I reached down and flicked his lightsaber off, then straightened up as Luke rose above Red. From her I only got peace, a peace I found vaguely reminiscent of the peace I'd imagined surrounding Mirax when Exar Kun showed her to me. "New trick?"

Luke shut off his lightsaber and I did the same with mine, plunging the alley into darkness. "Old one, one of yours. I hit her and knocked her out. Just easing some of her pain now."

"Nice sense of timing. If you hadn't arrived, the five of them would have killed me, clean and quick." I shivered. "How did you find me?"

In faint light from the street, I saw Luke's expression sharpen. "I knew, if you had learned all you needed to learn, that I would meet you here, and that we would be allies." I felt a chill run down my spine. "I see."

Luke's voice lightened slightly. "As for the when, with that I needed some help." He turned back up the alley. "Are we clear?"

A silhouette framed itself in the alley, prompting me to laugh. "I see no pursuit."

"Ooryl?" I hopped over Orange's body and ran forward.

"Ooryl, what are you doing here?"

"I am a Findsman." The Gand shrugged as if that should have explained everything. "The important thing of being a Findsman is not knowing where to look, for that is easy. It is knowing when to look. I knew the when was now, and went to Master Skywalker to tell him that. He pointed me here, and I brought him now."

Luke waved us back into the alley. "We have to get our sleeping friends out of here. We have a ship, but I need somewhere else to keep them. They know where Mirax is."

I nodded. "Can't be far from here, because Tavira brought them within a day of hearing we had Jedi trouble here. Who are they?"

"I don't know." Luke shook his head. "We better find out and find out fast, because if we don't, if someone learns they've failed in their mission, it may cost Mirax her life."

I reached down and hefted Orange up by his belt, letting Ooryl grab Yellow and Purple. "I know where we can take them, but getting information out of them will be tough. They know how to use the Force, and I'm not sure we can break through to find out what we want to know."

"I think I have something that can help us in that regard."

Luke gestured, allowing Red and Blue to float up into the air. "Lead on, Keiran. As Ooryl explained it to me, when is just an aperture in time, and we don't want it to snap shut before we can get through to your wife."

We took our five opponents back to the hotel. I called Elegos and had him meet us in the back, at the freightlift. Ooryl left the two he'd carried to Elegos, then returned to the s.p.a.ceport to fetch something for Luke.

Awaiting his return we stripped our prisoners out of their armor, separated them and treated the cuts and bruises they'd earned in the fight.

When Ooryl returned he brought with him a cagelike device that had suspended inside of it a small, furred reptile. A nutrient mix flowed through a network of tubes, sustaining the creature which, if it were capable of movement, seemed singularly disinclined to show it. I did see it blink an eye, but even that movement was slower than I would have expected in a living creature.

"This is an ysalamiri, one of two I brought with me." Luke rested a hand on the cage and looked a bit fatigued. "It is unique among living creatures-at least I don't know of any others-in that it seems to project a field that negates the Force. On its homeworld some predators evolved with a Force sense that lets them hunt, so its negation sphere acts as camouflage."

"Okay, that's why I feel so weird. Thought I was just tired." I tried to reach inside myself to tap the Force, but I got nothing. "It's like I'm back where I started, back before the academy."

Luke nodded. "You're fortunate in that you spent most of your life only having a fringe sense of the Force. I've been involved much longer than you and in the presence of an ysalamiri, I feel lost, like a limb has been lopped off." Luke flexed his mechanical hand. "Worse, actually."

"How do you think this will affect our guests?"

Luke managed a smile, but that seemed to tax him. "I think they've been involved with the Force longer than I have. They seem to armor themselves well with it. I suspect they will feel very vulnerable."

"Good." I gave him a feral grin. "Just what we want if we're going to get anything out of them. Just follow mv lead."

The Jedi Master caught hold of my shoulder. "I've not done anything like this before, interrogating prisoners."

I winked at him. "'Sokay, I know enough for both of us. Just stay over there, by the door, and look as malevolent as you can. Keep your face straight and you really don't need to say anything."

"Malevolent?"

"Think Hutt, but with eyebrows."

"Got it."

We picked Red to be the first subject-actually, Elegos did, for reasons of his own-but I didn't mind. Interrogating women is always tricky, mainly because they tend to be suspicious of any claims made by a man and often believe they can use their looks and wiles to fool a detective.

Red, who really was a slender beauty with wavy brown hair and blue eyes, could have melted many a detective's steel heart, but the surprise and fear twisting her face as she awakened robbed her of her beauty. The ysalamiri made me feel as if I was seeing in black and white, so for her it must have seemed as if she was blind.

When I saw her eyes flicker open, I looked back at Luke and nodded as if I'd received a telepathic message from him. "Yes, I will see what I can find out. Give her a moment to recover."

Luke stared at me for a second, then impatiently flicked a hand in my direction.

I smiled. Quick study. Let's hope she isn't.

I squatted down next to the chair in which we had bound her. "Forgive me for having to restrain you like this. I wish I could make things more pleasant, but he's rather insistent. I know you're feeling odd right now because you have lost the use of certain senses you consider part of you.

He has removed your access to them to make it easier for me to probe your mind, but I know how unpleasant that will be for you."

She shook her head adamantly. "I will not betray my people."

Her words came stiff and p.r.o.nounced slightly oddly. Precise, that's it.

It almost seemed as if she were speaking with the same very proper diction my grandfather used. It was a datapoint-not much of one, but a point nonetheless.

"No, of course, you don't want to do that. I don't want you to do that, but we have to find the Invidious, and find it quickly. Leonia Tavira has to be stopped . . . from being able to harm anyone else." I'd almost ended my sentence at the word stopped, but I caught a momentary hesitation of her breath, which made me add the extra phrase. "We really don't want to see her hurt anyone else."

"You can't stop her."

I glanced back at Luke, then turned to her. "He says that just because you could not stop her, does not mean we cannot. Sorry, he always makes things sound so dire, but the fact is, he's right. I've been here for months, on many operations where you or another of your brethren were on the Invidious, and you never detected me. Why not? Because he was shielding me. You know you looked, you know you tried, but it wasn't until this evening, when we wanted to trap you, that I revealed myself enough to let you find me. And you never even detected him."

I stood and walked over to confer with Luke, letting her mull over what I'd said. I raised a finger to my lips to keep Luke silent, but frowned to get him to give me that expression. When he did look at me angrily, I recoiled. "But you can't be so cruel. To remove her access to the Force forever isn't going to do her or us any good. Sure, it might teach her a lesson, but so would having a bantha trample her. I don't think she should be made an example of. It won't make the others more tractable."

Luke really got into his part, jabbing me hard in the chest with two fingers. I did an about face, rubbing my chest, and returned to Red's side. "I really do think I can get him to unblock your access to the Force, I really do. You just need to tell us where Tavira keeps the Invidious. I mean, we already know you manage to keep it hidden-you're very good at that stuff, hiding and all."

"No, I cannot tell you. None of us will betray our people." I sighed and rested a hand on her shoulder. "Well, I know you're thinking about things from your point of view, and maybe even thinking about them from Tavira's point of view. That Star Destroyer is very powerful, and for you to be working with her, you've got to be afraid she's going to turn it on your people if you betray her. I understand that. It's crystal clear."

I let my voice drop a bit in tone and volume as I leaned forward. "Thing of it is this, though: you didn't get me. You didn't get him. Tavira, when she doesn't hear that you succeeded, will see you as having failed.

And you know her-failure isn't an accident, it's a conspiracy. The way I see it, and I know her almost as well as you do, she'll see herself as betrayed at this point and act. What you have to ask yourself is this: do you want to be the cause of her killing all your people, or do you want to let the guys who defeated you take their run at Tavira?"

Red cracked a little and we were able to use what we learned from her to bust the rest of the Jensaarai-that's what they called themselves-wide open. What we got from them was incredibly interesting because it came wrapped in a strange philosophical package that equated Obi-Wan Ken.o.bi with Darth Vader in terms of being a Jedi exterminator. The Jensaarai were trained as Jedi were, even to the point of constructing lightsabers and training with them, but it was not nearly the transitional point for them that it was in the Jedi tradition I knew.

For the Jensaarai, their crowning moment, their full growth into becoming one of the Jensaarai Defenders-they had Apprentices, Defenders and Saarai-kaar, of which there appeared to be only one-was the creation of their armor. They started with a basic armor sh.e.l.l and covered it with spun cortosis ore fibers, providing them some modic.u.m of protection against all sorts of weapons. They styled the armor after whichever creature they felt best possessed or expressed their personal desires for service to the Jensaarai community, and if the armor we'd taken from them was any indication, the creatures chosen were all defensively minded-creatures that remained hidden and dormant until pressed, then they proved very deadly.

The history of the Jensaarai's involvement with Tavira was one of mistakes from the start. Tavira, fleeing a New Republic task force, jumped to the Suarbi system, in the Quence Sector. The seventh planet, a gas giant, had a big ring of asteroids around it and over a dozen moons.

One of those moons, designated Suarbi 7/5, became known as Susevfi to the colonists who had decided to tame the world centuries ago. Though similar to Yavin 4 in size and rotational speed, Susevfi ran to more savannah-like gra.s.slands, much like Noquivzor-a planet on which I had been stationed before Rogue Squadron took Coruscant. A couple of human settlements grew up, and the Jensaarai were located outside the large seaport, Yumfla.

Tavira and some of her people had come down to Yumfla, and she immediately went to work on the local Imperial governor-a petty bureaucrat who made the last mistake of his life by rebuffing her advances. Tavira had him shot, then declared the planet liberated from the oppression of the Empire and in opposition to the oppression of the New Republic. The Saarai-kaar of the Jensaarai went to Tavira and heard everything she wanted to hear from the Admiral. Tavira cultivated trust, then betrayed it, and put the Jensaarai in the position of protecting their fellow citizens-who had not even known of their existence-by serving Tavira. Failure to serve her would result in the annihilation of Yumfla.

The Jensaarai had picked up on Mirax's intentions when she'd come hunting the Invids. They nabbed her at Nal Hutta and brought her to Susevfi.

Tavira had wanted to slay her, but the Saarai-kaar had insisted on keeping her alive and imprisoned in the old planetary governor's palace.

Learning what we had, Luke and I knew we had to hurry to Susevfi, and we had to make a difficult decision because we could not bring the Jensaarai with us. A change of heart in just one of them could spoil any surprise we could generate, crushing our chances for getting into the stronghold where Tavira was holding Mirax.

We decided we'd leave them on Courkrus in the company of an ysalamiri. We knew we had to trust someone to hang on to them, so we went to Jacob Nive and revealed to him my ident.i.ty as Keiran Halcyon, Jedi Knight, and that of Luke Skywalker. We explained to him that we were going to finish the Invids and stop Tavira and offered him a choice. We could destroy the last of the Survivors or give them the same chance at a new start that the New Republic had offered other victims of Imperial aggression and coercion.

Nive accepted the chance to start over. With the New Republic gaining strength, and the last vestiges of the Empire in retreat, the Survivors were losing their anti-Imperial focus and just becoming thieves. Without the protection of the Invidiotts, the New Republic could have and would have smashed them a dozen times over. He willingly exchanged entertaining five guests and an ysalamiri for a new life.

He looked at me hard. "One thing, Jenos, how do I know you'll succeed?"

"Why did you fight the Empire all those years?"

"To avenge what happened to my friends."

I nodded. "Right. Leonia Tavira has my wife. I'm fighting so I won't need to avenge anyone."

Nive's eyes tightened. "The two of you alone?"

I winked at Luke. "We've got some allies, and one is really big. We'll do fine."

Before we left Courkrus, we shot two messages out. One went to General Cracken telling him we had located the Invidiotts' home and were going to take the ship out. Data letting him know where we were going was left with Nive, but we didn't transmit it directly to Cracken because we didn't want a New Republic task force showing up and alerting Tavira to what was going on before we had a chance to get in and rescue Mirax. If the New Republic made a move, the Jensaarai at Susevfi could still pick up on it and alert Tavira, dooming our rescue attempt.

I also sent a message to Booster, telling him that I'd located Mirax and was going after her. I didn't give him even as much detail as we gave Cracken, but I did note I expected to have her safe and sound within a couple of days. The message said I'd bring her to the Errant Venture for rest and recovery first thing.

We'd wanted to leave Elegos behind, but he insisted on traveling with us.

He and Ooryl had begun to get along famously-a trend I found profoundly disturbing-meaning that the two of them bonded while comparing experiences of sharing quarters with me. Elegos pointed out that the small ship which Luke and Ooryl had brought to Courkrus was notoriously difficult to handle with one pilot, and since he could fly, he should back Ooryl up, just for appearance's sake if nothing else.

Luke or I could have easily filled the second-seat role, but we were going into Susevfi within the protective bubble of the ysalamiri's Force repulsion. It would effectively hide all traces of us from any of the Jetzsaarai Defenders stationed in the planetary ring, as well as those on the ground. The Ring Defenders regularly used their Force powers to get a sense of incoming ships and to subtly direct them away from away from noticing the faint sensor phantoms of a Star Destroyer hidden in the rings. Even without the Jensaarai hiding the ship, the Invidious would have been tough to pick out of the rings. With the Jen-saarai in place such spotting was all but impossible.

Luke stretched out on a padded bench in the small ship's lounge and draped an arm across his eyes. "If we had more Jedi, we could have accompanied survey ships and probably have picked up on the Jensaarai efforts to hide the Invidiotts."

"Could be, but I only noticed them when they were at close range and trying to probe me. When I contacted Tycho at the battle of Xa Fel, they picked me up and I never even detected their presence." I stood and walked over to the food prep station. I pulled a prepackaged zureber syrup container from the chiller unit. "Want something to drink?"

Luke peeked out at me and nodded. "Sure, toss it."

I lofted it toward him and it landed with a plop on his belly.

He whuffed loudly.

I smiled. "You're supposed to catch it."

He sat up, nipped the corner of the package off and spat it out. "I was trying to, but inside the field the ysalamiri puts out, my effort failed."

I tore open the corner of my syrup container and sipped.

"Tough being normal again, isn't it?"

Luke sighed heavily. "First eighteen years of my life I didn't have a clue about the Force. I was just a farm boy who liked to fly. I wanted to join the Imperial service and become a pilot. Jedi Knights were ancient history, and old Uncle Owen didn't encourage me to study that history."

"I know, it was kind of the same in my house." I dropped onto the bench at Luke's feet. "Just didn't talk about the Jedi that much. I knew my grandfather had known one, worked with one once, but it was kind of like mentioning an ex-wife at a family gathering."

"Of your new wife's family, right?"

I laughed. "Yeah, there you go. You know, when I saw my grandfather several months ago and could see the pride he'd taken in helping hide Nejaa Halcyon's wife and child, I learned how difficult it had to have been for him to keep all this stuff hidden for so long. I think I disappointed him when I rejected my Jedi heritage to pursue the Invids on my own. I'll have to let him know I've reconsidered."

"I'm glad you did." Luke sat up and patted me on the shoulder. "Hard to tell what felt worse: having a student turn to the dark side or having someone just walk away because of my teaching."

I shrugged. "You know us Corellian Jedi-notoriously contrary and bent on going our own way." My conversation with Elegos flashed through my mind.

"I owe you an apology, by the way. I never put aside my expectations for the academy, so I never really gave you a chance to train me."

"Accepted but unnecessary." Luke gave me a nod. "I didn't make it easy for you. I've got to remember that parallel tracks are not better or worse, just different. We're still heading in the same direction."

"True, but that still doesn't mean I'm entirely comfortable with things like Kyp's track. Tavira has it all worked out that Kyp killed the Carida system on orders from the New Republic, and there are going to be a whole bunch of folks who believe her."

"I know, and I understand how you feel." Luke drank for a moment, then licked away a blue liquid bead forming at the corner of his mouth. "It could be suggested, though, that the deal we offered Jacob Nive and his Survivors is really a lot like the chance Kyp has been given. In dedicating his life to being a Jedi you know Kyp is really under something of a life sentence."

"I know, and it'll be hard labor, too. Killing him wouldn't make the galaxy any better, so this is likely the best solution." I drank, leaned my head back and closed my eyes for a moment. "Doesn't mean I like it and doesn't mean my inability to come up with a better solution isn't frustrating."

"All we can do is our best." Luke laughed wearily. "So, tell me, did you ever figure you'd be hurtling through hypers.p.a.ce planning to a.s.sault an Imperial Governor's palace, which is now the stronghold for a renegade Imperial admiral and her crew?"

I opened one eye and screwed it around to look at him. "Tatooine must have been really, really bad if that was the kind of fantasy life you created for yourself."

"It wasn't that bad."

"Right, I was there once. On any other world the Jawas would be the size of Hutts, but on Tatooine, they shrink."

"Good thing, too, or imagine what they'd cart off." Luke smiled.

"Actually, I have good memories of Tatooine, more than bad."

"But you wanted off that rock."

"In the worst way." His smile died. "And I got it."

I reached over and grabbed him by the back of the neck. "Yeah, but it brought out the best in you, and that means the rest of the galaxy gets a shot at realizing its best. Losing your uncle and aunt had to hurt, but I bet they are happy with the return the investment of their lives got through you."

"Think so?"

"Yeah, no doubt." I smiled at him. Here, within the ysalamiri bubble, Luke seemed to lose some of the brooding oppression that settled on him when he remained aware of the universe around him. The optimism and uncertainty he had known as a boy shone through. "You had no brothers and sisters, right-I mean, you grew up alone?"

"'Cept for friends, yeah."