by John Whitman
stepped into the room. Once more, Tash felt as if she were being watched. The
hair on the back of her neck stood on end. Something was here.
Tash was focused on her feelings now-on her sensitivity to the dark side.
As she concentrated on the Force, she began to relax. But then
Wham! Someone struck her from behind.
Tash fell forward, sprawling on the dusty stone floor of the room.
Whirling around, she looked up and saw a teenage girl with blue eyes and blond
hair pulled back in a neat braid.
She looked into the face of her attacker.
It was her own face.
CHAPTER 9
Tash couldn't believe her eyes. It was her. For a moment she couldn't
accept it. It had to be her imagination. Or maybe a hologram.
But the hologram was holding a rock in both hands. The other girl-the
other Tash-raised the rock over her head and brought it crashing down.
At the last moment Tash rolled out of the way and the rock broke against
the hard floor.
Her twin was trying to kill her!
Tash tried to scramble to her feet, but her twin was already attacking.
The other girl shoved her backward, pinning her against the curved wall of the
round room. The other Tash's fingers curled around her throat and started to
squeeze.
Tash gagged as her air was cut off. She clutched at her attacker's hands,
but the other Tash only squeezed harder. Desperately, Tash curled her hand
into a fist and punched. She felt her fist make contact. The other Tash
grunted and let go.
Tash slid along the wall, trying to stay out of reach of her attacker.
"Who-Who are you?" she gasped.
The other girl touched her jaw where Tash had hit her. Then she grinned.
Although she was an identical copy, Tash had already seen a difference between
herself and her mysterious twin. The other girl had a wicked gleam in her eye.
She started toward Tash again without answering.
"Stay back!" Tash said. She didn't know what to do. "I don't want to
fight. I need to know what's going on."
The other Tash laughed. "You won't need to know once you're dead!"
She lunged at Tash again. Tash jumped away and ran for the exit. Whoever,
whatever this other Tash was, she fought like an animal. Tash needed to put
some distance between them.
She ran down one of the passages between the ruined buildings, hoping to
lose the other Tash in the maze of stone blocks. But she soon heard footsteps
behind her. Whichever way she turned, the other Tash followed.
Tash kept cutting corners and running around the huge stone blocks. But
instead of escaping her pursuer, she made a wrong turn.
A dead end rose up in front of her. One of the stone building blocks had
fallen, blocking the path. It was too high to climb over. So were the walls on
either side of the passage.
Tash whirled around to turn back, but found herself looking at her mirror
image once again.
"Ha!" her twin laughed. "Nowhere to run."
"Who are you?" Tash demanded.
Her twin laughed again. "Don't you know, Tash? I'm you."
"You're not me," Tash replied. "Whatever you are, you're not me."
"Oh, I'm you," the other Tash said, stalking forward. "I'm the dark side
you don't want to let out. We're the same right down to the last gene. But
there isn't room in this life for both of us. And since I'm stronger-you'll
just have to go."
The evil Tash looked around and picked up another large rock. It was
twice the size of her fist. She hefted it and smiled.
Tash knew this other Tash would kill her. It was willing to kill; it even
wanted to kill. Tash was no match for that. She couldn't fight that way.
Time seemed to slow down as the other Tash inched forward. Tash thought
about the words her evil twin had spoken. I'm the dark side you don't want to
let out. Was that true? Was there something about the Jedi ruins that had
shown Tash a reflection of her own dark side?
Tash glanced at the stones around her. She remembered her earlier
amazement at the stones. Someone-a Jedi? - had used the Force to move these
giant stones. Someone had used the Force to build this entire fortress. This
evil Tash might be vicious and strong, but the real Tash had the Force, and
the Force was stronger.
Tash took a deep breath. She called on the Force. Immediately she felt
the touch of the dark side. It was waiting, willing to help her. She sensed
that with the dark side she could wipe this impostor off the planet, erase her
from the world in the blink of an eye.
No, Tash thought. I'm not like that. I won't be.
Tash pushed all thoughts of using the Force as a weapon from her mind.
Instead, she thought of the Force as a shield. She had done this once before
against a creature called Spore. Tash tried again now, imagining a protective
screen like a ship's deflector shield all around her body. She felt the Force
flow around her, and she knew it was working.
But the other Tash only smiled. Her eyelids fluttered up and down, and
her eyes rolled back into her head. Tash wondered what she was doing.
Then she felt the dark side.
It smashed into her like a crashing wave. The dark-side power broke
through her imaginary shield and struck her, throwing her off balance. Tash
stumbled backward until she felt her back against the stone wall. She stared
at her evil twin in disbelief.
The other Tash controlled the dark side of the Force, and she was
stronger.
"Now," the evil twin said, "you will die."
CHAPTER 10
Quick as a light beam, the evil Tash hurled the stone.
Something-an instinct, or maybe even the Force-pulled Tash out of the
way, and the rock cracked against the stone wall behind her. The evil twin
reached out to grab Tash's throat, but Tash ducked and slipped past her
attacker.
Tash bolted out of the dead-end passageway.
"You can't run!" the other Tash yelled. "I'll find you!"
Tash didn't listen. She ran as fast as she could, not thinking, not
caring where she went as long as it was away from this evil creature.
This time, desperation and blind panic saved her. She ran so fast and so
far through the ruins that the other Tash seemed to lose her. Tash could hear
the evil twin yelling at her, but she was nowhere in sight.
Tash looked for an exit from the ruins. She had to tell Hoole and Zak.
They had to leave this place immediately. She just had to get out of the ruins
and run for the Rebel base.
Tash saw an opening in the crumbling walls and raced through it. But she
was on the wrong side. Instead of the wide blue river and the bridge, Tash was
looking at the prairie. She was on the far side of the ruins, the side where
she'd come in earlier.
She paused. Going back through the ruins was out of the question. What
about going around? That would take too much time.
That only left one direction: forward.
At least, Tash thought, I know where I can find some help.
As fast as her feet would carry her, she ran for the Dantari camp.
The camp was in shambles.
Tents had collap
sed. Cooking pots had been overturned, contents spilled
on the dusty ground. Near the center of the camp one of the Dantari had set up
a wooden frame, a drying rack for animal skins. Now it lay broken, shattered
in several pieces as though trampled by a panicked crowd.
There was not a single Dantari in sight.
"Hello?" Tash called out. But it was useless. There was no place to hide
on the open prairie. If anyone had been around, she would have seen them.
"What happened here?" she said out loud.
Nearby, a flock of startled fabools flapped their way heavily into the
air. Otherwise, there was no sound.
Tash had once watched some Dantari on a hunting party. She remembered how
they tracked their quarry by its footprints, studying the tracks of various
animals until they had chosen the one they wanted, then figuring out in which
direction it had gone. She looked down at the ground, trying to study the
footprints. At first it seemed useless. There were dozens, maybe hundreds, of
prints of bare feet crisscrossing each other. That would be the Dantari. She
spotted a few of her own, and the print of a boot she guessed was Zak's.
Then she spotted another bootprint. This one was much larger, at least
the size of someone like Uncle Hoole. But Hoole didn't wear boots, which meant
someone else had been in the camp.
One of the Rebels?
Tash walked around, looking for more clues, but found nothing. She could
make no sense of what happened. She was still walking around, staring at the
ground, when a huge figure rose up out of the grass in front of her. She
stifled a cry.
It was Maga.
The Dantari pointed a thick finger at Tash. "You are to blame!"
CHAPTER 11
Tash was too exhausted and bewildered to respond. She had no idea what
Maga meant. All she knew was that he had tried to kill her-or at least he had
hoped she would become lost or injured in the Jedi ruins. Since then, her
entire world seemed to have turned upside down. Tash wanted to scream and yell
at Maga.
She held back. She knew it wouldn't do any good. Maga would not
understand. Besides, there was a wild look in his eyes and she didn't want him
to become violent.
As calmly as she could, she said, "What are you talking about?"
"You came here!" Maga thundered. "You brought the other humans. You
brought the man with no face!" Man with no face? What was Maga talking about?
She wanted to sit down in the dust and cry, but she couldn't. She had to stay
focused.
"I haven't been back to camp since I went into the ruins, Maga," she said
firmly.
"You lie. With my own eyes I saw you. You brought the man with no face.
The elders welcomed him because he was with you. Then he took them all
prisoner!"
Tash swallowed. "Someone took all the Dantari prisoner?"
"Your friends! The other humans and the dark man with no face."
Tash groaned. If Maga said that one more time she was going to scream.
"It wasn't me, I swear," she said as calmly as she could. "Maga, you told
Zak there was something strange about those Jedi ruins."
"The place of fallen rocks," the Dantari said.
"Right, the place of fallen rocks," she agreed. "Well, things have been
strange ever since we went in there. I was attacked by someone who looks just
like me. That must be the person who helped kidnap your people." She blinked.
"Why weren't you captured?"
Maga scoffed. "I am the garoo, wise man of my people. It is my job to
know things. I did not trust the others from the beginning. But no one would
listen to me. They believed only you." He spat that last word like a curse.
"It wasn't me," Tash repeated. Her voice was almost a whisper.
Once, in school, Tash had been accused of cheating on an exam. She knew
she was innocent, but her teacher had been so sure of her guilt that Tash had
almost begun to doubt herself.
She had that feeling again now, only it was worse, because someone who
looked like her actually was committing these acts.
Tash felt a pang of guilt. Even if her mysterious evil twin was causing
the trouble, Tash knew she was partly to blame. Because of Tash and her uncle,
the Dantari had stopped respecting their tribal wise man.
"When the elders would not hear my warning, I left camp in anger," Maga
explained. "Then I saw the strangers attack. The dark man with no face, he had
power. Greater than a garoo. Greater than you or Hoole. He captured many."
"Where did they go?" Tash asked.
"Some of my people fled. The strangers chase them. Hunt them." Maga's
brow wrinkled. "You ask like you do not know. You were here."
"I wasn't here," she insisted. "You have to believe me, Maga," she
pleaded. "You told Zak there was something dangerous about the Jedi ruins.
What do you know?"
Maga's eyes narrowed in suspicion. "I know many things. Wisdom passed
down from garoo to garoo. This keeps my people safe."
"Please tell me," she said again. "What do your garoo ancestors tell you
about those ruins?"
Maga stared at her as though his dark eyes could see right into her mind.
For the second time, Tash saw past the anger that had built up between them.
This time she saw why he had been chosen as garoo. She could see his mind at
work, judging her words, judging her expression, reaching an intelligent
decision. He wasn't using the Force or any other power, but he was probing her
just the same, using only his wits. She realized that she had to stop thinking
of him as less intelligent just because his people wore skins and hunted with
primitive weapons.
"Garoo learn to see," Maga said. "Learn to judge truth by looking at
eyes, hearing words. I think you are telling the truth."
He paused a moment to gather himself.
"Long ago," he began, "in the time of the garoo four before me,
offworlders came here in flying machines."
"Was that when the Rebels built their base?" she asked.
"No, before. Many seasons before that. Then there was only place of
fallen rocks. These offworlders flew there. They had great power. Like you,
only greater. They searched. They went away. After that, strange things
happen."
"What things?" she asked.
Maga shook his head. "The garoo stories are not clear. Sometimes Dantari
vanish in the place of fallen rocks. Sometimes one Dantari enters, but two
leave."
Tash's eyes widened. So the ruins did have something to do with her evil
twin!
Maga continued. "After several seasons, these strange things do not
happen. But the garoo forbid Dantari to enter the fallen rocks again. Our
tribe camped away from fallen rocks. Then no bad things happen. Even when
other offworlders came to build their stone camp, the place of fallen rocks
was silent. But then, last season, when the Dantari camped here, it happened
again." He pointed to the sky. "Ships came down. They landed at the place of
fallen rocks: And after that, all was different."
"How?" Tash asked.
"No Dantari go to rocks anymore, so nothing like before," Maga answered.
"But soon,
offworlders appear in old stone camp."
"You mean at the Rebel base? People flew there?" Maga shook his head.
"No. No ships come. But offworlders appeared. Where from? Even the garoo does
not know. The man with no face came first. He tried to trap the Dantari, but
Dantari escape into fields where he cannot find us. Then other strangers
appear."
Tash took a moment to sort things out. The Jedi ruins were thousands of
years old. But some time in the more recent past, people with "great power"-
Tash knew they must have been Jedi-carne to the ruins for a while, then left.
After that, the Rebels came and went. And then, less than a year ago, more
offworlders had come. Soon after that, Rebels started filling the old base
again.
Obviously, activity near the ruins triggered something-Tash didn't know
if it was the Force or some hidden technology-that was causing these weird
happenings. But what? And why?
"I need Uncle Hoole," she said. "Maga, will you come with me to the Rebel