"Not knowing sucks."

- From Men-at-arms aka Men-in-trouble by Jori

Aik spat out on the med bay's floor.

"Is kriff an indelicacy?" he asked.

Ben blankly nodded. "Yes."

Mandalorian man snarled. "Kriff."

Allana looked at him with her eyebrows lifted.

"Sorry, kid," Aik said insincerely.

Allana shrugged and turned back at Senator Norso, who had a hole in his left arm as big as a coin. She was applying some synthflesh and bacta patches to it.

Norso was biting his lips, trying to fight back the pain.

Ben looked at him. "I can find some anesthetics," he offered.

"No, thanks," Norso said weakly.

Allana smoothed out the last patch. "That's all I can do for you right now," she said and straightened herself.

Norso carefully touched the injured place. "Thank you, child."

Allana smiled a bit. "Don't mention it."

"Do you want my cabin to take a nap?" Ben asked.

"No, thanks," Norso said and stood up, hissing with pain.

Allana frowned and removed the cloth band that held her tunic, binding it as a sling for Norso's hand.

Her blue-green under-tunic drew apart, revealing the white jumpsuit beneath it.

Ben smiled. "Always prepared?"

She smiled as well. "For a fight? Of course. Jedi robes are heavy."

Norso breathed out deeply. "I guess we can discuss this now – what the kriff – sorry, kid – what, by the stars, happened?"

Ben threw a long look at him. "In short?"

"Yes."

"We don't know."

Norso sat back on the medbay's desk. "Oh."

Ben rubbed his face. "We know that we were attacked. We know that there was only one ship. We know that they didn't seem to want to pursue us."

Norso lay down. "So they were there because of the Sith?"

"We don't know."

"Do you think it was the Omniempire?" Aik asked.

Ben thought about it for a moment. "It's possible. But… why? They won't attack us just for the heck of it."

Allana shrugged. "Maybe they thought that the Sith were more allies that wanted to protect Gwallish. They wanted to scare them out."

"That's a good idea," Ben admitted. He dabbed his head twice on the wall behind him. "But also… I don't know. I have a bad feeling about it."

Allana took a seat on the desk next to Norso's legs. "What that means?"

"That I feel there's something more to that than we think that is."

"Something more to it?"

"Yes. It's… huger than we think. Or that's what my intuition tells me. What the Force tells me."

Allana's grey eyes confronted his blue. "Does that mean that you're staying?"

He sighed. He wasn't surprised Allana knew it. He couldn't expect Jaina not to tell her. "No. I still have to go. It's just… a warning. That things here may not be as simple as we thought."

"So no simple border conflict?" Aik asked.

"No simple border conflict." Ben shrugged. "I don't know where the issue is. But if I could just suggest something… I think you should send someone undercover down to Gwallish. I think it's going on there."

Allana nodded. "I'll propose it to Jaina."

Ben pulled off from the wall. "I'll go check on with the pilot."

His almost-niece gave him a short wave. "See you."

He left the room and passed the complicated system of narrow corridors and bigger circular areas so typical of Corellian ships.

He went on into the cockpit, not much different from the cockpit of the famous Millennium Falcon.

The pilot, a lithe man in white-and-gold armor was just joking with his co-pilot, the female Mandalorian that fled the Haven with Ben, who turned out to be the girl he met – and offended – in the hangar.

"- that they can't even see their own kad'e!" he was just saying.

The girl chuckled. "That's stupid. How could they possibly-"

"Am I interrupting?" Ben asked.

She turned to him. "No," she said, suddenly serious. "No, sir."

"Great." Ben sat into the navigator's chair. "Are we going to enter the hyperspace?"

"In a while, sir," the joker said.

"Great."

He used the navigator's console to access Fate's stern visual sensors. He found the one that now had clear view on Hespa and put its feed on the console display.

Here it was: grey, yellow and green moon with a build-up area that seemed like a rash on the face of the planet.

Here it was: a moon suffused with darkness.

It was like a slight feeling of doom, of destruction, emanating from the planet below them.

What was down there?