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He walked toward the exit, followed by Perhi.

“Jedi Kenobi?”

“Yes?”

“I’ve never had the pleasure of seeing one of you work until today. What you did up there in the bar—are all Jedi that good?”

Obi-Wan stopped and turned to face Perhi. “No, they’re not.”

The gangster seemed to relax slightly—but his expression changed as Obi-Wan continued.

“I’m only an apprentice. I have yet to take the Jedi trials. My Master is far more skilled than I. As a student, I’m afraid I’m a bit of a disappointment to him. In terms of fighting skills, I’m probably least among the Jedi.”

The Padawan had the satisfaction of watching the gangster pale slightly. Then he turned and left Yanth’s underground office, and the Tusken Oasis. With any luck, he had given Dal Perhi something to think about.

As he returned to the street, Obi-Wan mentally reviewed what he knew so far. Not much, unfortunately. He debated reporting back to the council, but decided to wait until he had something more than hearsay and supposition to offer. So far, all he knew for certain was that Darsha Assant had lost the informant she was assigned to protect. Her skyhopper had been gutted by a street gang, and her Master’s skycar had been destroyed after a supposed brawl with a cowled figure. He had seen the vehicles, but no body for the informant, no Darsha, and no Master Bondara.

Add to that the fact that a Black Sun vigo, Yanth the Hutt, had been killed by a cowled figure. There had been a sense of corruption pervading the location, similar to what he had experienced at the crash site of Bondara’s skycar.

Obi-Wan had two theories, which unfortunately were mutually contradictory. Theory number one: Darsha loses her informant to Black Sun attackers and trails them to the Tusken Oasis, where she is attacked and defeats an entire roomful of guards, along with Yanth the Hutt. She calls for help, and her Master comes to aid her. They flee and … vanish.

There were holes in that theory that he could fly a Dreadnought through. Darsha was good in a fight, but if she was that good, she would never have lost her informant in the first place. Also, it didn’t explain the sense of wrongness that lingered over the site of the skycar crash and the murders.

Theory number two was that there was some other entity—most likely connected somehow with Black Sun—involved who had killed Yanth the Hutt and his bodyguards. Obi-Wan liked the second theory better for several reasons, not the least of which was that he didn’t want to believe any Jedi capable of the crimes he’d been investigating. But neither theory explained where Darsha and her Master were, or why they hadn’t been heard from for so long.

Obi-Wan sighed. He hadn’t exhausted all his leads yet. There was still the block of cubicles to investigate. He checked the address he had been given and started to walk. With any luck at all, he might learn something there that would shed some light on the entire mess.

No such luck.

At the site of the cubicle explosion Obi-Wan had learned some very interesting news—but it was news that served only to muddy the waters further. One of the local police investigating the incident had told him that Hath Monchar, the Neimoidian deputy viceroy of the Trade Federation, had been the tenant of the blasted cubicle, and that he, too, had been killed.

It seemed obvious that Black Sun was somehow mixed up in all this. There was no evidence anywhere to suggest that the crime cartel was in bed with the Trade Federation, but it was possible, certainly.

Too many questions, Obi-Wan thought. Too many questions, and not nearly enough answers.

There was light at the end of the tunnel.

Lorn, I-Five, and Darsha hurried toward it. They reached a doorway—the partially boarded-over entrance to another kiosk similar to the one by which they had entered the underground—and emerged into the tenebrous shadows of Coruscant’s Crimson Corridor section.

It was like stepping into bright sunlight compared to the labyrinth they’d been trapped in for so long.

Lorn