The Essential Novels

by James Luceno

  The other five Cuis clones laid aside their staffs and sent their opponents’ weapons spinning from their hands with a single gesture. All the Lekauf clones were knocked flat on their backs and pinned down by an invisible hand.

  It had been a very brief demonstration. Lekauf looked resigned to his fate, hands clasped behind his back, eyes fixed straight ahead.

  “I would not expect any man to defeat a Jedi without adequate weapons,” said Palpatine.

  Vader wasn’t sure if that was a verdict of failure or simply an observation. He glanced at Lekauf. “No, Master,” he said, addressing the Emperor but watching his aide. “Perhaps we should now try this again without allowing use of their Force powers.”

  “No, I have seen enough.” Palpatine pulled his cowl a little farther over his face. “I will take the Cuis clones and train them more. Your Lekauf batch may yet prove useful for other tasks.”

  We could simply clone an entire army of the Cuis template. We know what they can do. But a soldier is the product of constant training. They need to see action.

  “I suggest that we put them all on active service and see how they perform,” said Vader.

  Palpatine paused again. “Yes. But commission a battalion of Cuis models from Arkanian Micro anyway. I’m impressed by how much the clones have retained of his Force abilities.”

  Lekauf’s clones had picked themselves up and were waiting at stand easy with their hands clasped behind their backs.

  “Does that mean we’re returning to Imperial Center?” Lekauf asked, unable to disguise his desperation.

  “Yes, Lieutenant, it does.” Vader strode ahead, and Lekauf managed to match his pace. His six clones collected their helmets and weapons and followed him, as did the Cuis batch. Sheyvan brought up the rear, looking sullen.

  “I apologize for our performance, sir,” said Lekauf.

  Vader noted the use of the word our. “I won’t consider that failure in hand-to-hand combat until I see you fight ordinary men.”

  “That’s very generous of you, sir.”

  No, it wasn’t generous: it was fair. The test against the Cuis clones was merely an act of curiosity and no reason to judge them unfit. Vader watched them mount the ramp of his Lambda-class shuttle and noted that even with their helmets on, he could tell the Lekauf from the Cuis simply by their bearing and their disciplined, synchronized stride. The Cuis clones looked more like athletes than soldiers, and—he couldn’t help but notice—they did not move like one machine.

  “Smarten up,” Lekauf snapped, instinctively knowing what Vader thought with his usual unerring accuracy. “You’re in the Five Hundred and First now.”

  COMMANDING OFFICER’S DAY CABIN,

  SHUTTLE ST 321, EN ROUTE

  TO IMPERIAL CENTER

  “I think I might like the Cuis battalion under my personal command,” said the Emperor, leaning back in Vader’s seat as the shuttle jumped to hyperspace.

  Vader ignored the infringement on his own territory and simply registered the fact that his Master bothered to do it. It was another of those little tests, the constant pushing and prodding designed to make Vader hungry for supremacy and angry enough to seize it. A thousand small threats would feed the dark side within him, but sometimes it seemed more for sport than education.

  I don’t need you to keep me sharp, Master. I won’t forget what drives me. And I’ll kill you one day, yes, but the day will be of my choosing, not a reflex when you finally provoke me once too often.

  “They will not form part of the infantry, then, Master?”

  Palpatine’s tone hardened a little. “I know how to command an army, Lord Vader.”

  “I mean that the Cuis clones are effectively all Hands, and so might be ideal for special operations.”.

  The Emperor accepted a glass of water from Lekauf, who never seemed to find menial tasks demeaning. “Yes, I shall train them to carry out many tasks.”

  Vader still managed to avoid the words that always hung between them now. “Cuis was loyal to his Master to the end. He would not reveal his name.”

  “A commendable quality that I hope will be found in his clones.”

  “It may be genetic, but it can also be encouraged.”

  It can also be crushed. Vader thought of the man he had been—yes, there was no pain now, just a vivid and angry determination—and those whom he had loved but who had betrayed him. He could still re-create that cold, focusing sense of disappointment when he realized that Palpatine had sent Cuis, and that the only thing he could trust him to do was be a source of constant threat. Knowing how alone he truly was might have made him stronger, but it did not comfort him. He suspected it was why he surrounded himself with the Lekaufs of this world: not simply because loyal soldiers were good soldiers, but also because it reassured the small part of him that had been Anakin, the part that still seemed sufficiently useful not to suppress. Lekauf was soothing: a man who liked to know where he stood, a man who simply wanted to excel and be given clarity of purpose in exchange for his devotion.

  You won’t disappoint me. So many people disappoint me.

  “Lieutenant,” said Palpatine, looking past Vader to where Lekauf stood in patient silence. “What makes you loyal to Lord Vader?”

  Lekauf, normally uncomfortable around Palpatine, relaxed a little. Vader could feel it. Lekauf’s doubts and passions seldom showed on his face, but he had them. Vader could always taste them, and sometimes he relied on them to understand what was happening within the Imperial Army.

  “With your permission, sir,” said Lekauf, and looked to Vader. “It’s because my lord never asks his men to do anything that he wouldn’t do himself.”

  “Laudable,” said Palpatine.

  Honest, thought Vader. He could have said that the Empire was all that was holy and I was its instrument. But he gave a soldier’s answer.

  The Emperor went back to sipping his water, and Lekauf still stood motionless. He wouldn’t sit unless Vader was seated. Vader was used to that now and occasionally had to order the man to sit when it was clear he needed to.

  “Call your wife, Lekauf,” said Vader. “Tell her when you will be arriving.”

  There was a brief flare of excitement in Lekauf’s spirit that illuminated the Force for a brief moment. “Thank you, sir. Thank you.”

  Lekauf saluted and disappeared through the hatch toward the cockpit. Master and apprentice remained silent until he was out of earshot.

  “You constantly surprise me with your capacity for … compassion,” said Palpatine, somehow shaping the word into an insult

  “Motivation,” said Vader, daring to correct Palpatine. “There would be no point in denying Lekauf such a small thing. Exercising power for the sake of it achieves nothing. Knowing when to let it go does.”

  “Making people want to please you is an important skill,” said Palpatine. “You are becoming adept at it. Fascinating, is it not? To see that desire for approval?”

  Ah, he enjoyed it. It was his sport. This was more than the exercise of political power. He liked to see people, helpless lesser people, in his thrall.

  I no longer wish to please you, my Master. Vader decided he was content to be a simpler man, relying on strength and clarity. Your need for games will one day be your undoing—now I know where you weakness lies. I will use it when the time is right.

  Vader settled down in the seat opposite—normally the first officer’s—and occupied his time catching up with reports from Imperial bases in the Outer Rim.

  It should have been a short, uneventful flight. And it was, right up to the time when something tingled at the back of his throat and he looked up, hand reaching instinctively for his lightsaber. Then the red action stations alarm lit up the bulkhead, and the warning klaxon deafened him.

  Palpatine, still all glacial calm, placed his glass carefully on the nearest table and opened up the comlink to the cockpit.

  “What is the problem?” he asked.

  There was nothing but the crackle of
static from the other end of the link. Vader was already at the hatch, his Force-senses tearing their way through what seemed like layers of padding and smoke to feel clearly what had been hidden from him by a concerted effort. The Dark Jedi were in revolt, struggling to screen their intentions from him, but all he needed to know was that they had no plans to be loyal to him.

  They were probably coming for him.

  Cuis clones were still on their donor’s mission, it seemed.

  Vader strode down the passage to the cockpit, lightsaber drawn, the pulsing red action stations light reflecting off his armor. He could hear blasterfire. He opened his com-link. “Lekauf, what’s happening?”

  “The Cuis clones killed the pilots and seized the entire forward section of the ship, sir.” The b-dappp of a blaster bolt interrupted the lieutenant. “It’s just me, my clones, and the navigation officer back here. We’re trying to blast the hatches open at the ten-meter bulkhead.”

  “Wait for me.”

  “I don’t think you should come down here, sir.”

  “I will deal with it. They want me.”

  “Sheyvan seems to want the Emperor, sir, not you.”

  Vader felt the shuttle lurch as if it had made a sudden course correction. He strode back to the day cabin and checked the navigation display repeater to check the heading; the shuttle was now traveling toward the Outer Rim. Palpatine was still sitting calmly in his seat, his lightsaber hilt on his lap.

  A thought crossed Vader’s mind. He phrased it carefully. “Is this a live-fire exercise you saw fit not to mention to me, Master?”

  “It is not,” said Palpatine.

  Another of his games, though. Perhaps he has tasked the Cuis clones to kill me. “You are in danger, Master.”

  “I can handle seven Dark Jedi, Lord Vader. What neither of us can handle, however, is the vacuum of space. So let us ensure there is no hull breach.”

  “Seven,” said Vader. “You include your own Hand, then.”

  “Either Sheyvan is dead, or he is part of this rebellion, in which case he will die anyway.”

  The Lambda was a small craft, twenty meters stem-to-stern, and Palpatine could fight as well with his Force powers from the day cabin as he could within lightsaber range of an enemy. Vader took his calm reaction as tacit proof that the Emperor knew he was not at risk, but that Vader was. And suddenly he resented him for compromising his crew, who deserved better than this.

  “I will deal with this, Master. There is no need for you be involved.” Don’t put obstacles in my way. Don’t try to test me further. Keep out of this fight. “Lekauf and I will restore order.”

  Vader strode back down the passageway and came out at the hatch one compartment aft of the ten-meter bulkhead. Smoke and the smell of discharged blaster filled the air; Lekauf, the navigation officer Pepin, and the Lekauf clones had stacked crates as a defensive barrier and were alternating between blasting at the hatch and attempting to force the sections apart with a metal bar.

  “If we didn’t have Jedi on the other side of the hatch, this would be open by now,” said Pepin, grunting with the effort as he put all his weight on the metal bar.

  “It’s Sheyvan, sir,” said Lekauf. “He led them.”

  Vader walked up to the hatch, moved Pepin out of the way with an assertive hand, and struck his balled fist against the durasteel twice.

  “Sheyvan, give up. You can never defeat me.”

  Sheyvan’s voice was muffled. Vader’s amplified hearing picked out the words clearly even through the heavy durasteel.

  “He betrayed us,” said Sheyvan. “The Emperor betrayed us all.”

  “Open this hatch.”

  “He uses us, Lord Vader. Don’t you understand?”

  Oh, yes, indeed I do. And I could rip this hatch apart with the power of my will, but I want to hear more. How did you find the strength to defy Palpatine?

  “I said open the hatch.”

  “He makes us believe we’re each the only Hand, and then we find—he throws away our lives, Lord Vader, and our loyalty deserves better.”

  Indeed it does. So did mine. Who am I still angry with—Palpatine or Kenobi? Which Master disappointed me more?

  “Cuis clones!” He rapped the hatch again. “You cannot have your donor’s memories. What makes you feel betrayed enough to threaten your Emperor?”

  A dead man’s voice answered with a slightly different accent, the accent of Sheyvan. “We’re loyal to the man who trained us, Lord Vader.”

  “Terrific,” said Lekauf. “Smart way to turn their qualities against us.”

  There was no disputing their capacity for loyalty, and Vader had been right to spot that quality in Cuis; but he hadn’t known how betrayed Sheyvan would feel by finding he wasn’t the only Hand, and by discovering what had happened to Cuis.

  But Palpatine must have known the reaction was likely. Had he engineered this, putting a bitter man in charge of training Dark Jedi who were highly likely to take on their instructor’s cause? Had he influenced Sheyvan’s mind? Vader never knew how many layers there were to Palpatine’s intrigue, only that he was tired of it.

  Lekauf was right. Loyalty was a two-edged sword. It was a pity that it was working against him at the moment.

  “Lord Vader,” said Sheyvan. “Lord Vader, help us overthrow Palpatine. You could rule in his place.”

  Yes, I will oust him. But now seemed very soon, too soon. Vader considered it for a moment. He turned and caught Lekauf staring at him, then dismissed the thought.

  “Stand back and let me open this hatch, Lieutenant.”

  The Cuis clones heard him. It felt as if one had moved closer to the hatch. “If you attempt to storm the cockpit,” the clone shouted, “we’ll overload the laser cannons and destroy the ship.”

  Lekauf nodded. “They can do that, sir,” he said quietly. “They have control of all weapons systems.”

  “Then we need to neutralize them safely.”

  “Safe for them?”

  “Safe for us.”

  “If you’re prepared to cope without life support for a while, my lord, I can probably cut power to the whole ship,” said Pepin. “The generator is on our side of the hatch.”

  That would cripple the laser cannons. It meant fighting in darkness, but Vader and the clones all had helmet enhancements that enabled them to see in infrared and low light. Pepin could manage somehow.

  “They still have their lightsabers, sir, even if we kill the power,” said Lekauf. “They’re very good at deflecting blasterfire, and any heavier ordnance might blow a hole in our hull anyway.”

  “I’ve got something they’ll have trouble deflecting,” said Nele, the Lekauf clone who had been thrown across the gymnasium. He hefted a large rifle with a cylindrical chamber mounted where an optical scope would have been on a conventional blaster rifle. “Instant barbecue.”

  Lekauf looked embarrassed for a moment. “A flamethrower, sir. He’s right. Better to char the section than put a big hole in it. And it’s quick.”

  Vader couldn’t imagine his ultraformal lieutenant teaching his clones phrases like instant barbecue, but there was clearly a side to the man he hadn’t yet seen.

  “Fire is the greatest danger in a vessel.”

  “Not as dangerous as letting them blow up the ship, sir.”

  “Very well,” said Vader. He could use the Force to contain damage if he had to. Feeling a presence approaching, he looked around to see Palpatine, standing serene at the end of the passageway and simply … observing. “Make ready.”

  Vader regretted the waste of Cuis’s clones. But this was a matter of survival, and if a Hand could turn on the Emperor, the man who had originally inspired his devotion, then he had instilled in his trainees a capacity to do the same.

  Clones were always fast learners. That was a two-edged sword as well.

  Palpatine remained at the end of the passageway that ran the length of Lambda’s starboard side. He had projected a shimmering field in front of him, a s
ilent statement that he would not participate in the fight.

  “I have confidence in you, Lord Vader.”

  That trick no longer works on me, Master.

  “And I have confidence in my men.” Vader could see from the tight control on Lekauf’s face that he was now far from inspired by the Emperor. For once, here was someone whom he didn’t appear able to imbue with the desire to please him. Lekauf seemed to feel what Vader felt. It was unsettling to see that in an ordinary man.

  Pepin stood with a hydrospanner in his hand, ready to shut down the shuttle’s drives and generator. Lekauf positioned the six clones on either side of the hatch with flamethrowers and blasters ready.

  Vader stood back. What they needed was not so much his fighting skills as his ability to prevent the Dark Jedi from using the Force. They almost certainly had a danger sense as acute as his—and seven of them together could reach out from behind that hatch and thwart Pepin or any of the clones.

  He took a breath and centered himself, shutting out almost everything around him until he was aware only of the living beings in the shuttle. He could feel Lekauf and his men; he could feel Pepin at the power controls. And he could feel the seven vortices of dark energy behind the bulkhead in the forward section as if no durasteel stood between them at all.

  There was a click and whir of blasters charging and a faint hiss as three of the clones adjusted the pressure in their flamethrowers.

  “Ready when you are, sir,” said Lekauf.

  Vader concentrated on Pepin and enveloped him in a Force-shield.

  “Pepin—now!”

  Vader felt a sense of focus from behind the hatch as seven minds seemed to sense the threat and reached out. Pepin cut the generator and the shuttle was plunged into darkness except for the shimmering red blade of his light-saber. He raised his left hand, knowing exactly where the weakest point of the hatch was, and sent a massive Force push that swept the two halves of the hatch doors apart.