'But none that he will remember longer.' C'baoth locked eyes with Luke. 'Remember that, Jedi Skywalker; remember it well. For if you allow your justice to be forgotten, you will be forced to repeat the same lessons again and again.'
He held Luke's gaze a pair of heartbeats longer before turning back to the door. 'We're finished here. Come.'
The stars were blazing overhead as Luke eased open the low gate of the High Castle and stepped out of the courtyard. Artoo had clearly noticed his approach; as he closed the gate behind him the droid turned on the X- wing's landing lights, illuminating his path. 'Hi, Artoo,' Luke said, walking to the short ladder and wearily pulling himself up into the cockpit.
'I just came out to see how you and the ship were doing.' Artoo beeped his assurance that everything was fine. 'Good,' Luke said, flicking on the scopes and keying for a status check anyway. 'Any luck with the sensor scan I asked for?'
The reply this time was less optimistic. 'That bad, huh?' Luke nodded heavily as the translation of Artoo's answer scrolled across the X-wing's computer scope. 'Well, that's what happens when you get up into mountains.' Artoo grunted, a distinctly unenthusiastic sound, then warbled a question. 'I don't know,' Luke told him. 'A few more days at least. Maybe longer, if he needs me to stay.' He sighed. 'I don't know, Artoo. I mean, it's just never what I expect. I went to Dagobah expecting to find a great warrior, and I found Master Yoda. I came here expecting to find someone like Master Yoda...and instead I got Master C'baoth.'
Artoo gave a slightly disparaging gurgle, and Luke had to smile at the translation. 'Yes, well, don't forget that Master Yoda gave you a hard time that first evening, too,' he reminded the droid, wincing a little himself at the memory. Yoda had also given Luke a hard time at that encounter. It had been a test of Luke's patience and of his treatment of strangers. And Luke had flunked it. Rather miserably.
Artoo warbled a point of distinction. 'No, you're right,' Luke had to concede. 'Even while he was still testing us Yoda never had the kind of hard edge that C'baoth does.'
He leaned back against his headrest, staring past the open canopy at the mountaintops and the distant stars beyond them. He was weary-wearier than he'd been, probably, since the height of that last climactic battle against the Emperor. It had been all he could do to come out here to check on Artoo.
'I don't know, Artoo. He hurt someone today. Hurt him a lot. And he pushed his way into an argument without being invited, and then forced an arbitrary judgment on the people involved, and-' He waved a hand helplessly. 'I just can't see Ben or Master Yoda acting that way. But he's a Jedi, just like they were. So which example am I supposed to follow?'
The droid seemed to digest that. Then, almost reluctantly, he trilled again. 'That's the obvious question,' Luke agreed. 'But why would a Dark Jedi of C'baoth's power bother playing games like this? Why not just kill me and be done with it?'
Artoo gave an electronic grunt, a list of possible reasons scrolling across the screen. A rather lengthy list- clearly, the droid had put a lot of time and thought into the question. 'I appreciate your concern, Artoo,' Luke soothed him. 'But I really don't think he's a Dark Jedi. He's erratic and moody, but he doesn't have the same sort of evil aura about him that I could sense in Vader and the Emperor.' He hesitated. This wasn't going to be easy to say. 'I think it's more likely that Master C'baoth is insane.' It was possibly the first time Luke had ever seen Artoo actually startled speechless. For a minute the only sound was the whispering of the mountain winds playing through the spindly trees surrounding the High Castle. Luke stared at the stars and waited for Artoo to find his voice. Eventually, the droid did. 'No, I don't know for sure how something like that could happen,' Luke admitted as the question appeared on his screen.
'But I've got an idea.'
He reached up to lace his fingers behind his neck, the movement easing the pressure in his chest. The dull fatigue in his mind seemed to be matched by an equally dull ache in his muscles, the kind he sometimes got if he went through an overly strenuous workout. Dimly, he wondered if there was something in the air that the X-wing's biosensors hadn't picked up on. 'You never knew, but right after Ben was cut down-back on the first Death Star-I found out that I could sometimes hear his voice in the back of my mind. By the time the Alliance was driven off Hath, I could see him, too.' Artoo twittered. 'Yes, that's who I sometimes talked to on Dagobah,' Luke confirmed. 'And then right after the Battle of Endor, I was able to see not only Ben but Yoda and my father, too. Though the other two never spoke, and I never saw them again. My guess is that there's some way for a dying Jedi to-oh, I don't know; to somehow anchor himself to another Jedi who's close by.'
Artoo seemed to consider that, pointed out a possible flaw in the reasoning. 'I didn't say it was the tightest theory in the galaxy,' Luke growled at him, a glimmer of annoyance peeking through his fatigue. 'Maybe I'm way off the mark. But if I'm not, it's possible that the five other Jedi Masters from the Outbound Flight project wound up anchored to Master C'baoth.' Artoo whistled thoughtfully. 'Right,' Luke agreed ruefully. 'It didn't bother me any to have Ben around-in fact, I wish he had talked to me more often. But Master C'baoth was a lot more powerful than I was. Maybe it was different with him.'
Artoo made a little moan, and another, rather worried suggestion appeared on the screen. 'I can't just leave him, Artoo,' Luke shook his head tiredly. 'Not with him like this. Not when there's a chance I can help him.' He grimaced, hearing in the words a painful echo of the past. Darth Vader, too, had needed help, and Luke had similarly taken on the job of saving him from the dark side. And had nearly gotten himself killed in the process. What am I doing? he wondered silently. I'm not a healer. Why do I keep trying to be one?
Luke?
With an effort, Luke dragged his thoughts back to the present. 'I've got to go,' he said, levering himself out of
