by Timothy Zahn
“I’m not being flippant; I’m being disbelieving,” she countered. “I hardly think Thrawn would have approved of you hiring me as your local affairs adviser.”
“On the contrary,” Parck said. “Thrawn regarded you quite highly. I know for a fact that he intended to offer you a position with us once the Empire had regained its territory.”
One of the Chiss beside Parck stirred, tilting his head as Stent had done earlier. “Admiral?” he said softly, squatting down beside the chair and whispering something into Parck’s ear. Parck replied, and for a minute they held an inaudible conversation. Mara ran her eye over Fel and the five Chiss, mentally mapping out how she might be able to take them down if it came to a fight.
But the attempt was little more than a mental exercise, and she knew it. With their eyes steady on her, and their hands resting on their holstered weapons, there was no chance she could take out all of them before they got her. Not without the Force.
The conversation ended, and the Chiss stood back up and strode rapidly away along the wall. “Please excuse the interruption,” Parck apologized as the alien left the room.
“No problem,” Mara said. Down to four Chiss now, plus Fel and Parck. Still rotten odds. “Having trouble pinning Skywalker down?”
“Not really,” Parck assured her.
“Glad to hear it,” Mara said, wishing more than ever that she could pick up something of his thoughts. That exit hadn’t looked like the departure of someone who wasn’t really having trouble. If she only had some idea what Luke was up to … “So Thrawn intended to offer me a commission, did he?”
“He did indeed,” Parck said. “He knew who all the best people were, both in overall skills and the kind of mental toughness he needed.” He gestured toward Fel. “General Fel is a good example. His rebellion against Isard was of no consequence to Thrawn. What mattered was his feelings for the people and worlds of this region. So after Thrawn had Isard capture him—”
“Wait a minute,” Mara interrupted. “Thrawn was involved with that?”
“It was entirely his plan,” Fel said. “You don’t think Isard could have come up with anything that clever, do you?” His mouth tightened, his remaining eye gazing away thoughtfully into the distance. “He brought me out here,” he said quietly. “Showed me what it was we faced, and what we’d have to do to stop it. Showed me that even with all the resources of the Empire and New Republic combined, and with himself at the head, there were no guarantees of victory.”
“On the contrary, he’s already made contingency plans for defeat,” Parck added soberly. “Ten years ago he had sleeper groups of the best of his cloned warriors scattered around the Empire and New Republic, ready to form the nuclei of local resistance forces should Bastion and Coruscant fall. Men who loved their homes and their land and their worlds, and who would give their lives in their defense.”
“Yes,” Fel said. “Once I understood—once I really understood—I had no choice but to join him.”
“As you will, too,” Parck said.
Mara shook her head. “Sorry. I have other plans.”
“We’ll see,” Parck said calmly. “Perhaps Thrawn will be able to convince you himself when he returns.”
“And what if he doesn’t return?” Mara asked. “What if the rumors are just that: rumors?”
“Oh, he’ll return,” Parck said. “He said he would, and he always kept his promises. The only question is whether or not this particular rumor is actually him.”
He looked up at Fel. “And under the circumstances, I suppose the only way we’re going to find out for sure will be for me to finally make a trip to Bastion. If Thrawn has indeed set up a headquarters there, that should answer the question of which side he’ll be working from.”
Mara felt her hands tighten into fists. “You don’t know what you’re saying,” she said. “You can’t just turn all of this over to the Empire. All these resources, bases, alliances—”
“They won’t misuse them,” Parck said, his voice grim. “We’ll make sure of that. The task ahead of us is far too serious for anyone to waste time on anything as petty as politics or personal gain.”
“If you think that, you are out of touch,” Mara snapped. “Try to remember back to Palpatine’s court, and what the taste of power did to those people. Personal gain is all some of them ever think of.”
“It’s a risk we’ll have to take,” Parck said firmly. “We’ll be careful, certainly—we’ll speak with Sorn when he gets back and sift through the data he collected from his pass through the Bastion system. But unless there’s something that positively quashes the rumors of Thrawn’s return, it’s time to make that contact.”
Mara took a deep breath. “I can’t let you do that,” she said.
“You can’t let us do it?” Fel asked pointedly.
“No,” Mara said. “I can’t. You give this to Bastion, and the first thing they’ll do is turn it straight against Coruscant.”
“Don’t worry,” Parck said. “We won’t give anything away until we’re sure Thrawn is with them.”
“On the other hand, we may do well to worry about her, Admiral,” Fel pointed out, eyeing her thoughtfully. “Someone as vehemently opposed as she is to our contacting Bastion could be trouble.”
“I suppose you’re right,” Parck said reluctantly. He levered himself out of his chair, one of the Chiss stepping to his side and offering him a supporting arm as he stood up. “I’m afraid, Mara, that you and Skywalker will have to be our guests for a while.”
“And if Thrawn is back, and I still don’t want to join up?” Mara demanded. “What then?”
Parck’s lips compressed briefly. “I’m sure it won’t come to that,” he assured her. But his eyes didn’t quite meet hers as he spoke. “We’ll have it all sorted out within a few days. Certainly no more than a month at the most.”
Mara snorted. “You aren’t serious. You really think a couple dozen ysalamiri are going to hold Luke Skywalker and me that long?”
“She’s right, Admiral,” Fel agreed. “It’s going to take more to keep the two of them quiet.”
Parck studied Mara’s face. “What do you suggest?”
Fel gestured to one of the Chiss. “Brosh, your charric. Set for level two.”
“Wait a second,” Mara said hastily, jumping to her feet as the Chiss drew his hand weapon. A brief flood of emotion surged through her—Stall, the urgent thought leaped into her mind—“Wait just a Hoth-frost second. I’m an unarmed prisoner.”
The other Chiss were drawing their weapons now, too. “I know,” Fel said. He sounded genuinely regretful, for whatever that was worth. “And I’m deeply sorry about having to do this. But I’ve had some experience with Jedi, and the only way I can think of to keep you a proper prisoner for a few days is to force you to go into a healing trance.” He looked over at Brosh—
“Wait a minute,” Mara said. Stall, stall, stall. “You said you wanted to make a deal with me, right? Well, I can tell you flat out that shooting me will definitely not get any such negotiations off on the right foot. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that it might put me off working for you entirely.”
“It won’t,” Fel assured her darkly. “Not when you know the full extent of the threats facing us.”
“Maybe it will, and maybe it won’t,” Mara countered. “And don’t forget Karrde, either. If you really want information, he’s the one you’re going to have to deal with. And Karrde does not take kindly to anyone who takes potshots at his people. I’ve seen him take whole organizations apart for that sort of crime. In fact, there was one particular Hutt group—”
“Yes, I’m sure,” Parck interrupted, frowning. “Really, Mara, you’re making far more out of this than you need to. Charric burns are certainly serious, but that’s hardly even a consideration for someone with the Jedi skills of pain suppression and healing. And General Fel is right: we do need to keep you quiet for a while.”
“Yes, I understand that,” Mara said. “And it’s a brilli
ant idea—really it is. There’s just one small problem: I don’t know how to do either the pain suppression or healing tricks.”
“Come now,” Parck said reproachfully, gesturing toward the black-edged hole in her jumpsuit. “Your shoulder indicates otherwise.”
“Skywalker put me into the trance,” Mara said, consciously relaxing her muscles in anticipation. “And he’s not here. I could die of shock, or bleed to death—”
“You’ll do neither,” Fel assured her. “I know both the power and limitations of Chiss weaponry. Think of it as an added incentive for Skywalker to surrender to us.”
He caught Brosh’s eye and nodded. The Chiss nodded back and lifted his weapon—
And from it came a brilliant green flash.
CHAPTER
28
Without warning, right in the middle of a step, Mara vanished. Mara? Luke thought desperately toward her, stretching out to the Force. Mara!
But there was no response. Somehow, they must have gotten past her danger sense and combat skills and had launched a sudden and overwhelming attack.
And she was unconscious. Or dead.
“No,” he whispered aloud, his pulse pounding in his ears. Once again, a person he’d cared for …
“No!” he bit out between clenched teeth, the agony in his heart swirling into something dark and deadly as the pain turned into a growing fury. Deal out casual death, would they? If death was what they wanted, he would show them just what death looked like. In his mind’s eye he saw himself striding down the spiral slideway, throwing the aliens aside like sand dolls, their bodies slamming against the unyielding black stone and dropping crumpled to the floor. His lightsaber would flash through their ranks, cutting through weapons and bodies and leaving more death in its wake—
His lightsaber.
He looked down at the lightsaber in his hand. Not the weapon he himself had made in the oppressive heat of the Tatooine desert, but the one his father had made so many years before. The weapon he had given to Mara …
He took a deep breath, letting go of the rage and hatred, a cold shiver running through him as he realized the magnitude of what he had almost done. Once again, he had come to the very brink of giving in to the dark side. Had nearly surrendered to hatred and the lust for revenge, and the overwhelming desire to use his power for his own selfish ends.
If you honor what they fight for … Master Yoda’s words echoed hauntingly through his mind. “All right,” he murmured aloud. No, he would not avenge whatever had happened to Mara, at least not for vengeance’s sake. But he would seek out the truth of her fate.
With an effort, he cleared the last lingering emotion from his thoughts, Mara’s picture of songbirds singing inside an ore-crushing facility flickering once through his mind as he did so. Stretching out with the Force, he focused his mental probe toward the spot where Mara’s presence had vanished. Unless they had already taken it away, he should at least be able to sense her body …
But there was nothing. Not Mara, not the humans or aliens she had supposedly been moving toward when she disappeared.
In fact, within a certain area, he could detect nothing at all. Almost as if something was blocking his access to the Force …
Abruptly, his breath went out of him in a rush, relief and chagrin flooding into him in equal quantities. Of course—the aliens had moved ysalamiri into the space between him and Mara. Even given the four-floor distance between them, he should have immediately recognized what was happening. Once again, it seemed, he was having to relearn Yoda’s warning against acting while in the grip of strong emotion.
But there was no time for self-recrimination. Within the ysalamiri effect, Mara’s fledgling Jedi powers were useless; and it was up to him to get her out.
He pulled out his comlink and thumbed it on. “Artoo?” he called softly. “I need you down here—take the non-moving spiral slideway behind the wall to the right of the hidden exit doorway and come down four floors. Splitter Of Stones, leave someone behind in the stairway to seal the door, and the rest of you come with Artoo. Got that?”
There was a twitter from the droid and a chirp from the Qom Jha. Luke returned the comlink to his belt and walked slowly across the floor toward one of the level’s back corners, stretching out beneath him with the Force as he moved. He could sense beings on the next level down, but none of them seemed to be in this particular area.
That could be misleading, given that he still didn’t have a clear reading on this species. But he would have to risk it. I gniting Mara’s lightsaber, the feel of the weapon bringing back a flood of old memories, he gripped it with both hands and dug the blue-white blade into the floor.
His big fear had been that like the cortosis ore in the cave below, the strange black stone would resist the lightsaber in some way. But though it felt rather like dragging a tree branch upstream through a rapidly flowing river, the blade sliced through the stone without trouble. Walking in a tight circle, beveling the edge inward so that the plug wouldn’t fall through to the floor below, he carved out a round hole a little wider man Artoo.
Finishing his cut, he confirmed one final time that no one seemed to be below him. Then, stretching out to the Force, he lifted the stone plug out.
It was heavy—far heavier than anything of such a small size had any business being. Maneuvering it off to the side, he set it down with its edge just overlapping the hole, then dropped flat to the floor and peered carefully down.
The area did indeed appear to be deserted. Getting a grip on the rim, he eased himself in to hang full-length through the hole. Bracing himself, drawing on the Force to strengthen his muscles, he let go.
The floor was about four meters down, a trivial fall for a Jedi. He let his legs collapse as he hit, absorbing the impact and dropping him into a hopefully unobtrusive heap as he stretched out his senses for any sign he’d been seen or heard. But there was nothing. Getting carefully to his feet, he looked around again—
Master Walker Of Sky?
Luke looked up. Keeper Of Promises was in the room above him, peering down through the hole in the floor. “Keep quiet,” he warned the Qom Jha. “Where are the rest of your people?”
They are coming in a flanking curve, Keeper Of Promises said. Some guard your machine—it is the slowest.
“Let me know when he gets there,” Luke told him, stretching out with the Force. There were, he could tell, more of the aliens on the next level down, but again they didn’t seem to be too close to him. Igniting the lightsaber again, he began cutting a new hole directly beneath the first one.
He’d finished the hole and had dropped to the next floor down when a quiet whistle from above signaled Artoo’s arrival. “Great,” Luke called softly, looking up at the blue-and-silver dome peering cautiously over the lip two floors up as he pulled out his comlink and thumbed it on.
The droid backed out of sight, and there was another acknowledging whistle from the comlink. “All right,” Luke said, glancing around. He’d come down into a deserted room this time, but through the open door he could see glimpses of moving shadows. “You see the control boards over there? I want you to go find a computer jack you can access and plug into it. Try to get a floor plan of the fortress if you can; if you can’t, just look around and see what else you can find. When I signal you again, unplug and get back over to the hole as fast as you can. Got all that?”
There was a slightly nervous-sounding twitter, and the comlink went dead. Gripping Mara’s lightsaber, trying to get a feel for all the minds around and below him, Luke waited.
When it happened, it happened all at once. Suddenly, virtually in unison, all the alien minds changed, their various tones and concerns and textures all shifting to focus in the same direction. Not with fear, concern, or even surprise, but with the calm, deadly purpose of professional soldiers.
Artoo had tripped the flags Mara had warned him about, and the fortress was mobilizing for action.
Luke crouched a little closer to the floo
r, acutely aware that everything now hinged on what exactly that action would consist of. If all the aliens merely settled in where they were and braced for possible attack, he would have no choice but to fight his way through them to get to Mara. If, however, they instead concentrated on the slideway ramps and the floor where the attempted break-in was occurring …
And they did. Even as Luke held his breath, he could sense the aliens below moving purposefully toward the slideway Mara had taken earlier. If he was careful—and quick—the path to her might just be open.
Especially if he was quick. Igniting the lightsaber, he set to work carving yet another hole in the black stone.
He had finished the opening and dropped through to the next level down when his probing senses picked up the cue he’d been waiting for: the subtle change in the alien minds as the assembled assault teams readied themselves. “Now, Artoo,” he called softly into the comlink. “Send the Qom Jha to me down the hole, and get over there yourself.”
The droid acknowledged, and Luke stepped beneath the hole to wait. The Qom Jha weren’t wasting any time; already they were dropping through like leaves blown from a tree, folding their wings tightly as they passed through each successive hole, opening them up between floors to regain control of their flight. Through the flurry of falling Qom Jha he spotted Artoo’s dome lean cautiously over the edge, and caught an echo of the surprised and nervous twitter as the droid saw how much farther down Luke was now than the last time he’d looked.
A twitter that turned into an electronic gasp as Luke reached out with the Force to pick him up and drop him wheels-first through the hole.
Luke winced at the noise; but fortunately Artoo quickly realized what was happening and quieted down before the sound of a descending electronic scream could give the whole thing away. Luke got the droid safely to the floor beside him, then stretched out again to the edge of the stone plug he’d left poking over the side of the first hole above. At this distance it felt even heavier; but with alien warriors presumably even now fanning out toward the command center, he had great motivation for speed. Three seconds later, the plug was securely back in place.
