Chapter 4
Everyone had gathered around the table in the Lightrunner's passenger area. Diya was sitting on the floor in the corner beside R2-Z5 while Silas and Zeala sat together on the couch. Kee-Xi stood apart, in traditional Jedi robes sans the traveling cloak with hood, pacing about the room. "By the time we get to LG-19's major arm, our fuel cells will be severely depleted, and our stocks low," he said. "We will have to carefully portion our meals and water use during the trip." He looked to Diya. "You offered when you came aboard to help with maintenance, Diya Suun. Well, that is now your sole concern. You and Zeefive will inspect this ship daily, particularly our fuel and power reserves."
Diya nodded tenatively. "Yes, Master Kee-Xi."
Turning his attention to the two Padawans seated together, Kee-Xi remarked, "As for you two.... I will resume your training, and when the time is right I will decide whether you have advanced to the level of skill to be Knights."
"Of course, Master."
Sighing deeply, Kee-Xi looked away for a moment. Everything that had happened, it was like being caught in a whirlwind that was still raging about, tossing him and his charges where it pleased. Who knew where it would end?
"We will also spend time monitoring the ship from the cockpit, alternating so that one of you may be trained while the other watches, then I will watch while you sleep."
"What of your rest?"
"I need none. Meditation during my cockpit watch will suffice," he answered, not entirely truthfully, but certain that he would not need further rest above that he was setting aside for himself. Standing at one end of the room from where he could look at them all "We have a long journey ahead of us, and this ship is quite small so space is limited. We must live together and work together to survive physically and mentally. If you have any problems, any fears, come to me and I shall do my best to help you with them. Now... I shall take my first turn in the pilot seat, and I suggest that you all get some rest."
The Infiltrator was silent as death as it left Lumin Prime. Unnoticed by the sensor grid of the system's traffic control, or by the Imperial cruiser moving by on patrol, it remained for a time in orbit.
From his cockpit Dieg Mantas checked to make sure his stores of supplies and fuel were full for what he expected to be a search lasting months. When this was confirmed he prepared to make his jump to lightspeed. But where?
As he was trained to do, Dieg felt out through the Force, letting it speak to him. His hand moved almost on its own as it entered astrogation data into the nav computers before reaching over and engaging the hyperdrive.
For a time everything seemed normal. But Dieg soon noticed something amiss. The speed readings he was getting from the astrogation computer were incorrect, showing a speed far greater than any hyperdrive was known to be capable of. At first he reached for the control to disengage the hyperdrive. But as his hand gripped it he felt a small tremor within him, a resistance to his decision. Intuitively he knew that something bad would happen if he pulled the control and he released it.
Looking at the astrogation data he noticed that in a couple of months he would arrive in Galaxy LG-19. Two months, with just enough fuel and supplies to make it there.
Two long, lonely months into the unknown, from which he could possibly never return....
As Deig sat and mulled over this, he sensed opportunity. Not just if the Jedi he was hunting were on this route as well, as he sensed they were.... but a virgin galaxy where there might be no Sith. Instead of being, at best, the apprentice of a master he could never hope to defeat, he could be the Master himself. With an entire cadre of followers competing for the right to be his apprentice.
Darth Vindis had a nice ring to it....
Two weeks later
Zeala and Kee-Xi were alone in the open recreational area while Silas manned the cockpit and Diya was slumbering in one of the bunks. He stood before her with his lightsaber set to training intensity. Her's was the same. "Begin!"
Zeala brought her lightsaber up in a defensive motion. Kee-Xi noted it was Shii-Cho Form. A basic form, the kind everyone learns first. He advanced with several Makashi strikes that Zeala deflected. "Make your movements sharp and small," he instructed. "The key to Soresu is to economize all movement. You save your energy and wait for the appropriate moment to strike."
For several moments they continued. Zeala kept those basic movements up. Kee-Xi noted with appreciation that she had a knack for this. Tyva had undoubtedly shown her what Soresu she knew, but Tyva had been an aggressive duelist. Ataru, Djem-So, and Shien were her preferred styles, much like how he prefered Makashi for dueling and Djem-So for fighting foes with ranged weapons.
Eventually, though, Zeala moved a bit too far and he landed a counterattack that, in a real battle, would have killed her instantly. She paused in place to acknowledge this. "My apologies, Master Kee-Xi," she said meekly. She moved a lock of disheveled blond hair from her eyesight. "I am not the lightsaber wielder I need to be."
"You have survived this far, so do not put yourself down," he replied. He pulled his lightsaber back and turned it off. "You have great promise in defensive lightsaber techniques. In time, you will master them." Kee-Xi gestured to a seat where they had drinks ready for sustenance. Zeefive was kind enough to bring them a tray with energy snacks that would remove the fatigued feeling. "And I sense your strengths are not in lightsaber combat."
Zeala nodded. "Yes. Master Tyva preferred that I help in other ways when our troopers went into combat."
"Battle meditation?", Kee-Xi asked.
"Yes." Zeala took a sip. "Master Tyva thought I did better using the Force to connect to others. She said it was my nature as a person, that I naturally made connections."
Kee-Xi nodded. "Yes. I agree. I hope that wherever we end up, you may focus upon that skill and not require our martial talents."
"May the Force make that true." Zeala looked over to a counter opposite their seats. Tyva's lightsaber was laying on it. Unused ever since Kee-Xi had set it there at the start of their voyage. Seeing it made a lump form in her throat. Her grief came roaring back.
Kee-Xi's hand came up and took her hand. "I understand," he said.
"It is not our way to be attached," Zeala said. "We are supposed to let go."
"Yes," Kee-Xi-agreed. "That is why the Jedi have found it easier to never let attachments form. But that doesn't always work." He looked to the lightsaber and felt a surge of pain in his heart. All of the loss, all of that wasted life... and now their future was cast on the winds. The Force knew what would happen next. And it was unlikely they could help save their home galaxy from the Sith wherever they ended up. "The important part is to accept the loss," he said to her. "A Jedi destroyed by loss is a terrible thing to behold."
"I understand," Zeala said. She swallowed. All of the younglings she had grown up with were gone. Tyva, the Jedi who had spent a decade training her to be a Jedi Knight, was gone. Kee-Xi and Silas were all she had left.
Especially Silas. She had known him since she could remember. They had come up as younglings together. And he was always so confident, so assured, that Zeala felt the same whenever he was around.
"We will recommence lightsaber training tomorrow," Kee-Xi said. "You should get some sleep. Our journey is but a quarter over now, we have much time ahead of us before we arrive at the other galaxy."
Zeala nodded and tried to hide her pleasure at the idea of her bunk. She looked forward to getting to sleep.
Six weeks later
The two months passed quicker than Diya had expected. Their eating might have been a little thin, especially near the end, but nearly every day she was occupied inspecting every nut and bolt of the Lightrunner, getting to know every system, doing on the fly maintainance with Zeefive to make sure that above all else the hyperdrive stayed on. Silas helped her at times, Zeala joining them once and a great while, as the two of them continued Jed training under Kee-Xi's watchful gaze.
If anything, the past months had helped Diya come to understand even more on how the YT-1300 worked. She'd examined every system, knew how every nut and bolt went together, every circuit and power feed. While examining her one day Kee-Xi had even stated he felt she had a natural affinity for that kind of work. While that was true, deep down Diya wished to be the pilot, not the mechanic.
Her main compatriot during the long journey was R2-Z5. She'd come to understand the astromech droid almost as well as Silas, who now often remarked that the droid seemed to have taken a liking to her.
Put together, it had been perhaps the best two months of her young life. There was no struggle for food and shelter. No worry about being sold to the Hutts. No worry of being killed in the streets by an irate food merchant she'd been forced to steal from or by some crook she looked at the wrong way. She was in the care of three noble Jedi, had a quirky astromech droid as a companion, and was getting to work with one of the most reliable spaceship designs to ever be built.
On about the sixty-third day of the voyage Diya went to the cockpit as she sometimes did, Kee-Xi seated quietly in his chair in meditative rest, and took the pilot's seat. She rested her hands on the sublight flight control s and imagined getting to fly the vessel around.
Behind her came a warbling sound, followed by a disapproving set bleeps and clicks. Looking back at the green-chromed droid, Diya replied, "Oh, Zeefive, don't worry, I won't touch anything important. I'm just daydreaming." After another warbling remark from the droid she added, "I won't wake Master Kee-Xi either."
"Yes, that would be pretty impossible at the moment," the meditating Jedi added.
Diya looked to him with a surprised expression which soon turned apprehensive. "Master Jedi? I.... I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."
"You did not disturb me, Diya," Kee-Xi answered. He gave her a reassuring smile. "How are the others?"
"Sleeping comfortably." Diya pulled her legs up onto the seat, putting her arms around them to rest her chin on her knees. "Silas and Zeala seem really close."
Kee-Xi gave a nod at that. "They were younglings together. Just as Tyva, Gumi, and I were."
Diya looked to him. "I miss Gumi," she said sadly. "He was so nice, and he was going to make me his co-pilot."
"Yes, I can imagine." Looking at the young lady Kee-Xi saw the wisdom of his apprentice's desire to save her from the slaver and to bring her. For all that she had been through, the only feelings he had ever sensed from her were sadness and more benevolent feelings. Any anger from old memories was brief and joined by her regrets toward the people she'd known on the street. Fellow children, almost all less fortunate than she was now. "I see now that Silas was right to insist on bringing you aboard, Diya. It's not often a Master is proven wrong by his apprentice, but it is a good thing I believe."
"He looks up to you so greatly," Diya said. "You're everything to him. A teacher, a mentor, even a bit of a father."
Kee-Xi nodded softly at that. "Such are the sentiments that exist between the Padawan and the Knight or Master. I felt much the same way to my Master, Dooku, for many years."
"Dooku? Count Dooku?" Diya said with surprise. "He was your Master?"
"Yes, he took me as his new Padawan after completing the training of Qui-Gon Jinn." Kee-Xi looked off into hyperspace. "That he ended up falling to the Dark Side, and leading the Separatists, was, is, a great sadness to me."
Diya took a moment to imagine how it would have felt. While some of the starship captains back on Gantoon had been paternal toward her, she'd never had a feeling of having a mentor. The idea of having one go bad, to turn against everything she thought was right, made her think that maybe this wasn't such a bad thing after all.
"How did you end up with Silas as your student?", she asked Kee-Xi, looking to shift the subject. "I mean, do you get to pick?"
"Normally, yes," he answered. "Jedi Knights and Masters select their apprentices. But I was a special case..."
Twelve Years Ago
Kee-Xi Laden stood silent in the midst of the leaders of the Jedi Order as Master Yoda spoke for them. "Long has your exile been, Kee-Xi Laden," the diminutive Grand Master continued. "Sense I your advancement in knowledge of the Force, wisdom to overcome the past mistakes."
"You have served the Jedi and the Republic well on the Outer Rim." Now Mace Windu began to speak. "The Jedi Council has come to the conclusion that you have earned the chance to teach an apprentice. One of our selection. If you train him well, with no further breaches of the Code by yourself or by him, we will remove our restriction and grant you the title of Master."
Bowing his head in respect and acceptance, Kee-Xi said, "I accept this charge from the Council, Master Windu, Master Yoda, with humility. I resolve to prove my worthiness of your trust."
"As we would expect of you," Ki-Adi-Mundi stated.
"We look forward to seeing you fulfill the potential Master Dooku saw in you, Kee-Xi Laden. This meeting is now adjourned." And with Master Windu's proclamation, the Council dispersed.
"Introduce you to your apprentice I will," Yoda said to Kee-Xi as they emerged from the Council room. Kee-Xi followed the Grand Master through the bowels of the Jedi Temple. "Great anxiety I sense in you, Kee-Xi. Speak to me you will?"
Kee-Xi drew in a sigh. He hadn't wanted to speak on this. But Yoda had sensed it and it was better to be open on the subject. "While I was on Lumin Master Dooku came to see me, Master Yoda," he said to the old sage. "He told me that Qui-Gon Jinn was slain by a Sith Lord."
"He was," Yoda responded sadly.
Kee-Xi nodded. A part of him, ha, how silly... a part of him had been hoping Dooku was wrong. "And if I may, what happened to this Sith?"
"Slain he was, in turn, by Master Qui-Gon's apprentice, Obi-Wan Kenobi."
"Do we know if he was the Master or the Apprentice of the Sith?"
"No." Yoda looked back to Kee-Xi as they moved along. "More to say, you do? More on your old teacher?"
Drawing in a sigh, Kee-Xi continued. "He attempted to persuade me that the Order would not forgive me, Master Yoda. He asked me to leave the Jedi and join him in seeking out and destroying the Sith."
Clearly sensing Kee-Xi's feelings, Yoda said, "And?"
"There was.... I don't know, Master Yoda, a bitterness about him. A sense of darkness and anger I found unsettling."
"Yes, sensed the same I did the day that Master Dooku left the Council." Yoda shook his head. "Suspicious and impatient Dooku has become. A tragedy for him and for the Order."
"What of my dreams, Master Yoda?" Kee-Xi followed Yoda onto stairs to bring them down toward the younglings' quarter of the Temple. "With every passing year they have grown worse. Perhaps the most vivid I have ever had them. The Jedi Temple in flames, an army marching in the streets of Coruscant, an entire planet destroyed by a weapon..."
"Dooku's pessimism I sense in your dreams. Be mindful of the truth in the Force you should." Yoda seemed to look away for a moment. "The Dark Side you both feel. Uncertainty, doubt, fear, these are not of the Jedi."
"And what about arrogance?" Kee-Xi asked. "If my feelings are correct, if these dreams are warnings from the Force, is it not arrogance to presume otherwise? Not without the slightest consideration?"
That drew a sigh. "Perhaps. Meditate on this I must. But now, your apprentice you must meet."
They entered one of the rooms in which the younglings were having a period of rest. Some worked on building their first lightsaber, others on studying the books and texts kept by the Jedi Order, while many also conversed. Yoda led Kee-Xi to one couple in the room, a brown-haired young Human boy who was helping a blond-haired girl, also Human, study lightsaber schematics. "Silas, arrived your new teacher has," Yoda said to the boy.
Both children looked up. The boy stood and bowed. "I am Silas Torson, Master Kee-Xi," he said. "I am honored to be your Padawan."
"I have heard much about you, young Silas," Kee-Xi remarked. "Master Yoda says great things about you. I foresee you becoming a great Jedi Knight one day."
"Thank you, Master." Silas turned to the girl. "Bye, Zeala!"
"Good luck, Silas!" the girl replied cheerfully. "May the Force be with you!"
Kee-Xi led his new apprentice away as Yoda and Zeala watched.
The Present
There was a melancholy silence for a time, then Diya spoke once more. "There was a time, as a child, that I wish I had been taken to become a Jedi. To get out of my parents' home and get to see Coruscant."
"It is a common dream among many, Diya. But the life of a Jedi is a harsh one." Kee-Xi sighed. "One that I have long believed to have been made too harsh by the rules of the Order. Use of the Force demands discipline, and they began to favor discipline before anything else. I wonder sometimes if the Order would have survived if it had been more tolerant and not become so secluded, so cloistered, from the rest of the Republic."
Before he could continue speaking, Kee-Xi was distracted when his eyes passed over the readouts from astrogation. "Diya, prepare to take us out of hyperspace," he said.
"Master?"
"We're back to normal speed," he said. "I want to drop out of hyperspace and take a star reading."
"So... we're almost to a planet then?" Diya pulled back on the control as she was asked, replacing the view of hyperspace in their cockpit with a field of black interstellar space.
"Perhaps. We are in a dense arm of the galaxy...." Kee-Xi turned his attention to the sensors looking for stars. "Now we must eliminate those systems that cannot bear life while looking for any signs of life. If we can find interstellar societies, so much the better...... there." He began pressing keys on the astrogation computer. "This system appears to have a habitable planet." He re-orientated the ship and briefly re-engaged the hyperdrive. When a few seconds passed he pulled it back again. Ahead of them a green-covered blue planet beckoned, a field of asteroids forming a beautiful ring about its equator.
Diya stared at the sight in wonderment. Lumin Prime had been a very bland world compared to this one. "It's beautiful," she said. "And people live there?"
"I sense life on the world, but..." Kee-Xi concentrated for a moment. A frown formed on his face as his hand moved like lightning to grab the ship controls. He twisted the Lightrunner to its left.
Just as a bolt of energy sizzled by them, close enough to scorch the hull.
Kee-Xi hit the ship's throttle and turned back to Diya. "Go get Zeala and man one of the guns. I will need Silas up here as well. We are under attack."
Diya was terrified yet ecstatic as she bounded through the Lightrunner's bay toward one of the side guns. After the weeks of routine this fight was something new and exciting. It was an experience unlike anything she'd known before.
Then she started to realize it might lead to her death. And it wasn't quite so interesting anymore.
Zeala and Silas didn't require any words to be spoken; Silas ran to the cockpit while Zeala immediately headed toward one gun, going down the ladder. Diya climbed to the other. She jumped into the gunner seat and took control of the quad mount anti-fighter blaster that served to protect the Lightrunner on that axis.
Diya was swinging the gun around when she noticed for the first time their attackers. They were ugly bulbous vessels, blue light streaking out of their ends toward the Lightrunner. A bright red light zipped past them in space, missing wide due to the Jedi piloting of Kee-Xi and Silas, and exploded in brilliant light that might have blinded Diya without the safety systems in the gunner station.
With just a bit of sweat on her forehead Diya pulled the trigger for her gun. Bolts of red light lashed out at their attackers. She was very new to this and even with the computer-assisted targeting her shots missed wide. She frowned and tried to bring her gun further over to send out another flurry of bolts, but at that moment the ship twisted and she lost sight of her target.
The Lightrunner rocked around her as it took more his on its deflectors. Soon another attacker veered into sight. This time Diya was satisfied to see her shots play along the vessel's grey hull, absorbed by flickers of blue light. "I got a hit!", she called out, ecstatic.
They banked hard again and the ship rocked even more violently, straining Diya against the harness of her seat. This caused her to miss what would have otherwise had been a perfect shot on one of the targets. She cried out in frustration and swept her gun along, holding the trigger and just spewing blaster bolt fire. When said blaster fire intercepted one of the red sparkling projectiles, it exploded harmlessly away from the Lightrunner. Diya looked with wide eyes, realizing that if it'd hit and went through the deflectors, she'd have probably been killed instantly.
This terrifying realization of just how close death was made Diya freeze up. This wasn't like the streets of Gantoon, where death seemed further away and things like hunger or abduction were more immediate concerns. Tears formed in her eyes. Her hands refused to clench the triggers on the guns.
She felt a sensation come over her, a deep and relaxing one. She felt her terror recede in waves of serene thought. A kind voice, one she knew as Zeala's, reached out to her. Do not fear, Diya. Be at peace.
Diya's fingers clenched on the trigger again, almost guided by Zeala it seemed. One of the smaller ships crossing her field of fire literally ran into her shots. Red bolts broke through the blue deflectors on the other ship and created gouts of flame and wreckage from it, creating a path of destruction along the length of the ship. Its return fire ceased.
"I got one!", Diya cried out in triumph. With renewed zeal she sent blaster fire at any enemy who showed up on her screens, inflicting damage and blowing up a couple of what looked to be snubfighters. Getting a good lock on another ship, she pulled the trigger yet again.
But nothing happened.
The ship's lights began to dim around her. Diya's heart froze. She didn't need to look at her status screens to realize what was going on.
The Lightrunner was out of fuel.
Even before the cockpit lights began to dim, Silas knew they were in big trouble.
Ordinarily, the tiny bit of fuel they had left for the Lightrunner's power plant would have been plenty to let them investigate the nearby planet and maybe even part of the local sector. But the necessities of powering their deflectors, their quad-mount blaster cannons, and the rapid maneuvers that Kee-Xi was performing from the pilot's seat had been too much. Emergency lights flashed everywhere as more and more systems had to start drawing from their emergency batteries. Soon their deflectors would fail, and they would be doomed.
Kee-Xi broke away from their attackers, spending almost every bit of their fuel left to dash for the asteroid rings around the planet. "If we can lose them long enough, we might make it to the planet."
His teacher's voice was neutral and calm, but Silas knew him well enough to know this was not a sure thing. They would in all likelihood be harried down by their foes and destroyed.
The enemy pursued of course. The Lightrunner's engines were more than powerful enough to outrun them, but their dying fuel reserves forced Kee-Xi to switch to the batteries as soon as they got to the first asteroid. Their speed slowed dramatically, and energy fire was already coming by them as they slipped close to the second.
The enemy ships stopped for the moment. Parasite craft, too small to be proper fighters, began to pour out of launch bays along their sides. "They're going to hound us out of here with their light craft," Silas remarked. "I don't think we can stay here, Master."
"Have faith, my apprentice," Kee-Xi murmured softly. "The Force is guiding us even here."
Silas was about to ask what his master meant when their scanners picked up a new contact.
The vessel came from "above" the asteroids and the pirate ships. Red bolts of light lashed out at the Lightrunner's attackers even as the enemy tried to scatter. Red sparks, missiles of some sort, crashed into one of the ships and caused great plumes of flame to erupt from the pirate's hull. The pirates returned fire, but their weapons had no apparent effect as the newcomer's attacks decimated their forces. Driven desperate, a number of the ships turned and fled, elongating briefly before they disappeared entirely. It was not like any jump to hyperspace Silas had ever witnessed.
The remaining enemies, unable to flee the system, turned toward the planet. Some of the parasite craft seemed to escape notice, but the big ship that remained - its glowing nacelle spewing plasma and debris - took several more hits before all of its lights died.
And just like that. It was over. They'd gone from near certain death to... what, exactly? Silas wondered just who this other ship was. As he did so, he noticed that the Lightrunner was receiving a broadcast audio message on several basic frequencies. Not a holomessage, obviously... "Master, the new ship is opening communication."
Kee-Xi nodded. "Put them on, Silas."
Silas nodded and pressed a key to put the hail over the speakers.
A woman's voice began to speak them clearly. "To unidentified vessel, this is the Federation Starship Enterprise. We are standing by to provide you assistance, over. Please respond. I repeat, this is the Federation Starship Enterprise...."
Statistics: Posted by Steve — 2016-01-14 03:56pm