"And there will be days when we won't." Altis held up his finger, distracted for a moment as if he'd interrupted himself. "Correction. When I won't. Because I won't dictate matters of conscience to the rest of you."

"Is there no point talking to Master Yoda? He might see sense."

"He already believes he does, and I think I see sense, too, but we see very different things. Do you think I could sway him? That's a genuine question."

"I don't know him."

"I fear my own negativity. But if I try to stand back from my emotion, then I'm simply left with a question-whether a being who has lived for centuries can possibly understand what's best for the majority of beings whose time is much, much shorter."

"Master, emotions aren't inherently bad," Geith said. "Why set them aside this time?"

"Because I need to be sure I oppose Yoda's position for the right reasons, and what it is that I actually oppose. Supporting the Republic even when it's flawed? Using clone troops? If I put aside emotions, what reality am I left with?"

"Emotions are our programming, the reactions that keep us alive and help us understand what's right and wrong. If I'm upset when someone treats me as having no worth or rights, isn't that how I work out that I shouldn't treat a clone trooper the same way, or a servant or anyone else? If it offends me, then it probably offends others."

"A good point, Geith, but beware the a.s.sumption that all beings react as you do."

"Master, I'd lay down my life for you, but I don't accept an argument that says if others are not like us, we can treat them differently. That's an excuse for exploitation. That is the path to the dark side."

"I wasn't suggesting that. Just that understanding others' motives and being able to see the world as they do is the key both to compa.s.sion . . . and to success in battle." Altis ruffled Geith's hair. "And while I'm touched by your devotion, I would much rather you lived a long and happy life, influencing others by your example, and raising children to do the same. You, too, young woman." He patted Callista's head. "Enough of the sacrificial tendencies. A little selfishness keeps you alive to do more good for others, yes?"

The transit shuttle swung into view and settled with its docking ring against the bulkhead. The air lock sealed, warning lights flashed, and the interior doors parted. It was time to go.

"You go ahead," said Altis. He shooed them forward. "I'm waiting for someone."

"If you miss this shuttle, the next circuit's not for another half an hour."

Altis shrugged. "Do you mind waiting for me?"

"Master . . . where would we go without you?"

"I'm not the community. You are. One day, it will have to go ahead and leave me behind."

"Never."

"Never is a long time. So if you then decide to hand my mortal remains to a taxidermist, and display me somewhere in the ship," Altis said stiffly, "I shall return as a ghost and ruin every game of sabacc you ever play." He smiled. "I'll wait."

Callista hung around with him until the last moment, until the pilot droid hit the warning light for embarkation and Ash shooed her on board after the others.

"It's someone important," she said.

"Everyone's important to the Master," said Callista.

She stared out the viewport as the shuttle pulled away on the short journey to dock with Wookiee Gunner, until Altis was just a small speck of charcoal gray in the brightly lit bubble of transparisteel and plastoid of the transit area.

Yes, everyone mattered. And every action they took mattered, too.

CAPTAIN'S CABIN, LEVELER, ORBITAL DOCK, KEMLA SHIPYARDS.

Gil was busy with the shipyard supervisor, and Hallena had never been good at farewells.

He'd understand. It wasn't forever. But it had to be now.

She had no luggage; that didn't matter. Gil's steward and one of the clone supply officers had cobbled together a few items- Fleet gray coveralls, man-sized underthings she could alter later, toiletries-and she stuffed them in a small fabric bag. She also had untraceable credits she could convert to cash creds. That was the great thing about being a spook: Rep Intel had trained her to vanish, to leave no traces, and given her the means to do that and survive anonymously in the field. Now she could do just that. She'd have to make the cash cred hit in one go, though, or else her constant dips into the untraceable account would get their attention, and they'd shut it down.

I don't really need much. I'm a survivor.

As she looked at herself in the mirror on Gil's cabin bulkhead, she wondered if the lump on her head was somehow con-nected to her decision to go into hiding. It was, after all, not her style; she'd always imagined herself storming into Isard's office, calling him everything but a Hutt's backside, and telling him what he could do with his job. That day hadn't even really featured in her fantasies, though. She accepted-less willingly, less easily with each pa.s.sing day-that she may not like her job, or even be able to sleep well after some parts of it, but that it had to be done. Her job was to go to the dark places where n.o.body else could.

The trouble was that she'd found the dark place within herself. It wasn't a place she could live any longer.

There was n.o.body to apologize to; there was nothing she could do here to atone. But she looked up at the deckhead, be-cause up was the only direction that felt appropriate.

"Sorry, Vere. Sorry, Ince. Sorry, Shil. Sorry, everyone who died so I could have a second chance. I'm not going to waste it. I promise."

She should have apologized to Gil, too, but theirs was a more complicated relationship, and always would be. She finished writing the letter-real flimsi, a proper letter for a gentleman who cared about such things-and sealed it carefully before kissing it and leaving it under the syrspirit decanter.

He'd look there.

He'd be the only one who would read it and understand its meaning.

And then he'd know where he could find her.

If she didn't leave now, then she never would, and Rep Intel were fully aware of her last known position. The decent thing to do was to relieve Gil of all complicity in her disappearance.

No prisoners. No hostages.

And, because he loved her, he would let her go-and for the time being, she had to.

Chapter Thirteen.

We Jedi are tainted by our connections to the Republic.

Many see us as its enforcers. We're on the wrong side.

We should be helping to bring the Republic down, once and for all.

-Jedi Knight Sora Bulq YARILLE, OUTER RIM.

It was yet another wasteland; another shard of the bigger war, and more shattered lives.

Altis stood on the loading ramp of the Wookiee Gunner and stared at the devastation with a sinking heart that did not befit a Jedi Master.

We can deal with this. Really, we can.

A brand-new city had sprung up on the tundra, a city of tents. Behind it, like a shattered vase, the regional capital of Yen Bachask lay in ruins. The area was so unrelentingly flat that Altis was sure he could see another bombed town in the far distance.

Maybe it's a mirage. Can you get mirages in cold climates?

Geith put his hand on the Master's shoulder. Neither man said anything as little dark shapes emerged from the tents to stand and stare back-refugees displaced by the fighting that had hit their world, then moved on.

"Let's do it," Geith said. He scanned the horizon, hands on hips. "Not even a tree. What a miserable place."

Callista, Ash, and the others who acted as section leaders moved out from the ship onto the thin dusting of snow to begin walking with slow, deliberate, we're-here-to-help care toward the tent city to make contact. It was always a good idea to send the females in first. Altis had known so many lethal, violent women that he wasn't sure why that usually rea.s.sured the scared and suffering; but refugees reacted better when the first hand extended to them was a woman's. Perhaps it was because soldiers tended to be male, right across the galaxy.

He waited until a few of the locals, huddled in heavy coats against the bitter wind, stepped forward and exchanged hand-shakes with Callista and Ash.

"She's a good girl," Altis said, more to himself than Geith.

"I know," Geith said. "She always bounces back. That computer thing really scared her. But she seems fine now."

Altis hadn't been thinking of that. But Callista had changed subtly, and he made a mental note to keep an eye on it. He took a wide path around the makeshift camp to see what might be dragged from the town and salvaged. As they neared the town walls, he found himself walking on an increasing density of debris, tan and white, metal and plastoid.

It was the remains of droids and clone troopers.

Ince. Were. Those young men, allowed to know nothing else.

It wasn't so much the realization of what he was walking upon that stopped him in his tracks and made his stomach lurch, but what he sensed. The Force seized him by the collar, shook him, made him look. See what your kind have done, Altis. Feel the pain and misery that empty piety begets. He had no choice but to listen to it.

"Yoda, you fool-you fool." He dreaded going farther. He knew he would see bodies, and he knew that somehow the bodies of troopers would disturb him even more than those of civilians. He would ponder on that. "And you wonder why the dark side has been growing these many years? Because we're letting it creep up on us a step at a time."

Geith caught his arm. "Master?"

"I'm fine, Geith." Altis put his hand on Geith's and patted it rather than shake it off. He didn't want to be touched. He felt unworthy of concern or sympathy. "I just have moments of clarity that cut me to the bone."

He walked on anyway, and, yes, there were bodies. He would arrange cremations. He would try to notify next of kin. Troopers had none, but surely somebody-somebody-kept records of their individual existence and pa.s.sing. Rex cared. Therefore if n.o.body else would mourn them, then at least a clone brother would want and need to know.

There is no pa.s.sion, only serenity.

"Garbage," Altis spat. "Garbage. Where's the pa.s.sion for justice? Where's the pa.s.sion for peace? The pa.s.sion for rights? We need pa.s.sion! No pa.s.sion-only complacency! We forgot what we were put here to do."

Geith, like the rest of his students, was used to these angry Altis-versus-Altis debates. He walked alongside his Master pa-tiently.

"We all feel the darkness coming, Master."

"It's not separate!" It was so clear now; the Force was shaking him and demanding that he listen. "It's not a separate ent.i.ty! It's not another being! It's us, it's in us, it's part of us. It's our blindness, that we think our little identichip that says good guys exempts us from looking at our own acceptance of evil. It's so much easier to point to Dooku and blame him. Isn't it? Dooku was a good man when I knew him. A principled man, a man with honest pa.s.sions. We drive such men to extreme ac-tions when we refuse to look at what troubles them. We are the dark side, all of us. It's what we all do-and don't do."

Geith was a good man, just like Dooku had once been. He had a fine mind; he never accepted authority because it stood over him with a fist or a disapproving look. He was unflinching in examining his own shortcomings. But it wasn't enough to examine and think. Every being had to do. Good intention wasn't enough.

Good intention, and blind eyes turned to a nagging reality, had killed the soldier who lay crumpled a few meters away in the shelter of a doorway. He could have been asleep, huddled against the biting wind, had it not been for the fact that a large part of his body was missing.

Who planned such an army? And how did they know war was coming?

"I think the time when that problem could have been solved was over long before you were even born, Master," Geith said. "So before you blame yourself for this, for withdrawing from mainstream Jedi life-don't."

"That," Altis said stiffly, "is the denial of personal responsibility. We can all make a difference."

"Master, if one man could change the galaxy-you'd have managed it by now."

Altis steeled himself to squat down and turn over the body. It was stiff, not from rigor mortis but from the cold. He wondered whether to remove the helmet, but he couldn't bear to see the face. He'd looked into Rex's eyes once too often. Geith put his hand under his elbow and helped him stand upright.

His back hurt. It had been a hard few days, and he wasn't getting any younger.

"We've tried to stay away from Republic business," he said. "But it won't stay away from us."

"Master," Geith said softly, "it doesn't mean we've compromised."

"We have to stop this war."

"You saw how I tried and failed to remain aloof, Master. Walking away from Rex and his men doesn't keep our hands clean. They still die. We do nothing-well, good can never come from doing nothing."

"I feel afraid when I realize that Sora Bulq has a point. That the Republic might well need bringing down."

"I don't think we can do that, either. All we can do is take responsibility for ourselves, and help the victims of this war."

Altis looked back at the ship. There was now a steady stream of Jedi and their support teams ferrying supplies to the refugees. "Like these wretched people."

"And those." Geith indicated the dead trooper. "They're victims, too."

"Let's make ourselves useful," Altis said. He needed to compose himself before he dealt with the bodies, and a little honest labor, even with a bad back, was a good way to do it. "Just getting the generators going will save lives. Is it my age, or is this place as cold as death?"

"It's cold, Master."

They walked back to the camp. Altis's heart broke; it wasn't the injuries he saw among the civilians so much as the look on their faces that tore at him. It was bewilderment. Why us? Why had the war come to them? A woman with a small child clinging to her legs held out a cup to him, steam curling from its rim, and he realized she wasn't asking for it to be filled, but offering him a hot drink. She probably saw an old man, his face pinched by the cold, in need of something warming. She was, frankly, thin and ugly, worn out by poverty; but he'd never seen such beauty and radiance in his life. It was perfection; a simple act of generosity, love in its raw and natural state.

Serenity, my backside. Pa.s.sion. Pa.s.sion and anger and love. That's what this galaxy needs, not serenity. Pa.s.sion for change. Anger at this brutality. Love-buckets of it, for everyone, love between child and parent, between spouses, between brothers and sisters, between friends. We need more attachment, not less. Attachment can stop us from tearing ourselves apart.

Altis had a gift. However these things worked, he had been given rare abilities by the galaxy, and it was his duty to use them. He just didn't always know how best to apply them.

Altis took the cup, drank, and embraced the emaciated woman. He found a few candies in his pocket for the child. One of his non-Jedi students, Gali, trotted over to him with an armful of blankets.

"We thought we'd lost you, Master," she said. What he thought was a blanket on the top of the pile turned out to be a coat, and she thrust it at him. "For goodness' sake put this on."

Altis pulled the overcoat around him to humor her. There was no rule against a Jedi Master teaching those who had no Force powers. If there was-bah, he'd ignore all that nonsense. The ordinary men and women in his community taught him more daily than he could possibly teach them in a lifetime. Like his dear late wife always said-not sensitive to the Force at all, p.r.o.ne to using his lightsaber to cut stubborn branches-there was more to wisdom than being able to move a table with the power of your mind.

Yes, Margani. I hear you. I hear you still.

Geith paused among the tents to make notes on his datapad. Everyone in the community knew their role in an emergency. Geith was noting how many refugees needed medical care; the urgent cases were already being treated by first responders, but there were others who would need drugs and special care when the first rush was over.

"Am I letting my doctrinal pride get in the way, Geith?" Altis said. He picked up a little boy who tottered up to him, and examined the child's runny eyes. A woman came running as if to find the kid, and Altis handed him back. "Tell me straight. Is this just vain ideology on my part, some idiotic schism with Yoda?"

Altis wanted it to be. He really did. Two old fools arguing over theories, academic vanity. It would have been so much easier to swallow than feeling he could avert a disaster if he only argued harder.