The Uncertain Path

6

Qui-Gon stared at the list. It was such an odd assortment of items. He could see no pattern there. He and Tahl were working on the assumption that these were petty thefts. That would be the easy answer. Somewhere there could be a student who seemed to be adjusting but who was hiding resentment or anger. He or she had lashed out.

But Qui-Gon had learned through long experience that the easy answer usually just led to a harder question.

The holographic files on the students were kept by Jedi Master Tun. Tun had a record of long years of service. He was several hundred years old, a wizened being of great learning. He had kept the records of the Temple for the past fifty years. Each year he was aided by two student helpers who volunteered for service. Tahl and Qui-Gon had interviewed both of them. They had answered steadily and clearly. Only Tun and other members of the Council had access to the private files. The students were never alone in the filing office without Tun.

It was typical of their investigation. Every lead had turned into a dead end.

An urgent knock came on his door. “Qui-Gon,” Tahl called softly. “I need you.”

He opened the door. “More bad news,” she said with an anxious frown. “The senior training rooms have been vandalized. All of the lightsabers have been stolen.”

Dismay made him slow to respond. Obi-Wan’s lightsaber had been in the senior training room. Qui-Gon had left it there. Part of him had hoped that someday Obi-Wan would reclaim it.

“This is no longer petty theft,” he said.

“Yoda has cordoned off the room until we see it,” Tahl explained. “Hurry, before TooJay catches up with me.”

They walked quickly to the lift tube and took it to the training floor.

Qui-Gon strode into the changing rooms. He stopped short, and Tahl bumped into him from behind.

“What is it?” she asked. “What do you see?”

Qui-Gon couldn’t answer for a moment. Sick at heart, he surveyed the room. Training tunics had been ripped to shreds, the pieces flung around the room. Lockers were flung open, their contents spilled onto the floor.

“I can feel it,” Tahl said. “Anger. Destruction.” She picked her way through the debris, reaching down to pick up a scrap of fabric. “What else?”

“A message,” Qui-Gon said. “Scrawled on the wall in red.” He read it to her.

“It’s mocking Yoda,” she said. “I know the students imitate him sometimes. Even I do. But we do it with great affection. Qui-Gon, there is hate here.”

“Yes.”

“We have to get to the bottom of this. And the students must know. We must go on alert.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “This cannot be secret any longer.”

The Temple went on high-security alert. It was a decision the Council was reluctant to make. It made prisoners out of the students. They needed passes to leave the Temple, passes to use the gardens and to swim in the lake. They needed to account for their time at every minute of the day. It was for everyone’s protection, but it violated the spirit of the Temple. The Temple’s philosophy was that discipline needed to come from within. Security checks contradicted that concept.

But Qui-Gon and Tahl had insisted on the measure, and Yoda had agreed.

The safety of the students was their primary concern.

An atmosphere of mistrust grew at the Temple. Students eyed each other with suspicion. As they were called into interviews with Qui-Gon and Tahl, they watched each other for guilty signs. Yet no one could believe that a student could be capable of such vandalism.

Bruck was one such student. “I know it can’t be any of the senior students,” he told Tahl and Qui-Gon quietly when they called on him. “We have been through training together. I can’t imagine any one of us wanting to damage the Temple.”

“It’s hard to see into another person’s heart,” Qui-Gon remarked.

“I was the last person to leave the training rooms last night,” Bruck said. “And of course you know that months ago I was disciplined for my anger. I’ve worked with Yoda, and I’ve made progress. But I guess I’m still a suspect.” Bruck met Qui-Gon’s gaze steadily.

“We suspect no one as yet,” Tahl assured him. “Did you see anything odd last night? Think carefully.”

Bruck closed his eyes for a long moment. “Nothing,” he said finally. “I powered down the lights, and I left. We never lock the training rooms. I took the turbolift to the dining hall. I was with my friends all evening until bed.”

Qui-Gon nodded. He had already confirmed Bruck’s story.

He and Tahl weren’t even certain what they were looking for. They were merely gathering information, trying to see if the students had seen anything out of the ordinary, even if it didn’t seem to be important at the time.

They dismissed Bruck, and Tahl turned to Qui-Gon with a sigh. “I think he’s right. I can’t imagine any of the senior students doing this. They are Jedi.”

Qui-Gon passed a weary hand over his forehead. “And no one has heard of a student who has recently been angry or upset. Just the usual things—a bad performance on an exercise, or a petty disagreement…” He drummed on the table, thinking. “Yet Bruck was angry once.”

“Yoda says he’s made great improvements,” Tahl said. “And Bruck acknowledged his problem used to be anger. He admitted it must look bad for him that he was the last one to use the room. I got no sense of darkness from him. A boy so honest couldn’t have done this.”

“Unless he was very, very clever,” Qui-Gon remarked.

“Do you suspect him?”

“No,” Qui-Gon said. “I suspect no one and everyone…”

“Master Tahl!” TooJay suddenly appeared in the doorway of the interview room. “I am here to lead you to the dining hall.”

Tahl gritted her teeth. “I’m busy.”

“It is dinnertime,” TooJay said in a musical tone.

“I can find it,” Tahl snapped.

“It is five levels down—”

“I know where it is!”

“There is a datapad three centimeters to your left—”

“I know! And in another second, it will be flying at your head!”

“I see you are busy. I will return.” TooJay beeped at them in a friendly way, and scooted off.

Tahl dropped her head in her hands. “Remind me to get a pair of vibro-cutters, will you, Qui-Gon? I really need to dismantle that droid.”

With a heavy sigh, she raised her head. “This investigation will try the nerves of everyone at the Temple. I feel a serious disturbance in the Force.”

“I do as well.”

“I fear it is not a student who is doing this. I think it’s an invader. Someone who hates us. Someone who wants to see us fractured and distracted…”

“Someone who could have a larger plan in mind, you mean? Is that what you’re afraid of?”

Tahl turned her worried emerald and gold eyes to him. “It is what I fear the most,” she said.

“As do I,” Qui-Gon softly replied.