by Paul S. Kemp
“Anything from the three V-wings to the south?” he asked Ophim.
“Nothing, sir.”
Belkor looked out the glass bubble cockpit of the craft. Much of the bubble was lit with the heads-up display of the craft’s elaborate sensor array. The bubble itself provided light amplification, so he could look out and down on the terrain as if it were dusk. Ryloth’s forests stretched out below, banded to the south by a desert dotted with tors.
He clenched his jaw in frustration.
“I take that back, sir,” Ophim said, holding a finger up to the headset he wore. “One of the V-wings is reporting smoke.”
“Where?”
Ophim put a finger on the screen to show the location—close to the Equatorial Communications Hub. The smoke was probably the result of the attack on the hub that Belkor had enabled.
Still, he had nothing else. Mors could have gone down near the hub; the smoke could be from her ship.
“Go,” he said to Ophim. “Send the V-wings the coordinates. They’re to continue their check of the grid. Then we rendezvous at the communications hub.”
Ophim nodded, accelerating, and the nimble S&R craft darted through the cutting winds.
“Anything from the V-wing on station near the smoke?” Belkor asked.
Ophim shook his head. “Dead air, sir. They broke up the comm ladder when you ordered the rendezvous at the hub.”
Belkor cursed. He wouldn’t know anything more until he was close enough to see for himself. Within a few minutes he’d convinced himself that it was Mors’s shuttle, that it had gone down near the hub, and that the Moff had died on impact, but his fantasy broke on the rocks of reality as the lights of the hub came into view in the distance.
“Incoming from the V-wing on station,” said Ophim. “Smoke is from the Equatorial Communications Hub. But…”
“But?”
“The hub suffered an attack, which explains the success of the jamming signal, and I think you should contact the commander of the station.”
“What? Why?”
“Sir, the V-wing pilot reports that Moff Mors was here.”
Belkor wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly. “What did you say?”
Ophim looked skeptical. “According to one of our men, the Moff was here.”
“When? How? Is she still here?”
“I don’t know, though I gather she is not here now.”
Belkor’s mind started working through possibilities. The Moff had survived the downing of her shuttle and had ended up at the communications hub. “Before or after the attack?” he murmured.
“What’s that, sir?”
Belkor felt the sweat forming under his shirt anew. “Nothing, Ophim, speaking to myself. Get Major Borkas on the line.”
Through the bubble of the recon craft he stared down at the distant, smoking ruins of the communications hub. Cham’s team had done a thorough job on the dishes, which lay in jagged, bent piles. Dozens of droids and men and ships, working in the glow of portable lights, buzzed around one of the fallen dishes, working to get it repaired.
Belkor wasn’t thinking clearly, he realized. He had not been prepared for Mors to have made it away from her ship, much less into the hands of an officer like Steen Borkas. Mors could already have deduced Belkor’s involvement in the day’s events. She hadn’t attempted to contact Belkor after the crash, after all. She could have shared her suspicions with Borkas, could be on her way back to the communication center at that moment. Belkor could return to find a security team waiting for him.
All at once he felt weak, like he was nothing but liquid, like he would drain away.
Ophim nodded when communications were established. Belkor cleared his throat and gathered himself.
“This is Colonel Belkor Dray. Am I speaking to Major Borkas?”
“Colonel Dray?” The voice did not sound like Borkas’s. “Major Borkas isn’t here. I’m Captain Narrin. The major left with Moff Mors over an hour ago.”
Belkor looked over at Ophim and cut off the comm for a moment. “Did anyone tell them anything about the Moff’s…betrayal?”
“No, sir,” Ophim said. “Need to know, you said.”
“Good.” Belkor reactivated the comm. “Left for where, Narrin?”
“She, Borkas, and a squad of stormtroopers took two ships on a rescue mission. VIPs who escaped the Perilous, as I understand things. You’re here to assist? Those must be some VIPs, sir, to bring the whole High Command down the equator.”
You’ve no idea, Belkor thought but didn’t say. He tried to process what he’d heard. The Moff was still attempting to find Vader and the Emperor, which meant she knew or at least believed that they’d survived the explosion of the Perilous and its immediate aftermath. That made sense. The Moff could perhaps save her office, or at least her life, if she was the hero leading the team that found Vader and the Emperor. But she hadn’t tried to contact Belkor.
“Did the Moff arrive before or after the attack on the station?”
“Afterward, sir.”
That might explain it. “Did she dispatch anyone to send word to the communication center that she was alive? Or that she was searching for Va—the VIPs?”
“Uh, let me check, sir,” said Narrin. After a lengthy silence, the captain returned. “No, sir, she did not. But she and the major were in a hurry.”
“No doubt,” Belkor said, feeling certain that the Moff had deduced his treachery.
“Sir, I don’t have the coordinates the Moff and the major are searching, and with comm being line of sight, we’ve no way to raise them and alert them that you’re en route.”
“That’s quite all right, Captain. I know the search coordinates.”
“Sir, if you don’t mind my asking, what in the hell is going on out there?”
“I don’t have time to brief you fully, Narrin. Terrorists have struck the Empire. That’s all you need to know for now. How long before normal communication is possible?”
“We’re focusing our efforts on Dish Three. Nine hours, sir. Maybe a bit less.”
Nine hours. Belkor had nine hours to find the Moff and arrange for her demise.
“What else can we do for you, sir?” Narrin asked. “If we can help with these terrorists…”
“Nothing,” Belkor replied. “You’ve been most helpful already. We’ll be on our way immediately.”
“Good luck, sir.”
The moment they cut the comm, Belkor said to Ophim, “So, we know that Borkas is in league with the Moff.”
“They aren’t rescuing any VIPs from the Perilous,” Ophim said.
“Agreed,” Belkor said, running with it. “Probably meeting other collaborators, or rendezvousing with the terrorists.”
“We’ll get them, sir,” Ophim said.
“Yes, we will,” said Belkor.
The Moff had two ships and some stormtroopers. Belkor had the search-and-rescue recon craft and half a dozen V-wings. If he could catch the Moff in the air, it would be over in moments.
“Here are the coordinates,” he said, feeding Ophim the site where Cham thought Vader and the Emperor had gone down. “Alert the V-wings and let’s get on our way.”
“Yes, sir.”
—
Vader sensed it, a hostile, hungry wave coursing toward them through the thick forest. The Royal Guards broke through the tree line at a full run, blaster rifles hanging from their hands. The sergeant had lost his helmet, and his eyes were wide and white in the mask of his tattoos. The ground vibrated slightly, and the foliage behind them shook as whatever was in pursuit charged hard after them. The captain stumbled as he ran but managed to keep his feet. He waved for Vader and the Emperor to retreat.
“Run, my lords!” the captain shouted, his voice muffled by his helmet. “We need a more defensible position!”
“Defensible from what?” Vader asked, igniting his lightsaber.
“Lyleks, my lord! More than—”
Vader heard them then, the insectoid clicking
and hissing of Ryloth’s apex predator carried on the wind. From the sound he judged there to be a dozen or so of the huge creatures, all tearing through the forest and closing fast.
“Lyleks,” the Emperor said. “Interesting.”
“My lords!” the captain said as he reached them, gasping. “They’ll be on us in moments! We should move!”
Deez aimed his blaster rifle back at the trees. “Seconds only, Captain,” he said tensely.
Vader activated his saber and took position beside the Emperor. Seeing this, the sergeant and the captain stood near the Emperor, too, rifles ready. They didn’t have long to wait.
The lyleks burst through the trees, huge insectoid creatures that bounding over logs, the pair of tentacles near their mandibles squirming. Seeing Vader, the Emperor, and the guards, they hissed and rushed forward.
The guards fired, their rifles writing red streaks in the air. The bolts struck the lyleks but bounced off their carapaces, deflecting into the trees.
Vader raised his hand, seized one of the leading lyleks with the Force, and flung it sideways into the trees. It struck a tree trunk as thick around as a man, and its ridged, spiked carapace cracked open, leaving it squirming helplessly at the base of the tree.
Beside Vader, his Master gestured with both hands and jagged lines of Force lightning shot forth, striking two of the foremost lyleks, lifting the creatures from the ground and driving them backward, tumbling, hissing, screaming in agony, dying.
When his Master ended the lightning, he drew his lightsaber and he and Vader moved forward as one, each protecting the other as they twisted and spun out of the way of the lyleks’ tentacles and snapping mandibles, slashing and severing legs, tentacles, heads. In moments the forest was still and Vader and his Master stood back-to-back in the midst of the carnage. Both deactivated their weapons. The sergeant and the captain simply stared at them, their blaster rifles hanging uselessly from their gloved hands.
The Emperor cocked his head, as though hearing something from far away. “There are more.”
Alerted, Vader attuned himself to the Force. He felt them coming.
“Many more,” his Master said.
“This terrain is poor for a stand against so many, Master,” Vader said, feeling the lylek horde draw closer. A rushing sound came from the forest, like an incoming tide. “There are hundreds,” he added, hearing the snapping of limbs, the hisses of the lyleks, the insectoid chittering. “At least.”
“Agreed,” the Emperor said absently, his voice as calm as still water. “Let’s find a more suitable spot to face these creatures, Captain.”
The captain sagged with relief. “Yes, my lord. Follow me.” To Deez, he said, “Take the rear, Sergeant.”
With that the captain turned and bolted through the forest, leaping logs and skirting tree trunks. Vader deactivated his lightsaber, and he and his Master kept pace. Vader noticed that the forest had quieted around them. There was only his breathing and the distant clicking and chittering of the pursuing horde, the snapping of wood, the low rumble of the lyleks’ collective tread. They were gaining.
“I don’t see any of them yet,” Deez said.
“They’re still coming,” Vader said. He presumed the lyleks could smell them somehow, or had a keen sense of hearing, or used some other sense to hunt.
The four men broke into a clearing covered in low grass and brush and dashed across it. The exhausted breathing of the Royal Guards now sounded as loud to Vader as his respirator. He still felt the lyleks behind them, their numbers growing as their bloodlust drew more of their kind. He imagined a horde could clear the fauna from a few square miles of forest.
“Hurry, my lords!” the captain said.
They’d almost crossed the clearing by the time the lyleks broke through the tree line behind them.
“There they are!” Deez said.
Vader spared a glance back to see that two score lyleks at least had burst out of the trees, a clicking wall of spiked exoskeletons, tentacles, and mammoth jaws. More followed, more, the horde boiling out of the trees. They clambered over one another in their hunger, a tangle of limbs and claws and clicks.
The creatures saw them right away, of course, and uttered a collective hiss and eager clicking. Their thick limbs and great weight threw up chunks of soil and dirt as they lumbered across the clearing. The four men reached the tree line on the opposite side of the clearing and plunged once more into the tangle of trunks and roots.
“Look for a cliff or a tunnel,” Vader said calmly. “A place where we can channel their attack.”
“They’re closing!” Deez cried, looking back. He fired behind him with his blaster rifle. “Shots bounce off the carapaces!”
The Emperor gestured with a free hand, using the Force to topple trees. They fell into the horde, crushing lyleks, knocking down other trees that crushed still more. The survivors clambered over the dead without pausing, continuing their frenetic pursuit.
The captain drew one of the grenades he carried, activated it, and tossed it behind them at the horde. It exploded a couple of seconds later, the boom reverberating through the forest, toppling another tree, and causing shrieks of pain among the lyleks.
“Go right, Captain,” the Emperor said. “One hundred meters from here there is a tunnel.”
The captain did not question, though Vader wondered how his Master knew. The captain angled right as the lyleks closed from behind, their huge bodies snapping trees as they came. The distance between the four men and the horde shrank, and both guards fired their rifles one-handed as they ran, the shots blowing off parts of tree trunks and striking lyleks but not slowing the overall advance of the horde.
They reached a steep ravine and the guards started down the side, stumbling and grabbing at roots to stay upright as they descended. Vader and the Emperor leapt down from the top. A creek bisected the ravine; the opposite side was a steep wall of rocks and tree roots and soil that extended as far as they could see to the left and right. The lyleks were still coming.
“Where, my Emperor?” the captain asked. “I don’t see a tunnel anywhere.”
The lead lyleks from the horde poured over the side of the ravine, long limbs digging into the soil, tentacles grabbing at branches and roots as they scrambled down.
Vader activated his lightsaber and stood beside the Emperor, eyeing the side of the ravine for the tunnel. Meanwhile the captain and Deez shot at everything that moved, their blasterfire lighting up the darkness. Lyleks hissed and chittered.
“Heads!” Deez exclaimed as he fired. “A head shot puts them down!”
More lyleks came over the side, more, until they looked like a seething avalanche tumbling down the hill.
“There!” Vader said, finally spotting the opening, a dark oval low on the face of the valley wall, perhaps two meters tall, and partially blocked by exposed tree roots as thick as an arm.
“Go, Sergeant,” the captain said to Deez as they all backpedaled quickly toward the tunnel entrance. “Then the Emperor, then Lord Vader. I bring up the rear. Go!”
The lyleks rolled toward them, clambering over one another as they came, the pedipalps at either side of their large mouths waving spasmodically, as if already shoveling flesh into their jaws. Half a dozen lylek carcasses hung in the roots along the side of the ravine, but the rest kept coming.
The captain’s blaster rifle dropped one with a shot to the head, then another, but the creatures just kept pounding forward. Ten or more had reached the ravine’s bottom and clambered wildly toward the men, tentacles squirming, jaws working.
Vader raised a hand, fell into the Force, and loosed a blast of power that slammed into the lyleks on the ravine’s floor, driving them backward, partially back up the ravine’s side, and into those that came behind, turning the creatures’ advance into a chaotic scramble of limbs and agitated clicking. They tore at one another in their frustrated frenzy.
Deez ducked into the darkness of the tunnel, followed by the Emperor, followed b
y Vader, who deactivated his lightsaber, and finally by the captain, who backed in, still firing as he retreated. The tunnel, as black as pitch, went back only a meter before opening into a large cavern that had openings to the left and right and center.
“The hillside must be honeycombed with these!” Deez said.
“Keep going!” the captain said over his shoulder, still firing out through the mouth of the tunnel. “Move, move!”
“No,” Vader said, reigniting his lightsaber. “This is where we stand.”
There was movement in the growth at the tunnel’s mouth, and then a lylek lurched through, snapping roots, all teeth and hisses, only half a meter from the captain. Vader pushed the captain aside, bounded forward, and drove the blade of his lightsaber into the creature’s mouth and out the top of its head. The huge carcass collapsed. Behind it, dozens more lyleks scrambled to get in around their fallen fellow. Vader bowed his head, raised his hand, and loosed a blast of power, eliciting squeals of pain and sending the lyleks flying backward.
“Back away,” the Emperor commanded, and Vader and the captain fell back.
The Emperor gestured casually, and the tunnel’s ceiling came down in a shower of rock and dirt. The sound of frustrated hisses and roars carried through the rubble. The four men stood in the light of Vader’s lightsaber. He deactivated it, casting them in darkness. The captain turned on his helmet lights.
“Listen,” Deez said, cocking his head. “I think something is down there.” He nodded at the left-hand tunnel.
Vader reached out with the Force, felt the lyleks coming at them down the side tunnel.
“You’re correct, Sergeant,” he said.
“We shouldn’t make our stand here, my lords,” said the captain. “They’ll be coming at us from both directions.”
The lyleks were getting closer, their clicks and hisses growing louder. Deez pulled one of the grenades he carried. Vader grabbed him by the wrist to stop him.
“You could collapse the tunnels,” he said.
