Into the Dark

by Claudia Gray

  Or not.

  The hood of a cloak could serve many purposes: warmth, disguise, muffling of excess noise, and so on. At the moment of their departure, Cohmac Vitus had his pulled up as a shield. He was working too hard at mastering his emotions to worry about controlling every flicker of feeling that might appear on his face. The turmoil within had to be quieted before he undertook his responsibilities on the frontier.

  Volunteering for this had felt like the right move, at the time. Not only was it important work, but it also took Cohmac back to the place where—in his mind—he had ceased to be a student and become a Jedi in truth. The Knighthood trials had been only a formality after the Eiram–E’ronoh crisis.

  But whenever Cohmac thought about those events, he had to fight back emotions no Jedi was supposed to experience.

  Going back will give you peace, he told himself. You will finally be able to set those feelings aside for all time.

  When Cohmac had told himself that on Coruscant, he’d believed it.

  Now he wasn’t as sure.

  Dez Rydan’s long legs stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankles, and he’d leaned his jump seat far enough back that he thought he had a chance of dozing off once they were underway. He’d expected this moment to feel more fraught, but instead he was invigorated. The mere making of a decision sometimes had as much power as any action. Purpose clarified every move, every thought.

  Master Jora would no doubt say that he should be more careful. That craving adventure as he did could lead to other cravings less compatible with the role of a Jedi.

  But resigning from the Zeitooine mission as suddenly as he had—questions had been asked and would be asked again.

  You did what you had to do, Dez thought. If you’d stayed any longer, your frustration would’ve ripened into anger. Aren’t you done second-guessing yourself yet?

  He’d thought he was. For the moment that was true. But only time would tell how long his resolution would hold.

  In the cockpit, Leox nodded as the coordinates came up on their screen. A few strands of his meditation beads, draped over the landing-strut lever, swayed and clicked as Affie eased the Vessel off the landing pad and beyond the spaceport’s confines into the rush of Coruscant. “Good job, Geode,” Leox said. “I’m about ready to get off this crazy planet. It’s so built-up and busy, being outside still feels like being inside.”

  “I wasn’t impressed, either,” Affie said. “We didn’t get to go around a whole lot, but still, Scover made it sound like this was the greatest place in the galaxy.”

  “Great in terms of scale.” Leox nodded toward the surface of the planet as they soared away from it. “Not so much in charm, if you ask me.”

  Affie couldn’t help feeling disappointed. She’d hoped to come back to Scover Byne with some insight or impression that would prove her worthiness to be one of the first members of the Guild to travel to the Galactic Core. There had to be something significant and fantastic about Coruscant, or it wouldn’t be the most important of the Core Worlds, would it? Whatever that was, Affie had missed it. Maybe their passengers would be interesting; if this “Jedi” thing meant much, at least she’d be able to tell Scover about that.

  I just want to make you proud, she thought to the Guild’s owner, and her foster mother.

  The atmosphere thinned. The sky darkened. The Vessel escaped Coruscant and slipped into space. Leox grabbed the hyperdrive levers and said, “Can’t wait to get away from civilization.”

  With that he pulled them into hyperspace, away from the Galactic Core, into the wild.

  The makeshift bunks aboard the Vessel weren’t luxurious, but then again, neither were the Padawans’ quarters in the Temple. Reath noted the small cot, the thin partitions, and the bare-bones ’fresher without complaint.

  Nor could he complain about the Vessel itself. All right, its crew was…eccentric, and maybe it was more ramshackle than the average ship that landed on Coruscant. However, the engines hummed along easily. The internal temperature remained within a range comfortable for humans and most near-human species. The Jedi had plenty of room to relax, either in solitude or with others in the mess.

  Was there any information center? Any way to access histories or fiction? Of course not. It would be silly to expect anything like that on a small transport. But Reath noted it anyway, as the first sign of the deprivations he’d no doubt face on the frontier. Probably it was better to go ahead and get his sulking done now, before he made it to Master Jora and had work to do. Reath still had hopes of changing her mind, but he would rule out that faint possibility before he’d even started if he showed up at Starlight at anything less than his best.

  So he wasn’t in the mood for company. However, he was in the mood to eat, as usual. Growing as fast as he was—twelve centimeters the past year alone—sometimes it seemed as if it were physically impossible to stuff in as much food as he actually needed.

  To Reath’s relief, the Vessel’s mess was completely silent. He could have privacy and lunch. Under his breath he muttered, “The best of both—gahh!”

  At the far end of the mess stood Geode. Had he moved from the cockpit? Had Leox and Affie moved him? Did he walk, or crawl, or roll, or teleport? Reath squinted at the rock, trying to determine whether the being was friendly, irritated, or even awake. Trying, and failing.

  “Sorry,” Reath began. “You, uh, you startled me there.”

  Geode made no response. Reath felt silly for expecting one.

  “Oh, hey,” said Affie Hollow as she trooped into the mess. “So, how do you like her? The Vessel, I mean.”

  “She’s perfect for what we need,” Reath admitted.

  The word perfect made Affie’s face light up like a Naboo lantern. “I love this ship. It’s my favorite in the whole fleet.”

  “What fleet?”

  “The Byne Guild,” she said, opening up a packet of pale pink powder and tapping it into a small bowl. “Scover Byne is the owner, and she says she’s grooming me to help take over someday. If I take on just a little more responsibility, she’ll give me a ship of my own—I just know it. And I’d pick the Vessel.”

  Reath silently downgraded his thoughts about the size and influence of the Byne Guild. The Vessel was serviceable, sure, but if this was the pick of the fleet, he had questions about that fleet.

  His expression must’ve betrayed his thoughts too clearly, because Affie laughed. “Scover doesn’t get why this is my favorite, either. But I feel like certain ships…they have an energy, you know? Maybe even a little bit of a soul. The Vessel has more of a soul than any other ship I’ve encountered. And that’s what I want to travel the galaxy in.”

  “I understand that,” Reath offered. Maybe the ship grew on you, after a while. “It does have, um, personality.”

  Affie stirred a little water into the bowl, and the pinkish powder puffed up into a sticky bun. “So, okay, tell me what the Jedi are in two sentences or less.”

  For the first time in what felt like days, Reath smiled. “Those two sentences might be pretty long.”

  “We’ve got nothing but hyperspace and time.” She settled herself into a chair and took a big bite of the sticky bun, through which she mumbled, “Ready for this, Geode?”

  Geode said nothing and did nothing.

  Reath sighed. Best to begin at the absolute beginning. “Do you know what the Force is?”

  Affie gave him a withering look. “Everybody knows about the Force, come on.”

  “All right, all right.” He held up his hands in mock surrender. “Sorry. Just making sure. So, the Jedi are Force users united in our quest to understand the mysteries of the Force and to serve as guardians of peace and justice throughout the galaxy.”

  “I’ve heard of Force users before,” she said. “But why does that make you monks?”

  “I still have one sentence to go. Um, we ground ourselves in a spiritual existence and give up individual attachments in order to focus entirely on greater concerns.”


  Affie chewed thoughtfully on her sticky bun for a moment before saying, “So, that means no sex.”

  Should he give her Master Jora’s whole speech about the difference between celibacy of the body and true purity of the heart? It was a very long speech. Reath decided to skip it. “Basically.”

  She nodded. “Definitely monks.”

  “Now, see, that I just don’t get,” Leox said later, when Affie and Geode tried to explain the Jedi to him. “How are you supposed to prove love to the galaxy at large if you don’t know how to love any one individual person?”

  Affie shrugged as she double-checked their readings. The wavering blue light of hyperspace glinted off every bit of metal in the cockpit, making it look beautifully electrified. Even Geode sparkled slightly. She said, “You don’t have to have sex with someone to love them. You should know that if anyone does.”

  “Indeed I do. But other beings seem to value copulation as a form of bonding.” Leox then made a face and swore. “Not appropriate. Sorry.”

  He meant well, she knew, but Affie hated it when he treated her like a kid instead of as an equal. Fortunately, he didn’t do that much. “It’s okay. I think I heard of sex once already.”

  That made Leox laugh. “Just make sure your mom knows I’m not the first person who talked to you about it.”

  Every time someone described Scover Byne as Affie’s mom, it warmed her through. “You know, it would be easy to get Scover to like you more. If you’d just wear the Guild coverall once in a while—”

  “Up with that I cannot put.” Leox shook his head. “A man’s gotta have standards. And since I lack the financial wherewithal to declare my independence from the Guild, my personhood must be asserted sartorially. In other words, you can take my beads from my cold dead body.”

  Affie suppressed a smile. “You know, the Jedi would probably say you were putting too much emphasis on worldly things.”

  “My relationship to the metaphysical is my own to judge, Little Bit.”

  “Don’t call me that!”

  Cohmac Vitus was a man of reason and logic. While he did not deny he possessed emotions, he never allowed them to cloud his judgment—or so he hoped. His precise, mathematical mind preferred the tangible to the nebulous, the quantifiable to the mysterious. More than one of his fellow Jedi had pointed out that this was an unusual frame of mind for a mystic. However, that was part of what Cohmac felt he brought to the Order: steadiness and rationality.

  So why did that mindset now feel less like a gift and more like a defense?

  Because you are traveling to the place where you first learned the harm that arises from imprecision. From emotion. All that was born between Eiram and E’ronoh.

  For a moment he was back in the caverns, Orla shivering at his side, staring in fear at the shapes in the frigid dark.…

  Cohmac shook his head, as though he could physically rid it of the memory. The best way to get out of the mind was to exercise the body. Options were limited on a ship that size, but a brisk walk through the corridors would do. He made his way through the Vessel, hoping for privacy. The hope was in vain, as he almost immediately came across Dez rapt in conversation with Reath Silas. “I mean,” Reath was saying, “would you call us monks?”

  “Not exactly,” Dez said. “I see you haven’t been able to talk Master Jora out of the Padawan braid.”

  “No such luck.” Reath gestured vaguely at the back of his head. In olden days, the braid had been mandatory, at least among apprentices from species that grew hair on their heads. These days, not every master required them; Cohmac had no intention of doing so, if he ever took another Padawan. Master Jora Malli clearly felt otherwise.

  Cohmac intended to absent himself, but before he drew away, Reath turned to him. “Excuse me, Master Vitus? May I ask how you go about discovering and recording new legends? As a folklorist, I mean. Just find the local wisewoman, ask for a story?”

  “Sometimes.” Cohmac gazed out of one of the Vessel’s very few, small windows at the brilliant, eerie blue of hyperspace. “Often it is more complicated. There are always the stories a people want to tell about themselves…and then there are the other stories. The secret ones, the dark ones, the ones whose meanings are more difficult to comprehend. Those aren’t the ones they offer to outsiders. Of course, those are generally the most important of all.”

  They were the stories that would have done the most good, between Eiram and E’ronoh.

  Dez grinned as he set about restrapping his boots. “How do you get them to open up about those?”

  “It varies,” Cohmac said. “There are species who respect outsiders who push them hard, demand the facts. There are also species who eat outsiders like that. It’s best not to pry until you know which kind of culture you’re dealing with. While you’re waiting”—he shrugged—“you study their art. Paintings, tapestries, literature. Symbolism and allegory can reveal a lot. Then you ask about the art, and the legends come up naturally.”

  “Crafty,” said Reath. “But also ingenious.”

  “Thank you.” Cohmac inclined his head.

  Dez said, “That’s got to be a challenge for you, doing something so completely new. To go off the map.”

  “Literally,” Reath joked.

  Cohmac could’ve said that he’d been to that area of space before. Specifically, to the lost moon between the twin planets that served as hosts for the new Starlight Beacon.

  But there was no need to speak of it, and Cohmac had learned to limit his words. It was far too easy to say too much.

  In the cockpit of the Vessel, Leox Gyasi chewed on a spice stick and considered the navicomputer readings.

  (The spice stick was legal in Republic space. For now. Mostly because they hadn’t had time to get around to outlawing everything yet. Maybe the sticks would make the cut and remain legal. But maybe not. Leox had laid away a stash just in case.)

  Oughta see signs of other traffic, he mused. Clearer signs than this. Are the readouts blurry? If so, why?

  “Geode, buddy,” Leox said, “you seeing what I’m seeing?”

  Geode’s ominous silence told the whole story. Something was genuinely wrong with hyperspace traffic. Deeply wrong. The few traffic patterns he could make out were moving in directions that didn’t make any sense.

  Leox muttered. “Not liking this. Not liking it at all.”

  The ship was still moving forward, under no more than the usual stresses, so they might as well keep going. The problem might be local, he figured—something they’d fly right by.

  Orla Jareni hoped to spend at least part of their voyage to Starlight Beacon talking with the Vessel’s crew. She’d be buying a ship of her own soon, something she’d never done before. As much as she’d studied specs and models, she still thought there might be valuable tips to glean from people who spent their whole lives navigating the stars.

  (Some Jedi fell into the trap of thinking that non-Jedi didn’t have anything to teach them. Orla, however, always remembered that every single being in the galaxy knew at least one thing she didn’t.)

  Affie Hollow seemed the likelier candidate for the conversation, Orla decided, if only because Affie seemed to have a greater commitment to sobriety.

  Yet Orla found herself putting off the chat. Actually talking about purchasing her ship would mean talking about her decision to become a Wayseeker. As little as Affie knew about the Jedi, she would surely ask the most obvious question: Why?

  At the moment, Orla didn’t feel confident of her answer.

  She could simply say instinct. That was true, but unlikely to satisfy Affie’s curiosity. It was more likely to pique it.

  Or she might say, The Jedi Order and I no longer…see eye to eye.

  Also true. Also likely to get her into trouble if anybody from the Council ever heard of it.

  Probably the best answer would be, I needed to come to know the Force in a deeper, even more meaningful sense. Also true, and both long and dull enough to discourage furth
er questions.

  Wayseeker, her mind had whispered, and there she was: Walking away from the Order to navigate an unknown region of the galaxy all by herself. Hoping that out there she would find the purpose her recent missions had lacked.

  “Am I deluding myself?” she muttered as she stood in the mess, making herself some Chandrilan tea. “If I can’t find the answers at the Temple, what makes me think I’ll find them out here? What would my master say if she could see me?”

  Then she paused, hoping no one had overheard that. Probably not, but on a ship so small, you could never be certain. She resolved to keep her musings internal for the duration of the voyage.

  Orla took a moment to center herself—but found she couldn’t. The energies on the ship were becoming muddled. Even frenzied.

  Orla murmured, “What’s happening?”

  That was when Leox Gyasi’s voice came over the ship’s comms: “Everybody who wants to stay alive, strap yourselves in now!”

  Reath ran for the jump seats, reaching them just as all the other Jedi scrambled in. As they hurriedly fastened their safety harness straps, Orla called out, “What’s happening?”

  Leox answered, “Near as I can figure, hyperspace is broken.”

  “What?” Dez looked as bewildered as Reath felt. “How is that possible?”

  “Tons of debris, the kind of thing you usually never find in hyperspace? It’s all over hyperspace.” The spice stick gripped between Leox’s teeth was getting a grinding. “As in, littering every route out there.”

  Reath could barely put the thought into words. “But that would mean a disaster on—on a galactic scale.”

  “That’s pretty much the size of it,” Leox said. “Now everybody hang on.”

  Affie had seen a lot more than most seventeen-year-olds. Had boarded and served as crew on ships traveling the length of the sector, now across the galaxy, all the way from Kennerla to Coruscant. Had helped steer a ship through a hyperspace vortex once.