us, and we don't issue commands or hand down decisions, not often anyway. Mostly we talk about stuff, and one or two of us steps up to address different issues."
"Sounds more like a working group," I offered.
"Don't know what that means, but sure. Anyway, you know the future's been very cloudy of late. And many Visions have seemed more like nightmares than predictions."
"I should mention," I added, "that many of the dystopian Visions probably match the future I saw. The Galactic Empire is a genuine possibility if we don't make changes."
Master Selbek shrugged. "I won't be around to see it. I die in a year and a half." He chuckled when he saw my expression. "Calm down, young Knight. I had my pick of several destinies, as we all do. But the Force only lends us to the Galaxy for a time. I'll die with my weapon in my hand, making a difference to people who need my help. Looking forward to it, honestly."
"Couldn't you do something now to fix the situation before it erupts into violence?"
"Not that I've been able to figure out. I'll send you the info on Husarth Five when we get back to Coruscant, and you can tell me. Anyway, my point is this: don't let the big picture stop you from seeing the good you can do right now. That's the ever-present danger of Seers: not everything important will be shown to you in a Vision, and you can't live your whole life for some nebulous point in the future."
"It's prettier than I expected," Olana breathed from her seat just behind us. "Everything glitters."
We were banking around a massive glacial cliff, the sun reflecting unevenly across the landscape below. "It's even better at night," Myren replied. "Enough glowing crystals are buried under the permafrost to give the surface its own luminescence, even when the sky is overcast. Which it usually is. Ah, there we go."
My craft pointed toward a layered break in the cliffs that, to my eyes, looked just like twenty others we'd passed. I scanned the console for any readouts. "No beacon?"
"None," the old man agreed. "Hope you were paying attention, as the number of people in the Galaxy who know how to get here just increased from nine to eleven."
"That may be an exaggeration, Master," Olana spoke up. "The Gathering takes place every few years, I know, and many of those who take part could surely remember the way back."
"To that temple, yes. The Sunrise Temple." He powered retro-thrusters, slowing us to almost nothing as we coasted toward yet another sheer wall of ice. "This is the Sunset Temple. We've only used it four times since I've been around."
I asked, "How many sites are there on Ilum?"
"There were eighteen, at one time. That we know of." Myren shut off the thrusters at the same time as we touched ground - which I only knew from the instruments; no detectable shudder at all. "We can still locate twelve of them. The downside of secrecy is the very narrow jump from 'a few people know' to 'nobody knows.'"
I roused Master Dooku from his meditation, the four of us donning winter clothes that would have been dangerously inadequate without the heating micro-elements. Myren led the way, and Olana brought up the rear, controlling the large float-pallet that contained a surprising amount of electronics along with expected supplies and camping gear.
It wasn't until we were within a thousand feet of the massive, jagged cave entrance that I realized it was man-made. The stone was the bluish-grey color of the surrounding ice and carved with similar textures, a skillful camouflage. As we entered the mouth, the crunch of layered frost gave way to stone under my feet as well. The air was also rapidly getting warmer as the cave narrowed, still meandering and natural in its contours but increasingly regular in its dimensions.
The door set in the cave wall was a miniature copy of the cave mouth, but with a carved stone surface that showed a few phrases in Basic, some of the Aurebesh characters inset with softly glowing crystals. Myren gestured us forward. "Small amounts of energy," he prompted, "like opening a holocron. Don't try to force it too much or it'll trigger the tamper lock."
As one, we each held a gloved hand out toward the door, drawing energy gently into it. The gems pulsed once, twice, and with a jarring crack the door slowly slid aside.
What was revealed was, in a word, understated. The space was five rooms, two meant to be quarters and one meant as something of a galley. The space was warm, and lit dimly by inset crystals throughout. 'Cozy' came to mind.
"It's a few minutes until dusk," Master Selbek announced. "Did everyone bring shielded eyewear?" I produced my own pair of protective goggles - a rather expensive design preferred by bounty hunters and scouts - and saw the other three each pull out a Jedi-issued pair.
"Olana, trade me for these," I ordered.
She shook her head. "I won't take yours. Besides, I'm not familiar with those."
"Learn them now," I insisted, pulling the others out of her slack grip. "They're yours. I'll buy myself a second pair when we get back."
The door wasn't shaped or decorated like the front entrance; it was a simple circular portal built like a hatch. Myren looked around to confirm our eyewear, then turned a lever to swing the door outward. "Stay close, but this is a sight worth seeing. You two have your camp gear?" Olana and I nodded.
Through the hatch was a valley - a broad trough crossed with twisted outcroppings of brown rock, only the very highest peaks in the distance covered with snow. It stretched more than a kilometer in each direction before the uneven terrain obscured its full extent. Dotted at random within the enclosure, the kyber crystals refracted the sun's light, making the need for eye protection immediately clear. The valley was desert-bright, to the extent of visibility. I could see some cut sandstone a fair distance in, but otherwise, this all appeared to be a natural formation.
"Where we take the kids," Myren explained, "is called the Sunrise Temple because it opens when the sun rises and warms the ice. The trials are taken during the day." He gestured out toward the bright valley. "This is the Sunset Temple for the same reason: the Valley of Mists is only active at night. Any minute now."
We waited in contemplative silence as the sun touched the edge of the sky and slipped behind the obscuring peaks with surprising speed. It took very little time at all for the warm tones of the valley to fade to paler hues as the sunlight gave way to the crystals' internal glows.
As the light faded, the mists rolled in, thick and swirling, seeming to cling but loosely to the features of the valley even as they obscured them. In a very few minutes, only the highest peaks were left unobscured by the vapor-filled air. A few dull globs of light remained, not entirely extinguished by the mists but certainly dimmed. I felt the chill that accompanied this change, and although I had seen that the valley was empty of visible plant or animal life just minutes before, it no longer felt so.
"This way," Myren's voice echoed among the mists.