The Cestus Deception

by Steven Barnes

  the cost of his own flesh. She dragged him down over the rocks. Jangotat

  was semiconscious now. He shuddered with pain for a few

  minutes, and then fumbled with something at his belt. Almost immediately,

  his body relaxed. She panicked as he became a deadweight,

  but when he began to struggle to his feet she figured he had

  self-administered some kind of painkiller that left him dreamy but

  still able to walk.

  She supported his shoulder, trying not to touch any of the spots

  seared by the droid's blast. He stumbled along beside her, knees

  buckling and ankles turning. Then he began to carry some of his own

  weight, and for that she was grateful.

  They stumbled down the side of the defile. There, hidden in a

  maze of shadows, was Spindragon. Although by now the muscles in

  her legs and back screamed for release, Sheeka ignored them and

  hauled Jangotat toward the ship, and safety.

  "Leave . . . me . . . , " she heard him whisper, and it alarmed her that

  some part of her silently agreed, wanted to give up. But Sheevis Tull,

  the same man who had taught her to fly, had taught her to ignore the

  weak and traitorous voices in her head. She disregarded them and

  bent to the task at hand. Breathe, pull, rest. Breathe, pull, rest...

  She lost count of the cycles of pulling and breathing, but a moment

  came when Spindragon's autopilot sensed her proximity and automatically

  extended the ramp, a sensible, albeit costly modification.

  She climbed up the incline, Jangotat gripping at her with a weakening

  hand. With every minor jolt, he grunted as if the pain stripped

  his nerves raw.

  A few more staggering steps brought them into the ship's interior.

  Sheeka loaded Jangotat into a crash seat, and initiated the ship's

  warm-up sequence.

  "Don't worry," she called back to him. "We're getting out of here."

  He seemed to smile at her weakly, and made a closed-fist gesture

  she had seen him make to other clones. She thought that it meant

  "good to go." Gritting her teeth, Sheeka turned back to her controls.

  She would have to deal with him, of course, but the first task was to

  get out of the mountains in one piece.

  Her scanners indicated that a quartet of enemy ships was sweeping

  toward her from the north. Time to move.

  All systems flushed and ready, Sheeka started her engines and

  lifted Spindragon from the ground, whirling her in place as the first of

  the pursuit ships appeared over the broken stone horizon.

  Their intentions were announced with the first bolt that sizzled in

  her direction, striking sparks and splashing slag from the rocks.

  Her face tightened in a fighting snarl: the daughter of Sheevis Tull

  was not so easily killed. She had made low-altitude runs through the

  mountain passes more times than she wanted to remember, every one

  of them wickedly dangerous. Always in the past she had risked arrest,

  imprisonment, revocation of her flying privileges. This was different.

  This time, it was life and death.

  Without further delay, Sheeka accelerated her ship toward the

  south, scrambling her transponder beacon so that it would broadcast

  no identifying signals. Now the only thing she had to worry about

  was being shot down in a blazing fireball.

  Of course, that was a pretty big only.

  If only she had armament! But Spindragon went in and out of cities

  too frequently, was scanned on a weekly basis. The Five Families

  were terrified of another uprising, and forbade suborbital craft from

  carrying mounted weapons.

  The pursuit craft were two-person security units, built for longrange

  recon and pursuit of... well, of suborbital ships like hers. All

  muscle and brain. But it just might be possible to meet their challenge

  . . .

  Unlike her pursuers, Sheeka Tull knew the mines.

  She rose up, flipped, and dived into an opening that was little more

  than an angry gash in the desert floor. With stomach-wrenching

  speed she dropped straight down. At the last moment she straightened

  out, making a sharp right turn.

  The security ships were only seconds behind her. Her task was to

  get far enough ahead of them to break visual contact. The heavy mineral

  deposits would reduce scanner efficiency. Given that, there was

  an excellent chance they'd be confused by the tunnels, and confusion

  shifted the odds in her favor.

  But first—

  A flash bright enough to stun the eye washed the tunnel from wall

  to wall. Sheeka screamed and threw a hand in front of her face in a

  reflexive motion that almost cost her her pitch and yawl control. She

  spun Spindragon sideways to slip between two enormous underground

  pillars, then zipped around a corner and sank to the cave floor

  swiftly, killing all lights.

  She could hear them, but they could not hear her. Distant searchlights

  splashed around the broken rock walls as they slowed to a

  crawl.

  "Where . . . are we?" Jangotat gasped.

  Sheeka slipped out of her captain's chair and walked quietly to

  him. "Shhh," she said. "They can find us with sound."

  "That may be a problem," he gasped.

  "Why?"

  "Because I think I'm going to scream." Despite the pain his lips

  curled in a bitter, self-mocking smile. "I'm out of pain meds."

  She wanted to hug him. Instead she said: "I think we'll make it.

  Hold on."

  Sheeka had a few tricks up her sleeve, and one of them was specifically

  designed to misdirect scanners: a trick that would blind her

  and the pursuing security ships as well.

  The difference was that she had been down here before, and they

  had not.

  She hoped.

  "I'm going to try something," she said. "If it doesn't work, then—"

  "Try it," he said, and closed his eyes against another fit of shakes.

  "For luck," she said. She bent and, wiping the blood from his chin,

  kissed him firmly on the lips. His eyes widened in pleased surprise,

  then she gave a crooked grin and went back to her captain's chair.

  No way to prevent this next part from being dangerous. She could

  see a searchlight off in the distance, reflected between a pair of

  stalactites, and figured that this would be her best chance. Sheeka enriched

  the fuel mixture absurdly, until the unburned hydrocarbons

  gushed from Spindragon's rear as dense, black smoke.

  Within seconds the lights had turned in her direction, and she

  struggled against a surge of panic. Then she calmed her breathing

  and lifted off from the ground a meter or two—much more was impossible

  because of the low ceiling. But she moved. Yes . . . even without

  her running lights, the reflected illumination revealed a turn up

  ahead. It was just as she remembered. If only the rest of it conformed

  to memory as well...

  She turned the corner just in time: a sizzling energy bolt slagged

  the wall just behind her. The passageway churned with dense, oily

  smoke. The pursuing ship slid past them, right through the murk,

  and collided with the wall in a flame-blossom that temporarily

  turned a
smoky night into day.

  Just as she thought: the ships were maneuverable and fast, but not

  well armored, and with no crash shields. The entire cavern glowed

  fiercely as the ship exploded.

  Her chance. Spewing more smoke, Sheeka took the opportunity to

  cruise low, knowing that the other ships would home in on the destruction.

  And there came one now, prowling like some kind of predator.

  Smoke belched from Spindragon's rear as the engine labored on its

  absurdly rich mix, but she knew that the cloud was large enough to

  conceal her.

  The approaching ship had twin beacons in the fore, so that it

  looked like some kind of lurking predator. An energy bolt ripped

  through the smoke and slammed against the wall, causing a rock

  slide she could hear and feel but not see. She tensed as another bolt

  sizzled by, but didn't move. The search ship was just questing about.

  It didn't know where she was.

  But Sheeka did. Just barely, but she did. She lifted up and pivoted

  her ship about. She knew where another exit lay, and if she was careful,

  she just might make it.

  Both front and rear viewscreens showed nothing as she crept away.

  Occasionally she caught the barest glimmer of a headlight, but then

  as she turned the corner once and then twice she left that behind and

  moved as quickly as she could toward the exit, trying not to think of

  the deadly search behind her, or wonder what had become of the Jedi

  and their proud plans.

  58

  0bi-Wan surveyed the small group of stragglers who had survived

  the cave slaughter. They huddled in a rocky defile, invisible to any

  ship overhead, but of course also invisible to other survivors or potential

  allies. If there were any who had not fled into the desert.

  All in all, he estimated that half their force had been killed or captured,

  and most of the rest scattered. He did not look forward to

  making his next report to the Supreme Chancellor.

  That, of course, assumed there would be another report.

  He climbed back up to the top of the ridge without exposing himself

  to enemy fire, looking down to where they had left their new

  transport, a cargo craft purchased from a small farming community

  southwest of the capital.

  The ship was now a smoking crater. Much of the communications

  gear, and their astromech unit. . . gone. Doolb Snoil. . . slain while

  heroically saving Obi-Wan's life. At least two clones had made it

  out—he did not know if there was a third. He had seen one ARC go

  down protecting the woman Tull, but no more than that.

  Unless something changed drastically, this mission was shaping

  into the greatest disaster of his career.

  Kit Fisto came up behind him. Although it was not in Kit's way to

  offer a comforting gesture, Obi-Wan knew his companions hearts.

  Everything that could go wrong had gone wrong, but none of it had

  been the Nautolan's fault. Perhaps, just perhaps, it was not his fault,

  either. G'Mai Duris had warned him that sinister forces were at

  work. That they were never meant to succeed . . . could that be true?

  And if so, what did it mean?

  "I do not understand." Kit said. "Each individual move we have

  made has been without stain."

  Obi-Wan rotated those words in his mind, seeking to put the lie to

  them. To his sad relief, he could not. They had done everything right.

  "And yet we've been outmaneuvered at every turn," he said, finishing

  his thought aloud. "Almost as if we've been playing the wrong game

  all along."

  All along. Obi-Wan remembered the moment in the throne room

  when he had pretended to locate the car by sensing its influence on

  the rest of the system. Well, he had only thought of that because of

  similar, less complex exercises taught long ago by Qui-Gon Jinn.

  He'd felt that same part of himself triggering, rising as from slumber.

  He needed to see something. To notice something. Look at all the

  pieces. Which ones have been disturbed'? What do you not see, as well as

  see? Not sense, as well as sense? Where should there have been a ripple

  where there was not? If something has caused each of your plans to disrupt

  ... if someone attempted to kill you... was that Duris's way? And do

  any of the Five Families have the power to cause such catastrophe? And if

  they do not, then what possibility does that leave?

  "Obi-Wan?" Kit asked, and suddenly Obi-Wan realized that he

  had been staring trancelike into the distance. Kit was studying him,

  and worry creased the Nautolan's normally impassive face.

  He whispered his reply. "There is another player. Another major

  participant in this tragedy, and has been from the beginning. Somewhere

  in all of this."

  "But where?"

  Obi-Wan shook his head. "I don't know. But I fear that before this

  is complete, we will know the answer to that question. And will wish

  we didn't."

  One of the clones approached from behind him. He cursed his

  self-pity. If he was confused, how much more so were these poor

  creatures, raised since before birth to operate within an immutable

  chain of command? He had to shake off this malaise, be worthy of

  their trust.

  "Your orders, sir?" Sirty asked.

  "Collect the equipment," he said. "Round up the survivors. We're

  moving to the secondary location. I don't know who betrayed us. But

  this time, we keep the loop closed."

  Sirty nodded tightly. "Very good, sir."

  "Casualties?"

  "Sixteen dead or captured that we know of, sir."

  Obi-Wan noticed that a few more stragglers had joined them

  without attracting the hunters. Good. Where there was discipline,

  courage, and creativity, hope still remained. "Casualties?"

  "Captain A-Nine-Eight, Nate, is missing and presumed dead."

  That hit Obi-Wan hard. Strange. Hundreds of thousands of clones,

  all cut from the same cloth. And yet hearing about that particular

  trooper caused him a special pain, and he wasn't entirely certain why.

  59

  sheeka Tull made very, very certain her pursuers were thrown off

  the track before continuing. She traveled south to the commercial air

  corridors, and then slipped along those, changing directions several

  times to be absolutely sure that Spindragon was not followed.

  Once certain, she zigzagged 200 kilometers into a stretch of rolling

  brown mounds 180 klicks east of the Dashta Mountains. A river

  channeled snowmelt from the Yal-Noy's whitecapped peak to their

  north, so the hills were greener than much of Cestus's surface, pleasing

  to the eye even from a distance. Still, the water supply was adequate

  rather than generous, so the population remained relatively

  low.

  Most called them the Zantay Hills. Sheeka Tull called them home.

  Sheeka went into a landing pattern, and breathed a sigh of relief as

  the engines slowed and stopped.

  At first there was no sign of habitation. Then an X'Ting cloaked

  in a brown robe emerged from one of the metal buildings. As Sheeka

  Tull walked Jangotat down the ramp, he hailed her, the customary


  smile of greeting gone thin and tight.

  "Brother Fate," she said.

  "Sheeka," he said. His faceted eyes peered more carefully at the

  burned uniform, and the unhappy expression deepened. "Bringing

  this soldier here is dangerous."

  Sheeka tightened her grip around Jangotat's waist. "He was injured

  in our cause. Help him, Brother Fate. Please."

  The old gray-tufted X'Ting examined the wound, rubbing the

  singed cloth between his fingers. "Blaster?"

  "What difference does that make?" she said urgently. "Help him!"

  Brother Fate let out a long, slow sigh. His faceted emerald eyes

  were filled with pity. "For you, my child," he said, and then raised his

  voice to the others. Slowly, a few other people, and then a stream,

  emerged from their shelters and, smiling, approached.

  Three children emerged, came running toward her crying, "Nana!"

  and hugging her leather skirts.

  "Tarl!" she cried, hugging the boy child. "Tonote," the girl. "Where

  is Mithail?" One youngster hung back a bit, but then she gathered

  him into her arms and kissed his mop of unruly red hair. "How have

  you all been?" she asked. As she distributed hugs and kisses to them

  she watched from the corner of her eye while Jangotat was carted

  away by several X'Tings in dark cloaks.

  "Who is the man?" Mithail, the youngest, asked.

  "A friend," she replied, and then ruffled their hair. "A friend. Now.

  Tell me everything that's happened in the last week."

  60

  Groaning with pain, Jangotat pulled himself into wakefulness.

  Everything inside him hurt, which he found alarming. Was this how

  it felt to die?

  He tried to open his eyes. He felt his lids slide up, but was still unable

  to see. Global pain combined with blindness triggered an unexpected

  and quite unwelcome panic response. He sat up, as he did so

  experiencing a tearing sensation in the skin along his waist. Agony

  forced an oath from his lips, and he thrashed his arms about, trying

  to discover the extent of his . . .

  Prison?

  "Now, now, calm down." A pleasant male X'Ting voice. "Everything

  is all right. It is imperative that you rest."

  Absolutely nothing in that voice triggered any sense of threat, but

  Jangotat couldn't dampen his reaction. Danger flared over his entire

  nervous system, as if his every sense had triggered simultaneously.

  And y e t . . .

  And y e t . . .