~@~ Trial By Fire

   The hard knot that had settled in Lara's stomach lurched a bit as Skywalker pulled back on the hyperspace lever to drop them smoothly back into normal space, into Coruscant space. She sat riveted by the sight, unable to take her eyes away from the living grid and the planet that it encompassed.  From space, all that could be seen of Coruscant was a sea of traffic as more moving ships than the eye could see all coalesced toward the massive city-planet below. 

   Coruscant was a truly impressive site. But as Luke looked over to his passenger, he knew that it was not the planet itself which was holding Lara's attention so raptly.  Her face was rigid, stone, and a sickly shade of pale gray.  The combination made it painfully obvious to Luke that she didn't want to be here. 

   "You all right?" he asked cautiously.  

   Lara swallowed hard, making an effort to regroup herself from intense emotions.  Part of her remembered distinctly the first time she had ever seen this sight, and yet it was unreal to her now. She had not expected arriving here to be at all pleasant, but the reality was proving even more discomforting than she had expected. This place was the embodiment of so much that should never have been – for her, for the entire galaxy.  Now she was returning to this place that had consumed so much, to be judged for it....

   She shook the foreboding sensation away and nodded a reassurance to Skywalker, just as the comm pinged for his attention.

   Luke watched her for a moment longer, wishing he was sure, before he turned to answer the comm.  A few minutes later he had transmitted the necessary clearance codes for landing, along with a short message to the Senate Inner Council. He glanced to Lara again as he punched out the communications and took up manual controls to guide the ship into its approach.

   Her color was better this time, and he noted that the set had returned to her jaw. Her eyes were still squarely focused ahead on the city that was now beginning to take shape beneath them, as though she was trying to reconcile the past with her present circumstances.

   "You'll be meeting with the Senate right away, then," Lara stated her assumption quietly, keeping her eyes ahead.

   "I'm sure they'll want my report as soon as possible," Luke answered, his voice remaining neutral.

   She looked to him after another moment and nodded an acknowledgment. "I appreciate what you're doing for me," she offered evenly.

   Luke shook his head. "I owe you much more."

   "No," she corrected him easily.  "You don't owe me anything." 

   He began to object. 

   "I made my decisions for myself, what I felt I had to do, and what I thought was able to live with," she tried to explain herself over his objection. "I'm glad that I was able to help you, and I understand that you want to return that... but unfortunately there's a lot that remains to be answered for," she added slowly. "What good I've done doesn't change that.  It can't fix it."

   Lara paused, letting a tight smile sneak through.  The sight made Luke wonder what emotion that brief smile was meant to express, or to cover.

   "I don't believe that," Luke answered her statement with one of his own. "It's all of your actions that make you who you are," he argued gently. "You can't divide them into good and bad, and keep score."

   "You know what I mean," she said quietly.

   He nodded reluctantly. She didn't want him to feel responsible for her because she had saved his life. 

   "I meant what I said when we left Marnia," Luke insisted determinedly. "I will stand with you," he offered again.

   She shook her head at him just slightly. "Impasse," she admitted.

   "Impasse," he agreed lightly.

~

   If Lara still had doubts about her reception, she had decided to keep them to herself. She looked to Luke only to help her with the proper protocols for dealing with the Palace guards and other routine security measures as they made their way into the heart of Coruscant. 

   Luke had to admit that he was grateful for that. He was concerned, however, that she would prefer to meet this alone, even though he could be her only character witness, and even though she did not expect it to go well.  Maybe the reason she preferred to go it alone was because she did not expect it to go well, he amended the thought.

~

   Within the hour Lara had been escorted to the Palace's guest quarters, and Luke had been called before the Senate Inner Council. As soon as he entered the room he could tell that the tension in the air was greater than usual.  He could see the stress in the faces of the Senate officials, and through his sister's relief as she came forward to greet him.

   "I'm glad you're back," Leia said with a tight smile, hugging him as tightly.  "And I hope you bring good news," she added grimly, "because we seem to be having a shortage lately."

   "The Empire?"  Luke asked the question reflexively as they started walking toward the circle of seats that would be occupied by members of the Inner Council.  Sometimes it was still strange to remember that the enemy they had fought against relentlessly for the better part of a decade no longer existed, at least not as the power that it had once been.

   "What to do with the left overs," Leia concurred.  Then she gave his shoulder a squeeze and took her own seat.  Leia smiled at him again before Luke continued across the room, where he would take the speaker's chair beside Mon Mothma.

   Luke gave his summary account for the Council, telling them how he'd backtracked the information they'd given him through the Myrtle system until he'd come across a lead in an intercepted transmission that had taken him to Myrtle proper. He told them about the run in that he'd had there with a group of mercenaries as he was trying to get a meeting with a local leader, and how that perilous encounter had caused him to hastily leave system, escaping with the help of another local.

   "The good news," he concluded firmly, "is that now we have a name and a location to work from."

   "But you didn't actually meet with this, Laus," Ackbar observed. "Can you be absolutely certain of his identity?"

   "Yes," Luke answered solidly.  "I believe so.  My source knew his reputation as a local power, and that the men who attacked me worked for him."

   "Source?" Ackbar questioned carefully.

   "The local I spoke of, who helped me to escape."

   "We cannot rely on second hand accounts to–" Fey'lya started in objection.

   "You don't have to," Luke stated.  "You can ask her yourself."

   "This source, she is on world now?" Mon Mothma asked.

   "Yes." Luke took a deep breath, his eyes carefully scanning the faces around the table before he spoke again. Now was the time to tell them. "My source – well, I should tell you that at one time this person was an Imperial agent, and one of high ranking," he added.

   The room seemed to explode into an immediate uproar.

   Luke had expected surprise, even suspicion, but nothing like this. Stunned by the knee-jerk reaction, he looked to Leia for a second opinion.  She could only lift her eyebrows in sympathy against the sea of turmoil that he'd unexpectedly stepped into.

   "If you are certain–" Mon Mothma's voice cut through the chaos.

   "Certain of what?" Fey'lya objected adamantly. "He admits to bringing an Imperial agent into our midst. This could all be an elaborate guise to get a spy or saboteur on world."

   "My brother's own judgement says that she is neither of those things."

   "I agree with Councillor Organna Solo."  Mon Mothma quieted the room again. 

   "Jedi Skywalker's source will be questioned," she conceded to Fey'lya. "Until then we will trust his judgement."

   The silence only lasted for a moment before Fey'lya spoke again. "Then I must ask that this person be placed under house arrest until we can be certain that there is no threat in her presence here."

   Another roar emerged, but it was mostly in favor this time.

   "That's not necessary," Luke stated. "I'll take responsibility–"  

   "I am sorry, Jedi Skywalker, but I'm afraid we cannot take that risk," Ackbar stated emphatically. Then he added in a more resigned tone, "I must agree with Councillor Fey'lya in this instance. Strong security measures must be taken until we are certain of with whom we are dealing."

   Luke looked between Leia and Mon Mothma as Mon Mothma brought the matter to a vote. 

   Only she and Leia stood with him.

   Almost immediately, the previous turmoil resumed.  This time it was over the accountability of the information given on Laus. In the wake of things, it seemed that none of the Inner Council members wanted to be known as the Senator who would believe Luke's "Imperial informant" without the benefit of a through questioning.

   Luke was used to dealing with doubt and suspicion; he had his moments when he actually thought that he was used to it. Perhaps no one understood better than Luke Skywalker the dangers of the Emperor's New Order, or the kind of fear that the Emperor and Darth Vader had once inspired (and willingly welded, in order to subdue an entire galaxy).  Luke had to remind himself that the past was not so far behind them all when he saw the effects that a generation of fear and terror could still have on those who had survived it. Still, Luke had come to think of the New Republic as a place where those wrongs would be righted and those wounds would be healed... if only they could find the strength and courage to move forward.

   Luke suppressed a heavy sigh.  They all still carried the scars of a past that haunted them, even the leaders who would be called upon to shape the future.  That thought was foremost in Luke's mind when he cast a lost look over toward his sister, only to find that her disillusionment matched his own.

~

   A short while later Luke waited while Leia gathered her things. 

   "Not quite what you had in mind," he tried.

   "You sure made things hard with this one," she answered him warily.

   Luke grimaced. "It's not what I had in mind either," he offered a despondent apology.

   She smiled up at him sympathetically.  "Come on, we'll talk."

   Neither noticed before they turned to leave that a small gathering of security officials was quietly meeting across the room with Admiral Ackbar.

~

   Lara walked out the spacious quarters once more before lying down again. Too restless to relax, she stretched an arm behind her head and looked up at the ceiling. Her mind echoed with the same question over and over again. Why?

   She still had no real answer. 

   What she had told Skywalker at the beginning of their journey here had been true.  She did understand the need to atone for things past, to answer for what had been done. But as Coruscant had grown closer, her feelings of disdain for the past she had chosen had also grown stronger. It was almost overwhelming now, to realize how much she had left forgotten in the wake of the past two years.

   There was a sharp line between the person she had allowed herself to become then, and why.

   Here and now, Lara found it impossibly hard to reconcile the two sides.  She looked around herself though strong memories, but through different eyes.  The passing of time and regimes had brought relatively little change to Coruscant. As much of Palpatine's influence as possible had been removed, and the general volume of the place was less than it had once been, but most of the sights and sounds were still familiar.  She was different, and it was eerie for Lara to realize that what had once become familiar to her now belonged to another person, one she no longer recognized.

   She had once been proud to have survived this place. Now she wondered if she truly had.

   She had come here headstrong and idealistic, knowing nothing of subterfuge, and manipulation, and destruction. The things that would become her survival....  Lara took a deep breath to try to clear her head, and consciously she pushed the difficult memories away, wishing that she could do the same for the guilt.

   Survival wasn't all it once was.

   Lara Dare shook the nagging feelings away as she stood and walked to door, ready to meet her coming fate.

~

   "I'm sorry, Luke," Leia apologized, moved by her usually hopeful brother's solemn dismay.  "It's just bad timing," she added as they entered the Grand Corridor and began walking toward her office. "The Senate is already painfully divided over the Pellaeon Agreements.  It's NOT a good time to have Imperial connections on Coruscant."

   "But that's exactly my point, Leia," he argued passionately. "She has no connections to the Empire. She was conscripted. She left after Endor.  End of story."  Luke hesitated, almost wishing that it was as simple as that, as he tried to restrain the growing sense of helplessness that he was feeling. "And she saved my life," he finished quietly.

   Leia grimaced in sympathy. "The investigation is just a precaution," she assured him. "Surely, she knew this."

   Something in his face made Leia remember the earlier feeling she'd had, that her brother was holding something important back.  "If she has nothing to hide, it will be short," she added simply.

   Leia closed the door to her office behind them, and waited for him to tell her.

   Luke shook his head and sighed.  "I'm afraid it won't be," he said knowingly.

   "Why not?" she asked, suddenly dreading his answer.

   He sighed again as he sat, and his gaze rested uneasily on her.  "I was hoping to break this to the Council gradually, but obviously they have no intention of taking this easily." 

   Leia sat too, her mood growing even more serious.  "What are they gonna find on her, Luke?"

   "She was a second to Vader."

   His sister's shock quickly turned to disbelief, and both were aimed at him.

   "I know how it sounds, Leia–"

   "She served Vader," Leia spat in disbelief, laced with disgust.

   Luke closed his eyes, feeling the sting of her words.

   "Not by choice," he said softly. Then he spoke more urgently. "Leia, do you remember Aci, the person I told you about? The one Vader sent– 

   “This is her, Lara."

   "Luke."  Leia spoke softly now, and also urgently. "Don't you realize how dangerous this is?"

   "For whom?" he asked gently.

   Leia only looked at him in amazement.

   An aid knocked on the door, to report to Leia that the woman under investigation was now being transported to the high security wing. After a few uncomfortably silent moments, the man excused himself.

   The door had hardly closed behind him when Luke stood and turned away, his gaze downcast. 

   Leia also rose from her seat.  "Luke–" she objected, prompting him to turn back to her. 

   "I have a responsibility to her, Leia," he tried to explain. The words didn't seem to work. "I'm sorry," he said regretfully. Then he turned to leave.

   Leia dropped her gaze to the floor as she listened to the door slide closed behind Luke, and she worked at bringing her emotions under control. She could have accepted that Luke had returned here with a former Imperial agent.  Leia had been fighting for tolerance within the Senate when it came to dealing with the remnants, and she had learned time and time again since Endor that many beings had fought the Empire from within – conscripts and defectors whose secret struggles had been every bit as dangerous and as courageous as any Rebel offensive. 

   Leia believed that those who acted in good faith against the Empire, even from within, deserved the gratitude and the sympathy of the New Republic.  The problem was that she was no longer certain which camp this Lara fell into.  Far beyond just stumbling across an Imperial conscript and bringing her here, now it seemed that Luke had formed an allegiance to this woman who had once taken her orders from Darth Vader, and that idea was troubling to Leia for many reasons. Any person who had served that close to the Dark Lord and lived to tell about it must have been cunning, or ruthless, or both.... It was well know that Vader had no tolerance for anyone who failed him. Sometimes Leia wondered if Luke tended to forget that....  Her brother had forgiven Darth Vader a long time ago, but Luke's feelings for their father were still complex, and largely unresolved. The young Jedi was still hungry to solve the mystery that was Anakin Skywalker. Luke had told Leia that he needed to seek the truth about the Jedi and the Force if he was to start their religion anew.  But maybe underneath, there was still a boy longing to know more about his father.

   It all made Leia wonder if Luke truly did understand what he was doing.  Luke had told the Senate Inner Council today that his source had held a high rank within the Empire.  She did not envy him their reaction when they learned just how highly placed Lara had been. But it was not her fellow Senators' reaction that worried Leia the most – Luke could weather the political turmoil – it was her brother's welfare that Leia was concerned for. At best, Leia feared that the woman's connection to Vader would affect Luke's assessment of her. At worst, if she learned the truth of Luke's attachment to Vader, it could give her even more leverage over Luke. Slowly, Leia sank back down into her seat. She still felt stunned, and she was wondering what kind of hold this person might already have over her brother.

~

   Luke stepped off the turbolift into the hall of the Palace's high security wing. Two guards stood to each side of the lift's entrance, the normal complement.  There was a group of five guards further down the hall. As Luke neared them he could see that an officer was programing in a security code for the door in front of him. 

   Two more guards stood, one to each side of the closed door, and two more stood a step behind them. Those two each extended a hand to rest on each of Lara's shoulders.  Her hands were bound in front of her.

   Luke took it in with a pang of guilt.  "All this isn't necessary," he stated.  "I'll take responsibility for her."

   The officer turned to meet Luke, and cautiously nodded his approval. "Very well.  I'll allow it, Jedi Skywalker."  He nodded to his men, and they each took a half step away from their prisoner while their commander finished programing the lock.  A moment later the door opened in front of them.

   "The binders," Luke prompted.

   The officer glanced between the Jedi and the prisoner, still wary of his charge and his responsibility. 

   Then, moving very cautiously, he leaned toward Lara to place a release clamp over the binders. With a clank, they fell away, and he returned them to his belt.

   Lara stood there, unmoving. 

   "Go on in," he said curtly.

   She obeyed without so much as a sideward glance.

   "Thank you," Luke said with forced civility as he followed Lara inside.  It didn't escape his notice that two men had remained outside to guard her door.

   Lara rubbed her wrists from the energy binders as she surveyed her new surroundings.

   "It's not their fault," she said easily, turning back to speak to Luke.  "Or yours," she added before he could apologize.

   "I didn't think it would be this way," he struggled to get out the words.

   "It's all right. I've seen worse," she said pointedly.  "When will they question me?"

   Luke was thrown by the sudden change, in subject and in her demeanor.  "They didn't tell me. Soon, I guess," he answered reflexively.

   "So I'm under house arrest until then."

   "For now.  I'm going to try to get it lifted."

   "As I said, I've seen worse."

   Luke felt himself flinch.  Under her even voice and calm eyes, something had grown sharper, harder, more unforgiving.  "This doesn't bother you at all?" he questioned, astounded, and unable to make sense of her reaction.

   "I said that I'd answer for my past. That's what's happing here," she stated.

   "They don't know anything about you yet, except that you were once an Imperial."

   "A high ranking Imperial," she corrected him warily.

   "A high ranking Imperial," he amended without weighting the words. "You don't want me to defend you. Are you at least planning to defend yourself?" he asked the rhetorical question with increasing intensity.

   "From my own actions?" she challenged him.

   "I don't understand, Lara. You were conscripted into the Empire.  That's a terrible crime, but it's not your crime," he intoned the last. 

   "Listen to yourself," she said incredulously.  "What?  I was just following orders? 

   “You know what the Empire was," she breathed.  "You know how relentless Darth Vader was." 

   "Yes, I do know," he answered her. "That's why I know; you didn't get a choice, Lara."

     She looked away from him, shaking her head. "I had a choice," she argued.  Every day of my life, I chose. I could have refused."

   "And you would have died."

   "Yes.  Instead of someone else."

   This had to stop here, his feeling sorry for her.  Push him away now.  She had seen it earlier on the approach, and she saw it again now.  He would sacrifice too much if she let him take on a life debt to her, and the thought of more loss on her behalf was sickening.  He didn't understand that nothing the Senate could decide would be worse than what she would give herself.  But Skywalker had faith in the Senate; he believed that they would grant her reprieve.  Lara Dare didn't believe that it was possible; but the harsher truth was that she didn't want reprieve. She had no defense for the wrongs that she had inflicted.  Why not be punished? Why not here, where the dark past was so close at hand?

   Push him away now.

   "Those were innocent lives," she challenged him, "and brave beings who were fighting against the Empire.  I could have refused to take part in their destruction, but I didn't. Where is there defense for that?"

   "You did what you had to do to survive the Empire. And you helped me when you didn't have to. What about that?"

   She shook her head again.  Of course he couldn't see it that way; she should have known that.  Skywalker was all compassion and honor... something about the honest feel of his conviction made her almost want to consider the Jedi's point of view.

   "I told you. That doesn't change the rest."

   "It does for me. It shows me that you have compassion, that you're not cruel, and you don't take joy in other's suffering. I saw that much in the way you fought. There was no aggression, no will for dominance, just defense – a means to an end. That tells me that you would be harder on yourself than anyone else ever would."

   As soon as he spoke it, he knew that was it. "That's what I don't want," Luke finished quietly.

   Her expression was defiant again.  "What lets you decide?"

   "What about your family, then? Would they want this for you?"

   "You leave them out this," she whispered.  Her stare and her voice had turned to pure ice, pushing him back.

   He made a slight surrender motion, feeling very much as if she was armed. 

   Whatever window he'd had into her a moment ago was completely lost now.

   "You can't save me, Luke," Lara challenged him, the edge of her voice turning harsh on him for the first time over the heated exchange. "No matter how you see it."

   "Maybe not," he conceded with an even strength in his own lowering voice, "but that doesn't mean you're not worth saving."

~

   Luke went before the Council again the next day, and he argued hard that Lara be treated as a conscript. There was strong objection, but in the end they agreed that she would be viewed as such, until overriding evidence to the contrary was presented. This ensured that she would not be tried for crimes of war, that she couldn't be, under the conscript codes. 

   Still, her status as an informant and her presence on Coruscant would require a through background check.

   On Luke's request, her security status during that time would be reduced to Secondary Security Restriction, meaning that she would be confined only to the Palace's high security wing and not monitored within those walls.  The additional restrictions were added that she was to have no access to the planet's computer systems, or to any other means that could compromise Palace security.

   And all this, of course, was ultimately dependent on the outcome of her investigation. That investigation would determine if she was a security threat to Coruscant and to the New Republic, and if she had deliberately kept ties to the Empire after Endor.

   It was not all that Luke had hoped, but it was a small victory.

   As the meeting was coming to a close, he received notification that Mara Jade had arrived on world.

~

   "You cannot be serious.  But I know you are," Mara stated her disbelief and then corrected her statement of it, almost in the same breath.  "They're holding her as a possible security threat, and investigating her for Imperial connections–" She fell silent, shaking her head at the unexpected and illogical turn of events. 

   It was one of the few times Luke ever remembered seeing Mara Jade at a loss for words.

   "It looks suspicious to them," he explained, clearly unconvinced himself.  "That she just turns up here, and now of all times."

   "This Pellaeon thing," she murmured the understanding. "Are they decided yet?"

   "No," Luke answered, "and that's part of what worries me."

   "What don't I know?"

   Luke sighed, giving a rare outward display of frustration. "She's been through hell, and she doesn't want anyone's help," he said wearily.

   Mara snorted and grinned at him. "She hasn't changed a bit then."  

   "Hi, Kid!"

   Luke turned to greet his friends.  "Hi, Han. Chewie."

   Chewie bellowed his own greeting from behind Han.

   Luke couldn't be surprised that the two of them were skulking around the landing platforms.  Whenever they had the time to spare, Han and Chewie were rarely far away from the Falcon; the two of them could usually be found nursing the ship through some state of disrepair.  But today Luke suspected that Leia had informed them of Mara's arrival, and like Luke, they were anxious to get Mara Jade's take on the situation.

   "Mara," Han acknowledged her.

   "Solo. Chewbacca," she returned the same acknowledgment.

   "I hear you've brought some trouble back with you," Han said to Luke, typically, cutting straight to the point.

   "It's looking that way," Luke admitted tiredly.

   "Got the Council's attention," Han noted lightly.  Then he asked, "Are you sure about this?"

   "You'll just have to trust me on this one, Han," Luke shrugged.

   "Funny," he said without humor.  "That's what Leia said too."

   Mara looked between the two of them. "Why do I have a bad feeling about this?" she grumbled.

~

   Luke stood nervously outside the Senate's Inner Council Chambers.  The Grand Corridor was busy, filled with Senators and their aids. Mon Mothma had granted Luke permission to be in audience for the hearings, as they were being called, but he wanted to wait for Lara to be escorted in before he went inside himself. 

   Leia and Han were having a hushed conversation off to one side of the Chamber's entrance and Mara Jade was seated across the hall, waiting impatiently.  She had been asked to remain on hand, and Mara was not thrilled about that.

   "Did you remember anything more on that name I gave you?" Luke asked as he crossed over and sat down beside her.

   "Laus," she repeated.  "I just can't connect it."  Mara gestured impatiently to the data pad she'd been studying.  "I wanted to review the new infor–" she broke off. 

   The hall had suddenly quieted as Lara was escorted in by Palace Security. 

   She saw Luke first, her blue-green eyes flashing over him and quickly past him as she recognized Mara.  The intensity between the two women filled the short distance between them with a strained electricity, and several lifetimes passed between them both in the space of a few heartbeats. 

   Only the mutual respect remained.

~

   Luke stood quietly to the back of the room, listening as Lara was questioned frequently throughout the brief session. The Senate Inner Council members questioned her at length about her conscription, her duties under Imperial service, and about the information that she had given Luke regarding Laus and his status in the Myrtle system. She answered the Council with the same straight honesty she had shown Luke, but there was an edge to her voice and in her eyes that hadn't been there before. 

   Luke wondered briefly if it came from training to not break under interrogation, or from her own single-minded determination to face her past, or simply an ingrained sense of defiance in her character. No matter the cause, the effect was obvious. The serious eyes and aloof demeanor made her unintentionally intimidating, at best. He could see it leading to distrust among some, mostly those who would be reluctant to admit fear.

~

   Another failed cross search. Mara tossed her data pad down on the bench next to her.  "There are easier ways to do this," she complained, exasperation filling her voice. Traffic in this part of the Grand Corridor had quieted to a slow trickle once the hearing had gotten underway a short while ago, and there was no one to hear her complaint except for Solo, who sat across the hall from her.

   "What are you looking for?" he asked, walking over to pick up the data pad.

   "A name Luke mentioned."

   "Laus?"

   "That's the one, how did you know?"

   "I've got my sources," he confirmed evasively, quickly scanning the results of her search before he handed the pad back to her.  "What do you make of all this?" Han asked casually, motioning to the closed Chamber doors.

   "I don't think she's a spy, or a loyalist," Mara answered shortly, and without hesitation. "You?"

   "When Luke says to trust him, I usually do."

   "But?" Mara prompted.

   "But," Han answered, "there's a lot of room for suspicion here.  The timing is awful, we've only got her word on her motives, and the connections speak for themselves."

   "I didn't figure you to fall for this, Imperial paranoia," Mara spat.

   Han only shook his head. "I'm not taking anyone connected to Vader lightly," he responded.

   They both looked to the Chamber doors as a few aids began to emerge. This session was only a  preliminary proceeding, basically meant to confirm the need for further investigation. As expected, it had been short.  Mara wasn't surprised by that, but she was a little discouraged; she knew that a swift decision at this stage did not bode well for Lara's case.

   Luke emerged a few moments later as the hearing began to break up in earnest.  Mara stepped into stride beside him, casually making conversation. His expression gave no cause to doubt her earlier assumptions regarding what had gone on behind the doors of the Senate Inner Council Chamber.

   "I found where I knew Laus from," Mara said under her breath a few strides later.

   He looked to her briefly.

   "You're not gonna like it," she warned him pessimistically.

   "Where?"

   "From a source on the outer rim, near the Tritis sector." ~@ ~ ~