One of the GAG troopers fired his blaster at Mithric. Kolir, hobbling, managed to get her lightsaber blade up and caught the bolt.
But it meant the troopers’ vision was returning.
Seha saw the Jedi exchanging words. Valin spun away from the engagement with Jacen and moved toward the one sighted trooper. That man fired again and Valin deflected the bolt with his lightsaber—deflected it straight toward Jacen. The improvised attack evidently came as a surprise: The bolt grazed Jacen’s right leg, sending him to his knee. Mithric redoubled his attack, hammering away at Jacen’s defense like a toolsmith on a primitive world battering away at a stubborn harvester droid.
Kolir, bent over from distress more than pain, hesitated, then turned and moved at a fast hobble toward the shuttle.
Seha pulled one last time and Master Katarn, shoulders-first, slid into her grasp.
Katarn’s eyes opened. His voice was little more than a wheeze. “Go…”
“You’re alive!”
“Explosives package…give me one…other one to block exit…”
Seha hauled him into the access hole, lowering him facedown, wincing as the movements made him gasp with pain. “I’ll blow up our exit route, yes. We’ll all get out.”
“Girl, leave me…”
She had to rely on her telekinetic power to lower him to the floor. Her skill was not the greatest. She lowered him four meters without incident, rotated him so that for the last portion of the descent he would be supine…and then, not meaning to, she dropped him. He fell two meters and slammed down onto duracrete flooring. He grunted and his eyes closed.
Seha yanked the hatch shut. She took a few moments to patch one of her explosives charges into the holocam goggles she would be leaving behind. Then she scrambled down the ladder. “I’m going to get you out alive. Or we can blow up together.”
Caedus hadn’t felt the blaster bolt coming. His concentration was slipping.
And this madman of a Falleen Jedi was starting to beat down his parries. His strength was slipping.
He wasn’t yet recovered from his duel with Luke. And now, as more of his troopers began firing, Horn began deflecting more bolts at him. The imprecise, barely aimed nature of the attacks worked in Horn’s favor. The shots were unpredictable and Caedus had to divide his attention between a mad swordsman and a growing number of half-blind snipers.
But he was still the best lightsaber swordsman around—excepting possibly Luke, perhaps the best there ever had been.
Caedus waited until the timing was perfect, waited until an incoming bolt arrived at the same moment as one of Mithric’s attacks so he could devote a single maneuver to both. He caught Mithric’s blow toward the hilt of his lightsaber. He caught the bolt near the tip, deflecting it up and straight into Mithric’s chest.
Mithric staggered back, the center of his chest blackened, as the smell of burned skin and meat filled the air. Caedus leapt up and executed a single, precise lateral blow.
Mithric’s head fell from his shoulders. His body toppled down half a second later.
Caedus and Horn spun to face each other. An expression of sadness crossed Horn’s face, but his dismay did not distract him. He caught three more blaster bolts with his lightsaber blade without looking at their firers.
Caedus gestured toward his troopers, signaling them to cease fire. They did; now the only ranged fire to be heard came from the speeders, still chewing the shuttle to pieces.
Caedus flexed his injured leg experimentally and decided it was not too bad. It would take his weight and allow him some footwork. He gestured toward Horn. “You going to try this alone?”
Horn shook his head.
Caedus smiled. “You’re a fraction of the man your father is.”
“Funny. That’s what I was going to say to you.” Horn seemed to blur as he dashed toward the shuttle, his sprinting speed augmented by the Force.
“Don’t be an idiot! That thing will never take off again.”
Caedus left off his harangue as Horn ran up the side ramp where the Bothan had disappeared moments before.
No matter. The shuttle would not take off; Horn or Hu’lya, or both, would be captured, and after a lengthy enough interrogation, Caedus would know where Luke and the Jedi were now hiding.
He bent over to pick up Mithric’s head by its ponytail. The Falleen’s eyes were still open, staring forward, eerily lifelike, but his skin color had gone to gray. Caedus dropped the head and looked around.
Where was Katarn?
The door slid open and Allana saw Jacen filling the doorway. He was sweaty but calm.
She wasn’t sure why, but the first thing she said was, “You’re hurt.”
He nodded, unconcerned, and entered. “A little bit. Nothing important. I put a bandage on it.”
“What happened?”
“Well, when Why-Vee was taking you out of the speeder, bad people showed up to try to take you away from me.”
Uncomfortable, she fidgeted. “I don’t like riding around in the box.”
“It helps keep people from seeing you. That way it’s harder for them to figure out where you are, harder for them to try to take you. Is it uncomfortable?”
“Not really.” In fact, it had a miniature cooling unit that kept the air fresh and clean, and she had her datapad in it. And Why-Vee, though he was dull and didn’t know any games—except Shoot the Scarhead, which he wouldn’t tell her how to play—carried it in a very smooth ride. But it was cramped. She couldn’t stand up or move around in it. “I just don’t like it.”
“Well, this morning was just a test. Most places, we’ll be able to drive right into a building in the speeder and not worry about the crate. But you’ll still have to use it sometimes.”
She knew her voice sounded glum. “All right.” She looked at him, waiting again for him to say the special words, but he didn’t.
He did have other special words, though. “I love you, Allana.”
“I love you, too. But I miss Mommy.”
“So do I.” His voice turned sad. “So do I.”
SANCTUARY MOON OF ENDOR, JEDI OUTPOST
The thorns dug deeper into Ben’s cheek, pressing against him in the fevered way the creations of the Yuuzhan Vong had when inflicting pain, and he could feel them injecting their venom. His cheek swelled, and kept swelling. He could feel the skin growing taut, the tissues beneath it beginning to rip, his nerves screaming…
And so he knew it was a dream. He was gone from the Anakin Solo, out of the Embrace of Pain, away from Jacen and his tortures. It was over.
He didn’t wake up immediately, but the dream ended there, with his realization. The vine had no more power over him. It went limp and still. His cheek ceased to hurt. A moment later he realized that he was growing impatient, bored, and it was then that he opened his eyes.
Actually, his cheek did hurt, just a little, and was still slightly swollen. He rubbed it as he stared around.
His “room” had once been a walk-in wardrobe belonging to the commander of this outpost, and as such it was large enough for the military cot, small table, and chair that had been brought in as his personal furniture. It wasn’t much of a room, but it was better than most of the Jedi here received.
He rose, tossing his blanket aside, and took down his robes from the hanger. Dressed, he moved out into his father’s living room. It was still and dark, and Ben assumed at first that he was the only occupant. Then he saw his father sitting cross-legged before the big viewport, staring, as was so often his custom, at the trees of Endor.
Ben watched his father for a minute. Luke sat perfectly still, expressionless, blinking less often than was normal for a man who was awake. He had to be aware of Ben’s movements and scrutiny, but he did not react.
Ben knew why. His father had been so solicitous of him in the days since his rescue from the Anakin Solo that Ben had begun snapping at him. The realization made Ben wince inside. Pain, self-consciousness, a pervasive feeling of betrayal from Jacen’
s torture of him, and, for all he knew, the teenage hormones everybody talked about all the time had made him twitchy and angry.
Ben felt he had plenty of reasons to be twitchy and angry, reasons that went beyond the torture he had experienced. He suspected—he knew, deep down—that it had been Jacen, not Alema Rar, who had killed his mother. And in all the universe, he seemed to be the only one who recognized that fact. It was hard to be the one person keeping alive a thought that big.
But his father didn’t deserve his anger. Maybe Ben couldn’t always stop himself from being that way, but he could at least recognize that it wasn’t his father’s fault.
Ben spent a few moments juggling words in his head, then moved over to sit beside his father—facing him, but in the same pose. The posture made his joints ache. The medics had said he would ache for weeks after what Jacen had done to him.
He tried to make his voice calm, mature. “I did my homework, you know.”
Luke blinked several times in succession. He did not look confused, but Ben knew, and took a little uncharitable delight in the fact, that his words had baffled his father.
Luke turned toward him. “What homework?”
“The assignment you and Mom gave me just before I went off to Almania.”
Luke shook his head. “I’m glad you did it. But I don’t understand what you’re saying.”
“It was about my grandfather. Anakin Skywalker. How he got to be Darth Vader. The Emperor did horrible things to him. Made him suspicious of his friends so they wouldn’t be friends anymore. Made him kill younglings so no one would ever trust him again. Made him alone. Made it so nobody else in the universe understood him…except the Emperor. I bet, just before he became Darth Vader, he probably hated the Emperor. But the Emperor had worked it out so that he was the only one Anakin Skywalker had.”
Luke considered, then nodded. “I expect you’re right.”
“So I figured it out. That’s what Jacen was doing to me.”
Comprehension dawned in Luke’s eyes. “That’s exactly right.”
“And if I had killed him that day, I would have turned into Darth Vader.”
“Maybe. For a while.”
“Maybe forever.”
“Maybe.” Luke shrugged. “But if you understand that, if you remember it forever, you’ll never turn into Darth Vader.” He shifted to look out across the forest vista again. “I think you’re probably smarter than my father.”
“I got my brains from Mom.”
Luke snorted, jarred out of his contemplative mood. “As well as your tendency toward verbal abuse.”
“You sent Valin Horn off on a mission.”
“Yes, I did.”
“Even though he’s the son of an old friend.”
“I have to forget about that sort of thing when deciding who to send off on missions. If I don’t, I’ll compromise the ethics of the Order, and the trust the Jedi Masters and Jedi Knights have in me. I might even cause the downfall of the Order.”
“Would you send me off on a mission where I might be killed?”
“You’ve been on missions like that. Centerpoint.”
“Yeah…with Jacen. You were actually sending Jacen, not me. Would you send me, as a Jedi Knight?”
“When you’re a Jedi Knight. You’ve only just been appointed as my apprentice.”
Ben took a deep breath. “If you could kill Jacen or save Valin from going to the dark side, which would you choose?”
Luke didn’t answer.
Ben fell silent. If he started talking again, his father could ignore the question. But Ben very much wanted to hear the answer.
“Ben, I would kill Jacen.”
“So you gave me special consideration you wouldn’t give Valin.”
“Yes.” Luke lowered his gaze to his hands, which rested in his lap. “Speaking as the Grand Master…I shouldn’t have.”
“It makes me…” Ben choked up and stopped. He spent a few moments regaining control of his voice. “It makes me partly to blame that he’s still out there.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“Yes, it does. And I’m not saying anything except…I don’t want any special treatment. Not anymore. Not when there’s anything important riding on it.”
Luke nodded. “You’re right.” He gave Ben a sidelong look. “You realize what a concession that is for me to give. How hard it is for me, as your father, to do it.”
“Yeah.”
“I want a concession from you.”
“What is it?”
“If you’re ever in the same position you were on the Anakin Solo, with Jacen at your mercy, you take your shot only if you can do it without hate. No kidding yourself, no logical gymnastics. Without hate.”
“Deal.” Ben extended his hand.
Luke shook it. “Kyp’s coming.” He glanced over his shoulder.
Ben felt a little pulse in the Force and heard a click from the button on the doorjamb. The door slid open, revealing Kyp Durron in the act of reaching for the chime button outside.
Kyp stepped in. “Grand Master. Apprentice Skywalker.” He held up the datapad in his other hand. “I have news.”
Luke rose. “From Coruscant?”
“Yes.”
Luke moved to a table and sat, gesturing for Kyp to take the seat opposite. “Let’s hear it.”
Kyp paused, glancing at Ben.
Ben stood, too. “I’ll go. I need to arrange to be moved into the apprentice dormitory.”
Luke shook his head. “You staying here is not special treatment. You’re my apprentice until and unless I decide to reassign you. Kyp, he can stay for this. He’s full of insights today.”
Kyp shrugged and sat. Ben took a stuffed chair next to the table.
Kyp’s voice became more sober. “The mission group reports partial success. Colonel Solo remains at large. Master Katarn was badly injured but has been successfully taken to a safe house. Jedi Mithric lost his life. The others are with Katarn. The droid-piloted shuttle did not get off the ground after its landing. The surviving team members did successfully evacuate through it into the undercity, but since it never got airborne, traces of their escape route were detected. We can anticipate that the undercity will not be a viable approach in the future.”
Luke took in the news, shaking his head over Mithric’s death. “And the package?”
“The package is on Colonel Solo.”
Ben frowned, puzzled. “What’s the package?”
“A tracer.” Luke outlined a square about five centimeters across on the table surface. “About so big. Black cloth. As long as it remains on Jacen, we can accurately plot where he is, get a better sense of his movements.”
Ben considered that. “So…you were sure that the mission you sent Valin on would fail.”
Kyp nodded. “The ambush portion of it, yes. Once I realized that we couldn’t mount a successful grab-or-terminate mission against Jacen without being able to control the place and the time, I decided that it should be as realistic as possible…but also that it would serve chiefly to set up future operations. Ones that have a chance of succeeding.”
“Did the team members know?”
Luke shook his head. “Only Master Katarn. We couldn’t risk any of the others being captured and tortured into confessing. I was certain Kyle would be able to escape—or die before being broken.”
Kyp caught Ben’s eye. “So. Insights?”
“Just that he’ll try to punish the Jedi now. He may have called them cowards and stuff in the holonews before, but he didn’t do anything that would make it impossible for you to go crawling back to him. Attacking him like this probably made it clear you’re not going back. He’ll discredit the Jedi every chance he gets and hunt us with whatever resources he can.”
Luke nodded. “We need to improve our resources, too. I think it’s time to call Wedge Antilles. Booster Terrik. Talon Karrde. See what kind of surprises we can arrange for Jacen. It’s time to come up with some new plans.”
But there was a look in Luke’s eye, a distant worry, that told Ben his father was not truly back, not truly recovered, not yet.
chapter twelve
KASHYYYK, MAITELL BASE
The popular conception of the Wookiee world of Kashyyyk was that it was all forest—pole-to-pole, kilometers deep, with the forest floor an impossibly thick layer of organic matter, twisted roots, monsters, and darkness.
And of course, there were huge belts of terrain that could be described exactly that way. But there were also oceans, mountains, and regions where the vegetation, growing atop shelves of rock only a few meters down, was no taller than on any other world. There, living beings could stand on the ground and see the sky through the branches.
It was at such a place that Palpatine’s occupation forces had built Maitell Base some six decades before. They had landed prefabricated buildings, had poured duracrete, had raised hangars and installed perimeter defenses. From places like this they had ruled the world. Then, after Palpatine died, the Wookiees had reclaimed their planet, one base at a time, driving the stormtroopers into flight. The wildlife of Kashyyyk had overgrown many of the bases, while others, like Maitell, had been kept in sporadic use as sites where offworlders could be housed and their spacecraft could be landed.
Zekk, panting in the shade of a tree less than thirty meters tall, decided that the years had not blunted the base’s utilitarian ugliness. Though green and brown vines snaked across the roofs of many of the buildings, the walls remained a dirty gray-white, shining like bones in the sun. The streets and landing strips were precise, straight lines, intersecting at right angles, all at odds with the flowing, organic nature of the world around them. Though currently employed by the Wookiees as a base to stage firefighting operations, this place still didn’t belong here.
“Hey.” Jaina’s call was curt. “Again.”
Zekk looked over at her. She stood in her Jedi robes, perspiring and tense, lightsaber unlit in her hands.
Zekk sighed. “Give me a minute.”
“I need to practice.”
“I’m not sure you can gain anything from sparring more with me. You’ve outstripped me with the lightsaber. Practice is all you think about, day and night. I doubt any Jedi Knight can stand against you. You need to practice against a Master.”
Star Wars: Legacy of the Force: Fury Page 9
