Ves held Ben's hand as they walked the corridors of the Omen, the ancient Sith dreadnaught that brought all of the ancestors of the Lost Tribe of the Sith's human members to Kesh, in the planet's vast Temple. Ves and Ben's walk was slow and plodding, but the former knew that it had to be that way for the latter as he unconsciously soaked in the dark side energies that permeated both the ship and Temple.
And that was all the while he was still high on his most recent dose of the acid-marijuana combination that Ves gave him.
"This place has a great history to us, Ben," Ves said during a trip down one corridor. "What had stranded our ancestors, what had robbed them of the opportunity to carry out their mission for Naga Sadow, turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Kesh had become their home, and it has been ours for thousands of years."
She stopped them both in their tracks and turned Ben toward her by his shoulders. "Can you feel it yet, Ben? Can you feel the history around us? The Lost Tribe's birthright? It was our destiny to make this our home, as the Force willed it, even if our ancestors didn't believe it, or know it, at first.
"This can be yours, too, Ben, if you join me, if you join us. The dark side is not the poison that you have been led to believe; you've been around us for quite some time now. You know that we're good people who only want what's best for the galaxy, just as I want what's best for you."
Ben's eyes appeared to be glazed over by the haze of the combo he was on. But there was a glimmer in those eyes that Ves took to be at least a child-like understanding of his surroundings and circumstances, and a passive acceptance of what was happening.
Ves saw no resistance in him at all.
"I want this, Ves," he said. "I want to be with you. I want to be with the Lost Tribe. There is no... true darkness here. This... is a beautiful... place. Like you. You're everything I could ever want; and if your people can... give me that, then... I will join."
Ves smiled. "Good. Good." She stroked one side of his face. "But we need to give you more time, Ben. Don't worry, though; you will be part of the Lost Tribe sooner than you think." Her hand moved down his face and ran across his tunic until it finally reached his belt.
With that understanding between them, they moved to the nearest bedchamber in the dreadnaught.
Then, for the next hour, the two of them committed an act that would not be considered sacred within the confines of Kesh's Sith Temple. However, they did clean up after themselves and left virtually no physical evidence of their indiscretion in the bedchamber before they left.
However, little did either of them know that their most recent bout of intercourse would produce more evidence than either of them would have wanted.
. . .
When Jedi Master Kyp Durron entered the police station, he was guided to the room where Grand Master Luke Skywalker and Jedi Knight Jacen Solo were being held by two police officers.
"How'd you manage to contain them?" Kyp asked his escorts.
"We have a few Force cages," one of the cops explained. "They had been lying dormant with us for a few decades after they were last used to imprison some Jedi who violated our laws here. You were lucky that they still had any power in them after so much time in disuse."
"There were Jedi who violated laws here?" Kyp asked. "Are you sure they weren't Sith or... you know what, never mind, I don't wanna know right now. Just show me."
Soon, they reached the specialized room that had contained the police station's Force cages.
"Kyp!" Luke cried from inside the cage that kept him from being able to use any of his abilities. He sat on the floor of the cage with a bacta patch wrapped around the wound that Jacen had told Kyp about and a bloodied nose. "You have to help me! Kill Jacen! He's not who he says he is! He's Darth Caedus! He's Caedus!"
"But... Master Skywalker," Kyp said carefully, "Caedus is dead. He was Jacen's clone, remember? It was proven by-"
"The tests were lies, Kyp! They were all lies! Let me out of here! Let me kill him! Let me kill Jacen! Mara! Ben! Oh, why?! Come back to me! Help!"
As Luke continued to rant and rave from inside his cage, Kyp looked at Jacen, who returned his stare with one of concern and sadness from his own confinement.
"I wanna talk to your captain," he said to the cops.
"This way, then, sir," the officer who explained the Force cages said with a wave back to where they came from.
A few minutes later, Kyp met with the police captain, who reluctantly agreed to allow Jacen out of his cell after being told that he was the father of the Queen Mother herself.
Once Jacen was out of his cell, Kyp crossed his arms across his chest before he spoke to the Knight.
"Okay, I'm gonna need more details than what you gave me in our last holocomm, Jacen," Kyp said as he rubbed the bridge of his nose in concern and frustration. "Tell me everything that happened."
After Jacen elucidated everything that occurred between his and Luke's arrival on Kavan to the end of their brief fight, he went on to explain, "Then the police showed up and I told them everything, including why I had to take off from the spaceport without proper clearance. Once I told them about Uncle Luke's derangement, they wasted no time in bringing us here and putting us both in our cages. Of course, they, thankfully, allowed me a holocomm call with you, and they told me that the Jade Shadow's been impounded "
"Well, now that I'm here," Kyp said, "do you think we should visit the site of where Master Skywalker fell for this trap?"
"If we're gonna do that, we need to be extra careful," Jacen said.
"Obviously," Kyp said. "And, hopefully, we'll be able to find some way to reverse what happened to your uncle. Until then, he remains in that cage."
"Agreed."
It didn't take long afterwards until Jacen and Kyp were allowed to leave the station after answering a few more questions for the cops. They then set off to where Luke and Jacen fought by taking a hovertaxi.
Once the two Jedi arrived, Jacen pointed to the sewer that Luke jumped out from. "There," he told Kyp.
The Jedi Master nodded and wordlessly waved at Jacen to lead the way.
But right as Jacen took a few steps forward, he stopped abruptly.
"What is it?" Kyp asked worriedly.
Jacen didn't answer; instead, in response to what he just felt through the Force, he looked up and off to the right.
He caught the faintest whir of movement from the window of an apartment.
"Master Durron," Jacen said, "do you sense any lifeforms in that apartment over there, particularly on that floor? Even a mouse of something?"
Kyp narrowed his eyes as he concentrated on the building that Jacen indicated. A moment later, he said with suspicion, "No. I don't."
"Neither do I," Jacen said. "At least not right now. But I think I saw something."
"Let's investigate then," Kyp said.
Without hesitation, the Jedi Master used a powerful Force-shove on the floor that Jacen previously pointed out to create a sizable hole for them to enter. The two Jedi then leaped up one at a time, with Kyp leading Jacen, and then they started to look around.
"Hold on," Jacen said with narrowed eyes. "I think I... Got it."
He then teleported out of that room and right in front of the door that led outside the apartment
And standing right in front of him was the same Sith who gave Luke the datapad that led him and Jacen here to Kavan; the dark sider had apparently been stopped dead in his tracks at Jacen's sudden appearance.
"Talk," Jacen simply said.
But instead of doing that, the Sith whipped out his lightsaber from his belt and activated it. Jacen, likewise, had his own up and active, and the two immediately began clashing as they stayed in place.
Half a minute into the duel, however, Kyp leaped down from the stairway from behind the Sith and had his own lightsaber active and ready.
The Sith, however, swiftly turned from Jacen so that he could properly face both the Master and the Knight as he parried away both of their attacks.
Yet it only took another half-minute before the Sith was promptly disarmed by a lightsaber strike from Kyp, who managed to slash his and Jacen's opponent's hilt. Jacen then punched the Sith right in the face with his free hand, downing him.
Jacen then brought the tip of his blade close to the Sith's face and repeated, "Talk."
The Sith allowed himself a moment to compose himself before he started to chuckle.
"Foolish Jedi," he growled. "Do you seriously hope to find a remedy for what happened to your precious Grand Master?" He chuckled again. "What he's just undergone is an irreversible process that's permanently affected his mind."
While Jacen looked instantly dismayed, Kyp appeared to be a bit more skeptical.
"Irreversible, huh?" the Jedi Master asked. "Well, tell us about it anyway; I'd like to know just how hopeless it is to bring him back from whatever you did to him."
"Oh, I did nothing," the Sith replied. "My Masters are the perpetrators of your Master's current mental state. They had performed a ceremony at the very place where his wife died; it conjured up the darkness that affected that very location and exacerbated it to prey on and exploit the negative feelings of Luke Skywalker."
"Only him?" Kyp asked.
"He was the husband of the one who died at the very coordinates I sent him to, was he not?" the Sith retorted. "The trap that was laid for my Masters was specialized for him and only him, and that was because of the deep connection that he had to his wife. If anyone else were to go where he went, it would be as if there were nothing there in the Force at all. So you won't be able to discover anything for yourselves down in that sewer."
"Mara Jade Skywalker was my aunt," Jacen pointed out with some hope in his tone. "I had a deep personal connection to her, too."
"But not as deep as your uncle's," the Sith countered. "What they had was something special, and that site's connection to her death, in turn, provided a metaphysical connection made specifically for Luke Skywalker. So, again, you won't be able to feel anything when you go where he went."
"We'll see about that," Kyp said. "You're coming with us."
Later, after Jacen and Kyp brought their quarry back to the police station and placed him in a Force cage well away from Luke, the Sith said to the Knight and Master over Luke's ravings, "You're wasting your time."
Neither Jacen nor Kyp listened; they left the Sith to smirk at Luke, who didn't seem to notice his presence given the perpetual feeling of rage toward Jacen that permeated his soul.
Once Jacen and Kyp returned to where they apprehended the Sith and finally went into the sewers, they walked to the location where Luke had fallen prey to the Sith Force trap and where Mara had died.
But neither Jedi felt anything at all.
"No, no, no, no," Jacen said with panic. He was now turning in circles, trying to find anything in the physical world or through his Force senses that could give him any clue as to how to help his uncle. "There's gotta be something here! Anything!"
"I'm trying to find it, too," Kyp said with a more calmed tone. Yet he also sounded slightly distressed by the lack of anything substantial that any of his senses could locate.
But after several minutes of futile searching, Jacen slunk down along one of the sewer's walls.
"We can't do anything, Kyp," he said with despair in his voice and tears in his eyes. "It really is irreversible."
"No, no, that's not true, Jacen," Kyp replied. "Even if we can't find anything here, maybe Tekli can do something on Shedu Maad or-"
"Kyp," Jacen interrupted sharply. "The Sith have broken him; I can feel it. He won't ever be the same man again."
"Jacen, you know how the Sith are," Kyp said as he knelt down toward the Knight. "Lies and deceit are part of their game, and so is sowing the seeds of despair and hopelessness. We can't let them win by giving into that hopelessness, so don't you start."
But Jacen didn't look convinced; he looked away from Kyp and began to sob quietly.
"Hey, hey, you're not a toddler anymore," Kyp said as he grabbed Jacen's chin. "Now's not the time to cry. And even if it really is hopeless to save your uncle, Jacen, there's still too much for you to do before you start wallowing in your pity. Ben is out there, in the Sith's clutches, and the more time that passes as they do whatever they're doing to him, the less likely it'll be before he can be saved, either. So get up and keep going.
"I'll take your uncle back to Shedu Maad You take that Sith with you and do whatever you can with him to find Ben. Don't you quit on me now, man; don't you quit on me now."
Kyp then released Jacen's jaw, stood up, and headed back the way he came.
Jacen finally stood up long after Kyp was gone. He wasted no more time before he headed back to the police station, not caring how badly he smelled.
When he got to the room with the Force cages, and saw that Luke was gone, no doubt having been taken by Kyp, he walked up the cage with the Sith in it and said, "You and I are going for a little trip."