"Heads only," Khedryn said to Marr.

"Get down!" Jaden said, and booted over another table for them to use as cover.

Khedryn and Marr hit the floor behind the table while Jaden used his lightsaber to cut an exit in The Hole's corrugated plasteel wall. The moment cost him, and a blaster shot clipped his shoulder. Pain ran the length of his arm, birthed anger. He spun, blade once more positioned to deflect the Weequay's rapid fire, and tried to regain his calm.

"Out," he said through gritted teeth.

"Cheat!" Reegas shouted after them. "You are a blasted cheat, Khedryn Faal!"

"I don't cheat, you heap of bantha dung!" Khedryn spat back.

"Yes you do," Jaden said, deflecting another pair of shots. A piece of metal came loose from the ceiling and fell to the floor with a crash. "Well, I did. I'll explain. Just go."

"What?" Khedryn said, his good eye fixed on Jaden, his lazy eye staring through the hole Jaden had cut in the wall. "Blast it all. I have a reputation here-" Blasterfire sizzled into the wall and cut short his words. Jaden, holding his lightsaber in one hand, deflected a trio of bolts harmlessly to the ceiling.

"Go, Captain," he said.

Marr fired two shots to get the Weequay down behind the sabacc table and then all three piled through the hole.

They hit the night-shrouded street. Glow lamps and makeshift lighting cast the street in a patchwork of shadows. Patrons of The Hole were streaming out, shouting, cursing, pointing. Passersby stopped in the middle of the street to witness the commotion. An ankarax reared up on its hind legs, growling.

"You have transportation?" Jaden asked, feeling his arm to check the damage. Minimal.

"Who are you?" Marr asked.

"Yes, who are you?" Khedryn seconded.

"Your friend," Jaden said, and deactivated his lightsaber.

"Well, I can't argue with that," Khedryn said.

"Though I can't say I expected to ever have a Jedi for a friend. Follow me."

They darted through the street, through the crowd, pursued by shouts, until they reached a parked swoop and a speeder bike.

"A Searing," Jaden said, admiring the raw lines of the swoop.

Khedryn nodded as he slid atop it. "Double up with me." To Marr, he said, "Back to Junker and then off this rock until we can get things ironed out with Reegas."

Marr fired up his speeder bike, wincing at the pain in his wounded arm.

"You all right?" Khedryn asked him.

"Yes," Marr answered. "I am all right."

Khedryn started to throttle the swoop, stopped.

"Why do you stay with me anyway?" he asked Marr.

The Cerean looked puzzled by the question. "You are my friend."

Khedryn stared at him a moment, seemingly at a loss.

Jaden felt as if he had witnessed something private. He wondered if Marr knew he was Force-sensitive.

"I am that," Khedryn said at last. He gathered himself and said over his shoulder to Jaden, "Meantime, whatever business you're offering, it looks like we'll take it."

Shouts from the crowd sounded above the hum of the swoop's engine.

"There! There they are!"

The Weequay burst out of the crowd, brandishing their blasters, searching the darkness for Khedryn, Jaden, and Marr.

"Time to go," Khedryn said, and Jaden grabbed the handrails as the Searing blazed into the sky. A couple of halfhearted blaster shots followed them into the air, but soon they had left Farpoint and The Black Hole far behind.

"Did you see Flaygin get out?" Khedryn shouted to Marr.

"Who?" the Cerean asked.

"Flaygin."

Marr frowned. "I do not know. I think so."

Khedryn nodded and drove. Only Jaden heard him say, "I hope so."

Kell had slid against the wall as the violence emptied the room. Screaming and shouting beings of all sorts had fled to the common area, then into the street. In the midst of the chaos, he watched Korr, Khedryn Faal, and the Cerean flee through a hole in the wall, watched Reegas, the fat human, order his Weequay bodyguards after them.

When it was over Reegas stood alone in the center of the suddenly quiet room, the king of so much flotsam, surrounded by toppled chairs and tables, scattered credits, spilled drinks, and four corpses, three of them still smoking from blasterfire.

Kell watched Reegas waddle to the body of the player at the sabacc table whom Jaden Korr had killed-Earsh. Reegas stood over the corpse, toed it with his slippered foot, and shook his head. His breathing sounded like wind through a leaky window.

"Get me a drink!" he shouted over his shoulder to no one in particular.

No response. The common room was empty. Reegas cursed.

From outside, Kell could hear the report of more blasterfire, a few scattered shouts. He presumed Jaden Korr and the crew of Junker had escaped. No matter. Kell would be able to follow them. Their destination remained in the sabacc room. He would catch up to them later. He had seen the mesh of their lines, seen it intertwine with his own. He knew their fates were as one.

At the moment, he was hungry. Proximity to the Jedi had sharpened his appetite. And since he would soon be leaving Fhost, he could feed more freely. The ghost need not be so circumspect.

Reegas grunted, huffed, and slowly managed to lower himself to all fours. Still wheezing, he began scrabbling among the debris on the floor, no doubt looking for the data crystal that the tumult had sent flying.

Blocking Reegas's perception, Kell slid in behind him, following him as he sifted through credits and the grime of The Hole's floor.

"Where is it?" Reegas whispered between gasps. "Where is it?"

He threw aside credits, ice, glasses, until at last he hit upon what he sought and held it aloft as it were a trophy. The clear data crystal shimmered in the light of the overheads.

"Got you!"

With another series of grunts and wheezes, Reegas put his feet under his girth and rose.

"Now for some keela," he said.

Kell stepped around to stand before him and let his perceptual screens drop.

Reegas's eyes fixed on Kell, widened. His mouth opened.

Kell held a finger to his lips for silence while their daen nosi danced in the space between them.

Be still and silent, Kell projected.

Reegas sagged, his brow wrinkled in a question, but he did as he was instructed. Kell took the data crystal from Reegas's slack fingers, placed it in the pocket of his jacket. He felt Reegas resisting the shackles of Kell's command, but only weakly.

Kell smiled, took Reegas by the shoulders, stared into his eyes, and freed his feeders. Reegas's mental resistance intensified. He struggled against Kell's grasp, opened his mouth as if to scream, but managed nothing more than a stifled gasp.

The feeders squirmed up Reegas's nostrils, burst through tissue and into the brain beyond. Reegas stiffened as blood leaked from his nose.

Kell fed. His consciousness broadened, but the weak soup of Reegas's mind gave only the barest hints of Fate's purpose. Kell's consciousness drifted back to give him perspective, and he saw the network of daen nosi that composed the universe, the sum of the choices of all sentient beings, but he perceived no order, merely an inchoate design with no meaning.

Irritated and disappointed, he devoured all of Reegas's sentience, all he was and would be, with minimal satisfaction. Reegas was sustenance, nothing more. He withdrew his feeders, slick with the bloody stew of the human's mind, but let them dangle from his face. Reegas's body fell to the floor with a thud.

The emptiness in Kell yawned, and he gave it a name:

Jaden Korr. Now more than ever he knew he would learn the truth of Fate only when he dined on the soup of the Jedi. Fate had brought them both to The Hole. Fate would bring them both to the moon of Krayt's vision. There, Kell would have revelation. The coordinates in the data crystal were the point in space-time where he would rendezvous with Jaden Korr, where he would finally learn the truth behind the veil.