by Greg Keyes
“Vua Rapuung, no,” Anakin said. “This is over for you.”
Rapuung turned to him. “I will die soon,” he said. “I am able to give you only a small chance. Take it. Now.” He turned back to the crowd.
“A salute to the Jeedai!” he shouted. “A salute of blood!”
With that he leapt at the front rank of warriors, amphistaff spinning. His first blow struck his brother, knocking him to the ground unconscious, but still alive. The others he attacked with much more lethal precision.
“Anakin?” Tahiri asked.
“Into the ship,” he shouted. If he could get her safe, maybe he could come back for Rapuung.
No. His first duty was to Tahiri. If he tried to help Rapuung, they would all die.
“Can you fly it?” Tahiri asked.
“We’ll worry about that once we figure out how to get the boarding ramp up.”
They ducked inside the hatch and started searching frantically for some sort of control.
“What are we looking for?” Tahiri asked.
“A knob, a smooth place—a cluster of nerves. I don’t know.”
“I don’t see anything like that! This is hopeless!” Tahiri said.
Anakin ran his hands over the spongy interior of the ship. Tahiri was right. If they couldn’t even get the ramp up, what chance did he have of flying the stupid thing?
Next to none, probably, but he had to try. He couldn’t have come this far just to fail.
He saw Vua Rapuung die. Already surrounded by a pile of corpses, his feet were trapped, forcing him to fight without footwork. An amphistaff struck Rapuung a downward blow in the neck and came out the small of his back. He dropped his own amphistaff down like a blaster bolt and crushed the skull of the one who had wounded him before collapsing. Then the other warriors were on him, amphistaffs slashing, surging past him up the ramp.
“Sithspawn,” Anakin snarled, planting himself in the doorway, lightsaber blazing, determined to go out at least as well as Rapuung had.
“Oh!” Tahiri exclaimed. “Tsii dau poonsi.”
The tizowyrm translated it as the mouth, cause to close.
The ramp sucked in, out from under the feet of the charging warriors, and the hatch shut.
“You have to know how to talk to it, I guess,” Tahiri said. She’d tried to say it lightly, but it was almost a parody of her old self. She knew it, too. Tears brimmed in her eyes. “They put things in my head, Anakin. I don’t know what’s real anymore.”
He reached for her shoulder. “I’m real. And I’m going to get you out of this. Believe me.”
She folded into him, suddenly, and his arms went around her without him even telling them to. She felt warm, and small, and good against him.
Then his wounded leg refused to support him any longer.
They cut part of Tahiri’s garment to make a tourniquet. The living fabric worked even better than anticipated, because after the shock of being severed, it contracted, perhaps dying. Anakin wished he had some of Rapuung’s healing swatches. Maybe they could find some on the ship.
They found the controls just as the craft rocked to a tremendous blast.
“Boy, that didn’t take long,” Anakin said. “I wonder why they didn’t just open the hatch.”
“I sealed it,” Tahiri said “It won’t listen to anyone outside.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do. I mean, I’m sure they have someone who can open it, but not before we get off the ground.”
“Assuming we can get off the ground,” Anakin said, looking at the controls and fighting a feeling of helplessness. He recognized a villip and an acceleration couch, and that was all. A wide array of not-quite-geometrical shapes extruded from the “console,” along with a variety of patches of differing color and texture. Nothing about any of them spoke to him. There seemed to be no writing or numerals either, no gauges or readouts. The walls of the room were opaque, as well. He couldn’t even see what the Yuuzhan Vong outside were doing, though it was obvious they had dragged up some sort of big gun or explosives.
The ship rocked again, and several of the patches emitted a dull phosphorescence, which probably indicated damage to something-or-other.
“Okay,” Anakin said. “Maybe I can’t fly anything.”
Tahiri lifted a sort of loose bag from the acceleration couch. A thin creeper attached it to the console.
“Put this on your head,” she suggested.
“That’s right!” Anakin said, remembering. “Uncle Luke tried one of those on. It’s some sort of direct brain interface.” He looked at the thing dubiously, then tried it on. Immediately he heard a distant voice, murmuring something he couldn’t understand.
“The tyzowyrm isn’t translating,” he said. “I guess it’s being bypassed by the hood.”
He tried a few mental commands, with no result.
“This could be bad,” he muttered. “It must be like the lambent. Without attunement, our brains won’t interface directly with Vong technology.”
“Yuuzhan Vong,” Tahiri corrected absently.
“Right. Maybe it’s just the language barrier. Maybe … Tahiri, you try it.”
“Me? I’m no pilot.”
“I know. Try it anyway.”
Tahiri shrugged and placed the sack over her head.
It squirmed and shrank to fit.
“Oh!” she said. “Wait.”
The walls became transparent as another concussion set the ship quivering. Anakin could now see what was causing this; another ship, also grounded, was firing on them with one of its plasma weapons. The Yuuzhan Vong had cleared out a safe lane for the shots. Anakin reflected that they probably hoped to break through the hull—skin?—without seriously damaging the ship.
“Okay,” Tahiri murmured, her fingers caressing the various nerve nodes. “Let’s see what—yow!”
The ship jumped off the ground like a fleek eel from a hot pan. Anakin gasped and then whooped, slapping Tahiri on the back.
“We’ll do this yet!” he shouted. “Let’s burn out of here.”
“Which way?”
“Any way! Just go!”
“You’re the captain,” she said. The damutek suddenly blurred away beneath them.
“Not bad,” Anakin said. “Now, if you can figure out how the weapons work—”
Tahiri shrieked suddenly, clawing off the headgear.
“What’s wrong?” Anakin asked.
“It’s in my head! Telling me to turn back! In another second it would have had me!”
“This isn’t good,” Anakin said, watching the ground rush up. It seemed to him he had seen altogether too much of that lately. Gravity was highly overrated.
By the time they found the hatch and crawled out, Anakin could hear the drone of another Yuuzhan Vong ship approaching.
“Tahiri,” he said, “run for it. I’ll just slow you down with this leg.”
“No,” Tahiri said simply.
“Please. I came all this way to rescue you. It can’t have been for nothing.”
Tahiri brushed his cheek with her hand. “It wasn’t for nothing,” she said.
“You know what I mean.”
“I know we used to be in everything together. I know if this is the end, there’s nobody I would rather be standing with. I know that we can still make them sorry they ever tried to mess with the two of us.” She took his hand.
Anakin gripped it back. “Okay,” he conceded. “Together.”
It didn’t take the ship long to find them; they hadn’t made it more than a kilometer beyond the river. This was no speeder analog, either, but something more corvette-sized.
Tahiri touched Anakin in the Force, tentatively, and for the first time he really felt what they had done to her—the pain and confusion, the sickening nightmare sense of unreality. He poured his sympathy and strength back into her, and the bond strengthened. And as she gripped his fingers tighter, as he finally surrendered the last of his barriers against her—against them
—the Force blew through him like a hurricane.
Tahiri laughed. It was not a child’s laugh.
Together you are stronger than the sum of your parts, Ikrit had said.
Together.
They wrenched a thousand-year-old Massassi tree out of the ground and launched it straight up. By the time it struck the Yuuzhan Vong ship it was traveling as fast as a speeder. It smacked into the dovin basal and splintered, twisting the ship half-around. Another tree jerked out of the ground, and another. The ship listed, firing gobs of molten plasma into the trees, not understanding exactly what was happening. One of the trees rammed into the cannon structure, and flame burst out all along one side of the ship.
In theory, a Jedi could use the Force effortlessly, without tiring. In practice, it seldom went that way.
Anakin and Tahiri had gone beyond their limits, and now their strength was ebbing.
The ship wobbled and molten fire dripped from its ruined weapon, but it was still there, and there were plenty more where it came from.
Still, Anakin gripped Tahiri’s hand. “Together,” he said.
The air above them shrieked and strobed, and sharp lines of red light carved into the Yuuzhan Vong ship as if it were a root vegetable. A too-bright-to-watch ball of flame followed close after, striking the craft in its already bleeding wound, and then the Yuuzhan Vong ship was a corpse hurtling to the ground. Anakin looked up, mouth open.
Another ship was descending, a ship made of metal and ceramic, not living coral.
It was Remis Vehn’s battered transport, and it was the most beautiful thing Anakin had ever seen.
It dropped on repulsorlifts, and the hatch swung open.
Qorl stuck his head out. “What are you waiting for?” the old man shouted. “Come aboard.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Talon Karrde followed the pinpoint on the long-range scanner with a raptor gaze.
Still, he was fully aware when Kam Solusar came silently up behind him.
“What is it?” the Jedi asked.
“Long-range sensors tell us some sort of transport just broke the atmosphere of Yavin Four,” Karrde told him.
“Only moments ago, I felt an incredible surge in the Force,” Solusar said. “I’m sure Anakin was involved, and I think Tahiri, as well.”
“Can you feel them now? Are they on that transport?”
“I think they must be,” Solusar replied.
Karrde shook his head. “Not good enough. If I commit that deeply into Yuuzhan Vong territory, there is every chance not a single ship in my fleet will come back out. I need to know. What if it’s just a Peace Brigader or two who’ve been hiding on the far side of Yavin?”
“It’s Anakin,” Solusar replied.
Karrde let his shoulders relax. “Well. That’s better. As long as you sound certain,” he said. “Fine.”
He turned to his crew. “This looks like what we’ve been waiting for, people. Our mission has changed. Up until now we’ve just been surviving, picking off strays. From what I gather, the Yuuzhan Vong have been using us for target practice and to thin the stupid from their gene pool.
“They’ll behave differently when we push to intercept the ship out there. They’ll probably hit us with everything they’ve got, and we’ll be in a position to get hit. We can forget backup from the New Republic; we’re on our own. If there are any doubts about this course of action, I need to hear them now.”
Silence, as he swept his gaze around the bridge and the screens depicting the captains of his other ships.
“When have we ever not been with you, Captain?” Shada asked from the Idiot’s Array.
A chorus of cheers punctuated Shada’s remark.
Karrde’s chest tightened with pride. “All right, people,” he said. “Let’s go to work.”
A series of bleeps and whistles greeted Anakin as he came aboard the transport.
“Hey, Fiver,” he said. “I’m glad to see you, too.”
“Get back to work, you lazy little droid,” Vehn snapped over his shoulder from the pilot’s seat. “And you, hotshot, pick a cannon. Let’s see if we can shake this crud.”
“I’d feel better at the controls,” Anakin said, watching Yavin 4 dwindle to starboard.
“After what you did to her last time?” Vehn said. “No, thanks. No vapin’ thanks at all.”
“Your ship,” Anakin said.
“Ramming right it is.”
Anakin looked over the pilot’s shoulder at the screen. “Nice lead,” he remarked.
“Yeah. Those Vong ships take longer to pull out of an atmosphere. Out here they’re gaining, though.”
“What’s the plan?”
“Fly real fast until we get away.”
“That’s it?”
“Hey, I’m improvising. You gonna complain about me saving your butt?”
“No,” Anakin said, “I was thinking about thanking you. Now I’m not so sure.”
“Stop it. You’ll make me cry. If you have a plan, let me hear it.”
Anakin looked at the starfield. He was weak, very weak, but he thought he felt something.
“Give me long-range sensors,” Anakin said.
“Sorry, no can do. We were working on those when the creepy twins back there told me they ‘felt’ you needed help. We cut the repairs short and hot-jetted it.”
“Sannah, Valin,” Anakin said, gesturing them forward. “Concentrate. Do you feel something out there?”
“Sure,” Valin said, after a minute. “Kam Solusar is out there, somewhere.”
“Yes,” Sannah said. “I feel him, too.”
“I’m too weak to be sure, and so is Tahiri. Tell Vehn where.”
Valin studied the space around him for a moment, then pointed at around ninety degrees to starboard. “There.”
“ ‘There’?” Vehn asked. “That’s supposed to be a direction?”
“Do we have hyperdrive?” Anakin asked.
“No.”
“Then I suggest you set course where Valin tells you. Otherwise, we’re going to end up as star food.”
“It’s better than being captured again,” Tahiri said.
“Well, fine,” Vehn said. “The little creeps have been right so far, today.”
Anakin started to take the copilot’s seat, but Vehn placed his hand in it. “That’s Qorl’s,” he said.
“I’ll give it up,” Qorl said. “Every Solo I’ve ever known was a better pilot than me.”
“Don’t be silly,” Anakin said. “Even if that were true, you’re in better shape than I am to fly. Sorry to presume. You two seem to make a good team.”
The two men glanced at each other.
“Qorl gave me a certain … perspective on things,” Vehn said.
“With my boot, more often than not,” the old man said. But he was smiling, too.
“Well,” Anakin said awkwardly. “Thank you both. You came through for Tahiri and me when you could have just run.”
“Are you kidding? And have the little creeps back there slag my brain?” Vehn said.
“Anyway,” Qorl reminded them, “we’re not out of this yet. Twice I’ve been shot down on Yavin Four. My luck’s not so good when it comes to getting out of this system.”
“True,” Anakin said, “but we’re a lot nearer than we were.”
“Speaking of which, we’re gonna have words with some Vong in about half an hour,” Vehn said.
“They’re catching up that fast?”
“No. These are already out here.”
“I’ll take the turret gun,” Anakin said.
“Right. Give ’em an argument at least,” Vehn said.
“The transport has been engaged by Yuuzhan Vong, sir,” H’sishi reported. “They’ve taken a few hits, but they’re still coming, right for us.”
“How soon?” Karrde asked.
“If we plot a straight course, less than twenty minutes. But if we do that, we’ll be perfect targets for the blockade that’s forming up down there.”
“Yes, but if we go around, we’ll never reach them before that destroyer analog. Dankin, plot it straight in, and have the Idiot’s Array, the Demise, and the Etherway escort us.”
“Sir, they’re hardly our best-armed ships.”
“But they’re the only ones who can keep up with us, aren’t they? Keep her steady.”
“Very good, sir. We’ll be in their range in ten minutes. Unless they have something we don’t know about, which seems to be almost a given with the Vong.”
* * *
Anakin watched the third coralskipper spin off to port. He hadn’t destroyed it—his first two shots had been sucked in by the gravitic anomalies its dovin basal projected and the third had only tapped it—but the smaller craft didn’t have the speed to stay with the transport. They were more than nuisances, but not much more at this point.
It was the destroyer analog coming in from above starboard that bothered him, that and the fact that they couldn’t see much beyond it. For all they knew, there could be an entire fleet between him and Talon Karrde. If Karrde was there at all. He tried once again to reach out for Kam Solusar’s familiar presence and thought, briefly, that he had found it. But Kam might be light-years in that direction—or it might be wishful thinking. He couldn’t be sure.
What was sure was that very soon the destroyer was going to catch them. He hoped Vehn had a few tricks up his sleeve.
“Direct hit on the Idiot’s Array, sir,” H’sishi reported.
“Shada, are you there?” Karrde asked, over the comm.
“Still here, boss. They tickled us, but we can still keep up.”
“One more hit like that and you’re ions,” Karrde disagreed. “Peel off. You’ve done enough.”
“Sorry, boss. Can’t hear you. Something wrong with my comm unit. Hang tight, we’ll get you there.”
The power on the Wild Karrde suddenly dimmed and reasserted itself, and a distant vibration shivered the hull. The two ships still running escort weren’t keeping everything off of them; the Demise had flamed out in the first exchange, probably with all hands.
Good people. He would mourn them later, when he had time.
He saw the Idiot’s Array take her final hit, right through the engines. Plumes of plasma streamed from her, and atomic devils danced in the ruined aft section.
