After spending over two hours in the Grand Audience Chamber listening to Tahiri relay her tale about being brought back to life by the Yuuzhan Vong, and then being rescued by a race that looked nearly identical but acted completely different, were the last things Jaina had expected the resurrected Jedi Knight to say. Then there was the part about these aliens, the Tsirran, wanting to help them fight their Vong relatives. Jaina found that harder to swallow then Tahiri's being brought back to life. But Anakin had been in close contact with these creatures as well, and had explained the unique differences between the Vong and the Tsirran. Everything from how they did not mutilate their bodies to how they lived in a peaceful village setting. They sounded sincere enough in their offer to help with the war effort, but he still did not know if he trusted them – even after spending time with them.
Jaina understood his skepticism. The Tsirran were distant relatives of the Vong, so it was hard to believe that they had Vong blood in them, yet did not act like cold-blooded murderers. Many of the Jedi Knights also shared her brother's uncertainty. She could tell by the looks on their faces on the reactions coming off of them through the force. There were others, though, who were quick to accept Tahiri assessment of the Tsirran and their offer of help. But ultimately, the decision of whether to ally with these aliens would be up to Luke Skywalker. No matter what he decided there would be those that disagreed with him – and that worried Jaina. If they got divided on the Tsirran issue, there was no telling how bad things could get.
No matter what their opinion was, all the students and even the fully trained Knights, including Luke Skywalker, had hung on to Anakin and Tahiri's every last word. They wanted to know everything there was to know about this new race. Anakin, who had not spent nearly as much time with them as Tahiri, did more listening then talking, while Tahiri launched into detailed explanations of everything.
Of course, the one question that had to have been playing on everyone's minds, but no one was brave enough to ask, was: what was death like? Or maybe no one asked because they did not think Tahiri would want to talk about it.
Jaina had to admit, she was extremely curious herself, but such an ordeal as being raised from the dead had to be an extraordinary and private thing that you wouldn't discuss with just anyone. If Tahiri wanted to discuss it with them, she would.
She had answered their continuous questions as best as she could, until she had asked to speak with Master Skywalker alone. They had left for Luke's office, and everyone had filed out of the Grand Audience Chamber now that the excitement was over – for the moment at least.
She wound the last corridor that would take her to her room, and stopped dead in her tracks when she saw who was standing outside her door waiting for her. She thought about turning around and coming back when he was gone, but she had a feeling he was not leaving until he talked to her.
Zekk looked nervous as she approached him, so nervous in fact that she hoped he would change his mind and go away. No such luck.
"Jaina," he said when they were face to face.
"Zekk," she greeted him coldly. "Back so soon? I hadn't even noticed you were gone,"
He sighed. "Do we really have to do this?"
"Do what?"
"Fight," he said. "That's not what I came here for. I needed to see you,"
"If it's to tell me you're leaving again, I kinda figured that one out on my own,"
"That's not it,"
"Then you're staying?"
He ran a hand through his short hair. "I dunno yet,"
"Whether or not you decide to stay I don't really care. I meant what I said, Zekk,"
"What did you want me to do, Jaina?" He said, growing irritated. "Stay here and risk hurting you and everyone else?"
"And did running away make things any better?" Jaina said, letting her own anger show. "Did you find what you were looking for?"
"No, I didn't," he admitted in a low voice. "I don't know if what I'm looking for is even out there,"
"Maybe five months ago I would have cared or felt sorry for you," Jaina said, opening the door to her room, "but I don't now,"
"Jaina, I'm sorry, but I can't change the past. I can't change what I am,"
"Did I ever ask you to?" She shot at him.
Zekk looked away from the harsh glare she was sending his way. "I didn't come here to hurt you,"
"No, you did a good enough job of that while you were gone," she said, and went to walk into her room.
"What's going on between you and Ganner?" He blurted out.
Standing in the doorway, she turned back to face him. "Ganner and I are friends. Not that it's any of your business," she said in an icy tone.
It was his business, and that's why he couldn't let it go at that. "What are you doing with a guy like Rhysode, Jaina? You're smarter then that,"
Getting defensive, she said, "you don't know anything about Ganner,"
"You're right. I don't. Maybe I should go talk to every girl at the Academy to find out about him,"
"This conversation is over," Jaina stated, clenching her teeth to hold back her anger.
Zekk's eyes widened in complete and utter shock. "He kissed you,"
"Get out of my head," she snapped. "You had no right to do that, and don't you ever do it again," she warned in a dangerous voice.
"I had no right? Ganner had no business kissing you. He's like what, a decade older then you?"
"It's seven," she clarified for him.
"Whatever. Geez, I wonder why a full-grown man is hanging around a seventeen year-old girl?"
Jaina had to use every ounce of self-control she possessed to keep from knocking Zekk from there to Courscant. "You lost any right you had to have a say in my life when you left here," she said to him, letting the anger she was feeling seep into her voice. "You might be back at the Academy, but you're not back in my life. I don't want you in my life. We're over. And that's not going to change no matter how long you decide to stick around for," and then she slammed the door in his face before he could say another word.
Tahiri was exhausted when she came by Anakin's room to say goodnight to him.
As strange as it was for her, she found herself tired from talking so much. Talking had always been like breathing for her, but explaining everything that had happened to her in the past couple of months over and over again got exhausting after awhile. She really could not blame them for their curiousity. She was thought to be dead and then out of nowhere she shows up on Yavin Four – alive. More then once she herself had been bewildered as to how the Vong had managed to accomplish it. She didn't remember a whole lot about it. It was mostly just a bunch of jumbled images that she saw in her head. Even when she tried to remember she couldn't recall any specific details. The only constant was the Yuuzhan Vong. They were always in them, doing things to her – putting things inside her body, but she could never see what. The thought that there was something alien crawling around inside of her was almost more then she could stand. She had never actually felt anything but that didn't mean there wasn't anything there. As long as it stayed inactive, she supposed she could live with it. Not like she had much of a choice in the matter. It was almost certainly there as one of the things the Vong used to help bring her back. Maybe it was the only thing keeping her alive.
She had left out those details and others surrounding her resurrection when she had explained being brought back. It would arouse too many questions – more than she was already having to deal with. She feared that if she told them about what she could remember that they would be afraid of her. That they would think she was under some kind of Yuuzhan Vong control, or worse yet, working for the Vong. That was what had led her to tell them she couldn't remember anything about what had happened. Her first memory was waking up in some sort of laboratory, but before anything could be done to her, the Tsirran posing as Yuuzhan Vong had gotten her out of there.
What had surprised her was the one question she had been expecting since her arrival never got asked – even though she knew they were all thinking it. She knew they wanted to know what death was like and where she had gone. But no one had provided a voice to the unspoken question, and she was not sure if it was because they thought it was too private a subject for her to discuss, or because they were scared. Maybe they were too afraid to know what the after life was like, or if they knew the secrets surrounding death, the mysterious aurora that had surrounded it since the beginning of time would be gone.
Whatever their reasons were, she had been relieved to not have to talk about it. Where she had gone after she had died was an issue she had not talked about openly with anyone – not even with Anakin – and she did not think she ever would. It would be too painful to talk about it. Right now, it hurt just to think about it. Too many of the people she cared about would be hurt if she told them the truth. Some things were better left unsaid.
Collecting her thoughts, she raised her hand and knocked on Anakin's door. It did not take him more then a few seconds to answer it. He must have been expecting her.
He invited her into his room, saying, "I never thought I'd get the chance to speak to you again,"
"I'm sorry we haven't had a chance to talk since this morning," she said, walking inside, "but I haven't been able to get away from everyone,"
"It's okay. Everybody here missed you, and now they're just happy you're back,"
"I had no idea I had such a fan club," she remarked.
"You were – I mean you are important to a lot of people," Anakin corrected himself. "Not only that, but your coming back to life has been one of the few good things that have happened since the war started. And now because of what you told them about the Tsirran, it's giving everyone their hope back. That maybe we really can beat the Vong,"
"I just hope I'm not giving them false hope," she said glumly.
"Even false hope is better then no hope at all. At least it will get everybody back in the right frame of mind now that we have a chance of winning,"
"I talked to Master Skywalker in private about meeting with the Tsirran at Anoth," she told him.
Ever since Tahiri had told him that there were Jedi traitors out there, he had been starting to wonder if maybe she was right. Initially, he had been certain the Tsirran had told her that lie just so that when she did go back to the Academy and told the other Jedi about it, they would become paranoid and suspicious of each other to the point that it would divide them. The Jedi would be so engrossed at pointing fingers that they would pose no real threat to the Yuuzhan Vong.
He had been so sure that the Tsirran were wrong, until he had actually allowed himself to believe in the possibility. As soon as he had, he was no longer sure they were liars after all.
It was common knowledge that a number of races had tried bargaining with the Vong in hopes of sparing their planets and the populations that lived there – the Syynnodes on Rygelia were the latest example of that. The Syynnodes were letting the Vong keep their slaves there until they found a permanent place to dispatch them. Though the majority of the deals made with the Vong, usually ended with the vicious aliens not keeping up their end of the bargain that had not deterred people from trying to make deals with them.
Was it really so farfetched then that some Jedi were also cutting deals to save their own skin? When people got scared, they did things they would never do under normal circumstances – and Jedi were people too. That was the reason he, Tahiri, and Zekk had decided not to tell anyone about the meeting scheduled at Anoth. If anyone was working for the Vong, they did not want to tip them off. Just letting everyone know about the Tsirran was risky enough, but there would have been to many unexplained questions – namely the living jelly acting as a sealant on Zekk's ship to try and answer. As long as no one knew the where the Tsirran were hiding, the aliens would be safe for the time being. The Vong would not split up their forces and make themselves vulnerable unless they knew where to look. They were too close to victory to risk doing something foolish like that.
They had also kept quiet about the fact that the Tsirran had entered this galaxy at a different vector point from the Vong. Anakin did not know if that piece of information would be significant or not, but it was best not to take any chances.
"What did my Uncle have to say about meeting with the Tsirran?"
"He seemed uncertain at first, but it didn't take him long to agree to go to Anoth. I think he realized he doesn't have anything to lose by going,"
"He doesn't want to be responsible for throwing away any chance, no matter how unbelievable it may seem, that might give us the edge for once,"
Tahiri nodded her head in agreement. "And when he goes, he's taking us with him – after the scouting team goes and checks out the place,"
"Scouting team?"
"A group of Jedi Master Skywalker has selected to go to Anoth before the Tsirran arrive to try and make it defendable in case the Vong find out about the meeting," she explained.
"No matter how defendable they make the stronghold on Anoth, it won't last too long under a Yuuzhan Vong assault," Anakin pointed out. "Who's he planning on sending, anyways?"
Tahiri ticked off the names on her fingers. "Well, there's your sister, Ganner Rhysode, Riley Walker –"
Anakin scowled at hearing the last name Tahiri had said. Riley was definitely not someone who should be going on a mission that was this vital.
"What's wrong with Riley?" Tahiri inquired seeing Anakin's sour expression.
"We had a difference of opinion regarding how the Vong invasion should be handled a few weeks back,"
It was a lot more then a 'difference of opinion', Tahiri was sure of it. "What happened?"
Anakin sighed. He had clearly wanted to steer clear of this subject. Taking his grief out on Riley had not been one of his finer moments. "I hit him,"
"You hit him because he had an opinion that was different then yours?" That did not sound like Anakin at all.
"No, I beat the living force out of him because of what he said," Anakin clarified.
"Gods Anakin," she said, shaking her head, "I can't believe you did that,"
"You sound like Uncle Luke,"
"I'm sure he was pretty upset with you,"
"He was. He told me to go home and cool off for a few days,"
"I still can't believe you beat him up,"
"He thinks we should surrender to the Vong. What kind of a Jedi does that make him?" Anakin said, trying to defend his actions.
"And so you hit him?"
"No, not then," he said slowly.
"When, then?"
He dropped his gaze to the floor. "After he told me I wasn't thinking straight because the Vong had murdered someone I cared about,"
It had been grief that had made him do it. She should have known. Anakin had never let people's opinions get the better of him before.
"It was stupid," he admitted, "and I shouldn't have done it. I don't know what I was thinking," he shook his head. "I wasn't thinking, that was the problem," before Tahiri could say anything, he quickly changed the subject, "who else is going?"
"Zekk,"
"Zekk?" The list just kept getting better and better. "We don't even know if he plans on sticking around long enough for that,"
"Master Skywalker seems to think he will,"
"Has he talked to him about it?"
"No. He's going to tell them all tomorrow," she said.
"If Zekk's still here by then," Anakin mumbled.
"He could have left hours ago, but he hasn't. I think he wants to stay,"
"I guess we'll find out in the morning,"
When they both grew silent, Tahiri said, "anyways, I just came by to say goodnight,"
"Goodnight," Anakin said to her.
That had been the real reason for her stopping by, but for some reason she couldn't bring herself to leave.
Anakin, sensing her reluctance to leave, said, "you could stay here if you want,"
"No, I should go. I don't think Kam and Tionne would be too happy if they learned I spent the night in here with you – newly resurrected or not,"
She kissed him on the cheek and went to leave.
"Tahiri," he called after her, "I'm here if you need me,"
"I know," she said, and then left his room.
She knew how badly Anakin wanted to help her, but even he couldn't help her with what she was going through.
