FIFTEEN

The room, it turned out, was merely an audience chamber. Obi-Wan's ephemeral self was being tugged along by the merest motion of his captor's finger; the dark tendrils of power that held him were obedient to her whim and he found himself following her however unwillingly.

"At first I was merely content to cause a disruption between the Bahreena and your precious Jedi Council; I figured the death of a Jedi Padawan at the hands of the gentlest Force-sensitives in the galaxy would raise no small stir." Nacena seemed content to narrate along as she dragged him along behind her, not particularly noticing as he passed right through chairs and tables and whatever else. None of the incidental contacts with freestanding furniture had any effect on either his condition or on the power she seemed to have over him. "As a side benefit it would be sufficient to destroy that bantha you call your master."

At that, Obi-Wan fairly bristled, and he cast a baleful look at the back of his captor's head as she continued to walk ahead of him.

"Force take you." He muttered.

"Tsk, tsk now Padawan. A Jedi knows no anger, remember? Or have you so quickly forgotten all that your teacher has told you?" She waved a finger in the air but did not face him, letting her condescending tone be the equivalent of a scathing look. "Two things have altered my designs but only by a little." She let the sentence hang, mocking him, daring him to break his uncooperative, unruly silence with her. Almost as if the words were being dragged from his mouth, Obi-Wan finally asked,

"What are they?" His voice was flat and uninterested sounding. But in truth if he ever found a way back to Qui-Gon he would warn him of any plan he learned here.

"The first is the discovery of another of my kind here. This place," She waved her hands around expansively. "Is his. He built it upon the discovery of the cerubathain you saw in there. And he is the member of a major House…the very same in which your master now watches over you. Or what used to be you."

Obi-Wan couldn't contain his shock. The Dark Side had taken refuge in a ruling House…the House Inais no less? Was that what the girl from his visions had meant by saying he had placed Qui-Gon in danger? Instinctively he cast a probing finger toward Nacena in the Force, attempting to ascertain if she was indeed telling him the truth or if she was attempting to mislead him in some fashion for a bigger purpose.

The sudden pain that coursed through him like a backlash of sorts quickly put an end to that, and he audibly gasped, both from the sensation itself and the confusion of the fact he could feel it when he was…well body-less.

"What did you do?" He found himself asking reluctantly. He wasn't eager to feel that again anytime soon.

"You're not completely disconnected you know. If you were, you'd be one with the Force already and your body cold and dead. One simply has to know how to find that slender link…"

Obi-Wan got the idea.

"What's the other thing?" He asked, trying to sound unemotional about it. Nacena laughed a little.

"Well the other thing is your current predicament, Padawan Kenobi. One would have to be a fool not to take advantage of that somehow or other. That idiot daughter of Jinn's has created an interesting opportunity for my master."

If Obi-Wan could have dropped his jaw in utter shock, he would have. As it was, he made a small involuntary sound that was indicative of his surprise. Nacena did turn to face him now; he abruptly stopped moving and found himself existing in the middle of a table. "Oh," Her voice fairly dripped with contempt and sarcasm. "He's never told you about his little family, has he? The woman he loved against the Jedi Code and fairly abandoned to die at the whim of your Council, and the daughter he left behind in order to take on a cub of an apprentice?"

"What…do you mean?" Obi-Wan asked shakily, and he fought to steady his voice.

"I mean," Nacena said sweetly although her words were cutting. "That if it wasn't for you that perhaps your 'Master' would have had a happier life."

Happier? Leaving the Order? But then again…what of love? As an apprentice to the Jedi Order he had not allowed himself to think on that; it was forbidden for good reasons and that was good enough for him. His family were the Jedi he learned and served with; he didn't need another. If Obi-Wan was anything, it was single-mindedly determined to reach his goal to be a Jedi and to make his Master proud. There was little room for anything else. And in twenty years he had never known his Master to be anything but content with his life as a Jedi Knight. Hard life or not, it was noble and a gift and Qui-Gon had shouldered his destiny with as much grace as any Jedi that Kenobi had ever known.

His thoughts derailed from their confusion briefly as they strayed to the memory of that holograph generator. The beautiful woman there who looked so much like the girl from his visions. With that everything snapped into place and he instinctively knew that this servant of evil was telling at least a partial truth. He could not believe it of Qui-Gon that he would leave anyone to die if it had been in his power to help her. And what did he, Obi-Wan, have to do with either of these women? That part of it was a total mystery to him. Surely he wasn't…truly Qui-Gon's son? The Council would likely have turned his training over to another Knight if that were the case, wouldn't they?

Watching the confusion and shock vie for position on the young Padawan's Force-aura face, Nacena simply smiled and waved a hand, jerking him along after her and continued to walk along to her destination deep inside the 'Blue House.'

++++

Qui-Gon watched as his daughter slowly circled the end of the bed to stand at Obi-Wan's side. Vague childish memories of a small playmate with that same ginger hair surfaced again briefly in her mind, and again she seemed to remember a hair-pulling incident. She shook her head a little, and found herself compassionately taking up one of the padawan's hands in both of her own, an apology of sorts for rescuing him in the most awkward, backward manner and for having subjected him to so much pain just to save him from more. Qui-Gon could feel the waves of sympathy rolling off the girl, and he smiled inwardly. So very much like her mother, loving and kind.

A moment later there was a small rap at the doorframe, just light enough to gain his attention and Qui-Gon turned to see Obuk motioning for him to come into the hallway. Jinn glanced back Iya, indicating with a small gesture that she should stay where she was and then joined Obuk outside the room, allowing the door to close behind him.

"What is it, my friend?" Qui-Gon prompted, and Obuk held out a datapad.

"I think I know what it is she's done to Obi-Wan and how she did it. Might help us to bring him back. Are you familiar with the concept of 'planing,' Qui-Gon?" He pronounced it as 'plane-ing,' and Jinn shook his head just slightly.

"It is not a familiar term to me, no."

"Planing is a metaphysical concept…between mind," Obuk tapped his head. "And body." He tapped his chest. "The idea that one and one equals…one. All Jedi are taught this to a degree, the difference between who we are and who we appear to be. 'Luminous beings, not crude flesh.' And all Jedi 'plane' to a degree when we communicate with one another through the Force, be it through the danger sense or…say the master- apprentice bond." Obuk waved his hand in the general direction of Obi-Wan's bed. "But true planning…the ability to actually step outside one's body in the Force and have a look around…that is an extremely ancient, extremely naturally-occurring, extremely rare gift. I would say from the looks of things that your young friend in there has it and then some. Especially to have halved your apprentice so neatly into separate 'one and one' parts that make up the whole 'one' of Obi-Wan Kenobi."

"Planing…" Qui-Gon echoed curiously. "Some Force-gifts are genetically present and passed on to future generations, even latent ones. Is it possible Iya could have inherited that from her parents?"

"Possible but not necessary. Planers were oddballs in the early days of the Order, people who were so strong in the Force that they could step from one plane of existence into another and back again without so much as batting an eyelash. That's where they get the name, by the way, the whole plane of existence idea." Obuk actually paused for a breath now and Qui-Gon couldn't help but smile. Always the same old dear Obuk. "Unfortunately planers were also often incredibly unstable; many of them were part of the first Sith knights back then. Because of the total annihilation of the Sith, those gifts have been thought to be lost to the Jedi forever."

"She's my daughter, Obuk." Qui-Gon confessed without preamble, and the healer's eyes went wide with sudden understanding.

"You didn't know Ina was pregnant when she left, did you?" It was a statement more than a question.

"No one knew. She kept it from all of us, including the Council. It was only her word that sealed my fate with the Council; if they had known there was a baby they would have dismissed me without so much as a by-the- Force's-leave. And they would have had every right to do so."

"Don't dwell on the past Qui-Gon. You've got a padawan in there who needs you very much. His time is running short and we've got to help Iya get him back."

"Short?" Qui-Gon echoed sharply, old pains suddenly melting away in the face of stronger, newer ones.

"Yes. It's my estimation from this material that we can expect Obi- Wan's body to survive two…maybe three days more maximum without the rest of him inside there before he begins to suffer major organ failure, cardiac and respiratory arrest and death. Planing was never meant to be anything more than a tool, a gift, a short walk around the block through the Force. Obi-Wan is not a natural planer, remember. He has been under for almost eighteen hours now, and he's already suffered a seizure."

Qui-Gon looked down at the datapad that Obuk had thrust into his hands.

"What's this for?" He asked mechanically, feeling his heart frozen inside of his chest at the thought of losing Obi-Wan forever.

"It's a little information on planing that might help you and…your daughter work together to locate Obi-Wan. I'll keep an eye on him here and keep him as stabilized as I can."

"Thank you, Obuk." Jinn said softly, feeling that frozen heart suddenly cramming up into this throat as if to shut off his air, and Obuk gently placed his slender hand on the Jedi master's shoulder. A sudden twinkle came to his eye and he said softly,

"You keep sending him back to me. At this rate he'll meet the Force before he meets the Trials, old friend."

Qui-Gon couldn't help but chuckle softly. Leave it to Obuk to take the weight off his shoulders at just the right moment.

"He'll be alright if he doesn't introduce himself to the Force first. Force preserve him."

"Force preserve him indeed."