Legacy
Book I
Chapter 10
"At least the storm has smothered the fire," Obi-Wan observed, peering upward through the roiling banks of smoke and swirling moisture.
Qui-Gon wrung his drenched sleeves out and hauled his companion to his feet. "Nothing broken?"
"My dignity, perhaps?" The younger Jedi grimaced expressively, sucking in a displeased breath. "My everything hurts…. I feel as though I've aged thirty five years in an instant."
"Ha," the subject of this barbed jest replied, gritting his own teeth as he straightened his spine. It was a mercy of the Force that they were in one piece, and a greater mercy that Ben To Li was innumerable parsecs away. "We'll compare bruises later." He gestured to the smoldering wreckage of the tanks, lying in a mangled graveyard of parts and slag a short distance down-stream.
They picked their way across the storm-swollen channel, sopping hoods hanging uselessly down their backs. The rain settled into a sullen drizzle, and the heavens quieted, leaving only the wind's lamentation and the rustling of foliage.
The assault machines were unrecognizable, but they located the charred remnants of one cockpit and painstakingly carved the cabin's hull open with their sabers. Qui-Gon pulled a limp, uniformed corpse from the wreckage, laying the blackened remains out upon the slick bank. "Human," he observed, in surprise.
It was a grisly spectacle; the man's last moment of sheerest terror hung in the Force, a diaphanous shroud.
"Paxellians don't enlist humans," Obi-Wan frowned, pity for the creature that had tried to kill them welling up despite his disgust. He glanced at the other tank's ruins, but its impact had been devastating, the entrails of the assault vehicle scattered like confetti at a festival parade. He exhaled, slowly.
Dawn was hours away. Niffrendi's two moons stared down in appalled silence, faces blanched and expressionless with horror.
"Kerrn will be looking for us," Obi-Wan said, dully.
The cliffside was tinged by reflected silver. Above, the treeline etched a ragged rampart against the purpled sky. "Not until morning. Let's find shelter."
Ever pragmatic, Qui-Gon swiftly located a dry patch beneath the roots of a dead tree, a place where seasonal erosion had carved out a wide recess lined with fallen leaves. Soon enough the mulch was gathered in a pile and set alight, and most the Jedi's rain-soaked garments laid out within its close circle of warmth.
"Why," Obi-Wan affably groused, "can we not on occasion have these spectacular accidents more in the horizontal dimension?"
The tall man stretched, the fire's heat prickling pleasantly against chilled skin. He rolled aching shoulders, and tipped his head back against the crumbling earthen curve behind them. "We could try pod-racing on Malastare," he suggested, academically.
"Well, that at least involves a vehicle. This crash-landing-without-even-a-blasted-ship business is for droids."
"There is always the Mandalorian jetpack to consider," Qui-Gon slyly observed. "We've not explored all the possibilities yet."
"Never mind," his companion snorted. "I'll stick with traditional sky-jumping. I learned young, after all."
"Is that an expression of gratitude, at long last?" Qui-Gon queried, humor deepening the creases about his eyes. "It's been six and a half standard since your first informal lesson… and I must say your technique has improved tremendously."
The younger man pretended to harbor a grudge, but his pretense melted like candle wax in the warmth of their homely shelter. His eyes slid sideways, evasive. "I can fall with the best of them," he muttered. "Thanks to expert tutelage."
"You are welcome… it was my honor."
Obi-Wan chafed hands against his bare arms, and rubbed gingerly at one or two spreading bruises. "This is still completely uncivilized," he grumbled, flicking a piece of clinging dirt off his navel. "I'm filing a petition with the Council."
"You would prefer to be stationed as permanent consul on, say…. Chandrila?"
The young Knight blanched. "Ah… no." He waved a hand at their filthy hovel. "I'm charmed. Enchanted. Let's do this again sometime."
"If the Force so wills," Qui-Gon placidly responded, settling in comfortably for a long wait.
Daybreak was still an hour away when he woke, every muscle cramped and sore in the aftermath of their precipitous descent earlier, time and the cold conspiring to make the effects more vibrantly present after the fact.. Qui-Gon reflected that he too may as well have aged thirty five years in an instant – and he didn't have the decades to spare.
"Hells' moons," he grumbled, shifting uncomfortably and rubbing at a crick in his neck. The fire was reduced to embers; he breathed life back into its heart and stacked more tinder upon the wavering flame thus engendered. Ironically, Obi-Wan slept on undisturbed, despite his vocal protestations against the uncivilized venue; curled on his less-bruised side, he slumbered peacefully beside the guttering tongues of flame, flickering veils of gold and ochre picking out the planes of his face, the dip of bone and muscle on shoulder and torso, the pale highlights in his too-long hair, the glint of chestnut scruff along his jaw – and just visible beneath one bent arm, the tiny, pale scar running from collarbone to belly, the indelible brand of a difficult path to the present moment: Xanatos, Syfo Dyas, Dooku, Melida-Daan – all these forever imprinted upon the young Jedi's flesh in a single calligraphic stroke of pain.
Or wisdom. One was the same as the other, according to the sages – at least, when purified in the Force's smelting furnace.
Much had changed, for the Force and the balance of all things, was forever in motion. In six months, the time since their reunion and Obi-Wan's Knighting, he had come to know his former student anew, to see hints of that soul he had always nurtured as potential greatness come now into seedling growth, its unfurling leaves as wonderful and unexpected as any new life bursting forth from unlikely germ. Opinion and insight bloomed freely, not tethered to the trellis of his own mind; brash enthusiasm had been transmuted, into a banked ferocity of spirit, one not easily provoked, nor easily cowed; the young man's heart, worn so preciously, vulnerably open upon the sleeve, was now encircled by a stalwart citadel of word and gesture, deflective wit and sarcasm. Behind those rarely breached walls, even he was seldom now allowed. Privacy had superceded guidance as the young Jedi's foremost need, and the older man strove to respect this – but with that subtle sundering of their worlds, there sometimes came a bittersweet and forbidden nostalgia.
The darkened, alien world was invisible beyond the luminous sphere of their refuge; here they were cocooned in a microcosm without distinct time or place, a bubble like the warped dimensions of hyperspace, in which he could easily imagine a braid still dangling behind his companion's ear, or a beloved voice chiding him to keep better watch over the last and dearest of his line.
"Tahl," he breathed, without acrimony or futile longing. In the soft radiance of this blessed cave, he could all but feel her presence, within the flame's leaping heart or ghosting lightly over their two faces. His eyes shifted to the pile of clothing and gear laid out to dry; among the equipment and boots, belts and tabards, sashes and tunics, he had earlier glimpsed a small azure stone upon which was engraved a delicate flower. The carving had caught his eye, stirring some unbidden pathos within him: the blossom was pierced by a slender flame, one surmounted by two stylized wings, the Order's most enduring symbolic glyph. The meaning of the mandrangea bloom was far more esoteric – and obviously personal. He had made no remark upon it, and would not in future, though the thing's very existence reminded him that the child he had raised from boy to man - uncertain padawan to promising Knight - had a guarded inner depth, an abyss plumbed perhaps only by the Force itself, or those rare few admitted to its most genuine depths of affection.
And with a melancholic pang, he wondered articulately for the first time whether he was truly counted among those few – or whether he in the ultimate reckoning could be. They were bound together by the sacred oath of teacher and learner, grafted into each other's destiny as one generation to the next… but there was more, more that he had always taken for granted while authority reigned supreme and undisputed between them. He discovered a seed of doubt where presumption had hitherto flourished unimpeded.
There was, after all, a profound difference between master and friend.
He was on the point of waking his companion, if only to break the unwelcome spell of introspection – when a subtle stirring in the universal energy called him back to the present moment without their humble sanctuary. He crept forward to the edge of the sheltering root-ball and peered into the inky night, sight and hearing coursing along invisible currents.
And there – hovering above the destroyed tanks, the oval gleam of yet another seeker droid. It burbled, spun in place, and then retreated in a southerly direction, hastening away with news of the assailants' demise.
"What was that?" Obi-Wan murmured, voice hoarse with interrupted sleep, but aura shimmering with wary alertness.
"A messenger," the Jedi master answered, settling back on his haunches. "That will raise uncomfortable questions."
The young Knight stretched, grating out some highly idiomatic Twi'Lek phrase and reaching for his begrimed clothing.
"It's nearly dawn – we may as well set out."
Within minutes, the tiny fire had been stamped out and its ashes strewn in a wide circle. The Jedi melted into the pale gloaming, into the forest's reverent hush.
They reached the high summit just after dawn, tunics and trousers stained and stiff, sporting a dozen new abrasions and sore spots apiece, and with hair lamentably tangled and matted – but miraculously alive, at least from Kerrn's point of view.
"I'll be vaped! Thought you two was lost or dead, for sure!" the Wanderer's leader exclaimed, beaming upon the battle-weary pair as they emerged into the campfire circle. just as breakfast was being dished out. "All hells broke loose here last night – raging forest fire.. musta've been lightnin'."
"There were two assault tanks headed for this position." Qui-Gon disabused him of his innocent notion in one fell swoop. "A raiding party, I would say. The Folk need to move to a more secure location.. perhaps the Wormholes?"
Kerrn's wrinkled face fell. "Raiders? Then… what happened to 'em?" he squinted suspiciously at the escaped gladiators, rheumy eyes glittering.
"There was an avalanche on the southern slopes," Obi-Wan supplied, helpfully. "The strom must have loosened a mudslide. And lightning struck a sequoo – the tanks were swept down into the river canyon."
"Well, I'll be double vaped. That 's a piece of luck. Glad you two squirreled yer ways out of it. Smart fellers, staying out of the line of fire like that."
Qui-Gon bowed, curtly. "All the same, your people are in danger. I suggest regrouping under the stones… there is sure to be a second wave, or at least a recon unit.."
Kerrn ran one gnarled hand over his whiskered chin. "All right," he mused, a calculating air about him. "We'll head down to the plains – gotta get this harvest to the traders afore the next ion storm hits. Urbs won't do nothing by way of business with us when the Scythe's a swingin."
He excused himself, striding away and barking orders at his ragtag band, pointing and gesticulating at the tarps covering the ionite haul.
"One of us will need to stay with them," Obi-Wan murmured, drawing the older Jedi a few paces away. "A second attack seems inevitable."
"I agree. You remain here while I investigate the situation in the capitol."
The young Knight planted his feet shoulders' width apart. "The trading arrangement seems less pressing than determining the origin of these attacks. We've still not looked into the relay station in the hills. It would be a short trip from here, if we took one of their grav-bikes up." He glanced at the Wanderers' small fleet of rusting vehicles. "We need to know who sent those probes.. and those tanks."
Qui-Gon crossed his arms, expression hardening. "You yourself said the Folk should not be left unprotected."
"You could stay with them."
This direct challenge to his authority – or at least, seniority - rankled. The tall man drew in a measured breath, clamping down upon his flare of annoyance. "I will be in the city, filling our mandate on this mission."
Now Obi-Wan bristled in his turn, flushing a little. "This is important, Qui-Gon. I feel it. Those tanks – those probes – something is amiss."
"There are Paxellian scouts within a hundred klicks," the Jedi master reminded him. "We don't have time to waste on disputes. I will escort the trading party, and investigate the local government's involvement with the Trade Federation. You stay here… and do as you see fit."
The concession was little more than an ultimatum. Abandon post if you will, but do not ask me to violate the dictate of intuition.
They stood locked in resentful opposition for another span of heartbeats, obstinacy and intuition locked in a stalemate of equal strengths. The Force churned uneasily, protesting the discordant overtones in its boundless harmony.
Qui-Gon outranked his former student; and this, in the end, settled the decision in his favor, though neither rested content with the outcome. Obi-Wan offered him a tight-lipped bow, yielding but not surrendering, and he in turn nodded once and stalked away to gently bully the smaller trading group into an early departure.
"I need to borrow a grav-bike."
The grizzled Wanderer in charge of the vehicles stared at him. "Kriff off, youngster – you're welcome round the fire but you don't run the show. Everyone here has a job – yers aint to do with these bikes."
Obi-Wan gritted his teeth and dropped the imperious manner. "Forgive me – I meant, I thought I saw ionite higher on the slope. When my friend and I first arrived.. I didn't realize at the time that it was of value."
This ploy proved more effective. "How long you think you'd be? Word is, we're moving out – back to the Holes."
"I'll meet you back there," the young Jedi promised, infusing his tone with what he hoped was earnest enthusiasm.
The man nodded, regarding him warily for along minute, and then rummaged in a pouch and produced the ignition cylinder for one of the modified swoops. "Don't wreck 'er – this is community property, not some gladiatin' ring prop job."
"I understand; thank you."
He swung one leg over the questionably functional conveyance and activated the repulsors, wobbling a bit at first as he felt for the machine's balance. The compensators were badly aligned, giving the bike a slight left-hand tilt, but that could not be helped. "I'll be as quick as I can," he promised, revving the bike uphill through the trees, relying on memory and instinct to guide him back to the coordinates he had gleaned from the first probe droid's motivator circuits.
Qui-Gon heard the swoop's drives whine into a fading high note on the cold air - and flipped his cloak hood over his face, long strides carrying him downhill and away on his own self-appointed task.
