Remnant: Force Heretic I (35 page)

Nom Anor woke to the sound of screams and the realization that, even in the depths of Yuuzhan’tar, he would never be safe.

Years of backstabbing—sometimes literally—his way toward the top had taught him to be a light sleeper. It was a habit that had served him well, saving his life more than once in the years before his exile. But even here, in the bowels of the planet, he slept with the coufee he had carved from a discarded flake of coral within reach at all times, and the socket containing his plaeryin bol always half open. If anyone was fool enough to attempt attacking him during the night, they would wind up dead within moments of intruding in his sleeping quarters.

This reflexive response had almost brought one of his new companions to an unfortunate end a week earlier. Quite unexpectedly, considering he had done nothing to curry her favor, he’d been visited in the dark hours by Niiriit Esh. In his usual semiconscious state he had sensed her presence and leapt from his sleeping mat, limbs instinctively adopting an attacking stance and his coufee whipping out to slash his attacker across the throat.

He had barely reined in the attack in time. The faintest of lambent glows had revealed the shock in her eyes—as well as the hurt. Silent in her mortification, she had hurried from the room, her simple shift swishing against the shell walls as she retreated to her chamber.

In the couple of heartbeats after she had fled, he realized with some embarrassment that she had almost certainly been unarmed, and that there had been no intentions of hostility in her actions. Far from it.

But that had been then;
this
awakening left nothing in doubt: he and the other Shamed Ones were under attack.

From the commotion outside, Nom Anor knew that the scream that had awoken him had been the sentry, Yus Sh’roth, being killed. It was a shame, he thought idly; the former shaper had been a vital member of this community of Shamed Ones. Nevertheless, Nom Anor neither had the time or the desire to grieve. The fact was, Sh’roth’s death scream could mean life for the others, because it gave them time to ready themselves for the invaders—whoever they were.

Maybe, he thought, it was nothing more than a loner that had inadvertently stumbled upon the camp and been surprised by Sh’roth; or perhaps even just another band of Shamed Ones hoping to make a silent raid while the camp slept, trying to steal some food—

But, no. He was fooling himself. The sound of amphistaffs cracking left no doubt in his mind that these attackers were warriors. Their camp was too deep to have been fallen upon by some passing patrol, which meant only one thing: these warriors, these trained killers, had been deliberately sent to wipe it out.

The certainty was more than enough to spur Nom Anor into action. He quickly gathered his things and left his humble dwelling, knowing as he did that it was unlikely he would ever return. Outside he was almost bowled over by someone dashing past in a wild panic, heading down the long, spiraling corridor that ran the length of the disused ventilation shaft. Probably I’pan, he thought, given the wily thief’s knack for getting out of difficult situations.

Waiting in the shadows a second longer, Nom Anor listened carefully for the sound of anyone pursuing I’pan. But there was none. All he heard were distant footfalls
and muffled cries. He didn’t know how many warriors there were, but it was clear they had the upper hand. The cavern was quickly filling with the sound of the Shamed Ones’ massacre.

Not this Shamed One,
Nom Anor swore to himself, turning to follow I’pan down the corridor into the depths of the shaft where the chuk’a hibernated, and wishing his former companions speedy passages to the afterlife—if one awaited them. The Shamed Ones had, without question, saved him from what had been a very difficult situation when he’d fled Shimrra’s wrath. He had lasted longer than expected by eating granite slugs, but eventually he would have succumbed to this alien environment and died—at the hands of a predator, or from something as simple and stupid as drinking poisoned water. He owed them his life and, thanks to their stories about the Jedi, there was every chance he owed them his future, too.

But what future would he have, he asked himself, if he were to charge up the corridor now and throw himself at a squad of fully armed warriors? He was just one against an unknown number.

He had owed a few people his life before. He owed no one a death.

With that in mind, he pulled a lambent from the wall and headed off down the gentle, curving slope in the direction I’pan had taken. Before he’d even taken a dozen steps, though, a high-pitched shriek brought him to a halt. He stood still for a moment, looking back in the direction of the scream, and knowing in his heart that it had come from Niiriit Esh. He hesitated for what seemed like an eternity, his newfound sense of responsibility causing within him a tremendous conflict. Niiriit might have been Shamed, but she was still a warrior,
and she would never have run away from a battle. She would have fought to the death, for honor, for Yun-Yammka, for—

He shook his head vigorously. This was all wrong, he told himself. He was still thinking of her in terms he knew from the world above. But she was no longer a warrior; she was a
Shamed One.
She wouldn’t have given her life to Yun-Yammka, the Slayer; she would have sacrificed herself to save her friends, as the Jedi did. Her memory deserved the truth, even if it still felt wrong to him.

He turned and continued down the passage, practically smelling the blood lust of the killing squad chasing him into the darkness.

The hulking mass of an old
Katana
-class Dreadnaught lumbered out of Borosk’s lower orbits, where it had been lurking unnoticed since the beginning of the battle. Saba was familiar with its type; she knew her history well. It was a survivor of the Dark Force fleet that Admiral Thrawn had used so effectively against the New Republic. Reclaimed and refitted with centrally computerized slave-rigging units, it operated with a bare minimum of crew. Even so, its sluggish hyperdrive and weak shields had left such vessels sorely outclassed by more recent ships, and Saba was surprised to see one still operating. She wasn’t the only one.

“That heap of junk isn’t going to get us very far,” Mara had said upon seeing it.

“That’s exactly what you’re supposed to think,” Pellaeon had replied over the comm. “And besides, it’s not supposed to.”

By then, Saba had changed ships and changed into one of the brown, lightly armored jumpsuits that had become standard for Jedi Knights going into close combat
with the Yuuzhan Vong ever since the mission to the worldship orbiting Myrkr. Danni Quee had also slipped into one and was sitting nervously with Saba as they listened in on the discussion about the ship that would ferry them into position. Saba’s claws twitched in readiness, filled with a primal need to strike back at the ones that had taken her people from her.

How better could they be remembered?

“I’ve been saving it for a suicide strike,” the Grand Admiral had gone on to explain. “It’s designed to die twice. The first time, what the enemy sees is selective field failures and shaped charges designed to make it look like the engines have failed. Then, when it looks like it’s adrift in vacuum, it comes back to life and takes everyone by surprise.”

“You hope,” Mara had put in wryly.

Pellaeon had shrugged in his tank. “That’s the plan, anyway. We’ve never had cause to use it before.”

“The difference between a fake death and a real one is slim,” Mara had commented.

“I am aware of that,” he’d said soberly. “That’s why the crew complement has been reduced to the bare minimum. We found some old combat droid brains mothballed in storage. Emperor Palpatine recovered them when Governor Beltane’s SD project fell in a heap, decades ago. Since there’s never been an SD-Eleven and we needed every resource we’ve got, I figured we could combine the two and create something new. This ship is pretty much capable of flying itself to the target, maintaining a convincing semblance of attack, keeping its crew alive while the outer shell ‘dies,’ then commencing the second, covert operation in accordance with new instructions. There’s plenty of room on the inside for stabilizers and inertial dampeners; it’s basically just a hollow
shell. Ordinarily we’d crew it with a squadron of TIE fighters and some troopers, blow the shell when surprise can be maximized, then retreat, if possible. But I’m sure we can make room for other cargo.”

On the way in, Saba knew, “other cargo” meant
Jade Shadow
and a reduced TIE fighter contingent. If all went according to plan, the Dreadnaught—originally
Braxant Brave,
but hastily renamed
Braxant Bonecrusher
in honor of her plan—would cram its empty heart with liberated slaves. A rapid repressurization unit had been installed at one end of the massive space;
Jade Shadow
’s tractor beam would help capture the slave carrier and its contents; force fields would keep the air and cargo in long enough for the ship to jump to safety while
Jade Shadow
and the fighters covered its back.

That was the plan, anyway. It was, as Pellaeon had suggested, almost crazy enough to work. Saba kept her thoughts carefully away from what she would like to do to the Yuuzhan Vong if the chance arose. Instead she concentrated on the people in the slaveship. They were what mattered. Not her. Not what she had lost.

“All in place,” came Jacen’s voice over the secure comlink. “Ready for you to dock, Aunt Mara.”

Jade Shadow
’s thrusters fired to jockey it into the same orbit as
Bonecrusher.
“All systems go?” Mara asked.

“Initial jump locked in; the drives are hot. We’re ready when you are.”

Jacen had wanted to be involved in the mission as soon as he’d heard about it. Pellaeon, however, had advised against it.

“You should stay behind,” the Grand Admiral had said. “That’s where a responsible leader belongs.”

Jacen had seemed mystified by this. “But I’m not leading anyone.”

“One day you will,” Pellaeon had said, “and you owe
it to those who follow you to be there for them, both during and after a campaign.”

The comments had been a compliment to Jacen’s character, but it didn’t seem to compensate for the idea of being left out of the mission. While he obviously appreciated the Grand Admiral’s confidence in him, he still did not want to be left behind. In the end, he had eventually forced a compromise. He would be the human brain behind the droid minds during
Bonecrusher
’s elaborate ruse, hidden away inside the Dreadnaught shell, where it was safe, and from where he was currently directing the operation. As sophisticated as the SD combat droids had been, they were no match for a Jedi, and Saba felt better knowing that she could trust the Dreadnaught to do what it was supposed to do with Jacen behind it. Once she and Danni were in the slaveship, she wanted to know that there would be somewhere to escape to on the way out.

Danni checked her pressure seals for what seemed like the thousandth time as
Jade Shadow
nudged its way into
Bonecrusher
’s ordinary-looking flight deck. They had enough air for six hours. If they weren’t out by then, they would need to locate pressurized areas on the slaveship, or find alternate ways to breathe.

“It’z okay,” Saba told Danni, who had moved from nervously checking her suit seals to rummaging through her instrument pack, making sure she’d not left anything behind. “Remember yammosk hunting.”

“That was easy compared to this.” Danni looked much younger with her hair pulled back into the hood of the jumpsuit; at barely half Saba’s mass, she wouldn’t have even passed for a Barabel child. But Saba was under no illusion as to what the woman was capable of. She had survived the Yuuzhan Vong on numerous occasions. Some people had even joked that she was a good-luck
charm. Saba didn’t know about that, but she did know that the woman was Force-sensitive, and that had to work in their favor.

Her breaths came in long, deep waves, filling her with an energy she hadn’t felt for months. The thought of the challenge was exciting and unnerving at the same time. She told herself that she was equal to it, but she knew that it didn’t matter if she wasn’t. She had to try. It was the only way she would ever be free.

A series of deep clangs announced that
Jade Shadow
had passed through the flight deck’s fake inner hull and docked with the heavy grapnels designed to withstand the shaking the Dreadnaught would receive during the early stages of its mission. Over Mara’s shoulder, Saba could see two rows of closely packed TIE fighters cradled in cushioning energy nets. The fake flight deck was filled with older TIE fighters piloted by less sophisticated droid brains, designed to act as decoys during the initial attack.

“Breaking orbit,” Jacen said. The ship might have been old, but its inertial dampeners were first-rate. Saba felt nothing at all as its drives engaged. “Heading for the jump point.”

“Fly well,
Braxant Bonecrusher
,” came Grand Admiral Pellaeon’s voice over the comm. “We’ll keep them as busy as we can for you down here.”

“Thanks, Gilad,” Mara said. “Just make sure you’re still around to pick up our pieces afterward.”

“It will be my pleasure to return the favor.”

Saba felt a stirring through the Force as though Luke and his departing wife were communicating in private—and then there was nothing but the silence of hyperspace. Her connection with the living universe was gone. They were on their way.

“First jump engaged,” Jacen said.

“Trim optimal,” interceded a droid voice, deep but with
jarring, nasal overtones—the voice of the droid brains doing the job normally done by thousands of crew. “Projection optimal. All systems optimal.”

“ETA?”

“Seven point five-three standard minutes,” the droid replied. “Perfectly optimal.”

“I don’t suppose
above
optimal is an option, is it?” Jacen asked.

“Good question,” Mara said, pushing her hair back from her face as she leaned back into her molded flight seat. “If we could shave off a few seconds, that could only be a good thing.”