Force Exile V: Warrior/Part 3

6
“Vong ships reverting from hyperspace!” Annita called out from the cockpit.

Jasika swore under her breath. She was suspended hanging upside down by her knees deep inside the bowels of Spindragon II, trying to repair the shield power conduits. Activating the shields right now, with the conduits half-torn open and all the protective insulation removed would be suicide. Of course, that might be preferable to death or enslavement at the hands of the Yuuzhan Vong.

The ship shuddered from a near miss and Jasika swore. The Vong had picked the worst possible time to attack, right when her ship was defenseless. Clambering up out of her precarious position, she staggered forward through the corridors to the cockpit. She needed to be at the controls of her ship, needed to be the one responsible for their survival. It was her job as the ship’s captain.

“Out,” she said quickly to Annita.

The older woman quickly vacated the pilot’s seat, allowing Jasika to slide into place. Grabbing the familiar controls, she quickly rolled Spindragon II into a corkscrewing evasive pattern even as a dozen coralskippers closed in on them.

“Get to the guns!” Jasika shouted to Annita, re-routing backup power to the much weaker auxiliary shields.

Annita complied and soon Jasika could hear the muffled whump-whump-whump of the dorsal and ventral double laser turrets as Jorge and Annita returned fire. The coralskippers returned fire with a vengeance, quickly tearing through the limited shields. Amber and red damage lights lit up on her console even as she strove to evade their fire. The Spindragon II would have had a hard time escaping this many starfighters even if they were vintage TIE fighters or Headhunters; dealing with the sturdy coralskippers was even harder.

“Give me long-range comms,” Jorge called through the headset.

Jasika slapped the switch even as another magma blast slammed into her ship, nearly knocking her from the cockpit. She ruefully noted that that damage had blown out the remnants of the hyperdrive. There would be no escape this time and her sensors showed that the Yuuzhan Vong were herding her back to a larger ship which had decanted from hyperspace a few seconds ago. A capture ship.

The coralskippers hemmed her in, shooting to disable, which meant that they were still alive, but only until that capture ship seized them. From her sensor boards, Jasika saw that the lasers were having little effect on the coralskippers. She had one or two tricks left up her sleeve, but they wouldn’t do much without some luck.

“Distress, distress. YGI code Aurek-Nineteen,” she heard Jorge transmit over the long range comm boards.

Well, that might do some good if the help was a few seconds away. At this rate, they’d be captured in another twenty seconds. She tried breaking to port, only to have two coralskippers pummel Spindragon II with blazing plasma cannon fire. The impacts tore through the hull armor, opening up a port storage compartment to vacuum. She quickly activated an emergency bulkhead panel to seal the breach, juking back to evade the rest of the projectiles.

The Yuuzhan Vong apparently decided to punish her for attempting to escap. Molten plasma burned through her hull, aiming for her guns. The hapless freighter shook and shuddered violently as her skin was torn apart by the burning material. Jasika heard the screech of sheared metal as the ship was sundered by the starfighter weaponry, almost like the sound of a person crying out in agony as it was attacked. Then there was an explosion, bigger than the rest that tore through the midsection of her ship. The impact slammed Jasika’s face into the control boards, inflicting a gash on her forehead. The ship whirled and spun and when Jasika recovered, she saw that among other things, engines and the inertial compensator were offline. Using the most primitive maneuvering thrusters, she attempted a stabilizing maneuver even as the Yuuzhan Vong ceased their bombardment. They apparently still wanted the inhabitants of Spindragon II alive. Then she saw the damage display to the midsection of the ship where the turrets were.

Un-strapping herself from her pilot’s chair, she grabbed a medkit and two breath masks from a storage compartment and kicked off. With the ship’s artificial gravity and main lighting offline, all she had to navigate with was a small handlamp. Pushing forward through a mess of blackened walls and smoldering debris, she made her way to the turret corridor. Thankfully, the hull breaches were confined to compartments that could be sealed off or she’d be dead of exposure by now.

“Jorge?” she called. “Annita?”

There was no reply. Jasika pushed forward, searching for her missing companions. Entering the access shaft that led to the turret positions, Jasika climbed up the ladder to see Annita slumped over at her chair in front of a blackened console that had clearly overloaded and detonated from the damage. Jasika quickly checked her pulse; Annita was still alive, but weak and unconscious. Ordinarily, she shouldn’t be moved, but Jasika heard a faint hissing that indicated a micro-rupture in the hull. She needed to seal the ruined turret off. Thankfully, in zero-gee, Annita was easy to move and Jasika hauled the unconscious woman down to the main crew lounge, getting a good look at her status. Her face, arms, and torso were burned from the exploding console and she was probably in shock. Jasika recoiled at the sight of the charred flesh, but knew that she needed to check on Jorge first. She whipped off her belt and wrapped it around Annita’s torso and the back of a chair, keeping the injured woman in place while she checked on Jorge.

Clambering down, she saw that his turret console had collapsed virtually on his legs, pinning him there. His eyes fluttered open as she approached.

“Anni. . .” he muttered.

“She’s fine,” Jasika said. “We’re going to get you of this.”

Jasika ignored the collapsed ventral turret console, instead loosening the bolts that held his chair in place. Once that was done, she pulled the chair back, freeing Jorge’s legs as it floated away from the site.

Unfortunately, not very comfortably. He screamed in pain and from the droplets of blood floating through the turret chamber, Jasika figured his leg had been badly broken, at least a compound fracture. She pulled him to the crew lounge also and set him down. He gasped in pain as she also strapped him to the deck. Jasika reached for the medkit when she heard the sounds of the port hatch being opened. Quickly, she reached over for her belt and grabbed the S-1 blaster from its holster and advanced.

“They’re not getting me without a fight,” she said.

Ducking into a corridor, she held her blaster at the ready. Her heart was pounding inside her chest at the anticipation of fighting the feared invaders face-to-face. Even as she heard the shearing sound of the docking hatch being bored through, Jasika gripped her blaster tighter, trying to remember all the lessons her father had given her on how to shoot straight. Sparks flew from the eviscerated metal, which fell to the ground with a clang, admitting a party of gigantic humanoid aliens covered in spiky armor.

Wheeling out from behind the wall she was using as cover, Jasika snapped her blaster’s muzzle up, gripping it two-handed and sighting off the weapon’s point rather than the sights. She squeezed the trigger as rapidly as it would depress, blazing away. She saw two of the warriors go down from being hit in the face and throat, and then a third one hurled something at her. Jasika tried to dodge, but it was too fast. Whatever it was flew like a blur to crash into her torso. The impact was like being hit with a steel ball and sent her flying back to the floor, gasping for breath. The blaster fell from her nerveless fingers to clatter on the deck. She looked up and saw a Yuuzhan Vong standing over her, grinning ominously. He picked her up by her feet and dragged her along the deck unceremoniously like she was a dead body so that only her head bounced and scraped against the rough floor. Hauling her over to a nearby compartment, he dropped her roughly.

Looking down at his helpless captive, the alien glowered hideously at her.

“Where are you from, little one?” he asked through his ferociously mangled lips.

“A place you’ll never find,” she said defiantly.

“You are wrong, infidel,” he returned. “By the time we are done with you, you will be screaming out the planet you came from. You will betray everything to us because you are a craven vermin, begging for the mercy of a quick and painful death.”

Though she was scared witless, Jasika managed to muster up the resolve to maintain a steely exterior.

“I’ll never tell you anything,” she said.

“I think you will,” he replied. “You are no warrior.”

He knelt beside her and withdrew a long coufee knife. Tearing open her jacket and lifting up the shirt underneath to expose her belly, he traced the point of the blade across her stomach so that she could feel its tip scraping along her skin.

“If I was to apply a little pressure, right here, your guts would spill out from your stomach all over the floor,” he said. “You would watch as your entrails were cut from your body.”

Jasika’s eyes were wide with terror as the coufee blade tingled and slid across her stomach. It swept upwards to touch at the base of her ribcage.

“I could stab upwards and the last thing you would feel is my blade sliding into your mongrel heart as your lifeblood poured out onto the deck.”

Jasika knew that the warrior was not given to exaggeration. Fear saturated her, but she made no reply even as she began trembling with anxiety. The lack of reply only served to infuriate her captor, though.

“Or,” he offered. “I believe you have a soft spot right here.”

He punched right in the side where her ribs were broken, eliciting a gasp of pain from Jasika. His fist left a small growing bloodstain on her shirt, and Jasika coughed hoarsely.

“See how you break under the pain, infidel?” he gloated. “Tell me now and I will kill you quickly.”

Jasika looked into his malice-filled eyes and spat at him.

“Takes a brave warrior like you to beat up on a helpless prisoner half his size,” she said, suppressing her fear to muster up an angry reply. “I see how the Yuuzhan Vong got their reputation.”

He hissed and stood up, glaring spitefully at her.

“Soon, I will show you the error of your ways.”

Pulling something from a pouch on his armor, he hurled it at her feet, pinning her in place. Then, he drew his foot back and kicked her in the face. Everything went black.

When she awoke, she was still lying on the deck of 'Spindragon II. As she regained the use of her senses, she felt something cold and liquid trickling down her face. Her feet were bound, pinned to the floor by some kind of jelly, but she still had the use of her arms. Wiping the liquid from her face, she realized that it was blood—her blood. Sitting up slightly, she noticed a conspicuous lack of Yuuzhan Vong warriors around. Furthermore, her blaster was lying on the ground only a few meters away. Surely her captors weren’t so incompetent that they’d leave a relatively unrestrained captive access to a functional weapon. Though the jelly kept her feet pinioned, she stretched, enduring the agony shooting through her ribs to grab the blaster. Checking its power levels, she saw it was still charged. Gritting her teeth in determination, she leveled the weapon at the doorway to the compartment she was in, ready to take the head off the first Vong that walked in. She heard footsteps approaching and adjusted her aim to catch the warrior right in the throat; their armor seemed weak there.

The door hissed open and she loosed three quick blasts at the armored figure, but they were inexplicably dissipated by an energy field which materialized centimeters from its face. The figure ducked down under her blasts quickly.

“Stand down, dammit, I’m a friendly!” he shouted in decidedly non-accented Basic.

Jasika ceased fire but did not lower her weapon.

“Who are you?” she demanded.

“Sergeant Dorn Gnnryl, Yanibar Guard Marines,” he replied. “I’m a medic, ma’am. We left you that blaster in case there were more of them, not to take potshots at us with.”

Jasika lowered her blaster.

“Perhaps I missed something, but last I checked, my ship was crawling with Vong. How did you get here?”

“We picked up your distress signal,” he said. “The Saesee Tiin arrived just in time to pin that Vong capture ship in place. We couldn’t get a signal from your ship, so we boarded it and took down the Vong here. They’re all gone. ”

He knelt down beside her and opened a medpac, retrieving various implements even as Jasika struggled to sit up.

“No, don’t move, ma’am,” he ordered kindly. “You’ve got some broken ribs for sure and a nasty gash on your head. Probably a concussion also.”

Jasika sighed and relented, even though the last thing she wanted to do was lie still.

“How are Jorge and Annita?” she asked.

“We evac’d them first since they were hurt more,” the medic told her as he applied some kind of salts to the jelly to dissolve it. “Begging your pardon, ma’am, but both the subdirectors were hurt pretty badly.”

“No, it’s all right,” she said.

Anger coursed through her veins at the memory of being shot at, boarded, captured, tortured, and knocked out, of seeing her friends and family on the verge of death thanks to the Yuuzhan Vong. She’d been helpless against the Yuuzhan Vong and the memory of the indignity and inability was burned into her memory. Jasika swore to herself that she would never be so defenseless again and that she would exact retribution on the Yuuzhan Vong for their predations, both on her and on others across the galaxy.

“Your blood pressure is spiking,” the medic commented. “Are you okay, ma’am? Too much excitement for one day?”

Jasika gritted her teeth as his gloved hand gently brushed against one of her broken ribs, igniting flares of pain in her torso. She endured it quietly, knowing that if at all possible, she would soon return the favor to the Yuuzhan Vong.

“I’ll be fine, Sergeant,” Jasika said. “Just get me patched up quick. I’ve got something to do when we get to Yanibar.”

“What’s that, ma’am?” Gnnryl asked, no doubt just trying to make conversation.

“I’m going to join the Yanibar Guard.”


 * Yanibar

“Good work, team,” Selu said as Ryion finished giving his report to him, Milya, and Selu’s brother, Sarth Kraen. “You successfully took down Sh’aalam Psykith before he could cause trouble for this sector.”

“Thank you,” Ryion acknowledged. “He was blind to our powers. We were trained well to handle him. Not that we’ll underestimate any darksiders we encounter in the future, but we were ready for him.”

“Then I’m glad our program has been successful on that front,” Selu said. “Is there anything else?”

“I have a question,” put in Ariada. “What is being done with the computer data obtained from Psykith’s files?”

“We’re analyzing it,” Milya replied. “YGI with some technical expertise from Kraechar Arms is handling it.”

“I’d like to volunteer to assist with that,” Ariada offered. “I’ve got technical experience and I’m trained in biology and genetics. I can decrypt and understand whatever was in his files.”

Sarth and Selu exchanged looks and it was Sarth who spoke first.

“We appreciate your offer, but I think we’ve got it under control,” the distinguished engineer said. “Security is very tight when we’re dealing with knowledge of this type.”

Ariada snorted.

“I’m cleared for all but the most sensitive material,” she answered. “We both know that I’m talented and experienced enough to handle it. What’s the real reason here?”

“This falls under that ‘most sensitive material’ category,” Selu interjected. “It’s for your own good that you’re not exposed to the Sith information in that file. The request is denied.”

Ariada’s jaw set.

“Master Kraen, I’m deeply grateful to you for everything you and your family have done, but if you’re afraid of me turning to the dark side, just please say so.”

Selu could have taken offense to her comment, but instead his features softened and he appeared sad.

“I fear for all of us,” he said. “These are dark times. When we are done with our analysis, we will destroy the evil that Psykith has accumulated and remove it from the galaxy forever.”

“Then there’s nothing useful there?” Ariada asked. “Absolutely nothing that could be of use to Yanibar?”

“Other than keeping abreast of the current objectives of this dark side group, what are you talking about?” Milya inquired.

“There were descriptions of ancient weapons there,” Ariada replied. “I only skimmed them, but it seemed that some of them could have practical value.”

Sarth frowned and drummed his fingers on the table.

“The things you’re talking about are bio-weapons. Weapons of mass destruction. Poisons. Machines that infect and twist the mind. Hideous things that no person of conscience could use,” he said.

“Even if it could combat the Yuuzhan Vong?” Ariada asked.

“Doesn’t matter to me,” Sarth said. “If we embrace evil to destroy evil, we only replace it with our own brand.”

“Of course,” she replied, though without much conviction. “I submit to your wisdom.”

“Is there anything else?” Selu asked.

Ryion and his team looked around but there were no further comments.

“I think that’s all,” Ryion said.

“Dismissed then,” Selu told them. “Get some rest.”

The four young Elite Guardians filed out of the conference room silently. Ryion noticed Ariada was lagging behind, a troubled look on her face, so he dropped back to walk alongside her as Zeyn and Qedai headed to the cafeteria for food.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“They’re wrong,” she said flatly. “There are things that Psykith collected that we could use.”

“Maybe,” Ryion answered. “But they also make a good point about it being dangerous.”

She shrugged.

“Perhaps we should consider that question in light of possible galactic extinction,” she replied.

“I see where you’re coming from,” Ryion said sympathetically. “And believe me, I want to take the fight to the Yuuzhan Vong, too. But we have to do it the right way and follow orders.”

“I know that,” Ariada said. “And that’s why I only made that one copy of the data. I could have kept another one for me, but I didn’t, Ryion. I did what they asked, what you asked. I did it for us, for the sake of the mission, and now they won’t even let me look at it, even supervised. Not even a thank you.”

“It doesn’t seem fair to me either,” Ryion said. “And if there’s anything I can do to help with that, or if I can get a look at it, I’ll let you know. Just please don’t do anything rash in the mean time.”

She shook her head.

“No, I won’t,” she said. “But they’re still wrong.”

She sauntered off and Ryion started to follow, but then he saw something out of the corner of his eye. It was a faint blue outline of a woman, robed like a Jedi Master. She looked at him with a mournful expression.

“Hello?” Ryion called, not sure what he was looking at.

The woman stared at him a minute longer, then turned and walked away. Ryion stretched out to sense her in the Force and he could feel a presence, one strong in the Force, but felt no impression of life. He also noted that she was floating off the ground and was translucent. Was he looking at a dead person?

He tried to catch up with her.

“Wait!”

She looked over her shoulder at him, then shook her head and dematerialized, leaving him mystified. He checked to see if anyone else had observed the ghostly woman, but there was nobody else in sight.

What had he just seen? Ryion couldn’t recall having ever seen anything like that. He decided to ask his parents; he needed to talk with them about the Sith information that Psykith had obtained and Ariada as well. This would be yet another item to what was sure to be an interesting conversation.
 * Ord Pardron

Cassi woke with a start, sitting up hastily from her bead. Pushing her tousled locks of hair away from her head, she looked around, disoriented. The room was still dark, but slowly, a pale blue light began creeping in. Frowning, she realized she was in the Hall of Remembrance, Yanibar’s sanctuary for the fallen heroes. They were memorialized with statuary in their image and holocards or graven plaques describing their deeds. It was a calming place, a sacred place, but it was not as she remembered.

She quickly ascertained that something was amiss. The spacious three-level hall was normally illuminated in a soft golden glow, but this pale, eerie bluish-red light was different. It was also colder than she remembered. The entire place seemed decrepit and run-down, abandoned by any caretakers. The stones were worn and crumbling and several of the statues had fallen. The chill howling of wind blowing through the open door at the end of the hall, a door that was normally closed, explained the coldness she felt. Suddenly, she heard an ear-splitting high-pitched screech that sent her cowering back in terror. The piercing sound screamed of danger and fear and Cassi staggered back, eyes wide with fright, until she collided with one of the many statues that populated the Hall of Remembrance. To her surprise, it was covered with thick cobwebs which clung to her tenaciously. Crying out, she backed away, only to look up at the statue with a look of abject horror as she recognized the visage on the crumbling sculpture.

It was her own face.

Wheeling back and away from it, she fled towards a shaft of light emanating from the ceiling to illuminate a panel of the floor. For whatever reason, the light brought comfort to her in that dark and chilly place and she embraced it, sinking down to her knees in confusion, trying to calm herself.

Suddenly, a shadow fell over her. She looked up to see the same strange man she had seen before looking down at her.

“What do you want?” she asked him pleadingly. “Why am I seeing this? Who are you?”

He stood there stolidly for a minute, then replied slowly.

“This is the way your world ends,” he said. “This is your future.”

Cassi shook her head defiantly.

“No,” she said. “The future is in motion.”

“Only if its course is altered,” the man countered.

“What must I do to change this?” she asked.

“Seek Atlaradis,” he told her. “It is the key.”

Cassi slowly stood up, pulling herself together as she gave the man a critical stare.

“You told me that last time, amidst a scene of great destruction. Now you tell me that after showing me my own death. What changed to cause that?”

“Sometimes, things do not have to change,” he said. “Sometimes, all it takes is the inaction of those who can halt what is to come.”

She heard that screech again, the thin pale venomous screech of some malevolent beast seeking its prey. Cassi turned her head back to the door and saw some kind of creature silhouetted there, clearly stalking her. Stifling a cry with one hand, she turned back to the strange man.

“From the stars you came, and from the stars will your doom come,” he told her forebodingly.

All around her, the rectangle of light she was standing on began to redden ominously. The man before her looked up and her eyes followed his gaze to see that one of Yanibar’s moons had turned blood red. She heard that terrifying cry and it again staggered her with its ferocity. Turning back, Cassi saw the creature advance deliberately, its unintelligible shriek enough to convey malice and danger. She ran away from it, seeking the shelter of the shadows, but her foot caught on a loose stone sending her tumbling to the ground. Everything went black.

She awoke to find something standing over her, gazing down at her with glowing eyes on its impassive face. Cassi screamed in fright and tried to wriggle away, only for the being to follow.

“Careful, mistress,” J7 told the frantic woman. “You seem to have injured yourself.”

Reality settled back into Cassi’s mind even though she wasn’t quite sure what that meant. Foggy memories of Ord Pardron, Open Hands, and J7, filtered back into her mind, reorienting herself.

“What happened?” she asked, noting with a wince the throbbing pain on the side of her head.

“I believe you fell out of your cot,” the droid replied, “which would explain the contusion on your scalp. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said, rubbing at the rapidly-rising lump.

“Your blood pressure is much higher than it should be for a human sleeping,” J7 commented. “And body language indications point to elevated distress. Would you like to re-state your answer?”

“I had a bad dream, that’s all, J7,” Cassi said, still dazed from her dream or vision or whatever it was.

The droid diplomatically demurred, knowing it was pointless to press her for further details. Cassi had made it quite clear that she did not need to be babysat.

“Would you like something to help you sleep? Or perhaps just a warm drink?” J7 inquired.

“No, no thank you,” Cassi said, pulling herself back onto the cot in one corner of her office that served as her bed. “I think I’ll be able to sleep now.”

The droid sighed at the refusal of his mistress to take more consideration into her own welfare. J7 considered lecturing her on the dangers of heightened stress, sleep deprivation, and insufficient nutrition, particularly for a woman of her age, but his prediction routines, honed by years of experience with sentient beings, told him that such an effort would be fruitless. The most he could was be there to pick Cassi back up when—not if—she fell apart.

“If that is all, mistress. . .” the droid said, starting to toddle off.

“Actually,” Cassi replied, a thought coming to her mind. “There is one thing you can do.”

J7’s servomotors whirred softly as he turned back to her.

“What can I do to help?” he asked.

“Look up anything you can find on the datanets regarding a place called Atlaradis.”

7
Ryion Kraen rolled over in his sleep, one arm snaking out to gently caress Ariada’s bare shoulder. However, it found nothing. Some neurochemical impulse from the lack of contact triggered a subconscious response that was enough to wake him. Blinking his eyes slowly in the dim light of his sleeping quarters, he soon realized that she was gone. Rolling back over, he looked at the chrono and saw that it was 0430. They still had two more hours before they needed to awaken, so Ariada’s departure was unusual. Sure, she had her own quarters, but when they were together, she rarely left his side.

The whole scenario seemed a bit too wrong and Ryion sat up fully, clearing his mind and coming fully awake. He quickly cycled through the list of reasons that Ariada might have left early. It was possible that she couldn’t sleep and had gotten up to go running or exercising or meditating. That seemed extremely unlikely after their last experience together, and Ryion remembered her falling asleep before he did. Alternately, she could have caught wind that Ryion’s parents, Morgedh, or some other authority figure were planning some kind of unusual early visit and had left before they could be caught in a compromising position. If either of those were the case, though, he figured he should be able to sense her easily. Stretching out with the small amount of Force sense needed to locate the presence of one so intimately known to him across a relatively small distance, Ryion expected to find the familiar sense of his partner and lover.

He found nothing. That was odd. He extended his senses further, but still found nothing, not even when he stretched out with his full power, which was considerable. He could sense Ariada across light-years due to their close bond, and now he found nothing. Slipping out of his bed, he noted that there was no trace of her in his quarters aside from the lingering scent of perfume, and he still sensed nothing. The only explanation for that was if she was masking her presence in the Force, but Ryion couldn’t think of a legitimate reason for her to do so.

Pulling on a robe, Ryion strode out of the door, making his way to her quarters half a kilometer away. Perhaps she was there, practicing her Force camouflage and stealthiness. He was still weary, but his concern and a careful use of the Force banished any thought of sleep from his mind. He could be tired later, after he’d found Ariada. Hopefully, he was just over-reacting.

Entering her quarters was no problem, as she’d given him the password and set the door to allow him in. He found things more or less the same as she always kept them, neat, organized, and well-furnished with a desk loaded with computer equipment and a miniature laboratory on the other side of the main room. Likewise, there was nothing out of the ordinary in her bedroom, refresher, or kitchen either. On a hunch, he opened her equipment locker and saw that a combat jumpsuit was missing. That set off alarms in his mind. He had been here the previous evening, helping her restock her equipment bag from their last mission, and that hadn’t been missing. If a jumpsuit was missing, he wondered what else was gone.

Sinking into a meditative posture on the floor, Ryion focused, calling on the nearly-holographic memory he had inherited from his father. His mind swept back to several hours before, allowing the details of each second to flash back into his mental vision. He compared them to what he’d just seen and to him, it seemed like he was overlaying two holograms on top of each other and comparing the differences. The more he thought about it, the more he realized that the jumpsuit was not the only thing missing. Her utility belt, combat boots, bag of lightsabers, a holoprojector, a genetic sequencer, an injector, and a small highly-capable datapad were missing. This was not good.

Ryion raced back to his quarters to retrieve his mechanical half-glove. It was designed to help him compensate for the injury to his left hand sustained several years ago and also had a built-in AI. The construct slid easily over his arm and its neural stimulators helped augment his left hand’s damaged fingers. While it did nothing to protect his hand—it wasn’t even a full glove, just a frame with added components and an artificial fifth finger—it gave him dexterity that he’d lost with his injury. Tapping a few buttons, Ryion called up a holographic image of Vigil, his AI.

“Vigil, where is Ariada?” he asked.

The glowing gold of Vigil’s holographic pseudo-human face gave him a puzzled look.

“Agent Cerulaen is not currently on assignment by the Yanibar Guard,” the AI replied.

“Are you sure about that?” Ryion asked. “Or is the mission just classified?”

“There are no indications of her being assigned at all, classified or no,” Vigil said. “No Yanibar Guard ships have left orbit in the past twelve hours and she is listed as being on leave. Would you like me to check her Firehawk’s sensor tag?”

“Do it,” Ryion told him.

Firehawks were highly-advanced swoop vehicles assigned only to Elite Guardian teams—no other pilot could control them. Incredibly swift, they also packed considerable armaments and a basic deflector shield. While larger than typical contemporary swoop bikes, Ryion loved the combination of speed and capability packed into the vehicle. Without his parents’ explicit permission, he had convinced his uncle Sarth into letting him help test-fly the first prototype batch several years earlier and found it to be the best combat swoop he’d flown.

“Her Firehawk is currently parked in the vehicle hangar closest to her quarters,” Vigil replied. “It has been that way for the past seventy-five hours. Security holocam footage confirms this.”

The AI paused, looking hesitant.

“I did find one unrelated anomaly, however.”

“What’s that?” Ryion inquired.

“Your Firehawk’s sensor tag is missing from its bay and has been since 0330,” Vigil answered. “Security holocam footage indicates that it is still parked there, however. Is there a possible equipment malfunction in your vehicle?”

“You’re talking about my Firehawk randomly having a sensor break on it?” Ryion asked. “We just ran a full diagnostic and maintenance schedule on it two days ago.”

He broke into a run, racing for the hangar where his vehicle was parked. Skidding to a stop in front of the point where his Firehawk should have been, right next to Zeyn’s, Ryion saw that it was there. Curious, he approached and touched the sleek stealth-black finish of the vehicle. His hand sank right through the exterior as if it wasn’t there.

“Analyze,” he told Vigil. “What is this?”

“It’s a hologram,” the AI replied. “A very high-quality one, capable of fooling the security holocams. There’s no indication in the records of anyone having entered this garage and taken your vehicle while replacing it with a holoprojector.”

Ryion walked through the hologram and picked up the holoprojector, de-activating it. It pulsed quietly, then went dead. The device was a generic model, one of probably thousands of this model on Yanibar. The Yanibar Guard used them extensively for simulations and briefings. He picked up a pair of macrobinoculars from his utility belt and focused in on the holoprojector, while sending the feed to Vigil for analysis.

“Any fingerprints, loose skin cells, anything that might indicate the owner?” he asked.

“None,” the AI explained. “It has been wiped completely clean of any physical evidence that would identify the last person who handled this. All that I detect are faint traces of a powerful cleaning solvent.”

“Fantastic,” Ryion said. “My girlfriend is missing and so is my swoop. I can tell this is going to be a wonderful day already.”

He ran a hand through his rumpled hair and reluctantly pulled out his comlink. He should have thought of this before, he figured. He tried calling Ariada. The transmission had barely begun before he realized that her comlink had still been in her room. Muttering a silent curse, he terminated the link and grimaced as he called the one person who might have a clue as to what was going on, dialing in the appropriate priority code. The comlink beeped as the connection was made.

“Ryion, this had better be really, really good, or at least you better realize what time it is,” came the groggy but unmistakably irritable voice of his mother, one of the few people in the galaxy who could inspire fear in Ryion Kraen.

“I’m sorry, Mom,” he apologized. “Ariada is gone.”

He heard her exasperated sigh.

“Ryion, I know it’s painful that she broke up with you, and I’m sorry about that, but can we talk about it in a more civilized hour?”

“Not that kind of gone, Mom,” he replied with a scowl. “Gone, as in, can’t find her gone. Not anywhere. Not even with the Force. And. . .”

“And what?” Milya asked.

“And my Firehawk is gone, replaced by a hologram. There’s no record of a swap in the security holocams either. Please tell me this is one of your assignments or YGI tricks or whatever.”

“Does sound like something I would do?” Milya replied indignantly. “Spirit off Ariada in the middle of the night and hide your Firehawk as some kind of obtuse mystery or punishment?”

“Well, not exactly,” Ryion admitted.

“Then I’m glad to see I haven’t completely lost your confidence,” Milya told him. “Dear, wake up. It’s important.”

Ryion guessed that that last part was not directed to him and wisely held his tongue.

“Ryion,” Milya’s voice returned over the comlink. “Try and locate your Firehawk via its tracer beacon and slave remote.”

“Of course,” Ryion said, activating Vigil and setting the AI to the task.

A few minutes later, the hologram of Vigil’s face shimmered and transformed into geographical coordinates.

“It’s parked at the Yanibar Guard base near Saqua,” Ryion exclaimed, surprised. “That’s nearly two hundred kilometers away. What in space is it doing there?”

Milya’s voice turned iron hard.

“Stand down, son,” she said. “Your Firehawk will be retrieved. Leave it at that.”

“I don’t understand,” Ryion answered, even more confused than before. “What are you talking about?”

“You don’t need to understand,” Milya answered just as rigidly as before. “Be aware that you are under an Article 45 order to proceed directly to Yanibar Guard Elite Guardian headquarters and report for supervision until otherwise ordered by a senior authority.”

All the color drained from Ryion’s face at his mother’s words.

“Do you understand and acknowledge the order?” Milya insisted.

Ryion’s mouth was dry, but he managed to hold down the comlink button to force the words out.

“Article 45, acknowledged,” he said quietly. “Complying with the order.”

“We’ll talk soon,” Milya told him.

The comlink closed down and Ryion felt as if all the energy had been drained out of him. Article 45 was a tenet of the Yanibar Guard Elite Guardians designed to protect members from having to confront or combat a family member, friend, or close associate unless no other recourse was available. It was also designed to protect the refuge from a group of people going rampant or falling astray. Under Article 45, any person deemed sufficiently close to an individual who posed sufficient cause to be considered a threat was to immediately report to their superiors for immediate supervision. They were not to intervene in any incident involving that person unless specifically ordered to do so and any attempt to escape protective custody, assist or otherwise intervene with that individual would result in being branded as the same level of threat as the original threat.

And Ryion knew exactly what it meant. It meant that his mother suspected Ariada was acting sufficiently contrary to the Code of the Guardians to be classified as a threat. It also meant that he was not trusted to be involved in any way with how the Yanibar Guard handled the situation.


 * Yanibar Guard Saqua Base

Ariada smiled wickedly as the files obtained from Psykith appeared on the screen before her. She hastily downloaded them into her datapad. While the Yanibar Guard had taken great pains to conceal the location of the files, both their physical location and the data storage site inside the network, they had failed to account for something she’d carefully implanted when she’d been assigned to download the information from Psykith’s dataframe—namely, a tracker program. Ryion’s instructions had been to not make any copies. He hadn’t said anything about not adding to the information. With her tracker program in place, it had been no problem to locate the files. The analysts that had checked the files had obviously been very thorough when they scanned the files themselves for threats, but they hadn’t checked the small addendum she’d added when she copied them.

So here she was, surrounded by glowing yellow-green towers of data cores nestled snugly in their cooling sheaths that kept the humming computer systems operating. Lines of data ran down each tower, signs that the computing towers were fully functional and were in use. The entire room was filled with these floor-to-ceiling towers and there were a dozen other rooms like it in the center, but this was the one she wanted. The dimly-lit room had multiple layers of security, but Ariada had been able to breach them rather quickly, allowing her to stand at a terminal positioned between two data towers isolated from the others and slice into the secure files she desired.

Not that she had wanted to obtain the information this way. It would have been so much easier if her superiors had simply let her have access to the files in the first place. Then all this skulking around wouldn’t have been necessary. It was Selu’s and Sarth’s fault, Ariada thought bitterly. They didn’t understand that more extreme measures needed to be taken to combat the Yuuzhan Vong and their atrocities. They had become too soft to do what was needed to weather the storm of the invasion. They had brought this on themselves.

She shook her head to clear her mind of those thoughts, knowing that she needed to focus on the task at hand. The system required her constant attention to suppress automated inquiries as to how she was accessing this data. It had taken her an hour to slice into the secure network and now she had to fend incessant probes and scans. It was taking all of her skill to deflect the inquiries from the security systems and she couldn’t let errant thoughts distract her from the task at hand. She knew that her motivations were just. Given enough time and some special attention, Ariada knew she could take the information from Psykith’s vault and turn it into something useful. Something capable of wiping out the Yuuzhan Vong and ending their trail of torment. Then the Kraens would be forced to admit that she was right.

The information finished downloading into her datapad, acknowledging the completion with a chirp. Ariada disconnected its secure link, closing it down. She glanced up at the security holocams gazing down benignly at the isolated control terminal from where she was working. Those holocams had of course been sliced by her before she’d ever set foot into this facility, keeping her presence in this extremely secure location from being discovered.

Ariada clipped the datapad onto her belt and sauntered out confidently. A wave of her hand, a carefully-practiced Force technique, and she disappeared from the visible, ultraviolet, and infrared spectra. Hidden from view and with her presence in the Force damped so low that nobody could detect her, she was perfectly invisible. If the Force was with her, she would be able to return to her residence and stash the data before anyone noticed that she was missing.

Of course, a voice in the back of her head reminded her that that was not likely. She’d sensed Ryion’s mental probes searching for her and knew that he had noticed her absence. Ariada didn’t know if he would understand. That was the largest knot in her plans, hiding what she had done from him and then explaining her actions if he found out. She knew he sympathized with her sentiments, but also knew how ingrained his obedience to his superiors was.

The doors whooshed open as she stepped out into the corridor that led away from the data center. The halls were deserted and she encountered nobody else during her egress, unsurprising given that it was still very early in the morning and the only personnel on site would be in the monitoring room, whose holocams and security sweeps she had already evaded. Her trainers would have been proud, once they got over their outrage at what she was doing.

Ariada remained unchallenged as she left the building and headed out to where she’d discreetly parked Ryion’s Firehawk several hundred meters away. As a precaution, she maintained her protective screen of Force camouflage even though nobody else in the base was patrolling in this region at this sleepy hour. Again, she saw nobody as she hopped onto the seat of the nimble craft and powered up its engines. The transparent canopy sealed over her and she lifted off, outbound from the Saqua base and headed back towards her residence. Despite her clean escape from the most dangerous part of her operation, she couldn’t shake the niggling feeling that something was wrong. Just as the Firehawk cleared rooftop level, Ariada’s speakers suddenly crackled to life with a voice she knew well.

“Stand down and land your vehicle,” ordered a stern, gravelly voice. “Do not attempt to resist or escape. Attempt no unauthorized activity and you will not be harmed.”

Ariada instantly knew she was hearing the steely words of Morgedh clan Kell’nerh, the head of the Elite Guardians and one of the most powerful Force-users on Yanibar. A Noghri warrior by birth and training, Morgedh was an extremely capable fighter, far superior to her own prowess. Fighting him would not end well, and the fact that he had found her so quickly was disconcerting. No doubt, he’d been sent or assigned to hunt her down and had parked his own vehicle on a rooftop so that she’d be visible as soon as she took off.

Cursing under her breath, Ariada drew on the Force, calling its burning currents into her body and re-focusing them into a concealing shroud that she drew over the Firehawk, hiding it from view and making it impossible to target with standard sensors. She then gritted her teeth and stomped on the accelerator pedal as hard as she could, sending her invisible speeder hurtling away from the lethal Noghri hunter.

However, Morgedh was undeterred. Climbing into his own Firehawk, he soared after her in hot pursuit. Her Force concealment seemed to have no effect on his Noghri and carefully-trained Force abilities, Ariada realized. Somehow, he was tracking her even with her concealment. She tried to break from the base, but he kept herding her in. One thing that Ariada considered fortunate: the Noghri had not elected to bring in reinforcements as of yet. However, given that he was the best hunter on Yanibar, he probably could catch her without them. She could not make over a thousand meters in altitude in the swift little Firehawk, much less orbit and hyperspace, so she would be forced to elude her pursuer.

“Stand down, Elite Cerulaen,” ground out Morgedh’s voice as he sideslipped to stay on her tail.

Ariada whipped her Firehawk around the crown of an anti-orbital turbolaser battery, accelerating rapidly away in an attempt to lose Morgedh. It was unsuccessful and the Noghri simply roared over the turbolaser and soon gained any lost distance between them by virtue of superior piloting.

“Face the consequences of your choices like a true Elite,” Morgedh grated. “This is cowardly.”

Ariada’s face burned at the rebuke, but she remained resolute, continuing to fly away from the base while trying to juke her tail. She clenched the Firehawk’s controls tightly, trying to come up with a means to shake Morgedh.

“This is your final warning,” Morgedh told her solemnly. “Out of respect for your teacher and for the oath you swore to the Yanibar Guard, I ask you to stand down.”

Ariada bit her lip, knowing what would happen, but it was too late for regrets now. She had chosen her course, now she had to fly it.

“I’m sorry, Morgedh,” she said quietly. “It doesn’t work that way.”

Suddenly, four little dots appeared on her sensors, emanating from his signal and heading towards hers at a much-higher velocity. The Noghri had wasted no time in escalating after her refusal to comply. From her speeder training, she knew they were hunter-killer drones, small guided bombs. She panicked slightly as they closed, wondering how Morgedh was aiming since she was still camouflaged. She dove into a steep descent, pulling up at the last second, but still they tracked her. Further evasive maneuvers had no effect on the relentless drones and Ariada stretched out with her senses to realize that Morgedh was guiding the drones telekinetically even while he stayed hot on her tail. It was an impressive display of Force usage, and one she could not match, but that did not diminish its deadliness.

Her sensor board showing only seconds until impact, she flipped a panel of switches, causing a series of ports to open up along the sides of her Firehawk. Six drones of her own armed and Ariada quickly keyed in the commands for proximity detonation. Her own control of the Force was insufficient for her to try and wrest the drones from Morgedh or guide her own hunter-killers in to accomplish precise kills. Instead, she punched the firing buttons, releasing the drones on glowing yellow contrails to intersect with the trajectories of the oncoming hunter-killers. This method was cruder, but judging from the messy explosions erupting behind her Firehawk, it was successful. She dropped the Force concealment, knowing that it was useless now against Morgedh’s skills.

One of Morgedh’s drones managed to survive from the blasts, but Ariada focused her mind just as it reached its detonation radius. Slapping it as hard as she could telekinetically while skimming low over the ground, she knocked the drone into the duracrete pavement where it exploded violently, just short of her Firehawk’s stern. She angled her swoop’s nose up, but to her alarm, several damage displays illuminated, showing that some of the detonation had caught her engine systems. Her controls already showed her velocity dropping and a momentary glance over her shoulder revealed charring and a thin line of smoke emanating from her engine.

Morgedh would be on her soon, his undamaged craft rapidly closing the gap between them. Ariada banked and directed her vehicle over the security fence of the base’s mammoth weather control nexus. Alarms wailed as she approached the fence, intensifying as she crossed over the perimeter. Her craft was losing power quickly, so she shut down the engines, piloting it into the gap between the generator quarter-disks that funneled massive amounts of energy into the weather control’s focus capacitors.

Even with reduced velocity, the ailing Firehawk skidded along the surface of the trench in a shower of sparks. Ariada punched off her last two drones back at Morgedh, then pulled the manual release on her canopy and leapt clear. The Firehawk slid into a relay conduit and exploded in an orange and crimson fireball. Ariada landed atop one of the walkways that connected the two generator segments, looking around for Morgedh. The Noghri would not be so easily dispatched by two hunter-killer drones, unless she had gravely overestimated his talents.

She had not. A loud roaring sound filled her ears as Morgedh’s Firehawk swooped up from over the generator disk to her side, hurtling right past her as she threw herself back to avoid being flattened, too surprised to react properly. The wash from the repulsorlifts knocked her off the walkway to fall painfully to the trench three meters below. The Noghri had also jumped from his own craft, landing silently next to Ariada with his lightsaber in hand as she struggled to rise against the pain in her side caused by ribs that were badly bruised, if not broken.

“It is over,” he said. “Surrender and no more harm will come to you.”

From her position on her hands and knees, Ariada looked up at the menacing, stolid Noghri. Then something inside her, the last vestiges of any restraint, snapped, and she snarled at him while gesturing pointedly at the bag hanging from her shoulder.

Even as Morgedh took a step closer, three short lightsabers flew from her satchel and came to life as they lanced towards the Noghri. Ariada focused all her effort into weaving them into a deadly cloud around Morgedh, but her adversary put up a steady, methodical defense that batted each lightsaber away in turn even as he closed the gap. His light blue saber wove a blindingly swift deflecting pattern that made her three weapons seem sluggish in comparison. Being attacked by three weapons hovering in the air from different angles didn’t seem to faze him in the least and she knew her approach was only delaying the inevitable.

Ariada leapt up and back, calling the lightsabers back to her as she vaulted through the air. Two of them returned at her call, but Morgedh whipped his own blue lightsaber through a deft overhand strike that shattered the hilt of one of her shotos, sending the two pieces fall sparking to the bottom of the trench, ruined.

Morgedh followed after her, not wasting energy or exposing himself by jumping. Instead, he manipulated the Force to speed himself up, dashing towards her as his saber swept up in an arc that would separate her right arm from her shoulder. Ariada hastily crossed her sabers to block, but the triple-blow follow-up strikes sent her staggering back, defending as fast as she could, but more often just retreating in the face of relentless barrage of his offense.

This was saber dueling of a caliber that she had only rarely seen, how Morgedh batted away her attempts at attacks, how his glowing saber blade sought to cripple her by hitting an arm or a leg. His one blade was three times as fast as her two weapons combined and the Noghri wasted no effort in overextended or poorly aimed combinations. His fighting style was efficient and direct, even though he was hampering himself by trying to disable her.

Ariada gave ground freely, her arms shaking from the effort of trying to block his relentless blows. Sweat soaked her even as Morgedh advanced coolly. In response, she swung out and hit a power cable, sending a flurry of sparks right at his face. He ducked under them nimbly, lunging and striking out in a blow that forced her to backflip to avoid losing her feet at the ankles.

Morgedh wasted no time, but immediately gestured. Ariada felt a vise-like surge of Force power close around her and slam her back into the rounded shell that encased the weather tower’s power capacitors. All the air left her lungs as she impacted, but Ariada focused her concentration into breaking Morgedh’s Force grip, snapping it off of her and preventing him from using telekinesis again. She could not ordinarily have accomplished that feat, but fueling her Force usage with the burning anger and pain inside her unleashed a more primal display of Force usage, wrenching the Force grip of Morgedh away from her body. Raw power flowed through her as she funneled her anger into Force usage, more power than she had ever felt.

However, the Noghri warrior struck swiftly, a powerful four-blow overhand combo that Ariada whipped her shotos up to counter. However, her defense, while well-executed and effective in fending off his slashes, did nothing to block the flying kick he planted squarely on her torso. The ribs that had previously only been bruised snapped from the impact as she flew backwards to impact the protective shell casing for the second time. Again, the wind was knocked from her violently and she gasped for air as she struggled upright, her weapons dropped from her hands.

For his part, Morgedh stood stolidly before her. Her stubborn refusal to yield was forcing him to use increasingly harsh measures in the effort to subdue her. His lightsaber held ready, he encroached on his injured opponent, ready for any sudden moves.

“Enough,” he said firmly. “You will only be injured worse if you persist.”

“That’s what you think,” she snapped.

Morgedh’s danger sense sent a sudden warning through his head and he backflipped over an invisible lightsaber that Ariada had concealed with the Force and thrown at his feet. Reminding himself not to treat her as weak, he gritted his teeth and extended his arm towards the concealed weapon, using his own Force skills to penetrate her camouflage. The thrown lightsaber arced away from her mental grip and flew to his hand, where he caught it easily.

In the mean time, though, Ariada had recovered and leaped up onto the protective shell, running up its steep slope to the crown of the weather control nexus. Ariada saw Morgedh doggedly continue his chase and knew that flight was her only option. She reached the rim of the protective shell, a circular ring that crested the buttresses containing the power capacitors. Tall conductive spires were arranged evenly around the rim, focusing energy from the capacitors into the giant polarization sphere in the center of the nexus.

The air began to crackle and spark and Ariada felt her hair stand on end as the dispersion arrays began swinging around. There was strong smell of ozone and she realized that the nexus was powering up to dissipate a storm. Soon, the entire crown of the nexus would be crackling with lethal tendrils of energy funneling into the polarization sphere, where they would be charged and directed into the focusing crystal and from there into Yanibar’s weather patterns.

She had no time to further contemplate the increasingly dangerous nature of her location, though, as Morgedh came leaping up, his lightsaber swinging out in a horizontal arc to prevent any attack from Ariada. Now reduced to only a single short lightsaber against his longer one, Ariada danced backwards, parrying his blows when necessary, but attempting no counter-attack. She would need a perfect opportunity to disable Morgedh.

Glowing blue tendrils of lightning began coruscating around the conductive spires and bolts began crackling off the air towards them. Ariada caught one on her lightsaber, feeling the jolt of energy rush up her blade. She quickly parried the first two strikes of Morgedh’s next four-blow combination, then ducked under the third swing. His fourth blow would have sliced off her right arm except for the kick she barely managed to land on his ankle, ruining his slash and allowing her to spin away. A larger bolt of lightning arced out from the nearest spire, but Ariada was ready for it and used her shoto to deflect the lethal energy towards Morgedh. The Noghri caught it on his own blade, though, forcing an impasse as she continued to deflect lightning towards him. He stood there immovably, his brilliant blue blade absorbing every joule of energy she deflected towards him.

“Surrender, Ariada,” he said.

She spat on the ground on his direction, too focused on her task for words. Then, he thrust out with one hand. Ariada’s eyes widened as she was forcibly hurled backward into the conductive spire. Immediately she was encased in a field of energy bolts snaking up and down her body, agonizing every fiber of her being. She screamed as the surges of energy seared her skin and scrambled her nerves. Pain and anger flowed through her just as readily and despite her torment, she collected all of the energy and channeled it through her hands, amplifying its effects with her own Force power. Morgedh caught her blasts of lightning on his lightsaber, but the impact was enough to drive him back a step. She screamed, a feral cry of pain and anguish as she tried to overload his defenses, but it was in vain. He was too strong.

Ariada collapsed off the spire, her skin smoking and charred where the energy tendrils had hit her. Her limbs shook and she felt that she could barely move. Still, she retained enough presence of mind to rise shakily to her feet and ignite her shoto one last time.

Morgedh stood waiting, as implacably as ever.

“If this is all you have learned from me, then I have failed you,” he said.

“No,” she replied indignantly. “You failed me by limiting my power. You failed me by not letting me explore my true potential.”

Closing her eyes and summoning the darkest, most primeval emotions from her soul, she howled at him in a Force screech, a wail of pain and anguish, of betrayal and loss. The earsplitting sound, laden with the malicious tones of dark side power, sent him staggering back. It was raw and unleashed, a side of her that she had kept hidden from everyone. Now, she poured it out, all the negative impulses and dark instincts, in an overwhelming flow of Force power. She felt strong as she harnessed that which she had sought to dampen and hide for so long, blasting away at Morgedh’s defenses with success for the first time.

Ariada was so enrapt by her new technique that it took her a second to feel the bar of blue energy that ran through her leg. A lance of fire exploded in her thigh, disrupting her concentration. Opening her eyes, she looked down to see the hilt of her own short lightsaber, the one that Morgedh had caught after she threw it at him, protruding from her thigh. She wobbled, then gritted her teeth and pulled the weapon out of her leg with an inhuman cry of pain. The agony was too much for even her Force skills to damp, overloading her senses as she went into shock. She tried to mouth one last curse at Morgedh, but couldn’t muster the strength for even that effort.

Clutching at her pierced leg, she fell over the rim and into the deep hollow of the power capacitor chamber. Morgedh leapt after her, catching the unconscious woman. Holding her tightly with one arm as they plummeted, he pulled a cable gun from his belt and fired a piton up onto the rim. The line jerked them to a halt and he hit a button, causing it to retract and carry them upward even in the slicing maelstrom of the power spikes. The Force was his ally, forming a shield around him and Ariada to protect them from the wild tendrils of electricity. Slowly, they made it up to the rim again, where he clipped Ariada to the line and hauled himself over before pulling her up. Morgedh set Ariada down and restrained her arms with a sturdy set of stuncuffs, then pulled out his comlink.

“I have her,” he said simply.

“How is she?” Selu came Selu’s reply.

“She lives, but is injured. She will need medical attention. I had no other choice.”

“I understand,” Selu answered. “And you?”

Morgedh exhaled heavily.

“I am fine,” he told his superior. “I just did not want it to be this way.”

“Same here,” Selu said. “Same here.”


 * Sha Kalan

Ryion sat in a quiet meditation room in the Sha Kalan, the Zeison Sha temple that had been turned into the headquarters for the Elite Guardians. The lighting was subdued, the nondescript, unfurnished room laden with shadows that split the room into light and dark zones. There was no furniture, not even a chair, or decoration on the wall. It was simple stone, hewn from the mountains of Yanibar and illuminated by faint glowlamps. Ryion was positioned right on the edge of one of the shadows, trying to utilize the quiescence of the meditation room to achieve clarity of mind. Cross-legged, his eyes closed, he was silent, letting the Force fill him and sense the duel between Ariada and Morgedh. He winced at the pain of his lover as she was driven back and wounded, sensed Morgedh’s steely determination, and grimaced at the taint of darkness inside Ariada as she unleashed the Force lightning on the Noghri warrior.

Quietly, he bowed his head as he felt Ariada slip into unconsciousness. With considerable effort, he opened his eyes and looked at his hands, noting that they were shaking. One hand slipped down to his belt for his lightsaber, but came up empty. He had surrendered it, along with his shield, to the gatekeeper upon arrival and had been sequestered in this room to contemplate, but not to act. He knew he was being monitored, and that any attempt of his to interfere would not be treated well.

Anger built in him at being unable to speak with Ariada. He knew he could have dissuaded her, could have stopped her from her foolish escapade. Instead, he was locked here, observed and distrusted, helpless to prevent a less violent outcome. It was the law, he knew, but it was an unjust one, and no amount of logical argument or tearful emotion would persuade his parents to change their minds.

Clenching one fist, he smashed into it into his hand, then reached up to brush away a tear that he hadn’t realized had started to slide down his face. As much as he hated to admit it, it was a lie. He would not have been able to stop Ariada, and that hurt even more than his inability to try. She felt dark, like there was a black cloud over her spirit that he hadn’t sensed before. Her presence was infused with an alien aspect to it that was so different than the shy, withdrawn, but caring woman he had fallen in love with. It was harsh and vengeful, spiteful and malicious, full of selfish pride and neglect for any other priorities but her own, qualities that Ryion never would have associated with Ariada.

Something had changed in her, possibly due to suffering she had seen during their offworld missions. Possibly it was due to her background, but whatever it was, Ryion hadn’t detected it until now. That pointed to a failing in him to see the darkness building up in the team member he was the closest to, the one whom out of all people, he should have been watching the most. Had he assumed that all was well with her emotionally, or just not been observant enough, or what? It was disconcerting that he hadn’t been looking out for her as much as he should have.

Ryion was so lost in his introspection that he didn’t hear the door slide open and Selu entered quietly. Only when the elder Kraen sat down in a pose that mirrored Ryion’s did the younger man look up at him.

“Morgedh caught her,” Ryion said.

It was not a question. The Force had told Ryion all he needed to know about that duel, including the fact that Ariada was still alive. Even if he hadn’t been actively sensing the battle, he would have known better than to guess that Ariada could escape someone as gifted as Morgedh.

“He did,” Selu told him, “but I’m not here about that. I’m here for you.”

“Oh?” Ryion asked, one eyebrow twitching upward slightly.

“Believe it or not, I know how you feel,” Selu said. “I know what it’s like to be helpless and to feel that you’re responsible for the loss of someone you love.”

“Do you?” Ryion asked him, his anger rising. “Have you ever had to sit quietly and do nothing while your teacher battled your lover?”

“No,” Selu said calmly.

“Then I don’t think you exactly know how I feel right about now!” Ryion shot back, eyes smoldering with anger.

If anything, the heat of his reply only made Selu look sadder.

“Son, let me tell you a story,” he said.

Ryion inclined his head slightly, but there was little patience in the gesture.

“Go ahead.”

“A long time ago, there was a young Jedi who was faced with a terrible choice. He was given the choice by a mentor to embrace the dark side and save the woman he loved, or he could report his treacherous mentor to the Jedi Council and stop the spread of the dark side.”

“What did he choose?” Ryion asked.

“He chose to do the right thing,” Selu said. “He went to the Council and reported that the man he had so much admiration and respect for, a man who had been a father to him, had fallen to the dark side, even though he knew that it might mean he would not be able to protect his love. Would you say he did the right thing?”

“I. . . I don’t know,” Ryion said, his voice thick with emotion.

Selu’s words had softened his anger and Ryion knew that venting his ire on his father was not a productive means of resolving his frustration.

“Before today, I would have told you that he did,” Ryion added. “I’m not sure now.”

“There’s more to the story,” Selu continued. “The Council sent four wise and powerful Jedi Masters to confront the fallen man and to stop him from spreading the dark side. The young Jedi who had been so honorable and reported this to the Council was asked to step aside, for fear of his own conflicted emotions. But in the end, the young Jedi could not do it. He interrupted a fight between the Jedi and the darksider, but acted on the side of the fallen one. He betrayed and killed the Jedi, not because he hated the Jedi Order, but because the thought of losing the one he loved was too much for him to bear.”

It dawned on Ryion who his father was talking about and his head snapped up so he could look directly into Selu’s eyes.

“You’re talking about Anakin Skywalker,” he said.

“That’s right,” Selu answered. “It took me years of espionage and digging to find out exactly how it happened, but I had to know. I had to know what persuaded the most talented, most accomplished Jedi in the entire order, to become the monster that was Darth Vader. And now that I know, it just makes me pity him all the more.”

“And you’re comparing me to Anakin,” Ryion concluded.

“You are a lot alike,” Selu admitted. “Talented beyond your years, more powerful than any other Jedi your age, accomplished, and involved to a relationship that is not sanctioned by the authorities.”

He leaned in closer to Ryion, gazing squarely into the eyes of his son.

“The question is, will you make the same choices that Skywalker did?”

Ryion returned Selu’s stare.

“Do you have to ask?”

“If I was in your position, at your age, with your bond to Ariada, I would have to ask myself that question,” Selu told him simply. “Never underestimate what love can make us do. It is the most powerful force in the universe. Even greater than the Force. Remember that, Ryion, and remember that you alone can choose the path you take in life.”

Ryion stood up suddenly, planting himself in a military attention pose.

“I am a Jedi, like my father before me,” Ryion answered through gritted teeth. “I cannot side with one who has fallen to the dark side.”

“I know you mean those words, son, but I also know that they hurt,” Selu told him, as he likewise rose to his feet. “The look on your face would tell me that, even if I didn’t have the Force.”

“I loved her, Dad,” Ryion said fiercely, turning to slap one hand against the rough-hewn stone wall for support. “We were partners, and something more.”

“I know,” Selu replied sympathetically. “And I also know that this wasn’t your fault. She made her own decisions and the blame for those lies on her alone.”

“I should have noticed,” Ryion answered, his voice bitter and angry. “I should have known something was wrong.”

“You can’t beat yourself up over that. If she could have gone to anyone, told anyone about what she was harboring deep inside her, it would have been you, Ryion. She knew that you would help her through it, that you wouldn’t abandon her if she confided in you. But she didn’t want that.”

“What do you mean?”

Selu paused, knowing that he was about to reveal another unpleasant truth to his son. “She did not want to be helped out of her darkness, son. She wanted to use it. She hid her rebellious intent, her pain, and her anger from you because you would not have allowed her to do what she did. Ariada rejected your help by never giving you an opportunity to offer it.”

Ryion looked back at Selu with a strange light in his eyes.

“Are you saying she deliberately deceived me? You’re saying she was trying to mislead me?”

“I’m saying that she did not make her thoughts and emotions known to you even though you are her closest confidante. One of the most dangerous things you can ever do is shut out the ones who care about you and whom you trust from what is happening in your life, and that’s what she did.”

Ryion shook his head ruefully.

“I understand, Father,” he said. “Thank you.”

The stiff tone in his voice told Selu that his son had had enough for now. Selu bowed slightly then stepped out of the room quietly, leaving Ryion back to his contemplation. Milya and Sarth were waiting for him outside the doorway.

“How did it go?” Milya asked him.

“About as well as expected,” Selu answered.

“That bad?” Sarth inquired.

Selu nodded.

“He’s pretty torn. What Ariada did hurt him deeply, but so does his inaction. When I told him that she hid her intent from him on purpose, I wasn’t sure if that thought would be helpful to him.”

“Are you sure now?” Milya inquired.

“No,” Selu answered curtly, then switched topics. “How is Ariada?”

“She’s stable. Confined, of course, after her injuries were treated. She’s being monitored, but so far she seems quiet. Contemplative, even,” Milya told him.

“If you looked at her, you never would have guessed that only a few hours earlier, she was breaking into secure facilities and disobeying direct orders while seething with the dark side,” Sarth said.

Selu frowned as Sarth showed him a datapad with a video image of Ariada in her cell.

“I don’t like it,” he said. “Nobody goes from raging mad to that quiet after their plans were upset. She should be a lot more upset.”

“Ariada has always been withdrawn,” Milya reminded him. “It isn’t like her to openly display that kind of emotion.”

“Or it means she’s hiding something,” Selu returned. “I don’t know. I just have a really bad feeling about this.”

“If it helps, I’ve set up the inquest already,” Milya told him. “It’s been years since we’ve had to organize one, but I still remember the procedures. The hearing starts in a week, once she’s more or less recovered.”

“Good,” Selu said. “There was great darkness running through her today. That kind of thing needs to be dealt with swiftly, but also with great consideration. We don’t want to act too hastily. How about the data leak?”

“Bad news is, she downloaded all of the data recovered from Psykith. The security protocols took her less than a half hour to break through undetected,” Sarth reported. “I’m rather surprised by how weak YGI’s security was.”

Milya glowered at him.

“May I remind you that she’s a very talented Force-using slicer who is also familiar with our security systems?” Milya shot back. “Not just your average slicer.”

“I’d be worried if YGI’s security system only protected from average slicers,” Sarth replied mildly. “My network security team might have some ideas to help improve in that area.”

“I’ll set up a meeting between them and the appropriate people then,” Milya said sourly. “And the good news?” Selu interrupted.

“Good news is that we got it all back, unless she did some kind of hidden transmission. You can ask her about that, I suppose. As far as we can tell, though, she had the only copy on her, and we have that now,” Sarth told him.

“That’s something at least,” Milya answered. “But I sense that we haven’t gotten to the bottom of this yet. Ariada Cerulaen is a lot smarter than to risk everything on a rash break-in attempt that she knew would probably get her caught. We’re missing something here.”

“I know,” Selu said. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”