Retribution 22 - The Schism

The Schism

Tick, tick! The three petitioners started at the repetitive sound of Yuthura's fingernail clicking on the hardwood desk. She sat regally in a sumptuous office that had once belonged to the prestigious landowner Ahlan Matale who now stood at her side as an accomplice to the Empire, the governor of Dantooine. Behind her a wide window offered an impressive view of the countryside and the teeming mass of the Sith occupation force arrayed outside.

The shock and carnage of the invasion was over, now the planet was waking up to the reality of the Sith Empire's new rule. After the Jedi were destroyed from off the face of Dantooine, much of the population surrendered easily and the Sith ground forces had little trouble annexing most of the large settlements. Resistance to the new rule was harshly punished and rewards were given to citizens who turned in the names of those still fighting the takeover.

Armed revolt ended within days, but despite accepting the Empire as their rulers many people were less than happy about the end of their way of life. They protested the new laws, their new duties, and Yuthura could not afford to let the objectors grow too organized.

"So..." Yuthura said slowly, "what you want is to derelict your duty to others and serve yourselves instead."

A frontiersman named Jon, one of the petitioners, rubbed his sweaty palms nervously. "No, mistress, but we are being bled of our very sustenance to feed your army. What about my daughter Ilsa, who starves while we are forced to surrender our harvest and pay ever greater taxes? I do not wish ill to others, but I must be able to provide for my own daughter!"

"Jon's right," Nurik Sandral, another landowner whose territory had been taken and redistributed by the Sith, agreed. "Dantooine is a self-sustained world, everything with which we feed ourselves comes from our own ground and the work of our own hands. What we do not need of our harvest is sold on off-world markets who pay us justly for our goods. Mere need will not plant a field and a harvest will not reap itself simply because people are hungry, it takes hard work. Dantooine's economy is based on the export of surplus produce to other markets, if we are denied our right to free commerce then this surplus sits and rots and is of no use to anyone. If our harvest is taken away, we starve."

"You say the Sith Empire cares for all under its governance," accused the third, a vain woman named Elise. "Tell me, if the Empire cares for us, why are we to support with food from our tables the same army that massacred hundreds in order to conquer and make such insane demands of us?"

Yuthura shook her head. "Have you any idea what untold billions there are in the galaxy who could not so much as dream to have such plenty as you?" she chided. "It is their right to have what you do not need."

"Need?" Nurik said angrily. "We have far less than we need, thanks to you!"

"Since you have the ability to produce, your duty is to provide for those who do not," Yuthura said coldly. "The Sith Empire is bringing liberation to the galaxy, to oppressed people everywhere. We are their salvation from greed and corrupt self-interest. You will serve others by serving the Empire." She crossed her arms. "The shipments will continue to be delivered."

"But-how are we to eat, to feed our families?" Jon pleaded.

"The mistress has spoken!" declared the balding Ahlan, reinforcing her word as a command from the legitimate domestic leader. "Remember that she speaks for Lord Malak. You will obey, or your reluctance will be taken as a sign of rebellion against the Sith Empire and its Great Cause."

Ahlan Matale was a true believer. One of the first to pledge loyalty to the Sith when their occupation began, he had handed over his land, his wealth, and the house in which she now sat without hesitation or protestation, and he had also aggressively pushed for the other landowners to acquiesce the Sith annexation. Ahlan Matale was responsible for turning over nearly half of Dantooine's settlements to the Empire.

Ahlan's actions gained him recognition as a zealot for the cause and proved his loyalty to the Sith, and he was justly rewarded with his position of power. As governor, he was again proving to be sternly devout.

"We-will obey," Nurik said stiffly.

"You are dismissed," Yuthura said. She would arrest them later, if they tried to bestir trouble.

A flat metallic voice halted them before they had even begun to leave. "There will be no pardon for treason," rang a hollow tone. Yuthura froze in her chair; there was only one person with such a voice. The petitioners turned and gasped.

Entering the stateroom behind them, attired in a form-fitting red leather war robe and a dark maroon cape fastened at one shoulder with his insignia of a lightning bolt, standing at his full proud height, was Darth Malak himself.

Elise fainted.

Malak scrutinized the Dantooites with dark eyes that brimmed with intelligence, his brow and nose pulled into a half expression of disdain while the lower part of his face, horribly ravaged and disfigured from a bomb blast, was defiantly displayed in its full grotesquery, testament to his unyielding resolve.

The Sith Lord reached out with two hook-like hands, lifting Nurik and Jon through the Force. They clutched vainly at their throats as he squeezed their windpipes shut. "Dantooine, its residents, and goods therein are property of the Sith Empire," he declared, the manufactured voice rattling from the spider-like device attached to his vocal cords.

"Mistress Yuthura has been far more tolerant of your seditious accusations and activities than I will be," Malak said in condemnation as the two Dantooites choked and struggled in his grasp. They kicked their feet uselessly, trying to draw a breath past the irresistible pressure constricting their throats from the inside. Yuthura watched stone-faced. as Malak strangled the life from them.

Nurik and Jon crumpled to the floor lifeless.

She looked at Ahlan Matale. The murder of two fellow Dantooites had shaken him. Yuthura had been harsh in leading the Sith repression of revolt in the newly conquered settlements, but was keenly aware that Dantooine needed able workers, and had been reluctant to order mass executions of dissenters, using imprisonment and forced labor instead. But Malak operated by a different standard of rule than his millions of underlings, and his word was final and unquestioned.

Even if she and Ahlan might have preferred less final a punishment for disobedience, they could not well object to Malak's choice of summary execution.

A trio of silver-armored Sith soldiers dragged the two corpses away and removed the faint Elise from the presence of Darth Malak, who seemed to finally take note of Yuthura and governor Ahlan.

"My lord Malak, forgive me, I was not informed of your arrival. Is there anything--" Malak's glare cut off Ahlan's babbling mid-sentence.

"You are dismissed, governor," he said.

Ahlan bowed profusely and scurried from the Sith Lord's sight. Yuthura immediately bowed to one knee. "Lord Malak, I must apologize. As the governor said, we were not informed of your arrival. I would have seen to it you were received properly."

"Indeed you were not informed," Malak answered. "Because I informed no one. There are matters of state, and there are matters of the Force. This is the latter, and I would sooner not be surrounded by a display of sycophantic prostration and ostentatious ceremony."

Yuthura did not know how to respond so she said nothing. Where he had once loved formality and ceremony, Malak had shown increasing discomfort with such proceedings and paranoia of his top military officers since the bombing incident. He became more a mystical, rarely seen figure, a fearsome legend only half-believed to exist.

"Your former master Uthar commends you, Yuthura."

"I could never compare to Master Uthar, Lord Malak," Yuthura responded humbly.

Malak shook his head. "Uthar's power is proven, but he is unenlightened and has long since reached his plateau. Your potential far exceeds Uthar's power, and you have our belief. You will become a great Sith lord, Yuthura Ban," he declared. "I came here to bring you to the Foundry where you will face the Schism as part of your trials."

Yuthura was thunderstruck. For the moment she could only think to babble, "The Schism, my lord? But you have eliminated the Schism."

 "The Schism threatens every Sith, Yuthura Ban," Malak reaffirmed. "It consumed Darth Revan and nearly halted the Crusade. Merely the fact that the Empire still stands means nothing. The Schism still exists and must be faced by every new Sith Lord. In the course of your trials you must defeat it or you will die."

Yuthura bowed her head again. "I understand, my lord." It was an unprecedented opportunity and an incomparable honor to be offered the trials of a Sith Lord, but she knew that it was also designed to eliminate her if she proved to be of insufficient loyalty or strength in the Force. If she failed in her trials, fell under the sway of the Schism, she would be expunged from the Empire.

"But as the Empire's representative on this planet, I still have responsibilities to oversee the conversion of its people to the Empire's benevolent--"

Malak cut off her protestations. "There has been no conversion, nor will there be for decades to come," he said. "You have been relieved of your duties to this planet. Your duty now is to see to the furtherance of the Empire by undergoing the trials."

She frowned. "No conversion? But my lord, surely the people's obedience indicates--"

"It indicates nothing!" Malak's voice actually raised in tone. "I have conquered this people, therefore they obey. They obey in fear, not a one of them believes as I do. Every person on this planet is still an enemy of the Sith Empire and they must be ruled. Do not forget that I am the final authority."

Yuthura turned her eyes down. "Yes, Lord Malak."

"Now rise," he commanded. "We must leave immediately. Another will take your responsibilities here. Gather only those things you must, the Empire will provide for the rest of your needs."

The few items she needed were in her well-furnished quarters, provided her by the Matale estate. Her current attire was for domestic government, it would not do aboard an Imperial cruiser. So Yuthura quickly changed into her gray officer's uniform and also tucked a set of neatly folded, deathly black Sith ceremonial robes into a light travel case. They were the same robes she'd worn when master Uthar declared her a Sith.

On her belt she clipped a handcrafted lightsabre that sported a rare ivory hilt and a brilliant orange focusing crystal. The weapon she often carried was an impersonal, mass-manufactured sabre which she favored for most occasions. The glossy white-handled lightsabre rarely went with her on official business because it had always seemed to have a life of its own, and that unnerved her to the point where she felt she was somehow unworthy of what she had made with her own hands.

But she wanted no other weapon at her side on the day she became a full named Sith Lord. If earning the title of Darth did not make her worthy of the elegant blade then she was sure nothing would.

Her most important possession in hand, Yuthura followed Malak onto the sunlit plain where the a full-strength battalion of Sith troops had turned the complex into a military fortress. The buildings of the estate were surrounded by all manner of defenses, from those as simple as earthworks and trenches to equipment as sophisticated as giant six-legged walkers and emplaced heavy turbolaser cannons.

A short distance to the east within the larger camp perimeter was an entire air- and space-born division complete with snub fighters, terrestrial bombers, and orbit-capable transport and gun ships serviced from a massive airfield laid over scorched farmland. Hour by hour, hundreds of patrol craft turned in and headed out, still hunting down the last few remaining pockets of guerrilla resistance in the remote countryside.

When Malak passed by, soldiers, technicians, and Sith disciples all halted their activities and stood at rigid attention. He paid their obeisance little mind, striding purposefully toward a line of chrome-plated, reptilian Sith fighter crafts.

"Report?" he asked a black-robed Sith who was overseeing a crew of techs in an inspection of a larger model fighter that sported an extended fuselage intended to hold an extra passenger.

"Ready for immediate departure as you ordered, Lord Malak," the Sith replied. Noticing that Yuthura stood beside Malak, worry appeared on his face. "My lord?" he asked in confusion.

"You have done well," Malak assured him, and suddenly the Sith began to choke. His eyes registering shock, he reached for his lightsabre, but Malak thrust his hand out and crushed the Sith's neck with a focused blast. He flung the corpse aside. "But you are no longer required."

Malak turned back to Yuthura and motioned for her to board the star fighter. "Come... my apprentice."

Yuthura obediently took her seat forward of the command cockpit at what would have been secondary gunnery control while Malak himself took the pilot's seat. After an abbreviated takeoff checklist was handled by the integrated navigation droid, Malak smoothly guided the fighter into Dantooine's airspace and gunned its powerful engines to bring them quickly into orbit.

In the blackness above, Yuthura could see the vastness of the Sith Fleet of Conversion hanging amid the stars, a mass of silver spires, hooks and bridges looking like a school of predatory fish. At its head was Malak's flagship, the massive Leviathan, easily half again as large as the biggest cruiser or carrier in the fleet.

As they started their approach to the monster Malak did something Yuthura thought was odd; he asked her a question. "Do you hear it?" he said.

"My lord?" She didn't understand.

For a minute he made no answer, and Yuthura was sure he had dismissed her, but then he spoke again. "The silence," he said. "Can you hear the silence?"

---

"Bastila, what is this delay? We must leave for Kashyyyk at once!" Juhani nearly shouted in frustration. Namenlos was certain that Bindo would be found on Kashyyyk, and while they had cleared Tatooine they had not yet entered hyperspace; Bastila insisted on questioning them first. Juhani felt it was wasteful of precious time. The Sith would not wait.

The Jedi in question was bruised and disheveled from an ordeal neither Juhani nor Namenlos had asked about yet. Bastila crossed her arms and cast dubious looks at the two Cathar. "We mustn't rush to any action without gaining a complete perspective on the situation, otherwise we run the risk of acting inappropriately or foolishly," she said. "This entire mission has been ill-advised from the start. Had we sought guidance from the surviving Masters we might not have even run afoul of this Darth Bandon."

She swept an arm about, indicating the state of the ship. It was a mess. "As you can see, things did not go well. The Sith very nearly achieved our capture and yours. So before we make another potentially catastrophic move, I would like to know what exactly it is that has led you and Namenlos to determine Kashyyyk as our next objective."

Standing next to Juhani, Namenlos raked his fingers through his tangled dreadlocks in irritation. "Bastila, how clear do I have to make myself?" he asked in a quiet, even voice that communicated urgency better than an angry shout. "We do not have time to sit around and debate. We have to get to Bindo before the Sith reach him."

Bastila turned to look at him. "Then, Namenlos, would you explain to me why?" she retorted.

Namenlos answered her slowly and calmly. "Well, first things first, my name is not 'Namenlos'. I have a name of my own," he said with remarkable composure.

"I-what?" Bastila's voice went flat, color draining from her face. "What are you talking about?"

"I am talking about knowing my own name," he answered. "I remember it now."

Juhani watched Bastila; she was stricken with dread. In an instant, Juhani realized how many secrets Bastila was keeping from them, and whatever reason she had to so fear the nameless to learn his name made Juhani hold her breath as Arravin spoke.

"I was born Arravin Korsk," he said with confidence. "Arravin is my name."

Bastila relaxed, her secrets submerged beneath her Jedi mask. "I see. And how did you become convinced we must go to Kashyyyk?" she asked wearily.

"I spoke with the spirit of Komad Fortuna, the man we came to find," he explained. "He told me how to find Bindo." Arravin stopped. "Bastila, tell me first what happened here with you and the others."

She huffed and turned away, staring at a set of scorch marks running through the wall. The marks of lightsabres. "It is as you said before; Malak hunts you," she said in an emotionless voice. "This Sith, this Darth Bandon, is Malak's apprentice. He is strong in the Force, possibly stronger than I am. And he has a singular power which he used to overwhelm the people on this ship, even Carth and I succumbed to it. He did things to this crew which I will not speak of, so that he could find you."

With this admission, recent events finally made sense. Juhani gasped. "A Jedi would never break under torture unless they had turned to the Dark Side," she accused. "But you led this Darth Bandon to Arravin, to us?"

Bastila looked her in the eye. "Yes, Juhani, I did."

"Why?" she hissed, in her mind's eye seeing him screaming as he was transfixed by a firestorm of white and purple lightning. Bastila had brought it on him.

"Because," Bastila said with an angered grimace, "he did not torture me."

"Misa," Arravin swore under his breath. Juhani looked around, seeing only Bastila, Arravin, and the Mandalorian in a nook off to the side. Mission was conspicuously absent, and Bastila confirmed her horrible suspicions.

"Mission followed you out of blind belief, Arravin, and it led her into the grasp of a Sith Lord," she said bitterly. "I have sedated her for now, so she can rest and begin to heal, Zaalbar is with her." She looked accusingly at him. Juhani felt sick. "Darth Bandon would have done far worse to her for my silence and he still would have found you. You call her a friend, would you rather I had let Bandon have his way with her?"

"Not her. Dear Misa, not her. She didn't deserve this," he whispered so quietly Juhani was sure only she had heard him.

"Whether or not you admit it, your actions or inactions have a direct effect on others. Please do not forget the price others may pay on your behalf."

Arravin's head snapped up in a glare that would have melted iron, but he said nothing. There was furious conflict in his eyes, scathing words on his lips that he chose not to speak.

"Now tell me how you came to speak to this spirit," Bastila continued.

He explained their lengthy trip by speeder into the desert with the eccentric Tannis and how he had betrayed them to a group of junior Sith who laid ambush at the ruined remote dwelling. Bastila stopped him at that point. "You were able to defeat them by yourselves?" she asked incredulously.

"I could sense their inexperience," Juhani said in explanation. "They had a lust for the battle, they thought to prove their supremacy, but none of them were proficient in lightsabre technique. I suspect they were only recently recruited, not fully come into their power yet, but filled with a false confidence. It is possible they were not even connected with Darth Bandon's presence."

"But more likely they were. Sith such as Bandon often travel with attendants," Bastila mused. "And what of Tannis?"

"He was killed by one of the Sith as he attempted to escape," Arravin said with a sideways glance at Juhani.

"Oh? Is that all, nothing else?"

She read his expression; he was asking her not to tell Bastila that he had nearly done the deed himself, rather than the Sith. Juhani was torn for a moment, her Jedi duty clearly dictating that Bastila, the senior Jedi, should be made aware of the development. But she had seen something change in him during that moment he held his knife's blade to Tannis's throat, something that had balanced out his terrible rage at the betrayal.

Moreover, if she kept this not in confidence, then Juhani feared she would lose his trust. Bastila would not understand as she did, Bastila had not been there to see it in person.

"The Sith killed him because he chose a selfish reason to betray us. They executed him as a traitor," Juhani explained.

"I see," Bastila replied coldly.

Relief passed over Arravin's face. Juhani touched his wrist in reassurance.

"It was shortly after that when Bandon arrived in the ship," Arravin went on, his eyes glazed as he fixated on that moment in time. "The ship crashed and suddenly the air was full of sand and dust and I couldn't see my hands in front of my face. He caught us blind. I don't know exactly what he did, but whatever it was it felt like he was ripping my soul from by body, and then I found myself in the void and approached by Komad's spirit. I knew he was dead because we'd seen the smoking remains of his cabin only minutes before."

Juhani listened in horrid fascination as he described the feeling of being trapped by Bandon's ravenous power along with Komad and other uncountable souls. The way he spoke it was obvious that he was reliving deathly experience with vivid realism, and that it was neither pleasant nor easy. His voice was dead flat, like he was only a neutral observer relaying the facts, and that somehow made it worse.

Bastila was aghast when he confessed that Komad had given up his very life force in order to help him break free of Bandon's grasp. "You took the life of another to enhance your own power?" she asked, horrified. "Such things are beyond forbidden!"

"I did not coerce or compel him to make the sacrifice he did," Arravin shot back angrily. "He demanded that I accept his price and to use what he gave me to stop Malak. I did not ask for that sacrifice; it was his decision. He paid a price on my behalf, don't now tell me to disregard it."

"Arravin, I have let you have your way far more than I am comfortable with. You skirt the edges of the Dark Side with almost every breath you take, but for reasons neither rational nor logical I am convinced you have not fallen. Taking another's life force is dangerous, a powerful lure of the Dark Side." Bastila sighed. "But perhaps, if it was freely offered, it could be seen as noble and not heinous. Forgive me for continuing to see the worst in your actions, but you must always weigh your decisions and be aware of the many temptations of the Dark Side."

"Thank you, Bastila."

"Then it would seem we must indeed go to Kashyyyk, if the word of this spirit is to be believed," Bastila said, quickly moving back to the relevant issue.

Arravin nodded. "I was told to speak to Chuundar of the Wookiees, that he could take us to Bindo."

"Chuundar?" Zaalbar entered the hold. "Who spoke of Chuundar?" As part of her Jedi training, Juhani had been taught to understand a wide variety of languages, though aesthetically she still found the Wookiee speech distasteful.

"We believe he may be able to take us to the Jedi Bindo. We have been bidden by a Jedi spirit to seek him out. Of what importance is he to you?" Bastila asked.

Zaalbar growled. "Chuundar is my brother."

"Brother? Chuundar is your brother?" she repeated for Arravin's benefit, who understood not a word of the Wookiee tongue.

Zaalbar nodded. "He is the firstborn, and is now Chieftain. He wanted to bring outsiders into our village, onto our world. I warned him that the outsider would only exploit us for their benefit, and when he refused to listen I tried to warn others." The Wookiee shuffled uncomfortably. "He is charismatic. He had already convinced people that he knew best and none of them would listen to me. I had only two choices left; to go against the will of the Chieftain and so brand myself a traitor, or to leave. I left."

"What did he say?" Arravin asked.

Bastila pinched the bridge of her nose. "That we may have trouble convincing Chuundar to help us," she replied. "Zaalbar is his brother, and says he was having dealings with 'outsiders'."

Juhani swore. "Are the Sith already on Kashyyyk?"

"We don't know that yet," Arravin reminded her. "In any case, we have little choice. Bindo is the only Jedi alive and not in the service of Malak who knows how to reach the Star Forge. We must risk it."

"I am afraid you may be right," Bastila agreed. "Very well, I will tell Carth to set a course for Kashyyyk at once."

"Thank you. If you need me for anything, I'll be in the cargo bay."

"Very well."

Arravin met Juhani's eyes. He smiled, silently squeezed her hand, then turned and left the room.

She stood confused for a moment, tingling on the verge of insight. She knew she had forgotten to tell him something, something else she couldn't say in Bastila's presence, something unbecoming of a Jedi. Juhani wasn't even sure what it was, but she intended to find out.

Bastila had other plans for her. "You have come face to face with a servant of the Dark Side today, Juhani," she reminded her, placing herself between Juhani and the door. "Meditate on these events."

It was a command, and with it Juhani saw straight through to her intent: Bastila did not want her with Arravin.

Juhani recalled the silent dread on Bastila's face when Arravin had announced his new name, brought to mind the memory of the Jedi who had collared him like a beast, and how she claimed to be helping him even when he did not want to be helped. She had studied enough history to know that such things would never be done for reasons as innocuous as were given. Bastila knew things about Arravin that he himself did not even know, and she was guarding her secrets tightly.

She realized she did not trust Bastila.

"Of course, Jedi Bastila," Juhani responded courteously. "I must recover my strength."

She obeyed, but only because she had no concrete reason for doing otherwise. All Jedi kept secrets, and her suspicions could yet prove unfounded. It also seemed foolish to openly defy a senior Jedi just to satisfy a fickle curiosity.

Juhani sat down in her corner to meditate, but her newly realized distrust of Bastila refused to leave her mind. She was painfully aware that she should have no such doubts of a fellow Jedi, but since she'd met Arravin she was beginning to learn that she had the power to make her own decisions, not the least of which was what to think, and her intuition told her that Bastila had done a good deal to mark her untrustworthy.

Before Arravin had come into her life, she would have regarded these thoughts as the cloying fingers of the Dark Side, the shadow to Jedi truth, but now she recognized them as nothing more than the crystal clarity of an intellectual revelation. She was capable of thinking for herself; something she'd never understood before and which she doubted the Jedi would have wanted to teach her. Juhani wished she could tell Arravin how much he'd been right.

---

"We have a problem."

"I am aware of it, Carth," Bastila replied, annoyed.

Carth was annoyed too. Annoyed-he was furious. If he hadn't already been convinced by the razing of two planets in their wake that this Jedi mind game with Darth Revan was an inane farce, the ease with which a single Sith had very nearly destroyed them all reinforced his conviction that this was a suicidal venture from which none of them were likely to emerge.

They were all in way over their heads with no support and no backup to speak of, and just a single mistake could spell doom for the entire effort. No, Carth was convinced they needed to involve the Republic, or at least reconnect with some of the other remaining Jedi; Bastila's control over the situation was disintegrating by the hour. Her strategy of playing into Revan's fanciful delusions in hope of gleaning that most vital of intelligence-the location of Malak's seat of power-had so far only resulted in a victimized fourteen year-old girl and the most deadly secret now floating throughout the crew at large.

And Bastila still hadn't told him how she intended to keep on top of everything and prevent total disaster. She was still holding out on him. "What are we going to do when she wakes up?" he asked.

"We will keep her quiet," she answered. "No one has made any noise yet."

Aside from the two Cathar, everyone knew now that they were towing around the missing and presumed dead Sith Lord Revan. Strangely enough, though, neither the Mando nor the Wookiee had said a word about it. And of course Mission was out of it, and Carth didn't want to think about what sorts of emotional problems the girl was likely to have, so it was anyone's guess how she might react to the knowledge when she woke up.

"Oh, and did you have something to do with that?"

Bastila crossed her arms. "I made a simple suggestion that Darth Bandon never in fact mentioned Revan, and was only looking for Komad Fortuna as we were," she said confidently.

Carth froze. "Wait, you mean you tricked them?"

"Of course," she replied casually. "Considering the circumstances, they were rather to believe the more likely situation. Unfortunately it is not a permanent solution. While a Master could cause such a suggestion to remain perpetual, my understanding of this technique is nowhere near as sophisticated. Their minds will eventually push out the suggestion and reveal the truth, but we have a number of days before this happens."

Carth sighed, sinking back in his pilot's chair with a small measure of relief.

"However, I do not believe a similar trick will work with Mission," Bastila said.

Carth slapped the instrument panel. "Blast it, woman! First you tell me not to worry, then say we still have the same problem? Let me ask again, what are we going to do?"

Bastila sighed heavily. "I do not have all the answers, Carth."

There was a moment of silence, during which Carth began to feel progressively more foolish. "Sorry," he said.

"You are tired," she said smoothly.

Yes, he was. Carth felt like he'd not slept in weeks. His face was a weed patch of graying stubble, his eyes were bloodshot from too many eighteen to twenty-hour days, most of which behind the controls of this very ship, and he felt perpetually a step behind everything that was happening. In truth, he was getting quite certain he didn't have it in him to keep fighting this war; it had taken too much from him, taken too much out of him. He didn't know how much more of himself he had left to give.

"Do you think this is really going to work?" he asked, changing the subject. "How do we know Bindo even exists anymore?"

Bastila shrugged. "It is as likely as not that he still lives. And there is no reason to believe he does not," she answered.

Carth rubbed his cheekbones and pinched his brow with both hands, fighting off a yawn.

"You really should get some rest, Carth," Bastila again reminded him.

"Just a few more hours, to see us on our way," he mumbled. Of course, once they were in hyperspace there was very little to do but watch the blue-white vortex through the cockpit windows or on the navicomputer display. The trip to Kashyyyk would take as long as it would take, regardless of how long he sat at the controls doing nothing.

Bastila spoke again, her voice soothing. "You want to rest now, Carth."

She was right, the urge to sleep had become nearly irresistible. His eyelids drooped and yawns began escaping one after another. By the time he realized this was her doing, he was already tumbling headlong into the world of sleep.

"Have to... watch... the ship," he mumbled, offering little resistance as Bastila pulled him from his seat.

"Shh, you want to rest now," she said again.

"I want to... rest..."

Carth fell asleep to the sound of his feet dragging on the floor.