43. A Fading Shadow Falls
*****
We went to the planet Pirin in the Locris sector, where the Kontag headquarters were.We were going to pose as prospective clients and so get a look at the factory floor.
Master said we were Jedi, and we were interested in upgrading our security. Instantly, someone came to help us. I think her name was Sasana. We got her to show us around. But it seemed weird...it was like machinery had been there at one point and then gotten rid of. And the droids that were there couldn't be serving the amount of jobs that they had said they were. Something like that anyway. We decided they were concealing something.
Master had taken a sensor suite from one of the prototypes we'd seen. Sensor suites always had a factory mark in them somewhere. The place we needed to be, apparently, was the Von-Alai factory planet.
-----
I don't like Von-Alai. It's built so many factories the climate was ruined and the plants died. It's depressing being there.
"They could have fought for their planet, but
their indifference and greed made them passive," Master said. "There was
no war here, my young apprentice. Merely beings who did not choose to fight
the power that ruled them."
"Perhaps they tried and failed." I said.
"Then they are also weak, which is worse." he
said.
I didn't like that comment at all. I knew something was definately wrong...he was acting so different.
This factory was different. It was dirty, dangerous...and the workers were children. They looked mostly like they were ill and starving. The whole place looked horrible. I was looking over it all when a man showed up. My Master told him we wanted information...and he told us the company he sent reports to was called Caravan. Something flashed in my Master's eyes at that point.
And then (I'm probably getting this mixed up. It's rather complicated) Eero showed up again. He had apparently followed us all the way. (Which I thought was odd) He said he'd found a factory worker who would talk. We followed him through the aisles...and suddenly, droids were there. And we couldn't fight them because of the children all aeound us. We were trapped.
-----
I'm not quite sure what happened next. But when I woke up, I was chained down. So was my Master. And I hurt all over.
"Breathe," I heard my Master say. "The pain will ease in a moment."
I did breathe. Then I asked "Do you know where we are?"
"No idea." was his answer.
There was a silence.
"Maybe Eero will find us," I suggested. "Or tell the Temple where we are."
"Eero is part of this. He set us up."
"But he is your friend. And he was hurt in the invasion."
"So it seemed," he muttered. "Injuries can be faked. Eero was a good actor, nothing more. I was foolish not to think of it before. This should be a lesson to you, Padawan. Have as many friends as you want, but do not trust them."
What? Didn't he...doesn't he...trust Amiri or me? Or was he just saying that because...well, I found out then what the matter was.
"The person who has imprisioned us was once in training with me." he said.
"He is a Jedi?!"
"No. He went through trained but was dismissed. Never mind why. We were friends once. I am beginning to suspect that he might hold some kind of grudge against me. So there is more going on here than you know."
Why didn't you tell me? I wanted to scream. I didn't, of course.
A few minutes later, Lorian walked in.
That was his name. Lorian. He'd been thrown out of the Jedi...so the first thing I thought of when he walked in was: Is this what Dilan's going to become? A pirate who kidnaps Jedi?
"Old friend," he addressed my Master.
"I realized some time ago, Lorian, that we were never friends," he answered cooly.
"You haven't changed," Lorian said. "Yet it's good to see you, even though it's unfortunate for me. If a Jedi had to be tracking me, I would've hoped for anyone but you. You knew me too well. Once."
This reunion went on for quite a while.
"I was young and made a mistake," Lorian snapped. "I paid dearly for it. Was I supposed to turn into a farmer? I was trained as a Jedi! So instead I went into business for myself."
"As a space pirate," Master added.
"Just temporarily. I started out kidnapping criminals, but that got risky. You'd be surprised out reluctant gangs can be to come up with the ransom. So I looked to Senators next. What if their security wasn't as good as they thought it was? When I heard Kontag was going backrupt, I got an idea. So I bought this factory and offered Kontag a deal."
(Er...that's the gist of it anyway. Maybe one day someone will kidnap us who doesn't like to talk.)
"A factory that employs children." I said angrily.
He turned towards me.
"So this is your apprentice, Dooku? Qui-Gon Jinn? Yes, I can see you in him. He is as sure of his own rightness as you are. "
(I am not sure of my own rightness, and anyone who disagrees with that is wrong. Heh.)
"What would you have me do, young Padawan?" he went on. "Fire the child workers? Many of them support families. Parents who are injured to too sick to work, or parents who have abandoned them so they are supporting their brothers and sisters. Would you have them starve?"
"I would find a better way." I said.
"Ah, he is unshakeable. Well, I'll tell you this, young Jedi. I am planning to phrase out the child labour. Improve conditions. But do you know what that takes? Money. The Jedi don't deal with credits. They don't speak of them. But the rest of us have to eat, you know."
"You are full of justifications," I answered.
"They make the planets turn. Have you been to the Senate lately? It runs on justifications. I am not evil, Qui-Gon Jinn. I know this for certain. I've seen the face of true evil. And I've known the terror of it. So don't be too quick to judge."
"True evil?" my Master said.
"Yes, Dooku. I did access the Sith Holocron."
So was that what he'd done?
Finally, he got round to telling us he wasn't going to kill us. About time too. He was just going to hold on to us until this last job was done. As soon as he confirmed that Eero was in on everything, Eero came in.
"Now you've done it!" he yelled. "The Senator is dead!"
"Dead?" Lorian asked. "How? He's being held in comfortable surroundings. I even sent in pastries, for galaxies sake."
"He had a heart attack. He died instantly."
"Ah," he said. "This isn't good."
"No. It's murder," my Master injected.
"We'll be tried for murder!" Eero wailed.
"Only if they catch us."
The panicking turned quickly into an argument. Eero drew a vibroblade. And then...Master summoned the Force, sending it flying and cutting his chains. He reached for his lightsabre, hidden in the room next door. Lorian grabbed Eero's vibroblade and a blaster. And the fight started. Lorian picked up my lightsabre, and they started to fight. I was frightened. Or maybe that's a bit of an understatement. They hated each other now, but you could tell they'd once been friends. The lightsabres clashed, Master's green blade on my own green blade. Except Lorian was holding it and not me.
"Master!" I yelled.
He paid no attention.
"Master. Stop."
He turned and looked at me. I read a hundred things in his eyes. Then he deactivated the lightsabre.
-----
We handed Lorian and Eero in to Coruscant security. Eero pleaded with my Master to let him go, but he didn't listen. We didn't speak a lot on the journey back. All I can remember is that he came and sat next to me, and said very quietly "Well, Padawan, it appears we have something else in common."
I didn't get it.
"Dilan," he explained. "And Lorian. They have both been punished for their actions...and rightly so. We did the Jedi Order a great service by getting them out, no matter what the personal cost."
"Me and Dilan weren't friends." I said.
"And neither were me and Lorian."
He never apologized for not letting me know who the space pirate was. When we reached the Temple, he just wandered off in the direction of the Archives. I went to our quarters.
I lay on the bed, thinking. And then a voice came over our bond. I'm completely postive that whatever it was, Master didn't mean for me to hear it. I'm not even sure it was my Master. He sounded different and older and harder and...crueller, even though he's anything but cruel. It said: Why should he know...when I do not?
Then something else, quieter: It is a failing of ours that we do not know our true enemy.
Then that voice was gone. But another kept echoing in my head that night...
"Betrayal can destroy a man."
*****