A New Jedi in an Old Republic

Jedi Archives

No one really paid Jan any mind as she walked with confidence through the halls of the Jedi Temple. So many people were rushing too and from that it was easy to not get noticed. She smiled, thinking about poor Kyle. As much as she was the one tasked with trying to figure out what happened, he had the hardest job – getting a feel for the Jedi and keeping their cover intact.

But still, the Temple was huge! She dimly remembered someone saying that it was what was left of a mountain on Coruscant before the world had become a world-city. Everything here was larger than life, and when compared to the Temple on Yavin, this place was grandiose. Almost excessive even.

The Temple had been attacked by Darth Vader and the 501st Legion at the end of the Clone Wars. With an eye toward defending this place from a full Legion of Stormtroopers, Jan evaluated what she saw.

And she didn't like it. Too open. Too many long corridors meant to impress the visitor that be defensible. Although, she figured that if they refitted half of these statues lining the walls with shield generators, and installed some pop-up turrets in the ceiling, you could create some excellent kill-boxes.

If things continued to go bad, she would see whom she could suggest these improvements to. There had to be someone around here who would appreciate her input who wasn't Kyle.

At least the Archives were not hidden. The massive doors were open to all to enter, and Jan stepped in, trying not to drop her jaw at the sight of all the Stacks. The massive databanks that held centuries of information from all across the Galaxy. If the solution to her problem existed, it would be here.

While no one came to ask her if she needed any help, Jan wasn't eager to interact with any of the local Jedi either. They may ask uncomfortable questions that even her New Republic Intelligence training would be hard pressed to excuse.

She really didn't like acting on so little information, with such a fragile plan. But it was their best hope right now. And that meant finding an unused terminal she could slip into to begin her search.

"Can I help you?" a wizened old voice spoke from beside her as she walked along the side of the stacks. "Not many come here simply to look at the machines."

Jan didn't startle at the presence. Instead she put on her best innocent face. "Sorry about that. First time here, you know. I'm Jan," she introduced herself to help control the flow of conversation. "I'm the pilot for Master Katarn. While he's doing his thing, he told me to do some research here in the Archives." Completely true. Utterly false. The best lies.

"My name is Rayce," the Jedi said, robes thick on him. "I am apprenticed to the head of the Archives, Master Nu. What can I help you with?" He seemed to be the helpful sort, which would only get in Jan's way.

"Thank you, but it's not necessary. I just need a terminal and some time." Her brows furrowed in concern. "What about the service? Are you not attending?"

Rayce's shoulders fell. "No, the ceremony proper is for Maters and high ranking Knights, of which I am not one. The event will be transmitted via holo to all public chambers, including this one once Grand Master Windu begins."

"You have my sympathies for your loss," Jan said honestly. "Once Master Katarn heard, he came straight to Coruscant."

"As did a great many other Jedi," Rayce admitted. "Look, there is an empty terminal. Did your Master give you an access code?"

Jan was certain she could have sliced in. "No," she sighed. "He forgot that too. First, his formal robes. Now a low-level access to get me into the public information networks."

Rayce found that funny. "A forgetful Master? Not something you see everyday."

"He's under a lot of stress. Some things slipped his mind."

"I can understand that. Come, I will log you in as a guest. Just the public information?"

"He wanted me to study up on some Hyperspace phenomena," Jan explained to the apprentice Jedi. "He sensed something on the way here, and wanted me to look into it while he did his thing."

"I understand." Jayce said as he leaned over and tapped in a passcode into the terminal. "This will get you what you need and more should you desire. It is just a guest access though, and your queries will be logged as normal."

"Thanks," Jan smiled in gratitude. That would save her a lot of trouble! It wasn't like she was going to be digging for secrets, so she didn't have a problem leaving a trail like that. She waited for Jayce to wander off in search of something else to do before setting her goggles off to one side and sitting at the terminal.

"Search query, huh?" Jan's hands hovered over the keyboard, knowing that with this, there really was no way to go back. Looking for a solution to a problem meant that there was a problem in the first place. "Let's see.... Hyperspace Anomalies? No, that would just give me a list. Let's try Anomalous Hyperspace events, and work from there...."

* * *

Obi-Wan Kenobi walked into the Archives, nodding at Master Jocasta Nu. The elderly woman returned his gesture coldly, still sore over his discovery that the Archives had been tampered with. While he was certainly innocent, that he was the one who discovered the flaw meant that she held him partly responsible for the problems she had since the rediscovery of Kamino.

"Kenobi," she said as she stood behind a desk. "What brings you here?"

"Master Katarn was called up to the Council Chamber, so he asked me to let his pilot know that he would be delayed." Obi-wan was apologetic, and used his body language to emphasize that he was still injured, and thus wasn't in a position to take or deal with anything other than politeness. "Do you have a Jan Ors logged in?"

"Yes, actually. Jayce set her up before the service at terminal D-1132. I presume you can find that?" No, she didn't like his presence at all, though she was willing to tolerate it for the time being.

"I can, thank you." He bowed to the matron of the Archives and walked down the Stacks, looking for D-section.

He found it, and spotted Jan quite quickly. True to Master Katarn's prediction, she was swearing under her breath as she flipped through page after page of information. He slowly approached her as he suspected that if he surprised her in her current state, she would probably hit him with one of the books in reaction.

Watching her, he could feel her tension ebb and wane as she looked over very technical articles. From his position behind and to the side, he couldn't read anything properly, but he did recognize some graphs associated with Hyperspace travel.

In a lull in her studies, one she took when she stepped up to stretch her legs, that was when he introduced himself. "Pardon me?"

"Yes?" She said without sounding the least bit impressed by the interruption. "Look, I know you guys want to help and all, but I'm fine on my own."

Ah, she thought him one of the librarians. "I'm sorry, I'm not who you think I am. Are you Jan Ors?"

"Who wants to know?" She was suspicious of him, so he settled on alleviating those concerns right away.

"My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi," there it was again! The sense of recognition, then surprise, then respect and sadness. While he could attribute that to news of Geonosis travelling around, this didn't have the same feel to it. Like it was deeper. And for her, unlike the Jedi she flew around, the respect was greater than anything else. He could use that. "I have a message from Katarn."

"Kyle? Is he alright?" Her worry was almost physical.

"He is fine." He shifted to make himself a little more comfortable. "After the service for the fallen, he was summoned to the Council Chamber. He asked that I inform you that he would be delayed.

"The Council?" Interesting. There was fear and dread now. But they weren't focused on Katarn at all. It was almost like she was worried for the Council...

Given what had transpired in the few moments that he had been there in the presence of Katarn and the Council, he was certain now more than ever that Katarn was far, far more than what he presented himself as.

Kenobi waved one hand to show he wasn't concerned. "I wouldn't read too much into it, Miss Ors. They probably wanted to hear his report sooner, rather than later." He took a guess as to the real purpose behind the summoning.

"Report. That's one way to look at it," she muttered. "Thank you."

"You are quite welcome." Kenobi had moved to get a closer look at what she was studying. "Interesting. Temporal dilation effects caused by gravity wells in Hyperspace? My former Padawan, Anakin is a pilot himself." He shouldn't be prying into the affairs of other Masters, but with everything going on, he just couldn't let this go."

"Yes," Jan said, judging him carefully. She made a decision. This was Obi-wan Kenobi, right? General, Hero, teacher of Luke? She could trust him. "Want to sit down? You look a little off." She offered her chair to him.

"No thanks. I am to be returning to the Halls of Healing to recuperate from the battle."

"Oh," she was disappointed, but at the same time glad. "You should get better soon," she said.

"I will. And thank you for your concern. I hope your research goes well."

"Oh, too late for that," she replied. "Bad news all around."

"A pity. If you'll excuse me?"

"Of course. May the Force be with you."

"And with you, Miss Ors."

Halls of Healing

"Master! I was looking for you!" Anakin spoke as Obi-wan entered the room he was supposed to be recuperating in. "I lost you after the service."

Glad for the honest worry, Obi-wan clasped his friend and apprentice on the shoulder. "I am well, Anakin. I just had to grab another Master to send to the Council, then delivered a message to his pilot to let her know he would be delayed." He sat down on the bed as the young Knight hovered over him, worried and protective. "It was a soothing walk, which is one of the things that I am supposed to be doing to help heal. What about yourself?"

"I am well, Master." Anakin was relieved, though not by much.

"Actually, while I have you here, I need to ask you a question," Obi-wan shrugged off his outer robes and set them off to one side. "Do you remember a Master by the name of Kyle Katarn?"

"No, Master."

"The name not familiar at all?"

Skywalker thought. "No, not really. Why?"

"Oh, just curious."

Office of Mon Mothma

Once she failed to open the locked case the Jedi had delivered to her, Mon Mothma summoned her security forces to examine it for any traps, or tricks. While they did that, she called down to the office of Bail Organna, her fierce friend on the Senate.

"Hello!" The Alderaan senator said through his holo. "What can I do for you twice in one day?"

"Hello Bail. Nothing much." Mon said. "That Jedi I sent your way?" She left the specifics of her question unsaid.

"Ah yes, Katarn, I think his name was? He picked up some flowers to take with him to the Temple. I think it was for one of the deceased Jedi, so I have him some from my quarters." Bail wasn't a fool, but he still waited for Senator Mothma to make her concerns known.

"I couldn't open the case he delivered," she said quietly, even though she knew there were no listening devices in this room. "My people are looking at it as we speak."

"It could be on a timer," Bail offered.

"Could be, but there was a code lock on it. And the Jedi himself was quite unusual."

"I take it then you haven't met any of the AgriCorps Jedi."

"No, I haven't." She knew of them of course, but didn't make the connection. "Oh, he even called himself a 'Bantha Herder' though he said it in jest."

"You're still young," Organna pointed out, though not in an insulting manner. "Essentially they are Jedi who don't go on to become Knights or Masters as we know them. They tend to focus on healing arts, disaster relief and yes, even agriculture. One of their worlds is a major contributor to Coruscant's imports."

Mon Mothma took in this information, recognizing what now made even more sense about the man. "Do you have any idea why someone would use an AgriCorps Jedi to deliver a package to me?"

"Many reasons," Bail replied. "Some good, some bad, some completely irrelevant. You will probably get your answer once you see what's in the case."

"Intruige," Mon complained with a deep huff. "Why can't politics be about being nice?"

"War is the extension of diplomacy into violence," Bail quoted someone who was quoting someone else. "I have a meeting I need to get too with the Chancellor about re-organizing our military forces and incorporating the Jedi. If you need any advice with your problem, let me know."

"I will Bail. And thanks." She shut off the holocom, her curiosity peaked. The timing, along with the declaration of war, was too much to ignore.

Jedi Archives

"Hey Jan." Kyle said as he walked up to his pilot. The friendly master of the archives had directed him to where Jan was studying. "How's it going?"

"Kyle!" She jumped up, not quite knocking a couple books off the terminal. "You're alive! The Council is alive!"

"Hey, hey," he chuckled. "I'm not that bad, you know."

"You had me worried!" She lowered her voice in response to a glare from one of the Jedi working in the Archives. "You met General Obi-Wan Kenobi?"

"Oh, good, he delivered the message," Kyle was relieved that his trust was not misplaced. "And yes, I met with the Council."

"I hope it went well...." Jan expressed her worry with nervousness.

"It did, and it didn't. Look, you learned anything?"

"You first!"

"Nuh-uh." Kyle objected. "What I got to talk about is best done on the Crow, where we can get some privacy."

"Kyle." Jan stepped back and looked at him.

"Yee-~sss?"

"What. Are. You. Wearing?"

"Oh? This?" Kyle tugged at the robes he wore. "Formal Robes for Jedi Masters here in the Temple."

"It's ugly. Where's your real stuff?"

"Oh good. I'm not the only one to think this is hideous. And uncomfortable. And it should have been delivered back to the Crow."

"That's good," Jan said. Kyle was certainly a sight in the Jedi robes. They fit him physically, but certainly not what she thought of when she thought of him. "So, um, I got good news and bad news."

Kyle pulled up a chair. "No sense in waiting. What's the bad news?"

"Time Travel is impossible." Jan announced.

"No it's not. We're proof of that."

"Right, but rather there are recorded instances of ships getting caught in Hyperspace and emerging later than what their chronos matched up with."

"Alright," Kyle paid attention as he let Jan distill the information she had for him.

"More abstract scientific papers concerning the possibility of time travel indicate that travelling forward in time is allowable, as all you're doing is changing the rate at which time applies to you without reversing it's direction."

"But you just said that it's impossible."

"Yes, no one can say for certain how to do it, so it's technically impossible to do."

"And the good news?"

"Well, the same papers indicate that travelling backwards would break causality," Jan said, feeling a heaviness in her chest. "Anything that did so, by whatever mechanism, should not be able to go back into it's own past. Here, the theories get a little confusing. First is that if you could, then you would be stuck in a repeating loop where no action you take can prevent you from going back in time in the first place." She came up with an example. "If this were true, then even if you prevented Luke's birth somehow, then we would still wind up in the situation where you and I and the Raven's Claw would travel back in time."

"Sounds like a headache."

"It is." Jan agreed. "The other major school of thought is that attempting to go backwards is even more impossible, and any attempt to do so would result in the travellers going, well, sideways instead."

"How do you go sideways in time?"

"Alternate universe."

Kyle thought about that. "What do you think has happened to us?"

"If it's the former, nothing we do matters to the future you and I meeting and coming through time. Not to say we can't change things. It's just that event will happen, no matter what."

"So we could say... kill Darth Vader?" Kyle made sure no one was around before dropping that name. "And prevent a lot of death and destruction during and after the Clone Wars because of that, but the you and I who... aren't you and I," he started to have some trouble with the tenses of time travel, "will still be friends, I will still be a Jedi, and we'll still have the Raven's Claw?"

"Yes," Jan agreed with his analysis. "Or you could do that, and completely change everything and everyone, and the you and I who aren't you and I," Jan ran into the same trouble, "will live their lives without having that one destiny hanging over their heads."

Kyle and Jan thought in mutual silence. "It seems to me, then," Kyle said carefully. "That we can act without concern for our future selves. We would still have to live with our actions, but no matter what, we are still free to act as we see fit, and we won't know for certain until that day over thirty years in the future."

Jan nodded. "Sounds like you already have something on your mind."

Kyle grinned a predatory smile. "Come on, back to the Claw. Have I got a tale for you. Then we need to make some plans."