The apprentice remained frozen, mesmerized by the Emperor’s ghastly charisma. Why not? Wasn’t this what he had considered on Raxus Prime? If he agreed to that plan, he would be free of one Master and slave to another—but what was to stop him from attacking that Master in turn, one day? He would not make the same mistakes Darth Vader had.
Darth Vader—who had murdered his father, lied to and betrayed him, killed PROXY, branded Juno a traitor, and kidnapped Kota and the others. Didn’t he deserve to die a thousand times over?
And power—he had become used to it in the service of his Master. When the dark side sang through him, others danced to his will. That would be hard to give up.
“No!” Kota’s voice came as though from a great distance. The apprentice noted, as though viewing the world in slow motion, the Jedi Master telekinetically snatching the Emperor’s lightsaber from his waist and, with a surety belying his physical blindness, using it to cut down the Imperial Guards watching the prisoners. Lunging forward, he struck next at the Emperor, who stood, apparently unarmed, with one hand still reaching out for the apprentice.
But the Emperor was never unarmed. Raising his other hand, he blasted Kota with lightning before the blow came close to falling. Sith energy crackled between them and the Jedi Master fell back, caught in the Emperor’s deadly grip.
“Help him!”
Bail Organa’s voice snapped the apprentice out of his trance. He shook his head, feeling the Emperor’s influence sliding off him like oil. What had he been thinking? He didn’t want to return to the dark side after everything he had been through. He had seen what it did, in Maris Brood, on Felucia, and in the eyes of Darth Vader. He didn’t even want to kill his Master, now that he saw him humbled and at his mercy. That was where it had all started, he now realized. When Darth Vader had killed Galen’s father and Galen had snatched the lightsaber from his hand, his intention had been solely to avenge his father’s death. That had been what Vader had seen in him all those years ago, not just that he was strong with the Force—and that was why Galen had blotted out the person he had once been. He had taken that first step down the path of the dark side all on his own, before he had been subjected to Vader’s cruel tutelage. He had to retract it now or submit to the dark side forever.
Murdering Darth Vader would accomplish nothing. Saving his friends might change the course of history.
Seen in that light, the decision was surprisingly easy.
A hail of shattered transparisteel and debris drove the Emperor back from Kota, breaking his concentration and freeing the Jedi Master from the fatal web of energy. Smoking and weak, Kota fell away and was caught by Garm Bel Iblis. The apprentice tossed them the comlink and advanced on Palpatine.
“Good,” hissed the Emperor, his claw-like hands upraised between them like a weak old man fending off an attacker. Stumbling, he fell to his knees. “Yes.” He looked up at the apprentice. “You were destined to destroy me. Do it! Give in to your hatred!”
The apprentice stood over him for a moment with his lightsaber upraised. Its aqua light reflected in the eyes of the galaxy’s Emperor as though it was the last thing he would ever see.
With a snap, the apprentice extinguished the blade and lowered his arm.
Kota limped up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder.
“That’s it, boy,” he said with rough pride. “He’s beaten. Let it go.”
The sound of engines from above distracted them both. They looked up to see the Rogue Shadow descending over the shattered dome, lights flashing on and off to attract their attention. Its repulsors dispelled the last of the smoke and sent the apprentice’s tattered cape whipping around his legs.
Juno, he thought. At last, everything is going to be all right.
“You fool!” snarled the Emperor, sending another wave of Sith lightning into Kota’s back. “He will never be yours.”
Kota fell with his arms upraised, and the apprentice knew that it wasn’t over yet. The moment of truth had arrived.
Without hesitation, he stepped between Kota and the Emperor, taking the full brunt of the Sith lightning into his own body.
The pain was incredible, searing every nerve back to its individual cells, skewering each of them on white-hot needles. He had never before felt anything like this. He wanted to recoil from the source, to curl into a ball and let unconsciousness take the pain away, but somehow he stayed standing, seeing the world through a crackling blue light, and even took a step toward the Emperor.
“Go!” he hissed at Kota. “Hurry!”
The general hesitated only for a moment. He, too, had seen a glimpse of the future, the apprentice remembered. He knew that it came down to a simple choice: him and the Rebels or the apprentice and darkness forever. Gathering up the Rebels, Kota ushered them toward the descending ship.
Another staggering, painful step and the Emperor was within the apprentice’s reach. With shaking fingers, he took the old man’s bony shoulders in his hands and gripped them tight. The Sith lightning spread to engulf the two of them, fueled by both their desperations. The Emperor tipped back his head and howled in lascivious pain. Darkness threatened to envelop the apprentice’s mind, but he clutched to consciousness with feverish will. He had to see this through. He had to.
A squadron of stormtroopers ran into the room, led by a limping Darth Vader. They raised their blasters to gun down the Rebels as they fled up the Rogue Shadow’s ramp.
“No!” the apprentice cried, dropping his defenses to strike one last time at the Imperials. Energy surged through him. He felt as though a star had blazed to life in his chest. Driven by concern for his friends rather than himself, he embraced the Force completely, utterly, and was rewarded with strength that made his efforts with the dark side look like those of a child. His nerves were on fire. Streamers of light radiated from his skin. His bones glowed like radiant lava.
He saw rather than felt the massive shock wave that consumed a large portion of what remained of the observation dome. A glowing bubble of fire tore the stormtroopers to shreds and engulfed Vader and the Emperor. Shrapnel filled the air like dust caught in the beam of the Death Star’s powerful laser.
Tossed like a leaf, the Rogue Shadow fled in haste, ramp snapping shut on its precious cargo.
The apprentice felt himself leaving his body again. Or was his body leaving him this time? He felt ripped apart by the energy that had flowed through him. Every cell was in shock; every fiber shook. The fire on his face possessed no heat at all. His limbs felt as distant as the farthest arms of the galaxy. He was amazed there was enough left of him to think at all.
Weakened by the blast, the dome’s supports gave way. It collapsed into the superlaser dish, triggering a series of conventional explosions. Stormtroopers converged on the site. Through the dense smoke, two figures were visible from the apprentice’s rarefied perspective.
Darth Vader struggled to his feet from the rubble, even more damaged than before. He reached out for support and found only his Master, scowling.
Together, unspeaking, they searched the rubble.
When they found what they were looking for, neither of them looked any happier for it.
“He is dead,” the Dark Lord intoned, gazing dispassionately at the body at their feet.
This moment, the apprentice thought. I saw this!
“Then he is now more powerful than ever.” The Emperor glanced up, watching sourly as the Rogue Shadow sped away into the busy sky. “He was meant to root out the Rebels, not give them hope. His sacrifice will only inspire them.”
“But now we know who they are, my Master. I will hunt them down and destroy them, as you always intended—starting with the traitor Bail Organa.”
The Emperor waved him silent and turned to walk away. “Patience, Lord Vader. Far better to destroy a man’s hope first. Or that of someone close to him …”
Hope will never be destroyed, the apprentice thought. Not now. It’ll survive anything else you can throw at them …
<
br /> Darkness pressed in. He didn’t fight it. Juno was safe. That was all he cared about now. He didn’t need to be there to see what happened next. He could imagine well enough.
With his last thought, he whispered his own name.
Unnoticed by anyone, the Dark Lord raised a solid, black boot heel and crushed his fallen apprentice’s lightsaber to dust.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
#1 New York Times bestselling author of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, SEAN WILLIAMS has published thirty novels for readers of all ages, seventy short stories across numerous genres, and even the odd poem. He has been called “the premier Australian speculative fiction writer of the age,” the “Emperor of Sci-Fi,” and the “King of Chameleons” for the diversity of his output. Best-known internationally for his award-winning space opera series, such as Evergence, Geodesica, and Astropolis, he is also the author of ten linked fantasy novels inspired by the landscapes of his childhood: the dry, flatlands of South Australia, where he still lives with his wife and family.
BY SEAN WILLIAMS
The Unknown Soldier (with Shane Dix)
Metal Fatigue
The Resurrected Man
EVERGENCE (with Shane Dix)
The Prodigal Sun
The Dying Light
The Dark Imbalance
THE BOOKS OF THE CHANGE
The Stone Mage & the Sea
The Sky Warden & the Sun
The Storm Weaver & the Sand
ORPHANS (with Shane Dix)
Echoes of Earth
Orphans of Earth
Heirs of Earth
THE BOOKS OF THE CATACLYSM
The Crooked Letter
The Blood Debt
The Hanging Mountains
The Devoured Earth
GEODESICA (with Shane Dix)
Ascent Descent
THE BROKEN LAND
The Changeling
The Dust Devils
The Scarecrow
ASTROPOLIS
Saturn Returns
Earth Ascendant
Remaining in Light
COLLECTIONS
Doorways to Eternity
A View Before Dying
New Adventures in Sci-Fi
Light Bodies Falling
Magic Dirt: The Best of Sean Williams
Star Wars: Force Heretic I: Remnant (with Shane Dix)
Star Wars: Force Heretic II: Refugee (with Shane Dix)
Star Wars: Force Heretic III: Reunion (with Shane Dix)
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
THE FIXERS
Castle of Zombies
Planet of Cyborgs
Curse of the Vampire (forthcoming)
Invasion of the Freaks (forthcoming)
STAR WARS—The Expanded Universe
You saw the movies. You watched the cartoon series, or maybe played some of the video games. But did you know …
In The Empire Strikes Back, Princess Leia Organa said to Han Solo, “I love you.” Han said, “I know.” But did you know that they actually got married? And had three Jedi children: the twins, Jacen and Jaina, and a younger son, Anakin?
Luke Skywalker was trained as a Jedi by Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda. But did you know that, years later, he went on to revive the Jedi Order and its commitment to defending the galaxy from evil and injustice?
Obi-Wan said to Luke, “For over a thousand generations, the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Before the dark times. Before the Empire.” Did you know that over those millennia, legendary Jedi and infamous Sith Lords were adding their names to the annals of Republic history?
Yoda explained that the dreaded Sith tend to come in twos: “Always two, there are. No more, no less. A Master, and an apprentice.” But did you know that the Sith didn’t always exist in pairs? That at one time in the ancient Republic there were as many Sith as Jedi, until a Sith Lord named Darth Bane was the lone survivor of a great Sith war and created the “Rule of Two”?
All this and much, much more is brought to life in the many novels and comics of the Star Wars expanded universe. You’ve seen the movies and watched the cartoon. Now venture out into the wider worlds of Star Wars!
Turn the page or jump to the timeline of Star Wars novels to learn more.
CHAPTER 1
Present day …
FROM THE DEPTHS OF MEDITATION came a man’s voice.
“You’re running out of executioners, Baron!”
Starkiller opened his eyes. He knew that voice. It tugged at parts of him that had lain dormant for a long time—or never genuinely existed at all, depending on one’s viewpoint.
He shied away from both memory and contemplation. There was no point wasting energy on either when his very survival was at stake. How many days he had been down the pit he no longer knew, but in that time he had neither eaten nor slept. His enemy wasn’t physical in the sense of a foe he could strike down or manipulate. It was himself—his fallible body, his weak mind, his faltering spirit. He would endure and emerge whole, or never emerge at all.
Such was the life of Darth Vader’s secret apprentice.
“He is dead.”
“Then he is now more powerful than ever.”
More voices. He closed his eyes and shook his head. Kneeling, he placed his manacled hands on the slick metal surface below him and concentrated on hearing the world outside.
Long stretches of isolation had attuned him to the cloning facility’s many moods. Through the metal he heard a relentless hiss that could only be rain. Sharp cracking sounds were lightning, coming and going in staccato waves. Rolling rumbles were thunder, and a deeper note still was the song of seabed-hugging currents that circled the world.
He was on Kamino. Starkiller was sure of that much. He had been reborn on the distant waterworld, where a significant percentage of the Emperor’s stormtroopers were grown. Here it was that he would live and grow strong, or die weak and unmourned. Every hardship, every hurdle, was one step closer to full mastery of his fate. That was the lesson underlying all lessons.
A new note entered the planet’s endless song: the scream of a TIE advanced prototype starfighter. Angular and fleet, with bent vanes, it entered the atmosphere with a whip-crack sonic boom and descended on a bold, high-energy descent toward the facility.
Starkiller tensed. He knew that ship’s sound and could sense the well-practiced hand behind its controls. He heard stormtroopers marching quickly in response to their master’s electronic summons, calling orders to one another as they went. Blast doors opened and closed with booming thuds. The facility woke from its unattended slumber.
He didn’t move as the TIE fighter landed. He didn’t open his eyes as two heavy, booted feet dropped onto the platform and began the long walk through the facility. He breathed at a steady pace through the whine of the turbolift and the hiss of doors opening. A ring of red lights at the top of the pit came on, and although he felt the light against his hunched back, he didn’t look up.
He heard breathing, mechanical and regular. Heavy footsteps came to the very lip of the pit, and stopped.
“You’re alive,” said Darth Vader.
At the voice of his former Master, Starkiller looked up, blinking against the light. Vader’s boots were three meters above him, barely visible behind the lights and the grate that separated the pit from the dark room beyond. The Dark Lord loomed like a shadow, a black hole in the shape of a robed man.
Starkiller’s throat worked. It was so dry he could barely talk at all.
“How long this time?”
“Thirteen days. Impressive.”
The compliment was hard-won. It ground out of the triangular grille covering Vader’s mouth and fell on Starkiller’s ears like dust.
“The Force gives me all I need.”
“The Force?”
The hint of praise turned to warning, as it did so often.
Starkiller lowered his head. He knew what was required. The weeks of training and isolation
he had endured made that exceedingly clear.
“The dark side, I mean, my Master.”
One gloved hand moved. The grate flew open.
“Come,” said the dark figure above him.
The metal floor beneath Starkiller lurched and began to ascend. He forced his leg muscles to unlock from their long kneeling position, and stood to meet Darth Vader upright and unbowed.
The room above was sparsely furnished, with no windows, just one exit—the turbolift—and little light. Shadows cast by terminals and floor lamps made its very dimensions ambiguous, but Starkiller knew from long training exercises that the room was circular and its walls were impenetrable. He flexed his fingers, yearning for a lightsaber to hold. Muscle memory was keener than any other kind. Even with the new skills Darth Vader had taught him, his hands wanted to fight the way he knew best.
At the very edge of his vision stood several skeletal PROXY droids, awaiting activation. If he was lucky, he would be unshackled and allowed to duel some of them. If not …
The lift ground to a halt. Vader stepped back to study him. Starkiller felt the keen eye of the Sith Lord on his gaunt form even through the layers of durasteel, obsidian, and plasteel that covered the man’s face. Something was different. Although nothing had been said, he could tell that this was no ordinary training session.
He waited. There was no hurrying Darth Vader.
“I have a mission for you.”
“Yes, my Master.”
“Starkiller’s former conspirator has been captured.”
He experienced a moment of confusion. Then his memories stirred, providing a name. The name of the one who had lured him away from the dark side and to his death.
The same voice that had disturbed him from his meditation …
“Vader thinks he’s turned you. But I can sense your future, and Vader isn’t part of it. I sense only … me?”
“General Kota,” he said, struggling to keep himself anchored to the present.
“Yes. You will travel to Cato Neimoidia and execute him.”
“And then will my training be complete, Master?”
“You will not be ready to face the Emperor until you have faced a true Jedi Master.”
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed Page 30
