"Why do I always get stuck with you...jerk."

A doleful male voice flooded the pilot's intercomm.

"I'm not that bad. Am I?"

"No," replied the woman, "it's just that I get stuck with you for ever CAP mission."

"Probably because we're wingmates."

"You might be on to something there," smiled the pilot.

It was there inside joke; a nearly daily routine when the pilots entered the cockpits of their Shadowcasters and blasted off from Victory Base off Almas. It was rare to see anything threatening, anything unusual, anything unsafe. Sheer boredom perpeutated the hour long flights as they made their loops within the Cularin system.

"Six," stated the woman, "I have something on the Full-spectrum transcievers. It looks like a derelict freighter."

"I have it to. There has never been anything like this before. There's some Cronau radiation in its wake. It looks like it just reverted from hyperspace."

"But why is there no power; engines are out. No comm even."

"Smuggler's ploy?"

"That or we have an emergency situation here. My LST picks up one man."

"Same here."

"I'm calling the rescue shuttle."

Ben's mind awoke in response to a light being shone into his eyes. He blinked quickly, but the vision before him was blurry and hard to make out. As he moved his head away from the bright light, Ben realized how much his head hurt. It was throbbing in pain and he tried to remember why and where he was.

Slowly everything became clearer as he groaned and tryed to lean up, but a hand on his shoulder pushed him back into the bed he lay on. He heard a man say something, but could not make it out. Ben took a guess and decided to stay laying as he tried to understand what was happening.

The last thing he remember was being inside the cargo hold of a freighter given to him by Stellar Enterprises. He had been given a mission to complete, but something had happened along the way. As he remembered, more and more details presented themselves. Ben had tried to reach the cockpit, but failed to do.

After a few moments his vision cleared and he saw a man standing over him. It seemed to a doctor. Behind him were two other men dressed in uniforms, probably guards.

"What..what happened?" Ben asked and rubbed his head slowly, feeling a bacta patch over his forhead.

"I.. I have a mission.. I have to complete it. Please.. I need to speak with a Commodore Lucerne."

"It was strange. Did Stellar somehow know that you'd be making an inspection of Victory Base?"

They were in the heart of Victory Base; the most ancient installation within the Confederation, as the base had formerly been a Sith Fortress thousands of years prior. More recently, the Confederation in conjunction with the Government of Almas had completely modernized into the military headquarters of the Confederation's Western forces. Adjoined to one side of the base was an LNR II and Kashan starfighters rested in the hangar where Darth Rivan kept his own starship thousands of years ago. Paladin IIs, normally stored within the reinforced basement, tirelessly patrolled the perimeter and within the base itself. And the midst of this security, the Commodore could only frown.

Corise turned to the base's commander. "That would be a grave breach of security. It was suppose to be a surprise inspection. Did you know of this ahead of time?"

"No sir."

"Well, if he somehow knows about my presence here, I suppose I see him."

"Why is that?"

"Because we don't know how he knows I would be here."

"Yes sir. Right this way."

The pair of officers made their way through the ancient corridors, past the bustling activity of the headquarter's personnel. Several turns and a set of stairs later, the two stood at a large metal door flanked by a pair of shock troopers. The soldiers saluted and opened the door opened, admitting the Commodore into the room. The younger Lucerne looked at the man before him.

"I am Commodore Lucerne. Who are you?"

Ben was being to wonder whether they would allow the Commodore to see him as he sat in the closed room. Perhaps the man was not even here and this was a dead end. He looked down at the floor and studied the stones that it had been created from. Positives thoughts were hard to come by in this place and Ben wondered why.

His head still hurt, but it was getting better. What bothered him were the feeling that kept going through his head. They were not his own. These feelings, images, and thoughts were of pain and destruction. They were of anger and fear. He had felt this way before...at the Jedi Temple. He had felt like this inside the room that Darami had found. The room with all the sith books....

The sound of the door opening made Ben jump a little and he quickly looked up to see a man standing there. A man that was saluted too by the guards.

Ben stood slowly and gave the officer a small bow. "Sir, I am... Ben, Ben Skywalker. Stellar Enterprises gave me a mission to find you and suggested I come here to look first. They had me bring a briefcase for you. It was in the ship that brought my into this system."

Once these words were said, one of the guards drew out a briefcase, one they found inside the freighter and set it on the table. "Sir, we found this case inside his ship, like he said. Scans revealed no weapons or explosives. There is a powercell inside, however, probably to power a datapad or comm link."

Ben, a little neverous cut in. "I don't know what's inside. I was just instructed to deliver it to you."

Corise hestitated, and glanced at the briefcase again. He turned back to the door and lightly rapped on it. A second later, the door opened with the contigent of Confederation personnel. He looked at the Colonel.

"Did any of your men try to open this case?"

"No sir."

He turned again to Ben. "How can I trust that you come from Stellar Enterprises?"

Without waiting for a reply, the younger Lucerne gingerly grabbed the case and brought it abruptly on the table top, with the side of the briefcase facing the commodore. He then cautiously reached over, and accessed the lock. It clicked open to his fingerprint. Corise's lip tensed, expecting the case to suddenly explode or let out a cloud of toxic gas like in the secret agent holos. Never of the sort happened, to the amusement of Colonel Tigh and the chargin of the Kashan man. The younger Lucerne sheepishly looked at the container's contents: datacards. Not anything that could truly pose an assassination attempt. He turned to Ben.

"Everything appears to check out," stated the Kashan man, "You're free to go. If you need anything, just ask our staff. If you'd like, I can arrange for you to take a tour of the base and this fine planet that is Almas."

Ben nodded. "Thank you very Commodore. I think I would like to leave this place. It is... not pleasant to me. I don't know how to say it. I think something evil once resided here. Sith I would say...."

He paused and looked around the room. "I would like to see this planet, however, where is the ship that I came here in? It was my only ride."

He wondered what had happened to it. Hopefully it would still be alright to fly because he didn't have anything else.

The younger Lucerne arched an eyebrow at the man's comments. The last person we had that comment ended up being from a force-sensitive soldier; one that we lost to the Jedi Academy on Naboo. He slightly shook his head at the thought. Who would employ a force-user as a courier? Maybe a galactic military, but a corporation? He shook his head slightly more noticably.

"Hm, yes, your ship. Colonel?" gestured the Commodore.

"It's currently at Forard now in space dock 51. You'll need some security clearance, so you'll have to go with me on my landspeeder to get to it," stated the Colonel, who then hestitated, "you do realize that Victory Base is basically in the middle of nowhere?"

Ben looked at the man talking to him and shook his head slowly. "No, I did not realize that. I assumed it was away from any major city, but not in the middle of no where. However, being a military installation, I can't say that I am too surprised."

He looked around the room slowly, the voices and feelings inside his head still reaching out to him. Ben tried to clear his head and concentrated on the Lucerne.

"Would it be possible to get a ride to Forard? I would like to try and fix my ship up."

The two Confederation officers turned and looked at each other, and then back at Ben.

Corise shrugged, "Yes, you can go with Colonel Tigh to your ship on his landspeeder. Colonel?"

"Yes sir."

Picking up the datacards, the younger Lucerne casually saluted the men and walked out, making his way to Victory Base's CIC, to view the information on the datacards. Colonel Tigh motioned the young Jedi out of the room. Accompanied the by a shock trooper escort, the group made their way out of the main base to the vehicle hangar bay, where Tigh's old, but well-maintained Arrow-23 landspeeder waited. The vehicle had served in the Rebel Alliance, the New Republic, and now the Confederation. For all its years of service, it didn't look bad on the outside, simply because it hadn't seen any action. The Colonel turned to Ben at the door of the landspeeder.

"Forard is on the opposite end of the planet. It might be a couple of hours. Do you need to use the refresher before we head off?"

"Thank you Commodore." Ben said and bowed gently towards the military man.

He turned and moved towards the others, pushing his hands into his sleeves in front of him. As the Colonel talked, Ben detected that the man's voice that of someone talking to a child. He looked the Colonel in the eyes and shook his head.

"No sir, I do not. We can get going."