Desperate Times/Part 4

"There are many Force powers only entrusted to Jedi Masters," the simulacrum of the old Twi'lek answered, his pale eyes narrowed in curiosity. "As there are many no Jedi may wield while remaining a Jedi."

"But the ones that are within the light," Tirien pressed. "Powers that can counter the Sith."

The gatekeeper took his time in answering. "Light is always the answer to the darkness, but a single ray of light can not fall on every shadow. To end a direct threat to life, some Jedi have reached into the discipline of morichro…"

"What is it?"

"With its power, a Jedi can slow the vital functions of a living being—bring on catatonia, stasis. Suspended animation without—"

"That's not what I'm looking for," Tirien interrupted. Master Robulg frowned at his side, but he pressed, "What do you know of Sith alchemy?"

The gatekeeper's holographic eyes went from Tirien to Robulg and back. "It is a perversion—a distortion of nature. In older times, beings called it 'Sith magic', and worshipped its practitioners among the ancient Sith species.  Stelae and tablets dating to the time of the ancient Rakata—"

"I meant countering it. Fighting its effects."

"Patience," Master Robulg counseled.

Tirien took a deep breath, trying to still his mind. "Do you have chronicles of Sith alchemy being used against the Jedi?"

"Too many," the Twi'lek lamented.

"And?"

"Ulic Qel-Droma," the gatekeeper said. "He was poisoned with Sith poison."

"What happened?!"

"It incited fury in him…drove him to the dark side. In the end, he struck down a fellow Jedi—his own brother.  Nomi Sunrider was forced to contain his powers—to block his ability to touch the Force."

Tirien winced. Qel-Droma's crimes were legend among Jedi, though he had never heard that Sith alchemy had been involved in the ancient Knight's fall. But listening to a holocron he couldn't so much as activate without help, surrounded by lives he couldn't feel, cast out of the embrace of the Force…was Sunrider really justified? Could even a dark sider—even a Sith Apprentice, as Ulic Qel-Droma had become—deserve this?

"Was Qel-Droma's connection to the Force ever restored?" Master Robulg asked.

"It was," the gatekeeper answered. Tirien sat up, hope bolting awake inside, but the simulacrum continued, "in a way. In death, he became one with the Force."

Tirien felt the fresh wound as hope died yet again. "If it's all the same to you, Master, I'd rather return to the Force before I die."

Master Robulg chided him with a frown. "A holocron knows only what it knows, Tirien, and it can not be blamed for the evils of the Sith." Looking up at the gatekeeper, he asked, "How did Qel-Droma return to the Force?"

"If that is known, I do not know it," the Twi'lek answered. "Only three Jedi beheld Ulic Qel-Droma's death and redemption—Nomi Sunrider, her daughter Vima, and Sylvar."

"Do you know anything more of Jedi who lost their powers and returned to the Force?"

"I do not."

Tirien sat forward, resting his head in his hands. After a moment, Master Robulg said, "Thank you, Master Jada."

After the too-familiar whuum of the holocron powering down, Tirien sat in the silence of the Holocron Vault, trying to master himself and think clearly. "Do we have Master Sunrider's holocron?"

"Not here," Master Robulg said. "It was kept with many others at the academy on Tython."

Tirien flinched, knowing where this story was going. "And then lost to the dark side?"

Robulg nodded sadly. "Along with most of Tython itself."

Tirien looked at the shelves surrounding them. One curving wall was sealed behind transparisteel, a few rows of palm-sized pyramids given extra security. He looked until he spotted one that was particularly familiar; he had last seen it on Byblos. "And what about the Sith holocrons, Master?"

Robulg followed his gaze and his expression morphed to distaste. "We keep them here because there is nowhere safer to keep them, and they must not fall into the hands of our enemies. That does not mean they are a source of wisdom or learning."

"Who would know Sith alchemy better than a Sith?"

"No one," Robulg agreed, "but why should a Sith Lord's creation divulge its knowledge to a Jedi? It is far more likely to poison your mind as well as your body."

"Maybe…" Tirien winced, then sighed. "Maybe I won't register as a Jedi to it."

Robulg studied him. "Perhaps not, but without your connection to the Force, you're in that much greater danger. No, Tirien, I am sorry, but I can not allow that."

"Master Tem-Fol-Rytil—"

"—bade me assist your search with the knowledge the holocrons in the Vault possess," Master Robulg said with finality. "He did not command me to expose you to mortal peril, and I will not do so of my own volition. If you can persuade him otherwise, you are welcome to try.  Otherwise, there are many other holocrons from Jedi that may possess the answers we seek.  Master Jada spoke truly—the answer to darkness is light, not more darkness."

Tirien sighed, rubbing his eyes; his head ached again. He had the sneaking suspicion Master Tem-Fol-Rytil would take Master Robulg's part if called to adjudicate the matter. He might ask the library Jedi to pursue the matter themselves, but when he forced himself to think clearly, he knew there were limits to what even he would do. He looked again at the holocron he had taken from Garrin Althos on Byblos, remembering the way it had infected the entire underground chamber with fear, had fought against his power and buffeted his mind with the whispers of the dark side…and it had not even been opened. He had lost his powers; Jedi who tangled too carelessly with Sith artifacts might lose their minds, or even their lives.

Tirien stood. "Maybe more tomorrow, Master."

"Go see the healers again," Robulg suggested. "Perhaps they will have news for you."

Tirien walked the long way across the Temple, wondering if Robulg's suggestion had been as innocent as it sounded. He met many fellow Jedi along the way, from venerable Masters to eager young Initiates moving in their Clan packs. Most extended greetings Tirien forced himself to return, but he did not break pace, and they took the hint not to push; one or two called after him, but he neither slowed nor turned, and they at least had the courtesy not to chase him down.

He fared little better with Master Culum that he had with Master Robulg.

"I have reviewed all my findings, Tirien," she growled in the guttural, sloshing Selkath style of Basic. She showed him a holo of an individual molecular bond. "We can find no contaminants in your blood, and you are unchanged down to the cellular level."

"If there's no trace of it, how is the poison still affecting me?"

She shook her head. "I do not know. Broken bones, scalded flesh, ruptured organs…these things I can heal.  I have snatched back from the edge of death many who suffered the worst of physical wounds.  But the dark side…it is a wound beyond the mere physical.  If the Crystals of Fire can not heal your wounds, Tirien, then I fear my humble powers are far too little."

The Circle of Healers had all agreed to permit the experiment, and Tirien had held the glowing cluster of crystal until his brow had broken into a sweat and his palms had started to steam. When he had finally set them down again, he'd had the strength to run laps around the entire Temple, but the oppressive, unending silence in his mind had robbed him of the motivation to try.

He made his way back to his room in the Temple dormitories, assigned in his name when Suwo Tolp chose him as a Padawan but rarely occupied for more than a week or two since that time. Slejux had been kind enough to bring his few possessions from the Crescentia, but apart from a full set of uniforms, various tools, and a small, wrapped box, the only thing that stood out in the room was Mali Darakhan's lightsaber, set on a stand like a relic. It twisted Tirien's stomach to see; he lay on his bedroll, wishing for sleep.

He did not know how long he lay there, staring at the ceiling as sleep and even meditative contemplation eluded him, but eventually he sat up and noticed his transceiver was blinking. He had no need to plug it into his datapad; this code was simple and familiar enough that he could translate the vibrations alone.

Returned home.

Striding to the washbasin in one corner of the room, he dipped his hands and splashed cool water on his face, combing his mussed hair with his fingers, trying to clean up his appearance. He could avoid other Jedi, but he had to put on some semblance of strength for Narasi, even if he was no longer her master. He sat cross-legged on the floor, trying to reach out to her, to get even a hint of her approach. Since Suwo's death, no Jedi had been closer to him than Narasi. If he could not sense even her…

The door beeped at a signal from without. Tirien leaned forward onto his knees, eyes squeezed shut in anguish. He gave himself a long moment of self-pity, then pulled himself together and opened the door.

"Hey."

"Hey."

Her face showed all the worry and unease Tirien had hoped to ward off; he struggled to smooth his expression as he looked her over. "You got hurt," he noticed, pointing to her cracked horn without touching it. "What happened?"

"Got punched." She tried a smile. "It hurt him worse than it hurt me."

"I'm…glad? Consider blocking next time?"

"See what happens when we're apart, Master? These things just don't occur to me…"

They each laughed, but it was a brittle sound. Swallowing, Tirien looked over her shoulder. "Where's Slejux?"

"He went to brief the Council. He said I…I should come talk to you…"

She sounded hesitant; Tirien wasn't sure what to make of it. Gesturing to the floor, he sat down, waiting until she had as well before he asked, "What did you find?"

Narasi looked at the floor. "There was a Sith listening post. We stormed it, took some prisoners, downloaded some data…but they don't know where Alecto is, Master.  Nobody does."

Tirien had expected it, but it was still disappointing. Bringing Alecto in alive was the only way they were likely to trace the poison back to the source. "Any mention of this other name? Kai Latra?"

The Republic struggled to piece together the framework within which their shadowy nemeses operated. The general structure they knew—the Council of Five at the apex, with the Sith Overlords ruling swaths of territory and supported by lesser Sith Lords, who themselves commanded unanointed Acolytes and dark side adepts—but individuals often defied Intelligence's every effort to identify them. They knew most of the Overlords, and Sith Lords like Alecto and Vandak were too conspicuous to remain shadows, but Kai Latra was no more than a name Alecto had let slip on Anaxes. Was it a person? A facility? A planet, even?

Narasi shook her head. "We turned the prisoners over to Intelligence. They said they'd call if they got something…"

The ache in her voice hurt, and after a moment Tirien slid the wrapped box over to her. Narasi took it, frowning in confusion. "What's this for?"

Tirien mustered a smile. "Happy birthday."

"What? Oh!  Oh, hey, yeah, I'm sixteen now!" She looked pleased but surprised by the realization. She stared at the box a moment, then raised her head, confused again. "Since when do you get me birthday presents?"

"It's…been a rough few weeks. I thought you could use something uplifting."

Her face twisted in a way Tirien didn't understand—as if something pained her inside and she was trying to conceal the symptoms. After a second she got herself under control and started tugging on the ribbon, frowning. "How much sealant did you put on this, Master?"

He chuckled once; his throat felt out of practice. "I should explain…you remember your first lightsaber?"

She had turned the box upside down, probing the seams of the paper with her claws and looking for a weak point. "Good hilt, looked kinda like this one, got burned out fighting Churka on Toprawa…yeah, I remember. What about it?"

"You remember how I advised you to hold onto it?"

"Yeah." She gave him a dry look. "I remember telling you that the difference between us was the Suwo's still worked."

"And yet many things can still be of use, even if not in the way we intend or expect. I hope you don't mind—I took the crystals."

Narasi had finally found a seam and stuck a claw under it, but she paused. "You said they were fried."

"And they were—they could never support a lightsaber's blade again, they would've shattered entirely. But I found a vendor a few megablocks down who helped me…repurpose them."

Narasi looked more confused by the moment, but she finally just cut through the paper, crumpling it one-handed and setting it aside. She set the box on her crossed legs and opened it, and her eyes filled her face.

"You did say Zygerrians like bangles and bracelets, right?"

Shaped like bracers, long enough to reach from Narasi's wrists halfway to her elbows, they gleamed with the muted gold of electrum. Each had a blue crystal socketed in its center—smoked dark and latticed with fault lines from the lightsaber's burnout. Narasi took one of them from the box, and her hands trembled.

"Your third crystal was smoked too, but it didn't look right for jewelry. I kept it in the lightsaber hilt, though, in case…in case you…"  He trailed off, frowning. "Narasi?"

She was shaking hard, and it took her three tries to get the bracelet back into its niche in the box. She looked up at him, eyes full of torment, then put her face in her hands and started to cry.

"Narasi!" He shifted to a kneel and laid a hand on her shoulder, feeling impotent and useless, unable to sense her emotions or offer her any consolation in the Force. "What is it?"

She wiped at her watery eyes, but it did no good. "This is m-my fault."

"What is?"

"You! I tried so h-hard, and I thought we could c-catch her, but I keep failing !  And you sit th-there so calm, and I can't feel your presence even when I can feel your hand, and it's killing me!  This is my fault; this never would've happened to you if…if I hadn't…"

She sobbed, but Tirien caught her wrists, firming his jaw. He had obviously failed to put up the strong face she needed, and that failure needed to be amended at once. "Look at me…Narasi, look at me." He waited until she forced her big blue eyes to meet his. "This is Alecto, Narasi. This is all the Sith and their evil."

"If I hadn't stuck you with that needle—"

"Then I'd be dead," Tirien said forcefully. He had wondered if Nomi Sunrider might have shown Ulic Qel-Droma more mercy by simply killing him, but he would never let Narasi see that thought on his face. "Alecto would've killed me along with the Chancellor, and Prince Taylo, and everyone else we lost; you are the only reason I'm still alive. You saved my life, Narasi."

She looked like she longed for that reassurance to be enough, but Tirien could see it wasn't. After a moment's hesitation, she just shook her head, took the box, and fled the room. Tirien opened his mouth to call her back, but what would he say? That it was better to be alive and cast out from the Force's embrace than to die a Jedi? Was it? Uncertain of the answer, he knew he could not show Narasi the adamant resolve she needed to heal; there was nothing to do but let her go.

Tirien had no outlet for the unwonted burst of emotion that propelled him to his feet, and he slammed his hand against the wall. He was not sure how long he stood there, head pressed against his other arm, sucking breaths through gritted teeth, but eventually a mechanized voice asked, "Tirien?"

Starting, he brushed the rough sleeve of his tunic across his eyes before turning. "Slejux? Narasi said you were with the Council."

"I was," Slejux answered. "We returned nearly an hour ago."

Tirien frowned, not sure what to make of it, but as he thought harder he suspected he had the answer—Tirien envisioned her in the dormitory atrium, pacing as she tried to work up the nerve to face him, bound and determined as she was to take the blame for all of this. The caustic thought singed his mind. "Come in, brother."

Slejux closed the door behind him, sitting as Tirien did. "Narasi told me there's no sign of Alecto or this 'Kai Latra'."

"Not yet," Slejux said; even through a vocoder his optimism sounded forced. "Intelligence is still slicing the databanks we confiscated. Has your research here—"

"No progress," Tirien cut the line of inquiry short. It was impossible to get a read on Slejux's feelings without the Force—for all that apprenticeship to Suwo Tolp had taught Tirien to pick up on body language, the faint movements of the Melitto Jedi Knight's cilia were beyond him—so Tirien rerouted the conversation. "Tell me about Narasi."

"She's very skillful—you've taught her well," Slejux said. "Her combat prowess is extraordinary for someone her age, and she has good instincts. I understand better now what you meant about her needing someone more deliberative to guide her, though."

Having to give Narasi's instruction over to another Jedi had been painful, but Tirien would never shortchange her by trapping her in the Temple along with him, nor entrust her education to just any Jedi. She had taken a shine to Kenza on Anaxes, but Tirien thought Kenza was a little too much like Narasi—too willing to act on instinct and plan later, if at all. Mali already had Aldayr, and so Tirien had called on the only other Jedi Knight he would trust with his apprentice's training, to say nothing of her life.

"I hope she hasn't disappointed you?"

Slejux took his time in replying, and Tirien narrowed his eyes. When Slejux finally spoke, he was obviously measuring each word. "She's brave and resourceful, but I worry that this assignment is too close to home—that she is too close to it to see clearly."

"What do you mean?"

"She's attached to you, Tirien. She's taken Darth Alecto's actions as a personal insult, and your situation as a slight to be revenged rather than a mission to be completed.  I'm concerned that, in her drive to save you, she might save you by any means."

"By any…oh." Tirien grimaced, reflecting on Slejux's choice of the word attached. Attachment could lead to the dark side, as could dwelling on grief or excessive self-castigation. And Slejux was unlikely to make such a comment in a vacuum… "Slejux, what did she do?"

Slejux considered his words long enough that Tirien began to dread the ones he would choose. "She would dare any peril to deliver you from this wound you've suffered, Tirien, but she risks forgetting what it is to be a Jedi. That there are lines we do not cross."

"What exactly—"

Slejux raised a hand. "You gave her over to my instruction. You trusted me to guide and train her, and every day I feel the weight of that burden.  But I can not be her master only when it's convenient, Tirien.  I'm her master for now, or I'm not.  And if I am, then a master must have the prerogative to protect his apprentice from the judgment of other Jedi."

Tirien bristled, but he choked down the sharp retort that sprang to his lips. Slejux was right—Tirien either trusted him or he didn't. Tirien did not feel the need to share every one of Narasi's shortcomings with the Jedi Council, and while he had hoped his friend would not see him as remotely as the members of the Council, he could not deny that he was no longer Narasi's master.

Tirien swallowed what he might have said, but it lodged in his stomach and boiled there. Forcing a calm tone that came out flat, he said, "Then I continue to entrust her to your guidance, brother. Thank you for coming to see me."

"Tirien, you're my friend—"

"I'm sorry, Slejux, but I'm feeling tired," Tirien interrupted. "I'd like to get some sleep."

Slejux did not move right away, and Tirien recalled that his innumerable cilia could detect not only movement but heat, sweat, and the changes in bodily chemicals. Could he smell the lie? Tirien stilled himself, willing his heartbeat to stay steady. Would Deesra Luur Jada's morichro work on oneself? Not without the Force, certainly…

"As you say, my friend," Slejux buzzed slowly. He rose at the same pace as if to give Tirien every opportunity to change his mind, but when he stood erect, he merely bowed once. "The Force will be with you again."

"And may it be with you."

Tirien watched him go, giving it a moment before he rose and sealed his door. Could he get out of Narasi the story that Slejux did not see fit to tell him? Perhaps, if he approached her the right way, but only if he was willing to torture her with his presence, the living reminder of her perceived failure. His face twisted at the thought, and stayed that way as he thought of encountering his fellow Knights; Slejux was not wrong, but their conversation had drained what little energy he had for encountering other Jedi. Laying back down on his sleeping mat instead, he watched the shadows creep across the walls of his room, remembering the Force until sleep had mercy upon him at last and took him from the emptiness.