Subject: [OTL]: (alt. Betsy/Star Wars) Fanged Butterfly 2: Knightcross 31/? (R; themes) From: Phil Hartman Date: Sun, 6 Apr 2008 21:10:41 +0000 will1@earthling.net Fanged Butterfly Vol. 2: Knightcross Chapter 31 by Phil Hartman DISCLAIMER: Marvel's are Marvel's. LFL's are LFL's. Any original characters are mine. The rest belong to their owners/creators. No money is being made off of this. Please don't sue. WARNING: Mature themes. Also, AU history of the X-Men. ------------------------------------------------- 40 ABY: Jade Shadow, Landing Pad of Bast Castle, Vjun, Outer Rim Territories, Galactic East: 21 Days after the Battle of Corellia: ------------------------------------------------- Ben was grateful for a chance to have something approaching a normal dinner with his real parents aboard a familiar ship. That he'd been so comfortable eating Vong food with his manipulative cousin and gene-altered relatives in a darkside fortress ... it scared Ben, a LOT, now that his genetics were his again. He slipped into the Shadow's refresher and peeled off the Phoenix bodyglove - he didn't DISLIKE the garment, but he was looking forward to looser fitting, less revealing clothes; stang, clothes PERIOD, for everyday wear - then started to shower after dealing with another matter ... #The vorazh membrane dealt with cleaning ... I didn't have to excrete, either. Back to being just human,# Ben thought, laughing a little at how ... ordinary it all felt, again. How much better it felt, to be human. Then how he'd taken the Shaping for granted hit him - how ... right IT had felt ... Ben shuddered; he'd been so ... LOST ... in what he'd been - He washed his still buzzed red hair quickly, then got out and dried off, before examining his body in the full length mirror; it was its previous, healthy pink, no scars, claws, talons, or sheaths. And Ben sobbed incoherently - he didn't quite understand why he was bawling, but he knew there was something ... #I CHOSE that. I walked into the Shaping chamber ... I betrayed Mom and Dad ... I ...# Ben thought, wracking sobs punching him in the gut as he leaned on the sink. A gentle knock on the door, followed by a worried knock at his mental shields through the Force, stirred Ben, and he reached out - Dad. /Ben, do you need ...?/ Dad asked, and Ben was grateful for his Dad giving him enough space, yet still wanting to help. /I hurt you. I turned on you ... I gave myself to Jacen to help Aunt Cilghal, then I WANTED to forget you guys ... Dad, I'm so sorry .../ Ben grieved, dressing in shorts and simple Jedi robes before he opened the door. Dad hugged him and insisted, "You did NOT betray us." "But - !?" Ben cried, walking with Dad to the card table set up between the acceleration couches in the Shadow's passenger compartment. Mom was there, with three MREs ... four ... and Aunt Betsy. They all looked so understanding, so sympathetic, that Ben broke out sobbing again as he sat down, trying to understand WHY he was bawling so much. ~Because how much you were violated has finally hit you. The Shaping left you unable to even comprehend the depth of how Jacen betrayed you, how much you were forced to deny who and what you really are,~ Aunt Betsy sent, reaching across the table and squeezing Ben's hands gently. Ben nodded, at least able to stop sobbing, and smiled wanly when Artoo rolled over to him. The boy rubbed the droid's dome, grateful for everyone's understanding, and Artoo toodled a welcoming, kind noise. "You're all so ... thanks. I just ... I feel like I threw you all away, and I feel awful. I'm so sorry," Ben tried to apologize. "Ben, you were BRAINWASHED. We're never going to give up on you," Mom insisted, and Ben almost cried again until Mom added, "Eat and drink before you dehydrate yourself, OK? For me?" "Thanks," Ben said, and started to devour the awful MRE and the blue milk Mom poured ... which tasted so good, since it wasn't Vong food, that he ignored the emergency fare. "Your mother is right. Not only will we never give up on you, I know something of what you faced," Aunt Betsy said, and Ben looked at her, wiping his face with a napkin as he listened. She looked ... guilty, herself, as she added, "I should have told you this story on Endor. I don't fault you for going to Hapes, certainly; one should try to face their tormentors and attempt to move past them. "But maybe if you'd known about my own time as a naked, brainwashed slave, you might've been better equipped to face Jacen." ------------------------------------------------- The Skywalkers all went dead silent, and Artoo squealed in a shocked fashion - Betsy HAD rather tossed a thermal detonator into the conversation. But she knew almost exactly what Ben had gone through, and bloody hell, she was going to help her godson. No matter how embarrassing or painful the story ... no matter that it had been almost 25 years since the events in question, they were still relevant. Still HURT, on some level. "Aunt Betsy ... who ...?" Ben asked, and Betsy glanced at Luke and Mara for permission to continue. /Absolutely, if you're up for this ... it must be REALLY awful, if you didn't tell us this when you first arrived,/ Luke worried. /Awful and embarrassing, both. I usually loathe self-pity, but Ben's pain is for others, not himself, and he HAS been victimized. If I can help him .../ Betsy replied, and the elder Skywalkers nodded. Betsy looked at Ben gently and said, "I was about Jacen's age when ... an enemy of my twin brother, Brian, mutilated me. I was wearing a suit of armor that granted me enhanced abilities; strength, durability, flight, along with my telepathy. "It afforded me nothing, and my eyes were destroyed." Ben gasped, reaching across the table in empathy, and Betsy smiled back at him; she'd known Ben still had a good heart, but that he was so ready to offer comfort was an especially good sign. "I'm sorry ... what happened next?" Ben asked, and Mara, Luke and Artoo all waited as well. "Well, after the initial shock and horror wore off, I refused to let the bloody karkbrain win. My telepathy let me see through others' eyes, so I wasn't entirely lost. I took a vacation in a region of my planet known for snow sports ... and I was ambushed by a bloated slavemaster from another dimension," Betsy continued, trying not to sound bitter. "Not ... WARU!?" Luke gasped, and Betsy ALMOST laughed. "No, although they were both overbearing blobs with a disregard for others," Betsy observed. She turned back to Ben and continued, "My psionic defenses were strong, but nothing against my attacker; I was shattered, much like Kyp was by that Anzati Sith. "My attacker rebuilt my mind into an eagerly obedient reflection of his ... and locked my body into a cybernetic frame similar to his, naked and hideously grinning, with artificial eyes," Betsy recalled, closing her eyes - her REAL ones - briefly against the memories. She reopened them, and Ben looked knowingly at her, breathing, "You were ... shaped ... almost like me ..." "I clung to my slavery, enjoying what I was, and I LET my slavemaster use me. That's why I respect you for fighting back much earlier than I did. You had help, like myself, but where I eagerly betrayed innocents, you fought to give Lekauf a choice, and stood by Tace and Allana," Betsy said. She was still haunted by how she'd betrayed Rahne, Roberto and those other children to Mojo all those years ago. Had it not been for the first class of New Mutants ... especially Doug Ramsey and Warlock ... "I had help freeing myself, thanks to friends and family coming to my aid. But the pain, the horror at what I did, lingers. What we have to remember is that our choice was taken from us when we were twisted. What we do AFTER that defines us," Betsy said, catching Mara's nod. "But I walked into that lab on Coruscant ..." Ben said, thinking hard, as Betsy quirked an eyebrow. "To save Cilghal. To try and turn the tables on Caedus. You didn't WANT to be Shaped, didn't know what Jacen had planned. You acted to save others," Betsy insisted, and Ben swallowed hard. "But after that ... I let Jacen ... worse, I CHOSE to let Jacen pretend to be my dad," Ben breathed, looking at Luke and Mara with pleading apology. "And you came back. You fought your way back, even before the ... Phoenix. That takes courage, and you were trying to protect others along the way ... you're here now, Ben. We love you, and we'll never reject you," Luke promised. "I love you guys, too. Thanks," Ben said, smiling a little, and including Betsy in his look. "More than welcome. As I've said before, you are like a son to me ... the difference being, I promise never to try and replace Mara," Betsy said, smiling at her friends. "Another reason why I'm trusting you with my kid, Braddock," Mara half joked, before she raised an eyebrow and asked, a little concerned: "Now. HOW did my son manifest a Scout Walker sized firebird and turn himself back to human, and HOW does that connect to me being from your homeworld?" "We'd better finish eating first. THIS story could take all night," Betsy warned, digging into her MRE with reluctance. ------------------------------------------------- They gathered around a campfire set up by several of the Shaped Ones from dried vines; the Skywalkers, most of the Solos (Jacen was busy reversing several Shapings), the other Jedi, Chewie, Threepio, Artoo, and Myri. Ben felt like he was home, sitting with family and friends. Aunt Betsy stood, dressed once again in her usual purple Jedi robes as the stars of the Outer Rim rose overhead, and began to speak of the Phoenix ... and it was ... mythic, like the tales of Tython, or the ancient Sith Wars. "Some of what I have to share didn't directly involve me. But I've telepathically melded with almost all of the people involved, and have touched the Phoenix Force without accessing it," Aunt Betsy began. Apparently, she said, the Phoenix was a ... cosmic avatar of life, able to access and channel HUGE amounts of Force energy ... both good and bad, she warned. Ben felt a lot better when Aunt Betsy smiled right at him and added, "When in control, the Phoenix Host determines how the power is used. The trouble started when the Phoenix gained sentience ... it is very willful." Aunt Betsy described how a teammate of hers, a Jean Grey, had sacrificed her life to save her fellow ... X-Men ... from a solar radiation storm when they were escaping an orbital station. To keep the shuttle from crashing, Jean had called out telepathically to the Phoenix, which gained the ability to think by duplicating Jean's mind. It took on a physical body, a replica of Jean's, and put the injured Jean in a healing cocoon. Everyone gasped when Aunt Betsy telepathically showed them what Jean looked like ... and Mom ... almost shivered, and Ben put a hand on her shoulder, which Mom thanked him for: Because Jean had Mom's red hair, green eyes, and a REALLY similar facial structure. "You can guess why I was so ... concerned when I first met Mara, that I was living in some odd kind of dreamworld blending what I thought were myths - YOUR lives - with my own," Aunt Betsy said, drawing a few nervous laughs from the crowd. She continued; the Phoenix joined the X-Men, helping fight evildoers, and fell in love with Jean's first love and ex-husband, Scott Summers. For almost three years, the Phoenix kept up the charade ... and then some poodoo head named Wyngarde tried to seduce the Phoenix, unlocking HER dark side ... "The Phoenix said Wyngarde when we were in the astral plane!" Ben blurted, blushing apologetically when Aunt Betsy mentioned the name. She just smiled kindly and said, "No need to apologize, Ben. It saw ... similarities between Wyngarde and Jacen. At least YOU didn't bloody go insane and threaten to eat a star." Kyp gagged violently, sounding horrified, and Betsy spared him a sympathetic look before she continued. "The REAL Jean, fortunately, broke free of the cocoon and confronted what was now Dark Phoenix in Central Park, the largest nature area in New York City in America, where the X-Men were based," Aunt Betsy continued. THAT had been a confrontation worthy of Tionne's songs; the real, mortal, Jean, against a creature of almost unimaginable might. The battle even moved to an area of Earth's moon, after some aliens called the Shi'ar teleported the X-Men and the Phoenix offworld out of fear the Phoenix meant the end of the Shi'ar. Ben marveled and trembled at the battle, and realized that since the Phoenix could transmute matter, THAT must've been how he ... unShaped himself with the Phoenix. At the last, with the X-Men almost defeated, Jean telepathically linked with the Phoenix. And confronted with the truth ... the firebird flew, its stolen physical form shattered. Jean won, wed Scott forever at last, and they began a happy family. Except that just like after Endor, like the leftover Imperials, the Phoenix refused to go away quietly. Jean and Scott were a couple years into their remarriage, with a little girl named Rachel, when a woman EERILY like a younger Jean met Scott, his brother Alex and their father Chris at the Summers family's airfield in a state called Alaska. "At the time, the X-Men feared that Madelyne was the Phoenix reincarnate, reborn from its ashes like our myths. They were both right and wrong; I didn't join the team until two years later, but I actually knew Madelyne before Jean," Betsy continued. Scott stayed true to Jean, who gave birth to a son, Nathan; Madelyne helped the X-Men defeat Wyngarde, who wanted revenge on the team for his defeat by the Phoenix. And Madelyne stayed with the team, despite lacking powers ... That was when the story got weird even for Aunt Betsy. "We were fighting a ... dark side manifestation, or maybe an actual demon, of chaos known as the Adversary. In order to seal the portal between his dimension and ours, nine life forces had to be bound in a spell. Madelyne and I were among the X-Men who sacrificed our lives to halt the spreading reality warp," Betsy continued, as her memories became ... nothing. The crowd gasped collectively as she blazed back into being, and Betsy smiled faintly, adding, "Roma, the ... Omniversal Guardian, one of my brother's employers, reversed the spell. We were believed dead, and hid in Australia, a southern continent, fighting bigotry and evil undercover. "It didn't take but a year for it all to go to shavit." Madelyne, it turned out, was ... emotionally unstable ... BOTH because she was a CLONE of Jean - Dad twitched like he was gonna hurl, and Ben leaned against Dad until the older Skywalker ruffled Ben's hair - and because Madelyne had a piece of the Phoenix in her Force signature, soul, whatever. Otherdimensional ... demons ... tempted Madelyne, triggering her huge latent psionic powers. She kidnapped Rachel and Nathan, planning to kill them to open a gate to some awful dimension. But Madelyne resisted, and the X-Men, and Scott and Jean's team of original X-Men, X-Factor, saved the kids. "I helped Jean and Madelyne keep the Phoenix from possessing either of them, and that was where it remembered me from," Aunt Betsy added, before continuing. Madelyne herself shut down her powers and surrendered to the authorities; the X-Men and X-Factor parted on good terms ... and that was where Aunt Betsy looked ... ashamed. "Inside of a month, the X-Men disbanded, temporarily. I ... the four of us who were left after some of the others drifted off, narrowly escaped an ambush by cyborg bigots. I ... mentally forced the three others through a portal, that gave us amnesia and allowed us to start new lives," Aunt Betsy said, hanging her head. She sighed, looking up, and said, "After my own restart, as a living weapon in a different body, I met Madelyne once more ... after she had given birth to Alex Summers' son, Scotty. She and Alex were members of a government strike team using the X-Factor name when I left Earth." Ben wanted to try and help Aunt Betsy feel better about her forcing her friends through that portal; but now wasn't the time, he guessed. She did telepathically thank him, and projected an image of herself in a yellow and black bodyglove, looking at Madelyne holding a blond baby in a medcenter bed. The image flickered, and Madelyne grew a little older, her son Scotty now a boy about 5 or 6 standard years, with a gap toothed grin, in plain pants and a shirt. But it was Madelyne's costume ... black skintight pants, with a similar black top, purple dragons running down the sides and a grin promising adventure, that made Dad TRY not to laugh, and Mom ... smirk, as the crowd looked at Mom with ... recognition. "WELL. No WONDER you thought you knew me when we first met," was all Mom said, before the laughter began. Aunt Betsy laughed as well, and shrugged. "If it's any consolation, you're far saner than Madelyne usually behaved," she offered, and Mom rolled her eyes as Dad choked. "Comment and die, Skywalker," Mom teased, and Ben tried not to laugh until Mom finally laughed a little. Dad STILL tried not to laugh, and Ben broke into giggles - it felt GOOD to laugh again, as Mom put an arm around him and joined in. "OK ... so Jean and Madelyne had pretty happy endings, or so you knew when you were teleported here. What about how it ties into Ben manifesting the Phoenix?" Mom asked. Aunt Betsy displayed another telepathic image, of an older human couple with graying hair, the woman with some kind of visual aids on her face ... but Mom GASPED, and Ben radiated comfort to her as Mom ... shivered? ------------------------------------------------- Betsy had been afraid of this; but she couldn't spill most of the Grey family's history and avoid sharing her and Vergere's theory ... and Mara's reaction to John and Elaine Grey pretty well confirmed what Betsy thought. "How do I ... I KNOW them, somehow ..." Mara whispered, letting Luke and Ben support her. "I believe you may well be a previously unrevealed sister of Jean and her older sister, Sara, kidnapped during a certain Grand Admiral's explorations of the deep Unknown Regions," Betsy offered, and Mara snarled in realization. "THRAWN!? KRIFFING *THRAWN*?! That ... OK. OK, I'm OK ... we all know Palpatine was a scumbag. And Thrawn ... was always a pragmatist," Mara replied, nodding despite a wave of bitterness that threatened to flow from her. Ben looked at his mother, who kissed his forehead and added, smiling sincerely now, "If I hadn't come here, you might never've been Ben Skywalker." And Mara smiled past Ben, to Luke, who looked both stunned and supportive, as she continued, "And I guess being stuck with a space farmboy isn't so bad." "What gets me is that you must've been Jean's twin, or almost, since 15 years have passed since I landed here, and she was 43 when I landed on Sernpidal," Betsy pondered. #Unless ... oh, bloody HELL, PLEASE tell me Mara's NOT the Phoenix reincarnated AGAIN ...# Betsy worried. But that wasn't possible, if Ben had channeled the Phoenix and it had had an intellect behind it. "Unless you were displaced through time AND space, Mistress Elizabeth. Wormhole physics are notoriously difficult to calculate," Threepio chimed in, NOT very comfortingly ... But Betsy forgave him, as much out of his accent as the fact that he WAS Threepio. He meant well, but the protocol droid never QUITE managed to be that comforting. Neal toodled and rolled over to Betsy, who smiled and thanked her astromech, and watched as Artoo trundled over to the Skywalkers. Ben hugged the droid from behind, and said, "But ... how did humans get into this part of the galaxy?" "Vergere and I discussed that," Betsy said, nodding as the Fosh entered the circle of beings gathered around the bonfire. Some of the Jedi were wary, but Luke accorded the avian a degree of respect that kept the rest of the crowd quiet. "Our working theory is that the Celestials transplanted a group of primitive humans to Coruscant. Elizabeth filled in some VERY interesting details about Celestial involvement in her world's history," Vergere said, as many among the crowd gasped again. "You KNOW about the Celestials!? More than even our xenoarchaeologists do?!" Corran Horn asked. "Only what other powered crimefighters of my world have learned; many of our various groups had information sharing agreements in place that developed as we grew to trust each other," Betsy said, sharing what little confirmed data she knew about the Celestials with the Jedi, Han and Chewie - it wasn't that Myri didn't need to know ... Well, it WAS Myri. Betsy winced inwardly at the idea of the crazy girl coming anywhere near the Celestials ... they might wipe out humanity just for Myri's fashion taste. She shook off the unkind thought and reminded herself that SHE once dyed her hair purple, until various genetic changes left it permanent, and that Ororo had white locks, Lorna green, and Henry blue. At that, Betsy added Myri into the explanation, and the girl smiled gratefully. And Betsy felt even more hypocritical, because with wild hair and an action junkie attitude ... Myri reminded Betsy of HERSELF. Minus Myri's Ewok fetish, of course. After the explanation sank in a bit, Raynar interjected, "If the Celestials did transplant humans from your world to Coruscant, it might explain why they forced the Nest to leave Alderaan in favor of human expansion. Although it seems a little bigoted." "I don't know exactly why the Celestials do what they do, Raynar. But ... with all due respect ... your claim that the Killiks built Centerpoint is a bit dubious, unless the CELESTIALS built the station and the Killiks tried to interfere," Betsy suggested, not unkindly. The former Prime of the Killik Nest frowned, and Betsy wasn't looking forward to their next conversation ... but she knew Raynar well enough to know he'd come far from the snarlingly rabid defense of his insectoid saviors he had labored under years ago. And he DID have a point ... "The Celestials can be ... fickle in their judgments of their experiments. Earth was visited four times by the Celestials; the first time, about a million years before I was flung to Sernpidal, is when the x-factor gene was implanted in my ancestors' DNA. It seems likely that that was when a group of primitive humans were transported to Coruscant," Betsy said. "And worlds whose inhabitants don't meet the Celestials' judgments?" Leia asked, gently ... looking around Vjun, in a protective and worried way that set wheels spinning in Betsy's mind ... Jacen's tampering WAS definitely a concern. "... many such worlds were wiped clean of their native lifeforms. Earth survived four such visits; and there was, when I left, at least one young man whose power rivaled that of the Celestials themselves. He was the one who ... brought me back from the brink of joining the Force, the second time I died," Betsy recalled, knowing she wasn't comforting Leia or the others. The idea that there might have been a FIFTH Host of the Celestials between Betsy's displacement and today worried her ... She focused on the others, then said, "What I find interesting is that the Celestials seem to have avoided recent manipulations this part of the galaxy. They seem to have focused on Earth ... without being egocentric, we DID make a lot of cosmic level noise, admittedly." "Yet we never heard of you until Sernpidal. That's not a suspicion, Betsy; you've saved at least half the people here, helped kill Shimmrra, taught K'urod, protected Ben. It just seems odd that your Earth never reached the Outer Rim, if there are a lot of humans with powers like yours," Anakin asked. "Unlike the sharing of advanced technologies here in the wider galaxy, Earth's technological achievements tended to stem from war, instead of civilized science. The nonhuman races we did encounter either tended to be extragalactic, or were probably in the Unknown Regions. Many of the X-Men's adventures were more outside the Milky Way - Earth's name for the galaxy - than inside it," Betsy replied, shrugging. She sighed, concluding, "And extrahuman powers are no measure of wisdom. Most of you remember how ... direct I was when I first touched the Force. Imagine that among hundreds of beings, not all of whom had the public well being at heart." "Force ... we might not be doing any favors if we contacted Earth," Han worried. Betsy laughed at that, and said, "TRUST me, Han, if you landed on Earth ... half the residents would think you mad; the other half would fawn all over you." Leia smiled bemusedly, as Betsy quickly added, "That is, if ANY of you landed, not just Han..." "It's all right, Betsy. You just described most people's reactions to Han," Leia teased, and the Corellian rolled his eyes. "And there is the question of the Chiss. What they know, why they so stubbornly refuse human exploration from THIS end of the galaxy into the deep Unknown Regions," Vergere said, and Betsy nodded, while Mara scowled and Luke pondered. "But if the Phoenix manifestation is reported to Csilla ..." Betsy suddenly worried for Ben, who gulped. If the Chiss WERE trying to prevent the spread of enhanced power humans throughout the galaxy, a Phoenix capable Jedi would shake them to the core. Maybe even to the Core. "He's suffered enough," Mara growled, and Ben smiled at her, while Jag coughed. "I can promise you this: The Fels have never taken action against humans with the kind of enhanced powers Master Braddock exhibits, nor have we ever found a world with such a population. Of course, the Ascendancy being what it is, and our own human status among the Chiss, we may well have never been considered trustworthy with such secrets," Jag said, as Betsy nodded respectfully at him. "I'm not accusing anyone of actually keeping the secret, Jag, certainly not your house. For all we know, Thrawn WAS the only one to find Earth. But the coincidences are too great ... and Jedi don't believe in them anyhow," Betsy said, as Luke nodded approvingly. "Once Ben's had a chance to rest, I think we need to set up a meeting with Formbi, and get some answers. WITHOUT putting Ben at risk. I don't think it's too much to ask that we keep the Phoenix a secret until after such a meeting," Luke asked, and everyone nodded. "Even from the Remnant? Or the Confederacy?" a voice asked from the shadows, and Han drew his blaster, while Corran looked wary and Kyp leapt to his feet, snarling. "DAALA?! HERE?!" Kyp spat, glaring as the dreaded Imperial ... with disturbingly cropped red hair, wrapped in a robe, her lover Liegius Vorn beside her with equally short hair ... walked from the shadows. "Freed from years as Jacen Solo's Shaped Hand, yes, Durron. And I must question the wisdom of NOT revealing such a potential weapon to the Remnant ... although the Confederacy should be kept in the dark. You need not fear Phenirr escaping to share what we have heard," Daala said, pulling a gagging Phenirr out of the bushes via a chain around his neck ... his own hair equally cropped. "You were all ... Shaped?! *Daala* was SHAPED?! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Jacen actually did something DESERVED?! BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!" Kyp cackled, and Betsy worried her rebuilding of his mind wasn't sticking ... "Were I still the Hand of Caedus, Durron, I could bite your neck and infect you with a virus to Shape you. I did so to Phenirr, and he drooled as a slave," Daala said coldly, shutting Kyp up while Phenirr blushed. She smiled that eerie smile of hers and added, "But in the interest of galactic peace, I see no reason to add to our problems in the current conflict. My silence is ... negotiable." "My son's safety is NOT," Mara warned, and the two redheaded women stared each other down. Betsy vaguely worried that DAALA might be a Grey, but if that had been true, Tarkin might have uncovered her and used her latent powers for Force knew what kind of chaos. Then again, Daala HAD protected the Maw superweapons for a decade ... her track record might not be that great after that point, but her survivability hinted at something extra ... Liegius whispered something to Daala, who finally sighed and nodded. "As usual, my better half has found a way to compromise. In exchange for someone helping us transport this traitor to Bastion, I swear by the Imperial Throne to never reveal young Skywalker's gifts or the other topics of discussion this evening," the former admiral offered. Luke and Mara shared a Look, and Betsy suggested, ~She has honor, if nothing else. And I have an idea ...~ The Skywalkers blinked at the flashed idea, but Luke replied, /It makes sense. And we DO need to approach him .../ Betsy turned her best "Don't kriff with the Jedi telepath" grin on Daala, as Ben took his place by Betsy's side. "Let me mindwipe Phenirr, then we'll talk," Betsy said, and Daala's returning eyebrows rose. "And I have SO missed Admiral Pellaeon ..." ------------------------------------------------- tbc ...