Race to Crashpoint Tower

by Daniel José Older

  “Can I count on you?” The rogue Force-wielder’s raspy voice was strangely kind, calming even.

  Ram wasn’t sure if he was up to the occasion—he’d only just been in his first fight a few hours earlier, after all—but something about Ty Yorrik made him want to step up and get it right, whatever it took. “Yes,” he said, hoping he sounded more assured than he felt. “Tell me what you need.”

  “That’ll depend on—”

  The prison door slid open, and a sizzling fusillade of blaster fire exploded into the room. The droid flew backward with a shriek and landed in a smoldering heap. “Unnecessary!” he warbled as a tall, muscular man with a cannon-sized blaster stomped in. His gas mask had three eyestalks built into it, which meant he was probably a Gran. “Mm, Jedi?” he yelled, voice distorted. He raised his weapon. “We’ll see about that!”

  “You will retrieve our things and release us from these cells,” Ty said firmly, with the slightest wave of her hand.

  The Gran cocked his head at her, nodded. “I will retrieve your things and release you from these cells,” he agreed.

  “And then you will subdue and capture any of your fellow Nihil that you find.”

  “And then I will subdue and capture any of my fellow Nihil that I find.”

  “Whoa,” Ram gasped.

  The raider crossed to the far end of the room, where a passageway led to the storage area, somewhere deeper in the complex.

  “Zarabarb!” someone with a gruff voice yelled from outside the door. “What are you doing, man?”

  Ram cringed as the Gran spun around, blaster cannon already raised, and unleashed a devastation of laser fire that tore half the wall to shreds. Something heavy fell to the ground in the other room, but more shouts were rising now, and Ram heard boots stomping toward them.

  “That’s a very creative interpretation of subdue,” Ty muttered. “But oh well.” She glanced at Ram. “Get ready to improvise.”

  A few shots zinged through the shattered opening where the door had been, then something flew into the room, clinked a few times on the ground, and rolled to a stop.

  “Thermal detonator!” Mantessa yelled.

  Ram had already reached out with the Force and felt his connection click onto the orb. If he sent it out into the hall where it came from, it would probably kill whoever was trying to kill them. But what if other people were out there—hostages or prisoners? It was too risky. He sent it zinging past Zarabarb’s head and straight out a window. A sharp crack followed, shattering the other panes.

  “Minimal damage to the enemy,” Ty commented. “But otherwise not bad.”

  “Charge!” someone yelled, and a group of Nihil burst in, blasters blazing.

  Zarabarb clipped two of them before charging into the fray and lashing out wildly with his huge arms.

  “Push them back!” Ty ordered. Ram imagined the Force gathering into an unstoppable wall as they both raised their hands, then shoved forward. With a yelp and a clatter, the entire tangled brawl of Nihil flew backward, smashing into desks and data-comps.

  “Ha!” 5-Triad yelled from somewhere underneath them. “Take that, villains!”

  Ty gave a gruff nod of approval, then growled. “Blasters, quickly now.”

  This was trickier. Some had fallen in the tangle; others were still gripped in sweaty hands. Ram reached out with the Force, felt the cold steel of those weapons, and pulled with all his might. Several slid across the floor toward him as another group hurtled through the air and clanged against the bars of Ty’s cell.

  A twitchy gnaw of tension in the Force made Ram look up to where a Mon Calamari Nihil had crawled to his feet, a bowcaster raised in his long webbed fingers. It was pointed right at Ty. Ram narrowed his eyes. If he tried to yank it away from the raider’s tight grasp, it might not work in time. Instead, he sent his mind surging through the greasy steel valves and gears of the weapon. It was different than anything Ram had seen before, but he quickly made sense of the machinery. With the slightest nod of his head, a spark leapt up, then a crunch. “Gah!” the Nihil yelled, dropping the bowcaster and leaping away as smoke poured out of it.

  “Not bad,” someone snarled. “Now put your hands up!” Ram looked across the room to where a tall, purple-skinned woman stood with a shoulder rifle aimed directly at him.

  “I—” Ram started, but then the woman flew backward with a grunt as a laser blast slammed into her.

  He glanced over at Ty, who had pulled one of the Nihil’s blasters through the bars of her cell. A small plume of smoke slid up from its business end.

  “Argh!” the Mon Calamari yelled, charging at Ty and then collapsing in a heap when she blasted him once and then again.

  “Sweet dreams, sweet seafood,” she said with a smirk.

  “Whoa,” Ram said, mouth gaping.

  Ty rolled her eyes. “They’re just napping. Now…” She pointed her blaster at a control panel on the other side of the blasted-open door, squinted, and let off one shot.

  With a wheeze, her own cell door slid open.

  Ty winked at Ram. “Teamwork! With a Padawan! I’m almost as impressed with myself as I am with you.” She headed for the hallway. “Now let me get yours—” Ty raised both hands and took a few steps back, that slight smile still on her bemused face. “Well, well, well.”

  A purple blur burst past her into the room. Something short and furry rode on top. Two somethings. Bonbraks!

  “Vee-Eighteen!” Ram yelled as the droid jolted to a stop and glanced around. “How…?”

  Then Ram saw the bright blue tip of a lightsaber, followed by its owner, a girl a little older than him, in Padawan robes, with a very severe frown directed, along with her lightsaber, at Ty Yorrick. “Drop the blaster.”

  Mostly, people in the streets had stayed away from Lula. She’d been scared—terrified really—about being alone out there. It hadn’t occurred to her just how used to her Padawan squad she’d become until she had to face down an enemy without them. But she quickly learned that the Nihil hadn’t come expecting much resistance; most traveled in groups of two or three, and once they caught a glimpse of her lightsaber, they gave her a wide berth and slinked off to hunt easier prey. There wasn’t much coordination to their attacks, either; it just seemed like a terrifying free-for-all.

  Even at the detention facility, the two raiders posted out front scattered quickly as she approached. But this Tholothian woman, who didn’t appear to be a Nihil, was another story. Even as she retreated, hands raised, and put down her blaster, she looked like she’d somehow won.

  “It’s okay,” the Padawan in the cell said anxiously. “She…helped me!”

  Lula glanced over at him. Ram Jomaram, the kid who’d sent the message. He was short, a year or two younger than her, and a bit of a mess, all in all—still in grease-stained clothes, with his hair all disheveled. He’d had a rough night, of course, but Lula had the feeling this wasn’t an unusual state for the kid. The outpost Padawans really did lead very different lives than those more closely tied to Starlight or Coruscant, she realized. “You trust her?”

  The woman leveled an intense magenta-eyed stare at Lula.

  “Yes, uh, this is Ty Yorrik,” Ram said. “She has the Force! And that lady is Mantessa Chekkat.”

  “You’re…” Lula looked at Ram. “She’s not a Jedi.”

  Ty rolled her eyes. “We don’t have time for this right now. Let us go.”

  She was right; they didn’t have time. But that didn’t mean they should just be letting criminals escape from jail, especially Force-wielding ones. What if this woman was part of the attack? “Why is she in here in the first place?” Lula asked.

  Ram shook his head, eyes wide. “I don’t…Lula, I might be dead without her.”

  “Get out of the way immediately, girl!” Mantessa demanded in a haughty growl. The woman was middle-aged and dressed in elegant finery that spoke of important meetings and negotiations. Her tone was that of one who does not take being told no lightly. “Thi
s is no time for foolery.”

  Lula stepped past Ram to face Ty directly and looked up into the warrior woman’s fiery eyes. Her mind was reeling. “You…you left the Jedi Order?” It was more of a guess, really, but the way Ty’s face seemed to tighten ever so slightly made Lula pretty sure she was right.

  “Listen, kid: any second a whole bunch more Nihil are gonna bust through that door, and it’s gonna take more than two Padawans to hold them off. Ram already told you I helped him, and you saw the mess these guys were in when you got here.” She nodded at the bedraggled crew on the ground. “There are a lot of things out there more important than your precious Jedi Order, and staying alive should be number one on that list.”

  For a smooth couple of seconds, they just stared at each other. Why would anyone with the Force leave the Order? It seemed incomprehensible to Lula; it would be like chopping off your own arm. But she believed Ram—he probably wouldn’t have been able to subdue all those Nihil on his own, and it was clear that Ty Yorrik was very powerful with the Force….

  Mantessa stepped forward, and Lula saw something in the older woman’s eyes—desperation. “My…my daughter,” Mantessa choked out. “She’s…she’s out there, in all that. I need to find her.”

  Lula glanced at Ty, whose stern face revealed nothing. Neither of them seemed particularly trustworthy, but Mantessa wasn’t lying, that much Lula was sure of.

  One of the Nihil snorted from the ground. “If it were up to me—”

  Ty silenced him with a single move of her hand. She hadn’t used the Force to do it, just the sheer ferocity of who she was.

  “It’s not.”

  “All right,” Lula said, exhaling. It felt good now that the decision was made. Whatever happened would happen, but this wasn’t a fight she needed. She extinguished her saber. “But if it turns out you lied to me, I’ll come find you. Don’t think I won’t just because I’m young.”

  Infuriatingly, Ty unleashed a sly smile and raised her eyebrows as she and Mantessa walked past. “So I see, Padawan.”

  When they’d left, Lula reached back to the panel in the hallway and opened Ram’s cell. “I’m Lula Talisola,” she said when he walked out, brushing himself off. “I’m a Padawan, too. You okay?” She patted him on the shoulder, hoping it would seem reassuring. Outside, the sounds of fighting rose and fell amid the ongoing carnage of Jedi Vectors and Nihil raider ships clashing overhead.

  Ram nodded, then shook his head, and finally just shrugged. “I don’t know. What’s happening? How did you find us?”

  “Starlight relayed your message to a Jedi Knight I was with, Vernestra Rwoh. We were investigating the Nihil, and as it turns out…they were on their way here. We don’t know the whole story yet, but we’ve got to…” She waved her hands helplessly as the full scope of whatever it was they had to do loomed impossibly huge, incomprehensible.

  “We’ve got to get my stuff and get out of here,” Ram said, already heading down the hallway to the storage area.

  Lula followed. Once they got away from the detention center, they could meet up with Vernestra and find out where Zeen and Master Sy were, and then…well, that was a lot, really. And anyway, it felt like they all might get incinerated at any moment, or overrun by a Nihil horde, the way things were going.

  “Here it is!” Ram said, pointing up at a box on a cabinet. He pulled a metal ladder over and started up it.

  Lula pulled out her comlink and clicked it. “Vernestra? Come in, Vernestra.”

  Only static came back.

  “What is it?” Ram asked from above.

  “The comms from our ship.” Lula shook her head, then tried again. “Vernestra? Can you hear me?” She frowned. “It’s still not working. That’s why I came to find you.”

  Ram looked stricken. “The tower…”

  “You said you stopped them from attacking it last night?”

  He climbed down with the box. “Yeah, they’d sabotaged it, but I fixed it, and…it had to be working because my message got out to Starlight, right? That’s how you all got here.”

  “Yeah,” Lula said, “but it wasn’t clear what was going on. They just knew it was something to do with the Nihil, so they sent it to Vernestra. That’s why we came. But if comms are down again, that means—”

  “No one can coordinate a counterattack on the ground,” Ram said.

  “There are some Vectors in the air that must’ve been here already, but nowhere near enough.” Lula shook her head. “And no one’s coming to help us.”

  Ram had been feeling a rising rumble of insecurity since seeing how poised and powerful Ty was, and it only got louder when Lula showed up. As a Padawan at one of the Republic outposts, Ram didn’t come into contact with other Force users much, besides the other Jedi in his temple. And they mostly left him to his repairs. Anyway, no one was that competitive on Valo; folks just went about their business. But now…the wider galaxy had opened up suddenly and violently in a matter of hours. Ram’s whole life had been Jedi studies, things he had to fix, and Bonbraks. It had been going back and forth from the under-construction temple to the living quarters to the lake, and one or two trips offworld at most. And up until now, he’d figured that was what his life would always be, for better or for worse. He’d grow old here on Valo, like Master Kunpar, and one day take on a Padawan probably—hopefully one who loved to fuss with mech stuff and didn’t talk much.

  But now, as they stood in the battered detention facility listening to chaos and battle sounds rise around the city, his city…the only thing Ram knew for sure was that nothing would ever be the same.

  He took a deep breath. You must see the whole for the whole, and each part for the role it plays—not for what you want it to be, not for what you fear it to be. Just for what it is. Whatever happened next, this moment was a crucial piece in it all, and he and Lula might be able to do something good amid so much destruction.

  “I know what we have to do. We have to make it back to the tower. Whatever they did when I caught them out there yesterday—there must’ve been more to it than just sabotaging the comms right then. They must’ve…” Those swirling pods in the setting sun…What if they had something to do with it?

  “C’mon,” he said, placing Breebak and Tip on V-18 and climbing on. “We gotta get back out there now!”

  Lula gaped at him. “What, on the droid?”

  “Oh,” V-18 said haughtily, “Breebak and Tip and I have been working on something while you lot were relaxing!”

  Since when had V-18 even gotten along with the Bonbraks? Now that Ram had a moment to look him over, he realized the droid had a whole different engine welded onto him. And was that a small starfighter propulsor?

  “I haven’t been relaxing!” Lula said. “And I don’t think sitting in a jail cell qualifies as—”

  “Fitzabom takna takna!” Tip insisted.

  “They upgraded the old speeder engine I had retrofitted on there,” Ram translated, helping Lula climb on. “To something a little spiffier.”

  “You put a speeder engine on a droid?”

  Ram shook his head. “Long story.”

  “ENGINES FULL POWER!” V-18 announced.

  Breebak squealed with delight. Tip muttered something rude.

  “Uh,” Ram said. “That might not be the best—”

  Tip let out a wild yodel as they zoomed through the blown-up wall, then into the war-torn streets of the Government District. It was a bright sunny day, one that would’ve normally sent Valons out for a splash in the lake or a stroll along the boardwalk. Instead, flaming debris rained down from the starfighter clashes above and screams rang out amid blaster shots all across the city.

  At the far end of the street, a crowd scattered past, stumbling and limping, and then about a dozen Nihil raiders stomped into view, swinging clubs and spears. A tall one with six arms turned his masked face toward Ram and the others, then yelled something.

  “We’ve been spotted!” Ram said.

  “Already?” Lula sa
id. She’d maneuvered around in the seat with her back to Ram’s so she could keep an eye out for anyone chasing them. “Which way to the tower?”

  Ram reeled V-18 around. “At this point, any way will do! We just gotta—”

  “Incoming!” Lula yelled as they sped away.

  Ram heard Lula’s lightsaber shriek to life. He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do—speed up or veer off or just stay the course? One wrong decision could mean they all ended up roasted. “Incoming what?”

  “I’m on it!” she yelled as the roar of approaching speeders grew suddenly louder.

  “OH, THESE SNOGGLE-MASKED MUSKWORTS WANNA PLAY?” V-18 yelled.

  “Uh, what’s going on with your droid?” Lula asked.

  “I’m not su—”

  “VEE-EIGHTEEN IS TIRED OF BEING SHOT AT!”

  Ram cocked his head. “Did he just refer to himself in the third person?”

  They veered into a tight U-turn, and something whirred and clicked into place beneath them.

  The Nihil apparently didn’t care what V-18 was tired of: the six speeder bikes had pulled up to a halt and all ten raiders were raising their blasters.

  “Fatoopa fatoopa fatoopa!” Tip yelped.

  Ram translated: “Apparently they also installed a—”

  Cannon fire thundered out, shaking the whole block and bursting in riotous explosions across the buildings and pavement around the Nihil. The raiders dove for cover; most of their bikes burst into fiery ruins.

  “Weapons system.”

  “Wow,” Lula said.

  “Fatoopa,” Breebak agreed solemnly.

  Already, a few of the Nihil were standing, dusting themselves off, and grabbing their gear.

  “Now we go!” V-18 said, spinning back around.

  They jolted forward, zooming around a corner and then weaving among a few scattered people in the street. Two speeders raced along behind them, and Ram could hear the pairs of Nihil on each one yelling back and forth.