Edge of Victory 2 Rebirth

by Greg Keyes

  they were twenty years ago."

  "We could use the Force, make one of the guards take us to them,"

  Tahiri said.

  "Absolutely not," Corran said with a frown. "You're not going to the

  dark side on my watch. Do it on Luke's."

  "What, then?" Anakin asked.

  "Consider also that the odds this room is being monitored are

  extraordinarily high," Corran said.

  "Since when did a Corellian ever care about odds?" Anakin muttered.

  "Fine. No odds. They are listening to us. Count on it."

  Anakin knotted his fingers in frustration. "Then I hope they hear me

  when I point out how ridiculous this is. We came here to warn them, and this

  is how they repay us?"

  "Anakin, look at it from their point of view. We came

  here in a Yuuzhan Vong vessel and acted as if we were going to attack

  their station. Now we claim a huge fleet is on the way to conquer their

  planet, and further we accuse them of having at least one faction

  collaborating with the Yuuzhan Vong. It would be hard for me to swallow."

  "Well, they have their proof by now."

  "There is that," Corran admitted. "You can't tell how close the Yuuzhan

  Vong are?"

  Anakin shook his head. "No. It's not like that."

  As if on cue, a deep tremor ran through the station.

  "But if I had to guess," Anakin went on, "I would say they were really,

  really close."

  "Right," Corran said. "We have to get out of here."

  "Haven't we just been saying that?" Tahiri complained.

  "The difference is, now I'm saying it," Corran replied. Unhitching his

  lightsaber, he went to the door.

  It wasn't locked, and there were no guards outside.

  "Interesting," Corran said, as the station trembled again.

  Struck by a sudden suspicion, Anakin reached out in the Force once

  more, this time narrowing his focus to the station itself. To his relief,

  his suspicions were not confirmed. The Givin hadn't abandoned the station

  and them with it.

  In fact, at that moment, two Givin carrying blaster rifles entered

  through the hatch at the end of the hallway,

  "Jedi," one said, in clipped Basic. "You will come with us."

  "We can take them," Anakin said, very low.

  "Probably," Corran acknowledged. "But we aren't going to. Not yet,

  anyway." He smiled at the Givin. "Lead on," he said.

  They passed several more Givin in the hallways, all in a rush, none

  seeming inclined to notice them. When they reached the command center they

  found it in a flurry of activity and eerily silent. The viewscreen depicted

  several large Yuuzhan Vong ships firing globs of plasma. Dodecian Illiet

  glanced up at them as they entered, "It would appear you were correct," he

  said tightly. "Congratulations."

  "It would have been nice to hear that a few hours ago," Corran said.

  "No doubt. You three will want vacuum suits. When the Yuuzhan Vong

  board, we will empty the station of air."

  "Aren't you fighting back?"

  "We are, but this station has limited firepower. Our shields will not

  hold much longer, and our fleet is assembling to protect Yag'Dhul. We can

  expect no help from them. The Yuuzhan Vong force is indeed quite formidable.

  I expect we have very little chance of victory."

  "Don't be so hopelessly optimistic," Corran said.

  "Perhaps I misphrased, somehow," the Givin said. "I did not mean to

  imply optimism on my part."

  "I was being sarcastic," Corran said. "Never mind. Where are the vac

  suits?"

  The dodecian gestured at another Givin. "In the old storage lockers at

  what you may remember as designated ring one-C of the docking area. My

  subordinate will take you to them in case your memory fails. I regret your

  position in all of this. I regret further that an attempt was made to

  bargain with your lives."

  "They didn't bite?"

  "On the contrary," Illiet said. "I reached a settlement with them. They

  promised to spare our station if you were turned over to them."

  "Then why . . . ?"

  "I did not believe their promise," the dodecian said. "Go. There is a

  small ship at docking port twelve, berth thirteen, if it has not already

  been destroyed. I grant you use of it. The rest of our vessels were used to

  evacuate unnecessary personnel before the attack commenced."

  "Thank you," Corran said.

  "Thank you for your efforts on our behalf," the Givin replied. He

  looked back at the tactical readouts. "You should hurry." He didn't look

  back up.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  Nen Yim bathed in a sea of knowledge. Protocols glistened and swirled

  in the depths, revealing the foundations and endless permutations of life in

  intimate and splendid detail. Beneath the cognition hood her expression was

  one of awe and wonder, and for the moment she was the eager, maze-eyed young

  woman she had been only a few cycles before, loving and in love with the art

  of shaping, with knowledge itself.

  She had long since passed the fifth cortex into the realm of the

  masters. Here were the living designs for the dovin basals, the

  thought-seeds of yorik coral, and yes, the protocols governing the creation

  of master hands. These she passed, navigating the shoals and depths with her

  questions, steering with her determination.

  She found the germ of the worldships and swam through its thick skin.

  Parts she had seen before, of course-the outline of the recham forteps, the

  pattern of the osmotic membranes of the endocrine cloisters-but these were

  only components. She had never seen the profound logic of the vessels laid

  out holistically. Her grasp of the organic relationships between organs had

  been based mostly on deduction, and she found it instructive to observe

  where she had been right and where wrong.

  At the center of it, at the outer limits of the seventh and final

  cortex, she found, at last, the brain. Its making uncoiled for her. She

  opened herself in turn and absorbed the information, let it fill the places

  her vaa-tumor had burned a place for. Strands of amino acid sequences flowed

  by like twisting rivers, pooling in her enhanced memory. Neurons

  divided, splitting and scrolling into million-branched ganglia that

  further folded into cortical coils. Subsystems nomic and autonomic explained

  themselves as the developmental process continued, finally settling into

  stability, maintenance, reorganization, stasis.

  And in the end, when it had all come and gone, when her own brain

  strained at the rush of knowing, she understood at last.

  The ship was doomed. The rikyam would die, and there was no protocol to

  stop it. Wonder dimmed in her, and the vast living library around her

  suddenly stood revealed to her not so much as a storehouse, but as a prison.

  Or a mausoleum, for though it created the impression of being alive,

  everything in the great Qang qahsa was desiccated, sterile, unchanging.

  There was nothing new here. If the protocols truly came from the gods, the

  gods had not seen fit to add anything to the sum of Yuuzhan Vong knowledge

  in a thousand years.

  But that was impossible. Since the invasion of the infidel galaxy,
new

  protocols had been handed down from the gods to Supreme Overlord Shimrra and

  thence to the shapers. The gods had been generous, especially in doling out

  weapons. Where had that knowledge gone?

  That thought stirred something in the Qang qahsa, as if it had been

  waiting for someone to think it. The seventh cortex faded from her

  consciousness, leaving her adrift in peace and dark, more confused than

  ever.

  There is nothing beyond the seventh cortex, she thought. I have moved

  to a place the gods have not yet filled.

  If there were gods. Mezhan Kwaad had denied them. Perhaps. . .

  But even as she renewed her doubt, something changed in the void. Like

  a light in the distance, or a tunnel opening.

  And then she beheld something that could not be there.

  An eighth cortex.

  With renewed hope she moved toward it.

  The membrane resisted her, filling her with pain that etched along her

  every nerve ending.

  This place is forbidden, even to masters, the qahsa told

  her. It was the first time it had spoken to her in something resembling

  language, the first time she felt its ancient sentience notice her. She

  recoiled. Who may come here if not master shapers?

  Return, the voice said.

  / cannot, she answered. Breathing hard, Nen Yim ignored the voice of

  the qahsa and pushed forward with her mind, accepting the pain, making it a

  part of herself. The agony grew, burning away her thought, but she held to

  her purpose, made it an animal thing that pain only fed and could never

  quiet.

  Her heart beat unevenly, and her breath chopped. She tasted blood.

  Beyond the cognition hood, she was distantly aware that her body was arching

  in tendon-ripping spasms.

  Open! she shrieked. Open to me, Nen Yim! Open or kill me!

  And suddenly, like waters parting before swimming hands, the eighth

  cortex opened.

  She looked within, and all hope vanished. She collapsed into her grief

  and was lost.

  Light filtering through her open eyes woke her. A sour smell cloyed in

  her nostrils, and she realized that it was her own congealed blood. She

  tried to move and found her body almost paralyzed with pain.

  Standing over her, grinning, was Kae Kwaad,

  "What did you see, little Nen Tsup?" he asked gently. "Did you see it

  all ? Are you satisfied, now?"

  "You knew," she said.

  "Of course I knew."

  She looked groggily around. They were in the shaper laboratory.

  "Mezhan," she said.

  Nothing happened, except that Kae Kwaad grinned more broadly. "I

  suspect that word was supposed to trigger something. The grutchin you

  altered, perhaps? I took the precaution of destroying it."

  Something about Master Kwaad's speech seemed very different. Wrong.

  "Clean yourself up, Adept," the master said softly. "We have a journey

  before us, you and I."

  "Where?" she managed to ask, through lips her own teeth must have

  gnashed and torn.

  "Why to see him, of course. Supreme Overlord Shimrra. He is waiting for

  you."

  THIRTY-NINE

  "Eleven, you've got two on your tail."

  "Thanks, Ten," Jaina answered, "but tell me something I don't already

  know." She jiggled the etheric rudder, watching the trails of superhot gases

  whip soundlessly past. Off to starboard, she caught a glimpse of the battle

  at Wampa, but the flashing lasers and long plumes of incandescence didn't

  tell her anything except that someone was still trying to cook the rock.

  She took a hit. The starfield tumbled crazily, and her cockpit was

  suddenly hotter than the midday double suns on Tatooine. Sparks crackled

  across her console, and every hair on her body stood at attention.

  My engines are gone, she thought. I'm dead.

  Interestingly, the thought did nothing to frighten her. Her only regret

  was that she wouldn't get to see the big show at the end.

  "Captain Solo, the Yuuzhan Vong ship is hailing us," C-3PO shouted

  excitedly. "They must have a modified villip on board."

  "You tell them I'm a little too busy shooting down their ships to

  answer them," Han replied, flipping the Millennium Falcon ninety degrees to

  squeeze thinwise through a tightly formed wedge of skips.

  "They seem quite eager to communicate," C-3PO persisted.

  "Well, tell them we'll call back." He'd been forced away from the

  interdictor by seemingly endless swarms of coral-skippers. Now the monstrous

  ship was following them,

  trying to establish the dovin basal equivalent of a tractor lock. In

  desperation, Han drove for the freighters, figuring he could at least use

  them as shields.

  He hadn't had time to check on Karrde lately, though the barked

  commands over the open channel told him the information broker was still

  alive, at least.

  He made the largest of the freighters, dodging its insignificant

  defensive lasers with ease, and once there looped around to face his

  pursuit, a determined snarl on his face.

  He blinked. There was nothing there. Not a single coral-skipper had

  followed him.

  "Sir," C-3PO said, "the commander of the Yuuzhan Vong warship Sunulok

  has called his ships back. If we do nor answer his hail, he will commence

  hostilities in sixty seconds."

  Han checked his sensor display. The coralskippers had retreated to the

  vicinity of the interdictor, which was now at a stop relative to the falcon.

  He estimated he was outside of the Sunulok's tractor range-barely.

  He eased back half a klick, to see what would happen. The ships didn't

  budge, though he noticed Karrde hadn't had any such reprieve. Off to his

  port, that battle raged on. It looked like Karrde was losing.

  "Better let me talk to 'em, Threepio," Han said. "I don't think letting

  them speak to a droid is going to make them any happier."

  "Indubitably, sir."

  Keeping a careful eye on both the viewport and sensor displays, Han

  keyed on the comm.

  "Sunulok, this is Princess of Blood. You ready to surrender, yet?"

  The Yuuzhan Vong were not.

  "This is Warmaster Tsavong Lah. You waste my time with nonsense," the

  warmaster grated.

  "Hey, you called me. What do you want?"

  "You deny me visual, skulking coward," he said. "But it avails you

  nothing. You are Han Solo, and your vessel is the Millennium Falcon."

  Well, ! wonder who he bought that information from?

  Han thought. So much for the anonymity of piracy. "You're callin' me a

  coward?" Han exploded. "You're the scum who had his underlings cut my wife."

  "She was not worthy to fight me. Neither was your jeedai son."

  "Listen, scars-for-brains, I couldn't care less how you explain your

  weak knees and yellow belly. We had a good fight going here. You want to

  finish it, or you want to call it quits? Either way is fine by me."

  "Jacen Solo is with you. I want him. Alive. When I have him, you're

  free to go."

  "Oh, sure. I'll just put him in an escape pod and send him over."

  "Dad?" Jacen's voice came up from the intrasystem channel. "Dad, maybe

  it's not a bad idea. If I can
get him to duel me ..."

  Han ignored Jacen and turned to C-3PO. "You got a read on that

  radiation signature yet?"

  "Yes, sir, but I'm afraid it's not very helpful. It's very low

  grade-the cargo pod contains liquid hydrogen enriched with tritium."

  "Cheap reactor fuel," Han grumbled. "Industrial waste. I was hoping for

  a cargo of ion mines, or something."

  "I'm sorry, sir," C-3PO said.

  "Infidel," Tsavong Lah roared. "There is no sign you are preparing an

  escape pod."

  Han's jaw dropped. "This guy doesn't have any sense of humor at all. He

  really thinks ..."

  Well, let him think it, then. He opened the channel for a reply. "Just

  give me a sec, will you? He is my son, after all."

  "You have two minutes."

  Han chewed his lip, thinking furiously.

  Leia called up from below. "Han, couldn't you put a concussion missile

  in the escape pod?"

  "Nah, they'll catch that," he said. "Waste of a missile we'll probably

  need."

  "It's got to be me, Dad," Jacen said. "I'm going back there."

  "Oh, no you're not." Han swung on C-3PO. "Jettison

  both escape pods. Now. Right now. Aim them both at the Vong ship."

  "Sir, I'm not sure which-

  "There," Han said, pointing. He cut the engines back in and began

  creeping back toward the freighter and the Yuuzhan Vong ship it nearly

  eclipsed. Two escape pods suddenly went tumbling across his field of vision.

  "Hopefully, it'll take 'em a few seconds to figure out there's no one

  on board," Han said. He fired his forward lasers. "Goldenrod, take a deep

  breath. If this doesn't work..."

  "But, sir, I don't breathe, of course I-oh, no!"

  Anakin, Tahiri, and Corran followed the Givin through the cramped

  corridors of the Yag'Dhul space station, their footing upset by

  ever-more-violent explosions.

  "Do you have any idea where we're going?" Anakin asked Corran.

  "The basic layout hasn't changed that much," Corran said. "We're headed

  down toward the berths."

  "Yes. Going to the berths," the Givin said helpfully.

  They reached an axis a few moments later and piled into the turbolift,

  which, at the Givin's command, whirred them down toward the anterior berths.

  Power flickered, and the lift jarred to a halt, only to start again a moment

  later when the lights came back on, albeit dimmed.

  "I'll be sorry to see this place go," Corran murmured.