"Don't play master-student games with me, Skywalker," Brakiss said. "Just tell me what you want."

"Your mother told me that you were expecting me," Luke said.

"You didn't hurt her, did you?" There was a swift protective-ness in Brakiss that startled Luke. It had not been there before.

"Of course not," Luke said. "Your mother is a good woman, Brakiss. She is concerned for you."

"She's never been concerned for me," Brakiss said, and Luke felt the pain, the ancient pain that had prevented Brakiss from facing himself on Yavin 4. Brakiss blamed his mother for the Empire's use of him as a child. Not the Empire. His mother, who had been unable to prevent his loss.

But Luke had no time for old family arguments. "Were you expecting me, Brakiss?"

"At some point, Skywalker. You never let your students eo easily."

"It's been years," Luke said. "Students make their own choices. You aren't the only student I've lost."

"I was the only member of the Empire to best you," Brakiss said, bringing himself to his full height.

Luke glanced around him. The light gave the room an airy, open feel that the protocol-droid section did not have. "This is an Imperial facility, then?"

"No," Brakiss snarled. "It's mine."

"You're no longer with the Empire." Luke smiled. "See, Brakiss? Some good did come from your stay on Yavin 4."

"I'm not with the Empire any longer because the Empire no longer exists,"

Brakiss said.

"There are still enclaves," Luke said.

Brakiss waved a hand in dismissal. "Powerless groups who cannot let go of the past. I have a new life here, Skywalker. I don't need you."

"I never said you did," Luke said. "But you have a talent in the Force, Brakiss, a talent that needs nurturing, not the hatred grown on the dark side."

"I no longer use the Force, Skywalker."

"Then why do you still carry a lightsaber?" Brakiss's hand fell to his side and clutched the saber, then let it go, as if he had just realized what he had been doing. "What do you want, Skywalker?" Luke took a step forward. The conveyor belts hemmed him in. He could only go toward Brakiss or turn his back on Brakiss. "Two tragedies have happened recently. In the first, millions died all at once. The second was a bombing on Coruscant that killed a number of senators. In both cases, I got a sense of your presence. You're connected somehow, Brakiss. I need to know how." Brakiss shook his head. "I live here now. I have legitimate work, and I make good money running this facility. I no longer work for the Empire."

"I never said the Empire was involved with those events. I'm not even sure what happened in the first instance. I thought perhaps you could help me." Brakiss narrowed his eyes. "Why should I help you?"

"Because there's still a spark of good in you, Brakiss, buried beneath all that the Empire taught you. In the end, Darth Vader returned to the light. So could you." Brakiss's chin trembled. His lips parted, and he took one involuntary step backward. For a moment, Luke could see the young Brakiss, the child Brakiss, the one buried deep beneath years of dark-side training, the one Luke had nearly reached on Yavin 4.

Then the glimpse vanished. Brakiss's face became a mask. It was as if doors had closed to that distant part of himself, as if he were not just walling it off from Luke, but from himself.

With a snarl, Brakiss pulled his lightsaber from his waist. A bright red flame soared from it. Brakiss ran toward Luke and slashed as he moved.

Luke's lightsaber was in his hand instantly. He parried Brakiss's thrust, smashing Brakiss's lightblade against a nearby conveyor belt. Sparks flew. Brakiss recovered, slashed again, and Luke blocked the hit.

The lightsabers hummed, and clanged as they clashed. Thrust, parry, thrust, parry. Luke matched Brakiss movement for movement. Somewhere in the last few years, Brakiss had gained strength.

Brakiss tried a series of small thrusts, little movements designed to be parried, and then he arched the lightsaber in one great circular movement. Luke didn't move quickly enough. Brakiss's light-saber seared Luke's shirt, narrowly missing his skin. Luke then matched each movement of Brakiss's.

The a.s.sembly room was hot with the sparks from the light-saber blades.

The edges of the conveyor belts glowed with the heat. Luke concentrated on each of Brakiss's movements, deciding to defend, never to attack.

Brakiss swung his lightsaber from left to right, going for Luke's unprotected sides. Luke blocked each attack. The swings got fiercer, the movements sloppier. Brakiss was no match for Luke, but he was a good, strong fighter, and they would both be exhausted before this match ended.

Then Luke felt a blast of fear. He glanced up in surprise. The fear had come from Brakiss, and the fear was not of Luke.

Brakiss stopped attacking and raised his blade, much as Ben had in the belly of the Death Star.

Unlike Vader, Luke shut off his blade. The hum stopped, and the sound of labored breathing echoed in the near-empty room.

"Kill me," Brakiss snapped.

"I have no desire to kill you," Luke said. "I would rather bring you back with me to Yavin 4."

"Kill me, Master Skywalker." All trace of sarcasm was gone from his voice. "Kill me. End it now."

"We all have to face ourselves," Luke said. He extended his left hand.

"Come to Yavin 4 with me. I will help you." Then Brakiss shook his head, as if he were coming out of a deep sleep. "It's too late for me," he said.

"It's never too late." Brakiss smiled, a wistful look. "It is for me." He swallowed. "I don't belong on Yavin 4. I belong here. I am better off without contact, alone."

"Come with me, Brakiss," Luke said. "You can't be happy here. "

"Happy?" Brakiss said. "No. But I am satisfied. I can be creative here.

And that is enough." He bolstered his lightsaber. "I was paid to get a message to you. That's why you've been following my trail. You're supposed to go to Almania. The answers you want are there."

"Who wants me in Almania?" Brakiss shivered. The movement was fine, almost invisible, but Luke felt it as well as saw it. Brakiss wasn't afraid of Luke. He was afraid of the person who had sent Luke the message. The person who wanted Luke in Almania.

"If I were you, Master Skywalker," Brakiss said, "I'd go back to Yavin 4.

I'd forget about everything else. Turn into Obi-Wan and retire. Leave the fighting to those who are ruthless. They'll win anyway." Then he turned and walked out of the room.

Luke clipped his lightsaber to his belt and waited, hoping Brakiss would return. But Brakiss didn't. Luke started to follow, and then stopped. He couldn't help Brakiss. Not yet. Brakiss had again turned down his offer to return to Yavin 4.

But Brakiss was getting closer. Brakiss would come eventually. The Brakiss who had stopped fighting, the Brakiss who had spoken this last, was the Brakiss Luke was trying to save.

Luke had never seen such defeat in a man. Or perhaps that wasn't defeat speaking. Perhaps Brakiss was giving him a hidden message.

Perhaps not.

Almania. Luke had never heard of it.

But he knew that he had to go there.

Or die trying.

Brakiss felt the door close behind him. He leaned on the metal wall in the utility tunnel and let himself shake. Never again did he want to be between Skywalker and Kueller.

Never again.

The line was too fine to walk, and Skywalker was adept at reading him.

Skywalker had almost convinced him to return to Yavin 4. In the s.p.a.ce of a conversation, Brakiss nearly had abandoned everything.

For Skywalker.

Never again.

If Kueller let him, he would renounce the Force. He would go on to make droids, to live the kind of life his mother wanted for him, a quiet life, lived in obscurity.

It was the best he could hope for as long as Kueller and Skywalker were in the universe. He was not as powerful as either of them, and he knew it.

He put a hand over his face. Kueller had wanted him to move with finesse, to make Skywalker want to go to Almania. Instead, Brakiss had warned him away. His feelings got too confused around Skywalker. It was almost as if Skywalker could turn him with a few words, a glance, an idea.

In the end, Darth Vader returned to the light. So could you.

So could you.

But something had compelled Vader away from the dark side. Rumors were that something was Skywalker.

If that was the case, then Skywalker was more powerful than both Kueller and Brakiss gave him credit for. Brakiss had gone into the meeting wanting to kill Skywalker. By the middle of it, he had begged Skywalker to kill him.

How humbling.

How humiliating.

Master Skywalker still controlled him. And he had warned the man away from Almania.

If Skywalker didn't go, what would Kueller say?

What would Kueller do?

Brakiss wasn't sure he wanted to find out.

TWENTY-ONE.

Cole let the laser wrench fall from his hands. It landed with a clank in the X-wing. He faced the security guards, none of whom he recognized, and said, "My name is Far-dreamer. I work here." R2 had inched closer to the X-wing. He moaned.

"Only Kloperians are authorized on the new X-wings," said the Kloperian guard. It was holding three blasters in its tentacles.

"Not exactly true," Cole said. "A number of engineers work on the X-wings. I was supposed to check this one's computer system."

"Who gave the order?" the Kloperian asked.

"Luke Skywalker," Cole said. "President Organa Solo's brother." The Kloperian clucked. One of the human guards lowered his blaster. "Keep it on the suspect," the Mon Calamari guard said. "We have no proof of his statement. "

"Besides, what would a hero of the Rebellion be doing giving engineering orders?" the Kloperian asked.

"When he believes someone is tampering with the equipment, he has the right to give orders," Cole said. He knew he was on a limb here, but he had to keep going. He had to talk them through this. They didn't look friendly with those blasters trained on him. He almost felt as if he were back on Tatooine in the days of Jabba the Hutt's regime. This didn't feel like Coruscant at all.

"No one has been tampering with the equipment," the Kloperian said.

"Someone has," Cole said. "Look." He nodded down toward the X-wing itself. The Kloperian slithered forward. It peered inside. "I see nothing."

"Then look again," Cole said. "There's a detonating device with an Imperial insignia inside the guidance computer." The Mon Calamari guard came over. It trained its huge eyes on the computer. "The Empire never announced its presence like this," it said. "Such a device would have no need of an Imperial insignia unless someone was trying to lead us astray."

"There are rumors that the new senate members, the ones who are former Imperials, were behind the bombing," said another guard. "What if they weren't? What if someone just wanted to make it look that way?" The Kloperian prodded Cole with one of its blasters. "Who hired you to sabotage this X-wing, human?"

"No one," he said.

"Skywalker?"

"Luke Skywalker is a hero of the New Republic," Cole said. He could feel the shock down to his toes.

"Skywalker is above reproach," the Mon Calamari said. "But he makes a good cover for this boy."

"I don't need a cover," Cole said.

"Stop, boy. The more you say the more trouble you'll be in. We caught you in the act of sabotaging this ship."

"I haven't done anything." His voice was rising. Through the corner of his eye, he saw R2 slowly move away from him. He had to keep talking, just so that they wouldn't notice R2. "I just discovered the problem in a reconditioned X-wing. I was checking to see if the same problem existed in a new X-wing. So I checked the prototype. If I were going to sabotage a ship, don't you think I'd sabotage one someone was going to use? "

"I have no idea what you would do, boy," the Mon Calamari guard said.

"He might have a point," said the slight woman guard beside the Kloperian. She had said nothing until now. "We don't know if he's sabotaging or experimenting." R2 had ducked behind one of the other X-wings. Cole had to be careful not to look directly at the little droid.

"That's not for us to discover," the Mon Calamari said. "Let someone with authority make that judgment."

"By all means," Cole said. "Contact General Antilles. He'll want to know about this."

"You know General Antilles?"

"No, but I work for him."

"We'll go to your supervisor," the Kloperian said. "I'm sure he'll inform us that you were not authorized to make these changes." R2 had reached the wall. His small arm came out, and he jacked into the computer.

"Luke Skywalker said that if anyone was to question me," Cole said, hoping that his half-truth wasn't obvious, "I was to tell them to contact General Antilles." The Mon Calamari sighed. "We cannot ignore this."