“I don’t know!”
“Where’s the mynock?” Han felt a sudden chill. If the mynock phantom linked to him wandered into the path of the frigate’s turbolasers, the attack would kill him as dead as any other.
“I don’t know. Gone.” In a brief moment of straight-line travel, Leia got to the front of her chair and hopped into it, facing backward to forestall any sneak attack from that direction, and resumed her death grip on the seat back. “Oh. Now it’s back again.”
It was then that Alema Rar’s voice floated, sweet and mocking, from deep within the Falcon. “Han? Han Sooooloooo…”
The attack came as Jaina and Zekk shot down through the hole into the next cavern. It was not signaled by any disturbance in the Force. Inert lumps on the rim of the hole into the cavern suddenly erupted into movement, became bipedal figures swinging two-meter clubs—
Reflexively, Jaina lit her lightsaber and parried. Her blow severed the club, revealing it to be a length of durasteel rail three or four centimeters in diameter. Her attacker was a protocol droid—sky blue, of ancient design and manufacture. Jaina hurtled past it.
She heard a pained “Oof” and looked up to see Zekk meters above her, descending more slowly. His attacker’s rail was pinned under his left arm; his attacker, a scarlet protocol droid, still held the other end. They floated in Jaina’s wake, slowed by the fact that what had been Zekk’s downward kinetic energy was now divided between them.
“Sorry.” Zekk twisted, and then he was a meter away from the track, his attacker right next to it. As Jaina watched, the protocol droid’s head began banging against every cross-tie on the track, causing the head to bounce back and forth. The additional impacts and friction slowed Zekk still more, causing him to drop farther behind. “Thought it might have been a Force phantom; didn’t attack it before it hit me.”
“Are you hurt?”
“A couple of ribs cracked, I think. Not too bad.” It sounded worse than that; Zekk’s breathing was labored.
The red droid’s head came off. The rest of its body went limp. Zekk gestured, and both it and the metal rail went flying off into the darkness.
Jaina returned her attention to her surroundings. Things weren’t too bad. Alema Rar had enjoyed plenty of time to work up surprises for unwanted visitors, and so far nothing had been too strange or difficult for her hunters.
The theory they’d developed concerning her Force phantoms and their limitations seemed to be proving true. On Kashyyyk and here, none had demonstrated an ability to project damage at range, as with a blaster—the phantoms seemed to be contained, confined to the limits of the bodies they simulated. Some could wield lightsabers, but that made a certain amount of sense, as the Jedi regarded their lightsabers as extensions of themselves.
This might work. This attack might just work.
Then Jaina felt a pulse of malevolence, followed by something approaching her—something too massive for her to deflect, moving too fast for her to dodge.
The stream of mynocks flitted by Jag, passing within meters, their angry eyes fixed on him. Several flicked their tails at him. Two swooped close enough to be real threats. He raised his left arm, caught a tail end across his crushgaunt. The blow did not scar the metal. With his right hand he missed the other tail. It lashed across his chest, cutting a razor-thin gash in his flight suit but doing no harm to the beskar breastplate beneath.
The blows sent him tumbling through the air in the mynocks’ wake. As much as he could, he bent toward the gash in his flight suit, clamping an arm across it, as though he were injured. If anyone was watching, he needed to conceal the presence of his armor as much as possible.
The mynocks wheeled in unison. His blaster hand twitched, every instinct telling him to draw and fire…but they flew past too quickly.
When they swept by again, he blocked three tail lashes before they were past—and then felt a jerk as a fourth tail, grappling rather than lashing, wrapped around his left ankle and towed him along in the mynock’s wake.
The flock dived, heading toward a narrow gap in the cavern floor far away from the rail track.
Jag gritted his teeth. He was doing his job. He was keeping these mynocks off Jaina and Zekk.
If only he didn’t hate this task quite so much.
At the lowest level of the cavern complex, Alema Rar sat on the chamber’s stone floor. A few meters ahead of her sat the railcar that provided access between this chamber, the habitat, and all caverns in between; it rested at the bottom of the track, angled upward. A few meters to her left was the entrance into Darth Vectivus’s private cavern, the one in which he had built his ridiculous mansion so long ago. The stone door that could seal the chamber was open. The artificial gravity in the chamber was active, and even here, outside its main area of effect, Alema could feel it, providing her with what seemed to be about half Coruscant’s gravity.
She was already panting, tired by the effort of maintaining so many phantoms at once. She didn’t think she could handle much more gravity than that—unless she drew continually on the power of this place, which would have other consequences. How had Lumiya accomplished what she had with the phantoms? With years of practice and tremendous will, Alema decided.
She felt a little better. It was time to return to the war—to begin finishing off her intruders.
chapter twenty-five
Descending in Jaina’s wake, Zekk felt the attack the instant Jaina did, felt its power and speed.
And its intent. It was aimed at Jaina. Reflexively, Zekk lashed out with the Force, pushing. Jaina shot downward as if fired from an ancient artillery piece.
Something flashed by a meter over her head, something silver. It severed the track there, leaving a clean break in the metal rails. A fraction of a second later it hit the far wall of the cavern with a dull flash of light and a resounding boom.
Zekk turned his attention toward the source of the attack. It was outside the range of his vision, but he could feel it now that it was on the offensive, no longer lying in wait. It had to be a hundred meters or more away, though exact distances were difficult to predict through the Force.
It reeked of dark side energy and intent, a Force presence that was at once unliving but not inert. It had purpose. Zekk could almost see it, reading its self-image: a large ball, webbed wings projecting from it, a weapon spike protruding from the top, a landing spike from its bottom…
And hatred for him, for Jaina, in what served it as a heart.
Zekk read its movements and intentions as it acted. Its top spike was aimed toward Jaina. Now it canted upward, aiming at Zekk, and prepared to fire again—
Zekk grabbed the track with his free hand and pushed off, adding energy from the Force to his movement, and hurtled downward. A fraction of a second later, something flashed by over his head and sliced through the track there, then slammed into the far cavern wall. Cut above him and below him, several dozen meters’ worth of track floated free, twisting as it slowly began to accelerate downward.
Zekk grimaced. He was fighting a starfighter, or the equivalent of one, and all he had was his lightsaber. At least he could serve as a distraction, keeping this thing off Jaina.
As he reached the top of the remaining portion of track below, the spot where Jaina had almost been hit, he angled himself so that his feet came down on one of its cross-ties. He took the slight shock of impact easily. “Jaina, you go on. I can deal with this.”
“How?” Jaina’s tone was flat, disbelieving. She knew he was lying.
“Don’t distract me with questions. Just go.” By dying, probably. He hoped that stray thought did not reach Jaina, that it had not crossed the faint remnants of the link they had shared since they had been Joiners together, years before.
He felt Jaina’s anger at him, at Alema Rar. But he felt, too, her acceptance. She knew it was the right thing to do. Divide Alema’s concentration. Attack her on as many fronts as possible.
The thing out in the darkness, the Sith ship—for s
o it had to be—drifted laterally, under power, perhaps trying to determine whether Zekk could track it. Zekk continued staring in the direction he had been originally.
Then something occurred to him and he grinned. Abandoning his Jedi detachment, he poured emotion into the Force: contempt for his enemy, disparaging dismissal of the Sith ship’s worth.
He felt his enemy’s anger grow, and winced as it lashed out at him, grasping in the Force.
But this was no attack. He could feel its thoughts now, primitive but clear, hammering away insistently at his mind like a fist against a door. He could almost understand them—
He could understand them, he realized, if he wanted to. There was something familiar about their patterns, their darkness. Techniques he had learned years before, as a student of the Shadow Academy, gave him that insight. Though he had shoved them away, deep into his memory, those techniques were still with him…if he chose to remember them.
He wavered on the rung that supported him, and wavered on the question. But he had no time left. If the Sith starfighter killed him, it would go after Jaina next.
He opened himself to the darkness. It flooded into him, engulfing him, gagging him. Abruptly his surroundings were much clearer in his mind. The exact location, the appearance of that Sith meditation sphere—yes, that was what it was—were now clear to him.
As were its thoughts. It hesitated in its movements, aware of the sudden change in Zekk’s outlook. You are Jedi.
Am I? I have been many things. I was a Jedi a minute ago. What am I now?
Not to be trusted.
Zekk let some amusement creep into his thoughts. And yet you trust her. He pictured Alema Rar in his mind, and let his memories of her as a young Jedi Knight color his vision.
The meditation sphere’s reply was tinged with contempt. Not trust. Obey. Must obey.
Because she knows a secret or two? Do you obey anything who knows the dark ways? You would obey me, then.
The meditation sphere did not reply.
A presentiment of victory, like adrenaline, flashed through Zekk. That’s it, isn’t it? All you need is the right order. From the right dark sider.
There was no answer.
What are you called?
I am Ship.
Zekk snorted, amused and contemptuous at the same time. You are stupid and simplistic. But I will do you a favor anyway. I free you.
He could tell that Ship received his words, but he felt no indication of understanding.
Of course not—this was a vehicle. It was made to serve. It would always serve. The question was, what would it serve.
I free you from Alema Rar. I order you to leave her, to leave this place. I order you to find a master better suited to your nature. I command you to go, as fast as you can, ignoring all commands, all cries for help. Into his words he poured his own power of will, and felt it joined, strengthened by the power of this dark place. His own strength swelled, bloating out beyond the confines of his body, growing like an explosion, until its fringes engulfed Ship.
There, within Ship, was a hard knot of resistance, older orders, planted by Alema Rar. Zekk saw them as a mound, like a standing stone. He lashed that stone with his own strength and saw it begin to erode, flaking away, dissolving.
In moments it was gone, reduced to nothingness. Zekk felt a sort of dark joy rise up within Ship, and then the meditation sphere was accelerating upward, toward the exit out of the chamber. An instant later it was gone.
Zekk sagged, relieved. Jaina would live. He would live.
He would descend to where Ship knew Alema to be. Zekk would kill Alema, cutting her until no remaining piece could sustain life.
Then he would kill Jag and be rid of that moralistic, interfering simulation of a man. That, of course, he would have to do in such a way that it did not distress Jaina.
And finally, there would be Jaina. He would reforge the link between them and, through it, pour his thoughts, his love. He would do so until she understood, until she loved and obeyed him. Until she was his.
Worry suddenly gnawed at him, like the sharp teeth of some undercity rodent. That’s not right. Slowly, he lowered himself to sit on the top cross-tie of the track, wrapping his legs around the rail for security.
That’s not what he should be thinking. The dark side was flooding him now, pouring its toxins into his thoughts.
He tried to shove it out, to become what he had been just a few minutes before. But it was strong, so very strong, and it laughed at his pathetic efforts.
Over the comlink, Jaina called for Zekk, for Jag. She got no answer. That was not entirely unexpected. These personal comlinks could transmit across many kilometers, but not through stone or thick duracrete, and she had plummeted into yet another cavern chamber through a narrow passageway since parting from Zekk.
A touch of Force exertion brought her alongside the track again. She put the soles of her boots against it, allowing friction to slow her. Alone, with only one set of eyes, she needed to descend more slowly, to be more alert.
Alert to presences in the Force. She felt them off to her left. Then they were closer, moving into the range of her glow rod: the flock of mynocks. The rearmost of them now towed Jag, who flailed helplessly.
The foremost of them came on, tail lashing, and struck at her as it passed. She dodged the blow with minimal effort. The other mynocks, strung out behind like a parade, wheeled in the first one’s wake, preparing for one attack after another.
Jaina snorted. “Jag, stick out a hand as you pass. I’ll pull you free.”
Jag didn’t respond. His helmet comlink was probably out—
That’s an assumption. Whenever I make an assumption like that, you two are free to mock me mercilessly. The words were Jag’s, but spoken long ago, during one of their many planning sessions.
And they were correct. She’d just made the sort of assumption that Jag himself routinely mocked.
As she dodged the second mynock attack, and the third, she cast out in the Force to sense the figure being towed by the last mynock.
It was Jag, all right.
Jaina worked the vertical rail track as a gymnast would a set of exercise bars, swinging her wide of every tail attack, or interposing the rails between her and an incoming tail, until only the last mynock remained. Jag, in its grip, struggled and waved frantically at her. Jaina extended her hand to catch his—
Then yanked it back, allowing him to be towed past.
As she did, Jag changed in form and dimension, becoming smaller, slighter. His outstretched hand suddenly had a blue-black lightsaber blade in it, and as Jaina pulled away the blade crossed the spot where her torso had been; it cut a gash in the front of her robe, but did not catch the skin beneath.
Abruptly it was Alema Rar being towed, the young, unmaimed Alema, and she stared angrily at Jaina as she and her mynock passed.
Jaina grinned at them. “Predictable, Alema, predictable.”
The other mynocks were suddenly gone, fading out of existence like the details of a dream in the moments after awakening.
Alema swung up onto the last mynock’s back, riding it as she would a tauntaun. The creature circled, keeping Jaina and Alema safely out of range of each another.
Alema’s reply was similarly lighthearted. “We wish to thank you for coming here and making it more convenient for us to kill you.”
Jaina shook her head. “That’s not what we’re here for. We’re going to end the threat you pose. You can die. Or you can surrender. The choice is yours.”
“You will never leave these chambers alive.”
Jaina shrugged. “Neither will you. I’m prepared to die. Are you?”
chapter twenty-six
ABOARD THE MILLENNIUM FALCON
Despite Han’s maddening maneuvers with the Falcon, despite his frequent swearing and the way the Falcon shuddered whenever her shields sustained a hit from the pursuing frigate, Leia kept her attention on the doorway to the access corridor at the rear of the cock
pit. And when the walls of the corridor began to glow, illuminated by a blue-black lightsaber blade that had to be just around the corridor, Leia leapt from her seat, moved to stand in the doorway, and lit her own blade.
Alema stepped into view, again young and unmarred. She rushed Leia, throwing all her effort into a savage attack, all fourth-form technique without the added elements of acrobatics.
Leia withdrew half a pace so that the edges of the cockpit door were centimeters ahead of her. She blocked the first attack economically, offering no undue motion, extending her weapon not one centimeter forward more than she needed to, conserving her energy.
She also extended her awareness through the Force—not to Alema, but to her husband. Attuned to his moods and conceits as she always was, by experience and her nature, she now became almost a second set of eyes just behind him, anticipating his every move on the Falcon’s controls. When he began a sudden spiraling dive, Leia knew it was coming a fraction of a second in advance, enough forewarning that she could stabilize herself with a hand on the doorjamb. Alema was not so prescient; when the maneuver began, she was thrown off balance, and her next blow sizzled into the doorjamb.
Neither woman spoke, but their faces told the story of how the duel proceeded. Alema began with a mocking smile; within the time it took to throw a dozen failed blows, it had faded, replaced by anger. Leia had not bothered to hide her worry and determination; but as Alema grew angrier, Leia allowed a sweet, condescending smile to cross her features.
Baffled, Alema stepped back. “We are young. You are old. You will tire. Or the ship firing on you, whoever it is, will hit your ship, and you will watch your husband die.”
Leia nodded agreeably. “Yes, I keep hearing that sort of thing. Across forty years now, the same speech. One of the downsides of being ‘old.’”
Alema’s lip curled and she lunged again.
Alema stared at Jaina as though the rage she felt could somehow burn holes in the Jedi. She drew a deep breath, signal of a tirade to come, and then stopped, looking upward.
Star Wars: Legacy of the Force: Fury Page 20
