Emissary of the Void

by Greg Keyes

  talent for the Force. Still, now and then, his luck was unusual enough to

  suggest that Master Skywalker's academy had left him with something.

  This time, he didn't think he would be as lucky as usual. When a sixth flier

  rose up from below the barge, scarcely two meters to his right, he was sure

  of it. He winced as blasters fired.

  But the bolts seared over his head and struck the flier harassing him at

  close range, and his focus suddenly changed, centering on the

  yellow-and-black-clad figure at the controls of the newly arrived vessel.

  The figure was gesturing impatiently.

  'You don't have to tell me twice,'' Uldir muttered. Still dodging the more

  distant fire, he ran toward the flier and jumped in. The instant he was on

  board, the girl punched the throttle, weaving through a net of white bolts.

  'Thanks,'' Uldir said.

  'If this is a trick, you'll regret it,'' the girl snapped. 'Why were you

  chasing me?''

  'I didn't know you were Jedi.''

  The girl banked crazily and dropped low toward the landscape.

  'I think you really want altitude, here,'' he added.

  'Yeah? You want to fly?''

  'Um -- okay.''

  'Great.'' She let go of the controls, leaving Uldir to dive for them before

  the flier smacked into a transmission tower. Meanwhile, she went back to

  work on whatever was strapped to her leg.

  'Didn't know I was Jedi?_That's_ why everyone else is after me.''

  'I thought you were a thief,'' Uldir explained, nosing up in time to avoid a

  serious insult from coherent light and charged particles. 'Why are they

  after you?''

  'Because I'm Jedi. Are you stim-pickled? Don't you know every planet in the

  galaxy is scrambling to turn us over to the Yuuzhan Vong?''

  'I'm aware of that,'' Uldir said, dryly. 'I nearly got turned in myself.''

  She laughed. 'You're no Jedi.''

  That stung more than Uldir cared to admit. 'Hey, be nice to me. I saved your

  skinny . . . er, your skin.''

  'And I returned the favor,'' she reminded him. 'We're even now. So. Why

  would anyone try to turn you in?''

  Uldir flipped a lock of his chestnut hair away from his eyes. 'I'm a rescue

  flier,'' he said. 'An ex-partner of mine turned out to be Peace Brigade, and

  he found out I once attended the Jedi academy. He arranged an ambush I was

  lucky to get out of. That was right after the Yuuzhan Vong warmaster

  announced that if all the Jedi were turned over to him, he'd stop conquering

  the galaxy.'' He shook his head. 'As if anyone could really believe that.''

  'You attended Master Skywalker's academy?'' The girl asked, skeptically.

  'Is there another?''

  'No.''

  'I didn't have any aptitude for the Force, though,'' Uldir added.

  'So much is obvious,'' the girl said.

  'Yeah, I think you mentioned that,'' Uldir said, veering sharply to port,

  where the police fliers were trying to flank him and doing a pretty good

  job. 'Hold on a second,'' he said. 'We'll have to fight a little, here.'' He

  glanced over his shoulder. 'My name is Uldir, by the way.''

  'Klin-Fa Gi, at your service,'' she said grimly. 'You almost got me killed,

  Uldir. Don't do it again.''

  'I'll try not to, Klin-Fa Gi. Stay down. We're going to take some hits.''

  'Not if I have anything to say about it.''

  For the second time that night, she leaped past him, landing with feline

  grace on the prow of the speeder. She stood there, a perfect target for the

  two fliers they were barreling toward. Then a snap-hiss carried over the

  wind, and a sliver of yellow energy appeared in her left hand, cutting

  quickly into a figure eight and sending a pair of blaster bolts humming off

  into the wastelands.

  _So that's what was taped to her leg_, Uldir concluded. Klin-Fa must have

  walked in front of one of the weapons sensors that Bonadan was lousy with.

  'I guess I have shields now,'' Uldir murmured, thumbing the blaster fire

  controls on his stick and jinking starboard. His shot was dead on, frying

  the opposing flier's stabilizer. It went spinning off. Uldir hoped the pilot

  would get the flier under control before it hit the ground below.

  _That's one_, he thought, as Klin-Fa executed another crazy series of

  parries that left their flier unscathed by enemy fire.

  As he'd noticed before, the pilots weren't stupid. Contrary to the usual

  tactics of aerial combat, they were now trying to get underneath them, where

  the Jedi's lightsaber wasn't. He let the flier drop, hoping that Klin-Fa

  could keep her footing, afraid to do any really tight turns.

  Shadowed wasteland came up at them, endless hectares of chemical-blistered

  ground cut into fractal patterns by violent erosion. Bonadan's primary was

  now a thin red lens on the horizon, and a little north of that lightning

  serpentined inside an anvil-shaped cloud. The wind tasted of water, grit,

  and unwholesome carbon compounds.

  The storm gave him an idea, though, so he flattened his course toward the

  thunderhead. Rain would stymie eyesight, and lightning would confuse

  instruments. Maybe even the eye-in-the sky droids the patrol was undoubtedly

  tapping into. If he and Klin-Fa got through that, maybe he could circle back

  and find the_No Luck Required_ before the security fliers picked up the

  trail. If the ship was repaired, then they might be able to get off-planet

  before the port authority shut them down. If . . .

  He grinned tightly, remembering what Vega would say:_'If'' is just a short

  way of saying, 'we're doomed.''_

  'Are those guys Peace Brigade?'' Uldir shouted to the girl.

  'You mentioned them before,'' she shot back. 'I never heard of them.''

  Uldir arched an eyebrow. That was surprising. 'They're a collaborationist

  organization,'' he told her. 'They figure we can't beat the Yuuzhan Vong, so

  they might as well join them, get in their good graces while it's still

  possible. Sometimes they infiltrate local law enforcement.''

  Klin-Fa snorted. 'Nobody in the Corporate Authority ever needed prompting

  when there was any potential for profit, and the 'zecs don't deal with

  middle-men unless they have to. There's a Yuuzhan Vong executor on this

  planet even as we speak. I'm guessing the 'zecs cut their own deal.''

  'What? But that violates the neutrality pact.''

  'I'll bet it doesn't. CSA attorneys can find a loophole when there isn't

  even a loop.''

  The cloud loomed, but the fliers were getting too close. He dipped lower,

  dropping into one of the arroyos that crawled downhill toward the spaceport.

  'I guess you can fly,'' Klin-Fa conceded reluctantly, leaping over the

  cockpit to land on their stern, now the most threatened portion of the ship.

  'You don't say?'' Uldir retorted. 'Gosh, I'm glad you told me. I'd never

  have known. Now I'm all beaming and confidant. I just know I can get us out

  of this.''

  She ignored the sarcasm. 'Rescue flier, huh?'' she mused. 'Who do you

  rescue?''

  'Jedi, mostly.''

  Klin-Fa blocked a bolt aimed for their rear stabilizer and shot him a

  strange look. 'What?'' She asked. 'Who do you work for?''

  'The paychit comes from the New Republ
ic Search and Rescue Corps, but that's

  sort of a cover. The orders come from Master Skywalker, ultimately. He's

  been organizing a network to move Jedi out of danger for months.''

  'I wouldn't know about that,'' she said. 'I've been . . . out of touch. I

  didn't even know about the warmaster's ultimatum until yesterday.''

  That explained why she didn't know about the Peace Brigade either. 'Where

  were you that you didn't hear about that?'' Uldir asked.

  Her eyes narrowed. 'You'll understand if I don't just volunteer that

  information.''

  'Hey, you're the Jedi. Can't you tell if I'm lying, or a threat?''

  She hesitated. 'I've been fooled before,'' she admitted. 'Just understand

  this -- I'm on a mission, also for Master Skywalker. I've discovered

  something of utmost importance, a dire threat to the New Republic.''

  'But you won't tell me what it is?''

  'No.''

  Uldir was impressed at how impassive she remained. Though his crazy course

  through the canyons had them temporarily free of blaster fire, it couldn't

  be easy for her to keep her footing, yet she hadn't even blinked. She had

  liquid helium in her veins, this girl.

  'We're about to plow straight into a storm,'' he said. 'Maybe you ought to

  get back into the cockpit.''

  'Storm? No. Maybe you ought to --_watch out!_ ''

  Uldir jerked on the stick, mentally tasking himself for becoming distracted.

  One of the security fliers had somehow worked its way up a side canyon and

  was now quite suddenly in front of him. Blaster fire scorched along their

  underbelly, and the craft jerked like a harpooned toukfin. The power system

  whined, and all of the indicators on the board went dead. The flier dropped

  as Uldir frantically jiggled at the re-route to emergency systems.

  The power failure lasted only an instant, but it was a gut-plunging one, and

  he was now on a collision course with the offending flier. He banked hard to

  port, momentarily forgetting he had a passenger balanced on his prow.

  Klin-Fa didn't seem to mind -- she deftly shifted to stand on the narrow

  part of the flier now presented to the sky, crouched, and cut downward at

  the other vehicle. Uldir saw a shear of sparks before the impact. It was a

  glancing blow, and their opponent went gyring away missing a good chunk of

  its nose. Uldir was vaguely aware of the crunching sound it made as it

  plowed into a canyon wall, but most of his attention was focused on avoiding

  the same fate. The repulsors sputtered again, and with a silent curse he

  rose out of the arroyo, unable to trust his craft enough to maneuver there

  anymore.

  It was then, facing the black wall of the storm, that he realized he didn't

  see Klin-Fa. His last maneuvers must have dislodged her.

  He dug into a sharp turn -- hoping to spot her and hoping as well that her

  Jedi abilities had helped her survive the fall -- when a shout from below

  got his attention. He saw the young Jedi clinging to the craft's magnetic

  mooring lock by the fingers of one hand.

  'Hang on!'' Uldir locked the course for the storm and reached into the dash

  compartment, coming out with an enforcement special blaster. Then he climbed

  out of the cockpit and onto the nose of the craft, waving his arms for

  balance.

  The three remaining fliers were catching up quickly, and the air was brittle

  with ionized death. Uldir dropped to his belly and reached over the brink,

  grasping Klin-Fa by the wrist. She locked her own fingers around his wrist

  in turn and dangled in space, whirling her lightsaber to deflect a blaster

  bolt that would have cut her in half. Uldir stood, hauling her up, watching

  in amazement as she continued to fend off attacks. With his free hand he

  grimly fired at the lead police craft, which was coming in way too fast. He

  grazed it twice, then hit the cockpit a glancing blow that must have hurt

  the pilot, because the craft peeled off suddenly. Then two concussions in a

  row rocked his flier so badly that Uldir nearly lost his footing. He swung

  the Jedi back onto the bow just as the first of the rain spattered around

  them.

  'Back in the cockpit!'' he shouted. The craft was beginning to list weirdly

  toward starboard, indicating a probably fatal malfunction in one of the

  stabilizers.

  Another bolt hit them as they made it to the crash seats, and then, as if

  they had passed under a curtain, the rain was driving so hard Uldir couldn't

  see anything. He flipped on the weather shield, and the water began sheeting

  off against its field, but visibility didn't increase in the slightest.

  An eighteen-headed dragon of lightning howled around them, and Uldir's neck

  hairs pricked to attention. The sound was like the implosion of a planet.

  'Sithspit!'' Klin-Fa shouted. 'What have you done to us?''

  'You don't see our friends anymore, do you?''

  'No. They'd know better than to fly into a sweeper storm.''

  'A what?''

  'Bonadan has weather control stations all over it. You don't think this is

  natural, do you? They generate these on the outskirts when the air gets too

  caustic for the miners. The rain and lightning precipitates some of the crud

  they put in the sky every day.''

  'Oh. Your point?''

  'My point is, it's more concentrated and violent than a normal storm,

  jets-for-brains. The funnel around the eye is designed to create maximum

  ionization.''

  'Maximum -- uh-oh.''

  It had been getting darker, but in the not-to-distance he saw sheets of

  lighting dancing like nebula veils.

  'So we don't want to go there, huh?'' Uldir grunted, frantically pulling the

  stick starboard. Nothing happened. The ship was carrying them nowhere but

  the heart of the storm.

  'No. So get us out of here already,'' Klin-Fa shouted. Even through the

  windscreen, the sound of the storm was almost deafening.

  'I can't. I locked the controls when I went out to get you. They're still

  locked.''

  'Well, unlock them, vac-brain!''

  Uldir continued flipping switches. 'Not happening,'' he said.

  'Well, what, then?''

  'Hang on, I guess.''

  He pointed the blaster at the rear repulsor assembly and fired.

  'Are you insane?'' Klin-Fa shrieked.

  'I wasn't before I met you,'' Uldir replied. 'Now I'd need a professional

  opinion.'' He fired again, and the flier seemed to sag against the wind. The

  bow dropped nearly perpendicular to the ground.

  'Like I said,'' Uldir remarked, as another net of lightning crackled

  completely around them, 'hang on.''

  He felt a tingle then that did not come from the lightning, and he

  recognized it as a movement in the Force. He might not be sensitive enough

  to actually wield it, but he had been around the most powerful Jedi in the

  galaxy, and had learned to recognize its use.

  Especially now, when it felt somehow wrong. He looked at Klin-Fa and found

  her eyes shut and her face utterly composed. For some reason that was

  momentarily terrifying. Then he didn't have any more time to think about it,

  because they hit the ground, skipped, tumbled, and hit again. The screen

  went down, and rain was
suddenly smothering them. After that, darkness.

  * * *

  Uldir woke spitting water from his mouth and feeling the painful itch of it

  in his lungs. One of the flier's running lights shone murkily from beneath

  the surface. Other than that, the darkness was broken only by the terrible

  white and red flares of lightning that grew more extreme with each second.

  The rain was mixed with hail now, which struck painfully against the bare

  skin of his face, and the thunder was an almost uninterrupted roar. The

  torrents unleashed from the sky were continuing to sculpt the arroyo he'd

  crashed in as it had been doing since the natural vegetation of Bonadan had

  given up its tenuous hold on existence. The flier was fetched up against

  something and filling quickly with water.

  In the dull light, he made out Klin-Fa Gi, slumped unconscious, her face

  just out of the water. He felt for her pulse and, to his relief, found it

  strong. When he failed to wake her, he got her in a swim carry, holding her

  from behind so her head would remain above the surface. Even as he did this,

  the level and speed of the flood rose, and swiftly. He had to get to higher

  ground; that much was obvious. Not too high, though -- lightning had a lofty