Skywalker
If The City had ever been known by another name, no-one could remember it.
It lay on the northern tip of the east continent and had been the economic and spiritual home of the Kheelians of that land for over two thousand years. It had a population of around two million, comprising primarily Kheelians with a small district of Dhosana and a few thousand immigrant Pechnar and other species. The metropolis housed all the major institutions of the state, including the university, the parliament buildings, administrative centre, state bank, museum, gallery of arts and national archives, as well as numerous markets, manufactories and the only spaceport on the planet. The vast hinterland of the east continent provided the City with produce and labour via the solitary train line which passed along thousands of kilometres of weaving, circuitous track through the major holdings and settlements of the province all the way to the furthest southern point of the continent - the town of Tszaaf, hemmed in by the impassable moors of Kender.
The ticket chit Yalani had bought provided Ben and his friends with three bunk spaces for the duration of their expedition to the north, a journey that was expected to take them at least three days and nights. More if they were delayed by weather in the mountains or by geomagnetic storms which commonly swept across the vastness of the plains that followed. Pakat's explanation of the distances involved hadn't been entirely clear to Ben, not having any frame of reference for a 'length', the Kheelian standard measurement of distance. But from the speed that the distant landscape blurred past the thick transparisteel windows he estimated that they must be travelling at least 400kph. Even allowing for the serpentine route of the train tracks and the several hours they would were expected to halt at each town they passed through, they must be journeying something like ten thousand kilometres from home. The planet was immense.
Ben learned all of this as they talked, and they talked much as they travelled. But that all came later on in their journey, for at first they were too weary to do anything but sleep. Ben could feel his own exhaustion clawing at him like some wild creature, thudding like a heavy drumbeat in his skull. The other two looked little better.
As Shaarm led them on through the rumbling train towards the residential area where their bunk spaces were to be found, Ben couldn't help but notice, even through his crippling fatigue, that the train itself was vast, far larger than he had appreciated in his distant glimpses of its exterior. Pakat carried him through endless long carriages, each connected to the next by sliding doors through a vestibule. They traversed narrow walkways through cars stacked wall to wall and high above them with shipping crates and containers of goods and produce. The containers twinkled in the low light like fireflies with hundreds of digital tags listing ownership and destination. After the goods cars they walked through compartments of livestock in a waft of hot animal smells; black beady eyes from a herd of caprius peered out at them from between the metal railings that separated the walkway from the gloomy, reeking pens of sleeping beasts on either side.
Finally, when Ben thought they must be nearing the end of the train, they arrived at the living quarters. The carriages here were divided up into smaller compartments about 12m long, each with a narrow corridor along the centre and stacked either side with personal luggage, goods and smaller shipping crates piled high up the walls of the carriage. The bunk spaces were suspended side-on above the luggage on long shelves that jutted out from both walls, running the length of the carriage. The native Kheelians easily ascended and descended the four-metre climb up to the bunks by means of niches in the walls between each bed forming a sort of ladder. Ben closed his eyes, suddenly dizzy, as Pakat passed him carefully up to Shaarm at the top of the ladder.
Then, at last, he was able to lie down on his thin sleep mat, drag the blankets over him, and with his back pressed firmly to the wall as far from the vertical drop at the edge of his bunk as he could, Ben slept.
It was a sudden sense of stillness that woke him, hours later. Ben sat up slowly, disconcerted. A low powered electric light had gleamed a constant blue at all hours in their compartment and, with no windows to the outside, it was difficult to distinguish day from night. The bunk he lay in was up against the end wall of the compartment. The bed that joined onto his at the foot-end was empty. On the next bunk, Pakat was stretched out reading a data pad. Three more bunks lay beyond; one contained a sleeping shape. The others were empty. Looking across the carriage he saw a similar line of berths on the opposite wall, two of which were occupied by Kheelians, reading or chatting quietly.
"What time is it?" Ben asked, quietly. Pakat looked up, startled, putting down his reading material and stylus.
"Ben! How are you feeling?"
"Much improved," Ben confirmed and it was true. He wasn't cold for the first time in several days, and the strange tingling seemed finally have dissipated from his limbs. The older pains in his leg, hip, chest and shoulder were still there but he felt stronger.
"You look it," Pakat agreed, appraisingly. "In answer to your question, it is about 10 turns. Did you sleep well?"
"I dreamed of sand," Ben answered, "but I don't recall any more than that. Why isn't the train moving, do you know?"
"We have just made our first major stop, at a town called Chandreta," Pakat answered. "It's the main market for the agricultural lands to the east, so we will be here several hours while they load all the produce on board. Shaarm has just headed out into the town to see if she can get some basic supplies for us, as we left in such a hurry. Do not worry; she will be back well before the train is due to depart."
Ben peered over the edge of the bunk. Far below, on the floor of the carriage, the door to their compartment had slid open and a group of Kheelians entered. He looked down on two females who were trotting along the narrow walkway between the stacked crates, chatting casually. Behind them skipped along a white-furred child, who was humming and tapping on the crates as they went. The little group made their way through the carriage and out of the next door without glancing up. Ben watched them go, pushing down the pang of misery that the sight of the child brought. Tiki and Ooouli would be safe. That was the only thing that mattered.
"What else is through there?" He asked Pakat, pointing at the far end of the carriage where the group had disappeared. "More sleeping carriages?" It would be good to get his bearings a little and find out a little more about how the train was laid out.
The next few compartments, Pakat informed him, contained more berths, as well as lounge areas, a canteen and a number of refreshers. The answer surprised Ben; he had considered from carriages he had so far seen that the transport was primarily designed for cargo and not passengers, but it seemed that some level of comfort for the Kheelian travellers had been considered. After all, it only seemed to be Ben who was uncomfortable with the vertiginous height of their beds, though the Kheelians must be significantly more cramped in their berths than he.
"I'm just going for a look around," Ben said, pulling on his boots. Pakat was clearly in the middle of some task. "I won't be long."
"I'll come with you," Pakat said, immediately. He tucked the datapad away into his russet-orange jacket and swung down out of the bunk before Ben could object. He didn't actually require company or a bodyguard at the moment but it was clear Pakat himself was feeling the need to be useful, even if that was limited to accompanying Ben to the 'fresher and back.
Ben declined Pakat's offer of help down from the berth. Instead, using a touch of the Force to steady and cushion him, he dropped from the edge of the bunk onto the top of the stacked crates and then lightly hopped down the piled containers to the floor. His hip twinged and the damaged leg cramped a little with disuse, but he made it, and the pain was a good, healing hurt. Pakat smiled at the sign of Ben's growing health and independence. A few curious faces peered down at them from the other bunks above but no-one spoke to them.
The pair made their way through two more sleeping compartments, Ben all the while marvelling at the sheer scale of the train. The compartment next to theirs was almost empty, with only a single purple-furred traveller stretched out on one of the high bunks, while the one after that was stuffed full with three harassed looking Dhosana adults and nine noisy children, all of whom were excitedly climbing on the bunks and tossing a ball between themselves across the carriage above Ben and Pakat's heads.
After passing through a vestibule which connected the two carriages and also had an external door, they entered a car which contained neither bunks nor shipping containers. Instead the narrow corridor was lined on both sides with white panelled cubicles, each an individual washroom. Pakat beckoned Ben down to the far end of the corridor where there were two much smaller rooms with doors so low even Ben had to duck his head to step through. Inside he found a tiny, perfectly proportioned refresher, sized exactly for an adult Pechnar. The provision for travellers of his stature shouldn't have been a surprise – he knew that other humans like himself were known in Tszaaf, though he hadn't seen any, and there would be more in the city. It was just strange and oddly disconcerting to find he could reach the taps and controls on the sonics easily, when he had become used to the constant struggle of existing in a world that wasn't designed for him.
Ben had emptied his pockets of their meagre contents - lightsaber, the children's painting, his list of memories, ID card and the hated inhibitor bracelet – and stuffed his clothes into the laundry spinner for chemical cleaning while he washed. The cleaner pinged to announce the end of its cycle, and he pulled the garments out, eying the fabric critically. The clothes - dull orange shirt, grey sleeveless over-jacket, blue scarf and black trousers – were the ones Shaarm had bought for him all those days ago when he had first been in the Tszaaf hospital after the narm attack. They were frayed and torn, and there was still a stain on the jacket that looked a lot like blood. Add to that look his thin, scarred face with its patchy beard, second-hand over-sized boots and the ragged handmade green wool coat he had worn every day since his arrival, and he was starting to look distinctly tatty. He needed a haircut, a shave and a good meal. With a slight frown and a sigh of acknowledgement that he wasn't likely to get any of those things in the near future, Ben ran his fingers through his wet hair to straighten it, and redressed in the only clothes he owned. At least they were now clean.
Ablutions complete and feeling distinctly re-energized despite his misgivings, Ben left the cubicle and continued on down the corridor towards the lounge where he had arranged to meet Pakat. He entered a wide bright space and at first all he took in was the window; a long strip of light stretched continuously along both walls of the carriage. The space was perhaps 30 metres long, filled with small tables and spread about with seating mats. The large carriage could have seated perhaps fifty Kheelians, although at the moment it was mostly empty. Ben guessed the train would only grow more crowded as they moved towards the city. One corner of the space contained a canteen unit manned by two droids who were dispensing scoops of food and beverages to waiting travellers.
Ben joined Pakat, who was sitting at a small table in the corner. The Kheelian hadn't been idle while Ben had been busy, and had acquired two trays of food. The meal of rehydrated protein cubes and crackers came in two flavours; one intended for the native population and one for anyone else, which in this instance included Ben. Significantly better than the food were the two cups of hot spiced tea that accompanied it. With little else to do, the pair of them spent the next few hours picking at the bland, processed food and studying the town of Chandreta through the windows.
As at Tszaaf, only the first few carriages of the train opened onto the raised platform outside what must be the station building. The rear of the train sat far back up the line, meaning they had an oblique view across the town. It seemed smaller than Tszaaf from what little Ben could see, with the low domes of its houses gleaming in the sun like wet river stones. The land undulated gently, shimmering under fields of solar panels and with low hilltops scattered with turbines which turned lazily in the breeze. From the other side of the train, they could see a dark line where the train tracks made a wide turn and passed across the foothills towards the distant purple shadow of far-off mountains, like a bruise along the horizon. Pakat pointed out a scatter of dark shapes about half a kilometre away. A flock of creatures known as an ostampagus – huge flightless birds each a little taller than a standing Kheelian and with a vicious hooked beak – were grazing on newly planted tubers out in the fields. They usually kept to the mountains, but a wandering flock would destroy an entire crop in less than a week, or kill a whole herd of caprius in one go if they weren't scared off. Ben could see why the narms were considered a rather minor threat in comparison to creatures the size of the ostampagi.
Several new travellers entered the lounge over the next few hours on their way to their allotted sleeping compartments. For the main part these were over-tired families returning home from Kel-Marr festival celebrations with relatives in outer towns, but some were gruff Kheelians dressed in working clothes who oversaw the stacking of their goods on board with tired scowls and then went straight to the canteen droid to buy cups of vok.
Two dusty Kheelians, discussing the state of mining wages, brushed past their corner table on their way to join the small queue by the canteen. They gave Ben little more than a cursory glance, something he was rather relishing. Pechnar must be least common enough out here that he wasn't an exceptional oddity. As if confirming his thoughts, the compartment door swished open and a group of humans stepped into the carriage. The memory of pursuit had him freezing at the sight, but his logical brain quickly analysed what he was seeing was unlikely to pose a threat. The first figure was a woman with rich glossy skin the colour of uncreamed caff and a long spool of black hair twisted up in knotted ropes around her head. Her companion was male, several years older and several centimetres shorter, grey headed and with the ruddy, tanned complexion of a manual worker. He was carrying a sleeping toddler in his arms. A teenager trailed behind, all gangly limbs and sticky-out ears. All of them were dressed in layers of rough green cloth, sleeveless jackets and headscarves, like labourers or farmers. The teenager caught sight of Ben's staring and muttered something to the woman. The group picked up their food trays and quickly disappeared to the far end of the carriage. The boy gave Ben a fearless glare as they left.
Pakat saw the direction of Ben's gaze. "Someone familiar?" he asked, with forced lightness.
"No," Ben said. "Just the first humans I can remember ever seeing who weren't trying to kill me."
The Kheelian blinked. "That is depressing."
"It certainly is. Why do Pechnar live out here?"
Pakat shrugged. "They come because there is work here, I suppose. Jobs that Pechnar stature is much more suited for than Kheelians and Dhosana – fruit picking, wind turbine repairs, droid maintenance. Even data entry is more suited for Pechar – all those fingers for typing. But I think many, like you, come here to start a new life, because they became unwelcome where they were or because they have something to hide. It would be difficult to be more thoroughly hidden than it is out here."
Shaarm returned from the town of Chandreta some hours later, with news.
"There was a telewire unit at the station," she told them as soon as the customary head pats and greetings were over. "I got through to Chana."
Pakat sat up, sharply. "You did? What happened?"
"Everyone is well," she assured them. "Grandmother has use of a house in the town for her political work, and Chana and the children are staying there with her for now, out of sight. Everyone sends their love."
"And the Jedi?" Ben asked. "What happened after we left?"
"As soon as the train was gone, Falayan apparently dragged Chana and the girls through some back alleys he somehow knows to a hidden route into the Dhosana enclave. They stayed the rest of the night with Yalani and Ysella and by morning there was no sign of the Jedi anywhere. They've asked around and someone thought he saw Pechnar leaving the town on speeder bikes, heading west. They've gone."
Ben nodded, relieved.
Shaarm's errands hadn't just been to acquire news, as welcome as it was to hear that everyone was all right. She had purchased backpacks for herself and Pakat and a shapeless cloth bag with a long strap for Ben, as well as spare sets of Kheelian clothes and the only Pechnar garments she could find – leggings and a knee-length sage green tunic. It seemed Pechnar were even less populous in Chandreta than Tszaaf. She had also acquired a selection of other travel essentials, including washing materials, maps and food. She showed Ben sachets of dried fruit and beans as well as bottled water and packaged phuff bread, all edible for his species, to supplement the processed canteen food. Ben took the new tunic, food and particularly the bag gratefully. His pockets had been starting to get a little full.
After a while Ben left the others and returned to the berths. The man slept again for several turns, still recovering from the exhaustion and weakness that had plagued him since the moor. By the time he awoke evening had drawn on and the train was winding its way through dark foothills, scattered with scrubby bushes and stunted trees. The train slowed significantly as they climbed and the track became steeper and more treacherous. One of the other Kheelians in their sleep compartment, an older female known as Maga, told Ben how heavy snow or storms in the mountain passes had been known to delay trains for days. The tunnel which had at one time passed under the mountain range had been destroyed in the war, and now they relied on good weather, good luck and an army of Kheelian volunteers who lived in waystations in the mountains for months on end to keep the tracks clear of snow, debris and wandering ostampagi.
The skies stayed clear, however, and by nightfall they had reached the mountains. Ben watched through the window in the lounge as the black silhouettes of the mountains drew in and swallowed up the deepening blue of the night sky. He shivered, and went to bed.
Time on the train passed strangely. The enforced inaction was lulled by the constant hum of engines and by the rolling, gentle motion of the train into a stupor of hibernation. The only clear moments of definition came when the train came to a slow, grinding halt at the numerous settlements along its route, stopping anywhere between 20 minutes to four full turns.
Ben spent some of the next morning sitting up in the berths, meditating on the events of the past few days, but the chatter of the other travellers in their compartment was difficult to tune out. He missed the peace and solitude of home. Eventually Ben rose, restless, climbed down from the bunks and set out to walk off some of the excess energy. He didn't get further than the lounge before he saw Shaarm and Pakat at their previous table, heads bent low in conversation. The golden light streaming through the window behind them made their manes glow like haloes.
They ate a late breakfast together although Ben was quiet, lost in thought. While Pakat disposed of the trays, Shaarm gestured to Ben's shoulder.
"I notice you are not wearing your sling," she pointed out. "How are your arm and chest feeling now? Your surgery was only five days ago, and it has been some time since I was able to check your healing..."
Ben agreed that a check-up was probably due, and so the group retired back to the sleeping compartment. Ben sat quietly on his bunk while Shaarm performed a quick examination; her long clever fingers rotating his shoulder and testing the give of his collar bone and ribs. She clicked her tongue at the sight of the 'saber burn on his neck, but made no further comment, replacing the dressings and his scarf. Ben shook his head when she asked about pain, fever, or shortness of breath.
Finally, when she seemed to be satisfied, Ben pulled his shirt and overclothes back on. He sat back against the wall and looked over at his friends, considering.
"Is this a good time for us to speak?" he asked, low. "There are some things we need to talk about."
Shaarm was tucking away the datapad she had been using to update Ben's MedIdent card. "What sort of things?" she asked, handing the card back.
"Nenka."
Pakat looked up, sharply.
"You believe hold me responsible for what happened to him," Ben concluded, simply.
Pakat was clearly horrified. He spluttered out; "Ben! Of course we do not, that is madness..."
"Shaarm does," Ben said, simply. "And she is correct. I am responsible."
Shaarm looked stricken, but she didn't deny it. Pakat was still making his protestations.
"Please, Pakat," Ben shook his head. "I'm not saying other factors weren't involved, but it was my wrecked ship which tainted the water so badly the narms had to abandon their homes. It was I who pushed for negotiations in the first place and took Nenka and the others up onto that moor with no idea of the complexity of the danger we were walking into. And ultimately, it was my ignorance and misuse of my powers which forced Nenka into an accelerated and unnatural healing. That damage is all of my own doing."
Pakat became increasingly upset as Ben spoke, seemingly horrified by the idea that Ben might blame himself for Nenka's misfortune, or worse, that Shaarm might as well. Ben regretted having raised the subject at all, but eventually Shaarm calmed her spouse down and the Kheelian left the compartment on the pretence of enquiring with the train guard about the next stopover they would make.
"Pakat is not fond of conflict, particularly amongst those he cares about. He will be back soon enough," Shaarm reassured Ben, after Pakat was gone. "You should know he would never blame you. He does not have an accusatory breath in him."
"I know that," Ben agreed. They were silent for a moment.
"You didn't..." Shaarm began and then paused. "When you healed Nenka. Did you know what you were doing?"
Ben shook his head. "I hadn't the slightest idea. I don't know if what I did should even have been possible. I saw him fall and then the blood...do you know he saved my life? The narms attacked him and all I remember is that I was utterly determined that no-one else should die. The Force saved him, not I."
"The Force?" she asked.
Ben nodded, but didn't clarify. After a moment, Shaarm said:
"You are correct in that I was hiding something from you."
"About Nenka? He will live?"
Yes," Shaarm said, firmly. "I was not being untruthful about that. He has a long road ahead of him, but he will recover. But as for what I was concealing from you...it is not blame, Ben. It is fear. The powers you possess... They terrify me. The things you can do and all without even knowing how? You can survive incredible injury. You can move things without touching them, speak to animals, control people's minds... You regrew Nenka's cells, at a thousand times their normal rate! Do you know how much energy that should take? Yes, it could be argued that advances in medicine are starting to do the same, but I understand the science behind those advances, behind bacta and surgical interventions. I believe in testable, provable facts. The things you can do, this force. That I do not understand and so yes, I do find it frightening. We all do."
She paused for a second, and then added. "Well, all except Chana, I think. But then he never has been quite sane."
Ben smiled at the attempted levity but it was a hollow thing that didn't reach his eyes.
"Then it is just as well we left the girls behind," he said, heavily. "You must be relieved, I imagine, if that is how you felt all along...afraid of me, of what I might do. Ysella was right, then, after all. Tiki and Ooouli should be kept as far from me as possible."
"Do not be an idiot, Ben!" Shaarm snapped, losing her patience in the face of Ben's self-recriminations. Across the compartment, two Kheelians on their bunks turned around to stare at them. Shaarm lowered her voice.
"Do you really think we would have continued to let you live in our home, let you teach and befriend our children if we thought for one second you would endanger them? I said I was afraid of your power. I am not afraid of you. You came close to dying while protecting Ooouli and Tiki. And then what you did to heal Nenka...it almost destroyed you. You were willing to place yourself back into the hands of men who tortured you to keep my family from harm. You are good. I do not fear you. I do not blame you, either," Shaarm concluded. "And if for a moment I did, then I am sorry."
Ben nodded, relief flowing through him like oxygen.
Pakat returned after an hour or so. He didn't ask about their conversation, merely seeming relieved that the conflict between them had apparently been resolved. The three relocated from the sleeping compartment back to the lounge just for a change of scenery, where the rest of the day passed slowly and monotonously. They alternated between looking out of the window, listening to music, meditating or reading. Ben showed Shaarm and Pakat the flimsi he carried with his list of things he had remembered, but they could make no more sense of the scattered fragments of memory than he.
Despite the old Kheelian Maga's fears, the weather stayed clear, and the train did not stop as they wove their way down from the highest point of the mountains that they had passed in the night. As the afternoon drew on they arrived into their next major station; Berghet Crosspoint. Ben, who was starting to find lack of purpose and constant proximity to the other travellers highly wearing, proposed his intention to alight from the train and see the town while they were stopped. Shaarm frowned but didn't try to dissuade him, and soon the little group were dressed in their outdoor gear and ready to disembark. Once the first hurdle was passed; a two-metre drop from the train door to the scorched grass at the edge of the rails, they set off into the town.
Unlike Chandreta and Tszaaf, there had been no settlement at Berghet before the railway was built, but it was here that the major infrastructure route passed over a broad river which flowed off to the east as well as an old drover's track used by the caprius herders of the foothills and plains to the west. The place became quickly established as a trading outpost between the three routeways and, where commerce is taking place, a town will quickly follow. Unlike the previous large settlements, the town they walked through was dominated by blocks of warehouses and storage sheds rather than winding streets of domestic residences. Still, there were plenty of signs of habitation; taverns and shops, residential units and even a small schoolhouse. Caprius were everywhere, cropping the thick green turf which formed the surface of all the roads and walkways of the town. There were still two hours before the train was due to depart once they had finished with the town's highlights, so they found a small eatery for a midday meal. The Kheelians tucked into the fare with evidence enjoyment, appreciating the break from the monotony of the processed train food, though Ben settled for a piece of caprius cheese, a handful of crackers and dried fruit out of his bag rather than risk anything more unfamiliar.
After eating they returned to the station and loitered at the edge of the grass, watching the final herd being corralled onto the train and taking in the last few minutes of fresh air before re-embarking. They leaned on a low fence at the edge of the track, looking back the way they had come across the grey, craggy mountains. The air was crisp and cold and it smelled of snow. Pakat had seen a news outlet in one of the bars they passed; the national weather department had issued a timetable showing a major coronal mass ejection over the previous few hours. The probability of geomagnetic storms was high over the upcoming days. They were due to arrive in the City in less than 24 hours and the other passengers were concerned that a major solar storm could significantly delay their journey. But there was nothing to be done about it, and Ben was in no particular hurry to encounter what awaited him at the end of this journey.
"How does it feel?" Shaarm asked suddenly, out of the blue. "Your magic? This...force?"
"Well..." Ben hesitated. "For one thing I would not truly call it 'mine'. If anything, I belong to it; the Force is with me, as I believe it is to be found in everything. Sometimes it feels like music and I can see every life and object in the universe are its notes, woven together in harmony or discord. Or perhaps it is more like a river or a fire. It gives life, but I know I could be swept away by it or consumed utterly."
"Are you afraid of it?"
"No," Ben answered simply, without hesitation. "No, it is not something that I fear. I don't think I understand it, yet, but it is part of who I am. Fear leads to anger, and to suffering, and I don't think there can be any suffering in the Force."
"You said you can sense it in everything," said Pakat, clearly ill at ease with the entire concept, but curious nonetheless. "Can you see it in us?"
Ben nodded, cautiously. "I did some damage to myself, I think, when I healed Nenka, and I am only starting to feel the Force again. Before that though, yes, I could sense you all in the Force. You all looked like stars in a constellation."
"And the Jedi? Were they the same?"
Ben smiled. "More like a supernova."
Shaarm sighed, looking out towards the distant plains. "I suppose that explains how they were able to find you, then. You must have shone like a beacon to them, as soon as you took the suppression bracelet off."
"I don't..." Ben said, frowning. The wind whistled cold around them. "I'm sorry, what do you mean?"
"Because of you also being a Jedi," Shaarm explained. "You must look the same to them, in the Force."
Ben stilled, his heart giving a sudden painful jolt. He glanced at Pakat and back again. "No. That's not right..."
Shaarm had turned to look at him fully now, and her expression was concerned.
"Ben, we talked about this."
He shook his head, but she persisted. "The night before you went up on to the moor, to negotiate peace with the narms. I told you that you must be a Jedi. We talked about it for some time. You...you do not remember, do you?"
"I am no Jedi!" Ben objected. "They tried to kill me!"
"That is what you said before." The two Kheelians exchanged an anxious look.
Ben paused, refocusing on this new problem. "How?" he asked. "How can I not remember that?"
"Ben," Shaarm said, holding onto his shoulder and looking at him with a sudden intensity. "Your memory... Since the crash, have you noticed any blank periods? Blackouts? Other conversations, things you could not recall afterwards?"
Ben was feeling a slow, creeping chill, like fog of fear. "No," he shook his head. "No, nothing like that. But I would not necessarily know if I had forgotten something, would I? Unless someone else pointed it out. Shaarm...what does this mean?"
"It is probably nothing," Shaarm said, though she was clearly still anxious. "You are clearly capable of both forming and retaining new memories, we have seen that. It probably means that you were just preoccupied when we talked before."
"People often do not recall minor conversations." Pakat added, trying in vain to comfort him.
"Or it means that I am starting to forget again," Ben concluded, "and that I didn't even notice it happening."
That was not a comforting thought.
They returned to the train a short while later, thoughtful and quiet. Ben turned in early, though he lay awake for a long time, thinking through every day he had experienced, every face he had seen and every conversation he had had. Searching for blank moments or expanses of lost time. He couldn't still be forgetting. Not when he had fought so hard for what he had. He couldn't lose it all again.
Shaarm thought he was a Jedi.
It some ways, it made sense. He could do incredible things that he didn't understand, things that tallied into what little the Kheelians knew about the Jedi. But he needed more information that was not coloured by speculation and folk tale. If he was a Jedi who had gone rogue in some way, or was some sort of traitor then that may explain why they pursued him so diligently.
If he was a Jedi...Back in Tszaaf the first time, back when his Force powers had not been crippled, he had sensed the Jedi outside the medcentre like a burning searchlight. It stood to reason that, as his Force use recovered and strengthened, they would also be able to sense him again too. Shaarm herself had concluded as much. Ben had been shoring up the mental shields he had discovered in his mind, but he did not know if they would hide him well enough from his pursuers. He needed to adopt a more direct course of action by the time they reached the city if he was to stay hidden.
Ben rolled over quietly, careful not to disturb the sleeping Kheelians around him, and reached for his canvas bag. He extracted the inhibitor bracelet. The shiny little cuff gleamed bright and innocent in the blue overhead lights. Without allowing himself any doubts or second thoughts, Ben took a deep breath and pushed the thing onto his wrist.
The sensation was like being punched in the gut followed by falling backwards into an ice-cold frozen river. Ben gasped, trying not to wake the others and slumped back, reeling and dizzy. He hadn't even snapped the cuff properly closed, concerned that if he sealed it shut the loss of the Force in its entirety might just plunge him back into seizures. Yet even with it slightly open, the sick, numb, crushing sensation rolled over him in waves. Ben clumsily grasped the cuff and managed to prize it open a little more. The sensation of being cut off, of being smothered, began to slowly recede. Ben adjusted the bracelet carefully, searching for a balance between his goal of blocking his Force presence, and the side effects of debilitating nausea and crippling numb ice-coldness. When he found what he guessed might be the right adjustment, he jammed a twist of cloth between the terminals of the bracelet's arms to hold it in place and prevent it snapping entirely closed.
Time for a quick test. Ben reached out with the Force for Pakat's stylus which rested on the side. The stylus didn't even twitch but Ben's nose was suddenly gushing in hot blood; he cupped his hand and a wodge of tissues under his nose and leaned forwards until the bleeding stopped. Hopefully that result meant success, but he might never know for certain if his appearance in the Force was as smothered as it felt. He didn't have any other choice but to hope. Ben shuffled his sleeve down over the cuff until it could not be seen, quite resolved not to mention this to Shaarm. Inside his head the Force buffeted against the numbing blanket of nothingness emerging from the inhibitor. How long had he lived like this before? Days? Months? If he was going to successfully hide in the city, he would have to be able to function, despite the awful sensation of the bracelet. This was necessary training.
There was certainly no possibility of sleep now, and so he quietly fled the compartment. After a quick trip to the washrooms to clean off any remaining blood, Ben found himself back in the lounge, all but deserted at this hour apart from a few vok drinkers and two Kheelians eating a late meal. He dropped into a seating mat by the window. Outside, the night rolled by, unbroken.
After some time, Ben felt steady enough to risk standing again, though his stomach still churned. Perhaps a glass of tea would help. He crossed carefully over to the canteen and lined up to queue behind a figure waiting at the counter. His level of distraction and unease meant it took Ben several moments to properly observe the being standing in front of him, and then he stared, fascinated.
He could not have imagined such a creature, though he remembered that once the Kheelians had looked equally as outlandish and frightening when he had first seen them. This being was at least bipedal, though it probably had a good 10cm in height over Ben. Its appearance was made even stranger by rich teal-coloured skin and by two long tail-like protrusions which grew out its skull and down his back. The pointed ends were wrapped in some decorative fashion with long crossing straps. As Ben watched, the head-tails gave a sharp twitch in towards the creature's back and then suddenly it was rounding on Ben in a fury.
"Something wrong with your eyes?" The creature snapped, flashing pointed teeth at him. Ben jerked back. "Take a hike, pal, before you find yourself walking home."
"I apologise," Ben said, trying desperately to break his gaze away. The creature had the same teal-coloured skin over its face and neck, with a high, solid brow, a narrow nose and brown, human-looking eyes. Currently the face was wearing a firm scowl. Ben spotted the rather large blaster strapped to one hip.
"I did not mean to stare," Ben continued, hoping to allay his previous rudeness. "It has just been a long time since I saw a..." he paused, panicking, but for once his brain did not desert him, and the word was suddenly on his tongue. "...a Twi'lek."
The creature – the Twi'lek – snorted.
"Yeah, you and me both, friend. Now do you mind? I'm trying to eat."
"I'm sorry," Ben said again and made to step away, glancing at the tray to which the Twi'lek had gestured. Ben observed he was eating the yellow food cubes engineered for Pechnar rather than the standard white. That must be a taste preference; his memory informed him that there was no reason why Twi'leks shouldn't be able to digest Kheelian food too.
"Twi'leks have two stomachs?" Ben said, before he could stop himself.
The Twi'lek answered "Sure," before turning away again, muttering something under his breath that sounded distinctly like: "Why do the weird ones always turn up on my shift?"
Ben laughed, despite himself, and apologised again. "I'm sorry. Forgive me; I am not at my best today."
"Sweet goddess...you actually speak Ryl?" the Twi'lek exclaimed with clear delight, hostility vanishing faster than coin in a spice den. "I don't believe it."
"I hardly believe it myself," Ben muttered, no less astonished to realise he had just spoken in what must have been the Twi'lek's own many languages did he speak?This was happening far too often. Time to make himself scarce before he drew too much attention. "Pardon the intrusion. Enjoy your meal."
Ben made to turn away, but suddenly found a hand was holding his arm.
"Oh no, you don't," said the Twi'lek, switching entirely from Basic to the new alien language. "You're not going anywhere. You come over here, acting all weird like some planet-bound xenophobe, and then you come out with the most fluent sounding Twi'leki I've heard from anyone without lekku? Now I am very curious. Are you waiting for food? No? Then grab a drink and come on. You can give me an explanation while I eat."
Ben floundered a little, not knowing how to answer.
"I am not good company right now," he said at last.
"You seem a bit funny in the head?" The Twi'lek asked. "Are you?"
Ben considered. "Probably," he concluded.
The Twi'lek clapped him on the shoulder. "Then talk about stomachs again for all I care. It's just been a really long time since I spoke Ryl to anyone and my Kheeli is terrible."
"Very well," Ben agreed, a little reluctantly. He was still feeling weak and unsteady as he readjusted to the loss of the Force and in no mood to be sociable. But perhaps a distraction was what he needed.
The Twi'lek stuck out hand.
"I'm Arendet'ti," he said. "People call me Ditto."
"Ben," said Ben, shaking the Twi'lek's hand. "Ben Waken."
Arendet'ti, it turned out was surprisingly good company, not least because he was exceedingly garrulous which made Ben's part of the conversation rather easy. The Twi'lek, Ben learned, had studied xenosociology on his home planet of Ryloth, choosing the Kheelian/ Dhosana wars as the subject for his dissertation which had been met with some confusion by his professors. He had quickly decided that field study was significantly more interesting than sitting in a library all day, and had made his way out to the planet he knew as Ata on the cheapest ship he could find. The first two years at the university had been great, but then his savings had run out and now he was stranded.
"And now?" Ben gestured at the Twi'lek's outfit. He was wearing a bottle green jacket and trousers that clashed a little with his skin tone. The jacket had long black stripes down the arms and a logo on the front left side; clearly a uniform. A shiny, new-looking blaster was neatly clipped into a holster at his hip.
"Technically I'm a train guard," Ditto explained. "But really all I do is translate from Basic, find lost luggage and deal with the biped passengers' ticket chits. Not many of the quadie guards (slang, Ben figured, for the quadrupedal Kheelians and Dhosana) speak any Basic at all and Kheeli is a right mouthful. I'm meant to be security for the humies and bipeds too, but there's seldom any trouble. Few drunken miners get in fights every now and again, and sometimes we have to chase anostampagus or two off the line. It's easy enough work, I get to travel while I earn some credit and it beats waiting tables. Which reminds me, I haven't seen you about before in the biped compartments. You're not a stowaway, are you?"
Ben smiled at that, though his attention was piqued by the last comments. He produced his ticket chit for Ditto's inspection. "There is a separate section of the train for Pechnar? I suppose that explains why I haven't seen that many others around. I'm travelling with two Kheelians. Colleagues of mine," he explained. "So our berths are in the Kheelian section."
"The bipeds on board are mostly humans, yes. Though we do get the occasional Twi'lek or Pantoran. Even had a Togruta out here last week. So you work in the City too, if you have Kheelian colleagues?" Ditto asked, and Ben realised he was being prompted for his own story, which he told in what he hoped was the right balance of vagueness and random specificity to be believable. He settled for the familiar lie he had been using in Tszaaf, not dissimilar to the Twi'lek's own story; he was a researcher at the university who had left the city to study the narms of Kender.
That initiated another long conversation, as Ditto was fascinated by Ben's account of the creatures and their society. It certainly distracted the Twi'lek from Ben's fake back-story, as the man recounted the attack, the negotiation and the fight on the moor. Ditto's eagerness made Ben smile, reminded of Pakat's own passion for the moor dwelling creatures.
An hour or so must have passed before the Twi'lek suddenly glanced at his chrono and swore. "Kriff. I have to go," he said. "Was meant to be at my station ages ago." He gestured back down the train towards the canteen and the Pechnar carriages beyond. "Thanks for the company, Ben. See you around?"
"Yes," Ben nodded. "Goodbye."
The Twi'lek disappeared and Ben cleared away his teacup back to the counter. He finally felt as if he might be able, at last, to sleep. Listening to another person's interests and fears and little problems had been a good distraction, a way to remind him that his own problems were not the only ones that mattered. He returned to the sleeping compartment, quietly, though Shaarm lifted her head as he climbed a little awkwardly up into his bunk.
"Everything all right?" she whispered.
"I think I made a friend," Ben said,
"That's nice," said Shaarm, and fell back to sleep.
He is aware of a sharp stinging on his face. It is but a small sensation amidst the sea of pain in which he currently adrift, but it catches his attention with its suddenness and draws him from sleep.
A voice says "Yes, he's coming round."
Ben turns his head muzzily, but there's nothing to see. Something is covering his eyes. His arms are still bound. The voice continues to speak, but he ignores it for the moment. It will make its demands known in time. Instead he catalogues his own pains, radiating out from the shrapnel in his leg, his chest where they had kicked him and his neck where the deep 'saber burn oozes and weeps. At least these are all familiar pains; nothing serious has happened since he was last conscious. He focuses back on the voice.
It is saying, "Are we ready to begin?"
A second voice, off to Ben's right, says; "Yes, we're ready. I just need to establish a baseline for the subject. Start off by asking him some questions you already know the answers to, so I can calibrate."
"Hmm, very well. No, Jedi, don't fall asleep again. We have work to do.
There is another sharp slap and Ben's head jerks back. He grits his teeth.
"Oh, don't pull that face." The voice continues. "Believe it or not but I have noticed your continued refusal to co-operate. So now we're doing this in a way where your co-operation is not longer required."
"Ready?" says the second voice.
"Yes. Okay. Let's start... Where are you?"
Ask whatever pointless questions you like, Ben thinks; I am done talking to you. But even as his thoughts are casually stating their silent defiance, there is a strange sensation in his head. It's like a humming, pulsing feeling on the side of his skull, under the left ear. The sensation increases to a soft buzzing, not painful but intensely irritating, and he wants to scratch the skin clear. His arms just jerk helplessly against their bindings. Then the pressure and the buzzing die away, falling back to just a faint, but constant, background hum.
"Okay, I am getting some alignment," says the second voice. "Try again."
"Where are you?" The man repeats, more firmly.
Ben isn't sure he knows that information, even if he had wanted to give it. He remembers the trap, the one he had walked right into like some crèche-fresh initiate. How embarrassing. He remembers being stunned from the explosion, searched, disarmed, cuffed. Held in a small room for what must have been several days. Then, he remembers the man. Ben had said to him, "Just out of interest, where exactly am I?" and the man had replied, "You're on my ship, of course."And Ben had answered, "Ah, yes. Information which is both factually accurate and completely useless at the same time. Thank you so much." The man had said, "Really, all that you need to worry about right now is that you are mine. You know, I have never actually needed a torture chamber before. Got this one made up 'specially for you. Would you believe that this used to be just an old smugglers' compartment off the hold? It's turned out pretty great I think." "It's a marvel," Ben had said, dryly, as he eyed the durasteel walls, stiff new manacles, cold metal drain. "Your decorator is to be commended."'
He remembers all that, but he doesn't say anything.
"Excellent!" says the man. He sounds pleased. "That was exactly how it happened. This is going extremely well."
"That was a very clear reading," The second voice agrees. "Better even than the other trials, I think. But don't get too confident just yet. That result may have just been beginner's luck."
Ben is confused, suddenly uneasy. What are they talking about? He cracks open his dry lips and his voice is raspy.
"What are you doing?" He asks.
"Quiet." The man snaps, instantly. "You had your chance to talk. Concentrate."
"On what?" Ben asks, but the man cuts him off.
"How old are you?"
Why would anyone want to ask that? His basic records are in the public domain. But even as he thinks this, the thing on his head pulses and memories are swirling up in his mind, and he suddenly remembers when he had been in the Medullia System investigating reports of a dangerous and highly illegal biological weapons laboratory. They had needed to get access to a secure area of the space station, so he had applied as much charm as he could muster along with a generous pinch of Force suggestion and two minutes later the lead research chemist had handed her key card over with a flutter of lashes. He had thanked her and walked back into the corridor where Ahsoka was waiting. She was pulling a face. "Something to say, Ahsoka?" he'd asked her, mildly. "Don't you think you were laying that on a bit thick?" she said. "It worked, didn't it?" he responded, looking for the exit. "I'm not saying it wasn't effective, Master," Ahsoka said, falling in step behind. "But no-one wants to watch old people flirting. It's gross." He had sputtered, indignantly. "I was not flirting! I was getting us a way in to the lab. And less of the 'old,' if you don't mind. I'm 36, I'm not dead."
Ben gasps and is suddenly back in the present, in the cold hard chair with his wrists trapped and his eyes bound. But the memory is not over; he can hear the echoes of his own voice off the metal walls fading away to whispers.
"I'm not dead...I'm not dead..."
There was another strange sound and it takes some time for him to recognise it as laughter. The man with the blue eyes is laughing.
"Oh, I like her!" The voice says. "This 'Ahsoka'. She's...hmm, what's that word? Feisty."
Ben despises the sound of that voice speaking her name. It is abhorrent. But there are bigger things to worry about right now. They can read his thoughts. Somehow, his own memories are being dragged up and displayed for these men to witness and he is powerless to stop it. If they ask the right questions, he'll unwillingly tell them anything. Everything.
"One more easy one," says the second voice, across the room. "Just to make certain the pattern is fully locked in. Then we can begin properly."
"All right," says the blue-eyed man. "Now, I want you to tell me ...who is the Grand Master of the Jedi Order?"
But Ben has not been idle in those few seconds since the memory faded, and he is prepared. As the blue-eyed man states his question and the device on the back of his head begins to hum against his skull, he slams up the solid walls of his defences around his mind. The rising memories are trapped inside a stone casing and he fills the space with white noise, lets his thoughts go long and empty, thinks of nothing, remembers nothing. It's kind of like meditation and it would be easier if he had any access to the Force greater than the thin, secret trickle getting through the inhibitor that he has been keeping held close in his chest like a fluttering bird or a palmful of water. But it is still working. It's enough. They'll see nothing but static. He can do this.
Then there is a sharp crack, and pain lances through his hand. The blue-eyed man has leaned over, grasped a finger on Ben's left hand and casually snapped the bone. Ben's concentration shatters and, with a gasp, the memory rises up and consumes him.
He is standing in Chancellor Palpatine's office, between Mace and Yoda. The chancellor is smiling his politician's smile under his hawk-like eyes. "Grand Master Yoda," he says, standing. "I'm delighted to see you. Thank you for coming at such short notice". "Come to serve, we did," says Yoda. "Just tell us how we can help." Ben says.
He opens his eyes, and hears again the echo of his own voice on metal.
"Help...help..."
"See?" the man says. "If you co-operate, this will go quite smoothly." He suddenly moves and Ben hears his voice by his ear, feels a gentle pressure squeezing around the snapped finger joint. "Don't do that again. Defy me and I will break every bone in your body. Understood? Now, show me what you know about all the Jedi commanding active campaigns in the outer rim."
He woke with a gasp, breath frozen in his throat, heart hammering against his ribs.
"Ben?" Shaarm's voice was a whisper in the dark. "What's wrong?"
"I-" Ben said, and didn't know where to start. "I remember..."
His voice caught, dry and tight. He had the sudden need to move, to shake off the clinging horror of the dream. He had to write it all down before the memory drifted away again. There had been names.
Ben tumbled out of the bunk, almost forgetting in his haste about the steep drop, and clambered inelegantly down the crates to the floor.
"Ben!" someone hissed down from above but he didn't pause, stumbling out of the compartment and back up the train. He wasn't sure where he was going, other than that he had the urgent need to move. His legs suddenly gave out while he was in the corridor between the caprius pens. He dropped where he stopped and ducked his head down to his knees, listening to the snuffling of the caprius in the pens around. The animals within were sleeping, their simple thoughts untouched by sense of distress or fear, dreaming only of fresh grass and clear skies.
Shaarm and Pakat found him not five minutes later as he sat with his back up against a metal strut, trying to force his shaking hands to write. Pakat leaned forward and easily plucked the flimsi and pencil out of fingers that trembled with phantom pain now long gone. The Kheelian lay down on his front with the flimsi under his hands, holding the pencil ready. "I will write," he said, simply. Shaarm settled down on the floor across the corridor from Ben and said;
"Tell us."
Ben breathed out slowly. The swirl of images and emotions threatened to drown him but the whirlpool was merely the rush of water down a drain and, if he didn't work to save them, the memories would swiftly be washed away forever. One single memory rose to the surface, and he grasped it like it would save him from drowning.
"I am 36 years old," he said.
Pakat wrote and Shaarm nodded, but neither spoke. They knew how significant that statement was. It was only one tiny fact, but it was, perhaps, the first thing Ben had remembered about himself as an individual that was not derived from guesswork and supposition. He knew his age.
Ben continued, haltingly. "There was a...device. I was blindfolded, I think. There were two different men in a room. I wouldn't answer the questions they asked me, but that didn't matter. Any thought that I had they could watch. Like a damned holovid. I tried to resist but..."
Ben flexed his fingers, feeling the grate of bone beneath the skin. Defy me, and I will break every bone in your body. He shivered and closed his eyes. What had he remembered? What had he seen? It was already starting to slip away.
"There was a girl. Older than Ooouli. She mattered to me, a great deal."
"Your daughter?" Shaarm asked.
He shook his head. "No, she was not human. Not as different as a Kheelian; she ...her head was... I can't remember clearly. Not a Twi'lek."
"Take your time," Shaarm said. "What did she look like?"
"I can't recall. Her name was-" Ben paused. "Her name..." But it was gone. The more he had tried to grasp it, the more the knowledge had dissipated from his head, like clutching at a vapour. It was as if his mind was rejecting the memories, draining them from his brain like pus from an abscess.
"I don't remember who we are speaking about," he confessed.
"You were telling us about a girl," Shaarm prompted but Ben shook his head. He couldn't recall any more.
"I went," he said and halted. "Somewhere. There were two people with me. Powerful. We-"
"Jedi?" Shaarm asked.
Ben shrugged, helplessly. He remembered remembering their names. But now the dream, and the memories within it, were gone.
No-one slept much for the rest of the night and dawn wasn't far off. Ben himself gave up on sleep again after a few restless hours and tried to meditate once more. Despite the attempt, he recalled nothing further from his nightmare. Wearily, he got up. Shaarm and Pakat were still asleep although some of the other Kheelians in their compartment had gone, perhaps to find food. Two of the berths were cleared out and the luggage stacked below was missing so some of their travelling companions were probably leaving the train.
Ben headed through the sleeping compartments to the 'freshers, noting that the gentle motion of the train had ceased once more. They must have arrived at the next major stopping point; a town, he remembered from Shaarm's map, known as Zabora. This was the last settlement on this side of the uninhabitable plains which stretched for over 400 lengths ahead between them and the City. If the effects of the predicted geomagnetic storm didn't reach them, they would arrive at the City that same day.
The human found himself in need of some fresh air, so he made his way to the vestibule at the end of the carriage and leaned against the open train door, cup of tea clutched in one hand, watching the quiet hum of activity taking place around train. Zabora was barely visible in the early dawn light, though Ben could see, under low sodium lights, a set of additional sidings parallel to the main line. The line here was slightly curved, and if he looked towards the rear of the train he could see flickering lights and figures around the far end where another carriage was being connected up to the train. He looked in the other direction, but even if he leaned out of the door, the train was so long he could only see the nearest five carriages; the rest of the cars and the engine beyond were lost to distance and darkness.
After another half turn, the doors along the carriages slid closed and the train grumbled into motion. Ben returned to his usual place in the lounge; though the datapad with its treatise on narms that Pakat had loaned him remained switched off on the table. It was time to start coming up with a plan. If they were going to reach the city today he needed a stratagem. He wanted to find out about his past and he didn't know how long that was going to take. A long time, probably, with the few clues he had to go on. Even longer if he was trying to stay hidden while he looked – he didn't believe his pursuers wouldn't catch up with him eventually. He just hoped he would have time to find out who he was first. In the meantime he was going to need a job, somewhere to live. He couldn't expect Shaarm to support him forever, and sooner or later the Kheelians would need to return to their family.
As he thought and planned, the dawn came and went. As the turns passed, more Kheelians wandered into the lounge for breakfast and to look at the passing landscape out of the windows. Ben had been compiling a list of his skills – if he was going to find work, he needed to know what he was capable of. It was a depressingly short list.
He wasn't sure afterwards what made him look up. The sound of the door opening, perhaps. Maybe he was looking for Shaarm and Pakat arriving from the sleeping compartment. But it wasn't them.
A Jedi stood at the end of the carriage.
Long brown robes, the colour of wet peat, and face hidden within a deep shadowed hood.
Ben had been found.
Ben took the sight in at a glance. Calmly, he slid he datapad into his satchel and picked up his empty tea cup. He stood, just as a group of Kheelians wandered through the carriage, heading to the canteen. He stepped in front, walking slowly, unhurriedly, as if he was heading to dispose of his cup into the waste chute, all the while keeping the quadrupeds between him and the Jedi.
With the suppression bracelet half closed on his wrist, the Force was like cold mud in his mind, dull and muted. The Jedi could not sense him. He could still get away. Just another slow, sleepy figure moving through the train. He kept his head down, and kept moving, heading for the door to the rear of the compartment towards the Pechnar area, walk slow, act natural-
"Ben. Ben Waken."
Ben froze. Every single muscle went taught as bow string. He couldn't run, he couldn't hide, he couldn't even breathe. That voice. That voice. The Kheelians flowed around his stationary form and off to the canteen, but he couldn't move. His hand was centimetres from the door. The limb dropped of its own accord. Slowly, dazedly, he straightened, every muscle fighting. Slowly, slowly, he turned around.
The Jedi stood in the centre of the carriage. Even as he watched, a second stepped through the far door behind him, then a third. Then a fourth. Four figures, shrouded in brown cloaks and deep hoods. Watching. Waiting.
He was in rather a lot of trouble.
The Jedi at the front stepped forward, hands a little raised. "That's what you've been calling yourself, right? Ben?"
Ben stayed silent for a moment, just calming his racing heart. One of the couple of Kheelians sitting at a table by the window looked over at them with interest.
Ben swallowed and kept the fear from his face. "Might I know who is asking?"
"It's all right," the man at the front of the group replied. "You're all right, you're safe now." The man pushed back his hood and Ben saw his face properly for the first time. He was a human certainly, and tall, taller than Ben. Light brown hair and blue, blue eyes. He was...familiar.
Ben took an unconscious step back, trying to keep all four of the Jedi in sight, trying to keep the door at his back, but trying not to make it look like he was trying. There were eight Kheelians in the train compartment. One was reading, and the others were now watching the show curiously. These Jedi wouldn't attack him while there were so many onlookers, surely. But even as Ben watched, the female at the back of the group slid open the compartment door behind her and stepped aside. She held out a small translation module.
"Everyone leave," the device intoned in loud, accented Kheeli. "Jedi business."
It took a moment for the orders to sink in, but the Kheelians, with their faces a mix between curiosity and awe at the word Jedi, slowly rose and shuffled out of the lounge back towards the sleeping compartments. They threw more than one puzzled glance at Ben too, but no-one spoke. The door closed with a smooth whir, and he was alone. Alone with the Jedi.
There was a moment's silence before Ben said. "Who are you?"
"We're Jedi Knights," the man at the front of the group answered, slowing moving forwards. "I'm your friend, so there's no need to be afraid. You can stop running."
"I am fairly sure I don't know you," Ben said, although that was a lie. That voice was burned into his soul. "Perhaps you have the wrong person."
"My name is Anakin Skywalker. I know you don't remember right now, but we're friends. We are here to take you home."
"Home?" said Ben, both playing for time, and because he couldn't help himself; he yearned for this, these scraps of truth, of connection to his old life like water in a desert.
"That's right," the man, Skywalker, nodded. "You live on Coruscant. The Jedi Temple. You remember?"
Ben glanced about him. "I...no. I don't remember. What happened to me?"
"There was an accident." Skywalker said. "You got hurt...a head injury. But we can fix it, as soon as you come with us. You'll get your memories back."
"How do I know I can trust you?" Ben asked, but even as he said the words he already knew that this man was no stranger. He felt as if those compelling blue eyes were looking straight through him, as if they knew every single thing about Ben; as if every confidence, every secret had been stretched out and flayed open before that crystal gaze.
"Well, we have been searching for you for almost a month," the Jedi said, and his face twisted into a wide smile.
"So, you are persistent." Ben acknowledged. "But that proves nothing."
It was only because Ben was watching so carefully that he saw it. The moment Skywalker's eyes darted to Ben's wrist, catching sight of the suppression bracelet just showing beneath Ben's sleeve.
Ben hesitated a second, and then asked; "Was that you I saw? In Tszaaf, outside the surgery?"
Skywalker nodded. "We almost got to you several times, but your new friends are extremely loyal. Here," Skywalker continued. "Will this do for proof? Would anyone other than a Jedi have this?"
He opened his hand. Lying across the palm was a metal cylinder. Chrome alloy, stripped-back bronze and a black ridged handgrip.
A lightsaber.
Ben stared, astonished and curious and afraid. But of course these Jedi would have lightsabers too. What he hadn't been expecting, though, was how different each 'saber was. The weapon Skywalker held out was a longer in the handle than the one currently hidden in Ben's satchel. He could see it was narrower in the grip and would be lighter too, as if made to fit a slightly smaller hand and stature. And despite the stark, almost skeletal, appearance of that exposed emitter matrix, it was sturdier, well-balanced. Less sleek, less showy than the one from the wreck. He knew that it had a blue blade and a single Adegan crystal. That would make it less powerful than the multicrystal structure of the 'saber Ben was carrying, but that was a price worth paying for an integrity and reliability and strength that would never overheat, never fracture, never fail. He knew all this. And there was something else he knew.
"No." Ben said.
Skywalker looked, for a second, taken aback. "I'm sorry? 'No' what?"
"No," Ben repeated. "You are not Jedi."
The man closed his hand over the 'saber. Then he straightened his back, tilted his head. And, as he looked at Ben, he smiled.
It was not pleasant.
"Now, why would you go and say a thing like that?" Skywalker said.
Ben grasped the suppression band on his right wrist and, in one smooth motion, he tore it free. The Force thundered into him, and with it, certainty. He felt nothing from the four people in the carriage; no rising maelstrom, no rushing storm of Force presence. Just the low hum of a living creature. This Skywalker was not the Jedi he had encountered in Tszaaf. In fact, he was not a force-user at all.
Without wasting a moment more, Ben grabbed for the Force, gathered it in close, and then pushed as hard as he dared, slamming a wave of Force energy into the group. They went flying back but he didn't wait to see the result of his actions. He turned and sprinted through the door at his back, slamming it shut behind him.
Ben ran for his life.
TBC.
AN: Thank you everyone who comments, favs, follows, or just reads and enjoys. I love hearing from you so let me know if you have any questions or comments and I'll try and get back to you as long as its not part of a later reveal! Stay safe out there.