Survivor's Quest

"They must be on a field trip," she said, crossing over to a larger desk in the corner and peering down at a datapad lying there. "Yes; they're down in the nursery today learning about the proper care and feeding of babies."

"Sounds like fun," Jinzler commented. "And the art of proper changing, too, no doubt. You said down? I thought we were on the lowest deck."

"The nursery's on Six, the next Dreadnaught down," Pressor's voice said. Jinzler turned, vaguely surprised to see the Guardian walking behind him. Preoccupied with his memories, he hadn't even noticed the other follow them inside. "There's less solar radiation down there, so that's where all the pregnant women and those with children under three are housed."

"And their families, too, of course," Rosemari added. "We'd all move down there except that it suffered so much more damage in the battle that there's less usable space for people to live in. And besides, Director Uliar doesn't want us living too close to—"

"Rosemari," Pressor cut her off sharply.

Rosemari flushed. "Sorry."

"Sorry for what?" Jinzler asked.

"So, did you really want to see the school?" Pressor asked. "Or was that just an excuse to get away from Uliar and his ranting?"

Jinzler hesitated, studying Pressor's face. The man's eyes were hard, his expression set in pale stone. It would not, he decided suddenly, be a good idea to lie to this man. "Mostly the latter," he conceded. "He seems so... angry."

"Wouldn't you be?" Pressor countered. "The universe turned upside down, with everything you'd pla

"I suppose," Jinzler said. "Are he and the other two the last of the original survivors?"

"No, there are ten left," Pressor said. "But the other seven are old and weak and keep pretty much to themselves."

"Most of the fifty-seven Survivors were either injured in the attack or suffered badly in the months after Outbound Flight arrived here," Rosemari said. "It affected both their health and their life spans, which is why there are only ten left."

"We're talking about the adults, of course," Pressor added. "There were also several children like me who were alive during the Devastation but were too young to know what exactly was going on. We certainly didn't have any plans for our lives yet." His eyes bored into Jinzler. "Though of course, plans or otherwise, our lives were pretty well destroyed, too."

"Tell it to Aristocra Formbi," Jinzler advised, holding his gaze evenly. "He's the one accepting guilt for all this, not me."

To his mild surprise, Pressor actually smiled. "You're right," he said without apology. "I'm sure Uliar will remember to bring that up."

"Did you really hate your sister?" Evlyn asked.

Jinzler looked down at the girl. She was gazing up at him, her eyes steady, her face expressionless. "Yes," he said. "Does that frighten you?"

"Why should it frighten me?" she asked.

"Maybe you're wondering if I hate all Jedi," Jinzler suggested. "Maybe you're wondering if I hate you."

"No," Pressor bit out before Evlyn could answer. "Whatever you're thinking, stop it right now. There's absolutely nothing special about her."

Jinzler frowned. An unexpectedly harsh reaction, far more vehement than the comment deserved. "I just meant—"

"No," Pressor said, his voice softer and under better control now but just as firm. "You're imagining things. Leave it alone."

Jinzler looked at Evlyn; and in his mind's eye he saw her calmly leading them into the turbolift trap. Unafraid of armed alien strangers, as if she somehow knew they wouldn't shoot her the minute her back was turned.

And then stepping casually through the doorway with exquisitely precise timing as the trap was triggered.

He looked at Rosemari. "Am I imagining things?" he asked.

Rosemari sent a hooded look at her brother. "Jorad worries about things," she said obliquely.

"There's nothing to worry about," Jinzler assured her. "If she has Jedi abilities—"

"I said to let it alone," Pressor warned harshly. "She's not going to have that kind of life. I won't let her. Neither will Rosemari. You hear me?"

Jinzler swallowed. The Guardian, he suddenly noticed, had his hand wrapped around the grip of his blaster, and the knuckles were white. "I hear you," he said quietly. "But you're making a mistake."

"You just keep your mouth shut," Pressor said. His voice was still tight, but his gun hand seemed to have relaxed a bit. "You hear me?"

Jinzler sighed to himself. "Yes. I won't mention it again."

"Why did you hate your sister?" Evlyn asked.

Jinzler looked at her again, feeling a tightness in his chest like a logjam starting to break up. For more than half a century he'd kept these thoughts and feelings locked away in the dark privacy of his own mind, never speaking of them to family or friends or confidants. The closest he'd ever come to even hinting at them before today had been his admission to Luke and Mara that he and Lorana hadn't parted on good terms.

Perhaps he'd kept all of it in too long.

"She was my older sister," he said. "Third of four children, if you care. I was the youngest. We lived on Coruscant, pretty much in the shadow of the Jedi Temple. My parents worked there, in fact, as maintenance engineers on the electrical equipment."

His gaze drifted away from his audience to one of the empty desks, where a spare datapad was lying. "My parents adored Jedi," he said, the words coming out with difficulty. "Adored them, honored them—practically worshiped them, in fact."

"Did the Jedi return the affection?" Pressor asked.

Jinzler snorted. "What makes you think the grand exalted guardians of the Republic even noticed a couple of lowly workers scurrying around beneath their feet?" He shook his head. "Of course not. They had better things to do with their time.

"But that didn't matter to my parents. They still loved the Jedi, and they thought the greatest thing in the universe would be if they could have a Jedi child of their own. As soon as each of their children was old enough, they hustled us over there and had them run us through the tests."

"Was your sister the only one who made it?" Rosemari asked.

Jinzler nodded. "Right at ten months," he said, his throat aching. "It was the happiest day of my parents' life."

"How old were you when that happened?" Evlyn asked.

"I wasn't even born yet," Jinzler said. "Parents weren't allowed to even see their children once they'd been taken into the Temple, and my parents lost their jobs. Still, they would hang around outside and finagle a glimpse of her every once in a while as she passed by. I was four when I first saw her."

"The same age I was when I first met her," Pressor murmured.

Jinzler blinked. "You remember her?"

"Of course," Pressor said, sounding surprised that he would even have to ask. "Jedi Lorana, we called her. What, I look too young to you?"

"No, of course not," Jinzler said. "It's just that so much has happened since then that it seems like... you know. So what did you think of her?"

Pressor shrugged, too casually. "She seemed nice enough," he said, his voice guarded. "At least, for a Jedi. I didn't know any of them very well, of course."

"Yes, I suppose she could have become a nice person by then," Jinzler said, and immediately regretted it. "No, that's not fair," he amended. "She was probably just as nice when she was six. I just... I suppose I wasn't in a position to notice."

"Let me guess," Pressor said. "You'd already failed your own test."

"Very good," Jinzler said sourly. "My parents never said anything about it, but I knew without asking that they were disappointed. Anyway, when I was four they brought me to the Temple. The Jedi were coming out for some kind of public holiday. We waited and waited."