Champions of the Force Read online

  "To be honest ... I need to get to Kessel within a week."

  "But I'm not going anywhere near Kessel," Han said.

  "You don't know where you're going yet. You're looking for Kyp."

  "Point taken. What's at Kessel?" Han asked. "I didn't think you'd want to go back there soon, after what happened last time. I sure don't."

  "Mara Jade's going to meet me there in a week. We're partners in a new spice—mining operation." He beamed, tossing his burgundy cape over his shoulder.

  Han tried to cover his skeptical smile. "And does Mara herself know about this partnership, or are you just talking big?"

  Lando looked hurt. "Of course she knows ... sort of. Besides, if you get me to Kessel, maybe I can find the Lady Luck again, and I can stop hitching rides with people. This is getting old."

  "That's for sure," Han said. "All right, if we go near Kessel, I'll take you there — but my priority is tracking Kyp."

  "Of course, Han. That's understood," Lando said, then mumbled under his breath, "just as long as I get to Kessel within a week."

  As a disembodied spirit, Luke Skywalker could only watch as his Jedi trainees and his sister Leia filed into the grand audience chamber. Artoo—Detoo trundled ahead, like an escort, silently coasting to a stop before the platform on which he lay.

  The other Jedi trainees stood in a row in front of the motionless form. They stared respectfully at his motionless body as if they were attendees at a funeral. Luke could sense emotion pouring from them: grief, confusion, dismay, and deep anxiety.

  "Leia," he called in his echoing otherworldly voice. "Leia!" he screamed as loud as he could, trying to break through the other—dimensional walls that restrained him.

  Leia flinched, but didn't seem to hear. She reached forward to grip the arm of his cold body. He heard her whisper, "I don't know if you can hear me, Luke, but I know you're not dead. I can sense you're still here. We'll find a way to help you. We'll keep trying."

  She squeezed his limp hand and turned away quickly. She blinked to cast away the tears welling up within her eyes.

  "Leia ..." he sighed. He watched as the other Jedi candidates followed her back to the turbolift. Once again he found himself all alone with his paralyzed body, staring at the echoing walls of the Massassi temple.

  "All right," he said, looking for another solution. If Artoo couldn't hear him, and if Leia or the other Jedi trainees could not identify his presence, then perhaps Luke could communicate with someone on his own plane of existence — another glistening Jedi spirit he had spoken to many times before.

  "Ben!" Luke called. "Obi—Wan Kenobi, can you hear me?"

  His voice hummed through the ether. With all the emotional firepower he could dredge from the bottom of his soul, Luke shouted into the silence. "Ben!"

  Growing more concerned at hearing no answer, he called for others. "Yoda! Father — Anakin Skywalker!"

  He waited, but there was no response.

  ... Until he sensed a coldness ripple through the air like an icicle slowly melting. Words trembled from the walls. "They can't hear you, Skywalker — but I can."

  Luke spun around and saw a crack form in the stone walls. It grew darker as a tarlike silhouette oozed out and congealed into the shape of a cowled man whose features were distinct now that Luke could see him in the spirit plane. The stranger had long black hair, shadowed skin, and the tattoo of a black sun emblazoned on his forehead. His eyes were like chips of obsidian and just as sharp. His mouth bore a cruel scowl, the expression of one who has been betrayed and has had much time to think bitter thoughts.

  "Exar Kun," Luke said, and the dark spirit understood him perfectly well.

  "Do you enjoy having your spirit trapped away from your body, Skywalker?" Kun said in a mocking voice. "I have had four thousand years to get accustomed to it. The first century or two are the worst."

  Luke glared at him. "You corrupted my students, Exar Kun. You caused the death of Gantoris. You turned Kyp Durron against me."

  Kun laughed. "Perhaps it was your own failings as a teacher. Or their own delusions."

  "What makes you think I'll stay like this for thousands of years?" Luke said.

  "You will have no choice," Kun answered, "once I have destroyed your physical body. Trapping my own spirit inside these temples was the only way I could survive when the final holocaust came. The allied Jedi Knights devastated the surface of Yavin 4. They killed off the few Massassi people I had kept alive, and they destroyed my own body in the inferno.

  "My spirit was forced to wait and wait and wait until finally you brought your Jedi students here, students who could hear my voice once they learned how to listen."

  An echo of fear rang through Luke's mind, but he forced himself to sound calm and brave. "You can't harm my body, Kun. You can't touch anything physical. I've tried it myself."

  "Ah, but I know other ways to fight," Kun's spirit said. "And I have had endless millennia to practice. Rest assured, Skywalker, I will destroy you."

  As if finished with his taunting, Kun sank like smoke through the cracks in the polished flagstones, descending to the heart of the Great Temple. In his wake he left Luke alone but more determined than ever to break free from his ethereal prison.

  He would find a way. A Jedi could always find a way.

  When the twins suddenly started crying on their cots beside her, Leia woke up with a feeling of dread.

  "It's Uncle Luke!" Jaina said.

  "He's gonna be hurt," Jacen said.

  Leia bolted upright and felt a series of whistling, tingling vibrations through her body, unlike anything she had ever encountered before. She sensed more than heard the howling wind, a gathering storm trapped inside the temple — centered in the grand audience chamber where Luke lay.

  She threw on a white robe, cinched it around her waist, and dashed into the hall. Several other Jedi trainees emerged from their quarters, also sensing an indefinable dread.

  The twins jumped out of their beds, and Leia called back to them, "You two stay here." She doubted they would. "Artoo, watch over them!" she shouted to the droid, who was buzzing in confusion down the corridors, lights flashing.

  "Come to the grand audience chamber," Leia cried to the Jedi trainees. "Hurry!"

  Artoo spun around in the hall and returned to the children's quarters; the droid's confused bleeps and warbles followed Leia down the hall. She rode the turbolift to the top. When it stopped and opened its doors, storm winds howled around the vast, open chamber. Leia stumbled out into a cyclone.

  Cold rivers of air gushed through the horizontal skylights high in the walls. Ice crystals sparkled as the temperature plummeted. Wind drawn in from every direction struck the center of the room and spun around, corkscrewing, picking up speed in an irresistible force.

  Streen!

  The old Bespin hermit stood on the outskirts of the storm with his brown Jedi robe flapping around him. His wild gray hair writhed around his head as if charged with static. His lips mumbled something incomprehensible, and his eyes remained closed as if he were having a nightmare.

  Leia knew that even powerful Jedi could not manipulate large—scale phenomena like the weather; but they could move objects, and she realized that was what Streen did now. Not changing the weather, but simply moving the air, drawing it in from all directions, creating a self—contained but destructive tornado that struck toward Luke's body.

  "No!" she shouted into the starving wind. "Streen!"

  The cyclone struck Luke, buffeted his body, and lifted it into the air. Leia ran toward her paralyzed brother, feet barely touching the ground as the powerful winds knocked her sideways. The storm wrenched her off balance, and she found herself thrown through the air, flying like an insect toward the stone walls. She spun around and reached out, calming herself enough to use her own abilities with the Force, to nudge her body away. Instead of being crushed against the stone blocks, she slid softly to the floor.

  Luke's body continued rising, tugged upwar
d by the hurricane. His Jedi robe wound around him as the winds spun him like a corpse launched out of a star — freighter air lock into the grave of space.

  Streen didn't seem aware of what he was doing.

  Leia staggered to her feet again and jumped. This time she rode the circling air currents, flying around the fringe of the cyclone toward her helpless brother. She reached out to grab the tail of his robe, felt her fingers clutch rough fabric, and then burn as the robe was snatched away from her. She fell back to the floor.

  Luke had been drawn up into the tornado's mouth, rising toward the skylights.

  "Luke!" she cried. "Please help me." She had no idea if he could hear her, or if he could do anything. Gathering strength in her leg muscles, she leaped into the air again. It might be possible to use her Jedi skills of levitation for a brief moment; Luke had done it several times, although she herself had never mastered the skill. Now, though, it mattered more than it ever had before.

  As Leia sprang upward, the wind caught her. She rose high enough to grab Luke's body. She wrapped her arms around his waist, twisted her legs around his ankles, holding him, hoping her weight would drag him down.

  But as they started to drop, the winds picked up in intensity, howling and roaring. Leia's skin went numb from the blinding wintry cold. They shot toward the roof of the grand audience chamber, toward the widest skylight, where jagged icicles hung like javelins.

  Leia suddenly knew what Streen intended to do to them, whether consciously or unconsciously. They would be sucked out of the Great Temple, tossed high into the sky, and then allowed to crash thousands of feet to the spear—pointed branches of the jungle canopy.

  The turbolift door opened. Kirana Ti charged out, followed by Tionne and Kam Solusar.

  "Stop Streen!" Leia shouted.

  Kirana Ti reacted instantly. She wore thin but supple red armor from the scaled hides of reptiles from Dathomir. She had been a warrior on her own world, fighting with untrained and unhoned skill in the Force, but she had also fought in physical combat as well.

  Kirana Ti launched herself forward on long, muscular legs, ducking her head as she charged into the cyclonic wind that surrounded Streen. The old hermit stood entranced, spinning slowly around with his arms dangling at his sides and his fingertips spread apart, as if trying to catch something.

  Kirana Ti staggered as she hit the wind, but she wrenched her head aside, spread her legs, and dug the toes of her bare feet against the stone floor for traction. She shoved forward into the wind and finally shattered through into the dead zone of the storm. She tackled Streen to the flagstoned floor and locked his arms behind his back.

  Streen cried out, then blinked his eyes open. He looked wildly around in confusion. Instantly the wind stopped blowing. The air fell still.

  High up at the ceiling of the grand audience chamber Leia and Luke plunged toward the unforgiving flagstones below. Luke fell like a doll, and Leia tried to remember how to use her levitation skills, but her mind went blank with panic.

  Tionne and Kam Solusar raced forward, stretching out their arms, using what they had been taught. Less than a meter above the crushing stones, Leia found herself slowed, pausing in the air beside Luke's body. They drifted gently to the floor. Leia cradled Luke against her, but her brother did not respond.

  Streen sat up, and Kam Solusar ran over to help Kirana Ti hold him. The old hermit began to weep. Kam Solusar gnashed his teeth and looked as if he wanted to kill the old hermit then and there, but Kirana Ti stopped him. "Don't hurt him," she said. "He doesn't know what he was doing."

  "A nightmare," Streen said, "the Dark Man talking to me. Whispering to me. He never lets go. I was fighting him in my dream." Streen looked around for sympathy or encouragement.

  "I was going to kill him and save us all, but you woke me." At last Streen realized where he was. He looked around the grand audience chamber until his gaze fell upon Leia holding Luke.

  "He tricked you, Streen," Kirana Ti said in a hard voice. "You weren't fighting the Dark Man. He was manipulating you. You were his tool. If we hadn't stopped you, you would have destroyed Master Skywalker."

  Streen began sobbing.

  On the raised platform Tionne helped Leia lift Luke back onto the stone table. "He doesn't seem injured," Leia said.

  "By sheer luck," Tionne said. She wondered aloud, "Did the ancient Jedi Knights have to deal with challenges like this?"

  "If they did," Leia said, "I hope you manage to find the old stories. We need to learn what those Jedi did to defeat their enemies."

  Streen stood, shaking himself free of the gripping hands of Kirana Ti and Kam Solusar. The old man's face was filled with outrage. "We must destroy the Dark Man," Streen said, "before he kills all of us."

  Leia felt a grip of unbearable cold in her heart, knowing that Streen was right.

  Being Chief Administrator of Maw Installation was a great enough burden under normal circumstances, but Tol Sivron had never counted on doing it without Imperial assistance. Standing inside the empty conference room, Sivron stroked his sensitive Twi'lek head—tails and stared out the viewport into the empty space around the secret facility.

  He had never liked Admiral Daala and her overbearing manner. In the years they had been stranded in the Maw, Sivron had never felt as though she understood his mission to create new weapons of mass destruction for Grand Moff Tarkin — to whom they both owed enormous favors.

  Daala's four Star Destroyers had been assigned to protect Sivron and the precious weapons scientists, but Daala had refused to accept her subordinate position in the scheme of things. She had let a few Rebel prisoners steal the Sun Crusher and kidnap one of Sivron's best weapons designers, Qwi Xux. Then Daala had abandoned her post to chase after the spies, leaving him alone and unprotected!

  Sivron paced the conference room, puffed with pride and saddled with disappointment. He shook his head, and his two wormlike head appendages slid across his tunic with a tingle of sensory perceptions. He gripped one of the head—tails and wrapped it heavily around his shoulders.

  The handful of stormtroopers Daala had left behind served little purpose. Tol Sivron had compiled a full tally of the soldiers: 123. He'd filled out official reports, gathered their service records, compiled information that might someday be useful. It wasn't clear to him exactly how this information would be useful, but Sivron had based his career on compiling reports and gathering information. Someone, somewhere, would find it worthwhile.

  The stormtroopers obeyed his orders — that was what stormtroopers did, after all — but he was no military commander. He didn't know how to deploy the soldiers if Maw Installation was ever attacked by Rebel invaders.

  During the last month he had kept the Maw scientists working harder to come up with better prototypes and functional defenses, writing contingency plans and emergency procedures, outlining scenarios and prescribed responses to every situation. Being prepared is our best weapon, he thought. Tol Sivron would never stop being prepared.

  He had requested frequent progress reports from his researchers, insisting that he be kept completely up—to—date. The storage room adjacent to his office was piled high with hardcopy documents and demonstration models of various concepts. He didn't have time to review them all, of course, but it comforted him just to know they were there.

  He heard footsteps approach and saw his four primary division leaders escorted to the morning briefing by their designated stormtrooper bodyguards.

  Tol Sivron did not turn to greet them, staring with a thrill of pride at the huge spherical skeleton of the Death Star prototype rising over the cluster of rocks like a framework moon. The Death Star was the Installation's greatest success. Grand Moff Tarkin had taken one look at the prototype and given him a medal on the spot, along with Bevel Lemelisk, its main designer, and Qwi Xux, his primary assistant.

  The four division leaders took their seats around the briefing table, each bringing a hot beverage, each munching on a reconstituted morning pastry
. Each carried a hard—copy printout of the morning's agenda.

  Sivron decided he would keep the meeting brief and to the point — not longer than two, possibly three, hours. They didn't have much to discuss anyway. As the Death Star orbited out of sight overhead, he turned to face his four top managers.

  Doxin was a man wider than he was tall, completely bald except for very dark, very narrow eyebrows that looked like thin wires burned into his forehead. His lips were thick enough that he could have balanced a stylus on them when he smiled. Doxin was in charge of high—energy concepts and implementations.

  Next to him sat Golanda. Tall and hawkish with an angular face, pointed chin, and aquiline nose that gave her face the general shape of a Star Destroyer, she was about as beautiful as a gundark. Golanda led the artillery innovations and tactical—deployments section. In ten years she had not stopped complaining about how foolish it was to do artillery research in the middle of a black hole cluster where the fluctuating gravity ruined her calculations and made every test a pointless exercise.

  The third division leader, Yemm, was a demonic—looking Devaronian who excelled in saying the right thing at the right time. He supervised documentation and legal counsel.

  Last of all, seated at the far corner of the table, was Wermyn, a tall, one—armed brute. His skin had a purplish—green cast that left his origin in question. Wermyn was in charge of plant operations and keeping Maw Installation up and running.

  "Good morning, everyone," Tol Sivron said, seating himself at the head of the table and tapping his needle claws on the tabletop. "I see you've all brought your agendas with you. Excellent." He scowled at the four stormtroopers standing outside the door. "Captain, please step outside and close the door. This is a private, high—level meeting."

  The stormtrooper made no answer as he ushered his companions outside and sealed the door with a hiss of compressed gases.

  "There," Tol Sivron said, shuffling papers in front of him. "I'd like you each to report on recent activities in your division. After we've discussed the possible implications of anything new, we can then brainstorm strategies. I take it our revised Emergency Plans have been distributed to all members of this facility?" Sivron looked at Yemm, the paperwork person.