“In that direction, we’re safe down to five hundred meters, and it gets better the farther we go—that’s the descending slope of a mountain range.”
Luke turned to the course Ben had recommended and began a gradual descent. There was a shuddering he didn’t like from the starboard wing. The engines were losing power, and the less thrust they could provide, the less lift the damaged starboard wing would offer.
The repulsorlifts seemed fully functional, though. Under direction from his son and Vestara, he brought the shuttle down until he could occasionally see crystal-decorated hilly ridges just a few score meters beneath the keel. By eye and sensor reports, he slowed the shuttle and brought it down to fewer than five meters. A minute later, the shuttle was running like a landspeeder—repulsors keeping it off the ground while increasingly balky ion engines provided rear thrust.
“Snaplaunce is going to be mad, Dad.”
“We’ll get it restored for him. Assuming he didn’t arrange this.”
“Huh?”
Vestara sounded snappish. “Ben, be sensible. The mayor volunteered his shuttle and knew our destination. The systems that failed—did they do that because they were being overstressed? Or were they sabotaged?”
“I don’t know.”
“I don’t, either, but your father is right. If Snaplaunce tried to kill us, we don’t pay for his repairs.”
Luke snorted, amused.
The engines continued to weaken, the right one giving out completely, as they completed their journey to the old rock ivory processing site.
It was, according to the data Snaplaunce’s people had transmitted to the shuttle, situated in the foothills of the mountain range the shuttle had last cleared. Despite the uneven terrain, despite the way the dust storm winds grabbed the intact solar wing array and tried to drag the shuttle around by it, Luke was able to navigate through broad ravines and up gentle hill slopes, coaxing the shuttle as though it were an ancient landspeeder being towed behind a bantha, until the facility was, according to the sensors, three hundred meters away. That was when the second engine failed utterly.
The only sounds left in the cockpit were the hum of the still-functioning repulsorlifts and the howl of the winds outside, punctuated by scrapes and dings as small stones hit the shuttle’s fuselage and scratched at the yellow paint. The wind pushed at the shuttle, compelling it to start sliding down the slope it had just grudgingly climbed; lacking thrust, and not daring to use the Force, Luke could do nothing to keep it moving in the direction he wanted to go.
Luke killed the repulsors, allowing the shuttle to settle down on the stony surface of the slope. The shuttle began to rock, pushed by the winds.
“Fun flight, Dad.”
“Quiet, you.”
Minutes later, wrapped against the cold and flying grit, they began their walk to the facility.
At a distance of twenty meters, the clouds of gray and crystal dust being driven past were thin enough that the three of them could see their destination. Situated in a cleft between two sloping ravine walls, it was a circular building of rough stones joined by permacrete mortar; it looked like the guard tower of an ancient city wall rather than a mineral processing plant.
And it was, as far as they could see, as dry and dead as most of this world. Its viewports, horizontal slits, were dark. There were no vehicles outside. But its main door, a slab of metal rare on a building this old on this world, was open, drawn halfway into the left wall section.
Vestara put her hand on her lightsaber hilt as if to reassure herself that it was still there. Her voice was muffled by her cold-weather veil. “Not a good sign.”
Luke shrugged. “Look at it pragmatically. At least we don’t have to climb a wall to get in.”
The main door led to a broad channel between permacrete walls. This had been a lane for bringing in ore, Luke decided; its foundation, natural stone ground flat in some long-ago time, showed ruts where wagons had passed by the hundreds, perhaps across centuries. The channel was open to the air above, but at its end it entered an enclosed area that was dark, kept in shadow by the roof.
Once they were past the durasteel door they could see, just protruding from the shadows, a pair of leather, fur-lined boots. They were not decayed, crumbled wrecks, and they had not sagged flat.
Ben sighed. “Also not good.”
They moved to the boots. Close up, they could see that this was a body, an unmoving figure lying mostly in shadow, facedown.
Luke opened himself up to the Force, seeking the distinctive, loathsome flavor of massed drochs, but he detected none. All he could feel were the looming presences of the tsils, watchful and intimidating.
He reached down to roll the body over. Vestara ignited a glow rod.
Once on his back, the victim proved to be stone dead, his body frozen. There was brown all over his chest, blood—practically freeze-dried by the surrounding air. His eyes were closed. His face was ruddy, not that of an Oldtimer, and his hair was graying black, tied back in a ponytail.
Luke knew his face. He’d seen it earlier today, many times, in holos.
Ben apparently had, too. “It’s Dr. Wei.”
They could not perform a full search of the old processing plant in just a few minutes, but a preliminary exploration did reveal that the place was plausibly unoccupied. There was no electronic equipment remaining, no food. There were a couple of muscle-powered machines still functioning, a wheel-shaped crank usable to open and close the outer door, and a hand pump that brought water up to a stone trough in the roofed area connected to the loading channel.
Their personal comlinks elicited no response from Hweg Shul, Koval Station, or any homestead.
Luke shook his head. “We may be too far from any receiver, or perhaps we’re surrounded by mountain peaks. Or perhaps it’s just the atmospheric conditions. We’ll try again when the winds die down at night.”
Seated on the water trough, Vestara looked at the body of Dr. Wei. They hadn’t found any cloth or flexiplast to wrap him up and give him a little dignified concealment from prying eyes. “So I take it he wasn’t working for Abeloth.”
Ben made a disgusted face, though Luke could tell his emotion was directed at the situation, not at Vestara. “No. Or if he was, he didn’t prove valuable enough to her. But I think he wasn’t. He never was.”
Luke gave his son a curious look. “How do you figure?”
Ben sat down on the trough beside Vestara. “Mayor Snaplaunce didn’t think Wei was the kind of guy who’d mutate drochs to unleash them on the galaxy. Let’s assume he was right. So how did all the evidence show that he was doing that? Well, first, there wasn’t that much evidence. Just enough to get us up and running. It might have been planted. Let’s say someone grabs Wei, kills him, flies his body out here in his landspeeder to have an authentic-looking record of the trip on his landspeeder memory. The killer dumps the body and goes back, then backs up the memory. Fiddles with the files, maybe, which is why Sel said they were a mess. And he—the killer, I mean—leaves that diagram for us to find.”
Luke thought about it. “That’s why the diagram was hand-drawn. Whoever drew it didn’t know how to use the graphics capabilities of Wei’s computer. Perhaps any computer. Which suggests it was an Oldtimer. And another one, one without any artistic ability, printed out the text accompanying the diagram in the first place.” He sighed, vexed at himself. “That had to be what Snaplaunce saw but wasn’t sure about. I saw it, too, and didn’t recognize it. There were no other hand-drawn diagrams in all those printouts. Just the one that implicated Wei.”
Vestara nodded glumly. “So they knew we, or at least you, would be coming out here to find Wei, which set you up for an attack by Ship. But they had to know that you’d be taking Snaplaunce’s shuttle. Its electronics began to fail the exact instant we were talking to Koval Station …”
“So either Snaplaunce was in on the conspiracy, or he has a habit of lending out his shuttle to important visitors, and the habit was well known.” Luke fe
lt as unhappy as Ben and Vestara looked.
“Dad, how long do you think it will take us to repair the shuttle? And how much food and water are aboard?”
“Two days’ rations for one average vigorous human. As for repairs … I don’t know. When the sun goes down, we’ll go out there and do an evaluation. We can jury-rig some heaters and run them off the shuttle’s power. Let’s hope the saboteurs left the tools in storage alone.” Luke didn’t bother adding what the two teenagers doubtless were already aware of: The saboteurs had known what they were doing. Yes, the three of them had survived Ship’s attack, but they were still stranded out here for who knew how long. This was time the saboteurs could spend productively. Maybe harvesting drochs, maybe helping Abeloth subvert the Theran Listeners. Maybe both.
Something else occurred to him. “Though we do have one communications possibility they might not know about.”
Ben perked up. “Which is?”
“Communing with the tsils.”
ABOARD FIREBORN, HUTT SPACE
FROM THE OUTSIDE, GRUNEL OVIN REFLECTED, CC-7700 FRIGATES were impressive things. Roughly triangular, evoking the decades-old dread of Star Destroyers but more rakishly arrowhead-shaped, they were fierce of appearance. It was a bit of an illusion; lightly armed and armored, equipped with a gravity-well generator, the frigate’s main role was one of support, such as by positioning itself along a specific hyperspace route at a specific time and dragging a specific target out of hyperspace for capture.
But lack of firepower did not spoil its good looks. The running lights of this particular frigate, an aging ship of the Galactic Alliance Navy, gleamed against the darkness of deep space and outshone visible stars. And its turbolasers flashed brilliantly as it fired warning shots—such as it had when compelling Grunel’s transport to heave to and prepare to be boarded.
From the inside, especially within the brig, the ship wasn’t so impressive. Floors and other surfaces were not maintained at the level of sanitary cleanliness preferred by the GA’s more hard-nosed naval officers. Crew uniforms were not pressed to stiff, crisp lines. Grunel had seen salutes thrown that would cause him to visit dire punishments on his own subordinates had they been offered to him.
When one was a leader of a desperate drive to free a slave culture, one had to be disciplined, hard, and merciless. Grunel was all three. And he was encouraged that the GA forces he faced were not as resolute as his own people. He was going to prison … but the movement would live on, perhaps led by his own brother. It would continue to swell, would achieve victory without him.
A larger-than-average Klatooinian, with the olive-green skin, heavy musculature, and severe, even brutish facial features common to his kind, Grunel knew he’d be a striking image on HoloNews during his trial. Perhaps this would not be the best way for him to serve … but it would still be service.
The door into his small, gray solitary-confinement cell slid up. He looked over from his bunk. A Falleen male, lean and vigorous, in a naval captain’s uniform stepped in. Behind him, a trio of guards waited. They disappeared from his view as the door slid into place again.
Grunel returned his attention to the ceiling. “You are my advocate?”
“No. I’m Captain Hunor. I’m here to discuss options with you.” The Falleen sat in the cell’s single chair, a spindly-looking thing of durasteel tubing.
“I’ll take the option where I go free and destroy your precious navy.”
“Not available, sadly.”
Grunel managed a weary smile. He knew it looked bestial to the humans and near-humans; the Klatooinian facial muzzle, not dissimilar to that of battle dogs but shorter, was intimidating to the more numerous small-chinned races. “I’m certain you are sad.”
“I am. I’m caught between my duty to the navy and my duty to sapient species everywhere. And increasingly, I choose to do my duty to the latter.”
Curious, Grunel looked at him again. “And how do you intend to do your duty this time?”
“By killing you. With your cooperation. And making your death mean something.”
* * *
ABANDONED ROCK IVORY PROCESSING PLANT, NAM CHORIOS
When night fell and the winds died down, Luke, Ben, and Vestara moved out to the TIE shuttle and got to work.
Luke let the youngsters attempt the resurrection of the shuttle. They had plenty of technical skill, and could call on him if they needed more.
For his own part, he went looking, climbing across the hilly ridges in search of crystals. He didn’t need ordinary ones—he wanted those that resonated with the Force. He needed the tsils.
He found more than one such being occupying one of the elaborate chimney-like crystal formations, the kind that had collectively been termed tsils before that word had been revised to refer only to the sentient silicon life-forms of the planet. This chimney structure resonated with the Force, suggesting that there were two or three spook-crystals within; another one lay on the dusty ground less than a meter away from its base. The formation wasn’t far from the shuttle. As he settled to the ground in a cross-legged position, his cloak under and around him, Luke could still hear Ben and Vestara talking.
Arguing, as usual.
“You have to admire his efficiency.”
“No, you don’t, Ben … Whose efficiency?”
“The saboteur. Looks like what he did was patch a high-powered capacitor straight into the electronics, triggered by receipt of any protracted signal on the official port authority comm channel. When it went off, every circuit chip and half the wiring in the shuttle fried. Probably no more than a five-minute job to set up the sabotage … days or weeks to repair it fully.”
“And you admire this?”
“Just the efficiency. Next time I have to sabotage something, I’ll have to remember this.”
“Well, remember how cold you are before you express—hey.”
“Hey, what?”
“The laser cannon was uninstalled …”
“We knew that. That’s why Dad wasn’t shooting back.”
“But the support systems for it weren’t. They were detached from the shuttle’s other circuits but not removed. So we have a few control chips, plenty of serviceable wire, power output meters, emergency start-up capacitors …”
“Stang!”
Though heartened by the teenagers’ discovery, Luke let his mind drift away from their conversation. He drew into himself, into his own ability to visualize, to communicate nonverbally.
The tsils were not remotely human. From his earlier contacts with them, they did not seem to be able to think purely abstractly. Even if they’d had ears, the spoken word “airspeeder” would not cause them to think of an airspeeder, nor would the word if written in text form, nor would even a simplified drawing of an airspeeder. But they were capable of some symbolic thought. One realistic image could be substituted for another, conveying an idea of association or comparison. That was how, three decades before, they had first communicated with Luke to inform him that crystals of their own kind were being brain-damaged, reprogrammed, and taken away to tragic lives of servitude as slaves.
And the tsils did care about living beings. Perhaps they did not truly worry about short-lived beings such as humans on an individual basis, but they cared about the survival of living, sapient species. They had struggled for better than seven centuries to keep the menace of the Death Seed plague, represented by the drochs, imprisoned on Nam Chorios, and this was in part over a concern for the fate of entire species other than their own.
Luke started with an image of a droch. He let it grow to a great size, the size of a human, the size of long-dead Dzym who had nearly escaped Nam Chorios three decades earlier. Luke modified the image in his mind, giving it many more legs and the greater angularity of the energy spiders of Kessel, but allowing it to retain the flavor, the Force-corrupting “taste,” of the drochs en masse, memory of which could still make him shudder.
Then, preserving its menace and awfulness, he sl
owly, meticulously re-formed it into Abeloth’s shape—humanoid but with a mouth broader than that of any human, with wavering tentacles instead of fingers, her body wreathed in mist. Then she changed again, becoming a human woman, silver-eyed and beautiful.
Luke was not done. He began creating other images to stand beside Abeloth. First was Callista, his love of so many years before. She stood, smiling and sad, beside Abeloth, so real in Luke’s mind that he felt a squeeze across his heart.
Abeloth opened her mouth … and Callista was drawn, shrieking, increasingly tiny, into that maw.
And Abeloth became Callista.
Next was Dyon Stadd, the onetime Jedi applicant who had helped Luke and Ben on Dathomir. He was dark-haired, natty, and vigorous, dressed in shorts and vest for tropical temperatures. Callista opened her mouth, and Dyon diminished in size. Thrashing and shrinking, he was drawn into her mouth.
A moment later Callista became Dyon.
Again and again Luke repeated this pattern, creating further images from whole cloth or basing them on characters from decades-old holodramas, showing the process of Abeloth absorbing lives.
He had just conjured up a beautiful blond human woman played by actress Wynssa Starflare, had her devoured by the particularly menacing but imaginary Devaronian man he had created just before, and had Abeloth assume Starflare’s guise, when the next victim appeared without his participation. It was an elderly man, gray-bearded and fierce-eyed, wearing a patched blue jumpsuit appropriate to life on Nam Chorios.
Luke knew his face. The man was Nenn, leader of the Theran Listeners.
Luke felt a touch of grief as Wynssa Starflare opened her mouth and Nenn was drawn, flailing and screaming, into it. Then the actress became the Theran Listener.
And the cycle ended. Nenn simply stood there in Luke’s imagination, smiling, his mouth open just a little, with the suggestion of movement within it—movement of dozens of beings now trapped forever within Abeloth.
The tsils knew. They knew even more than Luke did of Abeloth’s activities here on this planet. Now, perhaps, they could suggest some course of action, some way to keep Abeloth from seizing control of the Listeners …
Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi: Conviction Page 15
