Chilled

The ship is dark. The void without is dark. To the eyes, there is nothing to distinguish the one darkness from the other. But the eyes can deceive us, which is why we are taught from the most tender age how to do without their counsel. Deprived of sight, we open ourselves to other avenues of knowledge, sometimes those which have been with us all along, unnoticed. Here, lying still against the insufficient pallet of this ship's bunk, I can distinguish dark from dark in a myriad of ways. Here, within, there is gravity – generated artificially, yes – but enough to keep my limbs securely anchored to this hard cot. There is the scent of too-sweet, too-scrubbed air, an artificial atmosphere sent through the recycler so many times that it smells only of plastoid and metal and crisp, sterile oxygen pumped in for our benefit. There are sounds, too: the faint hiss of the life support vents, the subliminal hum of the ship's hyperdrive, and now something else, more definite and irregular: rustle, thump, pad pad pad.

I share this cramped haven with another living being, and I am not the only one who finds sleep elusive. There are other means of knowledge besides mere sensation; reaching out a tendril of my own energy through the plenum, I catch a flicker of dull, animal discomfort as the 'fresher door opens and closes in one fluid swish. A few muffled and very familiar sounds ensue, and the door reopens. Pad pad pad. That flicker of annoyance is still present, however. Tap tap tap. My companion is fiddling with the thermostat setting. Did I just sigh aloud? Certainly I did not mean to alert him to my wakefulness, or to censure the action. There is a long hesitation. I feel an answering tendril of energy quest across my own mind, but after five decades of long practice I can shield myself completely. I feign sleep. The hesitation ends. Tap tap tap. Pad pad pad rustle, sigh.

The vent, which is uncomfortably close to my face, hisses and pours a fresh stream of heated air down in to the cabin. I do not like sleeping in a stuffy, claustrophobic space. But my companion chills easily during space travel. The heating issue is a constant source of amusement, of gentle friction between us. Usually the argument ends with me shedding my own cloak and adding it to his own, with a wry word or two. Of course, in this case, the cloaks and most our other clothing are presently enjoying a prolonged oxidizing soak in the compact washing unit.

As though in sync with my own thoughts, I catch a glimpse of my apprentice's disturbed memories: black and scarlet stains soaking through tunics, trousers, cloaks. Tabards spattered with gore, white cloth begrimed with warm, reeking liquid. Boots slipping in puddles of the same, hands sticky on our saber hilts. He had to scrub the mess out of his short hair. I was spared that much – he took the brunt of the explosion, standing in front of me. He also caused it.

Enough hours have passed that I may review the events dispassionately. If my Padawan had not been by my side, I would be dead. Hundreds, possibly a thousand, other innocents would also be dead. A planetary alliance would be left in tatters, with the gateway of future war swinging open on its hinges. Terror would reign in a handful of other systems. He acted with the skill and single-minded focus of a much older man; with the cool, unwavering dedication to duty which a full Knight might display. It is not our way to dwell on praise or blame, to punish or reward that which is past. But I will not fail to include every detail in the Council report. My heart swells with pride. I wonder whether I should say something to him now…but already that awful bright memory is dissolving into blurry incoherence, as the warmth pouring from the vents penetrates the chill of the air and lulls him into a tranquil half-sleep . We will discuss it later.

"What's this?" I jest.

Obi Wan smiles, recognizing his own favorite jibe. "Tea," he explains, handing me the cup of clear, pure water. Tiny bubbles froth the surface. "Well….from a certain point of view." He sits in the co-pilots chair, clutching his own cup between two hands. His shoulders are hunched beneath the voluminous, and perfectly clean, robe.

I take a sip of this pretend-tea. In truth, I would prefer some tea leaves. But there are none aboard. And our breakfast of ration bars was not particularly satisfying. Perhaps he is right; we shall observe this ritual even in the absence of its main component.

"It's like a kata," Obi Wan remarks, as always flawlessly in tune with my own thoughts. I nod. That was a keen observation. Form is of more importance than substance or sensation. I take another sip of this bodiless tea. We are performing a tea kata, a dance of tea. Nothing disturbs the perfection of our movements, the concentration in the moment. Leave it to my apprentice to teach his own master a lesson in staying centered.

"When did you grow so wise?" I inquire.

That sudden sobering mask falls over his face. His eyes look beyond the viewport, into the sickening swirls of hyperspace. Beyond them, almost. He sets the cup down, precisely in the center of the nav-comp display screen, and tightens the cloak around his shoulders. He's still cold, despite the cloying warmth of the artificially conditioned air. I wait for him to speak, but he decides to deflect my question with another. "When did you learn to disable a double encrypted time fuse bomb?"

"Before you were born," I answer truthfully. "But it is a skill seldom employed."

"I'm thankful for that, master." A tiny hint of humor resurfaces.

I sip the non-tea. This conversation is also a kata, a kind of practice form. I ask. He deflects. The defensive maneuvering will continue indefinitely until I leave him room to broach the topic of his own accord. "Do you remember the bomb on Bandomeer?" he ventures quietly.

Surprised, I study him carefully. We never speak of Bandomeer. "How could I not? Had you not been there, I would never have been able to disarm it in time." He will understand that I am speaking of yesterday as well. We do not need to say all that we mean in words.

He shrugs even deeper into the cloak, the hot tea apparently having no salutary effect. "I preferred Bandomeer," he observes, emotionlessly.

"We were fortunate to avoid more violent confrontations on that mission," I respond cautiously. Though stars know there was peril enough, danger at every turn. "But it is not the Jedi way to prefer one situation to another. You know this, Obi Wan."

"Yes, master." Somehow he imbues the short, clipped syllables with a world of resignation and unacknowledged sorrow. And then he rises, collecting the empty cups with a wave of the hand, and retreats to the back of the small ship. Pad pad pad, swish.

It was touch and go, truth be told. Seldom employed skill would not have been enough to effect the needed miracle, if not for the Force's guidance. I can still feel the memory of the hard deck as I knelt, fingers obeying instincts not wholly my own, desperately seeking to undo the madman's doing. The timer counted down the seconds, in slow motion. Behind me I heard the flash and hum of my Padawans' saber, defending us both from the oncoming assault, the dozen accomplices to this suicide bomber's maddened rush toward destruction. The motion is so fast it is a continuous hum, like the rush of blood in my ears…

I wipe sweat from my brow and decide to set the therm regulator a bit lower. It's not that cold in space.

There is nowhere to run aboard a small commuter shuttle. From cockpit to cargo hold, the entire vessel is perhaps twenty meters long. There is a single sleeping cabin with a closet-like refresher, a few utilities crammed into the bulkhead of the adjoining passage, overhead storage compartments, the cargo bay itself, and a small hatch which opens down into the engine housing. From this cellar-like cavity, minor repairs and diagnostics can be made during flight, though most the functional drive components are only accessible from outside the ship. This is necessary due to radiation damping measures. Going too near a standard hyperdrive while its running is like tinkering with a lightsaber's ignition chamber while the weapon is activated.

I lean over the open hatch in the floor. Yellow light makes the space below glow like a paper lantern, like the pretty festival lights they use on Leturia. A scruff of hair appears in my view, a short nerf-tail sprouting from its midst. "Obi Wan," I address the back of my Padawan's head.

"Just checking everything over," he explains.

I feel one of my eyebrows creep upward. Republic diplomatic ships are kept in perfect condition, always tuned up between each successive deployment.

"I need to practice," he adds, with a thread of defiance coloring the polite tone. Really? I wonder. He is a senior Padawan now. No more academic requirements to fulfill, his time is completely devoted to missions and whatever training I see fit to supervise. His engineering skills are more than adequate, anyway, though he has no great fondness for machines and circuitry.

"I take it we're in no immediate danger?" I say.

The nerf tail shakes side to side. The thin braid swings a little with the motion. "No."

The heat down in the repair deck is oppressive. I note that he has discarded the cloak entirely. I wonder whether I have discovered the real motive behind the check-up. The small space affords some relief from his persistent chill. Or perhaps it is just adolescent restlessness. Someday I will manage to convey stillness into my teachings. He is strong with the Force, able to swim in its currents and depths with the ease of a whaladon. Someday, when he discovers stillness, he will root himself deeply to the bedrock of the Living Force, and then he will be …well, he will be a great Jedi. But that is someday. This is the present moment. "Come out of there," I command.

He obeys, leaping through the narrow aperture with a graceful twisting motion that lands him crouched on its edge. He shuts the hatch with a snap of the wrist and stands up, inspecting his hands for signs of grease or toxic fluids. His tunics are spotless. I wonder how much real checking-over happened down there.

"Their beliefs are not so terribly nonsensical," he says, completely non sequitur.

An image of the would-be bomber and his fanatical comrades flashes before my mind. "Ah. You have sympathy for their anti-technological doctrines?"

"Not sympathy, exactly, master. But there is a seed of truth there. Reliance on machines and technical skill does alienate people from the living realities, and by extension the Force itself. And technology is an effective way to channel and control power – which has its inherent dangers. You can see why they are so distrustful of those who want to introduce wholesale innovations into their society."

I shake my head. Does any other master have such a philosophical Padawan? He is standing there, calmly discussing the world view of a sect whose members were, a day ago, bent on his destruction. He has enough sophistication and composure to place his imagination in a very alien position and then to assess and explore the implications. I am astounded by his intellectual maturity, or prematurity. It is another sign of perfect detachment, a quality it seems almost impossible he should possess so young…

But I am ever the devils' advocate. "So you have sympathy for their desire to eradicate not only machines but those who advocate their use?" I tease.

"Of course not, master. Their intentions were dark. I simply have…an insight into their point of view."

"Insight is the root of compassion. Perhaps you feel a certain empathy for them?"

Now he is confused, and he shutters his thoughts away behind adamantine shields. His open expression grows aloof and distant. It has been mistaken for haughtiness before, and will be many times in the future. I watch him lean down, pick up his cloak, and enfold himself in the dark fabric, disappearing into archetypal Jedi reserve with it. The cloak brushes the smooth floor panels. Pad pad pad, swish.

Turning his back on me was rude. I sense something amiss, not for the first time since the mission ended. But we will discuss it later.

We are obliged to revert and change course outside the Inner Rim. Travelling into the Core is a complicated affair. There is no one single hyperlane which will carry a pilgrim homeward without fail. The nav computer recalculates the coordinates for the next jump, and recommends a fifteen minute stand-by to allow the drives to cool. I take the opportunity to contact the Temple, and submit a preliminary report. I gloss over one or two details – some more unorthodox elements of the mission which I would prefer to discuss with the Council in person – and place emphasis on my apprentice's bravery and self-possession. Yoda is pleased. He dotes on the boy.

Swish. Pad pad, rustle.

"There you are. Hungry?"

A soft snort. "How long till Corsucant?" he asks, making a complicated mental calculation, in which his appetite and the pending hours of transit are painstakingly tabulated and weighed. Ration bars do grow tiresome – even I will admit it.

"Too long," I promise him.

Tap tap tap tap tap. He is drumming two fingers on the burnished hilt of his saber. "Master…" Tap tap tap tap tap tap. "I apologize for my behavior earlier. I did not mean to show disrespect, and –"

There must be something showing on my face, for he pauses in his earnest self-accusation. "There is nothing to forgive," I assure him. Tap tap tap tap. Though obviously there is something more to discuss. "I just spoke with the Council. They will likely make an official commendation of your actions upon our return. You deserve such recognition," I add before he can object.

Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap. I swiftly press my hand over the drumming fingers. Such nervous habits are not becoming in a Jedi.

"I'm sorry, master."

"You're sorry for outshining your old master in the eyes of the Council?" I smile. His aversion to praise, at least to public honors, is another jewel in his crown. Humility is a rare trait in the very young and talented, but he has it in superabundance. Add it to courage, intelligence, detachment and serenity, and you have the very picture of the perfect Padawan.

His eyes slide sideways, glinting. "That's not my fault," he observes dryly.

Brat. He's shivering, despite the satisfaction of scoring a point at my expense.. "Are you ill?" I demand. We are not going to relive the nightmare after our mission to Trandosha four years ago. The fingers under my hand twitch, but I keep a steady pressure on them.

"No," he says. "I made sure." By which he means that he has dutifully meditated on it, perhaps entered a light healing trance to be certain the chill does not stem from some undetected physical malady.

"Good. Why don't you take over the piloting?"

He shifts to the pilot's console, and I exit, ducking under the low doorway. There is an emergency survival kit stashed in the storage compartment in the rear corridor. I scrounge through its contents and return to the cockpit with the light thermal blanket. It's intended for more dramatic situations – victims of shock, camping in sub zero climates, that sort of thing. I wrap it around Obi Wan's shoulders, eliciting a startled look and the beginnings of a protest. I raise one finger, in silent command, and the protest subsides.

Then I go to meditate.

In hyperspace, the philosophers tell us, we are in some sense nowhere at all. In the Force, we are in some sense everywhere at once. The former is the perfect place, or non-place, to meditate. Nothingness does not interfere with plenitude, not in the way that the particular does. There are some Jedi who do not care for hyperspace, going so far as to describe it as the opposite of a vergence. A place, or non-place, where the Force is not channeled and does not flow. I disagree, at least in part. Here, it is true, there is no flow. It is as though we have reached the limits of being, and that great ocean of energy is lapping placidly at its own invisible boundaries. Here the Force is a glassy, brilliant pool of limpid calm – a mirror of Light. Here, floating in spirit, I sometimes think that the Light is other than the Force, above and better, and that which we call the life energy is but the adoring vessel of that greater Light, the so-called Dark side nothing more than a failure to grasp this staggering truth.

Tonight, the tranquil sea is disturbed. After all, I am not alone. I share this cramped haven with another living being, and my first duty is not to my own speculations, to the siren song of mystery, but to this other being. I rouse myself from the deepest trance, and breathe in the stale, too sweet, too scrubbed air. The ship is thrumming like a sleeping colwar, which means we are mid-jump and all systems are on a safe and reliable autopilot. The source of the unrest comes from the cargo hold, directly behind me.

The lights are dimmed – just the little blue running lights cast a phantom glow around the empty square of deck. Obi Wan kneels in the center, still wrapped in cloak and blanket, hands resting loosely on knees, eyes closed. But his presence is a knot of cold tension. He stirs when I kneel opposite.

"I can't meditate," he says, disgusted and ashamed.

"Hyperspace can be disorienting," I offer, though we both know this is not the cause. "I will lead you." A muscle leaps along his jaw, a sure sign that he does not want my help. "Now," I decide. I can feel a trickle of alarm running at the back of my mind, an unbidden echo of whatever mental block is standing in his way. I do not believe in beating around the muja-bush. The direct approach is always better in the long run, though sometimes shocking to the system of less stalwart individuals.

I think I know what the problem is. Minds linked, we edge toward the memory which stays, lodged with the poison tenacity of a barb or a thorn. Until it has been dissolved and released to the Force, there will be no peace in his mind. I feel a gentle tug of resistance as I lead our mutual vision back to that corridor, the place where the suicide bomber made his desperate attempt to kill the entire peace delegation. I push harder, and he balks. Here is the frozen center, the source and nexus of the chill which spreads out from memory to imagination, to emotion, to heart and gut, muscle and bone.

Together, we remember what happened in that corridor.

Like the sudden clap of thunder after a long day's dark anticipation, the warning trembled in the Force. There is no try; there is only do and be. And so, we did not try to intercept the lone runner barreling his way along the top concourse. We simply were there, at the same time, our feet flying faster than his frantic pace. Two ends of the hallway; two Jedi. The madman rushed toward my end, hollering the same phrase again and again in his native tongue, his dark intent burning like a beacon in the Force: kill all those in the building, bring the building down in flames, go down into the flames himself, in a sacrifice for the ideal and the pure. On his back, a lumpy misshapen package – a bomb, enough explosives to blow us all to oblivion.

There is no try. There is the moment. I cannot touch that bomb, yet I cannot let the man keep it. He charges me, I slip aside, my saber cuts, down, around, severing the deadly package frorm his back. He howls in pain – I must have burned him – and stumbles forward, bursting through the Assembly doors into the waiting hands of the security guards. He flails, desperate, unbelieving. He expected to be consumed in rampant fire as soon as he entered. The guards struggle with him.

I struggle with the bomb. Still active, a volcano on the brink of eruption, it lies at my feet. I crouch, wrench aside the housing. Force help me, there are only three minutes left before it automatically explodes. Time slows to a crawl, the universe contracts to this one spot. I have nothing left to give to the world around me. I cannot afford to hear the guards struggle to subdue the runner, nor the delgates' panicked screams and cries. I cannot afford to hear the tramp of another dozen feet coming down the corridor, the fanatic yells echoing off the walls. Nor can I hear or heed the sound of Obi Wan's lightsaber screaming and spitting as he deflects a meteor shower of blaster bolts, holds the rushing guerillas at bay. I cannot care that the battle is drawing ever nearer, the rage of the madman's associates swelling to an awful crest as they realize the plan has failed. I cannot feel the moment approaching when their fury will break like a wave and they will fling themselves into death's arms as they planned, pulling out one small, round disintegrator grenade each, hollering a piercing warcry as they fling the dozen objects straight at the young man only a meter from my back.

The bomb is dead. I have killed it. And I turn, on one knee still, my hand still in the act of reaching for my saber, to see the twelve tiny murderous spheres arcing through the air toward us, the Assembly room just beyond. I feel more than see Obi Wan's command of the Force in that split second. The very air around us is seized and shaped and thrust outward, a mighty hurricane of power blasting the grenades backward in their flight. I hear his visceral grunt of effort, grunt myself as he staggers backward, treading on my hand, and then…

The hallway is transformed to a red rainfall. The shockwave carries the spattered remnants of the raiders across the space, painting ceiling, floor and walls in a butchery of tiny particles. Obi Wan is drenched, covered and coated in the gore. I too am not spared. The silence afterward is louder than the explosion. Dimly I hear the renewed screaming of the Assembly, the shouts of the guards, the strangled exclamations of the prisoner, now the only survivor of the crazed task force.

My Padawan turns to me. But there is nothing to say.

I pull us both back from the past, into the present. Obi Wan really shouldn't look as pale as he does. Anger colors his cheeks and sets his eyes aflame. "I don't wish to dwell on that," he snarls at me. He is shaking in earnest now, hands clenched into the folds of his robe.

"Then why have you not released the memory?" I counter. Why are you making yourself sick with it? Why? Where is that perfect detachment and serenity now? I do not throw these things in his face. They will be misunderstood.

"Because I'm a failure! I can't move past that! I can't do things like that and feel nothing! I never will! " He has more to add, but his voice gives way. He clenches his teeth and struggles to regain control.

"Why is that so bad?" I ask gently. "I have never forbidden you to feel."

That earns me another snarl, a deep guttural noise of despair and hurt. "There is no emotion, there is serenity," he spits out at me, diaphragm still spasming.

"Do not quote the Code at me, Obi Wan." Did I mention that they say I have the perfect Jedi Padawan? They are all wrong. He is better than a perfect Jedi. He is an imperfect one. "Release whatever it is you feel. Do not deny it, or try to suppress it. That is not what serenity means."

Glaringly, flagrantly, shockingly imperfect. He surrenders at last and dips his head. I look on, watching the hot tears fall upon the dark cloth of his robe. Spat spat spat spat. There may be no emotion, but he is weeping for the insane, wretched, murdering and depraved men whom he killed. For their broken lives, for the burden of being the one to stop them, for the waste and the tragedy of it. And the sheer grotesque horror, too. Spat spat spat spat. There may be no emotion in the Code, but I know from whence such compassion springs. It flows from the Living Force, which unites all life no matter how pathetic or broken, and which heals all rifts.

Compassion is stronger than grief, anger, sorrow, and pain. The fate of the galaxy may hang on it. And so, after a period of time I do not measure even in thought, he looks up and there is no more twist of regret in his eyes, the pain and the chill washing away with the tears. The thermal blanket has fallen to the deck, and his hands are no longer trembling with cold.

"I'm all right," he says after a while, as though surprised, as though he has walked unscathed through a wall of fire and is shocked to find himself whole on the other side.

"I should think so." I stand and he follows, with a slow deliberate exhalation. "Shall we? There are two more hours till we land, and we both could use some rest."

"Yes, master."

"Cold?"

"No…it's much warmer now."