Scourge

by Jeff Grubb

  Such a move would have left an ordinary opponent dazed, but the handmaiden was fueled by anger and hard spice. She flipped up to her feet immediately and met Mander’s own attack with a sharp strike toward the hilt, near the blade emitter. Despite himself, Mander pulled back, seeking to protect both his hand and the emitter. The Twi’lek seized that moment to press forward with a flurry of blows, Toro’s former blade arching like ionized lightning in the red-hued light of the factory-ship’s bridge. Mander was driven back, parrying blow after blow, but at last he caught and held his former apprentice’s blade on his own. The Twi’lek tried to move past the blade, but Mander held her at bay, guiding her back to a neutral position. She would have to retreat—lessen the pressure—if she was to make another attack, and then he would have her.

  “Too evenly matched,” said Mika. “You have knowledge but she has rage. Perhaps I can rattle that monklike calm that you Jedi love so much.”

  The Hutt pressed a couple of toggles on a console and the holoscreen changed. Instead of showing locations within the factory, they all showed the same display: the Barabi Run, perched on its landing cradle outside.

  “Where are your friends, Jedi?” asked Mika. “You had them when you came in. Did you think to send them to safety while you tried to deal with matters by yourself?”

  Mander let out a shout, but the Hutt’s pudgy digits punched a button. From half a dozen directions, beams of ionic power laced through the poisoned atmosphere and struck the ship. It disappeared in a ball of flame.

  Mander cried out at the sight, the image chilling him to his soul. The Twi’lek took advantage of his distraction. She jerked her head back, and then forward, arching the metal-shod tips of her head-tails above her and down onto the Jedi. One of the copper-colored tips carved a deep, hot crease along the side of Mander’s face, and the pain blossomed across his cheek and ear.

  He fell back from the Twi’lek, rolling as he did so and regaining his footing, buying himself time. But the Twi’lek did not pause from her assault, swinging wildly at him. He danced back, bringing his own blade up, but she beat it back, recovering in time to unleash another assault and not giving him a moment of peace. He could deflect the blows, but not return any of them, and with every assault she forced him farther back. Another two steps and she would have him against the wall, with nowhere to run.

  The Twi’lek, sensing her victory, made a broad, slashing attack against Mander’s stomach. He jumped back, against the wall itself, but smelled the burning of his robes as the blade passed too close to his flesh. His assailant was already recovering, bringing the crackling blade back along the same path.

  Mander thought of Reen, fighting this Twi’lek earlier in the Popara’s penthouse, and how easily she had dealt with her. Tempest or no, trained or not, this was the same woman with the same vulnerabilities. He ducked beneath the returning blade, and in doing so deactivated his own. He stepped into the arc of the Twi’lek’s attack, after the blade had passed, and twisted the lightsaber hilt in his hand before bringing the pommel up sharply against the Twi’lek’s chin.

  The Twi’lek’s violet eyes rolled up into her head from the shock and she pitched backward, losing her grip on the blade. The deactivated lightsaber followed the curve of her attack and flew, useless, across the room, spinning to a stop beneath one of the large holoscreens showing the burning wreckage of the Barabi Run.

  Mander turned toward Mika, standing at the command chair of the bridge. His face stung from the Twi’lek’s assault and, reaching up with his free hand, he felt something wet. His hand came away red with his own blood and fragments of plastoid. His comm had taken part of the blow, but jagged slivers of it were now piercing his flesh. He brushed the back of the bloody hand against his hair, shaking most of the splinters loose. His robes smelled of burned fabric, and his limbs ached from the fight.

  Mander thumbed his lightsaber alive once more and pointed it at Mika. He stepped toward the Hutt, who did not respond, but instead smiled at the Jedi as he advanced.

  “Surrender,” said Mander Zuma, though in his heart he wished the Hutt would try something. Go for a weapon. Try to flee. Try to use the Force on him again. Something that would give him a reason to cut him down and avenge Toro and Reen and Angela Krin. For a brief moment he could feel an abyss of emotion and temptation yawn before him.

  “It’s over,” he said simply.

  “Not yet,” said the Hutt, and his stubby hand reached down to the command console, slamming a cluster of buttons.

  At once the massive engines flared to life, and the ship gave a violent jerk. Mander was unprepared as the entire cabin lurched forward, the factory-ship tearing loose of its moorings and straining upward. Outside, he could hear small explosions as final connections were jettisoned. He stumbled, dropping to one knee. Mika smiled and pressed another series of buttons on the console. The factory engaged its huge rear engines, and the ship almost cleared the lip of the crater, the rocky edge scraping along the lower fuselage as it passed.

  Mander fell backward, his lightsaber flickering back to an inert state as he slammed heavily against the rear bulkhead. Dazed, the Jedi tried to bring the blade up, to reignite it and parry whatever assault the Hutt had planned, but he was too late.

  Mander writhed in pain as something heavy smashed into the hand holding the lightsaber, and in his grip the Jedi could feel his weapon come apart, sharded into pieces by the weight of the blow. The hilt split beneath the impact, the emitter crystal fractured, and fragments scattered in all directions.

  He had been bludgeoned by the blunt end of a heavy electrospear. Above him towered Mika the Hutt, a look of victory in his broad face.

  “Now,” said the Hutt. “Now it is over.”

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY

  FALL OF THE HUTT

  “I was surprised to discover how many materials in the galaxy can resist the power of a lightsaber,” said Mika, leaning on the electrospear and driving its heavy hilt harder onto Mander’s damaged hand. “Of course, there is a great inducement for people to discover them. This particular one is called phrik. It was rare before the war and is even rarer now. Still, there are surviving examples, which are available for a discerning collector.”

  Mika leaned forward, driving his weight down onto the Jedi’s hand. Mander could feel cartilage grinding and bones cracking as his hand was pinned beneath the butt of the electrospear. The pieces of his lightsaber were scattered around him. Mander rolled toward the remains of his blade’s housing and flung the pieces upward, hoping to catch the Hutt in his broad, taunting face.

  His throw was close enough, and the weight lessened for just a moment as the Hutt pulled back in surprise. Mander pulled his injured hand out from beneath the electrospear and rolled in the other direction, away from the Hutt.

  Beneath him the floor vibrated, the ancient ship now taking to the sky. The deck was tilted upward, away from him, and Mika was framed in the forward screen. Ahead of them Ardos burned with a vengeful and ineffective white fury, the other stars behind it clearly visible in its corona. The holoscreens were now all filled with static, and the bridge was a patchwork of red light broken by blue-gray bursts. The fallen form of the Twi’lek handmaiden was still slumped by one console.

  Mander rose to his feet, cradling his shattered hand against his torso. He could feel the bones slide against one another, and was sure that at least three of them were broken. He wanted to concentrate, to use the Force to reach out and gather the wounded parts of himself together and assuage the pain, but there was no time.

  “I really wanted you to be on my side,” said Mika, stalking Mander across the bridge, slowly. “I wanted to have one of your Order working for me. It would have been an emblem of power, of control. A status symbol. I thought I had simply made a mistake with young Toro, that I had tried the wrong approach. Giving into his weaknesses, downplaying his strengths, making him need my Tempest. Need me. But now I see that I did as well as I could have expected. You Jeedai, y
ou could never be …” He rolled his tongue around, searching for the right word. At last he settled on “… domesticated.”

  “We’ve found your base on Varl,” said Mander. “Others will find it as well.” He pushed the pain away and stood up straighter.

  “You’ve inconvenienced me,” said Mika. “Now I have to find another, newer methodology. Perhaps strip-mining Varl’s poisoned soil and setting up shop in some asteroid base, far from the normal space lanes. That would be another step in the process, and that means more people to hire and more pseudopods to grease. As I said, it is an inconvenience. Nothing more.”

  Mander looked around. His lightsaber was fragments and dust. The Hutt hefted the heavy-tipped electrospear and coiled up on himself, readying himself for action. Should Mander try for the exit, the Hutt would block him. Mika was preparing to charge him anyway, to rush him and overwhelm him with his bulk.

  “You have been a good tool,” said the Hutt. “But all tools break eventually and must be discarded.” And with that the Hutt rushed him.

  Mander reached out with his unwounded hand and let the Force surge through him. Ignoring the pain, ignoring Mika himself, he reached out to Toro’s short-hafted lightsaber, lying sleeping and inert by the Twi’lek’s collapsed form.

  He pulled the hilt toward him.

  It was in his hand in an instant, and the blade leapt from its emitter at the first touch. He caught Mika’s phrik spear in his assault, and felt the energy blade try to bite into the silvery metal, to cleave it in two. But the electrospear was too resilient, and the best Mander could do was bat the weapon away, dancing from the momentum of Mika’s bulk.

  Mika staggered backward and again coiled on himself, his tail pulled under his body. “Good,” said the Hutt. “I would have been disappointed if you had just let me kill you.”

  Across the room, Mander swayed on the shuddering deck. He felt odd and out of place here, far from his records on Yavin 4, bearing a strange weapon wielded in the wrong hand. He could not feel half of his face. He could feel his wounded hand all too well. Yet Mander cleared his mind and said simply, “As I said before, Mika, it is over.”

  Mander leapt forward himself now, with a fluid grace that caught Mika unaware. The Hutt brought up the electrospear to block his assault, but Mander beat his way past it, aiming a blow at the Hutt’s triangular head. Mika dodged the blow, but only just; the lightsaber left a burning crease along one side of the Hutt’s face, from the corner of his mouth to his small ear.

  Mander landed to one side, his feet firmly planted, finally sure of himself. He circled the tip of his blade at the Hutt, daring him to charge.

  Mika’s eyes flashed with anger, but only for a moment, and Mander could see Toro’s training in the Hutt. A burst of hot anger, then tamping it down, bringing his rage under control, planning for the next move.

  The Hutt lunged, his full weight behind his assault, using the heavy shaft of the electrospear as a staff. Mander fell back in firm, careful steps, letting the Hutt’s torrential assault pound with futile effect against a series of precise parries. As he fought, Mander felt the defenses with Toro’s blade come to him more easily, and his deflections were now sure and steady. The shortened hilt made such parries easier than with his own blade.

  And Mika’s maneuvers were familiar. Mander had seen them before, on Yavin 4, training his apprentice.

  Mika the Hutt was sweating, his skin glistening with a thin slime. He had sparred with Toro, yes, but Mander’s apprentice had never taken the Hutt to his limits. Mander danced to one side, dodged a precise stab, and was up again. He feinted to the other side of the Hutt’s face, and Mika brought up his weapon in a panicked countermove to avoid another scorching wound.

  Mika made a heavy overhand smash with the electrospear and Mander caught it with a steering block, catching the blow with his own blade. Against a normal foe this would stalemate the fight, but the Hutt used his weight and size to his advantage, leaning forward and pressing Mander both backward and downward.

  The Jedi felt his knees start to buckle, and knew he could not throw Mika back nor steer the blow aside. Instead he pulled backward on himself, retreating less than a step, a sudden break from the assault.

  Mander was gambling that Toro had not taught Mika this trick, the one that Mander had used the final time they dueled. Mander was right. The Hutt tumbled forward with a surprised cry, and Mander had the blade up again, aiming for the soft knuckles on the Hutt’s right hand, where Mika had gripped the electrospear.

  The Hutt let out a shriek of pain as Toro’s lightsaber bit deeply into his fingers, and he fell back, the phrik electrospear clattering to the floor. Mika held up his ruined hand, the dark blood already cauterized and crusted on the stumps of his fingers. Anger burned in the Hutt’s eyes, an anger deeper than any Tempest-inspired rage.

  Mika cursed and with his good hand funneled the Force, fueled by that sense of wounded rage, against Mander Zuma. The blow of energy caught the Jedi square in the midsection, and Mander sprawled backward. The unfamiliar lightsaber, wielded in the wrong hand, flew from his stunned grip …

  … and into the hand of Mika the Hutt, retrieved by the Force. “I’ve been a fool,” said the Hutt. “I should have made the Pantoran Jeedai teach me the ways of this weapon.”

  Mander rolled out of the way as the Hutt tried to use the lightsaber like a club—a heavy, unpracticed attack that did nothing but leave a deep gouge where the Jedi had been moments before. Mander jumped to his feet and lashed out a wicked kick against the Hutt’s midsection. He did not remember enough Hutt biology to understand where it landed, but Mika howled in pain and brought Toro’s blade around again.

  And a blaster bolt caromed off the Hutt’s rubbery hide.

  Screaming, Mika wheeled, and Mander saw that Reen Irana was gripping the side of the canted control room doorway, a smoking blaster carbine in her hand.

  “I knew I shouldn’t have left you alone,” she shouted, leveling another shot at the Hutt.

  Mika was fast now, moving like a serpent, closing the distance between him and the Pantoran, the lightsaber burning in his good hand like a torch. Reen fired a few wild shots at the Hutt, and then disappeared out the doorway. Mika wheeled again to take care of Mander before pursuing the smaller prey.

  When the Hutt turned, he saw Mander with the electrospear, cradled against his wounded side, charging point-first. Mika did not have time to bring the lightsaber up as the Jedi slammed into him, driving the spear through the Hutt’s body and into the bulkhead beyond it. The Hutt’s eyes widened in fear and what Mander thought for a moment was indignation. The lightsaber died and dropped from the Hutt’s nerveless fingers. Mika tried to speak, but the only thing in his mouth was blood.

  Mander Zuma dropped to his knees next to the Hutt, pinned to the wall like an insect in a collection. Reen reappeared, kneeling beside him.

  “You look horrible,” she said, and touched the bloody scar along Mander’s face.

  “You should see the other guy,” said Mander, and nodded at the Hutt. He tried to manage a laugh, but found he could not. All he could manage was a deep wheeze.

  “We have to go,” she said.

  “We just need to get control of the ship,” said Mander. “Put her in a steady orbit and contact the New Ambition. We should be all right.”

  “No,” said Reen, putting a hand on his shoulder, “we have to go now. We couldn’t fight our way out to the Barabi Run, so we retreated to the engineering deck. When the engines started, Angela and I threw the cutoff switches. We thought we could stop it from taking off, but we weren’t quick enough. We did manage to sabotage the main drive, though, and here’s the thing: we’re not going to reach escape velocity.”

  Mander blinked, realizing that the deep rumble of the ship was missing now, and had disappeared sometime during the fight. He looked up at the main screen and saw that they were no longer pointed at Ardos and the stars. Instead Varl’s bulk was rising in their path. The spice factory tha
t was really a ship was not a ship at all anymore.

  It was a projectile launched from the planet, now falling back to its point of origin.

  “Vago knew about an escape pod. Can you make it?” asked Reen. She was already under Mander’s shoulder, helping him up. Mander shook her off gently and cleared his mind. Push down the pain. Push down the hurt. For just a little longer. He swayed a bit as Reen separated from him and moved around the damaged bridge. Probably trying to figure out if something could be done on this end, Mander thought. Probably determining it was too late.

  “I’m okay,” he said after a few heartbeats. “Let’s go.”

  “Jeedai,” said Mika the Hutt, pinioned to the wall, his voice bubbling with blood.

  Reen and Mander looked at each other. The Hutt was still alive.

  “Take me with you,” Mika said. “I will come quietly. You win.”

  Mander almost took a step toward the Hutt, but realized the familiar feeling in the base of his brain. A quiet, reassuring voice saying, The Hutt is harmless, the Hutt is weak.

  Why be afraid of the small Hutt?

  Even at the last, Mika was trying to use the Force to influence them.

  Reen said, “We can’t just leave him.”

  Mander shook his head. “You go into the hall,” he said. “I will follow.”

  “But …”

  “He’s doing to you what he did to Angela Krin.” Reen looked at him, surprised and shocked, and then fled the control room.

  “I can be useful to you,” said the Hutt, his eyes filmy and unfocused now. “A good craftsman keeps good tools.”

  Mander shook his head, dispelling the fantasies that Mika’s voice put there. The Jedi leaned in close to the dying Hutt.

  “That’s where you went wrong in the first place,” Mander said. “We aren’t tools.” And he, too, left the bridge, Varl now huge in the main viewscreen. Behind him Mander could hear Mika bellowing in pain and frustration.

  Reen and the others had been busy earlier, while he had been on the bridge. The catwalks were blackened with blasterfire, and large rents had been furrowed into the bulkheads. Pipes of Varl fluid were shattered and spewing over decks, reducing them to slick pools. Droid chassis were scattered everywhere, and what asp droids were still functional were flailing about at the limitations of their programming, some trying to reactivate the ship’s systems, others trying to contain the spills of semi-refined Tempest, and still others continuing to move containers from one place to another. Mander and Reen encountered one of the ancient war droids, now damaged and walking in a circle, one leg shattered and useless, its weapons depowered.