Now they were at the medical center in Alcotis, being treated for their injuries. Valia sat by herself in a cubicle wrapped in a long white gown. Not quite all of the fruit juice had come off her hands and she sat studying her stained nails, listening to the voices and noises coming from the hallway outside. Her trip home was including visits to all the old familiar places, she thought dismally. She never would have expected to find herself here again. At least this time it had been only for treatment of bruises and a minor head injury. And I will never eat another freela again, she thought, shuddering, unable to get the smell or feel of them out of her mind. Or freela pie, or freela conserve, or freela jelly...

She knew Qui-Gon was in a cubicle down the hall. Medical personnel had rushed him inside and that had been the last she had seen or heard of him for over an hour. Only Obi-Wan had been allowed inside with him, and he had not emerged. Impatient, and annoyed at being left alone to wonder and wait, Valia rose from the treatment chair where she had been told to stay, and left the room. She anxiously stood outside the door where through which Qui-Gon had been taken. Was he all right? Surely it didn't take that long to close up a cut, even one as bad as the one he had gotten. But what really worried her was the mention of poison. Qui-Gon had never said or thought anything to her about poison while they were trapped inside the container, but Obi-Wan had told her and Velk that's what was wrong with him, and had worriedly crouched over him the whole trip to town.

Anxious for any kind of news, and suddenly deciding she could no longer wait to find out how Qui-Gon was doing, she opened the door. Maybe she'd be able to see him briefly before she was escorted out of the room by the medics and hustled back to her own.

Qui-Gon was dressed in his own clothes again, which were now cleaned and dried. Obi-Wan was in the act of helping him off the treatment table. Their heads were bent close together as Qui-Gon tested the strength of his legs under the watchful eye of the human doctor. Obi-Wan kept a supportive arm around his master until he was sure he could stand. Qui-Gon left his own arm around Obi-Wan's shoulders even after it was clear he was perfectly sound on his feet. The assistant medic droid was moving around them, putting things away.

"That big frame of yours is what saved you," the doctor was saying. "And in any case you probably didn't get a very large dose of poison. Had that stab been any deeper or longer..." He frowned and shook his head. "Luckily an all-purpose general antidote for plant-based poisons did the trick. We don't get too many poisonings around here." He glanced toward the door and saw Valia. "Impatient for your turn, are we?" he said to her. "Back to your room, now, until we've checked you out."

"But I've already been--" Valia caught Qui-Gon's eye for only a fraction of a second before the doctor efficiently guided her back out of the room. At least she'd seen with her own eyes he was all right, and he looked relieved to see her.

"We can't have this wandering around here," he said in a kindly voice. "I'll be in to see you shortly."

"No, I don't need any more--"

Velk stepped out of another room as they passed it. "Hey," he greeted Valia. His hand was neatly wrapped in bandages. He too, was in his own clothes. "How are you doing?"

"Fine, once I get my clothes back, and can get out of here," Valia growled, pulling the thin gown more tightly around her.

The sounds of shouting and angry, excited voices came from around a corner, far away. They were coming closer. "Excuse me," said the doctor with a frown and went toward the commotion. Valia's heart sank as she recognized the strident voice of her father. She and Velk exchanged grim looks. In another few seconds, the entire family, along with a good number of curious neighbors and friends came around the corner and stood milling about the corridor, everyone talking or shouting at once.

Tak and Velk began a shouting match, their faces and necks tightening as they went at it head to head. Tak demanded to know what was going on, and why he hadn't been told anything, while Velk heatedly defended his position, while trying to explain what had happened. Prawni scolded the children who were wandering excitedly in four different directions. She looked tense and anxious, and appeared as though she had been crying on the way to the medical center. Her toddler sat down in the middle of the floor and cried at the top of her lungs, upset by all the commotion. The doctor and an assistant were unsuccessfully trying to guide them back down the corridor and out of the patient treatment area. Binny was unsuccessfully trying to referee her son and husband and asking what was going on. When she saw Obi-Wan coming out into the hallway, she gave a cry of dismay over his disheveled state and the stains on his clothing and ran to him. When she saw Valia standing off to one side, looking wan and pale and forgotten, she gave another cry and ran to her and enveloped her in a smothering hug. Meanwhile the neighbors, friends and passers-by were relating their tales of what had happened, each of which believed they had the only truly reliable eyewitness account, of course. A hijacked orchard crawler, a run-away speeder, the worst calamity to befall the Alcotis Freela festival in over one hundred years, gunmen running amok...

Qui-Gon stepped out into the hall. Most everyone's attention was drawn to his imposing form, and the commotion quieted somewhat. He held up his hands for attention.

Tak was first to speak up. "What in blazes is going on around here?" he barked. "Is someone going to explain what this is all about? My son is going on about some undercover mission to arrest one of our neighbors, who is really a gun runner, and secret chemicals, and other damn fool nonsense. What's been going on behind my back?" He aimed a threatening glare at Qui-Gon, ready to forget his status as a guest of his household again.

"Pop, this is not something that's been happening behind just your back," Velk heatedly started in again. Qui-Gon laid a hand on each of their shoulders as they turned on each other. They both fell silent at the firm weight of the Jedi Master's hands. Qui-Gon turned to the doctor. "May we use the conference room down this hall?" he asked.

"Yes, of course," he said, anxious to get this noisy crowd under control. He gestured for everyone to move toward the room, and then belatedly wondered how his patient had known there was a conference room there, when he had been unconscious when he had been rushed past it on a gurney.

Once the family was inside the room, and the hangers-on had been guided out to the waiting area, Qui-Gon stood before them with Obi-Wan and began to explain everything that had happened. He began with Jax's escape, and proceeded from there. Without looking, Valia felt the stare of her father upon her when the part came when she had been recruited to help. Qui-Gon and his apprentice had chosen to wait until Jax made the first move and had revealed himself. Jax had been hiding on the Dekkar farm with the help of his brother Lommi since his escape. And he had been well aware of the arrival of two Jedi, thanks to the information passed by kitchen and farm employees, but had watched and waited to make sure they were no threat to himself. And he had been doing more than hiding. The final phase of his escape was to have included a proud return to Darat III, to the rebel extremists he had been helping to arm with his supply of deadly chemicals. How they would have been implemented was something Qui-Gon would determine in the days to come when he questioned Jax. Delivery in the water or food supply was the most likely and chilling threat they had averted.

Qui-Gon patiently answered each interjected question. Most of them came from Tak. Obi-Wan kept a close eye on his master. He could read the signs of fatigue well enough, and though they had been told all the poison in his body had been counteracted, he still needed rest and recovery. Valia watched him closely, too. He seemed completely healed, standing straight and tall at the head of the room. While he never really looked out of place, now he appeared in his element.

Qui-Gon continued his tale as they were piecing it together. Jax had had ample inside help in his escape and smuggling plans. An employee on the Dekkar farm had been the one who had blinded one of the Traxis roving droids, so that the chemicals could be hidden on the Traxis farm without being seen. He had damaged more than the visual sensors on the multi-purpose droid, and this had been a clue the Jedi needed. The same man had been the one who had been on guard out in the groves, who had been firing at Valia and Velk in an attempt to drive them away from the stash as it was being picked up. For his carelessness, and most likely since his usefulness to Jax was at an end, he had been killed during the chase. Sometimes this was the reward of those who closely associated themselves with Jax. The man at the warehouse was also being held as someone who had aided the smuggler, as well as the freighter pilot. It was most likely the inspector who had shut down the droids, turned off the anti-grav field and gassed down the shipping container. Qui-Gon explained that this operation had been going on for possibly years, and it was his hope that questionings of Jax and these men would reveal more names, and expose more smuggling routes through spaceports and shipping channels.

"Why us? Why here?"

"How could this happen?"

Many other dismayed questions came from around the room. When Qui-Gon turned his steady gaze to the silent Prawni, she lowered her eyes and covered her pretty face. Her shoulders hitched as she began weeping.

"Baby, I know this is all really upsetting," Velk said putting his arm around her. "This isn't good for you. Why don't you go on home--"

"No, you don't understand," she said in a choked voice. "I helped him."

"What?" Velk sat back. "Who?"

"I helped Jax. I knew he was back here on Nyme', and he needed to hide something again."

"You what? Prawni...! And what do you mean 'again'?" Velk was aghast, and the rest of the room turned shocked faces her way.

"We had been childhood friends, and our families have close ties," she said as if this explained everything. "He...he asked me to tell no one he was here several times before, a long time ago, to cover for him," she said, wiping her face. "He said it was something important for his trade business, and it would be better this way. I...I...didn't ask questions. He seemed so grateful."

"I'll bet he did," someone muttered. Other voices around the room rumbled assent.

"Then later, when I did ask questions, he seemed uncomfortable and didn't want to tell me. When I asked again, he finally told me. He said he needed to smuggle supplies for refugees from a war on another planet, oppressed people. He wouldn't say where it was, or anything more, only that their enemies were very cruel and powerful." Velk lowered his head and rubbed his face. What was he supposed to believe any more? There was still part of him that didn't believe Jax could be behind something as terrible as chemical weapons.

"But Prawni, didn't you have any idea that these were tools for killing you were helping him smuggle, helping him hide on our land?" She shifted uncomfortably. "He...he may have mentioned a couple of blasters for military personnel would be in a shipment, that I should be very careful to keep everything secret," she said.

"Oh ye gods, Prawni!"

"I didn't know!" she wailed, tears flowing once more. "I didn't know it had gone this far, beyond guns!"

"What if we'd been caught with those on our land? We would have been arrested! What if those canisters had broken open!"

"Nothing was ever there more than a day. Or two."

"We had poison chemicals out there!"

"He said they were killing babies and children," she cried fiercely.

"So let me get this straight: helping a man ship guns to a group of people on some other planet who can stand upright and shoot back is all right?" Velk shouted. Qui-Gon stepped forward and laid a hand on Prawni's shoulder. She was now bent forward, inconsolably weeping and unable to speak.

"The wrongdoing, innocent or deliberate has now been exposed," Qui-Gon softly said to Velk. "Prawni has confessed all she knows, which is not as much as it may seem, but it will be very helpful to us. We have been dealing with a man who is manipulative and persuasive, and is not above using friendship and relationships to get his way. As you can see, she had her doubts and was torn in her loyalties, but he used her instincts and darkest fears for his purposes."

"My wife, the would-be revolutionary," Velk said in a low voice, looking near tears himself. Valia sat near the back of the small room, listening in disbelief. So much for her 'good old boys' network theory.

In the next two days, Valia observed Qui-Gon more in his element than she had ever seen before. He tirelessly went from one task to the other, Obi-Wan beside him. While he was gone for many hours involved in the questioning of Jax and his helpers, he continued to base himself at the Traxis house to oversee the solving of other problems. Jax was closely being monitored, under a suicide watch. An examination had turned up clever, tiny poison delivery systems in several of his teeth. Qui-Gon later inwardly shuddered when Obi-Wan told him about his nearly being bitten while tying up Jax. When Qui-Gon felt they had gotten all the useful information they could get out of Jax, he ended these exhausting questionings, and turned Jax and his assistants over to the police in Tyannis. There he would be held until the Jedi would take him back to Corellia.

It was the time Qui-Gon spent with her family, neighbors and townspeople that most left an impression on Valia. His skills as a peacemaker and negotiator came to the fore as she had never quite had an opportunity to see before. He oversaw property and crop damage settlements, smoothed the mayor's ruffled pride, assisted police in a dozen issues surrounding the disrupted festival, and gently steered Velk and Prawni toward a peaceful understanding, if not marital counseling. He arranged for her to be immune from any punishment for her role in the smuggling operation. He treated every one of these farmers and simple folk with the same deference and respect she had seen him give royalty and planetary dignitaries on Coruscant.

At breakfast in the Traxis kitchen the first morning after the capture of Jax, the family gathered around the table with much noisy conversation. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan were actually taking a few moments to sit down and eat a hurried meal before heading to Alcotis. Most of the adults quieted out of curiosity when Prawni slowly approached Qui-Gon and laid a hand on his shoulder.

"You promised," she said quietly.

"Yes," he said pushing his plate away, and preparing to rise from his chair. "I did. Would you prefer a more private place?"

"Right here is fine," she said.

"Are you sure?"

She smiled. "A new child is a family event. Yes, I'm sure."

"What is this, Prawni?" Tak asked from the head of the table.

"Master Jinn told me he might not be able to see, but he would look at the baby and tell me if it was a boy or girl. If I helped, and told him the information he wanted to know."

"I would have done it regardless, if you had asked," Qui-Gon said. Tak stared at the two of them, surely wondering what this examination entailed, and looking as if he wanted to get up from the table and flee the room.

"Preserve us, woman!" Velk said from his place at the table. He raised his eyes toward the ceiling and set down his fork in irritation.

"We could eliminate half the name choices we've been going over if we just knew if it was a boy or girl."

"Have I been overly concerned about it?" Velk asked, gesturing elaborately toward his chest. He turned his attention to the heaping platter of fried cakes his mother brought to the table.

"Do you both agree to this?" Qui-Gon addressed Velk. "I will not reveal this information if it will cause discord between you."

"Go right ahead," said Velk liberally topping his cakes with fruit syrup. "If it will stop her from mooning around and wondering out loud in front of me," he said with a laugh.

Qui-Gon pulled his chair from the table and gestured for Prawni to sit. She did, enjoying being the center of the room's attention, but also apprehensive at what the large Jedi master had in mind. He crouched beside her. "May I?" he asked. She nodded her permission for him to lightly lay a big hand across her stomach. He closed his eyes and was silent for an entire minute. The kitchen full of family and staff members looked on in curiosity. Then Qui-Gon opened his eyes and rocked back on his heels. He looked at Obi-Wan next to him and nodded with his head, signaling for him to have a look . Obi-Wan touched her the same way, with a shy glance into Prawni's smiling eyes. He leaned back in his chair in less time than Qui-Gon had taken.

"A boy. Most likely," Qui-Gon said.

Obi-Wan frowned and shook his head. "I feel more strongly that it's a girl."

"Interesting, Padawan," Qui-Gon murmured. "Perhaps your connection with the Living Force is growing."

"I will defer to your judgement though, Master, since your experience is greater."

"But if your instincts are telling you true, you should not question it on my account."

Prawni's hopeful face went back and forth between the two of them. It slowly fell. "You can't tell, can you?" Qui-Gon shrugged and Obi-Wan scratched the back of his head.

"Life signatures really don't have genders," the Jedi apprentice offered.

"Especially at such a young age. So many gender characteristics are things we impose as a society later in life," Qui-Gon said. "What we can tell you, and this is the important thing for you to keep in mind, is that you have a strong healthy child inside you." As if to punctuate Qui-Gon's words, the baby kicked. Prawni winced and massaged her belly.

"Hey, what do you think about the name 'Daru'?" Velk asked Prawni. "I kind of like it. I think it would fit for either a boy or a girl." He winked at the Jedi and smiled hopefully at his wife.

Binny hurried through the herb garden after Qui-Gon and handed him the cup of tea he had forgotten in the kitchen. He thanked her and sipped it, looking a bit bemused at himself for having left it. "You're going to let the doctor look at you one more time before you leave, now, aren't you?" she asked him, looking up at his face with concern.

"Yes, he is," Obi-Wan quickly answered for him, while knowing it was probably an exercise in futility convincing his master a follow-up check by the doctor would be a worthwhile investment in time. Qui-Gon's scowl at his apprentice for his impudence was hardly convincing, as it was more of a smile than actual scowl. They were on their way to the Dekkar farm and Alcotis for still more investigations and resolutions. Tomorrow they would be leaving Nyme'.

Valia was coming up the path toward the house. "Did you get your cutting, dear?" Binny asked her.

"Ahhh, no. Not yet." Valia gave Qui-Gon a quick look when she felt his eyes on her. There had been no opportunity for the two of them to exchange more than a word or two of greeting in the day since they had been freed from the cargo container, and certainly no time for a conversation without family members or household staff near.

Tak was puttering in a corner of the garden near the house. Binny followed Valia's eyes with her own. The cutting Binny referred to was a piece from the plant near where Tak was working. A favorite houseplant of Valia's had languished and died in her apartment. It had come from that parent plant, and Valia had seen an opportunity to replace it while she was here.

Binny knew pushing would get her nowhere with Valia, but could not help speaking up. "You know, I'm sure your father would gladly help you with that cutting, and even give you some advice on rooting it, and keeping it alive. He's really very good with that sort of thing."

"I would think she'd be more comfortable waiting for him to move on, and then getting her cutting," Qui-Gon said, taking a nonchalant sip of his tea. "Why not wait until he's finished there?" he said into Valia's eyes.

"Why not, indeed?" Valia agreed with a slightly challenging look in return.

"Lia, something you said a few days ago comes to mind," said Qui-Gon thoughtfully. "Something about using a dull knife for so long that the user isn't even aware that anything is wrong..."

Valia began to glare at him. Then she stopped to think about what he'd spoken in so gentle a tone, and with just a hint of pleading. Well maybe, just maybe... She looked over toward Tak where he was meticulously trimming a prized ornamental tree. She sighed. What was the worst that could happen? After all the commotion and strife of the last few days, who wouldn't welcome a simple question or conversation about something non-confrontational? Like plant cuttings. She squared her shoulders and walked across the sunlit lawn toward her father. Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan and Binny watched both of them stiffen and keep their distance, but then slowly begin a halting conversation. After about a minute or two, they seemed to relax slightly, first Tak then Valia nodding at something the other said. Tak reached for his clippers and they walked to the plant Valia had pointed to. Tak snipped off a branch and he could be seen conveying what must have been a list of instructions and advice to her. She took the clipping and held it carefully.

"Thank you," Binny said softly. Qui-Gon turned to look down into her shining eyes. "Those are the most words they've spoken to each other in fifteen years."

"No thanks goes to me," he said. "This is really up to them." The reconciliation would be a slow process. It would eventually turn out to take more than a decade. But he felt with certainty as he watched them that this was a good beginning.

"Hey, don't let another six years go by before you show up here again," Velk told Valia. She had just checked her luggage and they stood under the stars at the spaceport in Alcotis.

"It will probably take about that long for things here to settle down after this visit," Valia said with a snort. "With any luck, maybe I'll see you on my turf first." Velk grinned and rolled his eyes. "Wish me a lot of luck convincing Prawni to come with me."

"You know you're all welcome any time. We'll paint the town," she said grinning back. "And we'll see how you do on my shooting ranges."

"You're on. As long as no one's shooting back."

They laughed lightly and fell silent, looking around at the night.

"Are you sure about leaving now, like this? You know you can stay as long as you like." Valia watched a freighter cut a path across the dark sky. This was already hard enough. She sighed. "I really have to get back. I've been gone longer than I should have been. This wasn't exactly a planned vacation."

"Well, make better plans next time then, dammit." Velk was truly sorry to see his sister go, in spite of everything that had happened since her arrival. She had abruptly told him that evening she had arranged transport back to Coruscant and had asked him to take her to Alcotis. A final evening meal, during which her mother could barely restrain her tears, and Valia had been packed and ready to leave immediately.

"Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are still gone. They probably ended up going to Tyannis today. You're not going to wait for them to come back before you leave?"

Valia shrugged offhandedly and closely examined the edge of her dark blue cloak before taking a handful of it and squeezing it in her fist. "I left a message on Qui-Gon's datapad. They know I need to get back to my stores. Besides, with everything being finished here, they really haven't needed my help for days now, anyway."

Velk gave her a long, probing look with his dark eyes. "Yeah, right," he said. Then they embraced tightly. "Take care of yourself," he said over her head. She nodded. "Same goes."

"I hope...I hope things work out," he said vaguely. She nodded again. She quickly turned away. She boarded the shuttle and began the long trip back to Coruscant.