Legacy III

Chapter 1

"Oh come off it, Kenobi! What possible objection can you harbor? This is the kind of opportunity that presents itself only once in a lifetime!"

Garen Muln – tall, dark, handsome, but regrettably not the silent type - threw up both hands in a dramatic gesture and winked broadly at Reeft Golodnyy, his seasoned accomplice and conspirator. The Dressalian padawan was also tall, though not dark or handsome, and certainly only less voluble in defense of the proposed plan because his mouth was full of brobdig hash and steamed torffli.

"Mmm- what he said," the latter of the pair mumbled.

Across the small refectory table, Obi-Wan demurely sprinkled salt onto his own supper. "Thank the Force for small mercies… I shan't have to resist the siren allure of temptation more than once."

"So you admit you're tempted!" Garen triumphantly concluded.

The young Knight raised a facetious brow. "Positively concupiscent."

"Look," his childhood friend wheedled, undeterred by the sarcasm, "It's your duty. The Republic needs this; the Council won't let Reeft and I enroll without proper supervision; and you're both qualified and available. "

Obi-Wan squinted at him. "I thought Feld was going to play governess for you."

Reeft mournfully polished off his third helping and set his utensil down. "He makes a third, but Master Tinn said we needed another full ranking Knight to complete the team. And if you don't step up, Obi, it will be Torbb Bakk'ile – and she's got no sense of humor."

"So I'm to be comedic relief?"

"No, no,no," the Dressalian hastened to amend his slip. "That's not what I mean. But think of it… you, me, Garen, Feld. Oh, and Zhoa, but she hardly counts – I mean she's a meter high and worships Feld like a Vetruvian sky-idol. Just us, out in the stars for six standard, roving and rambling, adventure-"

"A Jedi craves not adventure."

"He can live a little!" Garen scoffed. "I'm making it a personal quest to get Kenobi here drunk out of his gourd in the course of our deployment. How much you want to wager, Reefs?"

"Twenty dataries and my favorite dancing girl."

Obi-Wan choked on his next swallow and could not speak for several long seconds, a vulnerability his opponents pounced upon without remorse.

"You would be senior member of the mission," Garen crooned. "Feld's technically just taking his padawan on a training trip. We would all call you master."

"Master Disaster," Reeft qualified.

"Sir Sanctimony, Lord Lecture, 33rd degree Grand High Poojam of Pedantry… whatever you fancy," Garen chortled.

Their victim narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms. "You can both kiss my masterly aaa- ah, Zhoa." Jedi reflexes saved him from causing scandal to the younger generation, which had chosen this exact moment to manifest itself with wide eyes, rosy cheeks, and bobbing headtails.

"Master Kenobi," Feld Spruu's petite Nautolan padawan intoned, making the senior member of the group a very respectful bow.

Obi-Wan raised supercilious brows at his companions over the top of her head, provoking a double eye roll.

The young apprentice squeezed herself in beside the young Knight without further ado, sliding along the bench until they were wedged in knee to knee. She set about the business of eating with unembarrassed verve.

Her mentor appeared a moment later, frivolously employing the Force to summon a chair over to the table's edge. He settled his lean, lanky blue frame into place with all the grace of a hunting colwar, flinging one extravagant lekku over a shoulder to prevent its entanglement with his own meal. "Good morning, Padawans," he grinned, addressing himself to the sulking pair upon his right-hand. "Have you been asking nicely, or have you already bungled the negotiations?"

Zhoa looked up from her vestri pudding with bright, curious eyes.

"We have bribed, wheedled, and threatened, but to no avail," Garen lamented.

The tall Twi"lek knight pulled a very convincing moue. "What? Obi-Nobi, you are shunning our incomparable company? Foolish decision!"

Obi-Wan snorted. "Who is the greater fool: the fool or the fool who follows him?"

Feld clutched at his heart. "I'm mortally wounded."

"Good; I shan't have to tolerate any more absurd caviling."

"What? That's your spe-cial-ity, my little friend. "

Zhoa started in on a silent giggling fit, clutching both green hands to her mouth and quivering in place.

Obi-Wan wagged a stern finger at his contemporary. "You do realize that everything you do and say sets an example to your impressionable young student?"

But the Twi"Lek Knight only spread his hands apart helplessly. "I am a lost cause; all the more need for your rectitude and salutary moral influence."

But the plea fell on deaf ears. "Oh, I'm sure Torbb Bakk'ile will be an exemplary source of both."

All three young Jedi groaned.

"It's absolutely ludicrous," Obi-Wan groused, hefting one of the dojo's polished quarterstaves and giving it an experimental twirl. "You should have heard them."

Qui-Gon Jinn, already waiting patiently in the practice arena's center, leaned upon his own chosen weapon like a venerable sage's tall staff. "It is natural enough, I think; most senior padawans faced with the prospect of their first truly solo mission do feel some anticipatory excitement. And this opportunity enables them to meet that challenge with the fellowship of equals – it is a rare one, indeed."

His sparring partner finally selected a weapon that met his strident qualifications for weight and balance, then padded fluidly across the worn floorboards. "I wish them well. But why they need me involved is a mystery beyond my ken."

The tall Jedi master fell into opening stance, posture supple and relaxed, the Force cascading in majestic falls about him, an invisible cataract foaming back into its own infinite river. "You missed out on the traditional preparation sequence for the Trials; far from begrudging your friends their trip, I would expect you to wholeheartedly join in the endeavor."

Obi-Wan faced off with him, three scant paces apart, staff at the ready. "I didn't miss the solo phase," he scowled. "A year's exile in postapocalyptic desolation has a distinct pedagogical value."

The older man grimaced at his friend's wry humor. The hard truth cut too close to this satiric vein for comfort; Melida-Daan and its aftermath had been the harshest possible ordeal any young Jedi should have to face. "I meant simply that you haven't been afforded a chance to travel the galaxy on your own yet. At your age, I would have been eager to strike out and explore."

"You mean eager to escape Master Dooku's inspirational teaching style," his former apprentice observed, cagily.

Another grimace. "Well…. if that' s what it requires to push you out of the nest…." Qui-Gon spun his heavy staff threateningly, making the first lightning-quick strike.

A solid parry. Obi-Wan grinned in delight, welcoming the transition from wordplay into outright combative bliss. They clashed and whirled, the heavy wooden implements sending a flurry of sharp percussive echoes off the smooth walls, a martial rhythm punctuated with grunts of effort and an occasional bout of barking laughter.

And in the bruising cacophony of mock battle, the point of disputation was soon forgotten.

Zhoa Pleromata's slender shoulders slumped. "What's a culturally indicative idiom?" she moaned. "I'll never be able to complete this assignment."

"Nonsense." Obi-Wan looked up from his own holo-book and peered over the girl's shoulder at her current coursework requirements. "It's not so abstruse as it sounds; simply think of a turn of phrase – a figure of speech that is unique to the people who coined it."

The Nautolan's forehead wrinkled in concentration for a moment. "Oh! I know – Master taught me one: don't get your lekku in a twist. That's Twi'lek and it means one should calm down."

He nodded. "Yes. Wookiees probably have a good many for which there is no Basic translation. Dugs say to keep your feet off other people's property. And Hutts refer to their bondmates as slime of my slime."

Zhoa giggled, rapidly entering these gems of wisdom into her datapad.

Obi-Wan warmed to the subject. "My personal favorite is the Togorian adage home is where you hang your enemy's head."

"What do Jedi say?" the girl asked, innocently.

He adopted his most venerable authoritarian tone. "Focus, young padawan!"

Zhoa's peals of amusement earned them both a wrathful glare from Jocasta Nu; they instantly subsided into studious quiet as the imposing Senior Archivist skimmed by the outside aisle, peering balefully into the small alcove with its dim lamp and comfortable chairs.

"Thank you for helping me, Master," the younger culprit whispered a few moments later. "You are coming with us to the Outer Rim, aren't you?"

He held up a hand.

"Please, Master Obi-Wan… it won't be the same without you, and Master Bakk'ile scares me."

"A Jedi faces her fears," he retorted, pointedly taking up his volume again and refusing to entertain further debate on the topic.

Zhoa sighed theatrically and returned to slaving over her galactic cultures homework.

Bant was no mortal help, either.

"Why, of course you should go, Obi! It would do you a world of good."

"Bant." He emphasized his words with a terse, chopping gesture. "I have responsibilities. I have scholarship to pursue. And Qui-Gon needs a younger mission partner. He's nearly sixty."

The Mon Cal was unimpressed. "Master Dooku is nearly eighty and he seems to do admirably well without a full time certified nursing assistant."

They stopped at the edge of the artificial pond beneath the arboretum falls, where clouds of mist settled upon Bant's salmon-colored skin. She closed her opalescent eyes and relished the cool moisture, vestigial gills flaring in pleasure.

"Fine." Obi-Wan lifted a stray pebble from the path and held it suspended in midair above the rippling water's surface. "Qui-Gon needs a steadying influence."

But his companion was having none of it. "I'll bet he's already told you that he approves."

"That doesn't count… he just wants to convert the spare bedroom into a hothouse for tentacled kinetoflora, or some such nonsense."

A webbed hand rested on his sleeve. "Silly gundark… you just don't want to go solo."

A dismissive snort. "Six months of Garen and Reeft without respite or privacy? I'd hardly call that solo."

She ignored this feeble riposte. "You don't have a good argument – you know perfectly well that you can fulfill your duty to protect the Republic by joining this mission; your so-called scholarship is nothing but your usual eccentric intellectual hobbies; and it's not Qui-Gon who wants a steadying influence, it's you. You have abandonment issues."

The pebble dropped, splashing into the cold depths of the river. "I wasn't aware you were pursuing a specialization in mind healing," he answered, coldly.

Bant's globular eyes blinked once, patiently. "You've been a Knight for nearly two years," she pointed out, softly. "The Council would whole-heartedly approve your participation. And Master Yoda would be very pleased."

He exhaled sharply , venting pique into the cool vapor coiling around them. The falls thundered an endless oommmmm of serenity. "I know."

"Well then?"

His mouth thinned, and a pensive line appeared between his brows. "It's just…. "

Water spilled over the ledge, a glass column twisting, sinuous and elusive, yet unbroken, the future's skein passing between the deft fingers of the Fates, the weavers of destiny. In that ever-flowing current, light scintillated, but shadows also darkly wound, things seeming to lurk beneath the glossy surface of the current. The thundering of the falls sounded endlessly, heavy – pregnant, even- with prophetic import, the smooth cascade shattering to broken foam and white, blinding oblivion upon the rocks below, the desolation of all things –

-one step over the brink, and a headlong plummet into the Ordained, the Foretold –

"Obi?"

Vision dissolved again into settling mist, a diaspora of crystalline droplets, the weight of destiny atomized into disparate moments, the present, the now, the only reality. He ran a hand over his face, feeling the tiny sandpaper scratch of new beard, and exhaled slowly this time, deliberately rooting himself back in the placid familiarity of the scene, the salt-tang scent of Bant, the warmth of her presence in the Force. "I'm not ready," he insisted, though before what judge he made this futile appeal he could not say.

"A complete waste of time," Dooku averred. "I told the Council as much. This patrol system … a flimsy buttress against overburdened levees; the floods of barbarity will inevitably overwhelm our borders, unless the true problem is addressed. Corruption in the Core – here on Coruscant, in the heart of the Republic: these are the root causes of unrest in the Rims. The Order can squander its best talent peacekeeping on the far edges of this civilization, but nothing lasting will come of it."

Obi-Wan folded his hands into opposite sleeves. "You would counsel me not to go, then."

The silver haired Sentinel unsealed the clasps on an Archives stasis pod and opened the lid. "Of course not. Your gifts and skills are needed elsewhere than upon a such a quixotic quest… the Knights errant, wandering abroad in search of the downtrodden and oppressed." A dry chuckle. "We have a war to fight, my young friend. Darkness gathers on the horizon."

He withdrew an antique sword, forged of metal, and turned the curious object in his hands. "You remember this, of course."

"Yes."

"I have spent some long days researching its origins and manufacture, and I have come to one, rather startling, conclusion." A fey light glinted in Dooku's grey eyes. "Behold."

A swift surge of the Force, and the blade parted from the hilt, leaving each piece separate in the Jedi master's hands. "Ahhh…. As I thought."

His young companion frowned. "Is it defective?

"No, no, the forged blade is nothing but a disguise… or else a ceremonial sheath. " He dropped the stretch of hammered iron back into its container, diffidently. "This- this is what fascinates me." He turned the hilt in his hand and then smiled, lips curling in a feral and deadly satisfaction. "Ah, yes."

With a dissonant snap and hiss, a second blade leapt from the hilt – a thing black and lightless, pulsing with a low bass note, a menacing growl a full octave below that of a lightsaber.

Obi-Wan's brows shot up. "What is that?"

The Sentinel brandished the strange weapon, its song an portentous chorus, deep and weirdly textured, grating upon the nerves. "This," he breathed, a kind of curdled reverence in his voice, "is a darksaber."

"I've never seen one before."

Dooku snapped the blade back into its hilt. ""I shall speak to Jocasta personally. This treasure needs to be interred in the restricted vaults, with the holocrons."

The young Knight watched as he packed the bizarre artifact back into its preservation chamber and slotted the box in place among the countless other historical objects in the storage level. A droid hovered solicitously at the aisle's end.

Dooku swept down the corridor, Obi-Wan at his heels. "Regarding the matter of our previous discussion, no. I should certainly not waste my time upon it, were I you. Heed my words."

"Thank you, Master. Your perspective always lends insight."

"I should think so."

They parted ways at the lift to the upper levels, Dooku striding off intent upon his own private undertaking, and Obi-Wan making his way between the watchful gauntlet of the Lost with an unexpectedly lighter step.

He had made up his mind.