by Timothy Zahn
“He got a ride?” Luke asked incredulously. “Out here?”
Fel shrugged. “All I know is what Formbi said. Maybe he contacted Nirauan and Admiral Parck arranged something.”
“Maybe,” Mara said. Personally, she didn’t believe that for a minute, but there was no point arguing about it. “So what’s our next move?”
“Our next move is to go back to our quarters,” Luke said firmly. “I don’t know about you, but I’ve got a few small burns that need to be attended to.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Fel said, getting up quickly from his chair and starting toward one of the medpacs fastened to the wall beside the emergency oxygen tanks. “I didn’t even think about—”
“No, no, that’s all right,” Luke hastened to assure him. “We don’t need medical help. We’ll be able to fix ourselves up just fine overnight with a Jedi healing trance.”
“Oh.” Fel stopped short, and Mara could sense his embarrassment. “I’m sorry. I guess I don’t know as much about Jedi as I thought I did.”
“Have you ever even met one before?” Mara asked.
“Well, no,” Fel admitted. “But I have read up on them. I mean, on you. I mean—”
“We know what you mean,” Luke said, smiling slightly. “Don’t worry about it.” He stood up. “Mara?”
“We’ll see you tomorrow, Commander,” Mara said, getting to her feet.
“All right,” Fel said. “I’ll see you out.”
“Don’t bother,” Luke said. “We can find the way. You’d better go see to your men.”
“Maybe discuss some new security arrangements,” Mara added.
Fel made a face. “Point taken. Good night.”
The stormtroopers had vanished from the ready room as Luke and Mara passed through, their armor hung neatly on the racks lining the walls. “That last comment was a little unfair, you know,” Luke commented as they walked down the corridor toward their quarters. “I’m sure he did have some security set up.”
“That’s why I said they needed a new set of arrangements,” Mara countered. “The old ones obviously weren’t good enough.”
“Mm,” Luke said. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
Mara looked sideways at him. “You have a thought?”
He shrugged, glancing casually behind them. “I don’t know if it occurred to you, but we only have Fel’s word that there were any data cards here in the first place.”
“Or that he really did talk to Jinzler about them before dinner,” Mara agreed. “He could just be venting waste gases here, trying to get us to look suspiciously at everyone except him. You think we ought to pay a little visit to Jinzler before we lock down for the night?”
Luke shook his head. “Not worth it. We definitely need to talk with him sometime before we get to Outbound Flight, but I don’t want to do it with these burns distracting us. Besides, even if Fel did talk to him about Outbound Flight, it doesn’t prove anything. By Fel’s own admission he was trying to see what Jinzler knew about the mission. If Jinzler didn’t have anything, but said he wanted to see Fel’s records—”
“Records Fel didn’t have,” Mara murmured.
“Right—records he didn’t have,” Luke said, “then Fel would still have to fake a robbery. It’d be easier to fake it to us than wait until Jinzler came by.”
“Except that we might catch him at it,” Mara pointed out.
“You’re forgetting the sequence of the conversation,” Luke reminded her. “It wasn’t until we told him we couldn’t always catch people in lies that he even mentioned he had the data cards.”
Mara played back the memory. Blasted if he wasn’t right. “You’re really making me look bad tonight,” she growled. “I thought I was the one who was supposed to have had the investigative training.”
“It’s all the time I’ve spent hanging around Corran Horn,” Luke said dryly. “Some of it rubs off on a person. Besides, you’ve got other things on your mind.”
Mara felt her muscles stiffen. “What do you mean?” she asked cautiously.
He shrugged, too casually. “I was hoping you’d tell me,” he said. “All I know is that there’s something still churning around behind those beautiful green eyes of yours.”
Mara snorted under her breath. “So it’s flattery now, is it? That’s a sure sign you’ve run out of logical arguments and persuasive skill.”
“Or else it’s a sign of my sincerity and commitment to your continued happiness as my wife and companion,” Luke countered.
“Ooh—I like that,” Mara said approvingly. “Commitment to my continued happiness. Make sure you use that one again sometime.”
“I’ll make a note,” Luke promised. His smile faded into seriousness. “You know that I’m always ready to listen.”
She caught his hand, squeezed it. “I know,” she assured him. “And it’s no big deal—really it isn’t. I just have to do some thinking on my own before I can talk about it, that’s all.”
“Okay,” Luke said, and she could feel his concern fading a little. But only a little. “Oh, and there’s one more factor here we shouldn’t forget. Fel’s stormtrooper squad isn’t exactly homogeneous.”
Mara frowned. “Are you talking about that alien, Su-mil?”
“Yes,” Luke said. “We don’t know anything about him or his people, after all. It’s possible he’s running with his own agenda.”
“Possible, but unlikely,” Mara said, shaking her head. “The Five-Oh-First wasn’t exactly your run-of-the-star-lane stormtrooper unit. They were an elite among elites, and I can’t imagine Parck reviving it without holding to those standards.”
“I didn’t say it was likely,” Luke reminded her mildly. “I would hope that Fel hadn’t just thrown chance cubes when he picked his people for this mission. I just thought it was something we should keep in mind.”
* * *
They did make one short side trip on the way back, stopping by the Jade Sabre to make sure she was properly locked down against intruders. After that admittedly snide comment to Fel, Mara knew she would never live it down if her own ship got broken into. Back in their quarters, they were preparing for bed when Formbi’s official announcement came over the shipwide speaker system that the fire damage had been repaired and that the mission would continue without interruption. He made no mention of the assistance the Chiss had received in battling the blaze; nor was there any comment as to the cause of the explosion that had started the fire in the first place.
Later, lying beside Luke in the darkness, Mara stared at the ceiling and wondered what exactly was going on inside her.
It had come on so quickly, this quiet feeling of guilt that had suddenly taken hold of her like a hand gently gripping her throat. Suddenly, all the things she’d done through the years she was Palpatine’s agent were coming back to haunt her. The heavy-handed investigations; the casual brushing aside of even the limited rights that had existed under the Empire; the summary judgments.
The summary killings.
But she’d put all that behind her. Hadn’t she? She’d never truly been on the dark side, after all—Luke himself had pointed that out to her three years ago. She’d served Palpatine and the Empire as best and as honestly as she’d known how, based on the admittedly slanted information he’d given her. Certainly the fact that she was now a Jedi seemed to support the view that her actions were redeemable.
So what was it that was bringing all this back? Fel and his stormtroopers, the most visible image of Imperial rule and excesses? The mission itself and its constant reminder that the destruction of Outbound Flight had been one of Palpatine’s early atrocities?
Or was it something else entirely, something more subtle? After all, Palpatine had paid for his deeds with his life. So had Darth Vader and Tarkin and all the other Grand Moffs. Even Thrawn, whom she now realized had probably been nobler than all the rest of them put together, was gone. Only she, Mara Jade, the Emperor’s Hand, had survived.
Why?
She rol
led uncomfortably over onto her side, transferring her stare from the darkness of the ceiling to the darkness on the far side of the room. Survivor’s guilt, she remembered hearing someone call it once. Was that what Fel and Outbound Flight had sparked in her? If true, it was pretty stupid, particularly at this late date.
Unless it was what Luke had suggested earlier. That there were still things about the Empire that she was reluctant to let go of.
She took a deep breath, let it out quietly. Luke was still awake, too, she knew, watching her emotions swirl around, ready to join her in her struggle whenever she was ready to invite him in.
She reached over and found his hand. “We’re supposed to be doing Jedi healing trances, right?” she murmured.
He took the hint. “Right,” he murmured back. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” she said. “Good night.”
“Good night.”
She closed her eyes, settling herself more comfortably against the pillow and stretching out to the Force. After all, Luke had accepted her, dark past and all. If he could do it, she certainly ought to be able to.
* * *
Mara’s breathing slowed, her mind and emotions quieting as she slipped into the healing trance. Luke watched her lovingly as she went silent, then gently disengaged his hand from hers and rolled over to face the opposite wall. It had been a long and busy day, and he had his own burns to deal with. He’d best get to it.
But the calmness and concentration necessary for the healing trance refused to come. Something was going on aboard this ship, something wrapped in a dark and murky purpose. Someone aboard—maybe more than one someone—was going to Outbound Flight for some other reason besides respect or penance.
He shifted his shoulders uncomfortably beneath the weight of the blankets. But then, to be perfectly honest, didn’t he have an ulterior reason of his own for being here?
Of course he did. Outbound Flight was a relic from the last, turbulent days of the Old Republic, its existence and records offering the chance to fill in some of the gaps in the New Republic’s history of that period. But even more importantly, it might offer a detailed look into the ways and organization of that last generation of the full Jedi Order. There might be information aboard that would fill in the gaps in his own knowledge and understanding, showing him what he was doing right.
And, more importantly, what he was doing wrong.
He grimaced in the darkness. Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master. The Jedi Master, as far as most of the New Republic was concerned. Founder, teacher, and leader of the resurgent Jedi Order.
How in the worlds had he wound up in this position, anyway? How was it that he had been loaded with the responsibility for rebuilding something that had taken past generations centuries or more to create?
Because he had been all that there was, that was how. When gone am I, Yoda had said in those final moments, the last of the Jedi will you be. Pass on what you have learned.
He’d done his best to live up to Yoda’s command. But sometimes—too many times—his best hadn’t been enough.
Yoda’s training had helped, but not enough. The Holocron had helped, but not enough. Advice and correction from Leia and Mara had helped, but not enough.
Was there something that had survived aboard Outbound Flight that might also help? He didn’t know. To be honest, he was almost afraid to find out.
He was going to search for it just the same, because he had to. He and Mara had both felt the gentle but unmistakable leading of the Force in accepting Formbi’s invitation, and he knew too well that ignoring that nudge would bring bitter regret somewhere down the line. For good or evil, they were going to Outbound Flight.
And who could tell? Maybe there was even something aboard that would finally lay to rest his questions about Jedi marriage. Dissenting opinions from other Jedi Masters, perhaps, or even an indication that the whole Order had been wrong in the prohibition.
But he wouldn’t know until they arrived. And he might as well arrive healthy. Taking a deep breath, letting the doubts and concerns slide away from him, he stretched out to the Force.
* * *
All the noise and bustle in the corridors outside had died down by the time Dean Jinzler put aside his datapad and started getting ready for bed. It had been a long, strange day, full of odd people and odd events, and he was tired with the kind of weariness that had haunted him for so much of his adult life.
And yet, at the same time, there was a fresh excitement underlying the fatigue. An excitement, and a darkly simmering dread.
Outbound Flight. After half a century, he was finally going to see the huge, mysterious project that had taken Lorana away from the Republic. He would stand where she had stood, see what she had seen. Perhaps, if he was very lucky, he would even be able to catch an echo of the idea or goal that had captured her own imagination, and to which she had dedicated her life.
And he would see where that all-too-short life had ended.
He gazed at his reflection in the refresher station mirror as he cleaned his face and teeth. Behind the lines and wrinkles, he could still see a hint of the much younger face that had sneered at Lorana and resented her for so many years, the face that had sent her off without even a proper farewell. The eyes gazing back at him—had her eyes been that same shade of gray? He couldn’t remember. But whatever the color, he knew her eyes hadn’t been cold and hard like his, but warm and alive and compassionate. Even toward him, who hadn’t deserved any compassion at all. The hard set to his mouth hadn’t been there, of course, way back then.
Or maybe it had. He’d carried this edge of quiet bitterness with him for a long time.
Rather like that young woman he’d met earlier, the stray thought occurred to him: that Mara Jade Skywalker. There was an air of old and bittersweet memory about her, too. For all the evidence of recent smoothing he could see in her face, it was clear that some of those memories would take a long time to fade.
Some memories, of course, never faded completely, no matter how much one might wish them to. He was living proof of that.
He finished in the refresher and stepped back into the bedchamber. And yet, for all the traces of old hardness and cynicism he could see in her face, he also knew that it had been Mara who had made the final decision not to expose him to Formbi.
That made him nervous all by itself. Compassion was something he’d long ago learned to dislike, and compassion from Jedi was even more ominous. Jedi, if you believed the old stories and New Republic propaganda, were supposed to be able to read people’s characters and attitudes with a single glance. Could they also read minds and thoughts and intentions? If so, what exactly had Mara read in him?
He snorted. Nonsense. How in the name of Outer Rim bug-eaters could she possibly read his feelings when he himself couldn’t even sort them out?
He didn’t have an answer. Maybe she would, if he asked her.
Or maybe she would just decide that her mercy and second chances would be better spent on someone else, and turn him in to Formbi after all.
No. The chance cube had been thrown, and all he could do now was to sit back and see it through to the end. And as for the Jedi, his best bet would be to simply keep his distance from both of them.
Turning off the light, he settled himself down into the bed. And tried to push back the memories long enough to sleep.
CHAPTER 8
The next two days went by quietly. Luke spent much of the time with the Geroons, poring over New Republic planetary listings and trying hard to be patient with their continual and wearying mixture of hero worship and eagerness to please. Between world searches he tried to draw out some details of their encounter with Outbound Flight, but their stories seemed so confused and half mythic that he soon gave up the effort. Clearly, none of these particular Geroons had been there, and those who had hadn’t done a very good job of reporting the event.
He didn’t see Mara much during that time except at meals and in the evenings after they had s
ettled in for the night. But a comparison of notes showed she was doing far better at the task of information gathering than he was. With Feesa as her guide, she had begun a methodical study of the Chaf Envoy and its crew.
Her first task had been to confirm some numbers. It turned out Fel had been right about the crew complement: besides General Drask there were four officers, thirty other crew members, and twelve line soldiers, making a total of forty-seven wearing the black Defense Fleet uniforms. Formbi’s staff, in contrast, consisted only of Feesa and two other members of the Chaf family.
She never did get a proper explanation as to why Formbi was traveling so light, though Feesa did mention that under normal circumstances the entire ship’s crew would have been Chaf, with no Defense Fleet personnel present at all. Eventually, she and Luke concluded that he had been right about the Nine Families’ reluctance to have a single family get too much of the credit for the Outbound Flight expedition. The credit, or anything else that might come out of it.
The Chiss, for the most part, seemed fairly neutral to Mara’s presence and the various questions she put to them during her tour. Drask continued to be gruffly polite when she ran into him, though there was no way of knowing how much of the courtesy was because of Mara’s own status and how much was the fact that Formbi’s aide was standing right there, ready to report any slippage in proper behavior toward the Aristocra’s guests.
Formbi was even busier than the general, spending most of his time consulting in private with his other two staffers, Drask, or Talshib and the other ship’s officers. Mara saw him a few times, but only at a distance, and usually in deep conversation with someone else. After that first formal evening meal together, he also began eating elsewhere, leaving his host duties mainly to Feesa and Talshib’s officers.
As near as she could tell, Fel and his stormtroopers also kept largely to themselves and mostly out of sight of everyone else. On the handful of occasions outside of mealtimes when she ran into Fel, he was cordial enough, though she reported sensing a certain preoccupation beneath the surface. Neither of them mentioned the stolen data cards.
