by Джуд Уотсон
Xanatos looked back and grinned. The wind whipped his black hair, and his blazing blue eyes looked deranged. The wind was dying down. Qui-Gon moved quickly, almost running.
He caught up to Xanatos before they were above the landing platform. He could not let Xanatos move much farther in that direction.
Qui-Gon activated his lightsaber and attacked. This was the moment.
This was his stand. He would kill Xanatos here. Not from anger. From the certainty that this evil had to be stopped.
They fought with concentrated ferocity, each blow designed to cause the other to stagger and fall. Balance was tricky on the narrow ledge. Wide blows could only come from one side. Follow-through was difficult. Still Qui-Gon adapted his style to fit the area. He used short jabs, sometimes falling on one knee to come at Xanatos from below. He felt the Force swirl around him, strong and sure, aiding his instincts, telling him where Xanatos would move next and how. He blocked each blow and came back stronger. He sensed that Xanatos was on the edge of desperation, though his former apprentice would never let him see it.
"Haven't you forgotten something, Qui-Gon?" Xanatos called to him over the screaming wind.
"The last part of that takeover equation. Devastation."
"You must be tiring, Xanatos," Qui-Gon said. "That's when you begin your taunts." He gritted his teeth as he slammed a blow toward Xanatos'
shoulder.
Xanatos blocked it. "Your precious Temple is doomed!" he shouted. "When that idiot Miro Daroon powers up the last link in the system, the whole fusion furnace will blow. The Temple will implode. Did you really think I'd allow the Jedi to follow me?"
Qui-Gon staggered both from surprise and an unexpected short strike from Xanatos' left. Was he telling the truth? Desperately, Qui-Gon realized there was no way for him to know.
He attacked furiously, delivering a wide arm sweep from the left. The two lightsabers tangled. For an instant, their faces were very close.
Xanatos' eyes burned with a strange light. The pale half-circle scar on his cheek gleamed.
"What you revere can destroy you." His voice was soft, yet Qui-Gon caught every word. "Haven't you learned that yet?"
Above him, Qui-Gon saw the lights of the Council room flicker. After the lights, Miro would power up the communications system. Then the repulsorlift engines for the turbolifts throughout the complex. The air circulation would be last.
Qui-Gon calculated that he had only three minutes before the explosion.
Maybe four. If Xanatos was telling the truth..
"You can't be sure, can you, Qui-Gon?" Xanatos sneered. "Will you allow your precious Padawan to die just to kill me? He tried to get away from you once. Why don't you get rid of him for good?"
Qui-Gon hesitated, his lightsaber held in attack position. He knew he could defeat Xanatos. But how long would it take?
In that split second, Xanatos glanced below. An air taxi flew twenty meters underneath the ledge. Qui-Gon sprang forward, but Xanatos stepped off the ledge. He landed on the air taxi. Qui-Gon saw the surprised driver's look of panic as Xanatos calmly lifted him out of the seat and pushed him out into midair.
Qui-Gon had less than a second to decide. He could make the jump. He could land on the taxi. He could grapple with Xanatos. He could end this once and for all.
The second passed. Xanatos roared away. Helpless rage surged in Qui-Gon even as he deactivated his lightsaber and raced for the opening in the window.
Qui-Gon jumped inside and ran, accessing his comlink as he moved. He tried to reach Miro, but the communication fields weren't fully functioning.
He was halfway to the turbolift before he realized that it wouldn't be operating. Qui-Gon's frustration was turning to panic. How could he reach the tech center in time?
Suddenly, Obi-Wan burst into the hallway from the stairs.
"He's rigged the Temple to implode," Qui-Gon told him. "We have to get to the tech center."
Obi-Wan was already moving. "Follow me."
As they raced down the hall, Qui-Gon asked tersely, "Bant?"
"She's fine," Obi-Wan said shortly. "Bruck is dead."
A pall had settled over Obi-Wan's face. He would need to talk about this later, Qui-Gon knew.
"I studied the diagrams," Obi-Wan told him, changing the subject as they turned the corner. "I can get us there faster through the infrastructure of the building."
Obi-Wan leaped and kicked open a duct overhead. Qui-Gon noticed that he was barefoot. "Garen's boots slowed me down," he explained as he swung himself in. Qui-Gon followed. They crawled down a short length of an air circulation shaft and came to a service panel. Obi-Wan accessed it. It slid open and he climbed in.
It was a tight fit, but Qui-Gon made it. Here he could stand upright. They were on a catwalk, surrounded by machinery.
Qui-Gon heard a slow whining noise. "The re-pulsorlift engines are starting up," he said.
"This way." Obi-Wan ran down the catwalk. He came to a vertical ladder and began to scramble down. Quickly, Qui-Gon followed.
The ladder left them at a service door. Obi-Wan pushed through. They were now ten levels down.
"There's a back stairway to the right," Obi-Wan said as he raced down the hallway with Qui-Gon beside him. "It will bring us to the horizontal tube that is used to transport food from the dining hall to the med unit."
They came to the tube. Obi-Wan gestured for Qui-Gon to go inside.
Qui-Gon crammed himself into the small space. Obi-Wan squeezed in next to him. Then he hurriedly set the controls. In seconds, they were sucked down the tube on a moving ramp. At the end, Obi-Wan kicked open the door.
They spilled out in one of the resting rooms in the med unit. Qui-Gon knew it was on the same level as the tech center. But he also knew that a shaft separated the two wings.
Qui-Gon checked his chrono. "We have about one minute," he told Obi-Wan.
Obi-Wan's face was streaked with sweat. "The gas duct." He turned and ran.
Qui-Gon followed. Out the window he could see that across the shaft ran an air-systems duct. "Where does it come out?"
"Right where we want it to," Obi-Wan said, locking his fingers in the grate and prying it off. He kicked it aside and scrambled inside the duct.
"It's the gas transport system for the freezer containers used to store med supplies."
Qui-Gon squeezed into the opening. The duct wasn't high enough for him to stand. He followed closely behind Obi-Wan as they crawled rapidly down the tunnel.
"Obi-Wan, what happens if Miro tests the gas transport system when he powers up the air ducts?" Qui-Gon asked.
There was a pause. "I'm not sure," Obi-Wan answered.
Qui-Gon knew that the gas pumped into molten carbonite was toxic, but decided to keep the information to himself. He didn't need to tell Obi-Wan.
The boy had caught the implication and scrambled even faster down the tunnel.
Thirty seconds. Qui-Gon tried to move fluidly, gracefully. He was a big man, and wasn't normally fast on his hands and knees in a confined space. He felt the Force surrounding Obi-Wan in front of him, and it seemed to vibrate around them in the enclosed space, giving them strength and agility.
Qui-Gon saw a fractured beam of light ahead. They were approaching the grate.
Obi-Wan blasted through the opening so fast he seemed just a streak to Qui-Gon. Qui-Gon swung himself out. Miro was standing at the console, his fingers flying on the keys.
"Stop!" Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon yelled together.
"Don't activate the air circulation system," Qui-Gon warned. "It's booby-trapped."
It didn't seem possible that Miro's translucent skin could pale. But for a moment he seemed to shimmer like a ghost. He jerked his hand back from the console.
"We have to find the bug," Qui-Gon said, striding toward the console.
Miro punched in a code, and the blue screen that surrounded them filled with numbers and graphs. "I ran a complete bug check when the system was powered down," he said. "No
thing came up. There's no program in the system anymore except for mine. Are you sure about this, Qui-Gon?"
"No," Qui-Gon said reluctantly. "Xanatos could have lied. But can we take the chance?"
"I can run the checks again," Miro said, tapping on the keys. "Maybe I missed something."
Obi-Wan stared up at the blue screen, trying to read the schematics of the system. Qui-Gon turned away. He knew that Miro was vastly better at figuring out tech systems.
But he could do something that Miro could not. He could go inside the mind of Xanatos.
Qui-Gon closed his eyes, remembering the final scene with Xanatos on the ledge. His enemy's fatal flaw was his need to boast. Often he inadvertently let slip something that would alert Qui-Gon to the diabolical windings of his mind.
And Xanatos prided himself on his elegance. Whatever he had done, it would have a twist.
Qui-Gon remembered the fiendish glee in Xanatos' expression. Yes, there was something personal about what he had done, some final, stinging slap to the Jedi.
What you revere can destroy you….
Qui-Gon's eyes sprang open. "Miro, where is the main power source of the system?" he barked.
"In the power core," Miro answered. He crossed the room and opened a durasteel door marked fusion furnace. "Here."
Qui-Gon hurried through the door. He found himself in a small circular room. A catwalk ran around a deep central core. A ladder led down into it.
"This is the fusion reactor. The power sources are lined up in a grid," Miro explained. "It goes down about ten stories. I'm running my second checkup on the power sources now, but nothing came up the first time — "
"No," Qui-Gon murmured. "It wouldn't."
He hoisted himself onto the ladder and began to climb down. "Whatever you do, don't reboot the system," he called up to Miro.
It didn't take him long to reach the bottom of the core. Qui-Gon circled around slowly, running his hands along the various compartments and dials. He saw a compartment labeled fusion furnace access.
Qui-Gon pressed the lever. The door slid open. Nestled inside were the stolen Healing Crystals of Fire.
He tucked the glowing artifacts reverently in his tunic. Immediately, they warmed his skin.
He climbed up the ladder where Miro and Obi-Wan were waiting anxiously.
He pulled the crystals out of his tunic. "They were in the fusion furnace,"
he told Miro.
"They would have served as a massive power source," Miro said, his voice slightly unsteady. He cleared his throat. "They would have started a chain reaction with the burst of energy from the reboot. If I had punched that key — "
"What we revere would have destroyed us," Qui-Gon finished.
The Temple returned to normal faster than anyone thought possible.
Systems were up and running, students moved back to their quarters, new food shipments arrived, and classes resumed.
Obi-Wan felt out of step. He did not feel normal again. He still remembered the brush of Bruck's fingers against his. Time and again he stared down at his hand and opened and closed his fist, remembering how he had grabbed air instead of Bruck.
Bruck had tried to kill his friend. Obi-Wan was glad that he had stopped him. But he had been responsible for another person's death, and he could not forget it.
Obi-Wan only had one mission now: to talk to Bant.
She had been checked out at the med unit and pronounced in perfect health. The only thing she would need was rest, so she was given a day off from classes.
Obi-Wan searched for her everywhere. At last he found her at the place he least expected — the waterfall. She sat on a rock overlooking the pool where she'd almost died. Bant always sat as close as possible to the pool, so that the fine spray misted her skin.
"Why are you here?" he asked gently, taking a seat beside her.
"This is one of my favorite spots at the Temple," Bant answered, her silver eyes on the cascading water. "I did not want what happened here to spoil that. I almost died here. Someone else did lose his life. The experience taught me more about being a Jedi than a thousand classes." She turned to Obi-Wan. "I hope you don't blame yourself for Bruck's death."
"I know I tried my best to save him," Obi-Wan said. "But my heart is still heavy."
"That is how it should be," Bant said. "A life is lost. When he still had life, he had a chance to change."
"Bant, I am so sorry for — " Obi-Wan began in a rush.
"Don't," Bant interrupted softly. "There's no need to apologize. You saved my life, you know."
"There is a need," Obi-Wan said firmly. "There is a great need." He stared down at his hands in his lap. "I spoke out of anger and jealousy. What I felt mattered to me more than your feelings."
"You were worried about your future," Bant said. "You are afraid of losing Qui-Gon."
Obi-Wan sighed. He stared out at the sapphire pool. "I thought I could return to the Temple and everything would be as it was. The Council would excuse me and welcome me back. Qui-Gon would come around. But I am the one to come around. I see now that what I did cannot be fixed so easily. It may never be fixed. I see what I've done to myself, to the Master-Padawan relationship. This is why a Jedi waits so long and is so careful about choosing a Padawan. So much trust is involved. I ask myself, if Qui-Gon had rejected me, set me loose after I pledged my life to his, how would I feel?
Yes, I would forgive him, but could I join him again? Could I deliver all my trust to him again?" He met Bant's eyes, feeling desolation well inside him.
"I don't know the answer," he finished. "How can I expect Qui-Gon to know?"
"I think you could trust him again," Bant said slowly. "And I think Qui-Gon will do the same. All of this just happened. You haven't had time to sit down and think, let alone talk to each other. You've been through so much. There are things that happened on Melida/Daan you won't tell me." She paused delicately. "When you are ready, I would like to hear them."
Obi-Wan took a shuddering breath. He could not say her name aloud. But somehow he knew he must. He knew that if this moment passed, he might never speak of her again to a living soul, and something in him would die.
"Her name was Cerasi," he said. He felt a great tide of sorrow rise in him. But he also felt a release by saying her name. "Cerasi," he said again.
He lifted his face and felt the cooling spray. Suddenly, he felt stronger, as though Cerasi's vibrant spirit stood by him and touched his shoulder. "We had a connection that I can't explain. It wasn't the result of time, of hours spent together. It wasn't the result of secrets or confidences. It was something else."
"You loved her," Bant said.
Obi-Wan swallowed. "Yes. She inspired me. We fought together side by side. We trusted each other. And when she died, I blamed myself. When I thought that you might die, I knew I could not go on if it happened."
"But you would have, Obi-Wan," Bant said softly. "We all go on." She leaned against him, her eyes sparkling with unshed tears. "You saved my life. We will go on together."
Qui-Gon sat in Tahl's quarters. They had been silent for some time.
TooJay had been sent for reprogramming. For once, Qui-Gon would have welcomed her musical chatter.
"You are to meet the Council soon," Tahl said at last. "If you decide to take Obi-Wan back as your Padawan, it will help him. The Council would most likely allow him to come back."
"I know," Qui-Gon said.
"Especially considering all he has done," Tahl added.
"I am well aware of all he has done."
Tahl sighed. "You are a stubborn man, Qui-Gon."
"No," Qui-Gon protested. "Not stubborn. Cautious. I must be sure, Tahl.
What if taking Obi-Wan back is not fair to the boy, or to the Jedi? If I cannot give Obi-Wan my trust, our Master-Padawan bond will eventually break."
"And you feel you cannot rebuild that trust?" Tahl asked.
Qui-Gon looked down at his hands in his lap. "It is my flaw, I know."
&nb
sp; Another silence stretched between them. Then Tahl picked up her cup and ran her fingers around the smooth surface. She held it up to the light she could not see.
"This is a beautiful cup," she said. "I know this even though I can't see it. I can feel it."
It was beautiful, Qui-Gon saw. The material was so thin it was almost translucent, the color a blue so pale it was almost white. The shape was simple, with no handle or curved rim.
"I use it even though I may break it," she said. She placed it down carefully. "Have you ever heard of the planet Aurea?"