Wouldn't have mattered if he was using the dark side, he would have done a good thing."

I reached out and grabbed the back of Brakiss' neck. "Wait just one minute. What you're saying is that the ends justify the means for attaining them, and that's just plain wrong. It's as wrong as anything because it allows you to rationalize away any behavior as good. Sure, let's murder this criminal because we know he's killed folks in the past, or probably will kill them in the future. Or let's destroy this planet because we know, some-day, it will slam into that planet. So what if folks on the planet we destroy die-they would have died anyway, and with our way the folks on the other world are saved."

Brakiss spun and nearly slashed my face with his stick. Fortu-nately for me I'd had forewarning about the arc of his arm and ducked beneath it. A momentary mask of anger slipped over his face, but it almost immediately dissolved into shock and remorse. "Keiran, I'm sorry."

"It's okay, Brakiss. No blood, no report."

Kam came around and draped an arm rather heavily over Brakiss' shoulders.

"What Keiran's telling you is right, kid. Peo-ple start telling themselves they're ama.s.sing power for this goal or that, and they convince themselves that it's a good thing. Then when they get enough they find circ.u.mstances have changed. They find they need more power or they need to wield this power in ways they didn't expect before. An opponent who won't listen to reason becomes a bug to be squashed instead of a friend who just needs to be convinced. Power comes to poison those who h.o.a.rd it. They a.s.sume others want their power, will resort to any means to get it, and that frees folks up to retaliate in any way they can."

I nodded. "And there's no good that comes from evil. Your example of someone using dark-side power to destroy the Death Star is fine until you ask why he would do that. Is it for his own good, and that of his people?

If so, how will he deal with the next threat to them? If he hears of another Death Star and knows someone like the Caamasi are building it, does he destroy them?"

Kam frowned. "Bad example. Everyone knows the Caamasi were committed pacifists."

"I know, Kam, but someone could rationalize them as evil and go after them." I opened my hands. "Face it, someone did go after them and nearly wiped out the whole lot of them. I even heard there was a big Caamasi refugee group on Alderaan when it was destroyed. If someone could have seen the Caamasi as a threat, they could have seen anyone as a threat. A child. Anyone."

Brakiss furrowed his brows. "I hear what you are saying and I want to believe you. Part of me says, though, that you can't argue an absolute case that no good can come from wielding dark-side powers. There has to be a time when that could hap-pen."

"That's theory, Brakiss, but we've got to deal with the practi-cal realities of manipulating the Force." I shook my head. "I don't want to entertain the idea that I could remain uncor-rupted by dealing with evil for what I see as a good purpose. That's setting the first foot on a very steep and slippery slope. Maybe, with the help of Master Skywalker, it would be possible to get back to the top, but someone will pay a fearful price during my descent, and I don't want to inflict that on anyone.

Neither should you."

A quick blast from the trans-port's landing jets lifted debris on a searing wind that made some of the other apprentices duck back or raise their hands to shield their faces. I pulled the heat in and immediately used that energy to impose a tiny Force shield before me. It split the wind and saved me the annoyance of having to blink grit from my eyes and spit dirt from my mouth.

The boxy transport touched down as gently as a feather, but I expected no less from the pilot at the helm. As it settled on its landing struts and the pa.s.senger compartment gangway slowly lowered, the apprentices moved in behind Master Skywalker. Kam directed all of them but me to the opening cargo hatch. I walked over by Luke and smiled as Wedge descended from the ship's interior.

Luke waved a greeting at Wedge and the blue-skinned woman following in his wake. The bright-eyed young man com-ing third down the gangway won a smile from Luke. "Welcome, Kyp Durron."

The wiry youth returned Luke's smile. "I'm ready, Master Skywalker. Teach me the Jedi ways."

"It will be my pleasure." Luke waved him toward the line of folks hauling supplies from the transport's cargo hold. "We will start by unloading the ship. Keiran, if you will see to General Antilles' and Qwi Xux's comfort."

"As you wish, Master." I smiled at Wedge and waved him toward the Great Temple. "You will find our accommodations are a bit less primitive than they were when last you dropped off supplies. This way, please."

Wedge nodded solemnly. "It appears you have made much progress."

Qwi Xux fell into step with Wedge. "Wedge, could you tell me, please, when we will meet this friend of yours that you were anxious to see again?"

Wedge looked about to see we were out of earshot of the others, then his smile broadened warmly. "You have, Doctor Xux. Qwi Xux, meet Corran Horn."

The alien woman frowned. "But Master Skywalker called him Keiran."

Wedge nodded. "He is here under an alias for a variety of reasons.

Corran, this is Qwi Xux."

I turned in mid-stride and bowed my head to her. The friendly tone in Wedge's voice when he introduced her made me wonder if I shouldn't offer her my hand, but I felt reluctant to do so. As brilliant as she was beautiful, she had been a key researcher in the Maw installation-the Imperial think-tank that had created the Death Stars, the World Devastators that had ravaged Mort Calamari and the starfighter-sized, invincible Sun Crusher that Kyp Durron had just sunk into the depths of Yavin for safe-keeping. What little gossip we got out here suggested that she had been an unwilling dupe of the Imperials, someone only interested in pure research. That might well have been true, but I had to wonder how someone so bright could fail to notice all the projects she worked on had hideous names and could be so incredibly lethal.

"Welcome to Yavin 4." I pointed toward the sky. "The first Death Star died up there before it could destroy this place."

A hint of pain pa.s.sed through Wedge's eyes as I spoke, but Qwi just turned to look up toward where I had pointed. "Most of the debris would have fallen into the gas giant, I would suspect, but some must have impacted here." She looked at me with open cerulean eyes. "Have you found such debris?" I shook my head. "Haven't been looking. There was an Imperial survey team or two here after the Rebellion abandoned the planet, so I would a.s.sume they collected what they could for a.n.a.lysis."

"Pity."

"Right." I led the two of them into the Great Temple and took the turbolift to the second level. "Here we have refresher stations and rooms for you, if you wish to catch up on sleep. I can also get you food."

The doctor smiled. "I would like a quick nap, if that is acceptable."

Wedge nodded. "I'll check in with you in an hour, how's that?"

She nodded. "Good. Nice to meet you, Cor... er, Keiran."

"Sleep well, Doctor Xux." I pointed her to the room I'd prepared for her earlier, then steered Wedge toward the room I'd prepped for him.

Inside Wedge appropriated a chair and sat, tilting it back so it rested against the wall and his feet dangled above the floor. "You don't like her, do you?"

I caught just a hint of pique in Wedge's voice. "Don't know her well enough to form an opinion, but her playthings have made quite an impression. Maybe because you helped destroy two of them you have a different perspective on her, but I'd not consider myself a big fan of her work."

"She really didn't know what she was getting into, what they were doing with her research."

"Are you sure? The code names should have told her what was going on. She should have at least asked herself what would happen if, by mistake, these things were used on inhab-ited planets. We have life-sign sensors.

How tough would it have been to put a life-sensor interlock on the Death Star so it couldn't kill Alderaan?" I found anger creeping into my voice and raised both of my hands. "I shouldn't have said that, sorry."

Wedge glanced down at his hands. "Don't be. Nothing I haven't asked myself a million times since I started acting asher bodyguard. When she's around, when I speak with her, she's just so bright and innocent-the ant.i.thesis of the DeathStar and the World Devastators and the Sun Crusher. I think she thought the Sun Crusher would be used to eliminate beta stars from binary systems to provide system stability or to clear uninhabited systems from navigational routes."

My eyes narrowed. "Oh, no. You like her."

Wcdge's head came up. "What?"

I whirled the room's other chair around and dropped into it, letting my chest press against its back. "You're supposed to be her bodyguard and you're falling for her."

"You'd like her if you'd spend more time around her."

"Don't do it, Wedge, don't do it."

He glanced over at me, letting a sloppy grin tug at one corner of his mouth. "Why not? Wouldn't this be a final reconciliation of the Rebels and Imperials?"

~'Wedge, I'm speaking from experience." I sagged forward against the chair-back. "When I was with CorSec I had several a.s.signments where I was to see to the personal safety of some-one important. In fact, I once had to deal with your sister on a visit to Coreilia. Didn't know she was your sister at the time, however."

"If you're going to tell me you fell for my sister while guarding her, I don't want to hear it."

"Nope, not her. It was the daughter of the shipping magnate who owned Tinta Lines. She was the target of a kidnapper. Of course, when I was guarding someone, we found a hole and crawled in, didn't gallivant around the galaxy."

"Moving target is harder to hit."

"Good point." I smiled. "Anyway, Siolle Tinta and I got along fatuously once we discovered we shared similar opinions about art. In close quarters, we reinforced each other's ideas and it quickly became us against the world. On the outside, leila nailed the kidnapper, so we only spent three days to-gether, but if you'd asked me at the end of that time if it was love and lasers for life, I would have told you all systems were go."

"What happened?"

"While we had one thing in common, we had all sorts of things that weren't. I was with CorSec, which meant I couldn't take off and hit a spa on Selonia, or travel to Imperial Center for the opening of an art exhibit in the Galactic Museum. The gulf between us proved insurmountable. We parted friends, but we both knew that what we'd had while together was a super-nova that was collapsing in on itself. We might have generated a lot of heat and light, but eventually the black hole would have torn us apart."

Wedge nodded, but stared past me. "You'll allow me to plot my own course through this?"

"I can't stop you."

"But I thought you Jedi could easily influence weak minds." I laughed lightly along with him. "This Jedi knows better than to think of your mind as weak, and I've no desire to go mucking about without good reason.

You're a big boy. If it works, great. If it doesn't, you've got friends.

I imagine my wife would give you an earful on this."

"Yeah, and Mirax can be a mite more persuasive than you can." He tipped his chair forward onto all four feet. "No word yet from Han and any of his contacts about Mirax. Sorry."

I sighed heavily. "I didn't expect he would have much to say, given that he's been on Kessel recently. Booster's not been talking to you?"

"I've been hard to find, but I've had no messages."

"Best to let sleeping Hutts snore." I felt anger gathering, but I dissipated it with a quick calming breath. "You'll let me know if you do hear anything, right?"

"As soon as I do get word, you'll know." Wedge smiled sol-emnly. "It's the least I can do for a friend."

Wedge and Xux left in the evening and I felt sorry to see them go. The one truly difficult aspect of the Jedi academy for me was isolation from news of the outside world. Han Solo's ad-venture on Kessel and the theft of the Sun Crusher had been presented to us as asides-sidebars to lessons Master Skywalker taught us. More information came out now that Kyp Durron was with us as a student, but even that was tantalizingly spare.

Even more spare was any word on the Invids.

Kyp's presence seemed to put a spark back into Master Skywalker-the spark that had been diminished since Gantoris' death. Kyp proved almost immediately to be the greatest of the apprentices gathered there. With only a minimum of training, he blasted on past all of us in terms of what he could do. Supporting himself on one hand only, he could balance rocks and fallen tree boles with ease. Given my lack of ability in that area, I found his skills somewhat intimidating.

Master Skywalker found Kyp's abilities all but mesmerizing and devoted a lot of time to directing his studies. I guess that made sense in a variety of ways. I suspected that Luke saw a lot of himself in Kyp. They both came from brutal worlds-Tatooine and Kessel respectively. Kyp had received initial in-struction from the fallen Jedi female Vima-Da-Boda much as Obi-Wan had taught Luke. Kyp had also proved adept at pilot-ing a ship and had saved Han Solo's life-a positive endorse-ment, to be sure.

Lastly, Kyp's power dwarfed that of Gantoris, making him the perfect candidate to eclipse the memory of the academy's first failure.

Of course, no one stated that directly, nor did we think of Gantoris in that way. Gantoris' remains had been interred in the midst of a beautiful grove, and Master Skywalker himself had driven a grey plinth into the ground to mark the spot. We knew it was the sort of paradisiacal place Gantoris would have wanted for himself and his people. Several of us noted that we wouldn't mind being buried there when we fell, but none of us hoped that would be soon. Still, the spectre of Gantoris' failure haunted us all to a greater or lesser extent.

Luke turned much of the instruction of the other apprentices over to Kam Solusar, and Kam did a good job. As a taskmaster he was fair but firm, and everyone progressed steadily under his guidance. Luke made good use of Tionne's research to instill us with a sense of community and continuity. We began to think of the Imperium as Jedi Twilight, and we were the dawning of a new day of a new era.

Luke did allow Kam to start training me in lightsaber com-bat. I used my grandfather's lightsaber and relished its cool, smooth weight in my hand.

I could feel the antiquity in the weapon and almost feel Nejaa Halcyon's hands pressed there with mine. I think that sensation broke the final wall for me, allowing me to accept my position in the grand tradition of the Jedi. If I could feel my grandfather's essence in the weapon he had wielded, then I felt the weight of his responsibilities on me as well.

We began with remote training. I had a nodding acquain-tance with the little floating b.a.l.l.s that could sting you with a quick needle of blazing energy. At the CorSec Academy remotes played a part in blaster training.

A blaster set on stun could knock a remote out, so trainees used them as targets. In my time at the academy I became very good orienting on movement and nailing a remote with a blue bolt.

"The object of the exercise here, Keiran, is not to kill the remote, but to defend yourself from its shots." Kam let one of the small b.a.l.l.s hover over his outstretched palm. "Use your lightsaber to block the stingshots.

Once you can do this with one remote, we'll work with more. And once you can defend yourself against a handful, we will work on redirecting the bolts at various targets."

I gave Kam a smile. "It's a goal."

Kam released the remote and I ignited my lightsaber. The silvery blade splashed cold light over the interior of what had been the Rebel hangar in the Great Temple. We chose to work inside instead of out because the Temple's walls would stop the remote's bolts. While they wouldn't do more than wound my vanity, a stray shot could stun a woolamander and probably kill a stintaril. Since I was as much of a danger to myself with the lightsaber as anything else, doing everything possible to avoid collateral damage was a good idea.

The remote hissed and puffed as it floated through the air. It spun, then spat out a quick ruby dart that lanced into my thigh. I cursed and hopped back, but the remote came in, pressing the attack. I set myself and willed away the pain, then worked on picking up the remote and its next blast.

While the remote, being lifeless, did not have a direct con-nection to the Force, it existed within the universe bound to-gether by the Force. I made myself disfocus my attention on it directly and instead gain an impression of where it fit within the immediate area. I opened myself to the Force, allowing it to seep in and extend my sensory perception. Then, there, I saw the remote moving through the Force, leaving little oscillations in it like a moth moving through smoke. By spotting the distur-bances it created, I was able to pick it up and track it.

Likewise, within it, the transference of energy created even smaller vibrations within the Force. I sensed the microtremors of energy gathering to fire a stinger. I pinpointed where that reservoir of energy existed and began to bring my lightsaber up and around. As the stinger diode spat scarlet fire, I swept my lightsaber in an arc that picked off the dart heading for my stomach. A nanosecond later I caught hints of another bolt, but missed blocking it.

The dart pinned my left foot to the floor. I yelped-and Kam's laughter did not help ease the pain-and danced back. My retreat b.u.mped me into a pillar I'd not expected to be there, rebounding me back toward the remote. It fired again, but the lunge I took at it got enough blade in front of me to deflect the bolt back off over my right shoulder. And right past Kam's right ear.

He arched an eyebrow at me and hit a b.u.t.ton on his remote controller, powering the unit down. "Did you manage that on purpose?"

I dropped to one knee and rubbed my foot. "I'd love to claim credit, but I'm not the Force genius that Kyp is."

"That's readily apparent." Kam came over and plucked the remote from the air. "Think back for a second. You didn't know where the pillar was. Had you extended your senses enough to know where I was?"

I frowned and tried to recall. "Nope. I think my sensory range was about two meters, and you were outside it. So was the pillar until I jumped back."

"And when you were hurt you probably pulled the sphere in even tighter."

He opened a panel on the remote and twisted a small dial. "I'm going to move it out to four meters. You need to be able to push your sphere out larger and larger, and track the things inside it. If you don't know where you are and what you're doing, you're in deep trouble."

"Got it. Pilots refer to it as 'situational awareness.' If you can't track your own people and the enemy in a vape-brawl, you end up doing a burn-in on some world."

"That's it exactly. My father used to refer to it as a sphere of responsibility. He used to tell me that as Jedi our sphere of responsibility was as big as the galaxy, and the best Jedi could understand and sort out whole star systems. I'd not actually felt that until the other night, in the grotto."

I nodded. "I copy. As a pilot I tended to be pretty good in the situational awareness area, but using the Force is like trying to learn to see after having been blind for most of my life."

"Not easy, but you can do it." Kam slapped me on the shoul-der. "And don't let Kyp's progress bother you."

"Bother me?" I gave him an annoyed stare. "Kyp's progress doesn't bother me. It really has no effect on me."

"Really." Kam's eyes narrowed and sank back into shadows. "You're not a bit envious of the attention he is getting from Master Skywalker?"

I hesitated for a moment and let the question roam around in my brain. I shook my head. "I know I'm compet.i.tive, and I would have thought you'd be right, but I don't see Kyp as some-one I'm competing with. I've been second best before. That's a role I can accept. I make it my mission to make sure the front runner can't relax, but I'm more concerned with doing my best than I am with beating someone else's best."

Kam's expression lightened considerably. "That shows a fair amount of maturity."

"Kinda scary, isn't it?"

"Not in a Jedi Knight." Kam tossed the remote into the air and it withdrew to a range of four meters. "Go again, Keiran Halcyon.

Concentrate. Show me your best."

Of course, my best was nothing compared to Kyp Durron's best. Kyp's growth in the Force was nothing shy of incredible. In just over a week he surpa.s.sed anything the rest of us were doing by light-years. Master Skywalker didn't know what to do with him, he was so good. Kyp gave us hope that reestablishing the Jedi Order could be and would be done.