Out of the Shadows 4
This is currently the working title because I
don’t know what else to call it. This story is mainly for my beloved Mona
because I could not do without her and also for all my friends on the SSB
list. The characters all belong to Lucasfilm and I am only playing with them
for my own pleasure. If you are looking for the established timeline (?) and
character continuity…forget it. This is a very alternative universe albeit
still a Star Wars one.
Ash Darklighter
The smuggler chief, Talon Karrde, walked
purposefully through the narrow passageways to the busy command centre of the Wild
Karrde. His crew was more than capable of landing the ship but he always
liked to be around just in case there were any problems. He needn’t have
worried. He soon saw that his presence on the bridge hadn’t been required.
His newly appointed second-in-command stood grimly supervising the landing
procedures. For a moment he stood and watched her operate wondering if she
even noticed that he was there so intent was she on her task. But she had
known he was nearby with the uncanny sixth sense she had already unknowingly
displayed to him on several occasions since she had joined his organisation.
“Take a break, Jade,” he ordered.
She nodded and, without saying a word, stalked
gracefully from the area. Karrde watched her slim figure as she exited. Mara
Jade had been in his employ for over six months and he had never met a more
efficient human being. She was beautiful, with hard green eyes and a luxurious
but tightly braided rope of red gold hair. Yes, Karrde thought, efficient,
competent, intelligent and very decorative. She was all of these things and
more but she couldn’t be described as being warm or friendly. The mysterious
beauty masked an inner core of cold durasteel.
Karrde had, at first, thought she was one step up
from a human replica droid and had little or nothing in the way of normal
human emotions. But sometimes when she thought she was unobserved, hidden
fires could be seen lurking in the depths of her fabulous jade-green eyes.
Karrde admired her for her intelligence and her beauty but that’s as far as
his interest in Mara went. Of course he wanted to know what made her tick but
he would never have pursued a relationship with her. There was something dark
and scarred hidden in her past that she didn’t want to talk about and her
air of reserve stopped any questions. Plus she was the best assistant he had
ever had and he didn’t want to jeopardise Mara’s position within his
organisation. An affair with a close employee was doomed to fail. It meant
that any romantic liaisons Karrde enjoyed were kept outside his crew.
What’s more, the rest of his crew genuinely
seemed to respect Mara. She did her job well and was scrupulously fair, taking
her share of all the tasks on board a working freighter. He had his suspicions
of what her previous employment might have entailed. He was not a fool. She
had been trained by the best.
The only time he’d seen her react in any way was
at the sole mention Karrde had once made of a certain Jedi Knight by the name
of Luke Skywalker.
“Stang, boss!” Dankin exclaimed with a rueful
grin, turning away from the security vid. “She’s worse than you are for
regulations.”
“You’ve said that before but I notice you
don’t complain too much.”
“She’s good,” the pilot admitted quietly with
a careful look round at the rest of the crew who were absorbed in their
duties. “And easy on the eye but don’t repeat that to her. I want to live
a little longer.”
Karrde’s lips twitched. “I suspect she would
frown at your comments.”
“Probably.” Dankin grinned again. “No-one in
the crew will challenge her to a bout of hand-to-hand combat again, that’s
for sure.”
“Yes, Dreghan did come off worst in that
encounter and deserved to. He fought with all the panache of a three day old
ewok cub. After his pathetic display I decided that the entire crew could do
with a little workout and a brushing up of their weapons training.”
“Workout! Boss.” Dankin exclaimed with outraged
dignity.
“Admit you need some exercise.” Karrde stared
pointedly at the pooling of flesh around Dankin’s girth. You’re getting
fat, old man. That is why Mara will be instructing you and the rest of the
crew on a regular basis as of next week.”
Dankin grinned and fixed his gaze back onto one of
the security monitors. “Never hurts to keep up our skills. Could save our
lives one day and as I said...” He laughed quietly. “She’s really good.
Could give even you a run for your credits.”
Karrde chuckled. “She would beat me. But not
easily because I have a strong will to survive, know a lot of tricks and I
fight dirty.”
“I suspect so would Jade.”
“You could be right.” Karrde smoothed his
neatly trimmed black goatee, his pale blue eyes following the direction of
Dankin’s gaze. “What do you see?” he queried sharply, his amusement
gone. “Or perhaps should I say ‘who’?”
“It’s a ‘who’,” the pilot admitted
quietly. “Ever since we landed this guy’s been staring at the ship…”
“There’s nothing peculiar about that,” Karrde
countered evenly. “Unless it's customs.” He saw nothing to get excited
about…yet... but wasn’t about to dismiss Dankin’s suspicions out of
hand. “This is a spaceport. Beings check out the ships all the time.”
“Yeah…but this isn’t an expensive pleasure
yacht. It’s a bulk transport freighter.”
“There are beings who like to look at them. The
galaxy is a strange place with stranger things in it.” Karrde’s tone was
mocking but if Dankin was concerned then there was a good reason. “The Wild
Karrde is a good ship.”
“With a lot of things it shouldn’t have on
board,” he muttered. “Weaponry, increased hull plating, sensor and
scanning equipment…” He scowled. “I’ll need to get Aves to confirm
this for us but…” Dankin isolated the image he wanted from the security
scanners and a holo flashed onto the vid screen. It was the picture of a
familiar, good looking man in his mid to late thirties. “He looks like…”
“Well, I’ll be sat upon by a Hutt!” Karrde
exclaimed, startled from his habitual calm. He knew this character. “I was
just thinking about the very man.” There weren’t many things that
surprised Karrde. He’d expected a ship thief or another one of the smuggling
fraternity. Not… “Is he still out there?”
“Yup, but he’s been met by some sort of
reception committee.”
“Hostile?” Karrde’s hand automatically
travelled down to where he wore his blaster in a low-slung thigh holster.
“Her large escorts could be unfriendly but she
looks mighty glad to see him, the way she’s examining his tonsils. The
Karrde’s eyes narrowed at the images of two
people clinging together with a desperation belonging solely to those parted
for a very long time - the former smuggler turned
“Is that who I think it is? Or should I get Aves
to check it for us or Mara…”
“No, not Mara,” Karrde said quickly. “She
needs her rest. She took two double shifts getting us here. I can confirm that
it’s Solo and Organa.” He didn’t think that asking Mara to confirm the
identities of the
“The Princess. I never thought we would get to
see her out in the open now that the Rebellion is the
“Oh, Leia Organa can still get to places she’d
be better off not seeing. Probably Solo’s doing. But…” He shrugged his
shoulders lightly. “It might make her a better politician…”
“A better politician!” Dankin echoed.
“If that’s a possibility. She’s quite
competent already and very determined. She’s had to be to get through what
she’s been forced to endure. I wonder how her father would have viewed his
only daughter running for her life across the galaxy accompanied by smugglers
and other renegades. It’s a pity what happened to him. Bail Organa was a
good man. Seeing how a large proportion of the galaxy still exists for most of
the time won’t have done her any harm.”
“She’s been on the run for years. The Empire
had a huge bounty on her head and yet she managed to survive.”
“Yes, Leia Organa is quite a woman and Han
Solo…Well, everything they say about him is true.”
“I did meet him back in the old days but he
wasn’t doing so nicely back then.”
“Things have looked up for him.”
“Does he still travel with the Wookiee?”
Karrde nodded. “Yes, Chewbacca is as much in
evidence as he ever was. He won’t be far away.” He moved to his
captain’s chair and lowered his lean frame into it. What the smuggler
wondered was where the fourth member of the famous group had gone. He had
disappeared three years ago and no one - not even Karrde with all his
resources - had managed to determine the location of Luke Skywalker
It had taken him by surprise when Skywalker had
first vanished. It was said that he’d gone on some mission. But then he
hadn’t come back. Word was that he’d resigned from the military to
research the Jedi. Rumour had it that he hadn’t even been real but a myth
created by the Rebels to create sympathy and make them more appealing to
worlds that might be sympathetic to their cause. Karrde wasn’t buying that
one. Luke Skywalker had been real enough and he owned several holos of the man
proving his existence, plus a copy of his application to join the
If anyone knew where the young rebel commander had
gone it had to be the two people embracing as if they were about to be
separated forever. People did disappear under Palpatine’s rule but it was
the first time that a Rebel hero had vanished without any explanation at all.
**********************************************
Mara Jade breathed a silent sigh of relief as the Wild
Karrde eased through the bustling traffic lanes until it touched down
gently in docking bay 645 in Coruscant’s largest spaceport.
Coruscant!
Finally. Mara’s heart felt as if it might burst
from her body and wing its way out of the ship but she never let her turbulent
emotions show on her face. It was one of the very first things the Emperor had
taught her. But her own emotions confused her. What was it she actually felt?
Was it joy, relief, dread or anticipation? Whatever it was, she had finally
come home…or the nearest thing she had had to a home. Ysanne Isaard’s
treachery had seen to it that the jewel of the Core Worlds had been devoid of
its sparkle for its most faithful servant. Though imprisoned like a common
criminal, she had escaped. She’d been wandering the galaxy for so long -
like a Camaasi or even an Alderaanian refugee, denied their place of refuge.
But things could never be as they once were. He
had seen to that. Hate burned briefly for a moment until she controlled the
flame.
She sensed the presence behind her of the man who
had given her a new life. Talon Karrde had given her a job and a purpose to go
on existing and she was grateful.
“Take a break, Jade,” Karrde ordered.
She nodded silently and left the bridge, wondering
how much he had guessed about her past. She’d sensed his curiosity about her
but he never asked. Mara knew that he would wait until she introduced the
subject herself. He would have a long wait. She never spoke of that to anyone.
Some things were better left unsaid; some things better forgotten. She
couldn’t change her past; only make herself a new future.
Mara made her way swiftly along the cramped
passageway until she came to the small cabin she’d been lucky enough to
occupy alone in her position as Karrde’s second-in-command. Space was at a
premium on this vessel generally used for transporting cargo, not life forms.
The door slid shut behind her and she gazed tiredly at the narrow bunk. She
had time for a quick nap before she needed to make any decisions about what to
do next with her life - If there was any decision to make, that is. She’d
given Karrde her loyalty and that was something she did not bestow lightly.
She had been too keyed up to sleep knowing their
destination and had volunteered to take the night watch but now the reality of
being on Coruscant had caught up with her. Her first impulse had been to open
the entry hatch and run to see if it was still as she remembered it - to see
if the Imperial palace could instill the old familiar feelings of fear and
devotion inside her. But now she was strangely reluctant to do anything at
all. She would sleep and then make any new decisions when fully refreshed.
Too fatigued to undress, Mara lay down on the bunk,
pulled the blanket over her weary body and swiftly fell asleep. The dream,
when it came, was different from the others. She’d always had dreams, even
as a child growing up alone and out of place amongst the vast halls and marble
pillars of Palpatine’s palace. The Emperor had been the only person to
understand her dreams and to make something out of her confused, often
nightmarish, visions. When they’d become too disturbing and too clear for a
child of her age, he’d made them stop and for that she’d been thankful.
After his death the dreams had stopped until just
over two weeks ago when they had suddenly begun again with images of the twin
suns of the planet Tatooine. They hadn’t been the garishly bright
nightmarish fantasies of her childhood but just as disturbing in a different
way. She remembered Tatooine and her failure there. Why was this happening to
her now?
She stood alone in a clearing in a place she
didn’t recognise. She was dressed in a brown cloak, her hair unbound,
flowing over her shoulders and down her back. At her waist hung her
lightsaber. Mara’s sleep fogged mind tried to protest. This was wrong.
She’d lost her lightsaber - the one Palpatine had made especially for her -
when Ysanne Isaard had tried to imprison her after her Master had died. She
had no such weapon now. Her hands brushed the object. This was not hers. The
handle was shaped in a different way and she admitted that she liked this one
better. Carefully she took one step and then another. The trees seemed to part
for her until she glimpsed the shimmer of water ahead. Following her strange
compulsion, Mara kept moving forward until she reached the shores of a lake.
Mist rose mysteriously from the surface, the depth
indicated by the murky darkness of the water. Strange things lurked below; she
could just see the shadowy outline of a sinuous body coiling beneath the
surface and waiting…just waiting. It was her fear, she thought hazily. Just
waiting to strike her down. Mara couldn’t remember the first time that she
realised that fear was her constant companion.
Something made her lift her head. The powerful
presence in the Force was different from the Force users she had encountered
before and she couldn’t fathom why. It was as if a light had suddenly
emerged in the darkest of tunnels. She peered through the white vapour until
she spied a young man dressed in black standing on the opposite bank. He
appeared to be familiar to her but she’d never seen him before in her life -
or had she? He was handsome, she thought hazily – very handsome.
“Mara!” he said, his
voice carrying clearly across the lake.
‘He knows my name,’ she thought. “How do
you know…?”
“Your name?”
Suddenly he stood next to her and Mara couldn’t
fathom how he had got there. But of course, it was a dream. Anything was
possible.
“How do you know my name?”
she repeated, startled to find that his eyes were so blue. She’d never known
anyone with eyes of so vivid a colour.
“Your name? I don’t know how or why I know
it…I just do.”
He placed a hand on her shoulder and Mara was
surprised to find that it was warm and heavy, sending tremors up and down her
spine. “But I don’t know who you are,” she whispered.
“Yes, you do.”
“I recognise your face.”
“Faces can alter – minds may grow. Learn to
identify my existence...”
“Stop speaking in riddles. I don’t
understand,” she snapped.
The young man just smiled sadly and began to merge
with the slowly curling mist, his body fading away. “Maybe some day you
will.”
“No…don’t leave me here…alone.”
She didn’t want him to leave her. He made her feel warm and…safe. She
hadn’t felt anything like that ever.
“You won’t be alone.” The
voice had become as ephemeral as the mists. “You have the Force.”
“The Force! No…I don’t. It died when he
died,” she muttered as she opened her eyes and as the
remnants of her dream faded she whispered brokenly, “Without him, I am
nothing. I am no one.”
The words echoed in her mind. “No…you are
strong…believe.”
********************************************
Talon Karrde stood outside Mara’s cabin. He’d
meant to give this to her before she’d left the bridge. If he handed it over
now then she could rest and read over the information for the meetings he had
already scheduled. He pressed his hand against the door announcer and then
frowned. He couldn’t hear any signs of activity but then, she had undertaken
extra shifts. She could be asleep by now. She hadn’t looked tired but it was
difficult to gauge how Mara was feeling at any given time.
Mara heard the door chime as she struggled into
wakefulness. Someone was at her door. “Wait…” she called as she sat up
and pushed the cover away. It landed on the deck plates in a crumpled heap.
“I’m coming.” She activated the door release and waited for the door to
slide smoothly aside.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, Mara,” Karrde
apologised as he saw the vagueness of sleep rapidly disappear from her
features. Damn, he thought. She had to be tired for him to even glimpse a
weakness. He held out a small box of data cards. “We have several meetings
scheduled for two days hence and I meant to give you these earlier. These are
the details.”
“Thanks,” Mara mumbled, her hand reaching for
the box.
“I would like you to accompany me to these
appointments. There will be times when you will represent me on behalf of the
organisation. There are people you need to meet.”
“I understand,” she said.
Karrde placed the data cards into her hand and
stepped away, bowing his head politely as he moved from her cabin. He knew she
would do any research that needed to be done. From the very first moment
he’d met her, he realised that she was the type of person that was prepared
for anything - a strange habit for a hyperdrive mechanic on Varonat where
he’d picked her up. She’d saved his life when he’d run into trouble. He
had been lucky to escape but his friend and partner, Quelev Tapper, had been
killed. He still missed the old guy’s friendship and council. Karrde
reckoned that he owed Jade big time and when she’d asked for a job he’d
been happy to oblige. He paid his debts but in this case he’d been the
winner. Perhaps if he had been a more usual sort of employer he might have
insisted on her exact life history before she started working for him. But
there were areas in his own past that he was less than proud of. It was up to
Mara to tell him what she wanted him to know and why she was so interested in
what Aves had once sardonically termed ‘The New Republic Royalty.’
Leia Organa, Han Solo and especially Luke
Skywalker.
*********************************************
Clutching the box of data cards as the cabin door
slid shut, Mara let her self-possessed façade slip from her features and
stumbled back towards her bunk. Dropping the box on her small desk, she
reached for the discarded blanket and flopped onto the bed, hearing the
springs give. Work could wait until she’d had some proper sleep without
bizarre Force-fed dreams to disturb her.
Mara moved her head around on her pillow and then
finally decided to loosen her heavy plait. As she pulled the strands free, she
focused on what she could remember of her strange dream. It was how she had
always acted. Examining these signs would ultimately interfere with her
concentration so it was better to get it out of the way. Her hand stilled, her
mouth opening in horror.
Sith! The man in her dream. She did know who
he was. But he couldn’t know her. It wasn’t possible. They had never met
one another…only in her dreams.
She’d just had a vision of Luke Skywalker and he
had known who she was – he had called her by name.
She’d seen him once in the flesh on Tatooine at
the B’Omarr Monastery, stronghold of Jabba the Hutt. The Emperor had sent
her to kill him and she’d failed. It had been her first real failure and the
beginning of the end of her life as she knew it. The Jedi had escaped and
returned to the Rebel fleet. Soon afterwards, he had killed her Master at
Endor.
Mara curled into a foetal position, clutching at
her covering with stiff fingers. She’d been in the same room as Skywalker
and she’d failed to kill him. The Emperor had been right to be afraid of the
young Jedi Knight but perhaps he hadn’t been afraid enough.
She had tried to find him, tried to complete her
mission and again had failed. After Endor, the Rebels had immediately pressed
Skywalker into leading a task force to the remote world of Bakura, where he
helped the Bakurans break from the Empire and defeat an alien invasion. That
was the last mission he had undertaken for the Rebel Alliance, now calling
themselves the
Mara knew this was false. She’d seen him. She had
seen grainy holo-footage of him culled from Tatooine’s spaceport and stared
at him across the smoke filled chamber in Jabba the Hutt’s desert
stronghold. Where had he gone and why. Was he still alive? Mara thought so.
Somebody somewhere must know of his whereabouts.
She had a score to settle with him; one that this
time, she wouldn’t fail. Luke Skywalker would die.
**********************************************