The Eye of Darkness, page 19
KC-78 launched into a stream of peeps, whistles, and frantic beeps.
Avar held up her hands. “I know, Kaysee. I know it’s risky.”
“The droid’s right.”
Avar turned to see Belin standing in the doorway of the cockpit. He’d obviously been there for some time. She’d been so absorbed in the recording she hadn’t noticed him arrive.
“It’s probably a trap,” said Belin. He rubbed thoughtfully at his bristly chin. “It’s exactly the sort of thing they’d do to trap more Jedi.”
The affirmative warble from KC-78 suggested the droid agreed with Belin.
“You think she’s lying?” said Avar.
Belin shook his head. “Oh, I’ve no doubt the poor woman is a prisoner, all right. Just like the rest of us. Trapped with no way of doing anything about it. But this Nihil who’s supposedly helping her…?”
“But what if it’s real?” said Avar. “What if he really does want a way out? It’s not beyond the realms of possibility, is it? That someone joined up and doesn’t like how bad it’s gotten.”
Belin cocked a half smile. “A goodhearted Nihil?”
“That’s not what I mean. I’m not saying they’re a good person. Or a defector who suddenly wants to help bring the Nihil down. Or anything remotely like that. They obviously signed up to the Nihil in the first place, and I’m sure they’ve been party to terrible things. I’m not even advocating they could be trusted, even for a second. But what Rhil said—it rings true, doesn’t it? Someone who’s in over their head. Who’s running scared of Ro, sees their future dwindling the longer they remain in his orbit…That I can believe. It doesn’t have to be a change of heart. Just that they’re scared enough and desperate enough to look for other options. That I can use.”
Was she trying to convince herself as much as Belin and KC-78? Avar didn’t even know anymore. She’d wanted something big, some new opportunity to present itself. Was this the Force, showing her the way?
Or was it just another terrible mistake in the making, like so many she’d made before?
Belin shrugged. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned about the Nihil, it’s that they’re all in it for themselves. Aside from a few fanatics, they don’t believe in any great cause. They want to rampage, and destroy, and grow fat on the spoils. They don’t care about Ro’s crusade. Not really. So if you’re counting on this person putting their own interests first, I reckon that’s about the only thing you can trust.”
KC-78 made a sound that sounded distinctly like he was trying to approximate Oh no.
Avar met Belin’s eye. “I’ll drop you somewhere safe.”
“Uh-uh.” He crossed to the copilot’s chair and sat down, heavily. “My ship, my rules. You don’t go anywhere without me.”
Avar frowned, confused. “But…”
Belin wagged a finger. “Now, you listen to me. You might be a risk-taking fool of a Jedi that’s nearly killed me a couple of times already, but I saw what you did for those people, even if they’re too stuck up or desperate to see it for themselves. You made a difference. And there’s one thing I know for sure—piloting this ship for those Nihil isn’t going to do much good for anyone. So I’m coming with you, and I’m going to help.” He held up his hand to ward off her interruption. “And there’s not a thing you can say to stop me. My ship, my rules. I have spoken.”
“Belin—”
“Besides,” he said, cutting her off, “this old bird isn’t going anywhere until those coolant pipes are repaired. So you’re just going to have to sit tight while me and your little friend set things to rights.”
“It’s too dangerous,” Avar protested.
“Precisely the reason you can’t go alone. But if you’re going to go walking straight into a likely trap, then the least you can do is bring some backup.” Belin folded his arms across his chest. “Don’t go making me all grumpy again by protesting any further.”
“But what if I can’t protect you?” said Avar. Her voice was barely a whisper. “What if…”
“If I go and get myself killed. Then it’s my business, isn’t it? Don’t you see that? You may be a Jedi, but you don’t have to save everyone. You can’t save everyone. It’s the fact you even try that makes you different from the Nihil. You don’t have to win, Avar Kriss. All you have to do is try. That’s enough.”
Avar felt as though something was breaking. She didn’t know what to say. She stifled a sob and turned away, composing herself.
How could she be so humbled? By a being she barely knew. By someone whose ship she had commandeered, whose life she had put at risk.
What if he was right? What if trying really was enough?
That’s all Stellan had been trying to do, wasn’t it? The right thing. And Elzar, too, when everything went wrong for him on Starlight. They’d all made mistakes. Terrible mistakes. They’d allowed the Nihil to win.
But at least they’d tried.
Somewhere down the line, she’d forgotten that. She’d decided that, if she couldn’t live up to who she thought she’d been, who she thought she had to be, then she could become someone else.
Avar.
Just Avar.
But that wasn’t true. It had never been true.
And now a small Ugnaught pilot had held up a mirror. Had reminded her who she really was. Someone who tried.
So that’s exactly what she was going to do.
“Okay,” she said. “Okay. You can come.” She turned around.
But Belin and KC-78 were already outside, fixing the ship ahead of their journey.
HINTIS IV
“There has to be a pattern to the raids. Something we’re not seeing. Run it again.” Bell folded his arms, standing back to regard the huge holographic map of the Stormwall barrier. Elsewhere, one of the RDC technicians punched a button and set the simulation cycling again.
They were standing in a large briefing room in the RDC base on Hintis IV, amid a clutter of monitor screens at diagnostic and research stations. Beings dressed in RDC coveralls bustled around them noisily, orchestrating several RDC missions across nearby sectors.
Bell studied the map. Pinpricks of light dotted its surface in sequence, showing points where, during the last year, different Nihil vessels had emerged from behind the Stormwall, erupting into realspace through the use of their arcane hyperspace paths. Most of them were raiding ships like the Cacophony, sometimes traveling in small fleets or convoys, sometimes alone. The Republic had been tracking each emergence since the barrier was first raised, trying to determine how to lay a trap for such vessels, and now the data had been fed into a simulation that replayed each emergence in order, representing them all on the holomap as flowering pinpricks of light.
Bell watched with a furrowed brow.
It looked to be utterly random. No clusters around certain exit points, no obvious logic to the timing of each emergence. Just a cloud of tiny, twinkling stars, marking each Nihil vessel as it swam out of the inky void.
“Rwaaaarrr,” said Burry, from the other side of the large, circular holodisplay.
“Yeah,” said Bell. “You’re right. It seems as chaotic as everything else the Nihil do. But there has to be a way of making sense of it. Of unlocking the pattern buried in all this.”
He waved his hand at the holo in frustration. Close by, Ember snorted in empathy.
They’d returned to the base on Hintis IV following their short excursion to Phrill. He was itching to be back out there patrolling the border, taking on the Nihil, but they’d been invited to a briefing to hear what the RDC technicians investigating the Nihil raids had managed to uncover, and Burry was keen they use that time and information to formulate a plan.
Which all made perfect sense. Burry was right. They needed a plan. But it still felt to Bell like sitting idle while the Nihil were out there, laughing at them.
And besides, being on Hintis IV seemed to set his teeth on edge.
The planet was the fourth from the bloated red carcass of the dying Hintis star, and the only one among them still inhabitable. It had once been the home to a vast civilization that, so Bell had been told, had thrived there for many thousands of years. As their star began to bloat and die over the course of the previous two centuries, however, the cities had dwindled as the Hintians had fled, resulting in an eventual full-scale evacuation, aided by the Republic, around fifty years earlier.
A Republic scientific outpost had been established among the ruins of one of the former cities, Belax, to gather data on the dying sun; an early warning system designed to ensure the fallout from the expanding giant would be minimal.
It was here that the RDC had established a temporary base after the Stormwall had gone up. Strategically close enough to the edge of the Occlusion Zone to be able to scramble fighters, but not so close that the Nihil raiders could pose any real risk.
Additionally, the radiation caused by the red sun would be enough to throw any unshielded sensors into disarray. It was the perfect cover.
It was also the place where Amaryl Pel was overseeing the repairs to the Tractate, following its near destruction at the hands of the Nihil’s drill ships. She’d assured him they’d be completed soon, and that requisitioning a replacement ship would take even longer.
For his part, Bell was still trying to get used to living in the red sun’s shadow. The strange light made him feel as if they were existing in a constant state of alertness. The color had a tense, almost febrile quality to it. It left him feeling jittery and unsettled.
Or perhaps that was simply his impatience.
“All right, Harlak,” said Bell, addressing the RDC technician who’d been assisting them, “you can turn it off now.”
“Aye,” acknowledged the Gran. He flicked a switch and the hologram stuttered out of existence, leaving Bell and Burry staring at each other across the projection table. Ember, who’d been curled by Bell’s feet since they’d arrived in the briefing room, had now started to pace, as if picking up on Bell’s tension.
Burry could see it, too. He kept telling Bell to get some rest, to take some time to center himself and meditate. He did it again now, but Bell waved the suggestion away wearily.
“I know you’re right, Burry. We both need some time out. But how can we rest when the Nihil are still out there, acting with impunity?”
“Arrroorrroo waa,” said Burry, his tone melancholic. He felt it perhaps even more keenly than Bell. They had to keep going. They had to stop the Cacophony, and others like Melis Shryke, from hurting any more people. More than that, they had to find a way to do what Elzar and the others had asked of them—to take a ship, capture a Path drive, and give the Jedi a way into the Occlusion Zone.
Master Mirro and his Padawan Amadeo had recently returned to the base from another such failed mission. Bell hadn’t spoken to either of them directly—they’d gone straight back out on patrol after refueling and collecting fresh resources, evidently smarting from their loss—but he understood it had been close, that the captured Nihil had scuttled their own Path drive rather than allow it to fall into Jedi hands.
All it took was one success.
Bell rolled the tired muscles of his neck and shoulders. Then, with a sigh, he walked to the set of sliding doors that led out onto the landing decks outside the main building. Burry and Ember fell into step behind him.
Out here the red sun dominated the horizon, its surface cratered and fizzing, its warmth now paltry against Bell’s upturned face. He looked down on the ruins of the city below, the fallen towers, the crumbling walls, the creeping vines, and the roots that had already begun to reclaim the land that was once theirs.
One day, not too long in the future, all of this would be dust and ash. It reminded him of the ruined settlement on Phrill. And all the others they’d seen in recent months.
“Is this all that’s left in the end, Burry?”
It was a rhetorical question, and Burryaga gave nothing but a low keening sound in reply. They stood in silence for a moment, Ember pacing around their legs.
Bell rubbed the back of his neck, then shook his head. “No. The legacy of this world isn’t the ruins, but the beings who have left to start new lives on other planets. To create new homes, alongside other, different peoples, carrying all that knowledge, experience, and love along with them. That’s what makes this different from what the Nihil are doing, razing settlements to the ground.” He gestured out at the ruinous view. “These are just stones and roads and things. It’s the people that matter.”
“Arrwooo rarrgh,” said Burry, in agreement.
“That’s how we’re going to defeat the Nihil, Burry. By saving people, one at a time if we have to. Just like we did on Phrill. Every life we protect is another blow well struck. By ensuring their legacy lives on, even if the Nihil take everything from them, we show the Nihil that they can never truly win.”
“It’s a nice sentiment,” said a voice from behind them. Bell turned to see Amaryl Pel standing on the landing dock nearby. He hadn’t even sensed her arrival. He was too wrapped up in his own thoughts. “And you might want to hold that thought,” she added.
“What is it?” asked Bell.
Pel smiled. “The Tractate,” she said, “it’s ready for service.”
“Already?” said Bell.
Pel shrugged. “Well, the portside air lock isn’t tested, the cannons haven’t been recalibrated, and the air scrubbers need new filters, but there’s no drill ship sticking out of the side of it, if that’s what you mean…”
Bell felt a surge of adrenaline.
Finally, we can get back out there. We can do something.
He glanced at Burry. “You coming?” he said.
Burry looked pained. “Wraarr waaar wooo,” he said, which roughly translated, as far as Bell could tell, to: “The ship might be ready, but are you?”
Bell forced a grin. “Of course I’m ready. Harlak and the others will keep analyzing the data from the raids. We’re needed out there, Burry. You know that.”
Burry nodded and fell into step beside Bell as he followed the Tractate’s captain back into the base, but the Wookiee didn’t look convinced.
Not for a moment.
CORUSCANT
It was a cool night on Coruscant, and the breeze on the landing platform stirred Elzar’s robes, sending a chill shiver down his spine. He scratched at his beard. He felt out of sorts. Nothing about this situation was good. He was plagued by misgivings. To allow Ghirra Starros back on Coruscant? It seemed like a ludicrous thing to do. But then, Lina Soh knew what she was doing.
He glanced across at her, standing beside him, not even a single strand of hair lifted out of place by the breeze. How did she always manage to look so immaculate and serene? He knew that behind her carefully fashioned façade, she was frantic and anxious and brimming with the same uncertainty he now felt. Somehow, she knew how to disguise that inner turmoil, though, to present her political façade to the galaxy. It was a skill that stood her well.
Behind the chancellor stood a brace of guards and attendants, all dressed in the assorted fineries of a welcoming committee. And to Elzar’s left stood two members of the Jedi High Council, Soleil Agra and Ry Ki-Sakka. Their expressions were giving nothing away, either.
It was an impressive turnout indeed, for the enemy. But then Ghirra Starros always had been a good politician, too, just like Lina Soh.
This meeting was the fruit of the communications that the chancellor had alluded to during her speech on the eve of the anniversary of Starlight’s fall. The eve of Pra-Tre Veter’s execution.
Yet despite what Marchion Ro had done, the chancellor and the Jedi Council had both agreed to Ghirra’s proposal for a diplomatic meeting. Ghirra claimed she wanted to suggest a path to peace between the Nihil and the Republic, and while Elzar knew they had to hear any such proposals out, to talk of peace only days after her leader had carried out such a brutal public murder seemed…well, it left a bad taste in his mouth.
Added to that, the proposal had come with a clear warning: If anything were to happen to disrupt the talks—such as Ghirra and her allies being taken into custody—the Jedi and the Republic would pay.
So much for peace.
Thankfully Elzar was only there as an observer. The chancellor and the Council members would do the talking. And Ghirra, no doubt.
He glanced across at Lina Soh again. “Cold night.”
Soh fixed him with her cool regard. “Something on your mind, Master Jedi?”
Elzar couldn’t suppress a quiet chuckle. She didn’t miss a thing. “Are you certain you’re not a Jedi?”
“Elzar…”
“It’s a bold move, I’ll give them that. Especially after what they did to Master Veter.”
“After everything they’ve done,” said Soh. “But all the same, it’s our duty to hear them out. Especially if it could lead to a cessation of hostilities. And perhaps even an opportunity to reach out to some of our people in the Occlusion Zone.”
Elzar understood her thinking all too well. She would do anything to know that Kip was safe. And he couldn’t blame her.
The high-pitched burr of a shuttle engine cut through the background hum of the city. Elzar lifted his gaze. The ship, still too distant to be seen clearly, had started its descent. “Here comes our unwelcome visitor.”
“Ghirra Starros is still a senator, Elzar,” said Soh.
“Even though she threw her lot in with a bunch of thieves and murderers?” said Elzar.
“Opinion in the Senate is divided. Some seek to expel her. Others believe her to be a captive of the Nihil, strong-armed to do their bidding.”
“And what do you think?” asked Elzar.
“I think we’ll find out soon enough,” replied Soh.
“What do you hope to gain from this meeting? Surely you can’t believe that the Nihil come to offer the hand of diplomacy.”
