Showdown at Centerpoint (18 page)

Luke lunged forward into the wind and, using the Force to guide him, grabbed Kalenda by the hand and yanked hard in the proper direction. Kalenda came willingly enough, and Luke could feel Gaeriel in the Force, feel her hesitate a moment and then follow along as well.

Luke became aware of a burning sense in his chest. Air. He needed air. And if
he
felt the urgent need to breathe, the others must be in an agony to do so.

Closer. Closer. In his mind’s eye, he could see the hatch. He knew, with all the power and precision of his Jedi senses, exactly where it was. But that did not get him there any faster, did not give him the power to move effortlessly against this deadly wind.

There. They were there. He still did not dare open his eyes, but he knew they were at the entrance to the lock. He pulled Kalenda forward, pushed her in ahead of him, and shoved Gaeriel in as well before stepping in himself—and running smack into something metal, something hard and angular and tall. He suddenly realized it was Threepio. “It would seem Artoo and I got here before you after all, Master Luke!” Threepio shouted over the howl of the sandstorm. A droid could speak in this mess without wasting air or getting sand
in his mouth. Luke couldn’t, and he settled for a nod instead.

Luke nodded and moved farther forward into the lock, out of the stinging wind. He wiped the worst of the dust from his eyes and risked opening them, just in time to see the lock swinging shut.

There was a sudden flare of orange from behind him. He turned around. Gaeriel and Kalenda were standing, eyes still shut, in about the midpoint of the lock chamber, holding to each other, coughing miserably.

And Gaeriel’s long flowing white dress was on fire—and Gaeriel did not know it yet. Luke lunged for her and threw his body on the blossoming flames, trying to smother them. His flight suit was insulated and fireproof. He felt a brief bloom of heat on his chest, and that was all. The fire died. He stood back up and helped Gaeriel to her feet.

A red-hot bit of debris, blown from someplace where things were hotter still, must have gotten itself lodged in the fabric of Gaeriel’s dress. But how could it burn, with no available oxygen?

Luke heard a hissing noise from behind him and looked around. An oxygen mask. Lando and Kalenda had thrown an oxygen mask into the lock chamber—and Gaeriel had been standing right on top of it. Her dress must have trapped the oxygen. A million-to-one shot, but one that had almost killed Gaeriel.

All of that flashed through his mind even as he was grabbing for the mask. He tore the cloth strip off her mouth and put the oxy mask over her mouth and nose. Still half blinded, and probably still unaware of why Luke had knocked her over, she jerked away from the mask at first, until she realized what it was. Then she grabbed for it greedily, opened her mouth, and took in a deep, urgent breath. She started coughing almost instantly. Luke handed the mask to Kalenda, who took two deep breaths herself before handing it back to Luke.

Luke pulled down his dust cloth, exhaled the last breath he had breathed in back in the turbovator car, and sucked in as much air as the mask had to give. He realized that he had been seeing spots before his eyes, there toward the end.
Even Jedi Masters have to breathe,
he told himself.

He was just handing the mask on to Gaeriel when the inner door swung violently open, and the air in the lock blasted out into the chamber beyond in a last choking, blinding—but now harmless—cloud of dust.

They had made it.

*   *   *

“I was on
fire
?” Gaeriel asked, looking down at the remains of her dress. Jenica had led them all to a small infirmary near the Shell One side of the airlock. Everyone had cuts and bruises and scrapes and minor burns that needed attention of one sort or another. They all needed baths and clean clothes as well, but those could wait just a bit. “I was on
fire
and I didn’t know about it?”

“A claim not many can make,” Luke said, laughing. “I apologize for knocking you over—”

“And
I
apologize for throwing that oxy mask in there,” said Lando.

“Don’t either of you apologize,” Gaeriel said, a bit tartly. She went over to the sink and started scrubbing her hands. “The mask probably saved all our lives in there. I was near passing out, and if I had fainted and breathed in much more of that stuff than I did by accident—well, at best I’d have been in here with something a lot worse than a sore throat. And I’d much rather have a bruised dignity than third-degree burns.”

“I think we were all pretty lucky in there,” Kalenda said in more serious tones as she sprayed some quick-heal salve on Jenica’s burned hand. “The way the temperatures were rising, I don’t think we’d have gotten out another five minutes later.”

“What’s it like in there now, Artoo?” Luke asked as Lando sprayed antiseptic solution into the sand burns on his face. “Ow! That stuff stings.”

“Hold still,” Lando said, dabbing ointment onto the worst of the burns. “Almost done.”

Artoo, who had plugged himself into a dataport in the infirmary wall, squeaked and whistled and buzzed and beeped in an agitated fashion.

“Dear me,” said Threepio. “Things
are
rapidly getting worse in there.”

“What did that Artoo thing say, for those of us who don’t speak bird-whistle?” Jenica asked.

“Temperatures where we were ten minutes ago are up over the boiling point of water and headed higher,” said Threepio. “The surviving detectors show hot spots closer to the Glowpoint well over five hundred degrees—and there are probably temperatures much higher than that, except the detectors are not there anymore to tell us.”

“Not good,” said Lando. “Not good at all.”

Jenica Sonsen nodded her head. “And it’s also no terrorist attack,” she said. “Even twice didn’t make a great deal of sense—but three times?”

“I think you’re very wrong there,” Lando said. “Very wrong indeed. But I’m afraid your people here weren’t the intended victims. I think you were more like innocent bystanders who got in the way.”

Jenica turned and looked sharply at Lando as she flexed the hand with the burn salve on it. “Captain Calrissian—Lando—you said a few things earlier that made it sound like you had an idea what this was all about. Maybe now would be the right time to explain yourself.”

Lando let out a deep sigh. “I think maybe you’re right,” he said. “But no one’s going to like it much. I might even be wrong—but on the other hand, it’s all staring us in the face.”

“What is?” Luke asked.

“Centerpoint,” Lando said. “Centerpoint is right in
the middle of it all. Think about it. There are three big, impressive, inexplicable technologies at the middle of this crisis. The first, and the easiest to explain, is the system-wide jamming. Impressive, but all you really need for that is a whole lot of power. And where does the jamming come from?”

“Centerpoint,” Jenica said. “Without Fed-Dub even knowing about it—and we ran the place.”

“Or at least you thought you did,” Lando said. “Second up is the interdiction field. Nothing incredible about it, beyond its size. But if you had a powerful enough gravitic generator, you could do it. Where does it come from?”

“Centerpoint,” Jenica said again. “And from what you were asking about earlier, you thought it had something to do with the way we’re right at the balance point of gravitic potential.”

“Right. I have no idea how, but it seems to me that Centerpoint taps into the gravitic output of the Double Worlds. Now it seems someone has found a way to convert that power into an interdiction field.”

“And the third unexplained technology?” Luke asked.

Lando looked straight at him. “The novamaker, of course. The starbuster. We all wondered how it was done. We all wondered where the starbuster was. I’m just about positive we’re sitting in it right now. I think the Glowpoint flare means it’s just about to go off again.”

I
t was a lovely morning. The star Corell was rising in the east. The lovely rolling hills and clean blue sky of Selonia were laid out before them. The Hunchuzuc Den had put them up in a splendid hilltop villa, clearly purpose-built for the use of visiting human dignitaries. They had been comfortable and well cared for from the moment Mara Jade had set the
Jade’s Fire
down.

“I am tired of waiting, Dracmus,” Han said.

“Patience, Honored Solo. Waiting is not yet tired of you.”

“Whatever that means,” Han growled. “Have you ever given a straight answer in your life?”

“What, exactly, are you meaning by straight answer?”

Han Solo turned to his wife, who was sitting placidly at the breakfast table. “You see what I’ve had to put up with?” he asked. Dracmus had come to pay her morning call, as she did every day. And as
he
did every day, Han found himself wondering what the point of the visit was. “Riddles. Incoherent riddles. That’s all I ever got. It’s all we ever get.”

“Take it easy, Han,” Leia said. “Patience is the hardest part of diplomacy.”

“But mine has reached its limits,” Han said.

“I’m afraid I agree with Han,” Mara said. “Things are moving too fast everywhere else for me to put up with waiting here any longer.”

“I’m still not even sure why we
are
here,” Han said. “Right from the moment you yanked me out of that cell, I haven’t known for sure if I was your partner or your prisoner.
Are
we prisoners? Hostages, maybe? Or are we here to negotiate something? And if so, what?”

“I’m afraid it is not that simple,” Dracmus said. “To my people, these things—partner, prisoner, hostage, negotiator—are not so separate from each other as they are with your folk. To my people, one might be only one of these or all of them at once, or some of them changingly over time.”

“So which is it?” Han asked, a very clear warning note in his voice. A note Dracmus plainly missed.

“It is not yet determined. You must understand that to my people consensus is being all. Ambiguity has much use for us. If the issue is uncertain, then the meeting can go on, for disagreement is more difficult if no one understands the problem fully.”

“So is agreement,” Han said. “There are people with guns and ships out there who are shooting at our people. There is not much ambiguity out there.”

“Please! Please!” Dracmus said. “Understanding your impatience, but what you ask is not our way. For my people—”

“Traditions make for an awfully handy set of excuses,” Mara said. “Every time I have ever dealt with a Selonian who didn’t want to do something, she’s explained to me how tradition made it impossible, or the ways of her people caused it to be difficult to decide, or whatever excuse seemed handy. And
my
people always had to be respectful of your ways, and accept the structure of your culture. No more. This isn’t some trade deal for luxury goods where you can leave us
hanging for six months on the off chance that your convenient traditions will get us so frustrated that we give up and offer a better price. This is
war
. This is survival. There is no time. It is time for you to accept the ways of
our
culture before we are all wiped out. It is our way to speak plain, to speak true, to choose a course, and to follow it.”

“Please!” said Dracmus. “You
must
endure. Things are being complex. Take time to solve all.”

“But
there is no time,
” Mara said, putting a hard-edged emphasis on her words. “We cannot take what no longer exists, and we have run out of time. Or rather, you have. I may be many things, but I will not be your prisoner.”

“What is the meaning of your words?” Dracmus asked.

“Inform whoever it is you should inform that I am leaving. In one hour, I am going to walk around to the landing pad on the other side of this villa. I am going to get aboard the
Jade’s Fire
and I am going to fly away. My companions are welcome to join me if they wish, but I will be leaving in any event. I would also remind you that Leia and I escaped from the Human League and flew the
Jade’s Fire
off Corellia, while we were facing much heavier opposition than anything I have seen here so far. Besides which, as my ship is the one that brought the Chief of State of the New Republic to this planet, the case could be made that an attack on it constitutes an attack on the New Republic that you claim to recognize and support. In short, I would not suggest trying to stop me. You will not succeed, and I will not be responsible for any damage from the attempt.”

“But—but—”

“The
only
way to prevent my departure is to have our group meet with someone in authority, someone who will provide clear answers to our questions, someone with the power to make decisions before that hour is up. If such a person does not appear, I will leave—”

“And I’ll be with her,” said Han, and turned toward his wife.

Leia looked troubled and angry, but she nodded. “And so will I.”

Dracmus looked from one of them to the other. “But—but—”

“But you have one hour,” Mara said. “Vanish. Go make things happen.”