The Legacy of Ar'Kell:
Betrayal
Dramatis Personae
Imperial
Forces
Dark Jedi Knight Xar "Sauron"
Runis - Human male from Varnus
Dark Jedi Knight Masel
- Human male from Eriadu
Quaestor Mathis “Billbob”
Organa - Human male from Alderaan
Ret. Engineer Kay’inen
– Twi’lek male from Lyccos
II
Chief Engineer Thad Balfin
– Human male from unknown
Renegades
Former Dark Jedi Knight Tiberan
- Human male from Sif
Former Dark Jedi Master Janus - Human male from
Corellia
Sela Ralea - Human female from
unknown
Minos Cluster Residents
Commandant Shrrinn
Kruaan - Bothan male from Bothwui - dictator of planet Lantare
Captain Je’gem Shaara - Bothan male from Bothwui – Kruaan’s
henchman
Prologue
Jedi Hunter Tiberan sat in the cockpit of his TIE Defender, and watched
as the myriad colors of hyperspace coalesced into starlines,
and then receded into millions of individual stars as he reverted back into realspace. One star came closer than the others, a bloated
orange sun that shed its light on the blue-green world that appeared nearby. As
the ship slowed to sublight speed, two space
platforms and a dozen space containers came into view ten kilometers away.
Glancing at his radar, he saw that his companions, another T/D and a Patrol
Craft, had appeared just off to port.
The other Defender was piloted by Tiberan’s friend Masel.
Also a Hunter, he and Tiberan had been friends since
they had met as apprentices. Masel was always more
outgoing than Tiberan; while Tiberan
had had his doubts, Masel had been eager to get on with
the testing. Today, the two of them would take their final test. If they
passed, they would finally become fully-fledged Jedi Knights, and be able to
choose a Jedi House to which they would pledge their allegiance. They would
choose House Ar’Kell. There really was no choice. Ar’Kell was the
most prominent and feared of the houses, even though it had only recently been
reactivated after thousands of years. Yes, he was looking forward to that.
In the Patrol Craft was their mentor, Master Caemas. He had not told the Hunters their mission or where
they would be going, but that they had to trust their teacher. It was all part
of the test. They had gone through rigorous physical and mental training in the
past months, and both were greatly anticipating this final challenge. Then they
would be respected among the entire Dark Brotherhood. One last, minor test
would be nothing compared to what they would gain from this.
A chime sounded in Tiberan’s
cockpit, and he reached up and activated a communications link between him, Masel, and the Patrol Craft.
"--lcome to the Deison system," Caemas’
voice came over the commlink. "It is this place that you shall take your
final test. You have learned what you need to know to become a Jedi. Now we
must test your devotion to the Dark Side.
"You have been armed with Advanced
Torpedoes for this mission," Jedi Master Caemas
continued. "You are to destroy the space platforms and the containers,
utterly. Allow nothing to escape."
"Uh, what is the military importance of
this base?" asked Tiberan. To his left, Masel sped his Defender toward the containers.
"That is none of your concern. Just follow
your orders."
"Yes, sir." Tiberan
reluctantly feathered the throttle forward. He didn’t like the sound of
this. Something didn’t feel right. "Masel?"
he asked his friend.
"Who cares?" came the reply.
"Come on, we are about to become Jedi Knights!" Masel’s
Defender began firing on the first of the containers.
Switching over to torpedoes, Tiberan targeted the first of the platforms. He waited for
a solid lock, then hesitated. I’ll just ID it first, he thought. Probably
some Rebel supply depot. But if it was the Rebels, where were their
fighters?
At one kilometer his computer identified the
platform. Tiberan flinched. Twenty-two life signatures
were registered within. Civilians?
But how? And why?
His finger hovered over the trigger, as the PLT
filled the cockpit view. Just before he was about to crash into it, he pulled
back on the stick. As he passed one of the larger viewports, his worst fears
were confirmed. Two children stood staring out at him, frozen with fear.
"What?!" he yelled aloud. "No!
This is wrong!" How could they order us to attack innocent Imperial
citizens?
Outraged, he turned his ship back toward the
Patrol Craft. "You wanted me to slaughter children? What kind of people
are you?"
"This is part of your test,” came Caemas’ cold voice.
“Your devotion to the Dark Side must overwhelm everything else.
Only then will you become a true Jedi."
"But why kill innocent people?
They’re Imperials, for mercy’s sake."
"You must have no mercy. This is your last
chance, Tiberan. Turn around."
"No! This is wrong! How many have killed
for you before, Caemas? How many innocents
slaughtered at your command? They don’t even know why they’re being
killed. You can’t expect to get away with that!" As Tiberan gripped the stick with all his might, his finger
tightened reflexively on the trigger. He looked down in surprise and gasped as
two torpedoes shot from his launcher and turned toward the Patrol Craft.
Dark Jedi Master Caemas stared in horror as the torpedoes streamed in
towards him. Giving out a cry, he turned and stumbled toward the back of the
cockpit. "No..."
The torpedoes hit the front of the craft and
detonated. The cockpit and entire bow of the ship were blown away instantly.
The rear of the ship spun out of control, then flame rocketed through the
engines and the rest of the ship exploded into thousands of fragments.
Tiberan’s weak voice came over the comm. "What have I
done?" he whispered.
Then the TIE Defender turned and shot into
hyperspace.
The Legacy of Ar’Kell
Betrayal: Chapter 1
Dark Tidings
Palace Ravenspyre
Planet Frigg, Phare System
Two weeks later.
Dark Jedi Knight Masel strode down the shuttle’s entry ramp. That
title did not seem so significant in light of Tiberan’s
desertion. Neither of them had known that there were civilians in that base.
Still, he didn’t think his friend would have turned on their mentor like
that. He had been utterly shocked at what happened that day, and was glad when
he was recalled to Eos instead of having to finish slaughtering those innocent
people. He wasn’t sure he could have gone through with that.
Straightening, he studied the climate of the
planet Frigg. It was
Frigg had also been chosen because it seemed to be a
center for harnessing the power of the Force. The entire planet radiated with
the presence of the Force. Masel could feel its
power.
The shuttle had touched down on the main
landing platform, on the west side of the newly built palace Ravenspyre. The
palace was built to seem like it had stood for centuries, not just a few weeks.
It had a gothic look that gave it a dark atmosphere and made it look like a
primitive castle of stone, but it was made to fool the eye. The palace was
actually better built and guarded than most fortresses. Turbolasers
disguised as rounded, peaceful-looking domes stood at the tops of the
palaces’ many spires. The stone was black ferrocrete,
but one could not tell that by sight. There were numerous windows, though most
were higher up, and even a number of balconies with small gardens. The palace
and surrounding buildings were enclosed by a planetary shield generator, to
protect against bombardment from above.
Masel walked toward the eight-meter high armored main
doors as the shuttle lifted off behind him. The doors were inlaid with the
Ar’Kell symbol, and loomed in front of Masel.
He heard a low roar, and the huge doors began to swing open for him. They did
not open to their fullest extent, though; as soon a Masel
had half a meter to spare to either side, he quickened his pace and stepped
into the darkness. He had no time for scenery; the Quaestor
had summoned him to report immediately.
On the garden-surrounded flagstone balcony, near the top of palace Ravenspyre, a hundred meters aboveground, Xar Runis worked with his sword the forms that he had been taught years before. He used a steel blade, instead of a lightsaber, the pale sword whirling in his hands almost faster than the eye could follow. He wore long black pants, regardless of the heat, and a thin black shirt plastered to his lean form by sweat, sleeves rustling in the wind made by his fluid movements. His dark hair was mopped to his forehead by sweat, and his bare feet moved along the flagstones as if he were engaged in a dance. Block, parry, cut, thrust. Slice, block, spin and cut again. Over and over he practiced the forms he knew. Block, strike, block, strike, in an endless rhythm. The hours could pass by unnoticed this way.
When next Xar
looked around and took notice, it was already dusk. The sky overhead showed a
myriad of stars. Breathing steadily, he turned toward the west where Odin, Phare’s sun, was sinking below the horizon. Xar
ground the point of his sword on the flagstone floor and put one foot on the
edge of the balcony, where wildly colored flowers were growing, as he gazed at
the breathtaking view of the sunset on Frigg. Such a
view was an object of legend in this sector of the galaxy. It was said that a
sunset on Frigg could calm even the most heavy of
hearts. It was just what he needed. The pastel orbs of the moons Ullyr and Sif took up a full
fourth of the sky in the west, seeming almost as though one could reach out and
touch them. At this distance, there was no sign that civilization had touched
them. Xar stood there, his eyes never drifting from that mesmerizing display.
He did not even notice when the envoy stepped onto the balcony behind him.
"Jedi Runis, sir?" asked the
messenger apprehensively. "I have been sent to retrieve you."
Xar did not move.
"Runis?" No reply. "Runis!"
Xar tilted his head to one side. "Yes?
What is it?"
"Sir, you have been summoned to the Quaestor’s chambers immediately. Sir, if you are
late, I will be punished."
"Very well," replied Xar.
Nevertheless, he waited until the envoy’s footsteps faded to nothing.
With one last look at the western sky, he turned and headed toward the
turbolift.
The chambers of
the Quaestor – the head of House Ar’Kell
– were located near ground level, and were composed of a number of rooms
filled with various artifacts. The floor was laid with various rugs with ornate
seam work, and a few tapestries decorated the walls. Artifacts discovered on Frigg, as well as artwork from Alderaan,
the Quaestor’s home planet, stood on stands and
in displays. The office, however, was rather simple overall.
Though sparsely decorated, the room was
crowded. Books and papers covered every flat surface, and were piled onto the
tables, with some even on the floor. The room was brightly lit by candles that
seemed in dire danger of igniting the papers that they stood over, but Mathis
“Billbob” Organa was not concerned. He
was not as obsessive with the substance derived from wood as a Krath, though neither was he as nonchalant about it as the
Obelisk order of the Dark Brotherhood.
He leaned back and reveled in the knowledge of
his Sith power, his ever-present smile on his face as
he glanced at the sweating man in front of him. Masel
had already told him everything he knew during the debriefing. He had a
moderate level of ability, though probably not enough to ever progress beyond
his current level of Jedi Knight. His former friend, Tiberan,
however, could cause more trouble than he had already if he wasn’t
disposed of quickly – or so the Dark Council had decided.
A light knock on the door, and Xar entered,
frowned a moment at the papers, then moved over to stand beside Masel.
"I am sorry for the delay, but I was on
the roof." Not an apology, just a statement of fact.
So he had been practicing with his sword again.
Sometimes Mathis wondered why the man had not chosen Obelisk. It was clear,
though; the only thing greater than his skill with the lightsaber was his
ability in the Force. Although a skilled healer, Xar could also turn those
powers to the side of destruction. He had been trained before he joined the
Dark Brotherhood, and Mathis had been unable to get Xar to speak much about his
former training, nor his mentor.
A number of times Mathis had gone down to the
recreation area with Xar for sparring. Once, they had given one another rather
nasty looking whelps and cuts before having to be almost carried to the
healers. They had fast become good friends. But time to get to business.
"Xar,” he began, “This is Jedi
Knight Masel, our newest member. His friend, Tiberan, went berserk during their final test and killed
Master Caemas. Since they were both going to join
Ar’Kell, the Dark Council has decided that it is an internal matter, and
that we should handle it within the house. I have selected the two of you to
track Tiberan down, and... take care of him. Masel goes because he was Tiberan’s
friend and knows him. I want you to go, Xar, because I do not have a house
assassin, and you will suffice. And I know you can empathize with Tiberan’s position."
Xar glanced at Masel
and scowled.
Mathis leaned forward in his chair. “You
will take this mission seriously, yes? I will not have Ar’Kell
embarrassed before the Dark Council when we have hardly begun. Tiberan may be untrained, and he may be a fool, but he is
still dangerous. I have foreseen some... trouble... concerning him. He may be
capable of more damage than any of us suspect."
After a moment of obvious deliberation, a new
light entered Xar’s eyes. Determination. Good. He will devote his full
attention to the mission, then.
"Can we take the Nightmare?"
asked Xar.
"I think not," Mathis replied,
"It might be recognized where you are going."
Pulling out a drawer, he produced two datapads and slid them across the table toward the two men.
As they retrieved them, Mathis addressed them both. "There you will find Tiberan’s last known location, along with a full
briefing, planetary specs and customs, false identifications, and everything
you ever wanted to know about Minos Cluster."
For once Xar looked truly surprised. "Minos Cluster? That is practically next door."
Mathis nodded. "That is correct, Xar. Now
you see why the need for secrecy."
"You will be leaving within the hour. The
shuttle is outside on the perimeter landing pads." Mathis gave a slight
chuckle at that. "You have exactly an hour to take a shower, gather your
things, and be ready for liftoff. Masel is already
prepared."
Mathis studied the two in front of him.
"Do not fail, gentlemen. Remember what I said."
"We will be careful," was the reply.
"Then I wish you well on your journey, and
may the Force defend you."
Xar looked amused. "Maybe." Bowing,
he turned toward the door, followed by Masel. Maybe,
indeed. I fear that you soon may need all the help you can get, my friend, if I
have foreseen truly.
The door closed behind the Masel,
and Mathis leaned back. Reaching down, he took the book he had been studying
and continued reading.
A candle’s flame started to lick the edge
of a paper.
The Legacy of Ar’Kell
Betrayal: Chapter 2
Deceptions
As the blackness of the starlit sky banished the last
of Odin’s rays, and the now-eclipsed orbs of Ullyr
and Sif made their nightly treks along the horizon,
the small double doors adjacent to the Southern Entrance of palace Ravenspyre
burst open, and Xar and Masel tramped out, each
hefting a large duffel bag from their shoulders. “So your name is
Xar?” Masel asked. “Call me Sauron,” the man
replied. "Ah, the crisp night
air.” The taller of the two men, Xar wore black trousers and a cream
colored shirt, covered by an open dark jacket. The combination offset his dark
hair which was combed back smoothly. As the men traversed toward the landing
pads, he added, "That should be the shuttle over there. But I have some
things I need to retrieve from my ship also."
"No problem." replied Masel. Similarly dressed, though a head shorter than Xar, Masel’s dark eyes studied the surrounding landscape.
"It sure is beautiful here. Too bad I only got to stay here a couple of
hours before getting my first assignment."
Grunting in reply, Xar made his way toward the
jungle, and what looked like the cut-out side of a hill. However, that was
merely what the secret hangar was made to look like. Xar pulled a remote from
his pocket and tapped in a code sequence. What had looked like the edge of an
outcrop on the rocky wall opened to one side revealing a dark corridor within.
Xar entered, followed by Masel,
and as the entrance closed once more, large overhead lights slowly came on with
a buzzing noise.
"You may wait here," Xar told Masel. "I will return imminently."
"Hey, wait a minute, there’s nothing
wrong with.."
"I will not be long." Xar broke in.
Laying his bag on the floor, he made his way around the corner and into the
concealed hangar area. There, tethered on the pad, black finish gleaming under
the lights, stood the ship that had belonged to Xar’s former Jedi Master.
The name Nightmare had been laser burned into the cockpit side armor,
clear, and pristine, and filled in with silver. That will not remain much
longer, he thought. He had already scheduled the ship for re-christening,
though he could never seem to find the time to oversee the process.
Another key combination opened the hatch on the
underbelly of the ship, and Xar ascended the ramp at a slow pace. A final
button activated the Nightmare’s
internal lighting, consisting of overhead lamps augmented by long red lighting
on the sides of the corridors that stretched into the distance.
The sound of footsteps on the ramp behind him
halted Xar. He half turned, and said, "Is there some problem? Did you get
scared back there?"
Masel gave a slight chuckle. "No, I just wanted to
check this ship out. It’s a work of art!"
"Hmm. Then wait
until you see what is inside. Come on."
Xar led Masel through
the corridors, on the way explaining, "My clothes and personal things I
brought in my satchel. But I needed to come here to get a few other
things." They walked into a large lounge/observatory room with windows
that extended nearly from floor to ceiling on one wall. Entering a side
passageway, Xar stopped in front of a closed door. He pushed the access button,
and the door slid open sideways.
"This room always brings back memories to
me." Xar said. Of course, he’d had it remodeled extensively.
Entering, he crossed the comfortably sized room, with a bed on the far wall, a
small desk, and a personal refresher in a side room. Xar did not go to any of
these, however. Walking over to an empty table, he reached underneath and
pressed a hidden button. Part of the far wall opened, revealing a small storage
room with metal cases on the floor. Entering the small chamber, Xar crouched
down and opened each case in turn, grinning at Masel’s
gasp behind him.
"Yes, most of this is illegal in civilized
sections of the galaxy." Xar told the other man. "The Crinn are very
secretive. There are compartments like this all over. They also make some
rather interesting weapons. No one gets on this ship if I do not want them
to."
Reaching into one chest, Xar retrieved a
skillfully crafted lightsaber with gold embroidery. There seemed to be
different colors and topical features that were hard to make out, but mostly
the thing was black and gold in color.
"This is mine. It is made of many
different materials. That one was my former master’s." He pointed to
a cruel-looking black saber with silver embroidery. It looked to be made of one
piece of material, almost rocklike, jet black with curved, sharp points sticking
out from the side pointing toward the front. It would fit well in Runis’
hand, with those grips, but no other’s.
"His was an ancient lightsaber, very rare. They both have rather nasty
improvements made to them." After clipping his lightsaber to his belt, he
shut that case, and went to another. Reaching inside, he pulled out a black
cloth package. After untying the ends, he opened it to reveal what looked like
a shiny, polished metal gun of some sort, along with various attachments.
Nodding that everything was there, Xar also pulled out a pouch full of objects
that clinked together.
"What is it?" Masel
asked.
"A hand-held rail gun, or mass driver if
you will. Unique now to almost any race but the Crinn. You see, a blaster fires
energy-based rounds, but these shield-piercing projectiles will go through a
man and the building behind him before stopping."
Masel breathed a relieved breath when Xar retied the
package. Drawing a satchel from the corner of the room, Xar put the gun and
ammunition inside. That was followed by a small pocket blaster, a modified
hand-held blaster with pouch and belt with spare clips. After that, Xar put in
several variations of daggers, some with odd shapes and multiple points, and a vibroblade.
"Are you going to put an entire arsenal in
there? What do you think we’ll be facing out there?"
"Just being cautious. This is standard
equipment. I hate assassinations, though that was what I was trained for. I
much prefer a fair fight to striking from the shadows." Adding a coil of
rope and grappling hook, and a small medkit, Xar
zipped up the package and closed the cases. "Done."
One the way out, back in the observatory, Masel stopped dead in his tracks, exclaiming,
"What’s that?" He pointed to a long muzzled weapon
hanging on the wall over a couch and low table.
"High powered rifle." Xar replied.
"Precise hit at over two kilometers. Are you coming?"
"Oh, yeah. Right behind you." It
sounded as though Masel was eager to leave.
The planet Lantare I
Jedi Knight Tiberan entered the limits of Dol
Shura on foot. He was
a Jedi Knight, no matter what everyone else thought. And he was a Light Jedi,
having forsaken his dark powers after that fateful event in the Seidon system. He had vowed never to use his powers for
evil or to hurt anyone ever again, that day.
For the second time he re-wrapped the
head-scarf around his head, silently cursing the scorching, dry heat of the
desert world. He had to find a cool tavern, if such a thing existed on this
planet. Dol Shura was one
of the largest cities on Lantare I, except perhaps Jaggerbund, but he could not go there for fear of being
caught.
Looking around, he reconsidered that thought.
Seeing all the rough-looking humans and aliens alike, he wondered if a little stormtrooper presence here might not be a benefit.
More importantly, he had come to Lantare I for a purpose. A week ago, while streaming
through hyperspace in his TIE Defender, running wildly, he had received a
message. The sender had called himself Jedi Master Janus, a Light Jedi, who knew
of his plight. He knew why he was running from the Dark Brotherhood, and
claimed that he would give Tiberan safe quarter. He
also promised to instruct him further in the ways of the Force. After taking
some time to confirm the message, he had spoken by vidphone
to Janus. The man had such an aura about him, one of gentleness and... sadness.
Tiberan longed to have a true instructor in the
Force, one who would teach him in the light, like the fabled Jedi Knight Luke
Skywalker. Once Tiberan had envisioned himself as
another Skywalker, one who would earn honor and great fame. Once he had thought
he could help others and better the life of everyone in the galaxy. Now he
himself was running from the Imperials, scrounging on whatever he could find.
His Defender was even now parked beyond the outskirts of the city. Now it
seemed clear that reality was much different for most. He could still not
understand why the Dark Jedi used their powers for self-gain and selfishness.
By this time Tiberan
had nearly reached the center of town, and turned down a side alley, looking
for a cantina of any sort, when a voice halted him.
"Tiberan?"
the feminine voice repeated. When Tiberan saw a
figure move from the shadows into the light, he considered running. He held
still for the moment, however. The figure reached up and removed its low-pulled
head-scarf, revealing a light-skinned face framed with fiery red hair. Tiberan was looking at a surprisingly beautiful woman
"I am here to take you to Janus."
Frigg
As the rock door
closed behind him, Masel hurried to catch up with
Xar, who was heading toward the silhouetted comm
tower in the distance.
When they came into the lighted area of the
landing pad, both men stopped and stared in confusion. Before them was a
shuttle that must have been made before the Clone Wars. Physically, it looked
much like Sienar’s Lambda-class shuttle. The
similarities ended there, however. The old armor had more than a few burn
marks, speaking of past battles. There were no weapons, either. There was a broad
shouldered technician standing nearby, wiping his hands. He seemed to be
looking at the two men.
"What is the meaning of this?" Xar
asked, raising a hand as he strode over to the tech.
"Well, if you’re fooled by it, then
I’m a happy man," the well-built tech remarked, his eyes studying
Xar over a thick mustache.
"Excuse me?"
"The name’s Thad Balfin."
He reached out to shake Xar’s outstretched hand. "I’m the
chief engineering officer of House Ar’Kell, chosen by the Quaestor himself. We’ll be getting to know each other
much better in the future, I’m sure. Now, this is the Starwind,
here," he said, gesturing toward the camouflaged shuttle. "You listen
carefully to my instructions, and you won’t have any problems."
"I don’t know if I like this."
Behind him, Masel came up to peer at Balfin.
"Frankly, I don’t care what you
like, son. Now listen, I have spent two days working on this ship for your
mission, to make this brand-new ship look like a thirty year-old scrap heap.
Here, follow me inside."
As the three ascended the shuttle’s ramp,
Balfin continued. "Minos
Cluster is not a friendly place. Along with your cover story, no one will
question you in this ship." They turned and headed toward the cockpit.
"I know," remarked Xar. "I flew
several tours of duty there."
"Did you now? Well, this isn’t a TIE
Defender, either. She doesn’t look like much from the outside, but
she’s got added maneuverability and speed. There’s also a high-tech
scanner in the nose, which I will now show you how to operate."
Once Balfin had gone, giving final warnings and threats to take
good care of the Starwind,
and Xar and Masel stowed their gear in the
ship’s two quarters, they returned to the cockpit. Xar sat at the
pilot’s controls and began the pre-flight warm-up, while Masel took the copilot’s seat and closed the ramp.
Within a couple of minutes Xar had the Starwind operational, and the shuttle began rising into the
air.
"Here we go," breathed Masel. Soon after a sonic boom reverberated through the
jungle.
Out of the viewport, the planet Frigg seemed to fade away in the distance, and soon was
lost in fog. Above, the atmosphere became darker, more stars becoming visible
until, finally, the computer told Masel that they had
left the planet’s gravity field.
"Strap in, I am going to make the jump to
hyperspace," called Xar. Setting the proper course, the computer plotted
the best route to their destination. "Tiberan’s
last recorded location was somewhere in the Lyccos
system. That is our first destination." Xar pulled back on the controls.
The stars stretched into starlines, and the shuttle
shot into hyperspace.
Lantare I
Sela Ralea led Tiberan through a complex series of turns, and through
alleyways, keeping as low a profile as possible. Finally they emerged in a
crowded main street, which they crossed, stopping in front of the drab-looking
outside of a cantina.
"Master Janus is inside," Ralea told Tiberan in a low
voice. "Be careful in there, and do what you’re told."
"Don’t worry, I’ve been
searching for a long time. I’m not going to foul it up," said Tiberan "Good.
Now follow me inside."
Tiberan entered the Sandy Bantha
to a soft chiming of music. In sharp contrast, the room was dark and crowded.
His hopes of coolness were banished as soon as he felt the stuffiness of the
room. Ralea brushed past him and proceeded toward the
bar in the center of the room. Tiberan had no choice
but to follow her.
Janus was sitting at the bar with a couple
empty seats on both sides, drinking a small glass of caf.
He was dressed in gray, with a cape that fell nearly to the floor. He leaned
his short haired, white head back after taking a drink, then turned toward the
two and stood. He looked at Tiberan with eyes lined
by age, though his face was still quite handsome. A gold chain around his neck
descended under his shirt.
"Tiberan,"
he said, putting on a smile. "I am Jedi Master Janus. It is so good to
meet you."
"Good to meet you, too, sir." The two
men shook hands. "I’ve traveled a long way to find you."
"So you have. I can sense the Force
strongly in you. I’m looking forward to completing your training."
"Yes, well, so am I. By the way, where is
your facility located?"
"Oh, not here. It’s on Lantare," Janus replied. "We will be heading
there soon enough. Patience. I have some business to attend to here today, but
we will leave tomorrow."
"Whatever you say, sir."
"Indeed. I am sure you will enjoy working
with me. I have trained many Jedi Knights. I am eager to learn more about you,
when we arrive home." Janus glanced briefly over his shoulder. "But
for now, I must meet with a business associate. Sela
will show you around the city. I know you would welcome a cool refresher
bar."
"Boy, would
"See you later."
After waving the
boy away, Janus returned to his seat. From over at the stage, a tinny voice
yelled in Gamorrean, "One, Two, Three!" and
music started blaring, accompanied by the loud voice of the singer.
Janus took another drink as Captain Je’gem Shaara came out of
the shadows. Shaara was very large for a Bothan, with black fur streaked with white. Coming over to
sit beside the other man, he ordered a strange Bothan
drink, and turned to face Janus, who sighed.
"I was expecting Kruaan,
not his lackey."
A faint growl issued from the huge Bothan. "The Commandant has better things to do. He
wants to know where the shipments are."
Janus studied his ale unconcernedly. "The shipment
is almost ready. It will be shipped to you next week. It takes a while to mine
the stuff, much less process it, you know."
"Yes, well Kruaan
says that if he doesn’t get it on time, you won’t be around long
enough to regret it. He has a busy schedule."
"I do not take kindly to threats,
friend." Janus lifted a finger, and the Bothan
felt his windpipe closing. He grasped his throat, struggling to breathe. On the
stage, the music flared louder and louder, coming to a climax, until...
Finally, Janus let him go, and the Bothan gasped for
air. "Cannot breathe well in this humidity, can you? Listen, Kruaan and I have a partnership, and you are my minion as
much as his. If it weren’t for me, he wouldn’t be able to keep hold
of this rock much longer. He needs me. Kruaan will
get what he wants in due time, as long as he sees that I get mine. Tell him
that."
Shaara took a long drink before replying. "I will tell
him..."
"Good. Now run along. I have things to
attend to."
The Bothan left the
bar, and seconds later had vanished in the crowd. "You will not back out
now, Kruaan," Janus said to himself. "Too
much rides on it, for you and me." Seeing several Gamorrean
females walk down from the stage, swinging their hips and dancing, Janus
decided it was time to get out of this filth-hole. He drained the last of his
ale, then headed toward the entrance, cape swaying behind him.
Hyperspace
The shuttle blazed through the depths of hyperspace, millions of
swirling stars surrounding it, in this other dimension. Inside, Xar and Masel had been discussing their next plans. During the
trip, they had read the full briefing from Quaestor
Organa, as well as the history and current condition of Lyccos
II. "...and once we are settled in, I will go around and see what I can
find about Tiberan. You need not do much, except tell
me everything you know about him. I want to know what he will do when I confront
him."
"You’re going to confront him?"
"Yes," Xar affirmed. "Why? Are
you so eager to kill him?"
"Well, no, not at all, I just thought
you..."
"Thought I enjoyed killing people in cold
blood?" Xar finished for him. "Quite the contrary. I will do what I
can to convince him to come back with us. Now listen, let us go over the IDs
one more time. I am Kiruun Magnus. What is your
name?"
Masel sighed, exasperated. "Delk
Carmon. We’ve gone other this a hundred times! Listen, I’m far
from helpless. The world where I come from is not exactly a friendly place. I
grew up hunting Vraskars. They are large, fast, and
deadly."
Xar
shook his head. "Masel is from that world. Where
is Delk Carmon from?"
At Xar’s
heated stare, Masel threw his hands into the air.
"All right, blast you, I’m from Lantare. I
can’t believe this! Won’t you listen to me? You know you could use
my help."
"You..." Xar hesitated for a moment, then nodded finally. "Very well. I am sorry, Masel. I am used to working alone. We will be a team."
He extended his hand, and Masel shook it.
"Thanks. I..." The consoles beeping
cut him off.
After a glance, Xar strapped back in.
"Looks like we are coming up on the Lyccos
system. Exit in fifteen."
Xar counted down the seconds to reversion.
Although the shuttle would have come out of hyperspace on its own, it was best
to be in control and ready for anything. When he reached zero, Xar pushed
forward on the controls, and the stars ceased their swirling, reverting to starlines, which in turn receded into millions of stars. A
huge red sun jumped into view to port, while a creamy-brown planet loomed off
the forward viewport. The computer quickly confirmed that they were indeed in
the Lyccos system, though it couldn’t have been
any other. The planet slowly grew in the viewport.
Some time later a voice came from the speakers.
"This is Lyccos planetary control. Please
identify yourself and request landing procedures..."
A couple of hours
later, Masel walked behind Xar as they made their way
through the labyrinthine tunnels of Lyccos II. Since
the two planets of the Lyccos system were slowly
spiraling in towards their sun. Everyone, including the native population,
whoever they had once been, had had to live underground in vast caverns. The
surface of Lyccos II was a baking, barren rock,
without an atmosphere.
"Affirmative, Starwind. You have
clearance to enter cavernade 3, cavern 7, sub-cavern
17."
"Thank you." Xar said, shutting
off communications. "Now we land. You are going to love Lyccos II."
The planet grew larger and larger, until the
pair could finally make out a number of openings in the surface. There was not
much of an atmosphere to enter, and once they were through, they entered what
the computer map of Lyccos II told them was cavernade 3. The entrance was kilometers wide, but
continued to wane smaller deep into the surface. The entire cavity was lit by
large light sources set into the rock wall. The shuttle turned and entered a
side cavern, still large enough. The air thickened as finally they entered
another, sub-cavern, and Xar docked the craft alongside several personal space
yachts that varied in age from brand new to looking as old as the Starwind. They gathered their things and left the shuttle,
locking it up behind them. They visited customs, and went through several
anxious minutes while having their IDs scanned. It appeared that Mathis’
ID fakers were thorough, however, and had taken great pains to make sure they
fit their description. Masel’s, for instance,
fit well with Lantare because of his dark tanned
skin. "Have a nice stay on Lyccos II," the
attendant told them. "Your ship will be perfectly safe here."
"I would not bet on it," Xar said
to Masel later. They climbed aboard Lyccos’ mass transit system, the only practical way
of traveling from one cavernade to another, rode for
several kilometers, then on foot began their trek through the maze of tunnels
that was Lyccos’ planet life.
Masel looked in awe down corridors which seemed to go on
forever. "I can’t believe how huge this place is," he told Xar
once.
"This is just one ‘city’.
They have a repulsor super-train which ferries people between the cities. They
say there is more room down here than the surface of most planets. I think we
should begin tracing Tiberan from here first, though.
And so now they were standing in front of an
inn which, like most buildings here, was built directly into the rock of the
cavern. There was a holo-sign above naming it the Digger’s
Dream.
Xar explained to Masel,
"Lyccos II probably will not last but a few more
years, because the sun is in real danger of going nova. So, archeologists and
geologists have flocked here to study the ancient race and preserve their
treasures, and mine the exclusive minerals."
"Like what?"
"Not sure, but I think there is a valuable
metal mined here. Let us go inside and see about getting a room. I chose this
place for a reason. The briefing said there is someone here who can help
us."
Masel followed Xar inside. The interior was a little
sparse, but clean, with a modern look. It probably wasn’t very old. They
went up to the reception droid and booked a room. "Room 207, sir,"
the droid said. Xar nodded. "Also, I would like to speak with the
superintendent. He should be expecting us."
"Very well, sir. He is busy at the moment,
but will come to your room."
"Thank you."
They ascended two flights of stairs, and
traveled down a hallway to a door marked 207. It accepted Xar’s pass
card, and they entered the room.
"Not bad for the price," Masel remarked. The room was well-furnished, with all the
necessities. There was a clean refresher station, and a bed on either side of
the room. Setting his things on the counter, Xar took a seat at the table and
turned on the local holonews. Masel
followed him and sat on one of the beds.
"We should get started first thing
tomorrow," Xar said.
After a while, Masel
decided to try and strike up a conversation. "So, Sauron. Why did the Quaestor say that you could empathize with Tiberan? In fact, why did he choose you for this mission,
if you don’t mind my asking?"
Xar turned off the holoscreen
and faced Masel. "I do not mind, but explaining
will take a while."
"We’ve got all day," Masel answered, shrugging.
"Very well. I will be straightforward. My
old master, Runis, trained me to assassinate his enemies on the old Dark
Council. I was taught by different people, in the use of many weapons. After
Runis died, I returned to Varnus to find it devastated. It seems the Empire
came and ‘offered’ Varnus membership in the Empire. Negotiations
were not going well, but that was when a Rebel fleet entered the system. The
Imperials told them that it was an Imperial world, and the Rebels attacked. The
main city was nearly destroyed in the battle. I later learned that my father
tried to stop the fighting, tried to negotiate with them, but of course that
was not possible. He was shot out of the sky, and the city was bombarded. That
is one of the reasons I joined the Empire afterward. I loved to fly, there was
almost nothing left in my life, and I wanted to start over. Most
of all though, I wanted to put down the Rebels, who could not listen to reason
even enough to spare my homeworld. They could
have tried to overthrow the Empire peacefully, but they immediately resorted to
violent force. The Empire may be far from perfect, but neither is the
Rebellion."
"I’m sorry," Masel said after a silence. "Hmm. My reasons for
joining the Empire are much simpler. In fact, Eriadu
is in the Empire. My father is a ranking officer in the Security corps. There
was not much of a choice. But when I found out I was Force-sensitive... That
was two years ago, about the time of the Emperor’s death. Finally I found
the Brotherhood, and leaped at the chance to learn to use the Force. Boy,
things sure have changed since the days of the Empire. Do you think we’ll
win, Sauron?"
Xar thought for a moment. "Yes, I think it
is entirely possible that we can defeat the
"Kay’ineen."
Said a decidedly Twi’lek accent.
"Ah, good," said Xar, rising toward
the door. "Our help has arrived."
The door opened, admitting a tall Twi’lek dressed in dark robes. It was still easy to
see that he was quite muscular, though. One of his head-tails which hung down
his back was almost half-gone. Closing the door behind him, he studied the
other two men in the room. Seeing Xar, Kay’ineen
broke into a toothy grin. "Welcome back, Kiruun.
I haven’t seen you in a long while. Have you returned to continue your
search for the Shard of Destiny?"
Xar gave a small frown. Not many knew of his
passion for ancient artifacts. And Lyccos II was a
treasure trove, if one had the credits and knew who to look for. He bowed
slightly to the Twi’lek. "It is good to
see you, friend. But no, I have not come for the Shard. My last search nearly
ended in disaster. I do have a search of
a different kind, however."
"Indeed. I received a coded message
telling me so. I will gladly aid you. And your companion?" asked Kay’ineen, nodding to Masel.
"May I introduce to you Jedi Knight Delk Carmon, of the planet Lantare.
Delk, this is Retired Imperial Chief Engineer Kay’ineen. He has quite a legendary reputation among
higher class Imperial officers."
The Twi’lek
shook his head. “Yes, well, I chose to live here to escape all that.
Except for... special operations, of course."
Masel stood and walked over to shake the Kay’ineen’s hand. "Very nice to meet you,
sir."
Xar arched an eyebrow at the Twi’lek. Kay’ineen,
however, was quite used to alien customs, and returned Masel’s
smile.
"Now that the formalities are completed,
what is the nature of your mission?" asked Kay’ineen.
"Have a seat," offered Xar. Once
everyone was seated at the table, he began. "We are looking for a man by
the name of Tiberan, a traitor who has killed and stolen
Imperial property. Here are the full details." Uploading the data from his
datapad to Kay’ineen’s,
he also gave him Tiberan’s description.
Kay’ineen was well known for his access to most of Lyccos’ computer systems. He was often asked for his
knowledge of security; usually for a price, though. After a few moments of
sifting through his data, Kay’ineen nodded.
"I know the man you speak of. A TIE Defender? A valuable piece of property
indeed, but useless on the market. He passed through the system late last week,
then left abruptly. It seems he had a private conversation with a listed
archeologist corporation, but with who exactly it is unclear."
"What was the name of the company?"
Xar asked.
"Tri-System Archeologist Funds. It seems
their research is funded by private investors."
"Well, it is a start, better than nothing.
I wonder why Tiberan was talking with them?"
Kay’ineen looked at Masel, who shook
his head. "I dunno. He never said anything about
liking artifacts."
Xar nodded, then stood, ending the meeting.
"Thank you for all your help, Kay’ineen.
We may have use of your records again. And we will be staying here at the Digger’s Dream for the duration of
our mission."
"No problem. I am glad to be of service.
If Tiberan re-enters the system, I will be sure to
let you know."
After Kay’ineen
had left, Xar and Masel stowed their gear and
freshened up.
"Let’s go get a bite to eat,"
suggested Masel. "I’m starving."
* * *
The next morning
Xar woke Masel early. Sitting up sleepily, Masel had to stare for a moment to realize where he was.
"Oh! Ah... What’s happening?"
"Time to get moving."
"Oh. Right." He dressed quickly as
Xar began removing things from his bag of ‘toys’. Xar again wore a
dark jumpsuit. Masel wondered how many the man had in
his luggage. Xar first clipped his lightsaber to his belt. He slipped the vibroblade into a small sheath at his boot, then brought
the packages containing his mass gun and its ammo. He unzipped it, revealing
the shiny metal weapon. The thing made Masel uneasy.
Xar pulled on a shoulder holster, then removed the gun from its housing. He
held it up, seeming to study it for a moment, turning it slightly. "I have
many memories with this. Time to put it to use again." A twitch of his
finger ejected the clip, and Xar filled it with the projectiles, one by one,
fifteen in all. Then Xar slowly pushed in the clip. That was all that was
needed. The gun was ready. He put the gun in the holster, which was specially
made to fit it, and snapped it in place. Then he removed his jacket from his
case and pulled it on, covering the weapon and holster. "Have you got a
jacket?" he asked Masel. "It can get chilly
in the lower levels."
"Yeah." Masel
clipped his own lightsaber to his left side and holstered his blaster on his
right. He rounded the bed and got out a folded leather jacket. Pulling it on,
he asked, "Ready?"
"Ready. We have a lot to do before the day
is over. Only have time for a ration bar on the way to the super express train.
TSAF is located over six hundred kilometers to the east."
That night Xar
and Masel walked through the corridors, in the
general direction of the Digger’s Dream. It had been a long day,
and they were both tired. Coming to a junction, Xar saw that it connected three
tunnels. The tunnel to the right curved off into the distance, while the ones
before and behind them seemed to stretch on forever into darkness. The two were
making their way toward a café-style restaurant, deciding to at last get a good
meal. The neon sign above read The Hyperspace Diner. Windows surrounded
the diner, built into the rock wall of course, with a blue and white interior.
The entire place was easily visible from the outside. It seemed a cozy
atmosphere, with a bar on one side and tables at each window.
Heading that way, Xar mentally went over the
day’s accomplishments. They had traveled to TSAF first, to find it did
not open until later, and so they kept an eye out on who came and went from
across the street. When they finally entered they only got as far as the receptionist,
who when asked had told them that the CEO was currently out-system and not
available, and no, they couldn’t speak with any representatives. They had
been urged to visit one of their store chains, as funding was usually done
there and not at the main complex. Xar would have pressed further, but Masel had argued that it was no use.
Xar was developing a plan to get in, at any
rate.
They were much closer to the café now. Xar
could see only a few tables were occupied. The bartender, a large man with a
full, dark beard, was wiping the blue marble counter. There were numerous
bottles of liquids of varying colors behind him. Masel
started to open the door, when Xar heard a crash. "Hold on," he told Masel. Looking back across the corridor, he noticed a small
side tunnel where five or six shady-looking figures were off-loading crates
from a huge vehicle transport onto the floor. They were clearly low-lifes and hired muscle, and one of them was a huge furred
creature with fangs. Xar could barely make out the labels on the sides. The
crates were marked as Ziranthium, something Xar had
never heard of before. He could only see the rear of the vehicle, and the
crates were large and stacked together; they were obviously waiting for a
loading truck. Xar did not have to see a blue spark light up from the busted
crate near the truck or notice that the labels were pasted-on to know what was
happening was much less than legit. Still, it was not that. It was none of his
business, after all. There was just something about it...
Masel let the door close and stared as Xar started over
towards an unloading truck.
"Hey! Where are you going?"
Xar did not answer.
As he started after, Masel
wondered what could interest Xar about a bunch of guys unloading crates. Then
he saw a spark of Glitterstim, and stopped dead in
his tracks, realizing what was going on. Masel had
been raised in the Security corps. He had been taught to deeply respect the
law, and he hated those who broke it. Even so, he knew this was none of their
business. Why get involved? And it seemed Xar did not realize he was taking on
five burly-looking men. Masel ran to catch up with
him, opening his mouth to tell him to stop, but it was too late.
Xar walked right into the middle of the group,
who had finished putting down their crates.
"Greetings. May I inquire as to what you gentlemen have in the
boxes?" Three of the men were right in front of him, bewildered looks on
their faces.
Suddenly a vibroblade
flashed into the hand of one of the workers, stabbing towards Xar’s heart
before Masel knew what was happening. Before he could
activate the blade, however, Xar’s hands caught the man’s wrist and
elbow, bringing it down to his side, the blade cutting into his own flesh, and
then he slammed his right elbow into the man’s face. Screaming, the
worker dropped the blade, then his scream was cut off
as Xar grabbed the man’s hair and brought his head down to meet Xar’s
knee. As the unconscious man fell to the floor, another worker stepped in,
throwing a punch at Xar’s face.
Xar stepped back and caught the man’s
arm, hyper-extending it at the joint. The man yelled in pain. Turning the arm
the other way, he brought the man down onto his back, while throwing a sidekick
into a third man’s ribcage. Masel heard several
cracks as the man fell away, then watched as Xar punched the second man in the
throat, taking him out of the fight
Only seconds had passed since Xar had walked up
to the men. Seeing another man pull out his blaster, Masel
realized he had just been standing there watching. Running as the man brought
his weapon up, Masel dived into the man before he
could take aim, both of them dropping to the floor. The gun clattered down a
few feet away. Masel scrambled on top of the man,
trying to keep the man’s hand away from reaching the blaster. Only inches
away. Masel reached for the man’s wrist, but
the man’s other fist hit him in the mouth. Masel
scrambled to rise.
Xar did not
notice Masel’s struggle. He had his own
troubles. As the huge hairy alien approached, Xar backed away, pulling his
lightsaber from his belt. He brought it up, but in a huge backhand swipe the
alien knocked the weapon out of Xar’s hand. The force of the blow almost
spun him around. Then the beast moved with amazing speed, scooping Xar up in a
crushing bear-hug.
Xar could feel the life being crushed out of
him. Spots appeared before his eyes. He saw, remembered, burning on a world of
sand and dirt, facing a beast that had been about to kill him...
Xar fought down the panic that threatened to
overwhelm him. Calmness. Placing his
hands on the alien, he let the Force flow through him, as Runis had taught him.
The alien roared in pain as the Force coursed
into it, injuring it from the inside. It let go of Xar, but the pain did not
subside. The dark side of the Force had already done its damage. The alien
beast raised its head and gave a high pitched scream, then stumbled backwards
and tripped over the body of the first worker, dead.
As the beast fell, Xar turned toward the last
man, and froze. The man stood there, his blaster pointed straight at Xar. No,
thought Xar. How could I have been so stupid? I do not think I can absorb
and dissipate this... Two blaster shots rang out, and Xar flinched. Looking
down at himself, Xar at first wondered why he was not dead. Then he looked up,
and the last thug’s eyes rolled up, and he fell, revealing Masel behind him, his blaster muzzle smoking.
Masel stepped around the smoking body toward Xar, his face
serious. "Sauron. What the blazes did you think you were doing?"
Xar seemed abashed. "Masel,
thank you for saving me. I apologize for underestimating you earlier. I…
I am glad you are with me."
Masel was taken aback for a moment. Did the man not
realize he had endangered both their lives? Did he not think what he did was
reckless and stupid? "That’s okay," he said instead. No point
in worsening the problem. "I understand. It takes a while to build
someone’s trust."
"Indeed. I..." Xar stopped. He seemed
to be listening to something. "It seems we missed one."
"Huh?"
"Do you not feel it? Oh, forgive me. You
have not the strength to... Never mind."
Xar walked over to the crate that had crashed,
which was away from the others, and ripped the label off. Underneath was
another label that read Tri-System
Archaeological Funds. “Well, what have we here?” Masel looked on in astonishment. How had Xar sensed the
connection? But Xar simply shook his head as he pulled off his jacket and laid
it on the crate. He moved to the side of the stack of other crates, and reached
over and pulled his mass gun from its holster. Masel
wondered what he was doing. Before he could speak, Xar looked as him. "You
had better stand over there." He pointed back beside the hovertruck. Taking out what seemed to be a small laser
sight, Xar attached it to a spot on the gun’s muzzle. It was then that Masel first heard a high-pitched whine. Pulling out his own
blaster again, he looked down the long corridor that curved out of sight. Xar
was right, he could feel it now. At least, he could feel the presence of
someone approaching, someone with very malevolent intentions. How Xar had
singled it out from all the other millions on Lyccos
II, he had no idea. Perhaps the man would teach him some time. But it was too
late now. Masel could see someone coming around the
corner, someone on a speeder bike and repulsor sled. Someone dangerous. The
figure was dressed in ragged cloth, and wore a hood over a full breather mask,
but Masel could see armor underneath that cloth. The
figure seemed to notice them, and pulled out... something. It seemed to be a
long blaster carbine, or a riot gun of some sort.
Xar took up a shooting stance. He put his right
gun hand on top of his left arm steady his aim. "That is Kiraat Shal." Masel’s eyes widened. The famous bounty hunter of Minos Cluster? What was he doing here?
The hunter began shooting before even slowing
down. Blaster bolts began rapidly spraying toward them like projectiles from
outdated machine guns, hitting the crates and sending up splinters and puffs of
flame. Masel got off several shots, but with the
hunter’s speed they all passed behind him. The hail of bolts was too much
for even the two of them to bear. Masel started
running backwards. The hunter didn’t seem to care whether he hit them or
not yet. Xar took careful aim, trying to track Shal,
but he seemed to realize he was too close now. Kiraat
came to a stop next to the unloading truck, and climbed out, firing rapidly in
Xar’s direction. Xar ran to the side, blaster bolts hitting the crates
behind him, then dived over the wall of boxes. Blue sparks flew everywhere as
the glitterstim was exposed to air and light. Shal let off several more rounds around the area Xar dived
into. Masel fired a couple more times, but the shots
went wide. He just could not hit him while running. Then the hunter turned
toward him. Masel took off running away from Shal as fast as he could toward the Hyperspace Diner,
firing over his shoulder. Blaster shots missed within inches, so close he could
feel the heat, and hit the glass of the Diner in front of him, shattering
windows and melting the spots they hit. Masel blasted
the door, and it swung open in front of him. Then suddenly he felt a blast hit
his arm, and he yelled. In reflex his blaster was flung wildly away, and he
dived into the diner and slid to a stop near the bar. Scrambling away, he made
his way beside one of the booths next to the window. He sat up, and made
himself look down at his arm. It seemed it had only been nicked, but the flesh
had been singed and cauterized. He winced in pain. Looking around, he noticed
that the diner was completely empty. At least the people knew what to do.
Xar
ducked behind the crates, and watched as Masel got
nicked on the arm and dove into the Hyperspace Diner. He had been
fortunate to survive that exchange. Then several more shots hit the crates
around him, scattering blue sparks everywhere. Then he felt a sharp pain in his
arm. He noted, as he pulled out a small shard of wood that had hit him, that
this was not the best place for cover.
The shots had stopped. Xar, with his
Force-enhanced hearing, could hear Shal reloading the
clip, and footsteps receding in the distance. He is heading toward the
diner. Going to kill the lesser threat first? Is he that stupid? Or just being
careful, and going for cover? One of the crates had had part of the side
blown away, and something liquid was seeping out. Reaching over, Sauron he
touched some of it, and sniffed it. It felt slippery between his fingers, and
smelled almost like jet fuel. Whatever this is, it is not glitterstim. Perhaps I was wrong, or maybe I found
something more important after all... Reaching over, he activated the laser
sight for his hand-held rail gun, then moved slowly up
to the crate to peer carefully around the side towards the diner.
Silence was the first
thing Masel noticed. Then he heard quiet footsteps
approaching. Sliding up against the near wall, just below the window, he
waited. Looking out the window, he suddenly saw Shal
moving along the windows. He stopped right in front of Masel.
Fear almost froze him, but he saw that Shal was
facing away from him. What the... Well, he was not going to scorn good
fortune. Slowly, silently, he unclipped his lightsaber, and pointed its
focusing end toward Shal. If I turn it on, it will
hit him just right, he thought. But what if he is too far away? No, got
to take that chance... Suddenly two shots burst through the glass, leaving
two small holes in the window. Shal was propelled
through the window to land on his back on the booth’s table. Masel looked down in shock at the blood on his shirt and
pants. Glass showered him and he closed his eyes to protect them.
He heard running footsteps, then Xar was
standing over the body of the dead bounty hunter, searching him.
"Come on, Masel.
We have to go now." Masel got up, still
stunned, and looked around. There was not much blood on the hunter’s
front. Turning around, he saw two holes in the opposite wall, in the same
positions, where the projectiles had gone through. Exactly how close those
shots had been, and how deadly they would have been had he been in their path,
sent chills through Masel. He stumbled over toward
the entrance, his feet crunching on broken glass, and met Xar at the door. Then
anger pulsed through him, and his eyes narrowed as he looked at Xar.
"What in the name of the Sith did you think you were doing? Are you crazy? You could
have killed me!"
"Masel..."
"Are you absolutely insane?"
"Security will be coming."
"Good! I’ll tell them to lock you up!
You could have killed me!"
"But I did not."
Masel stopped, staring incredulously at Xar. Was the man
insane? Ruthless? Or did he have a plan?
"Let me see your arm."
"Why?"
"I can heal you."
Cautiously Masel
offered his burned arm. Xar put a hand it, and Masel
felt a chill run through him, and then pain exploded through his arm, much
worse than when he had been hit. He clenched his teeth and grunted; the pain
was swelling. It seemed the pain lasted for minutes, but it could only have
been seconds. When he looked down at his arm again, the wound was no longer
there. There was a scar, where the bolt had hit, but that was all. Slowly, ever
so slowly, the pain was subsiding, until it finally vanished. Masel’s arm still felt... odd, though. He suddenly
felt like he needed a bath.
"How... How did you do that?"
"My mentor was a great healer. He passed
all of his knowledge on to me. Or almost all. In any case, Dark Side healing is
different from the Light Side. There is pain, and scarring, and... a residue,
if you will, of the Dark Side. It can have unfortunate consequences, sometimes.
The pain may return occasionally. Those are the disadvantages of using the Dark
Side, and not just in healing. I myself was badly damaged when my teacher found
and healed me. The pain returns, but you can… force it away. Masel, let
us go back to the inn."
Masel took a deep breath. "Okay. And thank you.
I’m sorry I burst out like that. I guess that makes us even."
"Not quite yet, but a good start." Xar
looked over his shoulder, and Masel could hear sirens
in the distance. Yes, it seemed the people here knew exactly what to do in
situations like this.
"Let’s go," he said.
When they
returned to their room, Kay’ineen was sitting
at the table, waiting for them. He stood impatiently when they entered. His
face seemed carved from stone, and his voice dead serious.
"Kiruun? I have
been calling you all day." He paused, and took a deep breath. "Tiberan has arrived."
The Legacy of Ar’Kell
Betrayal: Chapter Three
Showdown
The tunnel
stretched off into the distance, several kilometers of roughly hewn rock and plasteel, dimly lit by glowrods
in the ceiling periodically placed along its length. At the near end the tunnel
stopped and broke into several side tunnels, along with a large wall of duracrete, which made up the perimeter of the Tri-Systems
Archaeologist Funds complex. A hovercar was parked on
the road at the base of the wall, not far from one of the side entrances.
Masel sat in the driver's seat of the hovercar
and for the tenth time looked down at his wrist chronometer and sighed. What
was keeping Xar so long? He looked around, peering through the darkness for any
signs of movement. It had been over half an hour since Xar had climbed over the
wall, with the purpose of finding out exactly what Janus and Tiberan were up to. Masel did not
know what he would do if Xar had been captured. He did not even have a way of
knowing if it happened. This is stupid, he thought. This is my first
mission. I had no idea it'd explode into something this big.
Then the high pitch of blaster fire cut through
the air, and Masel looked around frantically. Oh
no, what now? He heard a scraping sound overhead, and looked up to the top
of the wall beside the car. A man in black was swinging over the top on the
grappling rope he had used to enter, then he quickly rappelled the ten meters
down to the floor.
Xar tossed the rope aside and leaped into the
back seat of the hovercar, yelling, "Go,
go!"
"Right!" Masel
shouted. With a whine the engine came to life and the car jolted forward.
Xar moved onto his knees in the seat and
brought his blaster up as Masel turned the car
towards the tunnel that was their exit out of this sector. "Keep driving, Masel, we may be getting some company. I will try to hold
them off."
"Okay! Maybe we can lose them in the
industrial sector!” Masel offered.
"Good idea. Head that way."
Xar turned to face behind the vehicle just in
time to see the large double doors at the end of the road burst open as another
hovercar rammed them open. Xar turned his head to the
side and yelled, "Masel, step on it!" Then
he turned back to the other car that was rapidly coming up behind them as their
car accelerated.
The two hovercars shot down the dark tunnel about twenty meters
apart. Three men were in the TSAF vehicle, the driver trying to hold a steady
course while a gunman in the passenger's seat and one in the back lined up
their shots. Xar focused on trying to get an aim on the car behind him, then
ducked as several bolts flashed out, lighting the space between them. After a
few rounds had passed overhead, he sat back up and fired his hold-out blaster
back at the pursuers. Two of his shots hit the front of the car, spewing
sparks, another hit the plasteel windshield, creating
a melted smudge, while another missed over the heads of the gunmen. Their
return fire was more accurate, and Xar ducked again as several shots hit the
rear of the vehicle, causing sparks to fly out and blasting bits of glowing
metal into the air. He got back up and fired again, but none of his blasts
could penetrate the enemies' windshield, instead just melting more of it into
slag.
Another hail of bolts flashed out, and Xar
ducked again. One blast hit the back of the front seat, setting it aflame, and
another overshot the seat, hitting the inside of the windshield. This is
getting too close, Xar thought. He slapped out the flames and fired a
couple shots back before jumping over the back and into the passenger's seat.
He turned to Masel. "We must lose them
somehow," he shouted over the noise of the engine and scream of blaster
fire. The end of the tunnel was growing larger ahead of them, where it split in
two directions.
"Take the right tunnel," Xar said.
"That is the way to the Industrial Sector."
The hovercar followed
the right tunnel and entered a series of winding curves in the rock, the turns
providing a difficult target for the pursuing vehicle. Then, abruptly the
tunnel opened up into a huge cavern, brightly lit from ceiling floodlamps. The cavern was full of buildings and factories,
intertwined roads and corporate complexes. The Industrial Sector, as it was
called, was the processing center for the resources mined deep within the dying
planet, though recently, with the declining population of Lyccos
II, some of the refineries had been abandoned. The hovercar
shot through the outer gate and into the city-like expanse, swerving to avoid hovertrucks and bulk cargo transports. Xar looked back to
find their pursuers still hot on their trail, though now concentrating on
finding a clear path through the bustle.
Suddenly a massive cargo carrier began slowly
crossing the street in front of the car. Xar knew they were moving too fast to
wait for the carrier to pass. "There! Take that side street!" he
yelled to Masel.
"Okay!" Masel
slowed the car and pulled the stick to the right. The hovercar
turned into a narrow alley between two of the factory buildings, skimming the
wall on the left as they barely made the turn. The street below them suddenly
dropped a story, and the car descended abruptly. Xar looked back to see their
pursuers make the turn, hit the wall in a shower of sparks, and drop in behind
them. Blast. This is going to be harder than I thought. He turned back
around and instinctively ducked as their hovercar
passed under a low-lying conveyor belt bridge supported by metal poles to
either side. Above on the bridge, boxes were being carried from one building to
the next.
"Wow, we must have had centimeters to spare!" remarked Masel. Xar looked back at the bridge, and as the car behind
them squeezed through the gap, the answer hit him. As they approached the next
conveyor bridge in front of them, he turned to Masel.
"Masel, see
where those support beams attach to the bridge? If we can cut
it with our lightsaber at the right point, there!" He pointed to
the spot as they squeezed through the opening, hitting one of the support
beams, bending it.
"Yes, I see! But it will be hard to hit
and drive through at the same time!"
"Just hit it!"
Xar pulled his saber from his belt, Masel doing the same. A blaster bolt hit the back of his
seat, and Xar jerked away instinctively, but dared no look back. The final
bridge was looming ahead, a large container moving slowly across. One last chance, he told himself. He hit
the switch, and the lightsaber activated with a snap-hiss, a brilliant
orange-yellow blade humming to life. Masel's ignited, his green bladed lightsaber in his left hand and
the driving joystick in his right. He hit the break, slowing the vehicle as
they began going under the bridge. Xar stood up and held his saber with both
hands diagonally upward. As they went under the bridge the blade sliced through
the fragile support beam, and into the bottom of the bridge itself, cutting all
the way through the structure. On the other side, Masel's
saber sliced through his portion as well, but the blade did not make a clean
slice through the bridge. Masel hit the accelerator
and the car flew past on the other side, the men deactivating their sabers and
turning to look behind them. The one side of the bridge bent low, the weight of
the large container moving across seemed to be enough to make the difference.
The other side of the bridge broke, and the whole apparatus collapsed with a
tremendous crash, filling the entire alleyway with debris.
The driver of the pursuing vehicle saw the bridge
collapse, and hit the breaks hard, but they were already moving too fast. The hovercar slammed into the wreckage at a hundred kilometers
per hour, causing sparks to fly into the air and igniting a fire in the middle
of the debris. The driver was propelled forward into the windshield, his head
hitting the transparisteel with a crack. The man in the passenger's seat was
thrown over the windshield and front of the car into the debris, while the man
in the back, who had been standing, was launched into the air and flew
completely over the wreckage to land in the street.
As they drove away, Xar could not see if the
man got back up. He turned back to Masel.
"Ouch," said Masel.
"I think that hurt."
"Yeah. Come on, find us a place to leave
the car so we can get back to the inn."
"Okay," Masel
said softly.
The car turned back onto the street and headed
for the commercial sector.
Sela Ralea leaned against the
office wall and watched her boss's expression become more and more exasperated.
Janus had a glass of brandy in his hand, which he often did, but now he sat it
on the desk on touched. Janus' office was lavishly decorated, with a large,
ornate rug filling most of the floor on which the desk sat. A holoscene occupied one wall, under which was a shelf containing
various artifacts excavated by TSAF. On the other wall was a bookshelf with the
Jedi Master's datapads, records, and private book
collection. An officer, one of Janus' personal guards, stood in front of the
desk. Janus began shaking his head as the soldier finished his report.
"And then we lost them after they got rid
of the rented hovercar. We found it at the bottom of
a ravine. We currently conclude that they are holding out somewhere with the
stolen information, and possibly trying to contact their command." The
soldier finished speaking and stood at attention, obviously anticipating his
master's wrath.
Janus ran a hand through his slicked-back white
hair. "Who are these people? First they disrupt one of my spice/fuel
transfers, spilling the whole deal out into the open, and now they break into
my main facility and take our records! I don't understand it. Here, let me see
that recording again."
The officer took the datapad
in his hand and laid it onto the desktop. Janus held it up and hit the 'play'
button. The first scene was of outside the complex, of a man in a hovercar looking around suspiciously. Then the recording
changed to a dark man moving stealthily alongside a building. "Look at the
way he moves. This man's a professional. Something looks familiar about him,
but I can't tell from this. I don't know the other man, either."
"Sir, that was
the best picture we got of him. Like you say, he was very good. He took out
five guards, and two of them two didn't have a mark on them."
Janus started at that. “What? Why didn't
you mention this before?"
"I... I did not think it important at the
time, sir,” the guard stammered.
"Well, from now on you tell me everything,
important or not, is that clear?"
"Perfectly, sir."
"Very well then. Enough for now.
Dismissed."
The officer bowed, then turned and walked out
of the office. Once his resounding footsteps on the marble floor faded, Janus
glanced over at Ralea. "That man used the Force
to kill those guards, I'm sure of it. Probably Brotherhood-trained and sent
after me. Not one of my enemies, but he might work for them. How could they
know about the operation though? Unless..."
Realization dawned on him, and he looked at Ralea. "Blast it," he said.
A thoughtful expression came on Janus' face.
"I may be able to eliminate two mynocks with one
shot. If they find Tiberan, either they are dead, and
I am rid of them, or they catch Tiberan, and leave me
alone. Either way, I win. Go find Tiberan and bring
him in here. And get that officer back here and tell him to stand
outside." He picked up his glass from the desk and drained the contents in
one gulp, then reached to refill it again.
"Yes sir." The woman saluted and
briskly left the office.
Tiberan walked past the guard into the office. Ralea was standing in the corner, with Janus sitting behind
his desk.
"You summoned me, master?"
"Yes. I have a special mission for you.
Some people have been here looking for you. They have also been disrupting my
business. I have a special shipment being sent to our Bothan
partners on Lantare. I want you to accompany it there
and ensure its arrival to our contact there."
Tiberan was taken aback. "But master, I don't
understand. What about my training?"
"You have advanced well in your training. You are already a
Jedi Knight."
Tiberan took a deep breath and gathered his thoughts. For
the past weeks, Janus had been teaching him at his own convenience, a tidbit
here and there. He had promised to complete his training, but he was so often
caught up in his business ventures that Tiberan had
had to virtually train himself in the recreation center, working on his
fighting skills, with a blade or bare hands. Also, he knew Janus was involved
in something illegal, something he definitely did not want to get involved
with. But he could not question Janus on it. He felt like a trapped animal, and
thought, not for the first time, that he might have been better off staying in
the Brotherhood. Janus had not had much time to teach, or so he said. The other
part was the fact that his teachings were nothing like what he had expected.
His dreams of becoming another Luke Skywalker, of learning the Light Side, were
far from reality. Janus' teachings were almost the same as he had learned while
in the Dark Brotherhood. He had been taught how to injure or kill a dozen ways,
but none to heal. He had tried to stay away from those, instead trying to
increase his ability to control the Force, but he now knew that Janus was a
Dark Side, and not Light Side Master.
"Sir, may I speak freely? I've been trying
to learn more of the Force, and with the little you have taught me, I've had to
do a lot on my own. This will set back my training for a long time..."
Janus frowned sternly. “Didn't you hear
me? There are two Jedi from the Brotherhood who are looking for you! I'd think
you would jump at the chance to get off-world. You will go to Lantare. We will have a trap ready for them; you will not
have to do a thing."
Tiberan fought a sudden rush of panic. People from the Brotherhood were after him? He didn't want
to be there if they showed up, he would have to agree. But somehow, he would be
rid of this slavery. Maybe he could get enough money up to catch a ride out of
the cluster... "I'll go."
"Of course." Janus got up and walked
to the cabinet against the wall. He opened it, reached inside, and pulled out a
lightsaber. "And, just in case you do run into trouble, and to make sure
our associates know I mean business, take this." He laid the lightsaber on
the desk, and as Tiberan gently picked it up, he
said, "That was mine, before I lost the interest to continue. Learning
requires more time than I have. You've shown adequate skills with the blade in
your training. If you run into trouble, you'll be able to handle
yourself." He smiled. "Any more questions?
Good. Dismissed."
Tiberan, still stunned, remembered to salute, then left the office, clutching the saber in his hands.
The officer
entered, closing the door behind him. "You asked for me, sir?"
Janus walked back to the cabinet, where he
retrieved another bottle of Corellian brandy. He
ignored the guard's rhetorical question, and stood in the corner where he could
face both the officer and Ralea. "I think I know
how to find our intruders," he began. Pouring himself another glass of
brandy, he continued. "For months now we've been aware of a spy ring here
on Lyccos II, and we know I've been
investigated." He moved to the desk, still facing the room's two other
occupants, and set the bottle on the desktop. He was working out his plan in
his head, but spoke as though he had intended it all along. "We're going
to let it become common knowledge that a very important shipment is heading out
to Lantare, and that Tiberan
will be on it." He took a drink of brandy and continued. "I believe
that these two Jedi, if there are just two, are using the Brotherhood spy ring
to find out what Tiberan is doing, and they've
certainly discovered my presence here in the meantime. When our intruders find
this information, they will certainly go after Tiberan.
I'll have a trap set for them once they arrive in the Lantare
system. Meanwhile, we'll use this opportunity to find the leaks in our system,
and eliminate them."
Ralea stirred from her position against the wall, and
looked at Janus attentively. "But sir, won't that mean our presence here
has been compromised? Even if we destroy the leak, they've probably sent word
to their command by now. They know you're here."
"True, but after this operation's over
we're going to leave anyway." He stopped, and turned to the officer as
though realizing he was there. "You have your orders. Carry them
out."
"Yes sir." The man saluted and left.
After waiting for the door to close again,
Janus continued. "After this mission has been completed, our work here is done.
I hear we're going to have more important things to do soon." He smiled.
"But, as a parting gift to our enemies who have so vigilantly watched us,
when we find who is coordinating the spy ring, I want you to send them a
personal message."
Ralea smiled. "I understand perfectly, sir."
Janus moved back to his seat behind the desk.
He sighed a relieved-sounding sigh. "Within a week Kruaan,
along with everyone else on Lantare, will be dead,
and I'll have the Shard of Destiny in my hands."
"What about Tiberan?"
Ralea asked.
"He's served his purpose. One way or
another, we won't see him again. You weren't growing fond of him.” He
arched an eyebrow questioningly.
Ralea smirked. "Of course not."
"Sela, you're
the only one here with me who knows who we really serve. Don’t forget
your oath."
"Don't even suggest such a thing. I live
to serve."
"Indeed. That is all. Dismissed."
Ralea turned to leave, but at the doorway she stopped.
"You really should give up that," she said, pointing to the bottle of
brandy. "It's a bad habit. I can't have my liege bringing harm to
himself." Then she left, the sound of Janus' chuckling behind her.
After Ralea left,
Janus spent a long time in his office, staring into space, contemplating what
was ahead for him. Soon, he thought, Soon, I will have the Shard.
Then none of the others will be able to challenge me. I’ll be first among the
Xar and Masel entered their room to find Kay'ineen
already there, watching the news on the holovid.
"Ah, welcome back, my friends," the Twi'lek said, smiling. "I trust your mission was a
success?"
"Indeed," Xar replied. He held up a
disk. "All the information is here."
"Great. Let's see it."
Xar moved over to the holovid
and inserted the disk. Instead of the news, the display switched to a directory
listing all in code.
Xar shook his head. "This may take a
while."
Kay'ineen stood beside Xar and looked at the screen. "I
think I can sort through this. I'll go through it and let you know what I
find."
"Thanks."
Kay'ineen sat down in front of the screen and began typing as
Xar and Masel waited.
"Okay, here's what we've got," Kay'ineen said after a while, turning around in his seat.
Xar moved to a seat beside the table, while Masel sat
down on his bed. Kay'ineen, certain he now had an
attentive audience, gestured to the screen. "The Tri-Systems Archeologist
Funds is a legitimate company. But it looks like it's also used as a front for
its CEO's operations as well."
"Who's the CEO?" Masel
asked.
"A man named Janus Amonda,
who took over a few months ago. He actually runs a smuggling operation, dealing
contraband with other crimelords. Looks like he deals
in spices, weapons, you name it. From the manifest in these records,
anyway."
"You mentioned crimelords,"
remarked Xar. "Who are some them?"
"No big names, really. Wait, here's one.
Commandant Shrrinn Kruaan.
In fact, there's a shipment headed for Lantare
tomorrow morning. Manifest claims to be foodstuffs, but it's actually
carrying... Whoa.
"Rocket fuel? Wait a minute. That
is what I smelled in that scuffle near the diner." Xar tuned to Masel. "But why would Janus need it way out
here?"
Masel, looking confused, shrugged. "Maybe he wants to
propel this rock away from its inevitable doom."
"Intellectual-sounding, but not practical."
Kay'ineen spoke up. "They weren't just carrying rocket
fuel. Try electronic parts, datatapes, and the
like."
"Well, we can report all that to the local
authorities,” Xar said. “Our mission is to get Tiberan.
What about TSAF? What data is there on the company?"
Kay'ineen began typing, reading out the data in front of him.
"Let's see, it operates mainly here and on Lyccos
I, there's an exploration division, a workers division, a security division,
interesting... Even a research division."
"What kind of research?"
"Not specified. Just says they are working
on something called 'Project Clean Sweep'. Could refer to artifacts, I suppose.
Anyway, they're currently doing extensive digging into the Unexplored Sector,
in sectors 214-256."
"The Unexplored Sector? Near the
Slums?"
"Yes, that's correct. Why?"
Xar leaned back, in thought. "Nothing.
Probably unimportant. I just had a nasty run-in once in
the slums."
Suddenly Kay'ineen's
commlink beeped. "Excuse me please," he said, looking at his the
device. "I have an important call coming in. I'll let you know if there's
anything worth hearing."
Kay'ineen got up and walked to the back. A few minutes later
he came back. "Looks like you've got a vested interest in that shipment,
after all. Tiberan's going to be on it."
"Then we’ll be there too. Thanks for
all your help," Xar told the Twi'lek. "I
better report in now, and request an order update. I am fairly sure we will not
have to come back here, as we will catch Tiberan on Lantare."
"Glad I could be of service. Anything for my Imperial friends." He smiled. "You
know, this is my last month before retirement. I think I'll go off-world, maybe
retire on some backwater pleasure world."
"Sounds like the kind of life I could
never be satisfied with."
"I'm sure, but you're still young.
Someday, after you've had your lot with adventuring, you'll see as I do. Well,
I better set about finding someone else to run this place, shouldn't I? Again,
a pleasure working with you. Best of luck in this and all your future
endeavors." Standing, he shook the two men's hands and made his way out of
the room.
"I doubt it," whispered Xar.
"What was that?" asked Masel.
"Nothing. I better make that call now.
Then we need to get some sleep. I think we will be moving soon."
Ralea waited until the man shut off the commlink before speaking. The false data planting had gone just as planned. "Excellent work," she told the spy she had found and interrogated. "That's all I needed you for." With that she drew her blaster and fired a bolt into his head in one smooth motion. The spy never had time to cry out, and crumpled to the floor. Ralea stepped over the body and headed back to her hovercar.
"Janus?"
asked Mathis. Xar’s face filled the monitor in front of him. "Janus Amonda? Are you sure?"
"I am sure. Why? You know him?"
"I know of him. Dark Jedi Master Janus
used to be in the Brotherhood. He was removed because the Council found out he
really wasn't powerful enough to be a Master, that he'd been using a Force
Splinter to enhance his abilities to that of the norm. The Council tried to
cover the whole thing up after he was dismissed..."
"A Force Splinter?" The burst of
emotion that appeared on Sauron's face was quickly
covered. "Sir, I suggest we send a team to take out Janus as soon as
possible."
"Xar, I understand your concern. But I'll
send a transmission to the Council. They'll know what to do about it."
Xar seemed to be struggling to keep a straight
face. "Sir, with all due respect, I do not think that would be wise."
Mathis sat back, confused. "Why not?"
"Because Janus is looking for something a
lot bigger than a Splinter to enhance his powers. He has to be looking for the
Shard of Destiny."
"The Shard of Destiny?” Mathis
frowned. “That's just a legend."
"No sir, it is not. I looked for it once.
And believe me, the Lyccos
Security Corps has tried to cover up what happened for a long time. I got in
over my head back then. Anyway, that is not important now. What is, is that
Janus cannot be allowed to get that Shard. And neither can anyone in the
Brotherhood. Some things are best left alone. He is looking in the right place,
Billbob."
Mathis thought for a moment. "Very well.
But first, you must accomplish your mission. Here's what we'll do. You and Masel will follow Tiberan to Lantare, and take care of that problem. I'd also like to
find out the details about this deal they're doing. The Remnant would love to
get Kruaan out of office. Then, you'll return to Lyccos II, where I'll meet you personally. Then we'll stop
Janus. Quietly, I hope. Good enough?"
"Good enough, unless he gets his hands on
the Shard in the meantime."
"We'll have to act fast enough so that
won't happen. I'll get things finished here and join you as soon as possible.
With luck, we should arrive back at Lyccos about the
same time."
"Oh, one more thing. What should I do with
Tiberan? He is just a lost boy caught up in all
this."
"Just make sure he knows not to get in the
way of the Brotherhood. If he’ll listen, suggest he hide somewhere, become
a hermit. Preferably for a long, long time."
"Understood. Xar out."
Lantare System
0900 Hours
"Coming
out of hyperspace, now." Masel announced, pulling back on the levers.
The stars stopped rotating, pulled back into starlines,
and coalesced into stars, filling the viewport around them. A bright star
loomed closer, until it grew into a dirty yellow ball, not a star at all, but a
planet. Lantare.
"Navigation confirmed. Lantare system." He
turned to Xar. "We're here."
Xar nodded. "Just between us, I dread
this. It is going to be hot down there. On my homeworld
it rarely gets very hot." For a moment he seemed to see another place,
another time. Funny, Masel thought. H had never heard the man complain before.
"Well, I'm used to it. Hey, snap out of
it. I'm scanning for ships." The planet was growing closer in front of
them.
Suddenly two blips appeared on the screen.
"What the... Oh-oh," said Masel.
"What's that?"
Xar looked at the screen. "Z-95s."
Two snubfighters were
zooming toward them on the screen. "Only ten klicks
out. They knew we were coming."
"But how?" asked Masel.
"They're not pirates."
"Kay'ineen has a
leak of his own. But whoever sent these expected an unarmed shuttle."
"What do you mean? We are unarmed,
right?" Seeming to realize this for the first time, Masel
looked wide-eyed at the screen. "Seven klicks,
and closing!"
"Calm down, Masel.
This shuttle just looks old on the outside, remember? Our friend Thad Balfin outdid himself. Watch this." Xar reached under
the console and brought out an auxiliary control pad. "We have a surprise
for our ill-equipped and ill-informed friends."
Responding to Xar’s commands, a small
hatch opened on the underside of the shuttle's belly. What had seemed like a
cheap patch job was, in fact, a small concussion missile launcher. In addition,
round ports opened to the sides of cockpit, and hidden lasers extended from
their hiding places.
"Four clicks," Masel
announced.
"Weapons armed. They will probably not
even notice until it is too late."
"We're about to see. Three clicks. Coming
into missile range. What if they have missiles?"
"This ship has better shields than you
might think."
A tone indicated that they were in missile
range of the Headhunters, and that they were in the hunters' range as well! Xar
targeted one of the Z-95s and waited until yellow pulsing box painted around it
on the HUD turned red. At the same time a warning tone sounded.
"Missile lock," said Masel. "Them and us. What're you waiting for? Bantha
fodder! Missile incoming!"
Xar held the shuttle on course. "Hang
on." The readout on the display read them the missile's distance. Only one
klick away. Just as they could see the missile coming
at them at incredible speed, Xar fired the shuttle's own concussion missile and
pulled the ship hard down and to starboard. Masel
gasped as the missile flashed past, barely missing the port fin. Just then the
shuttle's missile sped out towards the Headhunters, now less than a kilometer
away, and rammed into the front of the left Z-95. The fighter exploded in a
spectacular fireball, flaming gases spreading out like the fingers of a hand.
The other Headhunter let loose with its laser cannons as it passed. The first
shots overshot them, but then several blasts impacted against the forward
shield, causing a brief, blinding flash as the shield absorbed the energy. Then
the Headhunter was past, and Xar was turning back to port to get on the
fighter's tail.
"No way we can get
behind him."
"One way." Xar turned the shuttle around, but the Z-95 had
already completed its turn and was heading back toward them face-to-face again.
Without warning Xar fired another missile straight at the fighter. The pilot,
perhaps thinking his targeting computer had malfunctioned, swerved to the side
to avoid the missile. The warhead, without solid lock, sped past into empty
space, while the Headhunter fell right into Xar’s crosshairs.
"Got you," Xar said, and fired. Green
lasers shot out, playing over the top of the fighter. The fighter pilot tried
to pull away, but he was heading toward and to port of the shuttle, allowing no
way to get out of the line of fire until the ships passed. The pilot tried to
bring his fighter around in one last futile maneuver, then
Xar fired again. The shots blew out the Z-95's tiny shield and cut through the
fuselage. The Z-95's power plant went, blowing the fighter into thousands of
pieces.
Masel gave a relieved sigh. "Sith bones, you're
better than I thought. I didn't think... Oh no!"
The missile that had previously missed them had
circled and reacquired its lock. It sped in and hit the underside of the
shuttle and exploded. The shuttle lurched, then shook violently as if an
invisible hand were shaking it. Electricity ran across the console in front of
Xar, then the shields blew out. Masel
yelled as a screen behind him, the shields terminal, exploded, sending a shower
of sparks and shards on his back and into the controls in front of him. Then
the ship leveled out, and the shuddering stopped as abruptly as it had begun.
Masel sighed with relief. "Whew, that was
close."
"Run a systems check," replied Xar.
"This ship can take some punishment. Those Z-95s though... Pieces of junk.
I would rather fly a TIE Fighter, any day. The Headhunter's lack of speed and
wide-spaced lasers cannot be made up for by those paper-thin shields."
"Yeah, well, we’ve lost our shields now. Other than that, we're
nominal. I hope they don't decide to send more after us, though."
Xar snorted. "I doubt it. With the credits
they just lost, they would probably rather cut their losses. They want to make
something off this deal." He grinned. "All right, now to find that
cargo transport."
"That shouldn't be too hard, considering
its size," said Masel.
"Correct." Xar looked out at the
yellow planet ahead. "Tiberan and his friends planetside are about to have company."
Tiberan stood outside the boarding ramp, watching the worker
droids unload the crates from the transport into the house. He looked again up
at the white sandstone house, which was more like a mansion, sitting in the
middle of the desert. He had to assume this was some sort of transfer point, as
this location was certainly too conspicuous to house a base. The mansion had a
red tiled roof, numerous windows, and a large storeroom in the back, which was
where the cargo was going. Tiberan had been surprised
that there were only two other guards who had come with him. With droids
present to do all the loading, they would have to face their partners at a
disadvantage. Probably why Janus had sent him, as a Jedi Knight, and with the
lightsaber.
He turned back from watching the droids, and
saw Kruaan's henchman, Captain Je'gem
Shaara, standing on the steps leading into the house
in front of him. Another guard stood beside him. Tiberan
had never seen such a Bothan as Shaara.
Not only was he much taller and naturally bigger than most of his race, but was
heavyset with muscles underneath that Bothan fur. All
around he made an imposing figure. Tiberan let his
hand touch the lightsaber clipped to his belt, both to remind Shaara of Tiberan's position and
to remind himself that the saber was there. As representatives of their bosses,
they both had technically the same authority. However, there was, as always, an
natural desire to assert their domination, one over the other.
Shaara's gaze fell on Tiberan, a
cold stare that sent a chill through him. Tiberan
could sense the Bothan's hostility towards him. A
brief thought occurred to Tiberan. He knew Shaara wasn't going to back off over anything. He tried to
ease the tension. "The loading is going good," he said. "Pretty
soon we can pull out and leave this to you guys."
Shaara did not respond. Instead he looked at the loading
droids heading back into the transport for another load. Then he turned his
head slightly to the side, as if listening to something. He looked towards the
sky. Tiberan followed his gaze, and saw a metallic
speck glinting the sunlight against the blue sky. "Something's coming
in," he said.
Shaara looked at Tiberan
skeptically. "You'd better get to cover," he said in a rough voice.
"I'll take care of them."
Tiberan looked defiantly at the Bothan.
"Your boss's trap failed. How do I know you can take them out? You'll need
my help. They're Jedi."
Shaara took several steps down the stairs toward Tiberan. "You insult me!" he roared. "Any
other day I would rip your heart out with my bare hands. I will destroy these
intruders, and you better be gone when I'm done!"
Tiberan unclipped his lightsaber, his heart racing. He
didn't want to kill the Bothan. But he had to resolve
this so they could concentrate on the task at hand. He reached out to the Bothan's mind with the Force. If he was, as Tiberan suspected, mostly muscle and little brain, he might
be able to divert his attention. "Shaara, we
need to concentrate on these intruders. I'll go in the transport and wait for
them. It's me they're after anyway. You go back in the house in case they go
that way. Good enough?"
Shaara paused, then shook his head slightly. "Well,
human," he said. "You better get to that transport in case they try
to take the cargo. I'll go inside and wait for them."
"That's right," Tiberan
said. Looking back up, he saw the shuttle coming straight for them at a steep
angle. "That pilot's crazy!" he yelled. "Go! Go!"
Forgetting the Bothan, he started running as fast as
he could for the rear of the transport, where the droids were just bringing out
another load of cargo.
The ground was looming closer and closer in
the viewport. Masel swallowed hard and looked at Xar.
"Hey Sauron, shouldn't we slow down a
little?" He could see a large building below, next to the transport that
the computer painted a targeting image around.
"We have the element of surprise.”
Reaching underneath the console he brought out the weapons controls. Then he
waited, his hands resting on the throttle controls. He began edging back on the
speed, and pulled out of their steep descent. Then they were flying only a few
hundred meters above the surface, yellow sand dunes passing below in a blur.
"Handle the controls for a minute," he told Masel.
As Masel brought them in closer to the complex,
bleeding off speed as he did so, Xar used the weapons board to paint several
targets on the HUD. "Lock on," he said. The complex was clearly seen
in front of them. There was a huge, contemporary looking house, a warehouse
beside it, and the large Container Transport lying in front of both in the
sand. "After I fire, bring us in fast and hot. We will have them surprised
for a few minutes." Then he hit the fire button.
Two missiles fired from the launcher in rapid
succession, streaking out towards the facility almost too fast for the eye to
follow. One hit the top of the transport and exploded, sending flaming shards
of metal into the air and setting the top of the ship ablaze. The second
missile shot past and flew into the warehouse through large open doors opening
the droids were just taking the cargo into. Huge flames came back out the
entrance, and the roof of the warehouse collapsed, and more flames came out,
reaching skyward. Burning pieces of metal from the transport fell down from the
air, landing around the ship. Several pieces landed on the mansion and went
through the windows, causing more fires.
Then the shuttle made its landing. The repulsorlifts caused a veritable sandstorm as the shuttle
hovered over the ground. As Xar left the cockpit, Masel
sat the shuttle down fairly hard, the impact lessened by the soft sand below
them. He immediately descended the boarding ramp. Xar, who had been waiting at
the entrance, rolled out when there was barely enough space and dropped to the
ground. Leaving Masel to hurriedly put the shuttle
through shutdown procedures, Xar went right for the side of the house and
cover, then drew his hand-held mass gun. As the
shuttle's whine became a soft hum, he looked around the house for some sign of
activity. Once the shuttle's systems died down, Masel
came out at a run, his blaster out. Xar’s job was to cover him as he made
his way to Xar’s position, hoping that no one saw Xar when he rolled out
under cover of the sandstorm. Their plan paid off. Xar saw a white painted door
along the side of the house open slowly, and a bearded face and a blaster came
out from around the side. Xar took aim and fired in one smooth motion. Only one
shot was necessary; the projectile went through the door and the man instantly,
dropping the latter onto the steps leading to the door.
Suddenly there was a crash of breaking glass to
Xar’s left. Masel dived behind the sandstone
wall circling the front of the house as blaster bolts spat out toward him. Xar
aimed in the direction of the shots and fired twice, attempting to at least
draw of the attacker's fire. Masel straightened and
fired several shots through the window, then looked at Xar and nodded. Then the
two men sprinted to the main door and burst inside.
The main room was
empty. They were in what seemed to be a living room with a contemporary décor.
Lamps on oddly shaped stands occupied the corners, and similarly shaped couches
surrounded a small table. They could see into the kitchen through an opening in
the wall, and at the far corner another entrance broke into a hallway on the
left and another room to the right, obscured from vision by the side wall. Various
paintings and a small desk completed the furnishings. Suddenly a man stepped
into the entrance and fired a snapshot at them. The shot passed wide and both Masel and Xar returned fire. The blaster shot hit the man
in the chest, and the mass bullet followed through, doing far more damage. The
man was knocked back into the far wall without firing a second shot.
Their unity proved to be a mistake, however.
They heard a noise and turned to see a huge Bothan
appear from the kitchen entrance, somehow hiding from view before. With a yell
he threw a vase at Masel, who was standing in front
of Xar from that viewpoint. Masel instinctively
raised a hand to block the object, and Shaara dived
right behind it. Masel knocked the vase downward and
raised his blaster, but was too late. The Bothan
knocked the gun to the side with a swipe of his hand, then threw a hard left
into Masel's face. The man fell to his back, and Shaara shifted his momentum to dive straight at Xar, who
had tried to get around Masel to get a clear shot.
The two struggled for a second, Shaara's hand holding
Xar’s gun arm up, and Xar trying to hold off the Bothan's
other hand. Raw strength proved to be the winning factor, and Shaara pushed Xar off and knocked his gun away. The weapon
clattered to the floor behind the couch, and Xar made a move toward it, but Shaara tackled him again and both men fell against the
couch, knocking it over. Xar made it up first, and hit the Bothan
in the face twice as hard as he could. Shaara hardly
seemed fazed, and hit Xar back hard enough that he fell to his back and slid
across the floor. Then suddenly Xar felt the gun under his back, and quickly
turned over to grab it. The Bothan yelled a war cry
and leaped for Xar, but the man had already flipped back onto his back, firing
twice. Shaara's advance was halted, causing him to
stagger back. Then the Bothan's eyes became flames,
and he roared as he started to advance again. Xar was shocked at the shear
ferocity of such a creature. Coming up on one knee, he fired again and again,
until he had totally unloaded on the Bothan. The
shots blew through him with lightning speed, with enough force to propel him
into the air, over the overturned couch, to come down on the glass tea table
with a crash. He was dead before he landed. Xar let out a long-held breath,
then holstered his gun and made his way over to Masel.
Masel came to and shook his head, and immediately
regretted it. "I've got a terrible headache."
"Yeah, I know. The hairball is history,
though."
"Is Tiberan
anywhere?" asked Masel as he came to his feet.
"No, and I do not sense anyone else
around... wait a second. Someone is in the other room." He pointed to the
far wall, beside the entrance that the other gunman had come through.
"I'll get him," Masel
said, moving toward his blaster.
"No, hold on. The gun is in his line of
sight."
"How do you know that?"
"Experience. Quiet." Xar moved along
towards the middle of the room, as quietly as possible. Masel
tried to listen, but could not hear anything. Xar seemed to be listening with
the Force. He stared at one spot along the wall, then unclipped his lightsaber.
Then he raised the handle, ignited the saber, and threw it at the wall before
it was fully extended. The blade did not cut off in midair, but quickly spun
over and over towards the wall. To throw a lightsaber, it had to be balanced
specifically and made without the pressure plate that many had, which was
sensitive to the holder's touch and would de-ignite once it left the hand. It
also took a lot of training on the owner's part.
Xar’s lightsaber flew true to its target,
the blade cutting through the wall instead of coming up handle-first. The man
sliding along the other side of the wall never had a warning other than the
sound of the saber ignition. The yellow-orange blade, over a meter long, easily
cut through the prefab wall. There was nothing to stop the saber, its simple
momentum was enough to make it go through anything in its way.
As Xar went to retrieve his saber, Masel picked up his blaster and followed. He tried not to
look at the body on the floor. To him, Xar seemed cold, indifferent to the life
he had extinguished. He had to do it, but the man could show at least show
some regret over it. He looked at the room around them. It looked like
another sitting room, with a lot of windows to the outside. Some of the glass
had been broken by pieces of metal from the transport, and the carpet and a
chair on this side had started burning. He could see the transport outside,
still motionless. "I think Tiberan's in there,"
he said.
"Probably."
"Let me go first. Maybe I could talk some
sense into him." He definitely did not want Xar to go ballistic and kill
the man. The last two people he had killed, the Bothan
and this one, were enough to make him want to throw up.
Xar seemed to consider it. "Perhaps you
can. Very well, go on ahead. I will check the premises. If there is anyone else
I will take care of them. I want to see what kind of cargo they are carrying,
too."
"Well you blew up the warehouse, so you'll
have to do that from inside the cargo hatch of the transport." Masel looked down at his chronometer. "Wait five
minutes for
"In five minutes you could be long dead.
But I will wait." Xar had a thoughtful expression on his face. "I
want to find out what is going on here. I think Tiberan
was used as a pawn."
"Maybe he was, but I'm going to try to
bring him around. See you, Sauron."
"In five minutes." Xar turned and
headed down the hallway. Masel, blaster in hand, made
his way out the front door.
Tiberan sat on a crate in the cargo hold and held a rag
against his head. Not long after he had entered the hold the whole ship had
lurched, throwing him against the bulkhead. He took the rag away and saw blood
on it, from where his head had impacted against the unrelenting metal. The
loading droids had all been blown away when the missile hit the storehouse. What
a botched job, he thought. He still couldn't figure out why his pursuers
were so relentless. It was like he was a threat to the entire galaxy. Or maybe just the ego of the Brotherhood's leaders who couldn't
stand having anyone who tried to go off on his own. Of course, there was
that incident with Master Caemas. Those Jedi probably
thought he had killed him on purpose. He considered trying to fly the transport
out of this place. He could probably sell it at some port, make some credits,
and disappear for a long time. It was clear Janus had used him, did not care
about him at all. Janus had his own agenda and Tiberan
was not a part of it.
Tiberan was just about to go to the bridge to see about
implementing his plan, when he heard footsteps at the entrance. Dropping the
rag, he unclipped his lightsaber and stood up. He saw a figure standing at the
entrance, silhouetted by the bright sand outside. Taking a few steps forward,
he asked "Hello?"
"Hello, Tiberan."
Tiberan instantly recognized that voice, the voice of the
only friend he had made while in the Brotherhood. "Masel?! What are you doing here? They sent you
after me?"
Tiberan heard the other man sigh. "Yeah.
Because I know you. Because you
might let down your guard around me."
Tiberan snorted. "Dark Jedi trash.
Willing to sacrifice anyone. I'm glad I left."
Masel walked closer, coming up to stand a few meters away
from Tiberan.
"Are they the only ones who sacrifice
their own? Listen to me, Tiberan. There's no point in
running. The Brotherhood will follow you as long as they know you're alive.
Janus can't protect you. Looks like he doesn't even care
about you, sending you out here."
Tiberan shook his head sadly. "I... I know that, Masel. I finally figured that out. But I'm not going back
Brotherhood, ever. And you can't make
"Come on, Tiberan.
They'll probably just banish you anyway. You can start a new life. But you
can't run forever."
"Never. They won't show me any mercy. You
know that, Masel, you're just avoiding it. I can see
it in your eyes. Why not come with me? We can leave all this behind."
Masel shook his head. “I've found a home with House
Ar'Kell. You know, the one we were going to join? It's
really nice."
"Yeah, I know. Well then, I hope you have
a nice life with them."
Masel’s voice took on a sense of urgency. “Tiberan, I can't let you go. We've got to work this out. I
have to bring you back, one way or another."
"I'm never going back, Masel.
I swear it."
"Tiberan, please
don't make me do this." Masel brought his
lightsaber handle in front of him.
Tiberan looked his friend in the eyes. "Is this what it
comes to? You're willing to kill your friend, just to follow orders?"
"No, Tiberan, I
don't want to fight you."
"Then leave me alone."
"I can't. I'm sorry." Masel ignited his lightsaber. Green light painted his face.
"Don't think you'll win easily. I've been
training." Tiberan hit the ignition switch. A
brilliant blue blade of energy extended from the focusing lens. "Never thought it would come to this. I'm sorry, Masel." Then he ran forward, striking overhead. Masel raised his blade to block the blow. The two blades
crashed together. For a moment the blades touched each other, each man looking
into the other's eyes. Then Tiberan brought his blade
around in a strike to the midsection. Masel blocked
and struck back. The men maneuvered as best they could in the cramped space,
for a moment each man holding his own. Their blades crashed together again and
again. Then Tiberan, filled with a sense of
desperation over losing his friend, and his struggle for freedom, began a
fierce attack, sending hard but unfocused strikes at Masel,
who backed off under the onslaught.
Tiberan struck at his opponent's left side, then the right,
then overhead. Each time Masel blocked and shuffled
back a bit, not making his own attack. Tiberan could
see the perspiration on his face, and when he struck again, felt the other
man's blade give way slightly under the pressure. He knew Masel
was weakening. Tiberan attacked again and again,
striking Masel's saber, then pushed forward and
locked their blades together. Both men pressed against each other for a moment,
then Tiberan, through advantage of training, pushed Masel's saber over to the right, and holding the blade down
with his saber, threw a left hook into Masel's face.
The man's head jerked back, and he staggered, holding his saber in front of and
away from him. Then Tiberan sidestepped to Masel's right and swung his saber hard down on the other
man's blade. The saber fell from his hands and clattered to the floor, the
blade de-igniting once it left the man's hand. Tiberan
held his saber away from him and threw his hand toward Masel,
Force-pushing him back against the wall.
Masel staggered back, holding his hands against his head.
"Ooh... My head. Why did you have to do
that?"
Tiberan stood back, glad the fight
was over, but incredulous towards his friend. "Are you crazy? You tried to
kill me! I'm your friend, Masel. Why?"
"No, Tiberan,"
Masel said, wincing with pain. "I didn't intend
to kill you. I just wanted to knock some sense into you. Get you to see the
light."
"Masel! These
are lightsabers, not training sticks! You don't use sabers unless you mean
it!"
"That is correct," said a new voice.
"Never draw your blade unless you intend to shed blood."
Tiberan spun towards the voice. Standing inside the cargo
hold, toward the entrance, was a dark haired man, looking him right in the
eyes. Tiberan had never heard him approach. The man
was holding his lightsaber handle in his hand.
"Who are you?" asked Tiberan.
The man looked around the hold, then at Masel. "Are you all right?" he asked.
"Yeah, except for a splitting headache. Tiberan won't come."
"I know." The dark-haired man looked
back at Tiberan.
"Who are you?" Tiberan
asked again.
"I am Sauron.
That is all you need to know."
Masel stood up and started walking towards Xar.
"Sauron please, don't kill him. He can't cause any harm. We both know
that."
"Like you said, Masel,
he needs to be taught a lesson." Then Xar leaned close to Masel and whispered something. Tiberan,
even using Force-enhanced hearing, still couldn't hear a word the man said.
Then Masel began
making his way out, and Tiberan was alone with the
newcomer.
"Okay, tough guy," Tiberan began. "I don't know who you are or who you
think you are, but get out of my way. I'm not going back to the Brotherhood,
and you can't make
"I know."
"What?"
"I know. You are not going back to the
Dark Brotherhood." The man ignited his lightsaber. An orange-yellow blade
extended downward at the angle which he was holding it.
Fear jolted through Tiberan,
but he fought it down. He wouldn't let this man get a psychological advantage
over him. This ‘Sauron’ definitely had an ego problem. Tiberan determined he was going to remedy that. He raised
his bluish blade in front on him, and shifted into a fighting stance.
"You're going to regret you met me, especially when I send you back to
your masters in pieces." With that, he ran forward to attack, determined
to strike first and end the fight quickly. Xar stepped back and raised his
saber over his head, blade pointing down diagonally. Seeing Xar’s
backside open, Tiberan moved in and struck that side
first. But suddenly Xar’s blade was there, parrying the movement before
it made it halfway. Tiberan stepped back, then went in again, striking hard and fast, with all the
techniques he had learned. But somehow Xar’s blade was there to block
every attack, every thrust and swing. Tiberan swung
low, then came up and struck straight down, but Xar’s blocked the attacks
with casual ease. So far the other man hadn't attacked yet. Tiberan
knew he was testing him out. He attacked even more fiercely, throwing all his
might behind his attacks to try and move Xar’s blade to the side, but he
couldn't match the other man's strength or get enough leverage. Tiberan stepped back, and for a moment the two men stood
there facing each other, each man watching the other's movements to detect any
attack before it came. Tiberan figured that somehow
the man must be sensing his attacks before they came, with the Force. For a
moment he wished he had stayed just a little longer, so that he might have been
able to learn how, too. But he saw the difference in this man and Masel, whom Tiberan had defeated
rather easily. This was no beginner, nor was he new to the art of lightsaber
combat. Every movement, everything about the man before him spoke of skill and
professionalism. Tiberan kept watching the man's eyes, a piercing gray that
made him uneasy, but he knew that the key to fighting was not to watch the
enemy's blade, but the eyes. So he did so, however uncomfortable it made him.
It was because of his watching those eyes that saved him, had he not been watching
he never would have seen an attack coming. Tiberan
could see the change, the switch from defensive mode to offensive. He knew it
was going to be bad...
As if saying that playtime was over, Xar
attacked. He advanced upon Tiberan with lightning
speed and terrifying ferocity, though he never betrayed any emotion. Tiberan's thoughts of attack vanished, and it took all his
concentration just to block the attacks coming at him from the side, overhead,
low, and thrusts in one continuous flow The man moved as if in a dance, as
thought the sabers the men held were just beams of light. Tiberan
moved back with each new attack, bringing his saber to block each at the last
instant, just before the blade cut through his flesh. Sweat began pouring out
all over him, as he tried to parry each strike. For a moment he blocked an
attack and the two men locked blades, then Xar pushed Tiberan's
saber down onto one of the crates. The blade cut into the crate and blue sparks
began shooting out of the gash, Glitterstim being exposed
to the intense light from the blade. The sparks blasted between them, and Tiberan tried to move backwards while blocking, then ducked
under a swing to his head. Xar’s blade hit the wall and cut threw a
circuit pipe, sending more sparks out and a blast of steam from the opening. Tiberan ran back deeper into the hold, then
turned just in time to block Xar’s next strike. The attacks came in again
and again. Tiberan knew he couldn't hold out much
longer. His strength was ebbing, his arms weren't responding fast enough. His
blocks were coming slower and slower. Shouldn't he be dead by now? Surely the
man couldn't have slowed so much. Tiberan stumbled
back, exhausted, holding his saber in front of him to guard any further attack.
Breathing heavily, he looked at the man in front of him, awaiting the final
strike that would end the brief but momentous existence of Tiberan
Samnov. Seeing the man in front of him, playing as a
cat with its prey, so far ahead of himself, rage filled him. Bringing up all
his remaining energy, he brought his saber up in a feint to the man's right,
then switched and struck downward on Xar’s left with all his might. With
a crash Tiberan's blade connected with his
opponent’s. A sizzling sound came from the touching blades. Then Xar spun
his blade around Tiberan's, the two blades touching,
bringing Tiberan's blade around counterclockwise
once, twice, then Xar pulled his blade up and Tiberan
lost his grip on the handle. His saber spun upwards and off into the distance,
de-igniting as it went. Disarmed. It's all over. Despair filled Tiberan. Xar brought his saber straight out towards Tiberan, who began backing away.
"Please, don't kill me. I'll..." Tiberan's foot hit something behind him and he fell over
backwards, landing on the hold's metal floor. Looking down he saw the pipe he
had tripped over, and then looking back up at Xar, he began sliding back until
his back hit another crate behind him. Nowhere else to go. Tiberan slid
all the way up against the crate, bringing his hands in front of him in a
gesture of surrender.
"Why? Why all this?" he asked Xar.
In reply Xar twisted something on his handle,
and the yellow-orange blade became thinner and longer, extending straight for Tiberan's heart. Tiberan gasped
as the blade came within centimeters of his chest. "Don't kill me, please!
I'll do anything! I'll do whatever you want!" Seeing the cold eyes of the
man in front of him, Tiberan nearly abandoned all
hope.
Then Xar replied. "I am not going to kill
you, Tiberan. That was not my intention from the
beginning. Do you really mean you will do anything I want?"
"Yes, yes, I'm sorry. I was a fool."
Xar hit a switch and the blade retracted back
into the handle with a hiss. Then he stood upright.
"Listen carefully to me, Tiberan. This life is not for you. I am going to let you
go, but I am going to give you some good advice. You would do well to follow
it. Leave Minos Cluster. Never return. Go off
somewhere, on the other side of the galaxy maybe, and start a new life. I do
not care what you do, you can live like a hermit if you want, or not. But
forget about becoming a great Jedi, changing the galaxy, or whatever. Forget
about the Empire and the Rebellion, the Dark Brotherhood, and most of all, what
has happened the past weeks. Just live a normal life, and be happy. In that, I
would envy you. That is my advice. Now, get out of here. Forget about taking
the transport, you would never get into a port with a stolen ship. You can book
passage on a liner from here on Lantare. I do not
want to see you again. Is that clear?"
Tiberan got to his feet. "Yeah, it's clear. And, for
what it's worth, thanks."
Xar shook his head once. “Believe me, I am glad we could end it this way. Better than the
alternative. Now, go. Wait a couple of minutes after I leave, no more."
With that he turned and headed back towards the entrance. He paused at one
point, and Tiberan saw the lightsaber he had dropped
fly over to Xar’s hand, then the man walked out.
Masel closed the shuttle's ramp once Xar was onboard. He
began powering up the systems as Xar came into the bridge. He saw that Xar had
two lightsabers clipped to his belt.
"Is it over?" Masel
asked.
Xar sat down in the pilot's seat. "Yes.
Our mission is complete. Tiberan will not be any more
trouble." Glancing over at Masel, he gave a
slight half-smile. Masel sighed with relief.
As the shuttle began lifting off the sand, Masel looked out the viewport at the base, for one last
time. "Goodbye, my friend."
As the shuttle rose, Xar brought out the
weapons console. Then he looked at his chronometer. After a moment, he nodded,
and began typing commands. The remaining missiles in the shuttle's
mini-launcher shot out, one by one. One hit the mansion and exploded, bursting
the place into flames. The rest hit the transport in the cockpit and down the
ship's spine. Then the lasers began firing, to finish the job.
Once the shuttle turned and blasted off toward
space, the base below was a conflagration of fire and destruction.
Lyccos II
2100 hours
Masel and Xar disembarked their shuttle with their gear.
Leaving the ship over to the repair facilities to patch up the minor damage
they had incurred on their trip, they caught a ride on the transit shuttle back
to Sector 519 and the Digger's Dream.
While in transit, Masel
took an obviously false, savory breath. "Ah, good to be back, is it
not?"
Xar grinned slightly. "Just remember to
use our aliases, now that we are back."
"Oh, sure thing, Kiruun
Magnus." Masel smiled.
Entering the Digger's Dream, the two
men made their way to the receptionist desk. "Any
messages for me?" Xar asked.
"Yes, sir," the lady said. You have
two. Would you like me to relay them to your room?"
"Yes, please. Thanks. Oh, is Kay'ineen around?"
"No sir, I haven't seen him around this
evening."
"That's odd," Masel
noted.
As the men turned to leave, the receptionist
called out, "Oh, wait!" Xar looked back. "One thing I forgot.
There was a man here looking for you this morning. I told him you weren't here,
and he left. Said he'd be back."
Xar paused for a moment, then
nodded. "Thank you." Then he turned back to Masel.
"Come on. We need to get to the room now."
As the two men hurried down the hall, Masel spoke up. "Hey, what's the hurry?"
"I just sensed danger... death."
Xar stopped in front of the door and entered
the card into the slot. The door slid open sideways, and he stepped in. Masel followed, then stopped as
Xar turned back in front of him. "What?" He leaned around to see past
the man. "Oh no..."
There was a puddle of blood on the floor at the
foot of the far bed. Lying in it was the body of Retired Chief Engineer Kay'ineen, his face a bloody mess, more caked blood filling
other wounds in his chest. On the mirror on the wall a message was half-written
in blood. It read: "IT--WAS--JA."
Masel turned around and dove into the bathroom. Loud
gagging sounds came out from inside. Xar shook his head slowly. "He was
not supposed to die... Why would someone want to kill him?"
Suddenly he felt another presence behind him.
He turned towards the door, just as a familiar figure moved to fill the
doorframe.
"Hi," said Quaestor
Mathis Organa, smiling.
"Intendant!" Janus snarled into the comm screen. "Is
the shipment ready to be loaded?"
"Yes sir," the man replied, "All
one hundred packets ready for placement."
"Good. See to it. We're going to send a
message to the galaxy."
"On it, sir."
"Oh, and once you're done and have been
paid, I expect you to disappear."
"Sir, with the reward I'm getting, I'll
never have to work again."
Janus shut off the comm
screen. Good. Everything was coming together. Soon he'd be able to get off this
Force-forsaken rock.
The comm light
started blinking again. Janus hit the button activating the connection. A man
in a construction uniform and hardhat filled the screen. In the background
Janus could see lights and hear the sound of machinery. "Yes, chief?"
The man gave an awkward salute. "Sir,
great news! We've been digging overtime like you said, and we’ve got an
item matching your description."
Exhilaration filled Janus, but his expression
didn't show it. "Good work, chief! What sector are you in now?"
"Sector 235, sir. Will you be coming now
sir?"
"As soon as I assemble my guard. Prepare
for my arrival."
"Yes sir! We'll have the item waiting for
you!"
"No!" Janus fought back the urge to
yell. "Leave it wherever you found it. I want to see it undisturbed. It's
very sensitive. I'll need to retrieve it myself."
"Um, very well sir. We'll mark the way to
it, though."
"Janus out." He shut off the link,
then dialed another number into the keypad. The screen flashed to a view of an
empty console. "Ralea! Ralea,
where are you?"
There was a scuffle of footsteps, then Ralea's image came into view. She sat down at the console.
"What is it? I had to clean up after taking care of the Twi’lek."
"He’s unimportant,” Janus shot
back. “Get the team ready and bring my transport! They've found the
Shard!"
Ralea's eyes lit up. "Yes, sir, at once!"
"Our mission is almost complete, Sela. This is it!" He shut off the link, then jumped up out of this seat to get ready.
"And,"
Xar finished, "That is basically it." He laid Tiberan's
lightsaber on the table in their new room.
Mathis sat back in thought. "I see no
reason no one outside this room needs to know that Tiberan's
still alive. Do you?"
"No, sir." Both of the other men
said.
"Good. Then your mission is complete. I'm
afraid we have another one, though, before this thing's over."
"Janus." Xar said the name as though
savoring it. "I am looking forward to it."
Mathis’ ever-present smile grew wider.
"You'll get the chance. That's why I'm here. He’s a threat we
can’t leave hanging around to cause trouble."
"Sounds good," Xar replied.
"Where is the team?" Seeing Mathis’ expression, he looked at
the man incredulously. "No, seriously?"
"That's right. Here I am. Sorry, no one
else could make it. Not after that business with the food shortages and
all."
"The what?"
"Never mind, I'll fill you in later. Right
now we have to plan our strategy."
"Hold on, let me check my messages... I
almost forgot in all the bustle." He picked up the controller and hit a
few buttons.
"Displaying message one of two," the
computer said.
Mathis’ face appeared on the screen. Xar
looked over at the man, now only across the table from him. Mathis smiled
wryly. "Heh. Sent it before I left. Just forget
it."
Just as Mathis’ face started talking, Xar
spoke up. "Delete message. Next message."
"Confirmed. Displaying message two of two.
Message is audio only."
A woman's voice came over the speakers. In the
background someone was groaning, as if in pain.
"I'm not sure if you'll be back to hear
this. You're probably dead right now, with all the others. Your friend here put
up quite a fight, but in the end he told me everything. If you come back, well,
we'll deal with you. When we find you, you're going to wish you had never been
born." The voice sounded self-assured. "I'll see to that
personally." The speakers clicked.
"Message over," the computer said.
Xar lowered his head. "Delete message." Then he threw
his cup at the holovid. Drink spilled down the
screen.
Mathis looked at Xar and Masel.
"All right, here's the plan. I have several contacts here that'll let us
know where Janus is..."
Lyccos II
Sector 235
0700 Hours
The black
stretch-hovercar came to a rest beside a strikingly
contrasting bulk hovertruck. The doors opened, and
Janus, Ralea, and four guards stepped out. Janus wore
clothing of the finest quality, a dark suit with a black cape around his
shoulders that offset his white hair. Sela Ralea wore a black jumpsuit with her weapons and utility
belt and boots. Her red hair was pulled back and tied. The guards surrounded
Janus and led him toward the entrance of the excavation site, a huge hole in
the rocky wall. Ralea led, with two guards in front
of Janus and two guards behind him to cover the rear.
They made their way through the massive
entrance and into a side cavern. The cavern was a dozen meters wide and about
seventy meters long, where at the end two more caverns broke in opposite
directions. Glowlamps provided illumination from
above, and a latticework of metal walkways and beams crisscrossed above their
heads. The whole cavern was artificially made during the expedition, and the
walkways above led to more entrances/exits below the twenty-meter ceiling. In
the cavern and on the walkways workers were busy about their business, going on
various errands or making their way to or from the excavation site. Waiting for
them in the center of the cavern was the Chief Engineer of the Tri-Systems
Archaeologist Fund's Excavation Department on Lyccos
II. Flanking him were several other workers in dusted-off uniforms, forming a
makeshift honor guard.
Once inside the cavern the guards spread out,
and Janus and Ralea approached the Chief Engineer,
who snapped to attention.
"Sir! We're honored by your presence here.
We've done a lot of work here, I think you'll be proud of us."
"I will be, if you've found my artifact.
Give me an update."
"Like I told you, we found the artifact.
It was actually buried in the ground not far from the ruins. My guess is the
aliens didn't want anyone to find it before they left."
"Yes, yes, go on." Janus said
impatiently.
"Well sir, like you told us, we didn't bring
it. The man who found placed it in a special spot, on a type of pedestal there
at the edge of the ruins, right near the ravine. You can't miss it. We've set
up red flag markers to show you the safest way down. Just take the right tunnel
there and you'll be on your way. Sir, if I may ask, why did you want to wait to
retrieve it yourself?"
"Because, none of you are Force-sensitive,
and the ones who left it here might have set some trap. For instance, in could
have been rendered useless if you'd taken it out of the ruins."
"Ah, I understand now, sir." The
chief nodded purposefully.
Janus smiled to himself. The man didn't
understand at all. He just followed orders. "All right," he said.
"Good work. Now I want everybody cleared from this area. You can all go
back now. Your job's finished.” He put in a dose
of Force Persuasion into his voice, to make extra sure.
"Yes sir." As Janus and the others
waited, the Chief spoke into his commlink. "All right, everyone. We're
pulling out! The job's over. Drop what you're doing and move!"
With that the Engineer started off to see that
his orders were followed. Janus ordered two of his guards to make their way to
the walkways above and guard the entrance. He didn't expect attack; after all,
he'd made a deal with the Silent Ones, who claimed this sector, but he wasn't
taking any chances either.
Janus could hardly bear waiting until everyone
left. After they were all gone, he sighed. "And now, my greatest moment
has come. At long last I shall receive that for which I have searched so
long." He smiled at Ralea, who smiled back
knowingly. "Two guards will remain at the entrance. Sela
will accompany me down. Let's go." The remaining four started walking
towards the entrance. Then, just as they were making their way down the cavern,
two men slowly stepped out from around the left side tunnel and turned to face them.
Both wore dark cloaks, with their heads uncovered. They strode purposefully
toward the group. Things seemed to happen in slow motion. The guards halted and
brought their blasters up to bear, yelling, "Halt!"
Janus could sense that both of the men were Force-sensitive, one of them powerfully
so. How he hadn't noticed them before was a mystery. They must have been able
to mask their presence from him somehow. Staying behind his guards, he
addressed the men.
"Who on this miserable planet are
you?" He could guess the answer though. They were, undoubtedly, the two
Jedi who had broken into TSAF and caused Janus so much trouble. But he'd been
told that they had gone to Lantare after Tiberan. Surely they couldn't have gotten back so quickly?
That also meant Kruaan's forces hadn't stopped them.
Ah well, it didn't really matter where the men died.
The two men stopped, unperturbed by the
blasters pointed at them.
One man raised himself up importantly. "I
am Billbob," he said.
The two guards in front of Janus snickered.
Janus couldn't help but smile himself. "Billbob?
What kind of name is that?"
"A very good one. But I'm afraid you'll
never find out. This here is Masel, my associate.
We're here to arrest you."
Further amused, Janus studied the man.
"You Brotherhood lackeys have no idea who you're dealing with.
Unfortunately, you'll never find out, either. Kill them," he told the
guards.
Masel held his hands up. "Wait! I know something that
you'd really want to hear!"
"Oh?" asked Janus. "Amuse
"Okay. In about five seconds, you're going
to wish you'd never met us."
Janus laughed. "Oh? I already do." He
opened his mouth to give the order to the guards to shoot, but the man's
expression stopped him. He could see Masel visibly
counting down the seconds. "What the..."
A huge explosion sounded behind them. Janus
spun around to see the flaming remnants of the hovercar
fly into the cavern. Then chaos reigned...
Xar pulled
himself up onto the walkway and pulled out his mass gun. He had reloaded it
from the spares in his bag, but he only had ten shots. He would have to make
them count. Keeping his head low, he ran across the bridge and into the main
cavern as the explosion from his thermal detonator took out the hovercar. He grabbed a handrail to hang on, then continued
once the bridge stopped shaking. The two guards standing on the walkway ahead
were just recovering themselves. Still running, Xar held one hand under his gun
hand to brace it, aimed, and fired two shots at each man. The shots flew true,
and one man gasped and fell back onto the bridge, while only one hit the other
man. Yelling, he spun and fell over the railing to the floor below. Xar ran to
the railing's edge, where the guards had been standing, and looked down at the
scene below.
The two guards below had turned back to look up
at him, and brought their blasters up. Xar brought his gun up and fired a round.
One of the men dropped to the floor, but the other got off a shot that barely
missed Xar to hit the scaffolding behind him. Masel
ran over and tackled the man, sending both of them to the floor. Janus started
moving towards Mathis, yelling to the woman beside him. "Take him
out!" he said, pointing up. As Ralea drew her
blaster, Xar leaped over the railing. The woman took a snapshot that passed below
Xar, then he landed on her, knocking her back and sending her gun clattering to
the floor. Xar straightened and leveled his gun at Ralea,
as she stood up and froze. Xar froze, too. Suddenly his mind flashed back, to
an image of another woman, her fiery red hair framing a beautiful face. Illiana.
Ralea saw the man freeze up for some reason. Taking
advantage of the situation, she slapped the gun out of Xar’s hand, the
weapon sliding across the floor to stop near the wall. Xar seemed to come out
of his trance, but Ralea gave him no chance to act.
Yelling, she came in and struck him twice with palm-strikes, sending his head
snapping back, then as he brought his hands up to block, she sidestepped and
locked his arm out, then kneed him in the ribs. Xar grunted, hunching over
sideways, then the woman spun and threw a kick into his midsection, sending him
onto his back.
Masel saw Xar go down, vaguely,
as he tried to get behind the man he was grappling with. He succeeded, and
wrapped his arms around the man's neck. He jerked the man's head to one side
with his Force-enhanced strength, heard a sickening crack, then
let go. The man slumped to the floor.
Ralea threw another kick as Xar was rising. Xar threw his
elbow forward, knocking the blow to the side, then stood quickly, feinted with
his left hand and threw a right palm-strike under Ralea's
chin, sending the woman reeling back. Ralea turned
with her momentum and dove toward her fallen blaster. She grabbed it and spun
to her feet, the muzzle trained on Xar now. He froze, knowing she would not
show him any mercy.
As the man dropped, Masel
turned to pick up his blaster, then watched the
scuffle between Xar and the woman. Ralea grabbed the
blaster and turned to face Xar. "No!" yelled Masel.
He brought his blaster up and fired. A sizzling blaster bolt hit Ralea in the side, just above the hip, catching fire to her
clothes as well. She gasped and fell down and to her side.
Xar looked over at Masel
and nodded. That was a second time he owed the man. Then both men turned their
eyes toward the end of the cavern, where Janus and Mathis seemed to be locked
in an invisible struggle. Xar knew they were grappling with each other using
the Force. Each man stared the other in the eye, hardly moving a muscle.
Neither seemed to have an advantage.
Then rage filled Janus' face, as though enraged
at his inability to best the other man using the Force. His hand disappeared
behind his back, and Xar saw the end of a blaster slide out in slow motion.
"Mathis!" Xar screamed. He looked around,
but his gun was all the way against the wall. It may as well have been a mile
away. He turned back to Masel to warn him, but it was
too late. Janus brought the muzzle up and fired. Xar couldn't see were the shot
hit, but Mathis flew backwards, his cloak flying out in front of him. Masel brought his blaster up, firing and missing, then Janus turned toward him first and fired again. The
blast hit Masel in the throat, and his head snapped
back. Masel stumbled back, clutching his ruined
throat. A gurgling sound came out of his mouth, then he collapsed.
"JANUS! You frigging butcher!" Xar
ducked out of the way and brought the mass gun to his hand with the Force.
Janus started running toward the exit, firing as he went. Ignoring the shots
around him, Xar brought up his gun. He fired just as Janus dove through the
exit, the bullet barely missing and blowing through his cape trailing behind
him. Then he was gone.
Xar looked down at Masel.
The man's dead eyes stared upward, an expression of disbelief on his face. Then
he heard Mathis groan. Holstering his gun, he ran over to where the Quaestor lay.
"Xar, I'm hit."
"Hold still, old buddy. Xar knelt down
beside Mathis. He could see now where the shot had hit, low on the man'' right
side. The wound had cauterized, and Mathis was starting to hyperventilate. He
was probably bleeding internally. Xar knew there was only one way to save him.
"Hold on, Mathis. This is going to hurt,
but it will save your life."
Reaching down, Xar placed his hand over the
man's wound. He worked himself into a state of emptiness, pushing his emotions
aside. Then with a sickening feeling he let the Dark Side flow through his
hand.
Mathis gasped, then
cried out in pain. He tried to sit up straight, but fell back down. He groaned,
trembling all over his body. Then Xar removed his hand, breathing heavily. The
wound was gone, but he could see a white scar through the hole in his clothing.
Mathis, still fighting the pain that was ever so slowly ebbing away, looked up
at Xar curiously. "How?" he asked.
"Healing, taught by my old master. But
there is a price."
Mathis looked up at him. "Listen, Xar. We can't
let Janus get his hands on that Shard! I'm too weak to help you. Go and finish
this, for Masel and me!"
Xar nodded silently. Then, rising, he drew his
mass gun and checked the reading. Three bullets left. Janus has a blaster.
And if he gets his hands on that Shard... But what difference did it make,
he thought. There is a time for everything. If it is my time to die, then so
be it. He ran full speed towards the exit. He had to catch up to Janus. He
had to.
Xar slipped
though the entrance quickly and moved to cover. He took refuge behind a stone
wall, then jumped up on top and into some sort of square. Only then did he
notice his surroundings. The ruins of an entire city surrounded him, extending
as far as he could see into the darkness. It had to be one of the cities of the
ancient race who built these tunnels, only recently discovered. Looking around,
he noticed the more recent-looking destruction of the buildings around him.
Janus' workers had been very thorough, in their search for the Shard. Of
course, they cared nothing for the city itself, or the secrets they might tell
about the race that lived here long ago. That thought further angered Xar, but
he fought it down, as he had before. For now he had to find Janus. He could see
some sort of markers with little red flags attached. That was probably the path
down, but he knew Janus would be watching that. So he would have to sneak
around the long way. He began running through buildings, vaulting over
knocked-down walls and boulders that had fallen, keeping an eye out on the path
to his left. Then he saw a glimpse of black fabric go around the corner. Moving
around the opposite side of the building, he saw Janus for a split second as he
passed between buildings. Xar raised his gun and fired, but the bullet passed
just behind Janus and through the wall behind him. Then Janus was out of line
of sight again. Two shots left. Xar
kept moving. He came onto an older path, and followed it to the next building.
Then a blaster bolt shot out from the window, hitting the wall beside him.
Seeing the spot where Janus was peeking through, Xar fired. The shot hit a
boulder beside Janus and ricocheted off into the distance. Janus fired again,
and Xar dove to the side to avoid getting hit. He waited a couple of seconds,
then jumped up and started moving again. Janus was running wildly down the path
now, firing blindly behind his back. Blaster bolts hit ruins thousands of years
old, destroying columns and pieces of wall. Then Xar got a clear view of Janus'
destination: He was almost on the outskirts of the city, where a platform took
up several square meters of ground. Then suddenly the path ended in a huge
crack in the floor, probably ten meters wide. On the other side the city
continued on. But Janus wasn't running for the other side. On the platform was
what looked like an altar made of stone, and on it was a semi-transparent
object about a meter long, sharp on both ends.
Janus fired behind him several more times, then
carelessly threw the blaster off into the distance as he vaulted onto the
platform. Xar knew it was too late to stop him from getting the Shard. Indeed,
Janus practically dived onto the altar and, gripping the Shard with both hands,
grunted as he lifted it. Xar looked around. He only had one shot left. He had
to find a good place to set it up. There, between those two boulders. Just
like at the ambush at the Diner. He ran and dived between them. Janus never
looked over, his attention was only on the Shard.
Janus
heaved the Shard off the altar and into his hands. "At last," he
said. His voice in awe, he stepped backwards near the edge. "My destiny
will be fulfilled. Yes!" He held the Shard over his head. The Shard
began to glow, and Janus could feel the power, more power in the Force than he
had ever felt in his life. He gazed at it in awe. The Shard seemed to have been
faceted once, but now there were chips and cracks along its body. Janus knew
that the Force Splinter that he now held in his pendant was somehow a missing
piece of this artifact, and what had prompted him onto his quest. Even this
piece seemed to have been part of a larger object once, but it didn’t
matter. Compared with this, the Splinter he had used before was an
insignificant trinket. Holding the Shard high above his head with both hands,
he yelled. "Absolute power!"
Lightning blasted out of the middle of the Shard, reaching for the ceiling a
hundred meters above. "With this, I am invincible! None of the
others can challenge me now!" His eyes filled with the power, he looked
around the ruins for some sign of Xar. "Where are you, miserable worm?
Look! Who has the power now?" Lightning shot out from the Shard into the
ruined city, blasting through columns and walls as if they were nothing.
Xar ducked as the waves of energy passed
overhead. Janus could not see him, but if he could just get off one shot…
He shifted his aim. There was something he wanted to find out.
Janus, his attention once again only on the
Shard, looked up into it. He felt the power coursing through his body, through
his veins, filling him with vitality and life. He knew his destiny, now, he would be the Herald of the new Return, leading
armies innumerable into battle to conquer the galaxy. With this, he knew he
could do anything.
Xar fired.
Suddenly something blew its way threw Janus'
right arm, midway between the wrist and the elbow. Bone splintered, and blood
and flesh sprayed out the other side. Janus screamed. He stared at his ruined
arm, falling away like a dead limb of a tree. Then he noticed he couldn't hold
the Shard with one hand. The power left him, too, and he stumbled backwards.
The Shard fell backwards, and Janus watched helplessly as its own momentum
pulled it out of his left hand. He was standing right at the edge of the chasm.
As the Shard fell, he reached out for it, but it was beyond his reach. He
watched the beautiful Force artifact fall into the endless black of the abyss.
"NOOOO!" Janus' scream followed the artifact down. The Shard
spun, end over end, over the side of the chasm and into the depths below. Janus
just watched it vanish, dumbfound. He thought he heard it shatter below.
Despair filled him. Enraged, he turned, clutching his forearm, just as a fist
came out of nowhere and slammed into his face, splitting his lips and sending
him staggering back towards the edge. He cried out as he began to fall.
Then Xar reached out and grabbed the man's
shirt, holding him back. But he didn't pull him in. He held him there, he feet
on the edge of the chasm. Janus’ eyes bore into his.
Xar looked into the man’s eyes. "Well,
Janus. Your plan is ruined. What are you going to do now?"
"You ignorant pig," Janus
spat, seething in pain. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?
What you’ve wasted?”
"Now, now. Talk, or you will go down after your precious Shard."
"Fool! I won't tell you anything!"
Xar calmly reached with his right hand into the
front of Janus' shirt, found the strap that held Janus' pendant on, and pullet
the piece out. Then he let go with his left hand, and then Janus was held from
falling only by the leather strap of his necklace, on the brink of the edge. Janus,
unable to move, released his right hand, which swung to the side out of
control.
"Now will you talk?"
Janus’ eyes slid downwards, glimpsing the
abyss below. Fear filled his gaze as he looked back at Xar. All right! What do
you want know?" he gasped. He risked another glance downward. There was
nothing but blackness, no sign of the bottom. Blood trickled its way down his
ruined arm and dripped from his fingers into the darkness below.
"Enlighten me. I know why you wanted the
Shard. But why the deals with Kruaan? Why the rocket
fuel, and using Tiberan?"
"I... I was ordered to," Janus
stammered. "Yeah, I was working with Kruaan, but
he's a fool. He wouldn't have lived to enjoy the fortune I sent him
anyway."
"Why not?"
"Because, in less than twenty-four hours,
everyone on Lantare will be dead. I've had scientists
working on a plague that will wipe out the whole population in weeks. They
recycle everything, even air, on Lantare, but it
won't catch the virus. They'll be spreading it themselves." Janus' eyes
rolled and focused again on Xar.
"But... Why? What would the point in that
be?” Xar demanded.
"I don't know." Janus laughed a sick
laugh. "I don't care."
Xar nodded evenly. ”That is just it. You
could not have planned all this yourself. Not with such a small time
organization. You are working for someone bigger, some larger force. Who?" Xar let the man down a fraction. "Who are
you working for?!"
Janus glanced down once more, then rolled his
eyes back up. Xar could see something different in them, now. He had hit a
nerve. This man was willing to die to keep this secret. The sheer resolution of
the man was astounding for a moment.
"Last chance, Janus. Talk. Who are you
working for?"
Janus' mouth twisted into a half smile, then he leaned his head back, hocked, and spit into
Xar’s face. “You’re dead anyway, fool!”
Xar’s left hand came up, breaking the
thin leather strap. For an instant Janus teetered on the edge, holding his arms
out, as his expression turned to shock. Then he fell over backwards. Xar
watched as the man fell, screaming, arms and legs moving wildly, into the
abyss. The man was quickly lost from view, then the yelling became quiet.
Xar reached up and wiped his face, and saw the spit
on his hand. Then he looked at the pendant he held in his other hand. Inside,
under the glass casing, was a small Force Splinter. That was what the Shard was
in thousands of pieces of, now. Turning, he made his way back toward the
entrance.
Dreadnaught Galthain
Phare System
1100 hours
"We hereby
commit his body to the Force. The Force gives us life and to it we shall
return," Mathis finished.
Xar stood in front of the coffin. "Masel... was a friend. He was dedicated, never backed off
from a fight, and died with honor. I worked with him, and he was a good man. He
will be missed."
All the members of Ar'Kell, gathered around the
sealed coffin, murmured their approval. Then they watched as it was lifted on repulsorlifts and slid out of the Dreadnaught’s
hangar bay, then launched toward Phare, the
system’s sun. The members of Ar’Kell watched until the object was
lost in the brightness of the star.
"Very well," said Mathis. "Dismissed."
Phare System
Planet Frigg
1900 hours
Back in the Quaestor's Chambers, Mathis finished debriefing Xar on the
mission. Standing in the outer office, the two men went over what they had
learned, and tried to piece together what had happened.
"Well, the local authorities will handle
it from here on. Those rockets will never get off the ground." Mathis
looked at the pendant, turning it over and over in his hands. "Heh. Charming trinket. Keep it.
You’re the artifact lover." He handed it to Xar, who pocketed the
item. Then he motioned the man to follow him into his chambers.
Once inside, Mathis sat down behind his desk
and put a datapad on the top. "I'm promoting you
to Aedile, second in command of House Ar’Kell."
Xar’s eyes widened. "Sir, are you
sure?"
"Positive. You've earned it. Besides, I
can't have you running around all over the place, now can I? You're too
valuable." He smiled. "Seriously, it's a good move for you, and will
get you into more administration responsibilities. You have a talent for it.
Weren’t you a prince?"
"Yes sir, but that is just the thing. That
was why I ran away from home, remember? Suffice that I shunned my –
princely role on Varnus."
Mathis chuckled. "Yes, well. I'm sure once
you get a real taste of it, you'll grow to like it. It's all spelled out there
in the datapad."
Xar picked up the pad. "Very
well. But I have a favor to ask first. I want to go back to my home
world, visit my family one last time. My remaining family, at
least."
Mathis nodded seriously. "I can arrange
you a couple week's leave. You've earned it. Meanwhile, I'll take care of all
the legal arrangements." He stood and bowed to the man across the table.
"Congratulations, Aedile Runis."
"Thanks, sir." Xar smiled. Then,
checking his chronometer, he said, "Well, I better get packing. You know,
for once I would like to stay in the palace for more than a few hours at a
time."
Mathis laughed. "Really?
Well, wait till you become Quaestor. You never get to
go anywhere. Well, not without infiltrating an enemy base, getting shot, and
uncovering a plot to kill millions."
"Then I am looking forward to it,"
Xar laughed. Then he bowed, turned, and left the office.
After Xar left, Mathis sat in his office for a
while, thinking. He rubbed the spot where he had been shot, and subsequently
healed by Xar’s technique. It still ached. He knew he should get to the
medical facility, for a checkup on the blaster wound. But something about this
past mission nagged at his mind. Oh well, he thought. Might as well
get some rest. One can always think better in the morning, anyway. Then he
rose, to begin his checks he performed every night before he went to bed. No rest for the weary, he thought
mildly.
* * *
The two beings
knelt in the throne room, awaiting their turn to be called on.
"Janus is dead, my lord,” they
finally said.
They waited. Then a feeling of anger and loss
filled them, and they knew what their next task was. Still bowed, they backed
slowly away out of the chamber, not looking up until they were well outside in
the hall. Then Dasok Krun
and Nereid Dumenos marched off, minds set on their
new task.
The End of
Betrayal: Ar’Kell’s
First
Written by Joshua Ausley
Copyright 1997