The sun was coming up over the Fountain Palace on Hapes, and from the landing platform it could be seen as a bright gold light low in the sky that cast vivid highlights on the white cloud-wisps overhead. It was, frankly, a beautiful sight that should have brought feelings of calm and renewal, all the more because it was the first natural light of any kind Tahiri had seen in weeks.

Instead she stared at the new day's sky and felt nothing. A Hapan shuttle sat on the dock before her, its crew making final checks as they milled around its lowered landing ramp. She would have to join them soon; though the Queen had officially absolved Tahiri of any crimes against the Consortium, it was also clear that she was not welcome on Hapes, and the shuttle was going to take her to Junction Station, a trading post that Tenel Ka had ordered constructed on the edge of the Transitory Mists. Ships from the outside were rarely allowed on Hapes or any of the other sixty-three worlds in the Consortium, but they could come and go freely on Junction. It had been Tenel Ka's attempt to open her dominion to outside trade while still retaining the privacy that Hapans had cherished for centuries.

That was all fine with Tahiri. She didn't want to spend any more time on Hapes than she already had. Still, she couldn't look at her passage off this planet, or the beautiful sunrise, and muster any feeling at all. Her guards would cast her loose on Junction and leave her to fend for herself, and she still had no idea where she would go. The Alliance wouldn't want her, and she couldn't bring herself to beg the Jedi for forgiveness she didn't deserve. The Imperial Remnant was clearly out of the question and wherever the wandering planet Zonama Sekot had gone since she'd left almost seven years ago, there was no way the Jedi or Alliance Intelligence would trust her with its location, even though she found she wanted to go there most of all.

Well, she thought, there was always Tatooine. It would almost be poetic to end things where she started.

Ben hadn't come to talk her her since that one time in her cell. Neither had Master Skywalker or any of the Solos. She was frankly glad of that; facing them would be hard and she only wanted to slip away on Junction station and try her best to become anonymous, as hard as that might be.

She picked up her lightly-packed bags and began walking toward the shuttle. Two Hapan guards stood at the base of the landing ramp, watching her with blank expressions, though she could pick up their disdain through the Force, the same disdain she'd been feeling from everyone since her capture.

Yet even as she felt that, something else touched her awareness. She stopped a good ten meters away from the shuttle and turned around. Walking onto the landing ramp was a small woman with long dark hair blowing in the breeze. Despite her short legs she walked at a fast, determined pace. Part of Tahiri wanted to run to the shuttle and never look back, but the rest of her stayed where she was, legs planted, unable to move as Jaina Solo walked up to her.

Jaina stopped a meter away, out of arm's reach. Jaina stared at her and she stared at Jaina and it seemed like neither of them could muster anything to say.

Finally, Jaina reached down to her belt. Tahiri hadn't even noticed, but she had two lightsabers hooked there. One was the weapon Jaina had constructed on Yavin 4 all those years ago. The other was the one Tahiri had surrendered to Ben Skywalker on Uroro Station.

Jaina took the lightsaber off her belt and handed it to Tahiri, pommel-first. The blond woman stared at it.

"Are you sure you want me to have this?" she asked.

"Do you want it?" Jaina asked evenly.

"I'm not sure." Tahiri didn't raise her hand.

"It will be safer."

"I know. There's going to be a lot of people who mean me harm, and not just the Imperials. Not that I blame them."

"Tahiri, I think you should take it. If I didn't, I wouldn't be here right now."

"I'm no Jedi."

"You're not a Sith either."

"You never were. What he made you do was-"

"Stop." She reached out and grabbed the lightsaber. She had to admit it felt good in her hand. "I did what I did. I'm sick of being somebody else's victim."

She hooked her weapon onto her belt, then looked at the one still on Jaina's. She had to know, so she asked in a weak voice, "Is that what you used? Is that what you… killed him with?"

Jaina nodded. Tahiri was amazed Jaina still carried it around. Maybe she wanted to keep it around, to carry it burden, as a way of punishing herself.

But that was speculation. Tahiri got nothing from Jaina in the Force; she dared look into the woman's brown eyes and found them unreadable too.

"There's something else," Jaina said coolly. "A question."

"Go ahead. Ask."

"Jag's been interrogating some of the Imperials responsible for the nanovirus attack on Tenel Ka." She paused. "You know Jag's in charge of the Imperial Remnant now, right?"

"I heard." She'd also heard about the Imperial attack on Dragon Queen and the death of Tenel Ka's daughter. Since Tenel Ka had told her she hadn't been able to shake the guilt.

"Anyway," Jaina continued, "One of the Moffs told him that… that Caedus was also looking into a bioweapon designed by the Yuuzhan Vong to target Force-users. I wanted to know if that sounded familiar."

Tahiri frowned. She had to admit it was something Caedus could have done. He'd increasingly come to see the Jedi as his prime enemies, and he'd never have qualms about wiping them out. He also knew more about the Yuuzhan Vong than most humans in the galaxy- though not as much as Tahiri, and that didn't sound familiar to her either.

"I never heard of him looking for a Yuuzhan Vong bioweapon," she said, hugging herself tightly, "Though I definitely wouldn't past them to make one, or him to use it."

"You're sure? Nothing he said indicated he might be working on one with Imperial scientists? Try to remember."

She decided Jaina was doubting her memory and not her intentions, and with reluctance she dipped her mind back to those awful final days before Caedus' death. He'd become increasingly deranged, like a mad animal almost, obsessed with killing Luke Skywalker even when it was clear that Jaina was the one hunting him.

Tahiri shuddered and shook her head. "I'm sorry, but no, I don't remember anything about Yuuzhan Vong bioweapons."

"What about Vong- sorry, Yuuzhan Vong- biotech in general? I heard he had some installed on his star destroyer and used it to torture Ben."

"He did," Tahiri nodded gravely. "I'm not sure where he got it from, though. He… He took me to Myrkr a few times, but everything there was dead."

"Myrkr?" Jaina tensed at the planet's name.

"Like I said, he could have gotten it from plenty of other Vongformed worlds." She saw a question in Jaina's eyes, took a deep breath, and said, "We went back to Myrkr a few times, to the worldship, Baanu Rass. It's breaking apart now, and it's all open to the vacuum, which is why I don't think he picked up any live biotech from there. But when we went back he… Let me see Anakin. With his flow-walking. I didn't believe it would work at first, but it was so real..." She looked down, afraid to see Jaina's face. "I thought it was real, that I was really seeing the real Anakin, touching him, talking to him, just like I used to. Like we used to."

"It was an illusion," Jaina said, softly, without reproach. "He was using it against you."

"I know. But I wanted to believe him, so badly." She hugged herself tighter. "Jaina… It could be so easy sometimes. Scarily easy. To get what I wanted I just had to do what he wanted me to… So I did what I did, to Pellaeon, to Shevu..."

Jaina didn't dare speak. Tahiri knew she was coming off as a victim again, weak and pathetic, but she'd never confessed this to anyone before and if she was going to say it to someone who else could it be but Jaina?

She squeezed her eyes shut. "The nanovirus. I knew Caedus was working with the Moffs to make it. It was supposed to be used against Boba Feet. I had no idea they'd use it against Tenel Ka and her child. You have to believe that, Jaina. I didn't want to hurt them."

"I know. Neither did Jacen."

"That's why he killed Isolder. He killed him and took his body off to be incinerated because he thought it would keep the Moffs from making a nanovirus from his DNA. I don't know what he did in the end, but he was trying to protect Tenel Ka and her daughter then."

"That is what he did in the end. Protect them." Jaina said, and for the first time Tahiri heard the deep, deep sadness in her voice.

"He didn't though," Tahiri sniffed. "Tenel Ka's daughter, Allana, she..."

Jaina took two steps forward and squeezed Tahiri's shoulder. "No. Allana's alive."

Tahiri blinked wetness from her eyes and met Jaina's. "What do you mean alive? They held a funeral for her, they-"

"Everyone needs to think she's dead. It's for her own safety. She's with my parents now. They're calling her Amelia and saying they adopted her as a war orphan."

"But… why? How? How did she survive?"

"I told you. It was Jacen." A few tears finally appeared in Jaina's hard eyes. "He sent a warning in the Force. Right before I killed him."

Tahiri's jaw dropped. Jaina went on, "He stopped fighting me, let me drive my saber through his chest, so he could warn Tenel Ka and Allana. That's why I think… I think he was Jacen again, just for a moment, when he died."

"He died for them?" Tahiri gasped. "But…. Why? I knew he and Tenel Ka were close once, but-"

"Allana is his daughter," Jaina said, voice breaking. It was all she needed to say. Implications rolled around in Tahiri's head and so many things finally clicked into place. The awful shape of what Caedus had done, what Jacen had allowed himself to become, became a little bit clearer.

"You don't have to feel guilty about Allana," Jaina said firmly. "She's okay now. And my parents… I think they need her even more than she needs them right now."

Tahiri sniffed and wiped her eyes clear. "Thank you, Jaina. I promise I won't tell anyone about that, but… Thank you for trusting me."

"I thought you needed to know," Jaina said, with just the hint of a wistful smile. "Where will you go now?"

"I don't know. They're sending me to Junction Station, and from there I'm on my own." She paused, then added, "You already know I'm not going back to the Jedi."

Jaina nodded, without word or judgment.

"I'll see who I can get a ride with at Junction. I think I still have some credits in my accounts, so I can probably pay someone. Assuming they're willing to transport me." The question had been niggling in the back of her mind for the past few minutes, so she had to ask, "Who's investigating that Vong bioweapon?"

"Uncle Luke is sending out people. So's Jag and so's Tenel Ka."

"What about the Alliance?"

"To be honest, I think Uncle Luke's afraid Daala might want that weapon for herself. So we're keeping this as quiet as possible."

"Thank you for trusting me."

"Well, you'd be the person to ask, for a lot of reasons."

She was also the person who stood the best chance of doing something about the bioweapon for those very same reasons. Jaina didn't come out and say it, but Tahiri was sure she was thinking the same thing.

"Listen," Tahiri said at last, "If I hear anything about the bioweapon, or if I think of anything new… Who should I contact?"

With a slight, tired smile, Jaina took a small datacard out of her pocket. "That has my encrypted comm freq on it, plus the info we have on this bioweapon, which isn't much."

Tahiri wrapped her palm around it. "Thank you for this, Jaina. Thank you so much."

"Not a problem." Her expression relaxed, finally, into that slanted smile that was the Solo family trademark. "Take care of yourself, Tahiri. Promise me I'll see you again."

"I promise."

For a moment it felt like Jaina wanted to step forward, bridge the gap, and given Tahiri an embrace. But she held back, hesitated, then turned away wordlessly. Tahiri picked up her bags and started walking to the shuttle and its impatient guards with new purpose in her step.

Jaina hadn't changed everything. What happened to her now- the choices she made, the risks she took- all of it would be done by herself, with no one's influence.

From here on out, Tahiri was on her own.