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Tahiri turned a curious eye toward the experiment. “What is it, exactly? It looks like a qahsa.”

“It is, so far as it goes. But I grew it with modifications.”

The Jedi sat cross-legged near her. “What sort of modifications?”

“Your talk of the Force binding the life of this world and serving as its means of intercommunication interested me. And yet, since Yuuzhan Vong life does not appear in the Force, I could think of no way to test that possibility. However, it occurred to me that if the ecosystem of this world is truly self-regulating, it must have some sort of memory—it needs to know what happened yesterday and last cycle to plan for tomorrow. Furthermore, that memory must be shared somehow by all of its constituents.”

“I’m with you so far.”

Nen Yim indicated a ten-legged arthropod she had enclosed in a nurturing membrane. “Even if the memory were stored at a molecular level, a creature this size could not possibly carry enough to be useful, so I reason the planet’s central memory core lies elsewhere, but that any living thing—even a cell—must be able to contact it, perhaps through this Force of yours.”

“Interesting. And you’ve found a way to test that?”

“I think so.” She glanced up at the young Jedi. “To explain, I may have to speak of things that will upset you.”

Tahiri’s eyes narrowed. “This concerns my own shaping, doesn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Go on.”

“There is a protocol—the protocol of Qah—which is used to integrate manufactured or borrowed memories into the brain tissue of Yuuzhan Vong life. We use it often, mostly for rather mundane purposes—teaching ships to fly, for instance. But we also use it at times to enhance our own memories, to gain skills or knowledge without having to learn them. In the past, on rare occasions, we’ve used the protocol to replace entire personalities.”

“Which is what you tried to do to me.”

“Exactly. But the protocol of Qah did not work on your human tissues, naturally—Yuuzhan Vong and human tissue are not sufficiently compatible for that. So instead we used your own brain cells to create a sort of human Qah cell, but filled with Yuuzhan Vong information. It was a hybrid cell.”

“And that worked,” Tahiri said.

“Correct,” Nen Yim said. “In terms of your brain tissue, you are quite literally half Yuuzhan Vong. We did not implant merely memories, but also the cells that carried them.”

Tahiri’s eyes narrowed. Nen Yim had learned that was a sign of danger.

“Do you want me to stop?” she asked.

“No. I mean, yes, but it’s like picking a scab. In fact, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you.”

“I attend,” Nen Yim said, cautiously.

“I need to know—was there a real Riina?”

Nen Yim blinked. What an interesting question—but of course she would be curious about that. “I’m sure there must have been,” she said. “The name was probably changed—names are easy to change—but the details of your childhood undoubtedly came from a real person. Such memories might be generated, I suppose, but there would be no reason to when they could be donated by any living Yuuzhan Vong.”

“Is she—dead?”

“I’ve no idea. Mezhan Kwaad supplied the memory data. Only she could know who the donor was—and of course, she’s in no position to tell you.” Her tendrils curled with curiosity. “Did it truly work? You remember being in a crèche, and so on?”

Tahiri nodded. “Some things like crystal, others muddier. I remember once, my crèche-mates—P’loh and Zhul—we took one of the scrubbing korsks and put it in the communal food area. It—”

“Ate all the i’fii,” Nen Yim finished, feeling a strange twisting in her.

“Yes,” Tahiri said. She frowned. “How did you know?”

“Do you remember an incident involving a damaged fighting n’amiq?”

“I—wait. You mean those lizard-bird things the warriors used to fight against each other? I … I found one once. One of the warriors had abandoned it in the grand vivarium because it wouldn’t fight. It was injured and I nursed it back to health. Then one of my crèche-mates took it and fought it—I got there in time to see it die.