The Moment of Truth

Chapter One

They hadn't spoken for many hours, not since they'd left the Core.

Anakin Skywalker kept his eyes on the dashboard indicators, even though they were traveling in hyperspace and the ship was flying on the navcomputer. His Master, Obi-Wan Kenobi, pored over star charts on a datascreen. Every so often he would raise a chart in magnified holo-mode and walk through it, studying the planets more closely.

Anakin usually admired his Master's thoroughness, but today he felt irritated by it. Obi-Wan studied things. He made logical conclusions and plotted strategies. What did he know about leaps in intuition, dreams, risks, compulsions, knowing a step could mean disaster but taking it anyway? What did he know, Anakin thought bitterly, about guilt?

A Jedi Master was dead, and Anakin had seen her die. Master Yaddle had hung above him in a night crowded with stars, held by the Force. She had saved a population by absorbing the destructive power of a bomb with her own body. She had become one with the Force. The great light had sent him crashing to his knees. He'd thought he would never be able to get up again.

And he'd known that as soon as he could feel again, as soon as he could think, he would feel responsible for her death.

Before that mission he had experienced a vision that had haunted him.

The only thing about it that had been clear was that it involved Master Yaddle. During the mission he had thought he understood what the vision meant. Yet he had kept going forward, kept pushing. He had thought he could change fate at any moment. And because he had thought those things, Yaddle had made a great sacrifice — a sacrifice he should have made — and she had died for it.

The Jedi had held a memorial service in the Great Hall of the Temple.

Hundreds of Jedi had crowded the hall and the surrounding balconies and levels. The glowlights had been turned out abruptly. Tiny white lights were projected on the ceiling. Then, out of all the thousands of lights, one had gone out. Using the Force to direct them, each Jedi had turned and trained their eyes on that empty space. The memory of Yaddle had pulsed through the room. Anakin had felt the power of every mind and heart focused on one being. The absence of Yaddle grew until it filled the Great Hall.

And it is my fault she is gone.

The blank space had expanded in his mind until it had seemed enormous enough to swallow him. He could not turn away. He could not reveal his emotion to the Jedi who surrounded him. It took all of his discipline, all of his will, to remain with his eyes fixed on the spot. The grief had coiled around his chest like a great serpent, squeezing the air from his lungs.

He couldn't forgive himself for the mistakes he had made. He didn't know how to get to a place where he could forgive himself.

He still carried that feeling. He could not find a way to live with grief comfortably, as Obi-Wan could. Anakin remembered the days immediately following Qui-Gon's death. Anakin knew that Obi-Wan had been deeply affected by his Master's death, yet Obi-Wan had continued on the same steady path. How could he have felt so much, and yet not be changed?

He doesn't feel things as I do.

Was that it? Anakin wondered. Did he feel too much to be a Jedi? He hadn't yet managed to achieve the distance from the Living Force that other Jedi could maintain. How could he learn to shut out his feelings, to close a door against them and keep on going?

Obi-Wan deactivated the maps he was studying and came to stand behind him.

"We are coming up on the Uziel system," Obi-Wan said. "We might run into Vanqor patrols when we come out of hyperspace." He leaned forward. The instrument panel cast a green glow on his frown.

"You look worried, Master," Anakin said.

Obi-Wan straightened. "Not worried. Cautious." He paused. "Well, maybe worried, too. I think the Council should have sent more than one Jedi team on this mission. It's a sign of how thin we are stretched."

Anakin nodded. It was a source of discussion among all the Jedi lately. Requests for peacekeeping missions were increasing, almost too many for the Jedi to handle.

"Our best chance for success is slipping through undetected," Obi-Wan said. "We'll have to rely on your talent for evasive flying."

"I'll do my best," Anakin said.

"You always do," Obi-Wan replied.

His Master's tone was light, but Anakin knew that he meant a great deal more than he'd said. It was one of several ways that his Master was trying to help him. Obi-Wan knew that Yaddle's death haunted Anakin. There had been a time, Anakin reflected, when Obi-Wan's kindness would have made everything better. Now he appreciated it, but it did not make a dent in his own guilt. Obi-Wan wanted to help him, but Anakin did not want his help.

Anakin did not know why.

Focus on the mission. It will get you through.

He had been glad when Mace Windu had briefed them on this mission. He had wanted something difficult to lose himself in.

The planet of Typha-Dor had pleaded for the Senate's help. They were the last holdout in the Uziel system against the aggressive invasions of the largest planet in the system, Vanqor.

An army of resistance fighters from the other planets in the system had found refuge on Typha-Dor and formed a coalition force to protect the last free planet. So far Typha-Dor had managed to hold out against Vanqor's colonization efforts. Yet they knew invasion was imminent.

One of the successful tools the Typha-Dor forces had used was a surveillance outpost on a remote moon. The outpost had been able to track the secret movements of the Vanqor fleet. Recently Typha-Dor had learned that Vanqor was targeting the surveillance outpost for attack. The outpost was in a remote area of the moon, hidden by heavy cloud cover. The land was packed with snow and ice for months, which also meant that it was almost impossible to get crews in and out.

Reliable information had come to the Typha-Dors that the Vanqors were close to pinpointing the location. It was imperative the news get through to the crew to abandon the post. There hadn't been word from the crew in several weeks, and the fear was that the comm units were down, or the worst had happened and the post had already been attacked. Anakin and Obi-Wan had been sent to discover what was going on and, if they were still there, to bring the crew back safely.

The ship eased out of hyperspace with barely a shudder. Instantly the surveillance equipment hummed to life.