The Joiner King (23 page)

“This
doesn’t look good,” Mara said. “Artoo, start plotting escape vectors.”

The droid tweedled an acknowledgment and went to work.

“They drew us in,” Mara said. “I’m ashamed.”

“They’re going to a lot of trouble to get us,” Luke said. “What I want to know is why.”

That was the question he held in his mind as he reached for Jacen and Jaina in the Force. Raynar had been unwilling—or unable—to discuss the Yoggoy attack honestly, but Luke felt sure his niece and nephew would prove much more open.

In reply, he received only an impression of confusion.

“Same story as on Yoggoy,” Mara observed. “Nobody knows anything.”

R2-D2 tweeted an announcement. The
Shadow
lacked enough current velocity to escape unscathed. No matter which way they turned, the fast swarm would have a thirty-second window of attack—and that assumed the
Shadow
suffered no damage to her drive units.

Nanna’s voice came over the intercom. “Shall I take Ben to the docking bay?”

“Not yet,” Mara said.

“I really think you should take Ben and flee in the StealthX,
Master Skywalker,” the droid insisted. “The
Shadow
’s odds of survival are—”

“Certain,” Mara growled. Her gaze slid across the mirrored canopy toward Luke. “Right?”

“Right,” Luke said. They had rehearsed just this situation many times. “We’re fine.”

Closing his mind to external distractions, Luke began a focusing exercise, breathing in through his nose, filling his belly diaphragm with air, then exhaling slowly out his mouth. He barely felt the
Shadow
shudder as the first dartships began to pelt her shields with balls of primitive chemical explosives, and when Han’s voice came over the comm, he heard the words only with his ears.

“Uh, why aren’t you on an escape vector? Is Artoo on the blink again?”

“Negative that,” Mara answered. She lowered the
Shadow
’s blaster cannon and began to fire indiscriminately into the cloud of swirling dartships. “We’re okay.”

“You don’t look okay,” Han said. “We’ll cut the
Exxer
loose and circle back to—”

“Nega
tive
!” Mara snapped. “You do that, we’ll never get free of these pests. Keep going—and don’t look back. Luke has a trick up his sleeve.”

“Copy.” It was Leia this time. “If you’re sure.”

“We’re sure.” Mara closed the channel, then—as the
Shadow
’s shuddering worsened—added, “I think.”

Luke was sure. By then, he had opened himself wide to the Force, and it was pouring in from all sides, filling him with a maelstrom of power, imbuing his whole body with its energy.

A bang sounded back in the engineering bay as a power circuit overloaded, then the lights dimmed as R2-D2 redistributed shield power. Luke felt a surge of anxiety from Mara, but pushed it to one side so he could concentrate on the task at hand. He formed an imaginary picture of the
Shadow
’s exterior, then expanded it into the Force, moving it from his mind out into the cockpit.

Mara turned around and inspected the image carefully, then said, “Looks good.”

Luke continued to enlarge the image, extending it into every corner of the vessel, taking his time to absorb the attributes that made up the
Shadow
’s sensor signature. He began to grow tired, but ignored his fatigue and expanded the illusion until it covered the entire ship like an imaginary skin.

Another bang sounded in the engineering bay. This time, before R2-D2 could redistribute power, the sound was followed by the muffled thuds of several hull hits. Mara hit the crash alert, closing all airtight doors and activating the pressure stop-loss systems, then spoke over the intercom.

“Nanna, get Ben into his vac suit.”

“I’ve already done that,” the droid responded. “We’re waiting at our evacuation station now. Perhaps you should come—”

“Nanna, you short-circuit!” Ben’s voice said. “We’re fine. Dad said so!”

Trying not to be distracted by his son—or by the steadily growing shudder of the barrage of dartship attacks—Luke brought to mind another image of the
Shadow
, this time with a black, star-speckled veneer that resembled the emptiness of deep space. Instead of absorbing the ship’s sensor signature, however, he blanketed it with a layer of cold emptiness.

Once the illusory skins were in place, he carefully adjusted them, drawing the masking image tight against the hull here, pushing the counterfeit out a little there. The effort of maintaining both illusions began to deplete the energy running through him, so Luke opened himself up completely, using his fear for Ben’s life, his anger at the insects that were threatening it, to draw more Force into himself. Every centimeter of his body began to nettle with its sting, and a faint aura arose from his skin.

A third bang sounded from the engineering bay.

“How about that decoy, Skywalker?” Mara asked. “Our shields can’t take—”

Luke released the outer skin. “Go!”

Mara shoved the throttles to overload, then, half a second later, shut down the drives. The
Shadow
slid out of her double and—still masked by the dark veneer Luke had constructed—glided quietly away from the Force illusion.

The shuddering stopped. Luke continued to maintain both illusions, the Force pouring through him like fire, burning more fiercely every moment. He was drawing more energy than his body was conditioned to endure, literally burning himself up from the inside. It was not really a dark side act—to a modern Jedi, the dark side was more a matter of intent than deed—but it felt that way to him. According to Mara, this was what happened to Palpatine, and Luke believed her. He could feel himself aging—his cells weakening, the membranes growing thin and the cytoplasm simmering, the nuclei coming apart.

The air around him began to crackle with static.

R2-D2 extended a fire extinguisher and started toward Luke, squealing in alarm.

“It’s okay, Artoo!” Mara said. “He knows how far to push it. He’s not going to ignite.”

I hope
, she added silently.

On Luke’s tactical display, the illusionary
Shadow
—the real one was not visible even to her own sensors—was slowly drifting toward the bottom of the screen, still surrounded by a cloud of attacking dartships. A small inset was counting down the seconds remaining until the Force-cloaked
Shadow
would be far enough from the dartships to restart the drives and flee. The way Luke was hurting, thirty seconds seemed like an eternity.

“We’re bringing Juun and Saba aboard now,” Leia commed. Her voice was filled with the concern that Luke felt in the Force. “Do you need help?”

They could not answer for fear that the dartships would notice the comm waves and discover the
Shadow
’s true position. Instead, Mara reached out to Leia through the Force, trying to assure her that everything was fine. Though the message would have been clearer coming from Luke, his body was starting to tremble and spark, and he needed all his concentration just to fight his exhaustion.

The
XR808g
began to drift away from the
Falcon
on the tactical display, and the Solos started a sweeping turn back toward the “battle.” Luke felt Mara protesting through the Force, but the
Falcon
only began to pick up speed. Leia was angry with them for trying to be heroes; the situation wasn’t
that
bad.

“Stang!” Mara cursed. “That—”

“Mpommmm!” Ben called, peeking around the corner. He was in his vac suit, with the helmet visor open. “Dad says we’re not supposed to say
stang.”

“Your father’s right,” Mara said. “Aren’t you supposed to be at your evacuation station with Nanna?”

“We were, but then the shuddering stopped and …” Ben’s gaze drifted over to Luke’s glowing, anguished form, and his eyes bulged with horror. “What’s wrong with Dad?”

“Nothing. I’ll explain later.” Mara activated the intercom. “Nanna—”

The droid appeared behind Ben. “Master Ben!” She swept him up and retreated aft. “The drill is
never
over until we hear the all-clear.”

Luke’s skin felt as dry as a Tatooine lake, and tiny haloes of golden light were starting to appear around his fingertips. The
Falcon
was on a straight heading and accelerating toward the dartships. The inset on the tactical display showed three seconds, two …

Mara brought the sublight drives back online. Luke let the illusions drop and slumped into his chair, his skin prickling and his hair standing on end as the last of the Force energy left his body.

Han’s voice came immediately over the comm. “What the blazes?” The
Falcon
made a hard turn away from the confused dartships. “Did you just tele—”

“Didn’t I tell you not to look back?” Mara asked, her voice still that of a reproving mother. “Now fall in behind us and stay there.”

“Uh, sure.” Han sounded more confused by her tone than he had been by the sudden change in the
Shadow
’s location. “Whatever you say.”

The comm went silent, and Mara let out a breath. “Chubba. Don’t tell me I just talked to Han like he was a—”

“It’s okay,” Luke assured her. “At heart, he’s just an overgrown kid anyway.”

She activated a mirror section and looked back at him. “How’re you feeling?”

“Like I grabbed a powerfeed,” he said. “Why is that so much harder than pushing a Star Destroyer around?”

Mara smiled. “Just don’t make a mess on my flight deck.”

Feeling in danger of doing just that, Luke started to rise—then caught a glimpse of himself in the mirrored section of canopy. His face was puffy and wrinkled, his skin sallow and dry, his eyes sunken and baggy and rimmed in red. He was starting to look like Palpatine.

Not by half
, Mara assured him through the Force.

“But get some rest,” she said aloud. “If you push that stuff too hard, there’s no telling what might happen.”

The AWOL Jedi stood waiting in front of their makeshift squadron, a small eye of calm in a frenetic storm of insect activity. The Knights were still wearing their rumpled flight suits, staring at the
Shadow
and
Falcon
as they landed. Tesar and Zekk had the good grace to wear guilty expressions as well, but Jaina and Alema merely looked defiant. Jacen and Tahiri betrayed no emotion at all.

Mara took her time closing down the ship’s systems, allowing their suspense to build—and giving herself a few moments to search the cavernous hangar for any hint of danger in the Force. There was no chance that Jaina or any of the others had been involved in the assault on the
Shadow
, but
someone
had attacked her family—and that someone had certainly
looked
like Killiks. Unlike Luke, she was utterly convinced that Raynar Thul would do anything he thought necessary to keep Jaina and the others in the Colony—even if that meant ambushing his old friends.

Finally, when she could not find even a hint of danger, Mara joined the others in the
Shadow
’s, main cabin. Despite a twenty-minute rest trance, Luke still looked like an escapee from a spice mine, with sallow skin and red-rimmed eyes. Ben was bright-eyed and eager to meet his cousins. He kept looking from his father to the door.

Mara took his hand from Nanna. “Ben, you understand that we have important business with Jaina and the others, don’t you?”

“I’m not a Gamorrean, Mom,” he said. “I know we wouldn’t come all the way out here if it was
unimportant
business.”

“Good. You can say hello to your cousins, but then Nanna will take you to stay with Cakhmaim and Meewalh on the
Falcon.”
She looked to Nanna. “Ask them to lock down the ship—I don’t care if it
does
offend the Killiks.”

“I was about to suggest the same thing myself,” Nanna replied.

Mara nodded, then opened the boarding hatch to the cloying, fuel-laced mugginess of the big hangar. Ben was off like a blaster bolt, racing down the stairs and throwing himself into Jaina’s arms. She laughed and gave him a warm hug.

“Nice to see you, too, Ben,” Jaina said. She stepped back and ran an appraising eye over him. “You’ve grown.”

“It’s been a whole year.” He smiled mischievously, then added, “Boy, are you guys in trouble!”

Mara, who was still only halfway down the stairs, cringed inwardly, but Jaina only smiled.

“I imagine we are.”

“Well, I hope they don’t take away your lightsaber or anything.”

This caused Jaina’s eyes to flash, but Ben didn’t seem to notice. He turned to Jacen, who had matured into a handsome man with a thick beard and brooding brown eyes, and seemed unable to decide what he should do next.

Jacen smiled and extended his hand. “Hello, Ben. I’m your cousin Jacen.”

“I know you.” Ben took the hand and shook it. “You went away when I was two. Did you find it?”

The question puzzled Jacen less than it did Mara. “Some of it,” Jacen answered.

Ben’s face fell. “So you’re going back?”

“No.” Jacen’s tone changed to that of a person addressing an equal. “What I haven’t found, I doubt I ever will.”

Ben nodded sagely, then glanced toward the
Falcon
, only now lowering her boarding ramp. “I have to go, but we can talk later.”

“Yes,” Jacen said. “I’ll look forward to that.”

Ben took Nanna’s hand and started toward the
Falcon
, leaving nothing but an awkward silence between Mara and the AWOL Jedi. Though Luke was the informal leader of the Jedi
Order, they had decided that she would be the one to confront them and put them on the defensive. That would leave Luke free to assume the role of judge, mentor, or friend—whatever was needed.

Mara stopped a few steps away and studied the young Jedi Knights in silence, meeting each of their unblinking gazes in turn, trying to gauge their moods but finding only the unreadable durasteel of veteran killers. She did not recall when they had grown so hard. The Yuuzhan Vong had come, and it seemed to Mara that they had gone almost overnight from being teenage Jedi-in-training to seasoned warriors. After what they had seen in battle—after what they had
done
—it seemed ludicrous to think of them being “in trouble.”