STAR WARS - THE NEW JEDI ORDER - Destiny's Way

by Walter Jon Williams

  She zigzagged around the piers and dashed through the exit to see the first ocean wave break over the Vong's canopy as it began to descend. Mara steered after the vanishing craft and looked for the ballast tank controls. Air sputtered from vents as she began her descent.

  Piloting the submersible, she found, was like flying a starfighter, but in slow motion. It rolled and banked like any atmosphere craft, and like any atmosphere craft it flew better when it was in trim, the ballast tanks filled equally tore and aft, which meant she didn't have to be constantly fighting the dive planes to keep the boat at the right depth.

  Visibility was quite good, but "good" visibility in the water only extended a hundred meters or so. fortunately, her displays kept her informed of other craft in the water.

  Radio-based detection systems were useless in the water, so submersibles featured a system based on sound. Rather than having every underwater craft pinging away all the time and confusing each other's sensors with overlapping noise, Heurkea Floating City itself issued regular low-frequency sonar pulses that highlighted every craft in the vicinity for thirty kilometers or more. In order to detect the vessels around them, all the submersibles had to do was set their own sonar sets to passively receive the city's pulses.

  Mara had no trouble following her target and doing it without calling attention to herself, though she did speed up at one point in order to make certain that the craft she was following was the right one. She crept up on its tail until she recognized the configuration of the cabin, then allowed her boat to drift back. Compared to her own, the Yuuzhan Vong boat was a squat, broad, roomy vessel, with its two passengers sitting abreast of one another, and she reckoned her own tube-shaped craft was much speedier. This and the usefulness of Heurkea's city sonar allowed her to keep her distance from the Yuuzhan Vong vessel, even to join other traffic patterns in order to make it less obvious to the Vong they were being followed.

  The target vessel plodded on at a deliberate speed, descending to thirty-five meters and circling the floating city until it was almost directly opposite the marina from which it had started. At this depth all color faded away to blue or gray, except for the occasional silver flash of a predator fish darting at the smaller fish attracted by the brightly lit windows of the residential areas. Below, the sea was a profound deep blue that seemed to stretch down forever, an azure vastness that seemed as limitless as empty space.

  The Yuuzhan Vong boat checked its speed and began to hover. Mara slowed her own vessel, uncertain what she could do without giving herself away. If she began to hover herself, it might make the Yuuzhan Vong suspicious, but so might tracking back and forth in their vicinity.

  Instead, she decided to pass within visual range of the target and see if she could make any sense of its actions. She dipped the dive planes to pass under the Vong craft, and set the throttle to a slow rate of speed to give herself as much time in visual range as possible. Then she almost jumped out of her skin as she passed in front of one of the city's sonar emitters and felt the deep low-frequency rumble as it shivered along her bones and caused her boat's small metal fittings to rattle.

  The squat form of the target submersible loomed up, silhouetted against the bright blue and silver of the ocean surface thirty-five meters above. The Vong boat had its stern to the open ocean, its bow toward the floating city, and it was simply hovering in place. Mara peered up at the boat, unable to see much of anything along its dark underside—but then through the perfect acoustic medium of the water she heard the hum of an electric motor, and with it a brief scraping. The sounds repeated themselves.

  This time, as she gazed up at the Yuuzhan Vong vessel, she caught a brief movement from the bows, a kind of dimple that appeared on its port bow, to match an identical dimple on the starboard side. And then her blood froze with horror at the realization of what she had just seen.

  The Vong boat had opened a pair of torpedo tubes. It was about to open fire on Heurkea Floating City.

  But why? she thought. Heurkea was colossal: a pair of torpedoes couldn't possibly sink it. Mara's head cranked to port, staring in consternation at the face of the city, at the series of clear windows that gave out onto the ocean deep, and there, silhouetted, she saw her answer: the tall, shaggy form of a Wookiee.

  Triebakk.

  Triebakk, gazing out of the sweating transparisteel wall of Cal Omas's apartment. Cal, the Chief of State candidate most likely to carry on the war against the Yuuzhan Vong. And Triebakk was soon joined by another, lanky figure that Mara recognized at once.

  Cal Omas.

  Cal and Triebakk continued to stand by the viewport. Mara realized they were holding drinks. Perhaps they had something to celebrate.

  The Yuuzhan Vong boat swam into view dead ahead. Mara's boat had no weapons, no torpedoes of her own, but on the other hand her craft was a weapon. It weighed a metric ton or more, and it was moving fast, and if she couldn't sink her enemy by ramming, she might be able to disable it. Mara rolled her sub more or less upright and fed power to the water jets as she aimed her vessel at the enemy canopy, descending on the Yuuzhan Vong craft from above its starboard quarter. If she could smash in the canopy, the enemy would probably be killed outright, and at any rate would drown.

  "Pull up! Pull up! Collision alert! Pull up!" Mara's nerves jumped as a roaring voice filled the cockpit, and her vessel's passive sonar went active with a series of high-pitched warning screeches aimed at alerting her target to its danger. The controls bucked in her hands as an autopilot seized control of the vessel. Grimly she fought the controls as she tried to keep her craft aimed at the enemy, while her eyes scanned the controls for a switch to turn off the autopilot.

  "Pull up! Collision alert! Pull up!"

  Things happened too fast for Mara to locate the autopilot override. There was an impact, then a scraping sound as her submersible rolled over the enemy craft. Her boat slewed violently to port as her aft port dive plane caught on the Vong's dorsal rudder. Locked together, the two subs whirled around each other, then parted with a grinding shudder. Mara looked over her shoulder to sec the Vong sub inverted and pitched nose-down, cavitation bubbles spraying from its jets as it tried to right itself. One of the Yuuzhan Vong, thrown against the canopy by the impact, glared at her with his false human face distorted by a furious rage.

  Mara sensed that Cal Omas and Triebakk weren't running away; they were peering out the viewport trying to make out what had just happened in the deep, distant blue of the water. Then the enemy faded into the darkness as Mara's boat sped away.

  Mara fought the controls to pull her boat around for another pass. Her port dive plane had deformed with the impact; she could hear the hiss and squelch of water as it passed roughly over the distorted surface, and feel the sideways slewing motion that the distortion imparted to her craft.

  Then suddenly she heard a whoosh and a frantic pinging, and her nerves keened with the knowledge that the Vong had just fired a torpedo. Her Force-sense told her that it was aimed at her, not at Cal Omas—she could sense the mass of the torpedo as it neared, and hear the increasingly fast, Doppler-shifted chirps of its active sonar as it sped closer.

  Mara yanked the craft to port, hoping that the drag of the distorted port dive plane would assist her in making a tight turn. At the same time she pushed out with the Force, trying to shove a stream of water at the torpedo to push it off to the right.

  The torpedo sizzled past Mara less than two meters beyond the sub's starboard dive plane, and Mara felt herself brace against the power of the explosion that would come with the detonation of a proximity fuse. But the torpedo must have had a contact fuse that ignited only on impact, because the underwater missile sped on, its frantic sonar pings Dopplering lower in pitch as it raced away.

  Mara gazed at her displays and discovered the Vong craft lumbering in a turn, trying to bring its second and last weapon to bear on Cal Omas. Mara fought the damaged dive plane, lifted the sub's nose, and straightened once she'd gained five meters of alti
tude above the enemy boat. She could see no way to disable the autopilot that would try to interfere with her ramming maneuver— either it wasn't possible, or it required codes she didn't have. She would have to anticipate the autopilot's taking over this time, and take its interference into account as she held her course against the enemy.

  As she pushed the throttles forward she realized that the fast pinging behind her had shifted, then began to pitch higher in volume. The torpedo had turned around and was coming at her again.

  The Vong craft loomed ahead, still turning to bring its torpedo to bear on the floating city. The pings behind Mara grew more frequent and higher in pitch. She pushed her throttle to maximum speed and dived down onto the enemy boat, water hissing through her jets.

  "Dive! Collision alert! Dive! Collision alert!" This time the autopilot was trying to pitch her downward to let her craft slip below the enemy. She fought the controls, trying to keep her machine on target.

  "Dive! Dive!"

  The pinging from astern beat faster than Mara's heart. Mara felt her sub shudder at the contradictory commands given the control surfaces, sensed the mass and speed of the torpedo approaching. And then she took her hands off the controls and let the autopilot take over.

  The damaged dive plane screwed the sub around to port as it dived beneath the swollen shadow of the enemy craft. Mara saw the looming shadow of the Yuuzhan Vong sub's rudder dead ahead, cutting toward her cockpit like a huge knife, but the drag from the damaged dive plane pulled her out of the way with millimeters to spare. The torpedo was so close that Mara could hear its hiss as it shot through the water.

  And then the torpedo hit the Yuuzhan Vong craft dead astern as Mara's boat slid beneath, and a great watery hand took Mara's sub and flung it spinning through the sea. Her hands and feet worked the controls as she tried to stabilize her craft, as she tried to gain her bearings in the giant white boil of the explosion.

  Mara managed finally to bring her craft to a hover. She was hanging upside down in the cockpit, one of her legs clamped hard on her seat and the other braced under the instrument panel. With careful squirts of her maneuvering jets, she managed to roll her sub upright.

  To one side, she could see the wreckage of the shattered Yuuzhan Vong craft spin downward into the blue depths below. The great mass of the floating city, on her other side, seemed intact. Triebakk and Cal were gone from the viewport, and through the roiling sea she could barely make out the apartment's front door, ajar—the two had fled.

  Finally figured out what those fast pings meant., eh? she thought.

  Well. Better late than never.

  Luke, alerted once Mara got to the surface, stashed Cal Omas in their own apartment, which, with Jacen still there, was getting a little crowded, but was at least above water and in a part of the city with better security. Lando shipped down a pair of YVH droids for safety's sake—and, out of the presumed goodness of his heart, offered security droids to the other candidates as well.

  Ayddar Nylykerka managed to get Mara out of the trouble she was in for stealing a submersible and getting it damaged during the course of an underwater dogfight.

  Mara arrived at her apartment late in the evening to discover why Cal Omas and Triebakk had been celebrating. On a vote held earlier that day, Cal had jumped into the lead with 46 percent, followed by Fyor Rodan with 24 and Ta'laam Ranth with 20. Pwoe had actually gained a vote, for a total of four.

  "Suddenly Ta'laam's twenty percent isn't worth as much to him," Cal told Mara. "I don't have to promise him much, because his supporters are going to defect in droves in the hope that I'll be grateful later." He looked puzzled. "What I can't work out is how Fyor's supporters turned out so wobbly." He glanced at Luke. "You didn't somehow arrange this, did you?"

  "No," Luke said.

  Cal grinned. "I didn't think Jedi mind control worked as well as that. I guess Fyor's supporters found out something about him that might be embarrassing if it got out, and decided to jump ship while they could."

  "I didn't arrange it," Luke said, "but I think I know who did." Mara gave him a sharp look. I'm not the only one who's been having adventures, she thought.

  Cal's grin faded. "Should I know about this?" he asked.

  "Absolutely not," Luke said. "But I wouldn't count on Fyor's defectors for anything more than getting you into office. My guess is they're good for one vote only. If I were you, I'd court Ta'laam Ranth and as many of his people as you can, because you're going to need them later."

  Cal rubbed his chin. "I'm not going to ask any more questions."

  "You're an intelligent man," Luke said. "You'll work it out without my help."

  By that point Mara had worked it out herself.

  The next day Ta'laam Ranth released his followers to vote for Cal Omas, and Cal was elected with almost 85 percent of the vote. Fyor Rodan and a few diehards refused to make the vote unanimous, and three loyalists still voted for Pwoe. Cal moved off Mara's sofa and to the suite reserved for the new Chief of State at Heurkea's poshest hotel, where he was ably guarded by a platoon of YVH droids.

  He began working on the acceptance speech he would have to give the Senate the next day. But before he began, he signed the order creating the new Jedi Council, with Luke at its head.

  * * *

  Chapter 18

  Your candidate has been elected," Vergere said over breakfast.

  "Yes," Luke answered.

  "Congratulations."

  Luke looked toward Mara, who was busy with the apartment's comm unit. "It was more Mara's doing than mine. She kept Cal alive long enough to give his acceptance speech."

  "Still," Vergere said, "you played a public role in his campaign "

  "True."

  "You realize that you and the Jedi will have to pay later for this political involvement."

  Luke nodded. "I know."

  "Just so you are prepared."

  Luke tasted his glass of blue milk with a wistful yearning for the fresh, more richly flavored variety he'd enjoyed on his uncle Owen Lars's moisture farm. Mara rose from the comm unit, came to the table, and laid out several holos that had been transmitted from the hidden Jedi installation in the Maw.

  "New images of Ben!"

  Luke gazed at the holos with his usual mixture of delight and longing. Infants developed so rapidly at Ben's age that Luke could plainly see how the boy had grown and changed in the short time since he'd been sent to safety in the Maw. He was walking now, with greater and greater confidence. He was speaking, too, though at the moment his vocabulary seemed to consist mainly of the word knee.

  At such moments Luke's misery at Ben's absence outweighed his thankfulness that Ben was in a place of safety.

  Luke and Mara showed the holos to Vergere, who looked at them with quizzical eyes. "A handsome human child," she said. "As best as I understand these things."

  "And strong in the Force," Mara said. "That's been clear from the beginning."

  Vergere's crest sleeked back. "Perhaps that is misfortune," she said.

  Luke stared at her in surprise. "Vergere?" he said.

  "You permit Jedi to many," Vergere said. "And permit not only marriage, but children. By your example, Luke Skywalker."

  Luke tried to contain his surprise. "In your day," he said, "Jedi were chosen as infants. They were raised knowing they wouldn't marry. But I had to recruit Jedi who were already grown—who had already established relationships."

  "It is very dangerous," Vergere said. "What if Jedi were forced to choose between their duty and their family?"

  Luke had made that choice more than once and was comfortable with the necessity. "Family makes a Jedi more of a whole person," he said.

  "It makes them less than Jedi!" Vergere said. Her head swung toward Mara on the end of its long neck. "And your child is strong in the Force—that is worse!"

  Mara's green eyes glittered dangerously. "And how is that, Vergere?" she asked.

  "Your Ben is heir to more than your husband's name—he is
Darth Vader's grandchild," Vergere said. "Three generations now of Skywalkers, all strong in the Force! This is a Jedi dynasty!"

  Vergere's head swung back toward Luke. "Can't you see how governments will view this as a threat? Once it is possible for Jedi to leave their power to their children, the balance that exists between government and Jedi falls."

  Luke held up one of the holos of Ben. "This is a threat? In a universe with the Yuuzhan Vong in it?"

  Vergere's crest sleeked back again, and she made a hissing noise that raised the hairs on the back of Luke's neck. He almost wanted to snatch the holo of Ben from the danger.

  The door chime sounded. Through a gentle Force projection coming from the other side Luke knew that the visitor was Cilghal, come to collect Vergere for another healing tutorial. When Vergere wasn't being debriefed by Fleet Intelligence—a process still ongoing—she had been perfectly amenable to spending time with Cilghal, teaching the Mon Calamari healer the art of making herself small. Perhaps Cilghal, too, would learn to heal with her tears, and then the two could pass the knowledge on to others.

  At the sound of the chime, Vergere gazed stonily at Luke for a moment, then hopped off her chair. "I must go," she said. "But I beg you, young Master, to think of this."

  She padded to the door and let herself out.

  Luke looked at Mara. "What do we think?" he asked.

  Mara reached for a knife. She began cutting up dried bofa fruit and adding it to a dried, crunchy form of Mon Calamari seaweed eaten by the locals.

  "Maybe she's embittered over fifty years of loneliness," Mara said, "but I call that an overreaction."

  "Yes."

  "Vergere is too smart. Too perceptive. Too enigmatic." Her green eyes flashed. "Too willing to torture young humans to get what she wants. I don't want her ever to get near Ben."

  "Agreed," Luke said. "I've checked the Jedi Holocron. There was a Jedi named Vergere fifty years ago, a former apprentice of a Master Thracia Cho Leem."