Pathways

by Corran Horn 62

My opinion as to what a few of the events at the end of The Swarm War will be. Jacen finds out about his grandfather, which leads him to ponder some interesting stuff. Also, a flashback to the conclusion of Jag, Jaina, and Zekk's story. Rating just to

"Pathways"

By Corran Horn 62

Jacen Solo walked into his uncle's quarters, tired after a long hyperspace journey from the Hapan homeworld. He sighed inwardly, remembering. A very long hyperspace journey. He had been looking forward to spending the time alone with Tenel Ka aboard his aunt's ship, the Jade Shadow.

But nothing about that cruise had been as he had envisioned it. Temporarily free (though it could turn permanent) from her duties as Queen of Hapes, and back into the action she loved, he had expected Tenel Ka to be happy and excited. But she had spent nearly the entire trip in a black mood, a black mood that he had not understood until he had asked her about it; and then when he had discovered the reason, he wished that he hadn't. Jacen couldn't understand why she was so persistent in her annoyance over this particular subject, and his actions. When he had forced the Queen Mother, Ta'a Chume, into a vegetative state, he had acted firmly, secure in his new vision of the Force and what his duty was. He knew that what he had been done had been necessary, and right. As a modern Jedi, he knew that there was no "Light" and "Dark" side of the Force…he knew the truth now, that the darkness came from within the Jedi, and only his intentions could be Dark. As long as the Jedi was acting out of good intentions, his actions were purely Light. And when he had reached down deep, deep into the twisted and evil brain of Ta'a Chume, he had seen the evil, seen the plans she had made, and, out of a desire to protect and preserve life, the lives of his lover and daughter, he had taken that twisted mind and twisted it in an entirely new direction, a direction that could not be tolerated, and he had felt the evil that was that mind shrivel,
screaming, and die.

He had felt it, and enjoyed it.

After all, he was acting out of defense, and in accordance with his new vision of the Force. So what was Tenel Ka's problem? Why was she so upset by this particular subject? He had already explained his logic to her several times. Ta'a Chume was too dangerous to kill, and too deadly to leave alive; therefore, he had done what was necessary. Why couldn't she understand that? He sighed, thinking of the terrible anger that had risen inside of him on the ship, and of the things he had said to her. He could still see the hurt in her eyes. He sighed again, and put the fight out of his mind. He didn't want to think about it, didn't want to think about the possibility that Tenel Ka did not love him. That night when he had visited her, the night when his child had been conceived…he remembered the love in her eyes when she kissed him, the bond that had been forged in the Force between them, and the pure joy he had felt. That was missing, now, and had been ever since he had returned to her after acting against the Chiss to prevent war.

For just a half second, suspicion clouded his mind. Zekk had been on Hapes, as well recently. He and Jaina had stopped there shortly after the fighting began. Jacen suddenly, jealously wondered if something had happened between Tenel Ka and Zekk during his visit. He had caught Zekk looking crossways at him several times in the weeks before the fateful mission to Csilla. No, he realized, relieved. Zekk could not have been spending time with Tenel Ka; his strange bond with Jaina had made sure of that. His anger gone as suddenly as it came, he thought with sorrow of Zekk's death.

Zekk and Jaina's mission had been simple, and had been designed by the Council to keep them out of the way of the Killik conflict. They had been requested by the Jedi Council to go to Csilla, the Chiss homeworld, and act as the Jedi's representatives during the crisis. But unknown to the Jedi Masters on the Council, to Jacen, and even to Jaina and Zekk, the two Jedi had been controlled by the Dark Nest, which had taken advantage of their Jedi assignment to give them another one. Jaina had been led to believe that she must sabotage a critical component of Csilla's defensive system in order to prevent violence and bloodshed. Zekk had been ordered to bring Jagged Fel to a prearranged meeting place, in order to discuss terms of a peace treaty. When he had returned, Jaina had completed her task already and been sent away. Zekk was brought before Lomi Plo and Alema Rar, the two leaders of the Dark Nest. Raynar Thul, the once-Jedi, was there also. Zekk was given the chance to choose his destiny.

Because of the nature of their minds, Zekk and Jaina had retained much of their free will despite their time with the Killiks. The Gorog could not directly order them to commit an action; they had to believe that they were doing the right thing. Zekk, for some reason, was more conscious of his choices than Jaina. He could choose whether or not to act. In order to seduce him to the Dark Side, the Gorog had offered him what he most wanted in the world, if he would but take the step from Jedi to Dark Jedi.

They had offered him Jaina.

But they also offered him something else; the chance to make Jaina truly his, and his alone. For Jaina, whether she knew it or not, was still in love with Jagged Fel. For Zekk to ever truly possess her undivided love, Jag would had to die. The Gorog revealed their control over him and Jaina, and offered him a choice.

He could kill Jag and claim Jaina.

Or he could die on the point of her lightsaber.

If he did not kill Jag, then the Dark Nest would arrange it to look to Jaina as if Zekk was betraying her and the Jedi Order, would make Jaina believe that he was evil, and plant in her mind that she should kill him. While Zekk didn't know if that would work, he also thought that Jaina could, in fact, kill him. If she believed that he was Dark, then she would do what she thought was needed.

The choice was his.

Zekk acted as a Jedi should act. Truly, completely free, choosing between saving himself with darkness, and surrendering himself and those he loved to the Will of the Force. The plans of the Gorog were laid bare before his eyes. He could join them, and in doing so realize his heart's desire; or he could die at Jaina's hand.

No one would ever know what went through Zekk's mind as he stepped up to Alema Rar, accepted the red lightsaber from her hand, and looked at the captive before him.

Jag was bound, hand and foot, by ties that he could not chew, bite, undo, or break. Ties that, curiously, he could not even see. He knew them at once to be of the Force. Ties that could not be broken or wiggled out of, locks that could not be picked. He knew this from experience, because Jaina had once used something similar on him. This, however, was completely different. He had been tied then for an entirely different reason, and he hadn't minded it too much, actually, though he had made her promise not to do it again. Yet now, though he knew it was futile, upon awakening in a field surrounded by these strange beings he had struggled wildly, until he had realized that Jaina Solo could not see or sense him, and that she was not herself. This was not his Jaina. She was someone else. She finished her report about taking down some planet's defensive capabilities and left for a landing pad nearby.

He listened calmly as the Twi'lek he identified as Alema Rar offered Zekk Jaina's
affections…and Jagged's life. "Not that my life has been worth much recently, but I'd still like to keep it, just the same. Or do I? Ever since my Jaina left me…" He left the thought unfinished. He was pretty sure that he knew already what Zekk's decision would be. He knew that the handsome young Jedi loved Jaina, just as Jag himself did. And he also knew that Zekk's heart had been in agony over their continued relationship. Jag didn't know what he would do if he faced the same choice about Zekk. He believed that his morals would win over his love…but his love was a powerful thing. So powerful, in fact, that it had almost killed him. Although he had resigned himself to death, "Huh. It'll be a relief, I think. Life isn't much good now. First Jaina left me, and now she is no longer Jaina." he still listened intently for Zekk's answer, needing to hear it out of some primal urge to fight for survival, though he couldn't really see why he should bother. He was slightly confused, because the answer didn't come. Instead, the Jedi "Should I even call him that anymore? Granted, the Jedi are not what they were at the beginning of the Vong War, but still…" merely stepped up to the raised area where Jag had been forced to kneel "My body may be kneeling, but my mind is free…" and accepted the lightsaber from the Dark Herald. He ignited the red lightsaber. "That's funny. I've never seen a red lightsaber before." Jag instantly berated himself. "Now that's a stupid thing to waste your last thought on, Jagged Fel. Have you resigned yourself to death so easily? YES! No, you haven't. THESE ARE…WERE…JEDI. I CANNOT FIGHT THE FORCE." How do you fight something you can't overcome? His parallel chains of thought snapped as the beginnings of an idea trickled through his mind. The Force.

Belatedly, he suddenly realized that his head was still on his shoulders, and looked up once more to see Zekk standing, indecisive. "Come on already, you nerf-brained sorry excuse for a bantha-smelling rancor-breathed maggot rider! Get on with it already!"

Zekk accepted the lightsaber, his mind whirling. To go ahead with the act he had been told to accomplish went contrary to everything he had been taught at Luke Skywalker's Academy, and against everything he had learned since. But to not go ahead was to lose Jaina, once and for all. For he knew the truth. "As long as she lives, she will love him."

Jag was in the middle of composing another round of epithets to mentally hurl at the Jedi
-he was incapable of speech, for some reason. Probably those kriffing Dark Jedi- when yet another thought struck him. "If thoughts keep striking me, my mind will get bruised." He could not help but laugh inwardly at the absurdity of that thought. Unfortunately, the moment of mental levity had also driven from his mind the flicker of an idea that he had. Resigned to death, but determined to make his last thought count, he remembered Jaina. Not the Jaina that had left the room without even seeing him, after cold bloodedly giving the report that –unknown to her- spelled doom for her former lover's people. The Jaina he loved. He had shared much with her. He had even learned to communicate with her telepathically (his one and only use of the Force) by focusing his love and attention on her. That only worked when she was very near him, though, and when he did succeed in communication, it was weak. Sometimes, he could get no more than feelings across, strong impressions of what he was trying to say. Defiantly, he looked up at the man who, if Jag happened to, say, get his head chopped off by a lightsaber-wielding maniac, would share Jaina's life. And Jagged Fel got the best idea of his life.

Zekk was still hesitating in front of the helpless man. He knew with crystal clarity what his options were. "Kill him, or be killed. Get Jaina, or lose her forever." Abruptly, a shadow crossed his face. "GET her? GET her? I do not want to GET her like that! I want her to love me! I want…I want…I want her to be happy. I want her to be Jaina, not a puppet I control. And if I do control her, she will never love me. If I do this thing, I will never have her love. But if I do not do this thing, her love will go to another." He realized something in that moment. "No matter what I choose at this moment, it will not make her mine. The best thing I can do is act according to what I know is right." His choice was made. And at the moment he decided, a touch came upon his mind.

It was not the close rapport of a battle meld, nor the sure touch of one Jedi communicating to another. Weak and faint, he could not distinguish what that touch, barely more than a tickle, was saying. And then he looked at the bound captive before him. And he saw a burning intensity, unmatched by anything he had seen or experienced in the galaxy, except a corner of his own heart that belonged entirely to Jaina. But this was no corner of a heart that he saw. This man's entire being burned with a love so bright that, viewed through the Force, Jag was a pillar of light. Though Jag was blind to the reality that was the Force, still burned so brightly that Zekk himself was partially blinded by it. And then, the Jagged in the Force, the one that Zekk knew was blind to all around him, opened his eyes. And looked at Zekk.

Jag was not confident that it would work. He had heard tales of Dark Jedi, beings so evil that nothing could save them, nothing at all. He could, in fact, see two and a quarter of them from where he knelt, and Lando Calrissian would not have laid odds that any of them had a scrap of goodness left. Despite this discouraging thought, he loved Jaina, and he would not resign her to this fate. Though she no longer loved him, he still loved her. He would die for her, here in this place. But he would not die until he had tried his best to make his death meaningful. He raised his head one last time, and looked at Zekk straight in the face. He brought forth his love for Jaina, his deep desire for her well-being, the conscious choice he was making to put her first in everything, to love her with every fiber of his being. And he caught Zekk's gaze and poured it all out. He was not touching the Force, that he knew of. He was unaware of what a Jedi would feel. He only knew that he had communicated with Jaina because of his love, and in order to save her, he must make Zekk hear him. So he poured out his love, and prayed that it was not falling to the ground.

Zekk stared at Jag through the Force, aghast. He knew that Fel could not touch the Force. He KNEW it. But somehow, something more powerful than anything Zekk had encountered was letting Jag into the river that was the Force, for a reason Zekk could not comprehend. But then the Jag that was in the Force opened his mind, and washed away Zekk's last remaining doubts about his course of action.

Jag poured everything that he was into making this communication. For all he knew, the glazed look in Zekk's eyes meant that he was about to strike. But his love for Jaina demanded that he attempt this. He reached out to Zekk's mind, as he had done to Jaina's, and spoke to him

"Hear me now, Jedi Zekk. I do not know what kind of being you are now, if there is any hope for you. But if there is anything in you that is still Jedi, if there is anything in you that loves Jaina, know this. She is in prison now, and she will never be happy in a cage. She thought I was going to bind her to me with my love. She thought that marrying me would mean an end to her freedom. She was wrong, but I know this: She will never be happy with any destiny other than one she chooses freely for herself. And I love her so much that I will not force my choices on her. Marrying her is the only destiny that will make me complete. My life has no meaning without her love, yet, though nothing else will make me happy, I will not force her to choose me. If she does not love me, I will die. But I will die knowing that I did the best thing possible for her. And as long as I live, I will try to make her happy. Listen to me, Zekk. I LOVE HER! She is the other half of my being, the completeness of me. She is the one thing in the universe that can make me whole. She is my all. But I will give her up, so that she is happy. Do you hear me? I will sacrifice my future for her. If I cannot make her happy, I wish that she will find someone who will. If you force her to 'love' you, Zekk, Jaina will never emerge from the prison her mind is in. She will spend her life trapped, in a cage, as a prisoner. And she will drive herself mad. I tell you this not out of jealousy, but out of a desire to give my love the best in life. There may come a day when love fails. A day when hatred and darkness overcome the universe we live in. But as long as I am alive, I will love her. I WILL LOVE HER!"

Zekk was still stunned by the sheer force of the will and love behind those words. Because they were only words, they could not even begin to encompass what he could see in Jag. They could not express the entirety of Jag's love and devotion to her. Zekk knew that that devotion he saw in Jag's heart was mirrored in himself. And the choice that he had already made was no longer a choice. It was a necessity.

Jag watched as Zekk's face suddenly snapped back to reality. A flash of horror spread across the Jedi's features, followed instantly by a blazing look of hatred so intense that Jag recoiled. Zekk raised his lightsaber high, high over his head, perfectly positioned to sweep Jag's neck from his shoulders, and struck.

Luke Skywalker, in the middle of a battle with Killik ground forces, raised his head, questing through the Force, and then fell to his knees. If Han Solo had not been at his back, he would have died at the hand of the blue bug he had been about to decapitate. Something more powerful than Yoda or Vader made itself known in his head. The greatest Jedi in the galaxy knew of nothing that was like that force, which was quickly joined by a second, similar one. Nothing except one thing.

Leia Organa Solo gasped as the shuttle transporting her and her Master, Saba Sebatyne, to Csilla made it's final approach to the landing field from which Jagged Fel had departed only hours earlier. She recognized the essence, the meaning and existence of the force that suddenly resonated in her head, though not the source of it. This essence was matched by another that joined it. Though the contact was not from him, Han's face rose in her mind.

Tenel Ka, in the command ship of the Hapan Fleet, was suddenly aware that the world around her had gone white, and something incredibly powerful was stirring. Something she had never felt before…yet knew intimately. Something that came from light-years away, yet was mirrored in her own heart.

Mara Jade Skywalker saw her husband go down. Panicked, desperate, she began to reach toward him, to save him from the death that was approaching; and was driven to her knees by something that roared in her head, a declaration so powerful it left her dizzy. She reached out to her beloved husband, and knew he felt it too. They both recognized it.

Corran Horn kissed his wife goodbye, preparing to lead a Jedi strike team on a mission into the heart of the portion of the galaxy that was erupting into war. Mirax's kiss, as usual, left him slightly dizzy…and then he became dizzier as the feelings he had for Mirax suddenly were echoed and screamed aloud by something that came from outside of him, something every bit as powerful and deep as his own love. He looked at his wife, and tears streamed down his face as he once again realized the depthlessness of his feelings toward her.

And in the midst of carrying out a task that would doom a world, Jaina Solo came back to herself. She did not know what had happened. She did not know what had touched her. But she was free of the prison that her mind had become, and was once again mistress of her own destiny.

All across the galaxy, wherever they were, whatever they were doing, Jedi stopped as the call echoed through the Force. Love was stirring, was poured into the Force in a tidal wave so powerful that every Jedi it touched could not help but stop what it was doing and add his own love to the call. Words echoed across the galactic reaches, stopping at every heart that could hear them, delivering their message louder than the loudest jizz-band Coruscant had ever seen, and at the same time whispering it in the tender voice of a mother to her newborn child, a cry that originated in a man who could not touch the Force, echoed by a Jedi who had made the hardest decision of his life, and amplified by every Jedi and Light-side Force User in the galaxy.

"As long as I am alive, I will love her"

"For love of her, I will give up what is within my reach"

And Lomi Plo screamed in agony as a glowing red lightsaber whipped across and separated her arm from her shoulder.

Zekk pressed the attack, lightsaber working furiously as he sought to destroy the being who had nearly enslaved him, and had made his beloved Jaina into a prisoner. The strange being that had once been human scrabbled backwards, desperately trying to stop the thing advancing toward her. It was no longer the Jedi driven by his yearning that she had subverted for her own use. It was no longer even a Jedi. It was the Force, embodied in a concept called love, refined into a single being named Zekk. The borrowed lightsaber he wielded was like a dozen, slashing and tearing at her. She leaped out of the way, desperately trying to find a shred of doubt in him that she could use to cloak herself, trying to find a weakness that she could exploit while still trying to avoid him. But there was nothing she could to do stop the Jedi that bore down on her with a fury that was like nothing she had ever met in all her years of service to the Dark Side, a fury that was somehow Light. In frustration, she reached with the Force –she had foolishly left her own lightsaber on the ship they had stolen- and plucked the lightsaber from Alema's belt. She blocked Zekk's blow this time, instead of dodging it, and the shock of the blow nearly tore off her two remaining arms. This demon seemed to be unstoppable! Zekk had never come close to matching Luke Skywalker in lightsaber technique , could not compete with Kyle Katarn or Corran Horn in a fight, and did not have the raw power of Kyp Durron. But in that moment, his love made him more powerful than any Jedi, and at the same time the equal of all who had loved. Darth Vader, fueled by his hatred for the Order that he thought had betrayed him, had defeated the combined strength of the Jedi. He was weak as a newborn nerf when compared to Zekk in that moment.

Zekk was fighting with his love, and nothing could stand before him.

Sobbing, Lomi Plo fled before this…this embodiment of light, this disgustingly pure center of goodness. She desperately reached for the only thing nearby that she could still command –Alema Rar had already fled the moment she reached into the Force and felt the power Zekk now wielded- and hurled it into the path of the Jedi.

Raynar Thul, whose last conscious action had been to save her life, had lived among the Killiks for so long that his spirit no longer had the slightest control over his body, except when Lomi Plo had allowed him to act as the leader of the Killik collective mind. He had already done all that he could to better the Killik way of life. His body was controlled by the Unseen Queen, and could fight. The fact that he was once a Jedi and still a good man gave Zekk pause long enough to allow Lomi Plo to flee from the wrath that followed. Recognizing that the man who had once been Raynar was a prisoner in the same manner as Jaina was, Zekk overcame his hesitation and determined to free the man he had known. Zekk had never respected Raynar horribly much. He had always seemed a bit too weak-minded to be a true Jedi. Yet he knew, from his time in the Taat Nest, what Raynar had done. He knew that he had acted from the core of his being, the essence of what it was to be a Jedi, on that fateful day long ago when Anakin and so many others had died. He regretted being forced to kill Raynar, but knew that Raynar was glad to be free of the prison that had entombed him. His blade sliced down, intersected with Raynar's blade, and drove it aside. He looked into Raynar's eyes as he delivered the final stroke, and saw there only respect and acknowledgement. As his blade came up and stabbed through the former Jedi Knight's body, as the light in his eyes faded away and Raynar departed even as his mortal form fell, Zekk took a moment to grieve for what he had been forced to do. The instants delay proved costly as his focus was diverted into pity for the Jedi he had once known, and that moment's distraction let a lightsaber that came out of nowhere slit the handle of the blood red blade he wielded in half.

He looked up to see a black lightsaber "how can a lightsaber be black?" without anything visible behind itcoming straight in at his unprotected chest. He reflexively threw up an arm to block and was rewarded for this with the loss of his arm. As the lightsaber penetrated his body armor and chest, he used the last remains of his suddenly-depleted strength to push away the lightsaber, "darksaber?" to break the will that wielded it. He failed. The shaft continued its journey toward his heart, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

Something brushed past his right thigh, where his own lightsaber still hung, and snatched it out of its restraint. A hand appeared in his narrowing vision, grasping the hilt of a protruding shaft, and Jagged Fel came to the defense of the man who had almost killed him. Mistakenly assuming that the hand of an invisible Lomi Plo was grasping the lightsaber buried in Zekk's body, Jag sliced down with the unfamiliar weapon. He missed only because there was nothing there to hit. Too late, he realized that Lomi Plo was not wielding her weapon invisibly…but through the Force. "THAT'S NOT FAIR! A black lightsaber, which is hard enough to see, being wielded by somebody who isn't there? What the...OK, this is definitely my day for surprises. I just attacked somebody invisible who has a nightsaber. Where's a healthy Jedi when you need one?" He looked down and realized with shock that Zekk was still alive. "So much for the run-like-heck idea." As the black lightsaber withdrew itself from the wound it had been busily creating in the Jedi who had just spared his life, Jag relaxed, smiled in grim acceptance, and set himself to fight a battle that he could not win in defense of one of the most courageous men he had ever seen.

Lomi Plo, safely ensconced near the landing pad hundreds of feet away, smiled contentedly to herself. Now that the terrifying thing Zekk had become was no longer a danger, her composure returned, as did her faith in the Dark Side. She could kill this Force-less idiot with a negligent flick of her hand and a Force shove in the right direction. There were a few large machines nearby that would make a wonderful hammer and anvil to crush the man whose senses were those of an ordinary mortal, and whose attention was fixed on the lightsaber trying to decapitate him. She smiled as the lightsaber she was wielding got past Jag's guard and slashed a deep cut through his arm. He cried out in agony and fell, somehow managing to bat her follow-up strike away with his left arm. She viciously slashed at the upraised lightsaber he held, hacking away at it until it tumbled from his grip and deactivated. With a triumphant smile, she held the lightsaber poised vertically above his head and held it there, savoring her victory.

From where Jag lay, he could only see a dark spot as wide around as a standard decicred. Of course, his perspective could be off, since it was poised directly between his eyes, and he had to cross his eyes just to see it at all. He was once again pinioned by the invisible bonds that had held him previously. He closed his eyes and fervently hoped that he did not have an open-casket funeral. The idea of people staring at his dead body had never appealed to him very much. It would be hard for his family to lose another son…but as much as he loved them, his last thought was of Jaina.

Lomi Plo held her lightsaber poised above the trapped warrior. She loved the irony of the fact that every second she held the lightsaber there, she was exerting energy to keep him alive. But she had never been much for wasting exertions on others. She raised the lightsaber straight up in the air until it was poised two meters above his head, and relinquished all control of the weapon, except for a fiber of will that kept the button depressed on its handle. The lightsaber plunged down toward his nose.

At that moment, a face appeared in front of her, tear stained but coldly furious, and Jaina Solo's violet blade entered her forehead and burned a neat hole straight through.

Jaina's heart was breaking as she sprinted toward the horrible tableau before her. Jag lay near Zekk, clutching a wound that looked as if a lightsaber had sliced partway through his arm, and dazedly attempting to peer at a large purplish bruise that sat directly between his eyes. Zekk sat slumped, with a hole in his chest directly above his heart. He should have been dead already, but something held him back long enough for him to look at her and say the parting words that she would never forget, words that would stay secret forever. He told her of his love, and of his choice. He imparted to her through the Force the complete story of Jag's actions and motives. He told her that he loved her, and he told her one final thing "Be happy, Jaina. Live well, and rediscover your love." And then his spirit slipped out of his physical form and merged with the Force.

Jagged Fel's world was agony. Through the haze, he saw Jaina speaking to Zekk, saw the Jedi close his eyes for the last time…and something in the back of his mind spoke to him. "Thank you, Jag. Thank you for helping me make the hardest decision of my life. Take care of her, Jagged Fel. Thank you."

And he knew nothing.

The galaxy, he though fuzzily, is a very funny place. Moments ago, he had been human, bound by a human's restrictions and limitations, lying wounded and near death. Now, he was apparently a
god, for he floated in space, and somehow was still alive. Furthermore, though he had no recollection of this, he also had managed to wave his hand "Or whatever it is that a god does" and save his adopted people, or something along that line, because the invasion fleet that had previously been poised to take over his world was no longer above him. It had disappeared, leaving in its place a most interesting pattern of black specks on a white background, instead of white stars against the blackness of interstellar space. He had always wished he could see that, which was yet another proof that he was a god.
Secondly, he noted, he seemed to no longer have a body. Or at least, not much of one that he could feel. The only part of himself he was aware of was his head, and of that, he only knew that he possessed his brain, because he was thinking, his nose, because it was between himself and the funny stars, his mouth, because it was dry, and his left ear, because it itched. Then he turned his head, which had apparently bumped up against a pillow and cot while he was floating in vacuum, and saw a Goddess, and instantly knew without a doubt that he was, indeed, a god. Then he knew nothing at all, because it all disappeared in a swirl and became nothing, which was quite possibly the most interesting thing he had ever encountered.

When he woke, he was mortal again. He knew, because no god would ever put himself upside down in a bacta tank, wearing nothing but a pair of flimsy shorts, without the ability to scratch his left ear, which still itched. Sighing, because it had been nice to be a god, he decided that, being mortal, he would use the things floating above him that must be his legs to put himself right side up. Before he could remember which one was which, and how to tell them what to do, he found himself being picked up gently by a large, padded claw while the bacta drained out of the tank. He was rotated in the air and set upright, where, still dizzy, he was promptly restored to godship when a Goddess kissed him. The two effects, one being dizziness from a large claw flipping you upside down and placing you on the ceiling, and the other being dizziness caused by a Goddess kissing you, proved too much for him, and yet again, he knew nothing, which was disappointing, because he had really been enjoying being kissed by the aforementioned Goddess.

Jag never spoke a word about his speech to Zekk, and never revealed what he had seen in the Jedi in that strange moment when their minds were linked. And he knew that even if he had failed in his attempt, Zekk would still not have killed him. Zekk was a Jedi, and he was in love.

As he headed toward his uncle's quarters, Jacen shook his head, wondering what exactly had gone on at that field. He knew only what Jag had told him, which wasn't much. The only thing Jag had been willing to say was that Zekk, because of his love, had been able to resist the temptation of the Dark Side and act to save Jaina.

Jacen's smile vanished as he thought of the wound Jaina had suffered, a wound that could not be cured by bacta. He had asked Jag what he thought would happen next with his and Jaina's relationship, and the answer had surprised him.

"Jaina will do as she has always done; she will choose what she wants, and act upon it. I don't
know if she will choose me. She has been hurt by Zekk's death, hurt so deeply that she will not fully recover for some time. The only cure is for her to realize that Zekk, too, made his own decision, and he did what he wanted, what he knew was right. Until that day, I will wait for her."

Jacen's train of thought abruptly jolted back to the present when he arrived at his destination; the private apartment of his uncle, Luke Skywalker, Grand Master of the Jedi Order.

Corran Horn had just finished telling him that Luke had spent the previous day and half sequestered in his room, with only Leia for company, while Artoo had displayed the different holos of the Clone Wars era that concerned his parents. Artoo had been reluctant at first, but eventually had agreed to show Luke all of the files he contained, which were extensive. The little droid had holorecordings of everything he had ever seen, and had somehow managed to acquire even more holos of things he should not have been able to access. He refused to tell Luke how.

At Jacen's entry, Luke looked up. "Jacen? I thought you were in the Hapan Cluster with Tenel Ka."

His mother also looked up, and smiled warmly at him, with just a touch of mischief in her smile. "You were with Tenel Ka, Jacen? Oh good. She really is wonderful…I would never have expected her to be able to abandon her duties and fight like that. It was a privilege to fight at her back." Jacen nodded, remembering the tales he had heard of Leia and Tenel Ka's mission to take down Alema Rar, the Gorog Night Herald. While Leia alone had fought against Alema Rar, (conveniently, in front of a hidden camera that had recorded the entire thing) Tenel Ka had been the one that got Leia out of that place before the charges she had set brought the whole thing down. His mother's sly smile widened. "You two really should spend more time together." Jacen grinned inwardly to himself. "If only they knew...but no, not yet". My secret must remain a little longer, until I am sure that there is no danger. Soon, though…very soon. He kissed his mother on the cheek while responding to his uncle. "Actually, our ship just got in to the Temple docking bay. You must have lost count of time in here; Corran and Kyle just told me how much time you've spent in here with Artoo."

Undeterred, Leia continued with her previous line of thought. "How is Tenel Ka doing? Losing Zekk was as hard on her as it was for the other Myrkr survivors." Jacen's inward smile faded as he contemplated his response. "She is...upset, yes. To tell the truth, we had a bit of an argument about..." He paused suddenly, surprised. For some reason, he could not confess to his mother what had happened with Ta'a Chume after the failed assassination attempt on his child…a child that still remained a secret. Jacen, though he knew the justice, the need, the rightness of his actions, still for some reason could not face his mother's reaction if she knew of her son's actions. "we had a bit of an argument about...something." He had finished that statement rather lamely, and knew it. He cringed, knowing that the former Chief of State could not have failed to pick up on his discomfort, let alone the Jedi Grand Master who sat next to her.

Leia looked slightly puzzled, but merely gestured for him to sit. Jacen complied, noting as he did so that both his mother and uncle looked extremely tired, but...excited. Sad, but happy. Burdened with a new weight of care, yet released from an old one. He looked from one to the other. "So..." he said, mostly to change the subject off of Tenel Ka. "What have you and Uncle Luke discovered in Artoo's memory about my grandmother?"

He had guessed correctly. Their faces both lit up with eagerness at their news. Eagerness...and something else. Trepidation? He couldn't be quite sure. Luke leaned forward, his eyes alive, and began his tale.

Hours later, he concluded. Jacen's mind was still whirling, examining over and over again the story. "Darth Vader, the greatest Jedi killer of his time, had turned to the Dark Side, the place of inner anger and hate...out of love?" All of his life, Jacen had known that his grandfather, though evil, had been redeemed at the end of his life by his son, Luke Skywalker.

But the man before Darth Vader, the good man who had been Anakin Skywalker...he had never considered him, beyond the occasional quiet whisper in the back of his mind that told Jacen that he must have existed. But to hear it now, to see again in his minds eye the quiet ceremony where his grandfather had promised to always love a woman named Padme: Jacen still was having a hard time comprehending it all. In his mind's eye, Luke's blue eyes were still bright with unshed tears as he explained to his nephew the terrible truth about Anakin Skywalker. The truth that, in his desire to save Padme, to protect her from harm, from death itself...he had unwittingly become her worst nightmare. All that Darth Vader had done on a fateful night in Coruscant, all the Jedi he had killed, the children he had slaughtered...all of it was in the mistaken assumption that by doing it, he was saving the life of the woman he loved. All of it was a misguided attempt to protect her. All of it. Murder had been done in the name of love. Under the guise of saving, all had been destroyed. He saw once again the pitiless look on Anakin Skywalker's face when he had destroyed the Separatist leadership in a strange fortress. People that needed killing. People that deserved death. People who had to die. Anakin had killed them. He had done something that would have happened anyway. In a different time, a different manner, he would have been commended for his actions. But despite Vergere's teachings, despite the new philosophy that the Jedi Order had embraced (though Jacen knew his uncle had been having some doubts about the wisdom of that course) Jacen knew that to do something right in the wrong way was still evil. Darth Vader had been acting out of good intentions, acting to destroy an evil. But that did not change the fact that what he had done was wrong, even if you didn't count the destruction of the Jedi Temple.

With that thought, Jacen saw something in his minds eye, a scene that he recognized from the hologram of his grandfather. But what he saw was not the staticky blue of a hologram, but the crystalline clearness of a Force vision. He somehow saw Artoo's recordings as they had been in real life. Through the view of a security cam, he saw the dark-robed figure of Anakin Skywalker approach someone in that long-gone fortress who, though not Force-sensitive, still into the Force radiated evil and malicious darkness. He saw the sinister figure of his grandfather hesitate, then, secure in his new knowledge that he was doing the right, thing, coldly take that life in his hands and crush it. And he saw another figure, in another place and time, do exactly the same thing to exactly the same type of person...to the former Queen Mother of Hapes, Ta'a Chume. He saw Artoo's view of Anakin Skywalker standing on a balcony, arguing with Padme Amidala, while the other figure "What is the meaning of this vision?" stood in a spacecraft, arguing with a one-armed Queen just that afternoon. He saw other images then, images that overlapped what had occurred in Anakin Skywalker's past with what had not occurred in "No! That person is not…he can't be!" future. He saw that figure, who was inexplicably overlapping the figure of Anakin Skywalker destroying the Jedi temple, eradicating a group of Killik-supporting humans. He saw, and shuddered. And then last of all, most horribly of all, he saw Anakin Force-choking Padme, his beautiful grandmother, on a world come to life in his mind, red and hot and burning with flames akin to the flames in Anakin's eyes. And then, when he thought that his revulsion was complete, that he could not witness anything more horrible, he saw "NO! I WILL NOT ADMIT IT!" he saw...the figure in his dream, wielding a lightsaber that burned as red as his eyes, poised above someone who had been foolish enough to reject his protection, to defy his love, to deny him, and as Jacen Solo watched in stunned horror, that figure in his mind's eye "NO" raised the sizzling lightsaber above his head, and slashed through a single arm, an arm that was holding an upraised lightsaber. And he gazed stunned, aghast as what could never happen happened.

And he cried out in anguish, knowing that what he was seeing was truth, though it hadn't happened yet:

The figure in his dream "ME! THAT IS ME! Jacen Solo!" killed his love.

He watched as he killed Tenel Ka.

And the horror proved too much for his mind, and he shattered, like a piece of transparisteel that has been kissed by a lightsaber's terminal curve.

Jacen became aware once again of the room around him, and realized that it was not the room that had been around him last time he looked. He was no longer in his uncle's private chambers, but the coldly clinical Infirmary at the new Jedi Temple.

He stirred, confused as to why he could not touch the Force to remove the binders around his hands. He experienced a moment of blinding panic, followed by...relief? "Relief? Why would I be relieved not to touch the Force? How could that be something that brings me joy?" And then he remembered the dream, and for one horrible moment, he knew not whether it was dream or reality. Then his gaze fell on two objects near him.

The first was a strange little cage, built to contain some creature, one that looked vaguely familiar, even to his drug-hazed eyes. A creature that, though not even moving, suddenly brought him wide awake when he realized what it was. A ysalamiri. That explained why he could not touch the Force. Then he saw the second thing next to him, and it made him rejoice…and made a hot flush of shame rush through him as his awful vision once again flew through his brain.

Tenel Ka. Alive and well.

She was staring at him. She was staring at him, and suddenly, in the face of the love that was in her eyes, he melted. He sobbed broken-heartedly, aware that something horribly wrong had happened, that he had made a horrible mistake, and had come within a hairs-breadth of following that mistake through to it's conclusion, a conclusion that he could not bear thinking about...the inevitable conclusion to his actions that had been shown to him by the Force, triggered when he saw the holograms sequestered in Artoo-Detoo's memory banks and realized that his grandfather Anakin's path was blending with his own path.

He raised his head and looked into her eyes, loathing himself, loathing what he would have done, loathing his existence, the pride that had blinded him to what Tenel Ka had been trying to say to him during that horrible fight that had taken place onboard the ship that had brought them to the Jedi Temple. Weeping, he looked into her eyes, and beheld a miracle.

The love was still there.

Words rose in his throat, words that suddenly, inexplicably, lodged there, held in place not by the Force, not by the lump that was somehow stuck in the general vicinity of those words...but by magic. The magic of her eyes. The magic, the wonderful, indescribable, indefinable magic that had a name: Love. He tried once again to speak, to tell her how sorry he was, to tell her that he realized he was wrong, to tell her what had almost happened, to tell her how much he loved her; and his words were suddenly swept away as she kissed him. The kiss was long and sweet, and it tore through his self-loathing with the ease of a lightsaber through flimsiplast, tore through the cloud that had been in his mind, tore through the barriers that had been erected around what was still his innermost ideals and morals, tore through the oppressive darkness that surrounded him, and yet, while tearing and ripping and destroying...also healed him, fully and completely, healed him more than any medicine, and hibernation trance, any Force-gifted healer ever could. And that kiss also told him that she knew what was in his heart, his mind, his thoughts. A kiss that told him, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that despite what he had done, despite what he had almost done...she loved him. And that loved burned with a brightness that outshone the stars.

The End.

Hope you all liked it as much as I liked writing it! Reviews are greatly appreciated!