Zayne Carrick

Hailing from the planet Phaeda, Zayne was discovered by an unknown Jedi Knight and brought to the Jedi Order for testing when he was quite young, coming from a family where he had four sisters. His father, Arvan, was an accountant with a "dead-end job at a nowhere bank" and his mother, Reiva, was a gardener. Although Jedi Master Vandar Tokare described Zayne's ability in the Force as "marginal," he was accepted to the Jedi Academy on Dantooine. It was hoped that Zayne's ability to quickly form kinships would blossom with Jedi training.

On Dantooine, Zayne was trained by Master Vandar, along with Shad Jelavan, Kamlin, Oojoh, and Gharn. However, his Jedi abilities did not advance as far as he might have hoped for while at the Academy.

By 3964 BBY, Zayne was being instructed by Master Lucien Draay at the Jedi Tower on the city-world of Taris. Here Zayne's ability to form friendships was demonstrated by his emotional attraction to Shel Jelavan, the sister of his best friend Shad. Yet Zayne struggled to keep up with his fellow Padawans on Taris; his clumsiness with the Force was often evidenced in his ongoing pursuit of the black-marketeer Marn "Gryph" Hierogryph.

Zayne was interested in the rapidly spreading Mandalorian Wars and other issues affecting the Jedi Order, but he felt isolated on Taris and doubted his ability to become a Jedi Knight and that the masters told him the Jedi are to prevent the return of the Sith. However, he received encouragement from the Jedi Knight Alek Squinquargesimus—who had rescued Zayne from falling to his death after a failed attempt (the eighth) to capture the elusive Gryph. At that point, Alek did not reveal his name, but identified himself simply as "Squint." While passing through Taris with his Master on their way to the Outer Rim front lines, Squint told Zayne that he was to become a bigger player than he thought.

However, Alek's advice to Zayne that "sometimes you have to enter the darkness to save the light" boded ill for the future. Jedi Master Q'Anilia sensed a dark change in the Force just after Alek spoke to Zayne. Indeed, the Jedi Masters on Taris were apparently worried that one, or worse, all of their Padawans would fall to the dark side.

Soon after Zayne's encounter with Squint, the Padawans on Taris faced a challenge on Taris' rogue moon. Zayne and the other Padawans had to find their way back to their Masters amidst the moon's perpetual meteor bombardment, blinded by their visor's blast shields. As he was the last to complete the task, Zayne felt that he might not become a Jedi Knight along with his friends.

The Masters' fears about their Padawans led them to desperate measures, for as Zayne noted, they hated the Sith—but hatred was an emotion forbidden to the Jedi. After observing their apprentices' completion of the rogue moon challenge, they retreated into cloister at the Temple. When they emerged, they announced that a knighting ceremony would soon take place.

The ceremony was only a ruse, however, for in consultation with Krynda Draay, the voice of the Jedi Covenant on Coruscant—a secret Jedi organization dedicated to preventing the return of the Sith with the help of seers—the Jedi Masters instead killed their Padawans, with the exception of Zayne, who, having finally caught Gryph, was running late. He discovered his masters in the midst of their crime and managed to escape.

Ironically, as Zayne later discovered, his own ineptitude saved him twice. While trying to pay for the damages he caused to a restaurant, he spotted Gryph out in the streets. Using his money, he finally captured his adversary. But instead of taking Gryph to the authorities, he quickly sped to the Jedi Tower. Not only was it his late arrival that saved him: it was expected, and the Masters were prepared to wait for him as long as needed; Shad Jelavan was originally going to be blamed for the crime. However, the delay, and the fact that Lucien was carrying his lightsaber like the other Masters, indicated that Zayne was going to be knighted, which the Masters confirmed with a hastily concocted story about his alleged "special relationship" with the Force and the increasing demand for Jedi Knights due to the Revanchists' decision to fight the Mandalorian invasion. However, Shad grew suspicious, as the masters had never treated Zayne seriously, and his disbelief and growing belligerence urged the Masters to strike preemptively. Zayne arrived moments after the other four were killed.

On the run from the Jedi Masters he once served, Zayne had no choice but to flee. He took Gryph with him in a speeder chase that rammed them right through a school. They hid in a cafeteria disposal chute but accidentally slipped, falling into the seedy Lower City of Taris. Meanwhile, the Jedi Masters successfully framed Zayne and Gryph for the Padawan massacre—and knowing that the Dantooine Council would not believe that he could have done it with his lack of skill, they said that he allegedly received help from the dark side. Zayne decided that he must return to every place where he had been trained in order to decipher why the Masters had betrayed him.

After hitching a ride with some Wookiee garbage collectors and a close encounter with some Black Vulkars, Gryph led Zayne to Junk Junction, where they encountered the aging mechanic "Camper" and his friend Jarael. Jarael was suspicious of the fugitive duo and attacked Zayne, upstaging the young Jedi with her shockstaff skills, even in the face of Zayne's lightsaber. Initially both Jarael and Camper refused to help Zayne—Jarael because of Zayne's indirect role in convincing Lhosan Industries to leave Taris, and Camper because of Gryph's failure to pay him for their last transaction; however, when a force led by Constable Noana Sowrs and Lucien arrived on the scene, Jarael and Camper allowed Zayne and Gryph to escape with them on their ship, The Last Resort.

However, The Last Resort had not flown in years, and soon stalled in the asteroid field in orbit around Taris. While the other passengers slept, Zayne sent a transmission to Master Vandar Tokare, who believed his story. But to Zayne's surprise, Master Vandar began to speculate that Zayne might have murdered his friends, but did not remember the incident correctly. He advised Zayne to contact one of the Jedi Consulars on Taris—who, of course, were trying to catch him. Zayne was interrupted in the middle of his discussion with Vandar by Jarael, who knocked him out with her shockstaff.

After his transmission to Dantooine, Zayne quickly realized that it was odd that four out of the only five Masters stationed at Taris, save for Lucien, were Consulars: Q'Anilia, Feln, Raana Tey, and Xamar. He descended with Jarael to the rogue moon, hoping to find clues to the mystery of the Padawan Massacre. While there, the duo uncovered the destroyed droid T1-LB ("Elbee") that might have had information as to why the Masters murdered their Padawans. Elbee had been present for the Jedi Trials but had foolishly fallen off the edge of a cliff. Zayne realized that his masters had thrown Elbee off the cliff to prevent him from witnessing their conversation, as the Padawans had jumped from orbit without harm. Yet before they could locate Elbee's information, Lucien Draay and the forces of the Republic descended to the moon's surface to apprehend Zayne.

Thanks to a surprise attack by Camper and Gryph, both Zayne and Jarael got away without harm and with Elbee's memory bank in their hands. Camper tried his best to transfer Elbee's memory bank to another droid brain and he gave him a vocabulator and holoprojector. Zayne asked Elbee to recall the last moments of his recordings on the Rogue Moon. Zayne saw a revelation: a dark secret had been kept by his own masters. The four Masters (bar Lucien), as it turned out, had all seen terrifying visions of the future, which ultimately led them to commit the murders. All the Masters saw a Sith Lord encased in red armor and armed with a red-bladed lightsaber responsible for their own deaths; Feln was the first to make the assumption that the red figure symbolized one of their Padawans, each of whom was wearing a red environmental suit on the moon at that moment.

Zayne now knew the truth about his masters. However, moments after Elbee's projection was finished, The Last Resort was brought in by the tractor beam of the Oroko, a bounty hunter spacecraft captained by Valius Ying. After some negotiations, Gryph determined that Zayne's freedom was non-negotiable, but that the other members of the party could go free; the bounty on Zayne's head was too high for Ying to let the Padawan go. Gryph and Zayne made an alternate plan: Zayne would go and then distract the guard and take The Last Resort for his escape. However, they did not predict that Jarael was waiting there to cut him off. She reminded him that there was nothing wrong with running, but one must not endanger others to save oneself. Zayne did not want to die, but neither did he want to lose his new found friends. He came to the only decision that a true Jedi would make: he decided to stop the prophecy from happening by surrendering to the Masters.

Valius brought Zayne to Taris and dragged him through to the Upper City, now filled with an exultant crowd impatient to see the "murderer" punished—including Shel Jelavan, who was led to believe that Zayne killed her brother—to the Jedi Tower.

The young Padawan's fate was, at last, in the hands of the five Masters. Having Zayne alone to themselves, Lucien Draay explained to the young Jedi how Shad Jelavan's impetuousness had forced their hand, making Zayne their unintended patsy. They prepared, finally, to end Zayne's life (not before disposing of Ying, who learned too much about the actual circumstances of the crime). It was at that moment that Jarael, dressed as the five masters' mysterious Sith Lord—complete with the red suit, closed helmet, and Zayne's lightsaber—chose to rescue Zayne. They escaped together with the help of Camper and Gryph inside The Last Resort, after which Gryph offered him a place in his "organization," consisting only of himself—to which Zayne agreed, happy that someone finally indicated belief in him. He joined on one condition—that Gryph stop calling him "intern." Gryph agreed, calling him "henchman."

Lucien, desperate, ran out of the Tower to reach his former apprentice as he was boarding The Last Resort. He admitted underestimating Zayne and asked him, if he intended to run, to forsake the Jedi ways because, as Lucien put it, he needed to fear his dark destiny that the other Masters had foreseen. Zayne refused, saying that fear leads to the dark side.

Zayne successfully escaped from the masters once again, but with terrible consequences for Taris. Because of the Masters' repeated failure to catch the supposed Jedi killer, public confidence in them plummeted to the point that the Jedi Council recalled them to Coruscant. In an effort to keep the masters from following them, Gryph determined that they needed to scare them and so came up with a false prophecy that Zayne would say to the masters in a holographic transmission. Roughly three weeks after his escape, Zayne contacted the five Masters and announced Gryph's prophecy as a warning, stating that he had had his own vision; four of them now had the death mark—just like the rogue Padawan himself—and that the single Master who survived would confess to their terrible crime.

On the run from the Jedi Order, Zayne Carrick and the crew of The Last Resort made life on Vanquo, a mining colony on the fringe of Republic space. With supplies low, the crew did what they could to survive; they stole.

Disguised as a refugee, Zayne had himself spotted by the mining crew and begged for supplies for his "family." During his "pleading," a distress transmission came in from Master Q'Anilia. At first, the mining crew believed it to be a trick. By using a Jedi mind trick, Zayne convinced the crew that the Mandalorians were indeed attacking and ordered the camp to evacuate.

The plan was successful; the transmission from Q'Anilia had actually been performed by Jarael in disguise. However, while the crew raided the mining camps supplies, the Mandalorians actually attacked. Jarael was surrounded by them and taken prisoner. Stricken with guilt, Camper had to be carried away from the scene by Zayne and Elbee. While trying to flee to The Last Resort, Zayne and Gryph attempted to hold off the Mandalorians with what little they had. However, the Mandalorians managed to beat them to The Last Resort and steal it.

As the single Mandalorian, Rohlan Dyre, attempted to steal The Last Resort, Zayne, Camper, Gryph and Elbee were able to jump to the landing platform and climb aboard as The Last Resort lifted off into space. Camper managed to stun Rohlan with Jarael's shockstaff while Zayne was able to hold him down. Though Rohlan began choking Zayne, the Jedi immediately called upon Elbee to assist him by telling him that it was Rohlan who crushed his hand as the landing platform closed.

When locked inside a smuggling compartment, Rohlan informed Zayne that they would need his help to rescue Jarael. Rohlan informed the renegade Jedi that the Jedi Council on Taris had moved to Coruscant and Taris was in chaos. Zayne vowed to make it right, somehow, and when informed of other Jedi captured on Flashpoint Station, Zayne began to form a plan.

After reaching Flashpoint Station, Rohlan pretended to bring Zayne in as a captured Jedi to Demagol while Camper and Gryph hid in the smugglers' compartments in The Last Resort. Rohlan managed to convince Demagol to take Zayne immediately. While inside Demagol's laboratory, Rohlan attacked Demagol and locked him in a storage cabinet while Zayne stole his armor. The pair walked out, purposely making a note that Zayne perished. Zayne was attacked by Jarael, though she backed off when he telepathically communicated with her.

Rohlan and "Demagol" walked out onto the facility's surface. Elbee dropped a sack of charges out of The Last Resort, which was docked there, and with the Force, Zayne placed the mining charges on the bases of key structural points. Disguised as a Republic Admiral, Gryph then contacted the Mandalorians there and set off the charges, claiming they were a Republic trap. The Mandalorians evacuated immediately, though Zayne, still disguised as Demagol, claimed to want to save his work and left while Rohlan went after him, telling another Mandalorian to inform Mandalore that he died with the facility. When all the Mandalorians were gone, Zayne revealed himself. He and Jarael left Flashpoint Station with Rohlan stowing away.

Cash became a problem afterward. Luckily for the group, Gryph kept a legal account on the banking world of Telerath, although, because of the misfortunes on Taris, it was frozen. Camper and Jarael disguised themselves as nobility who supposedly owned the account, and were disgruntled by it being frozen due to the similarity of the fake names they used to Gryph's name. As they were about to be given the cash, Arvan, the banker assisting them, was captured by the Moomo Brothers. Zayne went off to stop the brothers from escaping with their captive, and was startled to discover that the banker was his father.

The Moomo Brothers managed to get away with Arvan, but Zayne and Gryph devised a plan to rescue him. While Gryph discovered where Arvan was being kept and distracted the Moomos, Zayne would free his father. After he freed him, Zayne learned from his father that his family didn't believe he killed his friends unless if it was something he had to do. Zayne then levitated a box and sent it straight at Del. Thinking his brother tried to assassinate him, Del started a fight that enables the Carricks to escape. During the rescue, Zayne discovered it was Raana Tey who wanted to lure Zayne out with his own family members, which earned her the top spot on his list of the Covenant Jedi he would hunt down. He also learned about several bankers working with the Jedi Covenant, specifically the Draay Trust. Zayne requested some of the money that would be taken from Gryph's account on Telerath to be transferred to Taris, and requested his father move to Dantooine for safe refuge with Vandar Tokare.

Zayne and Gryph decided to leave the rest of the crew of The Last Resort on the planet Ralltiir. As a parting gift, Jarael and Camper gave Zayne a unique pair of phrik vambraces. While on Ralltiir, Gryph hired someone to steal a large freighter for them, much to Zayne's dismay. They were instructed to meet their contact on Pad 223 at the local spaceport, and when they arrived a ship was indeed waiting for them. Before Gryph could finish negotiating with Slyssk, the Trandoshan who had acquired their ship, the true owners showed up, forcing them to take off prematurely. Once in orbit, the three learned that their new ship, the Little Bivoli was in fact a civilian supply for the Republic Fleet in orbit around the planet. In order to maintain their cover, the Bivoli was forced to follow the fleet, led by the Courageous to the planet Serroco.

When they arrived at Serroco, along with the rest of the fleet, Zayne and Gryph quickly developed a reputation with their restaurant, the Little Bivoli, as "the place to be in camp 3." Their restaurant-ship was hailed as the best place to eat, so much so that Gryph remarked: "When the Mandies get here, they'll have to eat standing." Zayne had other concerns about them being with an army fleet, as it made the possibility of them becoming recognized far greater. Gryph dismissed his worries until after the dinner rush was over, when they finally had a chance to talk to one another. After a heated argument about their remaining with the army, Zayne went outside for a breath of fresh air and experienced a Force vision in which the Mandalorians bombed the entire staging area on the planet, which was due to happen with their arrival the next morning. Having foreseen that event, Zayne returned to the restaurant and urged Gryph to start packing and get off the planet as quickly as possible; he also said that he could not accompany him because he had to talk to Admiral Saul Karath.

Zayne stowed aboard a Republic cargo ship, piloted by Carth Onasi, whom he had met before his vision. He explained to Carth his story and how he was not a fringer, but a Jedi. Carth Onasi agreed to take Zayne, or "Shad Camper," to Admiral Karath. Unfortunately for Zayne, Saul Karath immediately recognized him as the killer of the Padawans on Taris. Saul Karath quickly made accusations of Zayne being a Mandalorian spy despite his protests of innocence in his crimes on Taris and on Vanquo when Karath first spotted him.

While Zayne was being cross examined by Karath on the Courageous bridge, Mandalorian ships dropped out of hyperspace and launched nuclear missiles straight towards the Republic fleet. Zayne protested to get the Republic armies away from the Stereb Cities, due to his vision. However, Karath ignored him, and ordered the fleet to countermeasure the attack. However, the missiles veered off from the fleet and steered straight.

Zayne was sealed in a cell shortly after, and was later visited by Carth Onasi. Carth informed Zayne that he had hailed a tornado warning to seventeen cities on the planet, despite his uncertainty of Zayne's innocence; however, he was sure of his kindness, seen earlier when Zayne fed a starving Stereb. Carth left Zayne and told him to "Hang in there."

While Zayne sat in his cell, the Mandalorians attacked and boarded the Courageous with Shock Troopers, slaughtering almost everyone on board. Admiral Karath hesitantly ordered Carth to take Zayne with them so he would help them escape. Thanks to his ability with the Force, the young Jedi had pried the bolts off of his cell walls and they were able to escape on Carth's ship, the Deadweight. However, Karath was still suspicious about Zayne and about what had happened on Taris.

As the Deadweight sped away from the Courageous, Karath informed Zayne that he was lucky and inevitably, he was going to meet his old master once again. The Deadweights course was redirected, however, when they received a transmission from the Duros Eejee Vamm. Eejee informed those on board the freighter that the head of Adascorp and Lucien's childhood friend, Arkoh Adasca, wanted to meet with them and that he could have the means to end the escalating Mandalorian Wars.

Finally, the Deadweight boarded Adasca's ship, the Arkanian Legacy, in the exogorth-infested system known as Omonoth. As the Deadweight landed on the Arkanian Legacy, and the group disembarked, Zayne was spotted by his old friend Jarael. Jarael kissed him—though only as a means to give Zayne information on her and Camper's situation. Zayne was taken and secured in a cell. He was soon joined by his old master, Lucien Draay, who was bound to him while they were guarded by HK-24 droids. Despite being bound to his former master, whom he had pledged to hunt down, Zayne and Lucien worked together to release each other of their bonds. Lucien, however, attempted to kill Zayne after acquiring his lightsaber, but the vambraces Zayne had received from Camper protected him. Lucien agreed to settle things with Zayne after they dealt with Lord Adasca.

After destroying other droid guards in the security room, Zayne and Lucien were shocked to find Adasca allying with Mandalore the Ultimate. But things started getting easier for Zayne, when Carth had slipped out and brought the Padawan's lightsaber from the Deadweight to him. Even Rohlan Dyre started to help as he agreed to rescue Jarael. Zayne agreed to wear Rohlan's spare armor as a disguise, and by doing so caused Lucien to believe that he had been around Gryph for too long. Lucien voiced his opinion, to which Zayne quickly replied that the Snivvian was the best teacher he had ever had.

Zayne and the others set their plan in motion. Upon returning to Adasca, Zayne, disguised as a Mandalorian, shoved Carth who retaliated. Zayne ignited his saber and destroyed several of Adasca's HK-24 units as Lucien revealed himself. The group made it appear as if Adasca was working with the Jedi to capture Mandalore. Mandalore fell for the ruse as the Mandalorians, Adasca's forces, and Republic forces fought each other. Zayne managed to release Jarael from her bindings as she fought her way through HK-24 units towards Adasca. Zayne communicated with Camper that Jarael was released and he took control of the exogorths and of the HK-24 unit watching him.

Zayne, Jarael, Carth, Alek, Lucien and Admiral Karath managed to escape the Arkanian Legacy observatory as the exogorths devoured it, killing Adasca, though Mandalore managed to escape to his shuttle. Carth, despite being ordered to bring Zayne with them, let him "escape" with the others. Camper left Elbee and took The Last Resort into wild space, luring the exogorths away from civilization. Zayne's escape from Adasca and Karath was short-lived, however. As he asked Jarael to accompany him in confronting his masters, Lucien bargained to Zayne that he'd take them away from the crumbling Arkanian Legacy if and only if he'd turn himself in. Zayne agreed though the timely arrival of the Moomo Williwaw intervened with Lucien's capture.

On board were the Moomo Brothers and the Trandoshan thought to be dead, Slyssk. Zayne, ecstatic about seeing Slyssk alive, asked who sent him. Slyssk replied that Marn Hierogryph was still alive and on Taris, leading the resistance against Mandalore's second in command, Cassus Fett.

Zayne returned to Taris, where his so-called "crimes" had first started, only to find the Mandalorian ships circling the planet. Still in his Mandalorian disguise, Zayne leaped from the Moomo Williwaw and jetpacked slowly to the Lower City, where he encountered a Mark II assault droid that came from behind him. After destroying the droid, it uncovered the entrance to a Hidden Bek hideout where the swoop biker Brejik and multiple swoop gang members drew their weapons against Zayne. They were ordered to stand down upon the entry of Gryph and Brejik's adopted father Gadon Thek, the Beks' leader. With the Mandalorians beginning to pour in with more firepower, the Hidden Bek gang and Zayne retreated.

While in the Hidden Bek base, Zayne did what he could for the wounded though healing was never a strong suit with him. Gryph explained the situation of Taris and of the resistance there, headed by Jervo Thalien, who promised to lift the charges and bounties on them. During their discussion, Zayne noticed a young Twi'lek girl watching him conversing with Gryph. She introduced herself as Mission Vao. Though her older brother, Griff Vao, told her to stay away from him, she wanted to show him something. Mission led Zayne to follow Griff where she claimed that he had a "pet" that he was feeding. However, the two were spotted by Gryph who gave away their position to Griff. Brejik attacked Zayne and though Zayne disarmed him of his vibroblade, Brejik attempted to pull a pistol on him, with the excuse that he was trying to escape. Del Moomo on the other hand followed and restrained Brejik before he could take a shot. Zayne, Gryph and Mission discovered that Griff was actually feeding the missing Constable of Taris' children. Though Gadon was enraged at the kidnapping, it gave the Hidden Beks an opportunity to open up negotiations with the Taris Resistance and then join them.

Gadon led a swoop chase through the Taris Undercity, evading and attacking Mandalorians as they made way for the Resistance base. At the base, Zayne was reunited with Shel Jelavan. However, instead of it being a warm welcoming, she pulled a blaster on him and shot him. Though the equipment he was carrying protected him, it still knocked him off of his feet. Shel pointed her blaster at him as Raana Tey, unknown to her as one of the conspirators in Shad's murder, revealed herself and ordered Shel to finish it.

Del Moomo wouldn't allow the bounty to be taken from him and fired upon his former employer. Gryph took advantage of Raana's distraction and wrestled Shel's blaster away from her. While Zayne lay unconscious, Gadon, Raana and Senator Goravvus debated on the situation. While Raana asked the Senator to finish Zayne and Gryph, Gadon defended him by revealing the constable's discovered children. Raana attempted to discredit Zayne though Goravvus was convinced that the Resistance needed the help of everyone—even criminals such as Zayne and the Hidden Beks.

During Zayne's stay at the resistance base, Shel avoided him. When he finally confronted her, Zayne asked where Shel's little brother Shay was and he told her that he had sent her the money. Shel was enraged because she thought that he thought that they still had a relationship after Shad's death. Despite Zayne and Gryph's protests of innocence, Shel was still unconvinced. When Raana arrived, she immediately placed blame on Zayne, claiming he had fallen to the dark side. Frustrated at both parties, Shel immediately left them, wishing she had never met either Raana or Zayne.

Later, the resistance learned that Cassus Fett, who was in command of the Mandalorian invasion force stationed on Taris, had placed his headquarters in the abandoned Jedi Tower. The resistance then planned an assault on the Tower but Goravvus did not wish to waste munitions if Fett wasn't there so he planned for a recon mission before the assault. Zayne volunteered for the mission though the Constable, Sowrs, still didn't trust him. Shel also volunteered, claiming that she wished to put the past behind. Raana intervened and volunteered herself to accompany them under the guise that Shel needed protection from Zayne if he had fallen to the dark side and that even if he hadn't fallen, he was still an incompetent Padawan. Unknown to Zayne, Raana showed Shel how to install a crystal into her late brother's lightsaber so that Shel could kill Zayne if she failed.

While Raana Tey ventured into the temple through a shaft, Zayne would sneak into the tower as a Mandalorian bringing in Shel as a prisoner. Walking the same road that Zayne first walked when captured by Valius Ying, Shel still refused to talk with Zayne and be cooperative even while pretending to be a Mandalorian prisoner. The two argued concerning her belief in Raana and not in him, bringing up past feelings about their relationship. When Mandalorian guards took notice of their conspicuous arguing, Shel kissed Zayne, leading the Mandalorian off them under the notion of Zayne "recruiting." The kiss was short-lived, however, as Shel kneed Zayne. Zayne finally asked her to believe in him simply because he was telling the truth.

Once inside the temple, while in the storage level to open the vents and let Tey in, Shel began to carry out Raana's plans of using Shad's lightsaber against Zayne. However, Zayne began reminiscing about the past and his childhood in the Temple, particularly about his friendship with Shad. Shel could not bring herself to murder Zayne after she saw him crying over the death of her brother. Zayne continued on into the Council Chambers just as Raana entered the storage level through the vents. While inside the chambers, Zayne encountered Gormer, a Mandalorian Neo-Crusader under the command of Cassus Fett. Quickly thinking, Zayne pretended to be another Neo-Crusader searching for Fett. Gormer told him Fett had already left to attack the resistance, but grew suspicious of Zayne for not knowing that. It was at this moment that a green-bladed lightsaber slashed through the Mandalorian, killing him. A visibly angry Raana Tey then entered the room, lightsaber still lit. She accused Zayne of being a Sith and refused to listen to his attempts to calm her down. Tey attacked Zayne and began Zayne's first duel with a Covenant member.

Zayne managed to avoid Tey as the two dueled, utilizing the jetpack from the Mandalorian armor to evade her jumps and slashes. Despite Tey's unstable mental condition and Zayne's improved lightsaber skills she forced the former Padawan to lose his saber with a quick slash. Zayne quickly fired upon her with a blaster, but she easily blocked his shots and used the Force to throw him into the glass ceiling and disable his jetpack. The crazed Master advanced upon the helpless fugitive with her lightsaber as well as his own in her hands. Raana informed Zayne of the Prophecy of the Five. Zayne retorted that the prophecy was obviously about the "traitorous, evil Jedi Masters" that hunted him. As Tey was about to kill Zayne, a lightsaber pierced her back, with Shel as its handler. Shel dropped to the floor and finally admitted that Zayne did not kill her brother. The two embraced as Gryph and Gadon Thek swooped over to rescue them.

As they were about to escape, Raana, injured and on the brink of death, rose to stop them. They managed to escape from her as she leapt to the rooftop but just barely missed Zayne. With Mandalorians coming and explosives set, Zayne offered his hand to save Tey even after all she had done to him. Tey at first refused, believing that the catch was that she confess to the Jedi Council that Zayne was innocent, but Zayne told her that he didn't care about that. Tey, finally seeing Zayne's kindness, drew her saber to dislodge her stuck hand. But Gryph, who was high above them and didn't hear the conversation, thought Tey was attacking Zayne, and he blew the charges on the Tower. Knowing her death was before her, Raana asked Zayne to tell her master, Krynda, that she was sorry. The temple collapsed into the lower levels, killing Raana, a death that would be felt by her fellow Circle members.

As Zayne and Shel escaped, Shel apologized for making him lose his chance to have his name cleared. However, Zayne was pleased to know that he managed to get a name out of Raana: her master Krynda.

After Raana's death, Zayne and Gryph left the Taris Resistance and journeyed into the Undercity. After Gryph left the gate of the Outcasts' village open as he tried to scavenge credits, he and Zayne were both forced out of the village. Chased by Rakghouls, Zayne and Gryph encountered a Jedi Master named Celeste Morne, an agent sent by the Jedi Covenant to recover an ancient artifact called the Muur Talisman (as he was in a vision seen by the Covenant, with three others) as well as (unknown to Zayne) to bring the fugitive Padawan in. While Celeste brushed the pair off, the two continued to follow her in hopes that she would provide a route off-planet and onto the Moomo Williwaw.

Through Zayne and Gryph's conversations, Morne figured out that the young man following her was the supposed killer of the Padawans on Taris. While she believed it was her duty to bring them in, she found it difficult to believe that they were capable of killing anyone with the amount of noise they generated. Blasting in the tunnels interrupted their trek and all three fell through the floor due to excavation by the Mandalorians. Upon waking, the trio learned that the Mandalorians had discovered the Muur Talisman and moved out. Celeste followed in pursuit with Zayne and Gryph on her trail.

The trio boarded the excavation team's vessel, the Mar'eyce, led by Demagol's former intern, Pulsipher. Hiding out in the ship's ventilation shafts, Zayne and the others overheard the Mandalorians discussing their discovery, and witnessed the Muur Talisman's power at work when it seized control of Pulsipher and forced him to kill one of his subordinates.

While Pulsipher became ill as a side effect, the Mar'eyce landed on Jebble. As Celeste continued her mission, Zayne and Gryph were mistaken for prisoners meant to be trained as Mandalorians. Gryph slipped away from Zayne as they were informed of the Mandalorians' plans to invade the Core Worlds, beginning with the defenseless planet of Alderaan. Zayne located Celeste, though she was less than pleased to find him again and Gryph appeared clad in Mandalorian Neo-Crusader armor. Utilizing it, Gryph managed to get Zayne and Celeste inside the War Forge on the planet, telling the guards that he and Celeste were and Hettie Hierogarl also known as the Taris Techno-Terror Twins. However, before a message could be sent to warn the Republic of the impending attack on Alderaan, Gryph alerted the Mandalorians when his rifle went off inside the tunnel causing him to fall to a lower level of the War Forge.

Before Zayne and Celeste could be taken in, however, the guards themselves began to feel ill and transformed into rakghouls. The pair held off the transformed soldiers, though they were baffled at the soldiers' quick transformations and the fact that they were still able to utilize their blasters. By the number of recruits in the facility, Celeste determined that it was a massive staging area for every recruit in the Outer Rim, which would lead to a massive infection of the rakghoul plague if ever let out.

Zayne and Celeste went out to find a way to contact the Republic and warn them about the impending invasion. Celeste became more doubtful of the stories she had been told of Zayne's supposed murder of the Padawans due to Zayne's clumsy means of escape down the mountain side. While Zayne informed Celeste of the secret cabal formed by Lucien and the other masters, he also asked about the name he had heard from Raana Tey—Krynda. Celeste denied knowing anything although she let it slip that it was called a Covenant—a name which Zayne had not mentioned when revealing his masters' murder of the Padawans.

Celeste managed to make contact with the Jedi, unknown to Zayne, however, she called Lucien specifically. Lucien ordered her to retrieve the Talisman and take it to one of the Jedi safehouses and kill Zayne. While Zayne contacted the Moomo Williwaw, Celeste drew her saber and prepared to kill him. However, Zayne asked her to stand guard instead while he contacted Cassus Fett to have him stop the invasion from Jebble by ceasing all landings on the planet and quarantining any others from Jebble on their transports. Cassus was hesitant to believe him under the assumption that he was simply trying to save the Republic's worlds. However, Zayne offered that he was also saving the Mandalorian worlds because, in Zayne's eyes, despite being Mandalorians they were people as well. Cassus cut communications to consider Zayne's request.

Zayne set off to find Gryph inside the citadel, but was ambushed by a pair of Mandalorian-transformed rakghouls. They dragged him off to Pulsipher and he restrained Zayne inside his laboratory. Pulsipher began to interrogate Zayne in an attempt to learn the Muur Talisman's secrets. While Zayne told him he did not know anything, Pulsipher did not believe him and threatened to have the rakghouls tear him apart or to enclose him in an oubliette, one that belonged to the ancient Sith Lord Remulus Dreypa. As Pulsipher continued to threaten him, the Talisman detached itself from Pulsipher and went after Zayne, due to his Force sensitivity. Pulsipher's rakghouls turned on their former master and Celeste attempted to pry the Talisman away from Zayne, although he protested that he might be able to stop the invasion force with it. Celeste ordered the Talisman to come to her and immediately she was overwhelmed by it as it attached itself around her neck. Gryph arrived and released Zayne from his restraints. They rushed to her aid, but she had already realized that the rakghouls were not a problem for her, though she was ignorant as to what it meant for everyone else.

It quickly became obvious what was happening to Celeste. She became corrupted by the Talisman and began sending the rakghouls on the attack against the Mandalorians on Jebble. Zayne was appalled at her apathetic reactions as rakghouls tore apart the Mandalorians. He began to question the rakghouls' behavior and their new abilities to operate machinery to which Celeste explained that through the Muur Talisman she could revive the known skills the beings used before they became Rakghouls. When Gryph was captured and brought to them by a rakghoul under Celeste's orders, he revealed that Celeste was an agent for the Covenant and for Krynda Draay, Lucien's mother and the woman mentioned by Raana Tey, confirming Zayne's suspicions. Celeste became enraged at them for questioning her devotion to the Draay family and the Covenant. As Celeste was about to deal with the two of them, Zayne informed her that she was only assisting the Sith, the faction she had sworn to protect the Galaxy against. Celeste managed to break free from the Talisman's control and asked Zayne to strike her down. However, he could not and opted for another solution.

Zayne took Celeste to Pulsipher's laboratory to have her temporarily sealed inside Dreypa's oubliette. Celeste willingly did so and asked him to take her to the planet Odryn, into the Sanctum of the Exalted using her key. She believed that Covenant researchers, experts in Sith artifacts, might be able to help her. Before sealing the oubliette, Celeste ordered him to reach Krynda and tell her about what really happened on Taris, believing Krynda would never have allowed such an act to transpire. With the Muur Talismans influence sealed, the rakghouls turned on each other and on Zayne. Zayne and Gryph managed to make their way to higher ground, surrounded by rakghouls, when the Moomo Williwaw, carrying Jarael, Alek, Rohlan, Slyssk, Shel, and the Moomo Brothers, arrived from delivering Constable Sowrs' children to their father in the Core Worlds.

However, Zayne was not yet ready to leave, as he still planned to retrieve Celeste when Cassus Fett's fleet arrived in the system. While Zayne believed them to be landing, they instead fired nuclear warheads onto the surface, destroying the citadel with Celeste still inside. Zayne felt as though he was reliving the destruction of Serroco. He was devastated at the loss of Celeste, but felt motivated again to end the Covenant. Zayne asked Alek if he would help, due to his debt from Flashpoint. Shel assured him that they would all help him. For his first course of action they would travel to Odryn and use the key Celeste gave him.

Shortly after the encounter with the Muur Talisman, Gryph made a holographic recording detailing his memoirs of the encounter with Celeste, mainly how the rakghoul plague and the Talisman worked. He twisted some of the details in order to enhance his contributions to the events he encountered. Zayne saw the opportunity to use it as a part of his plan to help clean up his name from an accusation in the Padawan Massacre of Taris and sent the hologram to Vandar Tokare, the only member of the Jedi Council he could trust, to enlighten him on the events that really happened on Jebble.

For Zayne's first move in his plan to reveal the Covenant to the Jedi, he and the rest of his companions, minus Alek and Shel, landed on Odryn in order to obtain evidence of the Covenant's misdeeds. To start off the plan Zayne and Gryph hid in Del and Dob Moomo's laundry hamper while Jarael posed as Celeste in order to gain entry to the Sanctum of the Exalted. Once inside Zayne used Gryph's recording gear to document the many Sith artifacts which the Covenant had recovered and had hidden within the Sanctum. After a day and a half of processing through the artifacts, Zayne discovered where Covenant researchers analyzed the artifacts and witnessed their interest in the artifacts' abilities. He then decided he had enough evidence to show the Jedi Council. As Zayne and Gryph attempted to sneak out of the Sanctum, they encountered the Feeorin Borjak and after a short fight had pinned him at lightsaber-point, though he and Gryph were forced to surrender when other Feeorin arrived and surrounded them. Taking the duo to a blockhouse, Borjak questioned Zayne's intentions and explained that ever since Covenant member and associate in the Padawan Massacre as well as leader of the Feeorin and Jedi Master Feln had joined the order, Feeorin customs and way of life had broken down. As Zayne asked Borjak why the Feeorins still considered Feln their leader, the Exalted himself arrived.

The Feeorins bound Zayne and Gryph while Feln destroyed their recording equipment and gave his report of the situation to Lucien Draay. Lucien came to the incorrect conclusion that Zayne had killed Celeste Morne, taken the Muur Talisman, and come to Odryn in order to obtain more Sith artifacts and obtain evidence to present against the Jedi Covenant. He ordered Feln to be prepared to execute Option Ossus and destroy the Sanctum of the Exalted with all of the artifacts inside in case Zayne or his friends threatened to get a hold of them. Feln had his doubts concerning such an action, but readily agreed to kill Zayne.

While Feln contacted Lucien, Zayne reached out to Borjak and the Feeorins in order to convince them that Feln was using his own people and breaking both the laws of their planet and the laws of the Republic and Jedi to further the Covenant's goals, but they stood by as Feln released Zayne of his bounds. Feln saved a moment to taunt Zayne and throw his lightsaber away as a way of reminding him of the last time they met when Zayne threw Feln's lightsaber away. He then punched Zayne in the midsection as retribution for Raana Tey's death before drawing his lightsaber to finish him off. However, Borjak reminded Feln that according to the Rime Feeorin (the embodiment of the Feeorin's laws), since Zayne had been inside the Sanctum, Feln had to best Zayne in unarmed combat. Feln grudgingly consented but while he was distracted, Zayne kicked Feln in the midsection and grabbing his face tentacles, kicked the Jedi Master down in the mud before running away. He managed to avoid Feln by running through the Feeorin village before Feln struck Zayne with Force projected wood and pinned him beneath his foot. Just as Zayne appeared to be finished Borjak arrived to report that the Moomo Williwaw was approaching Odryn. Fearing Lucien's warning that Zayne's friends would come to raid the Sanctum. Zayne was forced to watch as Feln activated a detonator which caused not just the Sanctum but the entire hill underneath it to explode, burning the village to the ground and causing a shockwave which blew both Jedi clear from the crater where the Sanctum once stood. Mad with horror at what he had done, Feln blamed Zayne for the devastation and vowed to strike the dazed fugitive down with his lightsaber until he realized that all he had was a stick, just as he had seen in his vision. Gryph had secretly swapped the lightsaber shortly after Feln had agreed to fight unarmed. Before Feln could take any other action, Borjak and the other Feeorins turned against Feln, ending his life and rule.

Later in the evening the Moomo Williwaw arrived and Zayne wished the Feeorins farewell. Borjak found Zayne's own lightsaber and said that they would rebuild away from the remains of the Sanctum of the Exalted. Zayne agreed with his plan and believed that things would be better for Borjak and his people. However, Zayne no longer had evidence against the Covenant, until Jarael revealed that the Moomo Brothers had smuggled Sith artifacts out of the Sanctum onto their ship.

With Alek and Shel already on Coruscant to arrange a meeting with Masters Vandar Tokare and Vrook Lamar of the Jedi High Council, it fell to Zayne and the others to actually reach the planet's surface intact.

However, Admiral Saul Karath on the Swiftsure had already been notified of Zayne's arrival and had set up a blockade of Republic Warships around Coruscant. The fleet included many ships, including Captain Dallan Morvis on the Veltraa and Carth Onasi in command of Lancer Squadron. When Onasi's fighters intercepted the Williwaw Zayne thought he had caught a break and tried to ask Carth for assistance. However, the fighter pilot had to refuse, having already been punished for 'losing' Zayne before. Lancer Squadron engaged Zayne's ship, shooting to disable it, but Zayne refused to allow his shipmates to return fire except to disable in turn, refusing to kill the fighter pilots despite the dire situation and Rohlan's desperate pleading. The Williwaw made it to the blockade but due to the fleet's computer coordination and their use of the Vanjervalis Chain tactic, the Williwaw was completely incapable of breaking through the blockade.

Determined not to be stopped, Zayne instead had the Williwaw crash in the hangar deck of the Swiftsure, emptying the hangar of crew and jamming the doors shut. By the time Admiral Karath and his soldiers were able to enter the hangar, they were only met by Jarael and the Moomo Brothers. Zayne, Gryph, and Slyssk had stolen the Deadweight from the hangar and made their escape to the planet. Onasi and his fighters noticed the ship, but Carth let it go, telling his pilots that they had already caught their prey and were done for the day, privately wishing Zayne luck.

The Deadweight made it the surface safely with the trio and their cargo of Sith artifacts. Gryph sent Slyssk off to a hotel before the Trandoshan could have a panic attack, and despite Zayne's offer to get out while he could, he remained to help Zayne deliver the evidence to Tokare and Lamar. However, before they got far they were ambushed by Jedi Master Xamar of the Jedi Covenant's First WatchCircle (who had been sent by Lucien to oversee the Republic blockade and make sure that they killed Carrick) and captured. The Seer then brought the pair before Master Tokare and Lamar, claiming that he had brought them to face justice and that the form it would take would depend on the Councilors.

Xamar would soon confess Zayne's innocence to the Council, who later paid all the bounties, in exchange for Krynda's safety as well as she being given full immunity to the First WatchCircle's crime, having become disenchanted with the Covenant. He brought Zayne and Gryph to the Draay Estate. As an act to enter the Estate, Zayne was clad as a Dark Jedi/Sith-like character, with eye contacts, a Sith-like voice, and a replica of the Muur Talisman containing his lightsaber, and had a plan to lure Krynda out into the open: he pretended he had turned to the dark side. But inside, Lucien was prepared to kill Zayne again only for Lucien's former mentor, Haazen, to interfere. With their plans compromised, Zayne decided to openly face the Covenant, keeping up his Sith guise, bluffing that the Talisman made Sith artifacts come to life. Haazen attempted to talk to Zayne and managed to get closer to Zayne by using his massive injuries as a cover. He snatched the fake talisman from Zayne's neck, which actually contained Zayne's lightsaber. At that moment, the Jedi Order burst into the Estate, showing the members of the Covenant that they had been revealed. Zayne then told the truth of what happened on Jebble. In response, Haazen issued command "Vindication" during the same moment, ordering the Covenant to destroy the Jedi Council due to it having been "infiltrated" by the Sith. It gave Haazen remote command of Saul Karath's ships, which killed Xamar and many other Knights. Haazen, now revealed as a servant of the dark side, was in charge of the Covenant.

When the Jedi strike team led by Master Vrook was forced to retreat from the attack from above, Lucien told Zayne that Haazen, like the poor unfortunate Padawans, was also a Jedi failure and explained his family history with him. Like Zayne, Haazen was looked down upon as a marginal student with a string of failures catching con artists. Haazen was denied his chance to become a Jedi Knight, as Zayne presumably would have been had the First WatchCircle not had their vision. Unlike Zayne who stayed true to the light, Haazen chose darkness when given the opportunity to kill his friend Barrison Draay.

As Lucien tried to stop Haazen, the traitor revealed the Gauntlet of Kressh the Younger around his mechno-arm and unleashed its power on Lucien, knocking him backwards when he attempted to touch his former teacher and electrocuting him when he tried to cut through him with his lightsaber. Zayne attempted to help Lucien free himself from the rubble, but Lucien blamed him for not killing Haazen when he had the chance earlier. Zayne protested that he had not known who Haazen was, to which Lucien retorted that Zayne's inability to strike when possible had been the reason Lucien had not recommended him for Knighthood, which angered the former Padawan who had experienced the consequences of striking without heed.

While they argued, Haazen told them that they—himself, Gryph, Zayne, Q'Anilia and Lucien—were the figures in Krynda's Prophecy of the Five, and that Zayne was the one for the light. The traitor gave Lucien his red lightsaber, tempting him to join him. Q'Anilia woke up at this point and ran off to find Krynda. Zayne told Gryph to follow her and try to get Krynda's help. Lucien, however, attacked Zayne, saying he would not let him near his mother if there was a chance that the Rogue Moon Prophecy was correct. Gryph followed Q'Anilia to Krynda's room. There, he found her nearly insane and mourning over Krynda's body in a stasis pod. Q'Anilia thought she was dead, but Gryph recognized that she was in stasis and got her out of it.

During the fight, Zayne's special relationship with the Force was unlocked, allowing him to hit Lucien with a powerful Force push. He tried pleading with Lucien to go see Krynda so they could end the madness, but Lucien refused to do so. Just then, Gryph brought a dying Krynda down. Lucien threw him into a wall and took his mother into his arms. Krynda was devastated over the deaths of Zayne's fellow students, especially when she realized that it was her own teachings which corrupted Lucien to the point where he could order such a massacre. Before she died, Krynda told Lucien that she had been wrong to make him think it was right to take such a ruthless preemptive action. Lucien became enraged when Gryph inadvertently revealed that he had released her from the stasis that was keeping her alive. An enraged Lucien blamed Gryph for killing his mother, even though the Snivvian protested that she was being constantly tortured in the chamber. Zayne ignited his lightsaber and told Gryph to run while he held Lucien off.

As they dueled, Zayne pleaded with Lucien to stop fighting and help stop Haazen. Lucien, in his grief, said it was too late for him to escape the dark side. Zayne angrily retorted that Lucien was, and would forever remain a tool that others could manipulate for their own ends which took Lucien aback. In the meantime, Gryph ran out onto the estate's balcony, calling for Zayne. A sudden Force push knocked him off the balcony and near Haazen's feet. Lucien then burst outside and jumped down towards the fallen con artist. Zayne intercepted him in mid-air and knocked his former Master away with a kick. The two resumed their duel at the foot of Barrison Draay's statue, exchanging slashes and blocks until one of Lucien's strikes hit his father's statue, which had been already damaged by the orbital bombardment. Lucien attempted to stop the statue from falling, but it toppled onto Lucien, pinning him beneath it. Zayne, surprisingly, used the opportunity to stab the helpless Jedi Master.

Haazen, impressed, offered Zayne the chance to become his apprentice. Zayne reluctantly agreed, on the condition Haazen would stop bombarding Coruscant, which the Sith agreed to. As he knelt before Haazen, Zayne said he was having a vision of the future. As Haazen drew closer, Zayne grabbed his arm and said Haazen was not in it. In a quick strike, he sliced the mechanical arm off with his lightsaber. An enraged Haazen blasted Zayne with Force lightning but Zayne and Gryph were suddenly thrown far away from the burning estate. At this moment, Lucien stood up, revealing that Zayne had not actually killed him. Revealing to Haazen that the whole duel had been a ruse to get him off his guard, Lucien then used the control mechanism built into Haazen's severed arm to redirect the Republic fleet's fire to the Estate. The resulting fire killed Haazen, and presumably Lucien. However, unbeknownst to the Jedi, Lucien survived with the help of the gauntlet. Zayne and Gryph landed in a sludge tank on the other side of Coruscant. Gryph could not believe that Zayne and Lucien had not let him in on the plan; Zayne commented that Haazen would have never believed him.

With the Covenant's rebellion stopped, the Republic covered the affair up as a Mandalorian terrorist attack. Zayne's lightsaber was lost in the blast on the Estate, so he replaced it with a new one containing the merged lightsaber crystals of his friends who had died on Taris. Due to his part in stopping Haazen, the Jedi Council offered Zayne the opportunity to come back to the Order as a Jedi Knight. Zayne declined, deciding that he owed Gryph for the assistance he gave him, becoming his partner and that he would rather try to help people than focus on the big problems of the galaxy.

Soon after Operation Vindication Zayne told his friends that he wanted to see his family and left for a month, presumably for Dantooine. In reality, he founded the Rogue Moon Project with the families of his four deceased Padawan friends. The organization aimed to help those abandoned by the Jedi Order and the Republic too busy with the Mandalorian Wars.

During Zayne's month away, Gryph came up with a scheme to swindle the planetary exchange market on Metellos 3. He recruited Rohlan to pose as a native of a recently discovered planet, Italbos, and Jarael to pose as a ship captain to ferry him to the moon. Since the mining rights to the planet had recently sold, the plan was for Rohlan and Jarael to show up and claim a share of the money from the deal. Gryph disguised himself as a professor of law who took up their case to issue a new auction. However, the leader of the planetary exchange, the Chevin Nunk Plaarvin, grew suspicious and wished to rid himself of the three so that Metellos would not lose credits. While Jarael and Rohlan were captured by Sentinel droids and Chev security, Gryph was attacked by the droids and almost pushed out of a window. Suddenly, Zayne arrived and saved Gryph by cutting down the droids with his new blue-bladed lightsaber. Zayne and Gryph tried following Nunk, but he and company left the station to the "Negotiation Room." Gryph then decided to show Zayne the Hot Prospect, which was bought by Slyssk, who was tricked by a saleswoman that it was a "gem of a ship" when it was actually a gem miner, extremely filthy and covered in dead mynocks; Gryph used Slyssk's life debt to its fullest by cleaning up the ship. Zayne then snapped at Gryph for trying to sell a planet they had never seen to people who thought there was a fortune there. Gryph justified his actions by saying that he was hitting people who deserved such treatment, and mentioned the Raff Syndicate, for which Slyssk practically worked, and said that they would need an army to free their friends. With his eyes on Slyssk, Zayne realized that they did not need an army.

The duo dressed Slyssk up as a member of the Syndicate and barged into the "Negotiation Room." With Slyssk, they were able to fool Nunk into thinking that the Syndicate knew about the credits he was embezzling on Metellos 3 and sent him towards the recently devastated planet of Jebble. This allowed the Chev slaves to work free. However, though it seemed that Jarael and Rohlan would be cooked in the "Negotiation Room," they emerged, unharmed, only a little bit smoked. While inside, Jarael found out she was Force-sensitive, and Rohlan said that Zayne should train Jarael in the ways of the Force. Zayne later tried to tell the truth to everyone at the auction, but they bought Gryph's story and bought the planet anyway.

The Hot Prospect later discovered a derelict luxury cruiser called the Chancellor Fillorean. Zayne, Slyssk, Jarael and Rohlan boarded the ship to investigate. When they opened the hatch, they found a number of floating bodies, all asphyxiated. As Zayne searched the kitchen, he was attacked by a droid which grappled him. Rohlan attempted to blast the droid, only for a Bimm named Toki Tollivar to come out of hiding, stating that K-OB7 was simply trying to protect him. Once they restored lights and gravity, Tollivar explained that when he and Kayo left Corellia, the passengers began to turn up dead one-by-one forcing him to stay in his room. When he came out, he found that everyone, crew and passengers, was dead. Tollivar thought that they had been attacked by pirates.

While Slyssk fixed up some food, Zayne contacted a Republic ship to rendezvous with them. He stopped in his tracks when he saw Elbee, who had not moved in weeks, assisting Kayo. As it turned out, they were both made from the same Kellenech plant on Rendili. Rohlan then reported that the passengers and crew had all died by being strangled. Suddenly, Zayne sensed something wrong in the Force. Rushing into the kitchen, they found Slyssk unconscious and unable to breathe. Rohlan stepped in and stabbed the Trandoshan's throat, enabling him to breathe. Tollivar admitted that he had sent Kayo to get food earlier, which prompted him to think that maybe he had strangled Slyssk. Zayne ran into the cargo hold and hacked off the droid's arms. However, Elbee threw Zayne away, stating that Kayo was not programmed to hurt people. Kayo further reinforced that by telling Zayne and Rohlan about the master's secret. Numerous business partners of the Bimm had turned up dead; all strangled. Kayo was tasked with disposing the bodies, and held a suspicion of his master yet was unable to understand how a tiny Bimm could have strangled so many.

Realizing who the real murderer was, Zayne rushed back to the galley just as Tollivar, revealing his position as a Sith adept under Exar Kun, started to Force-choke Jarael. Zayne blasted him away from her before engaging the adept in lightsaber combat. However, Tollivar played dirty by bringing down a headlight down on Zayne. Kayo then came in, determining that he must protect his master from himself. Tollivar began to unleash Force lightning, swearing to hunt down Zayne and especially Jarael, shortly before Rohlan shot them. Zayne stated to the Mandalorian that he did not have to kill them; Rohlan snapped at him that he was no good if he could not protect Jarael. Later, Zayne discussed his problems with Elbee, especially what he did on "vacation," and offered to be Elbee's friend.

The crew of the Hot Prospect soon met up with Gryph on Jervo's World, a space station above Pantolomin, which was known for its large network of swoop-dueling arenas and as the location of the Hall of Champions. Gryph's planned to scam Jervo Thalien by taking advantage of a delay between the holofeed in the arena and the betting area. Since the Franchise allowed betting during the match, Gryph's plan was to call down the results of the match to Jarael who would quickly place a bet for the winner before the feed could reach the bettors.

The plan was soon thrown in flux thanks to Jarael and Zayne. Jarael had moral concerns over swindling legitimate bettors, and also disapproved of the duels' savagery. Zayne on the other hand was entranced by the Hall of Champions as well as being in such close proximity to the swoop dueling arenas. He had been such a huge swoop racing fan while a Padawan on Taris that his hero was not a Jedi, but rather, famed duelist Goethar Kleej. When a replica of Kleej's swoop bike was offered as a prize to the amateur placing highest in the Tandem Open, Zayne quickly signed up, which antagonized both Gryph who was counting on him, as well as Jarael who was upset by his selfishness.

Zayne quickly established himself as a contender by qualifying for the Open despite being an amateur on a rented bike. After the race, Zayne ran into Aubin Kleej, a young Gotal who was suffering from madness due to excessive feedback from electromagnetic signals in his headcones. Aubin's father, Zayne's childhood hero Goethar, soon approached the former Padawan and threatened him and his family with death if he did not keep Aubin alive and in play until the Tandem Open finals.

Zayne and Aubin quickly reached the semifinal round in the Tandem Open. During the round, the duo were involved in a high speed swoop bike crash which knocked out the other competitors. This enabled the two to reach the finals where they were to face Rohlan, Goethar, and four other competitors. Back on the Hot Prospect, Jarael overheard Zayne talking with someone about a secret plan as well as how he had needed to blow off steam before coming into contact with Goethar. He was evasive when Jarael entered the cargo hold and claimed that he had been talking to Elbee. Jarael showed him the clip of what Goethar had really said when making his retirement speech. The Gotal had been attempting to tell the public about the slave system that the Franchise used to populate the swoop duels. Zayne spoke to his childhood hero after this, where he taught Aubin a Force technique to block out the discordant signals that he was picking up. Zayne later became visibly agitated after Rohlan criticized him for teaching a Force technique to Aubin and not to Jarael. Little did the two know that Jervo Thalien was planning to sabotage them and the Kleejs in the final.

The Tandem Final featured Zayne, Rohlan, the Kleejs, two Togorian sisters, a Tyluun Night-Soarer and a Mandallian Giant. However, Jervo's saboteurs had done their work; they had soaked the Night-Soarer's claws in venom, and removed the safeties from the Togorians' weapons. Most insidious of all, they had sabotaged the Kleejs' bike and Zayne's blaster. Despite Zayne's misgivings, Gryph was able to communicate a plan to Zayne through a comlink to get Goethar and his son to safety. The plan involved replacing the official musician's score with Goethar's warning about the slave system and Jervo's plans to kill the Kleejs and their friends. The effects of the sabotage were soon apparent as Rohlan was temporarily disabled by a shot from the Togorians. When Goethar's accelerator jammed and brakes failed, he asked Zayne to grab Aubin. As they flew through a swamp, Zayne and Aubin fell off the bikes when the Mandallian Giant tried to ram them. Zayne tried to shoot him, but realized that his blaster had been tampered with as well. He jumped at the Giant with a long pole but was quickly knocked aside. Fortunately, Goethar defeated the Mandallian with a couple of well placed punches. Meanwhile, Rohlan was able to defeat the Togorian sisters by causing them to shoot each other. As the Night-Soarer attacked Zayne's speederbike, Goethar crashed it through a weak section in the protective glass separating the duel area from the audience, which Gryph had also communicated to them. The Kleejs were finally able to escape, and Rohlan became the winner by default as he was the only undefeated participant who had not gone off of the course.

During the escape, Goethar's and Jervo's speeches were played to the audience, causing the crowd to throw debris at Jervo. Rohlan received the "Goethar Special" bike to which Zayne requested he share with him. As the Hot Prospect was about to leave, Zayne asked Jarael to consider training with him in the Force. While they were talking, Goethar noticed Jarael's facial tattoos and immediately attacked her, warning her to stay away from him and his son. He then told Zayne that he never wanted to see his face again, and accused him of being a liar for associating with Jarael. As Jarael marched off to her room, Zayne ran after her, asking to speak to her. He asked if she had been a slave before she had linked up with Camper, but Jarael replied that instead of being a slave, she had been a slaver and closed the door in his face.

The crew of the Hot Prospect traveled to the planet of Wor Tandell to rest for a while. While there, Zayne had a conversation with Jarael regarding her slaver origins. Although reluctant to talk about at first, Jarael opened up to him about her past. She had been kidnapped by the Crucible as a young child and forced to fight in the slave pens to train for dueling. Her life there was hard and was made harder still by another slave that had been given the position of minder to oversee the fights. She challenged the minder and won, becoming the new one in the process. She claimed she had done this to make the training easier for the other slaves. She was eventually rescued from this life by Camper. Zayne offered to help her track down the Crucible, but she said that the slaving organization was too powerful and that if Zayne cared about her, he would help her run like she had done for him. After they parted, Zayne went on to the town of Gantra Lea while Jarael returned to the ship. While in the town, Zayne noticed a Republic navy cruiser in the center of town. When he asked why it was there, he was told that it had come to look for him and his fellow crew. The speaker was Ferroh, a Cathar Jedi whom he had helped to rescue from the installation at Flashpoint. Ferroh introduced him to Captain Telettoh the commander of the cruiser the Testament. Ferroh brought word to Zayne that the Jedi had joined the war against the Mandalorians, to Zayne's astonishment. Ferroh then told the story of why the Jedi had decided to join.

When Ferroh had returned to his home planet of Cathar, he had found that his entire species had vanished off of the face of the world, leaving behind the buildings, but nothing else. He followed rumors from other Cathar refugees that the Mandalorians were responsible so the Revanchist leaders, Revan and Malak, had investigated the planet, only to be told by the Jedi Council that the Cathar had probably left due to disease and that they should quit their investigation. Just as they were about to disperse, Revan noticed a Mandalorian mask on the ground. As the light struck it, he and the rest of the Jedi present had a vision of the massacre of Cathar refugees by Cassus Fett and his Mandalorian Neo-Crusaders. The Mandalorian force herded the Cathar into the ocean, while the Jedi futilely tried to stop only to realize that it was just a memory of the past. One Mandalorian attempted to stop the ensuing genocide, but Cassus ordered Mandalorian ships to fire on the ocean killing the Cathar and the one dissident Mandalorian. The Jedi reeled in shock from the massacre, and Revan took up the fallen Mandalorian's mask, claiming he would take up the one dissident's cause and that he would not take off the mask until justice had been done, and finally taking the moniker of Revan. After the revelation of the genocide, the Jedi High Council gave the Revanchists permission to join the war.

As Zayne, Ferroh and Telettoh returned to the Hot Prospect they came across Malak and Rohlan battling each other. Malak had attempted to recruit Jarael to the Revanchists' cause only to earn Rohlan's disapproval. As Malak attempted to reason with Rohlan, the Mandalorian punched him the face, causing Malak to attack the Mandalorian, claiming that he had shown his true colors. Malak was able to disable Rohlan and slammed him into the ground. He fastened his hands around his neck and was about to throttle him to death until he was pulled off and calmed down by Telettoh and Ferroh. After this incident, Malak told Zayne that he had come for Jarael as he had promised and that she would be a great ally for the Revanchists. Zayne agreed that she would be, but then approached her and gave her a kiss. Malak and Gryph were taken aback by this, the former exclaiming that Shel Jelavan had suspected the two were romantically close but that he did not realize. Zayne told him that although he appreciated the Revanchists' offer, he and Jarael had their own plans across the galaxy and away from the war, thereby declining to join them.

After Telettoh and the two Jedi left, Zayne wondered aloud if Malak had bought the ruse that the two were a couple. Jarael thanked him for his quick thinking although she was confused about his motivations for stepping in. Zayne explained to her that she had not only helped him run from the Covenant but that she had also given him time to prepare for the Covenant when he was ready to prove their complicity in the Padawan massacre. So he had decided to do the same for Jarael to help her refuse Malak, whom Zayne said would return to try and recruit her again in the future. The two agreed to go after the Crucible and Zayne explained that during his vacation after the fall of the Jedi Covenant he had made contacts that he could call on to help finish the slaving organization.

Zayne and Jarael's first plan was to undermine the Crucible's relationship with its customer, the Sungrazer cooperative. The cooperative was in the comet mining business, extracting valuable minerals before the comets broke up under high stress. Because of this, it was an extremely deadly job, so not many miners got into the business. The cooperative had to import slaves from the Crucible to meet its quotas.

The two disguised themselves as Crucible operatives, and made their way aboard the mining ship Sungrazer. They told the Koorivar in charge, Sariyah Budan, that the price for slaves had increased. Since the cooperative couldn't pay the increased price until they mined the comets, they convinced Budan that the Crucible had sent them ahead to claim part of the minerals for themselves to offset the difference. After the two were settled on board the Sungrazer, they communicated their initial success to Gryph on the Hot Prospect. Zayne was careful not the mention Jarael's personal reasons for the mission, claiming that she had merely stumbled upon the information about the mining operation: Jarael feared that Gryph would abandon them if he learned the truth about her slaver past. She told Zayne that she had served on the ship before, as a liaison delivering slaves for the Crucible. It was here that she learned that failed slave duelists were shipped to their deaths mining comets.

Zayne and another slave, a Nazzar named Qohn, traveled to the ready room, where eighty slaves prepared to extract thorilide crystals from a large comet that was slowly breaking up. At the same time, Budan contacted the Crucible which confirmed that Zayne and Jarael were impostors. The two were able to evade capture and make their way down to the comet's surface. A Sungrazer team followed them there, but were defeated by the two. Zayne commed Gryph and told him that "something of great value" was on the other side of the ship. As the Hot Prospect swooped in to pick them up, Gryph was met with the sight of Zayne levitating the slave miners towards the mining ship; away from from the rapidly disintegrating comet. Before a reluctant Gryph could take the duo and all the miners on board, they were attacked by a number of Skyreaper drones, the hallmark of the Crucible. A massive ship came alongside the Hot Prospect. A voice identified himself as Fleet Captain Dace Golliard of the Gladiator and demanded the mining ships surrender.

A wing of skyreaper drones swooped upon the fleeing slaves, capturing Jarael in the process. Zayne quickly destroyed the drone before it could take her back to the waiting Gladiator. The duo were then rescued by Rohlan who flew them to the Hot Prospect. The crew quickly realized that the warship outgunned them, but they decided to use the mining ship's capabilities to their advantage. The Hot Prospect fired its mining drill into the cockpit of the Gladiator causing it to decompress, and Rohlan damaged the warship further by unloading mining explosives onto its hull. Golliard ordered the surviving drones to press their attack on the mining ship, which could not jump to hyperspace due to its proximity to the Crucible ship. Zayne decided to shut down the Prospects centrifuge, which threw the ship into an uncontrolled spin, but enabled it to break free of the warship and jump to hyperspace. The crew dropped off the freed slaves on a freighter heading towards a refugee camp. Meanwhile Jarael told the rest of the crew about her secret, and they agreed to fight the Crucible.

The crew's plan hinged on smuggling Carrick into the Crucible's slave combat pits on Volgax. Zayne posed as a lost Republic Navy lieutenant whose Aurek fighter had been found alone in deep space. Dace Golliard brought him to Volgax and into the pits to prove himself in combat. Although Carrick attempted to keep the peace in the pits, he found himself participating in combat multiple times. After being interrogated by Chantique, he attempted to comfort the mute Caamasi Snout, whom he had earlier Force pushed away but was beaten for his trouble. In the mess hall, the Caamasi opened up to Carrick, telling him his real name of Ralthar Sitan. He explained to the former Jedi about the memnii memories of his species and shared them with Carrick. Carrick was overcome by the agony and uselessness of the pain and suffering of every Caamasi slave captured by the Crucible and begged the Caamasi to stop. Chantique took the collapsed ex-Jedi to her chambers and informed him that the Crucible knew of his and Jarael's identities and their scheme; Golliard could tell that his Aurek fight was salvaged and located its homing beacon. She dismissed his protest that the fights were not needed and claimed the Jedi were hypocrites since they too practiced violence. She then informed Zayne that Jarael was still keeping the true details of her experience in the Crucible a secret, and that in the Crucible's language her name and facial tattoos meant "Destroyer."

Meanwhile, back on the Hot Prospect, Jarael and Hierogryph attempted to locate Carrick and retrieve him, a process made difficult by the loss of the homing beacon. Hierogryph's plan to hire some "muscle" failed, and Malak refused to help as well. With nowhere else to turn, Jarael turned to Elbee, since she had once overheard her friend confiding to the droid. To her surprise, Elbee immediately opened up communications with Carrick's old friend Shel Jelavan, who was now working for the former Senator Goravvus. Jelavan, who had once provided Carrick with information about the Crucible's whereabouts, told the Arkanian offshoot that the slaving organization had been spotted on Volgax.

Back on Volgax, Chantique continued her manipulation of the former Jedi by telling him of her and Jarael's pasts. They had both attended the same school and were part of the same settlement until Chantique's own father, a teacher at the school, sold her to Captain Dace Golliard of the Crucible. Jarael would follow soon after, after the school was attacked by Golliard. Chantique quickly ascended the ranks and became an overseer, until Jarael literally stabbed her in the back and left her to die. The Zeltron slave was sold off, but tapped into her latent Force powers to kill her new owners and return to the Crucible where she became Magister Impressor. Carrick attempted to reason with her and asked her to stop the fighting, but she sent him to once again fight the Caamasi Ralthar Sitan. Although Carrick tried to calm down Sitan and avoid a fight, the maddened Caamasi attacked. After a short duel, Sitan pinned Carrick but instead of finishing him off, he stabbed himself. He died quickly despite the former Padawan's attempt to heal him. The Crucible then evacuated the planet, leaving Carrick to mourn on the surface of the planet. The crew of the Hot Prospect located him soon after and Jarael landed on the surface to retrieve him. However, Chantique's manipulation of the former Jedi had worked and Carrick lashed out at his friend, demanding to know why she had left the other slaves behind when she had escaped with Camper and questioning why she still kept her facial tattoos of "Destroyer." Jarael grew angry, saying that she had tried to help the slaves and that he had decided to fight the slavers despite her objections. She then told him that they needed to part ways, since he still didn't know her despite all they had been through. As she left, she told Zayne that she kept the tattoos because they meant "Protector." Zayne finally realized that Chantique had been lying the entire time.

Soon after the events on Volgax, Jarael left the Hot Prospect, accompanied by Rohlan. Before he left, the Mandalorian told Zayne to return to Coruscant to testify against the recently reawakened Demagol. While the woozy scientist was dragged to the courtroom, Carrick learned that certain members of his crew were keeping secrets from him. While Hierogryph's and Slyssk's secret only involved their escape from the bombardment of Serroco, Elbee's secret held much darker implications. The droid revealed that Rohlan had lost approximately four kilos after the escape from Flashpoint. As he pondered this stunning news, Zayne and his crew remembered other discrepancies from the Rohlan he had met before Flashpoint, and the one who stowed away after the breakout. Realizing the implication that Demagol was traveling with Jarael, he resolved to break Rohlan out of custody since the rest of the galaxy was under the impression that the prisoner was Demagol.

During the trial, Rohlan broke his restraints after being goaded by Malak. The Mandalorian was immediately set upon by the enraged Jedi, who appealed to the crowd's emotions by demonizing the Mandalorians. The crowd converged on Rohlan after he questioned Malak's designs, and the Mandalorian was hustled off to a waiting security speeder for his protection. As the speeder flew away, the two guards accompanying Rohlan revealed themselves as Carrick and Hierogryph. The pair told Rohlan that they needed his help to stop Demagol. Unbeknownst to the trio, Demagol had revealed his true identity to Jarael that he was, in fact, Antos Wyrick, Jarael's former teacher.

Fleeing Malak and the security forces, the fugitives took refuge in a shed belonging to Zayne, where Rohlan told Zayne and Gryph what he had learned about Demagol's past. Demagol, originally named Antos Wyrick, was a Zeltron who as a young man had been abducted by sadistic Iskalloni slavers. Later freed by a Mandalorian raid, Wyrick was introduced to the Mandalorian culture by Mandalore the Indominable, whose defeat against Ulic Qel-Droma caused the Zeltron to acquire a consuming passion for the Force and its mysteries. Through a robe he took from Qel-Droma's room, Wyrick came into possession of the DNA of Arkanian Jedi Master Arca Jeth. Wyrick began experimenting on children, attempting to create Force-sensitive individuals, which eventually resulted in the creation of his "triumph," the little Edessa, who later renamed herself Jarael. Funded by the Mandalorians, Wyrick founded an academy on Osadia where he raised and trained the children issued from genetic manipulations. When the school was destroyed by the Crucible, to which Wyrick had been an associate, the Zeltron was distraught. He later became a Mandalorian Neo-Crusader, under the alias of Doctor Demagol.

As Rohlan finished his tale, Shel Jelavan and Slyssk arrived, bringing replacement armor for Rohlan. Zayne decided to inform Gryph of the existence of the Rogue Moon Project. Descending into the basement of the shed by way of a secret elevator, Zayne showed Gryph and Slyssk what he had built for his organization using the money earned on Metellos and the bounty on Toki Tollivar. The young man told them that since the Republic and the Jedi did not care for ordinary people because of the war, he and the families of the four Padawans killed in the Padawan Massacre had decided to form an organization which would help people without hope in the galaxy. In the command center, Shel gave Zayne his lightsaber, now engraved with the names of his former classmates. This caused Slyssk to recall a microtag dropped by Demagol on the vessel which had read "Double-bladed lightsaber of Exar Kun." Distraught by the corrupting powers of the weapon and the effects they might have on Jarael, from Rohlan's information, Carrick realized that Demagol and Jarael were on Osadia, but he did not know the coordinates of the planet. Realizing that the only way to gain the information was to capture Dace Golliard, he asked Rohlan to contact Cassus Fett, banking on the war leader's willingness to repay his debt.

After enlisting Fett's aid, Carrick's next move was to anonymously contact the Republic's Defense Ministry and claim that Fett and a Mandalorian raiding party was planning to hit an asteroid-mining facility near the planet Ithor. Admiral Saul Karath, his reputation burnished by the Republic's cover-up of the destruction of the Draay Estate, was sent to deal with the imminent threat. In accordance with Carrick's plan, Fett broadcast an unscrambled signal before the attack, hoping to attract the attention of Dace Golliard. The plan worked to fruition as Golliard concealed the Gladiator behind some asteroids and planned to pick up survivors for the Crucible's use. However soon after the two sides engaged in battle, Fett's ships jumped to hyperspace, per the plan. Carrick immediately contacted Karath and told him Golliard's identity and location, knowing that Karath would help with the capture since the admiral's father had perished in the Great Sith War due to the Crucible captain's cowardice. Golliard was swiftly captured and gave up Osadia's location. Carrick enlisted Admiral Karath's help by threatening to reveal the truth about Karath's role during Haazen's failed insurrection and in the battles of Omonoth, and Serroco.

Carrick, Hierogryph and Rohlan traveled towards Osadia on Captain Telettoh's ship Testament where the captain updated the trio on the complex relationship between the Revanchists, Jedi Council and the Republic. Afterwards, Hierogryph confronted the former Jedi Padawan about his relationship with the Force, specifically about why good breaks were so often followed by bad breaks and vice versa. Carrick explained that his Jedi teachers thought of it as a learning disability, as he did not have a good grip on influencing events when he tried to use the Force to shape an outcome. The former Jedi would use the Force to affect a positive outcome, only for problems to arise or whenever he was in great danger, Carrick would have a stroke of luck that enabled him to reverse a situation. The Snivvian could not understand the thought process of the Jedi, and viewed Carrick's balancing power as an asset.

Despite Carrick's fears about the fate of Jarael, Demagol and his former student quickly picked off the numerous guards surrounding the Crucible headquarters on Osadia with Jarael utilizing Exar Kun's lightsaber to great effect. After killing Bar'injar, Demagol and Jarael split up to look for the other students being held prisoner. While searching the training hall, Jarael was attacked by her former rival Chantique. After repeated taunts by the Zeltron concerning her broken relationship with Carrick, Jarael attacked. After a short duel, the Arkanian offshoot knocked Chantique to the floor, effectively disarming her. She stood over her fallen rival, ready to strike the killing blow.

Meanwhile, Carrick and Rohlan had reached the planet, the Mandalorian carrying the former Jedi via his jetpack. When Rohlan released him, Carrick landed through the roof and onto Jarael, sending Exar Kun's lightsaber flying into the grasp of Chantique. The two dueled until Carrick informed the Zeltron that her father, Antos Wyrick, was on-planet. After Chantique left to confront her father, Carrick told Jarael the truth about Demagol, much to her disbelief. Carrick soon felt the same after Jarael explained to him that she could not sense the evil in Kun's lightsaber. Before he could further question her, they were unexpectedly attacked by Chantique who used the Force to throw them into the wall and steal Carrick's lightsaber. The Zeltron, who could sense the darkness within Kun's lightsaber, planned to kill the two but was prevented by her father, who stabbed her in the back and forced her to give the location of his former students.

Demagol, both lightsabers in hand, vainly searched the schoolyard for his former charges, only to be informed by his now recovered daughter that she had buried the students alive in the yard. His dreams crushed, Demagol dropped the lightsabers and vainly tried to recruit Jarael to his cause, only to be flatly rejected by her and Carrick. Although Jarael had finally seen the truth, Carrick's reasons for turning down Demagol were more complex. He informed the former Mandalorian that although she was a great physical fighter, she possessed little Force ability. This was corroborated by Rohlan who informed the Zeltron that all the Force feats she had performed were actually Demagol's own unwitting use of the Force, from a Force push he had earlier used against him to his successful impersonation on Hierogryph's crew. After this revelation, Chantique suddenly attacked her father, utilizing the knife he had stabbed her with. Demagol quickly reached with the Force for Carrick's lightsaber and ignited it. However, due to his untrained Force powers combined with Carrick's Force balancing ability he had selected Kun's saberstaff. When he ignited it, both blades tore through his and Chantique's torsos, killing them both.

After the battle, the crew returned to Coruscant where Carrick apologized to Jarael for his loss of trust in her. As a further way to make it up to her, he and Rohlan had located her parents, leading to the long-awaited reunion of her family. Rohlan "The Questioner" soon left Coruscant, still seeking answers about the involvement of the Mandalorians in the war, while Hierogryph and Slyssk settled down on Coruscant to run their restaurant and spy on the influential patrons dining there. However, Carrick's plans were less definite. He considered further helping his Rogue Moon Project, helping the Jedi teach remedial students, helping out in the Mandalorian Wars, or just relaxing with his new speeder bike. Although his future options varied greatly, he could face them with a companion at his side, as he and Jarael finally began a relationship.

After the dissolution of The Crucible Zayne returned to his homeworld of Phaeda, where, due to the Republic's dwindling resources, he was drafted into the planet's local militia, and assigned to a Republic fleet under the command of Dallan Morvis, who was seeking to liberate the Outer Rim world Essien from Mandalorian occupation but he and the Phaeda militia were betrayed by Jedi Master Dorjander Kace and his Mandalorian Knights and were captured by the Mandalorians.

With help from Koblus Sornell and Marn Hierogryph, Zayne gained knowledge of Kace's past as well as his plans to abduct the Jedi younglings from Dantooine as recruits for the Mandalorian cause. After persuading Morvis to cooperate, Zayne led a bold plan to sabotage the abduction. Zayne's trickery convinced the Mandalorians that their involvement with Jedi was too much trouble, and the Mandalorian Knights were captured by the Jedi Masters on Dantooine.

Following a return to Coruscant, Zayne was finally able to visit his family and Jarael on Phaeda. The reunion was short, however, as Zayne was now a "special diplomatic agent" assigned to Captain Morvis' command. He would serve as the conscience of Morvis' crew as they rejoined the battle against the Mandalorians.

Three centuries after his service to the Republic, Outpost 22, a nearly forgotten supply base, became the main staging area of the Republic Fleet during the Cold War with the Sith Empire. The base's role was something of a reflection of Zayne's own life, and would thusly be renamed Carrick Station in his honor.

At some point, Gryph's holocron entered a cache of artifacts on the planet Muunilinst and fell into the possession of Fane Peturri, who used the information within the recording to research Dreypa's Oubliette and the Muur Talisman. Upon coming into possession of the oubliette, Peturri showed a segment of Gryph's hologram, which included Gryph's scene with Zayne, to the Sith Lord Darth Vader in 19 BBY, the year that the Jedi Order was almost completely destroyed and the Sith finally ruled the entire galaxy. The same hologram had been shown to Vandar Tokare when Zayne had traveled to Coruscant to clear his name.

However, Zayne's failure to help Celeste would have dire consequences for the galaxy. Because of its mysterious nature, Dreypa's Oubliette would later start a cycle of greed and bloodshed across many planets before the device was opened. Celeste, who never died, emerged expecting to see Zayne, but when she learned of the years passed, she knew her friend had failed. Taunted by the ghost of Karness Muur for centuries, Celeste eventually came to think that Zayne had abandoned her, until she encountered a former Jedi, Cade Skywalker, several more years later. When she entrusted Skywalker to end her life and destroy the Talisman, Celeste believed that Zayne had sent someone to help her after all.

As a Padawan, Zayne showed himself to be very dedicated to the goals of the Jedi Order, as evidenced by his dogged and unsuccessful attempts to bring Marn Hierogryph to justice. However, he was rather insecure about his place in the Order. He recognized that he was far behind his fellow Padawans in his training and feared that he would not attain Knighthood. He was so certain about his fate that he made plans to start a relationship with Shel Jelavan after he flunked out.

Even after he was accused of killing his fellow Padawans and went on the run, Zayne remained faithful to the ideals of the Order, such as self-sacrifice. Although he faced the possibility of death, Zayne willingly surrendered to the bounty hunter Valius Ying to keep Jarael, Camper and Gryph from danger. He would later demonstrate this again when he surrendered to Saul Karath in order to warn him of the Mandalorians' plan to bomb the cities of Serroco.

It is also notable that Zayne, despite having participated in many battles during his exile, had not directly killed anyone. During the rescue at Flashpoint, he was able to free the imprisoned Revanchists without violence. After Celeste Morne asked him to strike her down to free her from the control of the Muur Talisman, Zayne was unable to bring himself to do the deed and found another solution that would not result in her death. Despite engaging in duels with two Jedi Masters of the Covenant, as well as a former Sith Acolyte under Exar Kun, he was not responsible for their ultimate demises.

In the case of Raana Tey, he attempted to save her life despite her attempt to murder him just a short time before. Another instance where Zayne tried to save the lives of his enemies was when he notified Cassus Fett about the outbreak of the rakghoul plague among the Mandalorian army mobilizing on Jebble and advised him to cease landings on the planet to avoid more Mandalorians from succumbing to the disease.

After the events of Vindication, Zayne grew more confident in his ability with the Force. He no longer held back from a battle, particularly when it meant rescuing his friends. He was able to rescue Gryph from the clutches of Nunk Plaarvin when he took on several Sentinel droids who were attempting to shove him out a viewport. Later, he attacked the Sith adept Toki Tollivar after he attempted to strangle Jarael to death. His confidence also manifested itself in other ways. Previously he had been on the receiving end of two kisses, both of which were meant to convey information or maintain a cover. However, when Jarael was hesitant of joining Malak and the Revanchists, Zayne took the initiative and kissed her to let Malak know that she would be following him and the crew of the Hot Prospect.

When he was first accepted into the Jedi Order, Zayne was thought by Vandar Tokare to only possess a "marginal" ability in the Force. However, Vandar noted the young boy's natural ability to form close friendships with his fellow trainees and hoped that initiation would help this ability grow.

Zayne possessed a "random destructive power" which referred to his tendency to accidentally cause havoc as well as his reputation as an incompetent Padawan (only Marn Hierogryph viewed this as an asset). Despite his clumsiness and ineptitude as a Padawan learner, Zayne had a natural ability to form bonds with people, signifying a powerful connection to the Living Force.

In addition, Zayne was highly vision-prone, being able to predict the future with great accuracy. This signified a connection to the Unifying Force as well, but unlike his masters who deliberately induced their visions to learn the future, Zayne—who had seen firsthand how easily visions could be misinterpreted—believed spontaneous visions to be the most reliable. He was understood to have had at least two visions, one which was of the devastation of Serroco. The first vision regarding his masters' fates was later revealed to be a trick thought up by Gryph.

Through access to Master Vandar's records from the Jedi Temple on Dantooine, Haazen found out about Zayne's "special relation" to the Force, a relation which Lucien was aware of but failed to report, and which the Jedi reportedly "didn't know what to do" with. Haazen described it as "a reversal of fortunes." It was thought of as an odd connection to the Living Force, one that allowed him to become stronger as a result of failure. Zayne was able to use this to unleash a powerful Force push against Lucien.

It wasn't until Zayne's brief conversation with Gryph before reaching Osadia that he revealed the bizarre nature of his Force abilities—"Learning disabilities" as he put it. While others used the Force to achieve their desired outcomes, like lifting a wine cup with Telekinesis, Zayne failed to produce the most desirable result as he literally spilled his cup. Gryph "enlightened" him that while the Force didn't offer him a winning deck, the game itself was fair, and all that mattered was how he played it. It was later that Zayne utilized this fact to outbalance Wyrick's Force grip, which resulted in Chantique and him killing each other.

Despite Zayne's strengths in the Force, he had little success when forced to fight with his lightsaber. When he fought against Master Raana Tey of the Jedi Covenant, he was defeated, despite utilizing a jetpack during the duel. Only the intervention of Shel Jelavan saved his life. His fight with Feln, despite not using his lightsaber, almost ended with Zayne's death until Borjak and the Feeorin people put an end to Feln's life. Zayne would also be defeated by the Sith adept Toki Tollivar, and almost killed until the Sith's droid Kayo and Demagol intervened. One of the only lightsaber duels in which Zayne was able to hold his own, the duel with Lucien Draay, turned out only to be a ruse for Zayne to gain Haazen's trust; the second example was shown in Zayne's brief fight against Chantique, despite the advantages given to her by Exar Kun's lightsaber.

Zayne's ability in the Force showed a marked improvement after he cleared his name and entered his partnership with Gryph. During his fight to free the comet mining slaves in the Koornacht Cluster, Zayne used the Force to levitate almost eighty miners away from a rapidly disintegrating comet. He later developed the technique of Force stealth, which he employed to conceal his presence from Dorjander Kace while simultaneously disguised as a Mandalorian.

Zayne had two lightsaber throughout his lifetime. His first lightsaber was a yellow-bladed weapon that he carried until the events of the Padawan Massacre, as Zayne was framed for the murder of his fellow padawans by his former master, Lucien Draay. Zayne had allowed Jarael to use this lightsaber on several occasions. While being on the run, Zayne obtained a pair of unique vambraces invented by the Arkanian mechanic Gorman "Camper" Vandrayk. Camper created this set of vambraces using a tydirium-phrikite alloy of his own design that he combined with personal energy shielding technology.

He lost his yellow weapon in the blast on the Estatemanage but replace it with another weapon. His new lightsaber produced a blue blade, different from the yellow shine of its predecessor, and was etched with the names of his former classmates; the victims of the Padawan Massacre of Taris. It's crystal was formed by fusing the deceased padawan's crystals together.

In an interview to Lightsabre.co.uk, John Jackson Miller, the writer of the Knights of the Old Republic comic series, admitted that, while the series was not a direct adaptation of the video game of the same name, Zayne was partially inspired by the early player experience in the game, with the overall feeling of disorientation and the player learning the controls—with Zayne still "learning the controls" with the Force. Because he was a lesser known character, Zayne would at times be drawn off-model on comic covers by artists not familiar with the story. As such, he was sometimes depicted as a muscular figure despite his, in Miller's words, "meek" appearance within the comic itself. Miller in general had little to do with the covers for his comic series and thus was unable to correct issues later found upon them.

John Jackson Miller intended Zayne to undergo the five stages of grief. As Miller put it

"• In #2, Zayne's conversations with Gryph are full of denial over what has happened to him.

• In #3, Zayne reacts with anger – he's pretty much a jerk to the whole world this issue.

• #4 is about bargaining – his own, with Vandar.

• #5 takes Zayne into depression, where he's rapt with hopelessness.

• And finally, beginning with the last page of #5 and leading into #6, Zayne finally arrives at acceptance. A horrible thing has happened to his life, and there's no way back to what existed before."

As artist Dustin Weaver said on the official Dark Horse Comics forums, he bases the appearance of Zayne on a young Christian Slater.

According to Miller, Carrick's last name comes from the Carrick Hall dorm building at the University of Tennessee,, itself named after Reverend Samuel Carrick, the university's first president.

Zayne's lightsaber color is based on the fact, according to creator John Jackson Miller, that his needed to be different from the Jedi Covenant's sabers but also relating to his childhood, where the Luke Skywalker action figure bore a yellow lightsaber rather than blue.

According to Dark Horse editor Freddye Lins, "Zayne is not related to the Skywalkers."

In a promotional advertisement for Star Wars Miniatures: Knights of the Old Republic, Zayne is seen fighting Mandalore the Ultimate and Darth Sion alongside Jarael. When a character called "Todd" appears and claims he is roleplaying as a Jedi with them as his unwitting pawns, Jarael grabbed Zayne and asked for him to hold her, while Marn Hierogryph said that he certainly would.

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