Star Wars®: The Cestus Deception

by Steven Barnes

  Behind Obi-Wan an amphibious Aqualish’s translation pod gargled a question. “But what of living opponents?”

  The technician nodded, as if she had anticipated such a query. “Our very next demonstration involves an Advanced Recon Commando.”

  On cue, a single clone trooper, a commando in full battle armor, armed with an infantry-grade blaster rifle, stepped forward from his hiding place beneath the lip of the arena wall. Clone Commandos were specialized troopers. They had been modified from the basic trooper template to allow for specific training protocols. A blast helmet concealed his features, but his posture bespoke aggressive readiness. An uneasy mutter wound its way through the crowd.

  The amphibian seemed taken aback. “I…would not wish to be responsible for a death…”

  The technician fixed the Aqualish with a pitying gaze, as if every response had been anticipated. “Don’t worry.” Her motions were measured and relaxed as she manipulated a few controls. “The machine is calibrated for nonlethal apprehension.”

  Although that pronouncement quieted most of the witnesses, Obi-Wan felt even more uneasy. This droid, with its ethereal beauty and unconventional lethality, had something to do with his mission. But what? “What exactly is the trooper’s objective?” Obi-Wan called down.

  The corners of Lido Shan’s lips pulled upward. “To fight his way past the JK and capture me.”

  The muttering witnesses regarded her with disbelief and something more disturbing: anticipation. They knew they were about to witness something memorable. But which did they desire most? The JK defeated, or this snooty technician given her comeuppance?

  The trooper edged forward warily until he was about two dozen meters from the creature…

  Obi-Wan shook his head. Creature? Had he really done that? Thought creature instead of droid? What had triggered that?

  The trooper raised his blaster to his shoulder and fired a crimson bolt of light. The spinning absorption disks reappeared, sucking the energy bolts with a liquid crackling sound.

  But the mere fact that the droid needed a force screen seemed to encourage the trooper. He feinted to the right and then rolled to the left, sprang nimbly off his shoulder to fire again, repeatedly changing position as the droid continued its defensive action.

  Obi-Wan opened his senses, stretching out with the Force. He could almost feel the man’s racing heart, taste his nervousness, sense the choices weighed as he wove his evasive web. Left, right, left…the next move would be to the—

  Left again.

  As the great Jedi watched, the JK spat out a webbing of strands as thick as his small finger, ensnaring the clone helplessly in midleap. He might have been no more than a wounded thrantcill, bagged by any musk merchant with a net. The timing was superb. No. More than superb: it had been perfect. What kind of programming made such precision possible? Obi-Wan could swear that the aim had been almost precognitive, almost…

  But that was impossible.

  Struggling in the net as the JK dragged him closer, the trooper pulled his blaster around to draw a bead on the technician. Obi-Wan’s eyes flickered to the technician: she seemed unconcerned. In the moment before the barrel would have fixed on her, an orange spark flowed out along the tentacles. The trooper rocked with a single hard, violent shiver, thrashed his heels against the sand, and then lay still. The JK pulled him close, one tentacle lifting his trunk high enough for a second, more slender probe to flash a beam of light against the trooper’s closed eyes. The JK lowered the trooper back to the sand, then stood still and watchful.

  For a moment the crowd’s every intake of breath seemed frozen in their collective throats. Then the JK’s web unraveled, flowing back into the droid. The trooper groaned and rolled over onto his side. Another moment and he levered himself to his knees, wobbly but unharmed. Another trooper helped him retreat beneath the arena wall’s curved lip.

  The audience applauded, with the exception of Obi-Wan and another Jedi who edged his way through the crowd to stand beside him. Obi-Wan felt relief as the familiar form approached, and also as he saw that the newcomer was no more inclined toward applause than he.

  The newcomer was two centimeters taller than Obi-Wan, yellowish green in skin tone, with the ropy cranial sensor tentacles and unblinking eyes typical of a Nautolan. This was Kit Fisto, veteran of Geonosis and a hundred other lethal hot spots. He neither smiled nor applauded the JK’s actions: no Jedi would ever look at another being’s injury, no matter how superficial or temporary, as entertainment of any kind. Was it mere coincidence that the Nautolan was here, or had he, too, been summoned?

  Kit looked down at Obi-Wan’s hands, noted their tension. “Such displays are not to your liking?” he asked. His voice had a moist sibilance even when speaking of mundane issues. The surfaces of Fisto’s unblinking black eyes swirled. This was repressed anger, but few non-Nautolans would have known that.

  “I see little regard for the trooper’s welfare,” Obi-Wan said.

  Kit gave a humorless chuckle. “The reefs of policy and privilege make war seem merely some distant entertainment.”

  The globe-headed being in front of them turned his head 180 degrees without moving his shoulders. “Come now, sir. It’s just a clone, after all.”

  Just a clone. Flesh and blood, yes, but bred in a bottle, merely another of 1.2 million clone troopers born with no father to protect them, and no mother to mourn.

  Yes. Merely a clone.

  Obi-Wan had no interest in arguing. To these, who had little fear of dying in combat, whose offspring would also be spared a soldier’s terrible choices, clone troopers were a supreme convenience. This troglodyte had merely spoken his honest opinion.

  “Excellent, excellent,” said another witness, a leathery creature sporting a cyclopean cluster of eyes in the center of his head. “Excellent. I now understand how the JKs earned their reputation among the criminal class.”

  The two exchanged a swift, odd glance, piquing Obi-Wan’s curiosity. “Which is…?”

  The two turned back to the arena, pretending not to hear his question. Obi-Wan was not so easily fooled. Alarm trilled along his spine. These waters ran deep indeed.

  The leathery one spoke again. “You wish us to be concerned,” he said to Lido Shan. “We are prepared to acknowledge the potency of such a device. But…ahem…we are fortunate enough to have Jedi among us today. Would it be impolite to request a demonstration?”

  Obi-Wan watched as dozens of eyes turned toward them, evaluating, triggering whispers. He watched fingers, tentacles, and claws touch furtively, and was certain that credits were changing hands. Gambling on the outcome?

  Kit Fisto leaned closer without ever looking directly at him. “What do you make of this?”

  Obi-Wan shrugged. “I’ve little urge to satisfy their curiosity.”

  “Nor I,” Kit said, and his tendrils swirled with a life of their own. He then turned and addressed the technician. “Tell me,” he said. “Does JK-thirteen have meaning beyond a standard alphanumeric designation?”

  There it was, the question Obi-Wan himself had hesitated to ask.

  A thin current of whispers rippled in the arena. The technician shuffled her feet hesitantly. “Not officially…,” she began.

  “But unofficially?” Obi-Wan prodded.

  The tech cleared her throat uncomfortably. “Among smugglers and the lower classes,” she said, “some call them ‘Jedi Killers.’ ”

  “Charming,” he said, more to himself than anyone else, momentarily too stunned to answer. Jedi Killer? What was this obscenity?

  Beside him, Kit doffed his cloak, face set in its implacable pale green mask. His cranial tendrils, Obi-Wan noticed, were restless even as his unblinking eyes focused on the droid.

  “What are you doing?” Obi-Wan asked, knowing the inevitable answer. In fact, almost certainly, this was why Kit had been invited: his volatility and courage were renowned.

  “I would feel this thing for myself,” Kit said, voice deadly calm. He the
n raised his voice in challenge. “Technician! At your pleasure.”

  The Nautolan’s head sensors wavered in the still air. The droid regarded him without reaction. With a single glance back at Obi-Wan, Kit somersaulted to the floor of the arena with a poise and fluidity no chin-bret point guard could have dreamed of, landing without a sound.

  He stood a dozen meters away from the JK. As before, the droid seemed harmless. Master Fisto’s lightsaber flashed in his hand, and its emerald length rose from the hilt, scorching the air as it blossomed.

  The droid emitted a hum that climbed in pitch and intensity until Obi-Wan’s skin crawled. It remained motionless except for its surface, which once again segmented into an arachnid configuration. It seemed to sniff the air. Its insectile whine changed, as if it were wary of its new opponent.

  It extended tentacles again, but this time they wiggled in an oddly sluggish fashion. Strange indeed. Although previously appearing flexible and alert, was it now about to use the same tactics it had used against the commando? Perhaps the droid was not so advanced as he had initially feared…

  Kit’s lightsaber swatted the first tendril from the air with contemptuous ease. Obi-Wan found his attention straying from the JK, focusing instead on Kit, admiring the strength of his stance, the clarity of his angles as he chose lines of engagement. Kit favored the Form I style of combat, a fierce—

  Wait.

  Warning sirens howled in Obi-Wan’s mind. Something was terribly wrong. Intellect raced to keep pace with intuition. The JK’s repetition of previous patterns had lulled him into complacency. The tendrils were only a feint. Where, then, was the real attack?

  He leaned forward, examining the droid more carefully. Its feet. The spiky protrusions were sunken in the sand. And projecting outward from the treads themselves, burrowing under the surface…

  Were more tendrils, color-camouflaged to resemble sand. This thing attacked on two levels simultaneously, a strategy beyond most living warriors. Even more disturbing, it was deliberately misleading Kit by performing at multiple levels of tempo and efficiency, literally juggling its tactics, luring him to overconfidence.

  The sand tendrils were within centimeters of their target before Kit sensed them. His lidless black eyes grew wider still as the sand erupted. A stalk snaked around his foot, trying to yank him onto his back. Other vines raced to assist the first group.

  The onlookers gasped in amazement as they realized that they were about to see the unthinkable: a mere droid defeating a mighty Jedi!

  But Kit was far from vanquished. As if he, too, had merely been playing a game, he crouched and leapt forward, spinning on his body’s vertical axis like some kind of carnival acrobat, surging directly at the JK. He rode the JK’s yanking motion instead of fighting it, slipping between the tendrils, the Nautolan’s sense of timing faster and more precise than conscious thought.

  Whatever its powers, the droid had not anticipated such an assault, nor could it adjust in time. It released him and retreated up a step, all tendrils lashing at the Jedi. Kit’s lightsaber rained sparks. Tentacles flopped onto the sand, some of the larger pieces twitching, more like separate creatures than severed limbs.

  The Nautolan hit the sand, rolled, and bore in again instantly, his face tightened into a fighting snarl.

  Now the JK battled at maniacal intensity, and Obi-Wan wondered: What is it trying to do? Again and again the tendrils lashed at Kit’s head. Had Lido Shan failed to give the droid proper inhibiting commands? If so, and the gleaming monstrosity had a single opportunity, it would slay the Nautolan. Obi-Wan’s hand crept toward his lightsaber, the weight of thirty-six grueling flight hours banished from his limbs. If the need arose—

  But Kit had entered lightsaber range. At this more intimate distance, the droid was at a disadvantage. Now Kit was the predator, the JK reduced to the role of prey. Hissing, it retreated on its slender golden legs, tentacles wavering, as if it couldn’t crunch data fast enough to counter the unorthodox attack. Kit’s emerald lightsaber blade was here, there, everywhere: unpredictable, irresistible. The spinning energy disks no longer absorbed the strikes: now they merely deflected them, sparks raining in all directions.

  Kit accelerated into a blur of motion complex and rapid enough to baffle even Obi-Wan’s experienced gaze. The Nautolan Jedi’s lightsaber wove between the energy shields, descending on the JK’s housing for the first time. The droid emitted a painfully thin shriek. Its gleaming legs shivered.

  It collapsed to the sand. It twitched, struggling to rise. And then spilled onto its side, spewing smoke and sparks.

  The arena was silent as the crowd absorbed what they had just witnessed. Doubtless, some had never seen a Jedi in full action. It was one thing to hear whispered stories about mysterious Temple dwellers; another thing entirely to see the almost supernatural skills for oneself. A century hence, some might be regaling their great-grandchildren with tales of this demonstration.

  But there was another aspect of the affair that most eyes had missed, a strange phenomenon that had manifested first with the trooper, but seemed even more pronounced with Kit Fisto: the JK had anticipated the Nautolan’s responses.

  A bitter metallic taste soured Obi-Wan’s mouth, a sensation he recognized as the first whisper of fear. “What is this device?” he asked. “I note that the shields absorb, rather than deflect.”

  The technician nodded. “And what does that suggest to you, Master Jedi?”

  “It is no battlefield implement. It is designed to protect its environment, even from ricochets.”

  “Excellent,” she said.

  “And judging by its cosmetic appearance, the JK is some manner of personal security droid.”

  Lido Shan held up her hands, requesting silence. “That concludes the demonstration,” she said. “There will be briefings for some of you. As for the others, the Supreme Chancellor appreciates your presence.”

  The crowd drifted away, a few of them pausing to congratulate Kit. Perhaps they had considered descending to shake his hand or slap his back, but neither gesture seemed appropriate given the tightness around Kit’s dark, unblinking eyes.

  Obi-Wan jumped down from the stands and handed the Nautolan his cloak. Without a word Kit accepted it, and together they walked up the stairs toward the exit. Obi-Wan looked back at the sand, where service droids were still vacuuming up oil and fluids. What would he, Obi-Wan, have done given the same challenge? He allowed himself no doubt that he would have emerged victorious, but simultaneously realized that Kit’s chaotic, unpredictable approach had given the Nautolan an advantage against the machine. Obi-Wan’s own more measured response might well have proven less effective.

  On their way out they passed a knot of troopers, all carved from the same rock, all with the same broad shoulders and shielded faces, the same military bearing and polish. With surprising tenderness they cared for their defeated brother, and Obi-Wan wondered…

  The Nautolan’s tendrils lifted and Kit turned, seeming to read his mind. “Obi-Wan?”

  “For a moment I wondered if I had met him before.”

  “And?”

  “And I realized how foolish that thought was.”

  “Foolish?” Kit asked.

  “Yes. I’ve met every one of them.”

  True enough. Yet watching them caring for one of their own as if none of the witnesses existed, he wondered if he, or any outsider, really knew them at all.

  3

  The Chancellor’s briefing room was as tall as four Wookiees, its marble ceiling supported by massive duracrete pillars. Its vast bay window peered out on Coruscant’s magnificent skyline: the Bonadan embassy and revolving Skysitter Restaurant were directly across the avenue. The dense duracrete forest conveyed a sense of grandeur that impressed dignitaries from the Outer Rim but always left Obi-Wan wondering if something more productive might have been done with the space.

  At the moment a cluster of scaled and emerald-eyed Kuati dignitaries busily exchanged formal pleasantries and
good-byes with the Chancellor and his robed assistants. The two Jedi stood in a corner of the room as the ambassadors executed elaborate ceremonial bows.

  As they waited, Obi-Wan noted that Kit seemed a bit ill at ease. “Are you all right?” he asked quietly. “Did the droid come too close for comfort?” In truth, he could not remember Kit ever seeming other than utterly self-possessed.

  “My life does not revolve around comfort,” the Nautolan said. “Still…it was, as I’ve heard humans say, a ‘close shave.’ ”

  And strangely, even those words told Obi-Wan how challenging the JK had been. That last statement was as revelatory as the Nautolan Jedi had ever been.

  As the diplomats exited the room, Supreme Chancellor Palpatine finally addressed them, his broad, strong forehead creased with worry, lips drawn into a thin, tight line.

  “My pardon for the inconvenience and mystery, my friends,” he said. “I hope that you will shortly understand the need for both.”

  “Chancellor,” Obi-Wan said, in no mood for formal pleasantries. “Are you prepared to share this ‘Jedi Killer’s’ secret with us?”

  The Chancellor winced. “I admit to being mystified. Even our lowest citizens would not find such a vulgar appellation amusing.” After a pause for thought, he continued. “In the interest of providing context, please indulge a digression.” Palpatine waved them toward a pair of chairs. The Chancellor sat at his great desk, rectangles of light and shadow dividing his face into quadrants. He turned to the short-haired female technician, who had silently entered the room while the Chancellor spoke. “Lido Shan?”

  “With pleasure, sir,” she said. “When this device first came to our attention, our first priority was to determine exactly how it performs in such an unusual manner. Ordinary scans showed little of note in the inner workings, save for a completely shielded central processor unit.”

  “Naturally, that processor was the focus of your investigations,” Obi-Wan said.

  “Naturally,” Lido Shan replied, allowing her pale lips to curl into a smile. “Opening the processor invalidates the warranty, but we thought it worth the risk.”