“What about the sewers?” Mando asked. “The Mandalorians have a hideout down in the sewers. If we can get down there, they can help us escape.”
“Yeah,” Cara said. “Sewers are good.”
Mando switched on his scanner. “Checking for access points.”
Cara stared out the open window. On the other side of the public house wall, the stormtroopers had unpacked a large white crate and were flipping its latches and raising the lid. The row of Imperial forces moved to either side as the troopers brought out a tripod and began assembling what she realized was a heavy repeating blaster. She felt a wave of hopelessness settle over her.
Karga’s shoulders sagged. “It’s over.”
Through his visor scanner, Mando picked up a heat signature along the far wall. “I found the sewer vent,” he said.
“Let’s get out of here,” Cara said. She and Mando grabbed the bench and pulled it loose to expose the access point. The grate underneath looked as if it had been cemented in place, and when they yanked on it, it wouldn’t budge. Cara grabbed her blaster rifle. “Get out of the way!” She opened fire on the grate, but it held tight.
From outside, Moff Gideon’s voice rang out clearly. “Your astute panic suggests that you understand the situation,” he said. As always, his tone remained calm and reasonable. “I would prefer to avoid any further violence, and encourage a moment of consideration.” He gestured at the heavy blaster resting on a tripod. “If you are unfamiliar with this weapon, I am sure that Republic shock trooper Carasynthia Dune of Alderaan will advise you that she has witnessed many of her ranks vaporize mid-descent facing the predecessor of this particular model.” He paused, allowing them to process what he was saying. “Or perhaps the decommissioned Mandalorian hunter Din Djarin has heard the songs of the Siege of Mandalore, when gunships outfitted with similar ordnance laid waste to fields of Mandalorian recruits in the Night of a Thousand Tears.”
Mando stared at him, motionless, listening.
“I advise disgraced magistrate Greef Karga to search the wisdom of his years,” Gideon said, “and urge you to lay down your arms and come outside. The structure you are trapped in will be razed in short order, and your storied lives will come to an unceremonious end.”
It was Karga who finally answered him, leaning forward and raising his voice to be heard through the open window. “What do you propose?” he called out.
Gideon’s cold gaze continued, unblinking. “Reasonable negotiation.”
“What assurance do you offer?”
“If you’re asking if you can trust me,” Gideon said, “you cannot.” He spread his hands in the gesture of one conveying an unfortunate but inevitable truth. “Just as you betrayed our business arrangement, I would gladly break any promise and watch you die at my hand. The assurance I give is this: I will act in my own self-interest, which at this time involves your cooperation and benefit.” He turned to survey the forces and weaponry around him, and beyond it all, the steadily sinking sun, and then looked back at the public house. “I will give you until nightfall. And then I will have the cannon open fire.”
He turned and walked away.
“The minute we open that door, we’re dead,” Cara said.
“We’re dead if we don’t,” said Karga. “At least out there we’ve got a shot.”
“That’s easy for you to say,” Cara said. “I’m a rebel shock trooper. They’ll upload me to a mind flayer!”
Karga snorted. “Those aren’t real. That was just wartime propaganda.”
“Well,” she said, brandishing her rifle, “I don’t care to find out. I’m shooting my way out of here.”
The Guild agent looked over at the bounty hunter. “Mando, what about you?”
“I know who he is,” Mando said. “That’s Moff Gideon. I haven’t heard that name spoken since I was a child.”
Karga glanced at him. “On Mandalore?”
“I was not born on Mandalore.”
“But you’re a Mandalorian.” Karga frowned.
Cara shook her head. “Mandalorian isn’t a race.”
“It’s a creed,” Mando said. He was thinking again about that long-ago day with his parents, running down the street, the roar of blasters and people screaming as the gunships flew over. That was the last time he’d seen them alive. The memory continued to play out in his mind: walls exploding and buildings collapsing, spraying debris and great billows of smoke as they continued to run. Behind them, super battle droids had landed, and he could hear the blasters as they cut down bystanders. He and his parents approached the bunker, swinging open the double doors. His mother clasped his shoulders and took one final look at his face; his father pulled him close to kiss his forehead, the man’s tears cutting tracks in the dirt smeared on his cheeks. They looked at him one last time.
Then they lowered him inside.
He looked up, lifting one hand toward them, their faces already blocked out by the blinding light behind them. His father closed the doors, cloaking the boy in shadow.
An instant later, the explosion hit.
It was forceful enough to shake the doors on their hinges. Silt and smoke oozed through the crack. Through the gap between the doors, he could hear the footsteps of something heavy approaching, and he knew what it was—one of the super battle droids.
The doors swung open, and there it stood, massive, merciless, towering over him and threatening certain death. The droid extended its wrist blaster and aimed it point-blank at his head.
He closed his eyes and turned away, anticipating what would come next.
WHAM!
A volley of blaster fire from above smashed into the droid, blowing holes in it and knocking it sideways with a hollow clank. When he looked up again, a new figure had appeared in the doorway.
He stared up at the Mandalorian soldier reaching down to offer a hand, beckoning him to safety.
The boy stood up to join him and felt the soldier lift him out of the shelter, then plant his feet on the ground. All around him, he could see Mandalorians in jet packs, landing with their blasters out and fighting back against the Imperials. They were blasting the assassin droids from all sides—and they were winning. One of them gestured at the soldier who had helped him out of the bunker, making a motion for liftoff. The Mandalorian looked at him, and the boy nodded back. Taking him in his arms, the soldier activated his jet pack and took flight.
Mando remembered what it was like looking over the soldier’s shoulder, down at the place where his parents had fallen, as his rescuer took him to safety.
“I was a foundling,” he said to Karga and Cara. “They raised me in the fighting corps. I was treated as one of their own. When I came of age, I was sworn to the Creed. The only record of my family name was in the registers of Mandalore.” He looked at them, saw them listening to his story. “Moff Gideon was an ISB officer during the Purge. That’s how I know it’s him.”
The others didn’t speak, and Mando’s thoughts returned to the Child, out there somewhere with the Ugnaught. He activated the comlink.
“Come in, Kuiil.”
Instead of the Ugnaught’s voice, the familiar sound of the Child’s giggle came through the receiver. Then they heard another familiar voice.
“Kuiil has been terminated,” IG-11 said.
Mando’s voice went cold. “What did you do?”
“I am fulfilling my base function,” the droid said.
“Which is?”
“To nurse and protect.”
IG-11 came roaring out of the desert toward the outskirts of the city with the Child tucked safely against its chest. Coming closer, its photoreceptors picked up a group of scout troopers and stormtroopers at the city gate. The droid drew its blasters and accelerated. This might also become very unpleasant, but it had to protect the Child.
Blasting the troopers at the gate, the IG careened past them down the street, firing nonstop from both sides at once and taking out troopers on either side. In front of the droid, the Child g
iggled happily, delighted with the speed and activity, ears blowing in the wind.
Seeing the regiment of troopers ahead, the IG whirled its torso around to protect the Child and continued firing as it approached the public house.
“Look!” Cara shouted, pointing into the street as the droid arrived.
“Cover me!” Mando said. Behind him, Cara laid down a solid line of fire while the Mandalorian charged into the open, with Greef Karga not far behind him. What he saw there was even worse than he’d expected. Death troopers and stormtroopers moved to attack them. Mando and Karga fought back, firing at the helmets, kicking and punching the ones who were too close to shoot. Through the chaos, Mando could see the IG with the Child strapped to its torso, and watched as a blaster bolt hit the droid and dropped it to its knees.
Mando looked over at the heavy blaster.
Walking over, he yanked the cannon off its tripod and turned it on the remaining stormtroopers, destroying them in a rain of orange fire. Across the street, another death trooper approached the public house and placed a detonator on the wall.
Cara was still inside when the explosion blew the wall out and threw her to the ground. She grunted, trying to crawl to shelter as blaster bolts smashed into the floor and walls around her. Death troopers, two at least, were inside with her, closing in.
She sprang to her feet, rifle in hand, and shot them both down.
Out in the street, Moff Gideon watched the battle turn. His eyes narrowed slightly with distaste. This was not the outcome he’d anticipated. He aimed his blaster at the Mandalorian’s helmet and squeezed off a single shot. Mando cried out in pain and shock, and swung the partially dismantled cannon in Gideon’s direction. Gideon adjusted his blaster, taking aim at the power generator next to the Mandalorian, and fired.
The generator erupted in a blinding conflagration of fire and smoke, throwing Mando sideways with its impact and dropping him motionless to the ground.
From inside the public house, Cara saw him fall. She ran out past Karga, who was still firing at the troopers. Grabbing Mando’s body, she dragged him back inside, with IG-11 and Karga at her heels, then slammed the door shut behind them.
Outside, Gideon felt something tighten inside his chest. Enough was enough. His patience had come to an end.
“Burn them out,” he said.
INSIDE THE PUBLIC HOUSE, Cara Dune dragged the Mandalorian’s body toward the far wall. The bounty hunter was dead weight, and the beskar armor only made him heavier. “Stay with me, buddy,” she said. “We’re gonna get you out of here.”
If he heard her, Mando didn’t answer. The explosion outside had left him unconscious and badly injured, and his body was limp, almost lifeless. Desperately, Cara turned to Greef Karga, who was looking at IG-11.
“This is our only way out!” the Guild agent said. “Can you clear it?”
“Yes, of course,” the droid said. It placed the Child gently on the floor and bent down to begin removing the grate, sparks flying from the precision cutting tool in its hand.
“Yes,” Karga said under his breath. “I love IG units.”
On the floor in front of Cara Dune, the Mandalorian stirred. His voice was weak, filled with pain, and he was struggling to breathe. “I’m not gonna make it,” he said. “Go.”
“Shut up,” Cara said. “You just got your bell rung. You’ll be fine.”
“Take this.” Reaching into his armor, Mando pulled out a necklace with the image of a mythosaur skull and handed it to her. “When you meet up with my tribe, show them this. Tell them the Child was in my protection. They’ll give you safe passage.”
Cara took the necklace and tucked it away. She put her hand along the underside of his helmet and looked down at her fingertips. They were covered with blood. “I’m gonna need to take this thing off.”
“No.” He grabbed her hand. “You leave me.” He was gasping for air, lungs rattling. “You make sure…the Child is safe….”
Cara started to answer him when a huge jet of flame erupted through the public house with a roar, igniting the bar and the walls. She could already feel the heat rising around her, sucking up oxygen, as the fire grew.
“I can hold them off long enough for you to escape,” Mando said. “Let me have a warrior’s death.”
Cara stared down at him, defiant. “I won’t leave you!”
“This is the Way,” the Mandalorian said.
The entire building was awash in flames that began consuming everything around them. Cara’s eyes stung with smoke, and she felt her throat beginning to tighten. When she looked over at the doorway, she saw the red-striped incinerator stormtrooper stepping inside with a flamethrower. She could remember fighting their kind in the war and was all too familiar with the terrible power of the weapon in his hands.
The trooper turned and aimed the flamethrower directly at them, preparing to unleash another blast. There was nowhere to run.
This is how it ends for us, she thought. Fighting the war all over again, in a bar on some backwater planet—
In the corner of her eye, Cara saw the Child standing up, lifting his hands, and closing his eyes in deep concentration. What happened next was impossible, and if she hadn’t seen it with her own eyes, she never would’ve believed it.
The fireball swept toward them with a deafening whoosh—and then, somehow, it stopped, as if frozen in place, its power and ferocity held at bay by the Child’s powers. Cara and Greef Karga stared at it in frank astonishment. Even the Mandalorian managed to lift his head and look, the orange reflection of flames flickering off the visor of his helmet.
With a simple gesture of his hand, the Child caused the fire to swerve around and recoil on itself, engulfing the stormtrooper in a wash of heat and blowing him out through the open doorway. Distantly, they heard him scream.
Across the room, IG-11 gave the sewer grate one final kick, and it came loose, opening up their escape. “We have to go, now!” Karga shouted.
The Mandalorian gazed up at Cara. “Go…” he croaked, and fell silent.
He slumped to the floor. Cara saw the IG coming toward her, handing her the satchel with the Child inside it.
“Escape and protect this child,” the droid said. “I will stay with the Mandalorian.”
She stood up. “Promise me you’ll bring him.”
“You have my word.”
Cara took hold of the Child and followed Greef Karga down into the sewers, leaving IG-11 alone with Mando. She hoped she could trust the droid.
Then again, she didn’t have much of a choice.
THE PUBLIC HOUSE had become a blazing cauldron of fire, teetering on the verge of total collapse. Flames were rising higher all around them, burning out of control. The droid knelt down in front of the bounty hunter.
“Do it,” Mando said.
IG-11’s red processing array blinked inquisitively. “Do what?”
“Just get it over with,” Mando said. “I’d rather you kill me than some Imp.”
“I told you, I am no longer a hunter. I am a nurse droid.”
“IGs are all hunters.”
“Not this one,” the droid insisted. “I was reprogrammed. I need to remove your helmet if I am to save you.” It extended one hand toward the bounty hunter’s helmet, and Mando lifted his blaster and pointed it at the droid.
“Try it, and I’ll kill you,” he said. “It is forbidden. No living thing has seen me without my helmet since I swore the Creed.”
“I am not a living thing,” IG-11 said calmly. Without waiting for permission, it began detaching the helmet. There was a soft hissing sound as the helmet unsealed and came loose, and the droid lifted it off and looked at the human beneath it.
The bounty hunter’s face was bloody and stricken with pain, sweat matting the dark hair against his temples and forehead. His brown eyes looked vulnerable and exposed, the gaze of a man about to greet life’s last great mystery.
“This is a bacta spray,” IG-11 said, extending the medical applicat
or along his wounds. “It will heal you in a matter of hours. You have suffered damage to your central processing unit.”
“You mean my brain?” Mando said.
“That was a joke,” the droid said. “It was meant to put you at ease.”
Mando chuckled weakly and groaned. Then he closed his eyes.
Down in the sewers, the Child had begun crying softly. The air was damp, and dark enough that they could hardly see more than ten meters in front of them. Cara shined her light down the long tunnel ahead and stopped walking.
“What is it?” Greef Karga asked.
She held up one hand and cocked her head to listen. Footsteps were approaching in the distance, coming up behind. She and Karga turned to see who it was.
IG-11 emerged from the shadows. Limping along beside the droid, scarcely able to stand, was the Mandalorian. A light from his helmet pierced through the gloom. He looked weak, but he was at least upright and moving.
Cara ran up to him and held him up. “I got you.”
They kept walking. “Do you know which way to go?” Cara asked.
“No,” Mando admitted. “I don’t know these tunnels.”
Karga squinted into the darkness. “If we follow the smell of sulfur, it will lead us to the lava river.”
“The Imps will catch us before we make the ship,” Mando said. “We need the Mandalorians to escort us to safety.”
He searched for tracks. The IG’s bacta infusion had begun to work, and he felt stronger, able to stand and walk on his own. Moving faster, Mando led them down another corridor and around a corner, then stopped abruptly.
A pile of Mandalorian armor and helmets lay on the floor in front of him. Mando stared down at them and dropped to one knee, lifting up a random face shield and peering at it.
“We should go,” Cara said.
“You go. Leave the ship.” His voice was adamant. “I can’t leave it this way.” He turned to Greef Karga, feeling the anger building up in him. “Did you know about this? Is this the work of your bounty hunters?”
“It was not his fault,” came a female voice from behind them.
Star Wars: The Mandalorian Junior Novel Page 12
