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He frowned. How had it never occurred to him that Skywalker might not be an only child …?

LUKE STOOD FROZEN, UNABLE TO MOVE, UNABLE TO think, before the litter of dead Pawns—dead men and women, innocent men and women, dead by his hand. His mind spun with endless splintering echoes of his exchange with Nick on the Shadow Throne.

They’re all innocent?

Most of them. Some of ’em are like me—it’s been a while since I was innocent of anything.

Nick knelt beside one, a middle-aged woman, and probed her neck with his fingertips for any hint of a pulse. He sighed and lowered his head. “I remember—there’s something grown into us. Our skulls. The Pawns’ skulls. An antitamper feature for the crystals and the crowns …”

“A deadman interlock,” Luke murmured.

Nick looked up, his mouth going slack. He lifted a hand to the bruise that swelled on his forehead above his right eye. “That punch …”

Luke nodded distantly. “Must have damaged the interlock, or you would have died right there on the throne.”

Nick’s eyes widened. “And if I had, how would you have gotten yourself—”

“I wouldn’t have,” Luke said. “That punch saved both our lives.”

“Then I guess we’re both lucky you’re such a nice guy.”

“Maybe we are,” Luke murmured. He looked down at the dead. “But it didn’t help them any.”

“Skywalker—Luke—this is not your fault. You didn’t bring them here. You didn’t open their skulls and stick stuff in their brains—you did everything anyone could.”

“Yeah,” Luke said. His voice came out thin and dry as moondust. “I’ll be sure and explain that to their families.”

“Blackhole killed these people. He killed them when he stuck those crystals in their heads.”

“And I pitched in and helped him do it.”

“This is a war, Luke. Innocent people get killed.”

“Maybe so,” Luke said softly. “But they’re not supposed to be killed by Jedi …”

Nick stood. “Come on, kid, snap out of it. Like an old friend of mine used to say, the difference between fighting a war and shoveling grasser poop is that in a war, even the guy in charge gets his hands dirty.”

Luke looked at him and Nick sighed. “Ah, sorry. Another old friend of mine used to say my mouth’s stuck in hyperdrive. He was a Jedi, too.”

“You knew Old Republic Jedi?”

“Met a few. Only really knew one. Dead now, of course.”

“Of course.”

“Way I heard it, Vader killed him personally.”

Luke let his eyes close. “Vader? You’re sure?”

“Had to be. Nobody but Vader would have had a chance.”

Luke only nodded. Maybe he was getting used to revelations like that. Or maybe it was that he felt like he was still in that stone tomb, hanging in the darkness at the end of the universe … He hadn’t escaped it at all. He’d just turned it inside out.

That darkness—that Darkness—lived inside him now.

He’d clawed his way back to the dream-world of light … but look at what he’d done. All this death. All these lives wasted. It didn’t matter whose fault it was. Not at all. It wasn’t anyone’s fault. Everything that lived struggled, and suffered for a brief interval, scrambling in pain and terror to stave off the inevitable tumble back down into the Dark.

And all that suffering, all that struggle … all for nothing.

These weren’t the only wasted lives. Everybody’s life was a waste.

What did it matter if you succeeded beyond your wildest hopes, or if your dreams were shattered and ground to dust? Win or lose, all your triumphs and joys, regrets and fears and disappointments, all ended as a fading echo trapped within a mound of dead meat.

Blame it on the Force.

Why should there be life at all? Why did life have to be nothing more than a thin film of pond scum drifting on an infinite dead sea? Better to have never lived at all than to exist for only a brief moment of struggle and suffering, deluded by the illusion of light.

Better to have never lived at all …

“Hey! Skywalker! You with me? Is anybody in there?”

“Yes—yes,” Luke said. He gave himself a little shake and brought up a hand to rub his eyes. “Yes, sorry. I was just … thinking, I guess.