Chapter 18

Resting in the pilot's seat of the Starry Ice, Dankin gazed at the silky white fur of the stuffed whisperkit. On a whim he'd set the toy on the console before him, as though it could help guide him through space. He needed to return the stuffed animal to Benji, but for the moment he was enjoying the silent company of the creature.

[I have a question.]

Startled, Dankin looked up. H'sishi could move surprisingly quietly for a being of her size. [What pirates paint their ships black?]

"I don't know of any off-hand. Why?"

[The child. He said the ships that attacked us were painted black.]

"I hadn't noticed. That's peculiar." Pirates tended to operate with stolen or salvaged equipment, including ships. He couldn't think of any reason why they would take the time to repaint anything.

Dankin's thoughts were interrupted as Odonnl entered the bridge. Benji was close on his heels. "What's wrong?" Dankin asked. Benji looked panicked and close to tears.

"He wanted to see you," Odonnl offered. Benji threw his arms around Dankin. "I had a bad dream," Benji mumbled into Dankin's jacket.

Dankin put his arm around Benji and handed the whisperkit to him. "It's okay. It was just a dream. It's over now."

"Line creepers," Odonnl said suddenly. The others looked curiously at Odonnl. "Ghent said he was having trouble with line creepers. Why would he bring up such a minor detail?"

"I don't know," Dankin replied hesitantly. "Some think line creepers are a bad omen. Do you think Ghent could have been trying to warn us about something?"

"Sithspawn." Odonnl chewed his lip. "This could be bad. This could be really bad." Odonnl pressed the button for the hypercomm. "I'm calling Mara."

The others nodded a silent agreement.

Mara stood just inside the engine room, staring blankly into the glow of the hyperdrive and trying not to panic. Mara had thought she was being logical, rational when she made the plan. Luke could fly a ship without sensors—Luke was a sensor, probably a better sensor than any of the electronics that had been blown to pieces days before. And Mara knew the ship, knew its limits and capabilities like she knew her own heartbeat. And they could connect through the Force, they'd done it before. Luke would guide them, alert them to danger, and Mara would control the ship. Meanwhile, Dankin, Odonnl, and the rest of the crew would lend support in the Starry Ice. It would work, if not for that one detail.

When Mara and Luke had connected through the Force on Nirauan, there had been no room for secrets. They had known each other's minds like they knew their own. If that happened again, Luke would know all her secrets. Including those about Callista's last words and Jacen's hidden identity. The middle of the battle was not the time Mara wanted to drop that bombshell.

We are so kriffed, Faughn thought as she tiptoed through the corridor. Jade and Skywalker appeared to each independently be about to lose it. She definitely needed backup.

Faughn slipped into the communications pod and fired up the hypercomm. It took a few minutes to connect and even then the signal was fuzzy and intermittent. But Faughn was just able to make out a voice on the other end.

"Thank Corell," she sighed into the comm. "I really need your help…."

"We need to talk about Callista," Mara announced when she found Luke in the cargo hold.

"I know. I think I'm beginning to understand," he replied.

Mara was a bit surprised, but decided to go with it. "Yes?"

"Benji isn't meant to be a Jedi. She knew it. She knew it all along. Everyone knows it. You know it."

Mara was silent for a moment; this was not the conversation she'd planned on having.

"Why did no one tell me?"

"Would you have believed them if they did?" Mara asked carefully.

"No, probably not," Luke confessed. "That's why—" Luke grabbed Mara and pulled her toward him. Surprised and confused, Mara didn't fight back. And then she was in Luke's mind. There was something he wanted to show her. A memory.

Luke was flipping through a sheaf of flimsies, reading through the notes and status reports tracking Benji's progress since the last time Luke had been home. "I've been gone nearly two months and all he's done in that time is play on the computer? The only thing worthwhile he's done is spend a few hours on the flight simulator."

"But his cryptology scores—" Callista began.

"And he hasn't even beaten it yet?" Luke continued, exasperation edging its way into his voice. "At his age Jaina could have completed this simulation in her sleep!"

"Jaina?" Callista repeated quizzically.

"Yes, Jaina Solo—Benji's cousin? Jedi Knight and Commander of Rogue Squadron?" Luke replied, his exasperation now full-blown.

"I know who she is! What I don't know is why you're comparing Benji to her." Callista's voice had that rare harsh edge, a tone it took on only when they argued. A tone he had heard all too often lately, ever since Kyp had refused to take Benji as a padawan.

Luke breathed deeply. He hated fighting with Callista and wanted to end the argument quickly. But he couldn't compromise his son's training—it was far too important. When he continued his voice was calm. Calm, but very serious. "Benji is to be a Jedi. You're not just his mother—you are his Master now. You're supposed to be teaching him the ways of the Force. Leave the cryptology nonsense to Republic Intelligence. Please?"

Callista nodded, layers of hurt and frustration etched on her face. He knew the emotions were there, but he couldn't sort through them. Why was this so hard for her? After all, it was her idea in the first place to become Benji's Master. Why wasn't she helping Benji progress the way he should? "Look, I know Benji's young. I know I'm asking a lot of him.

"It's just that, I was nineteen before I began my Jedi training. And when I think of all that time wasted, of all the lives I could have saved if I'd only learned how to use the Force sooner—maybe I could have saved my aunt and uncle. Maybe I could have changed the tide of the war earlier. Maybe . . ." Luke trailed off, knowing that line of thinking was futile. He took a step closer to Callista and pulled her close to him.

"I just don't want Benji to have the same regrets I do," he said softly.

"Alright," Callista relented. She leaned into him, resting her head against his chest. "We'll stop the cryptology and focus on the Force exercises."

"I was so stupid." Luke released Mara and stepped back. "Stupid, stupid, stupid."

Breathless, Mara stared at Luke. She wanted to be offended, or at least annoyed, that he would spring such a personal memory on her. But he was obviously in such a crisis that she only felt sorry for him. Especially since that crisis was bound to get much worse.

Stepping away from Mara, Luke suddenly felt entirely unbalanced and dropped unceremoniously to the floor. Seeking solid ground, he pressed his palms hard against the floorboards.

Luke had always hated it when people compared him to his father. Yet that was exactly what he had done to Benji, expecting his son to follow in his footsteps, measuring his son's progress against that of his niece and nephews.

How could I not see how foolish I sounded? No wonder Callista resisted every time I made plans for our son.

Benji was Force-sensitive. But that didn't mean he was destined to be the galaxy's most powerful Jedi yet. Though his son had access to the Force, that didn't mean he could feel it and manipulate it the way Luke could. Benji was young, so his connection to the Force still had time to grow. But what if it didn't? What if he was always limited to just barely tasting the power Luke could drink in so easily?

Years ago, Luke had sworn it wouldn't matter to him whether his child was Force-sensitive.

But it had.

The day Benji was born, Luke had decided his son would be a Jedi like himself. He'd set his child's destiny in stone and had never looked back.

It was about time he broke that stone.

Half an hour after firing up the hypercomm, and the crew had heard nothing but the grating hiss of static from the device.

"It's no use," Dankin declared, reaching across Odonnl to flip off the hypercomm switch. "Incy's comm was probably damaged in the last attack."

"So what are we going to do?" Pormfil asked. "We can't fly right into a trap."

"I don't see that we have a choice," Dankin replied. "We can't just leave Mara and Luke to go it alone. Especially if it's a trap."

"But Mara and Luke are not our only consideration," Odonnl said softly, looking at Benji, who was huddled between Pormfil and H'sishi on the passenger bench, clutching his stuffed animal.

Dankin swore under his breath. "You're right. Maybe we should turn around."

"No," Benji said steadily. Strangely, the panic that had seemed about to consume him minutes before appeared to have dissipated. "We have to keep going." His tone was more forceful than Dankin had ever heard it before.

"But Benji," Odonnl replied, "We can't just walk into a trap. You said yourself you had a bad feeling about it."

"I know," Benji replied quickly. "But it's gone now. I want to see my dad. We have to keep going."

"We still may be able to reach Mara with the comm laser as soon as we hit realspace," Pormfil offered. He shrugged. "That's our best chance to warn her."

"Okay," Odonnl said looking around to each member of the crew in turn. "We'll continue on and try to reach Mara as soon as we break hyperspace. Any objections?"

Pormfil, H'sishi, and Dankin shook their heads. Benji stood up, an odd look in his eyes. "I'm going to my room," he announced and left the bridge quickly.

Dankin watched him leave and then turned slowly to Odonnl. "Do you remember Ralltiir?"

"Of course," Odonnl replied. "Why do you bring it up?"

"When I fell in that river, I was sure I was going to die. At first I was terrified. But, after a while, I felt . . . calm. At some point, once I was certain death was coming, I wasn't so scared—what good would fear do me?" Dankin's eyes had been focused on the mottled view of hyperspace just beyond Odonnl. They came to focus on Odonnl as he finished his sentence. "How did Benji seem to you just now?"

"Calm," Odonnl responded. "Very calm." Dankin nodded. "That's what I thought too."

They were sitting together on the deck of the cargo hold, talking. Just talking. Like two people who had known each other for half their lives. Like two people who had a lot in common and a way of understanding each other that ran deeper than words.

"It was selfish, really," Luke confessed. "I wanted to spend more time with Benji. I figured when he began his Jedi training in earnest I'd be able to see him a lot more often. Before long we'd be fighting side-by-side, the way I couldn't with Callista.

"The worst part is, I think sometimes, on some level, I ascribed the same motives to Callista. I thought she was avoiding training him as a Jedi so he would stay home with her." Luke sighed deeply. "How could I be so blind?"

"Sometimes you don't see what's right in front of you until it's too late," Mara replied. For several moments she looked around the ship, taking in each detail. She knew the ship as well as she knew her own body. Which is what made her next words so painful. "I hate my job," she said quietly.

Luke blinked, surprised by Mara's words. She'd worked hard to get where she was, he'd always assumed it was exactly where she wanted to be.

"But I can't give up now," she continued. "There's too many people depending on me."

Luke nodded, not in agreement, but wanting to encourage her to continue. "I thought this is what you wanted to do. What Karrde trained you for."

"It is what I trained for. But I never wanted the responsibility. You weren't too far off when you said I'd never cared about another person."

"Mara, I was out of line—"

"I've never wanted to care for anyone else," Mara cut in. "I've never been comfortable with people depending on me. But I do care. There are people—more than a few—who I can't possibly let down. I don't know how I ended up here. I wish I only had to care about myself. I'm good at taking care of myself."

"You may not like it, but you're pretty good at taking care of others. Your crew adores you. You've been a better parent to Benji than I have these last few weeks."

"Luke, I…" Mara trailed off, so he continued.

"You're not the only one who ended up somewhere they never thought they'd be. 'Grand Master'? What does that title even mean? It's just…I can't believe how I squandered my time with Callista. What's the point in fighting a war if you can't even enjoy a moment of peace?"

"It's not too late," Mara said. "You could walk away. You could spend the time with Benji you never got to spend with Callista."

Luke furrowed his brow. "Maybe."

"Definitely," Mara corrected. "You're a Grand Master, who's going to stop you?"

Luke took Mara's hand and held it gingerly between his own. He looked her straight in the eye and asked, "Would you come with me if I did?"

Mara opened her mouth, but before she was able to form words, Faughn appeared.

"You ready to take these binders off yet?" the blonde smuggler asked, thrusting her bound wrists toward Mara. "We break hyperspace in fourteen minutes."

Author Note: Thank you very much to everyone who has read, followed, or favorited this story!