Mercy Kill

by Aaron Allston

  He closed the top of his pack with a clack and secured the seal. Then he checked the catches that held the separate ordnance pack to see that they were moving freely. That mattered when he needed to jettison explosive materials fast. When he glanced up, Fi was propped on one elbow, looking down at him from the bunk.

  “Dry rations go on the fifth layer,” he said.

  Niner always packed them farther down, between his spare rappelling line and his hygiene kit. “In your squad, maybe,” he said, and carried on.

  Fi took the hint and rolled over on his back again, no doubt to meditate on how differently things might be done in the future.

  After a while he started singing very quietly, almost under his breath: Kom’rk tsad droten troch nyn ures adenn, Dha Werda Verda a’den tratu. They were the wrath of the warrior’s shadow and the gauntlet of the Republic; Niner knew the song. It was a traditional Mandalorian war chant, designed to boost the morale of normal men who needed a bit of psyching up before a fight. The words had been altered a little to have meaning for the armies of clone warriors.

  We don’t need all that, Niner thought. We were born to fight, nothing else.

  But he found himself joining in anyway. It was a comfort. He placed his gear in the locker, rolled onto his bunk, and matched note and beat perfectly with Fi, two identical voices in the deserted barrack room.

  Niner would have traded every remaining moment of his life for a chance to rerun the previous day’s engagement. He would have held Sev and DD back; he would have sent O-Four west with the E-Web cannon.

  But he hadn’t.

  Gra’tua cuun hett su dralshy’a. Our vengeance burns brighter still.

  Fi’s voice trailed off into silence the merest fraction of a section before Niner’s. He heard him swallow hard.

  “I was up there with them, Sarge,” he said quietly. “I didn’t hang back. Not at all.”

  Niner closed his eyes. He regretted hinting that Fi might have done anything less.

  “I know, brother,” he said. “I know.”

  Introduction to the REBELLION Era

  (0–5 YEARS AFTER STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE)

  This is the period of the classic Star Wars movie trilogy—A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi—in which a ragtag band of Rebels battles the Empire, and Luke Skywalker learns the ways of the Force and must avoid his father’s fate.

  During this time, the Empire controls nearly the entire settled galaxy. Out in the Rim worlds, Imperial stormtroopers suppress uprisings with brutal efficiency, many alien species have been enslaved, and entire star systems are brutally exploited by the Empire’s war machine. In the central systems, however, most citizens support the Empire, weighing misgivings about its harsh methods against the memories of the horror and chaos of the Clone Wars. Few dare to openly oppose Emperor Palpatine’s rule.

  But the Rebel Alliance is growing. Rebel cells strike in secret from hidden bases scattered among the stars, encouraging some of the braver Senators to speak out against the Empire. When the Rebels learn that the Empire is building the Death Star, a space station with enough firepower to destroy entire planets, Princess Leia Organa, who represents her homeworld, Alderaan, in the Senate and is secretly a high-ranking member of the Rebel Alliance, receives the plans for the battle station and flees in search of the exiled Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi.

  Thus begin the events that lead her to meet the smuggler and soon-to-be hero Han Solo, to discover her long-lost brother, Luke Skywalker, and to help the Rebellion take down the Emperor and restore democracy to the galaxy: the events of the three films A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi.

  If you’re a reader looking for places to jump in and explore the Rebellion-era novels, here are five great places to start:

  • Death Star, by Michael Reaves and Steve Perry: The story of the construction of the massive battle station, touching on the lives of the builders, planners, soldiers, and support staff who populate the monstrous vessel, as well as the masterminds behind the design and those who intend to make use of it: the Emperor and Darth Vader.

  • The Mandalorian Armor, by K. W. Jeter: The famous bounty hunter Boba Fett stars in a twisty tale of betrayal within the galactic underworld, highlighted by a riveting confrontation between bounty hunters and a band of Hutts.

  • Shadows of the Empire, by Steve Perry: A tale of the shadowy parts of the Empire and an underworld criminal mastermind who is out to kill Luke Skywalker, while our other heroes try to figure out how to rescue Han Solo, who has been frozen in carbonite for delivery to Jabba the Hutt.

  • Tales of the Bounty Hunters, edited by Kevin J. Anderson: The bounty hunters summoned by Darth Vader to capture the Millennium Falcon tell their stories in this anthology of short tales, culminating with Daniel Keys Moran’s elegiac “The Last One Standing.”

  • Luke Skywalker and the Shadows of Mindor, by Matthew Stover: A tale set shortly after the events of Return of the Jedi, in which Luke must defeat the flamboyant dark sider known as Lord Shadowspawn while the pilots of Rogue Squadron duel his servants amid tumbling asteroids.

  Read on for an excerpt from a Star Wars Legends novel set in the Rebellion era.

  Prologue

  He looks like a walking corpse, Xizor thought. Like a mummified body dead a thousand years. Amazing he is still alive, much less the most powerful man in the galaxy. He isn’t even that old; it is more as if something is slowly eating him.

  Xizor stood four meters away from the Emperor, watching as the man who had long ago been Senator Palpatine moved to stand in the holocam field. He imagined he could smell the decay in the Emperor’s worn body. Likely that was just some trick of the recycled air, run through dozens of filters to ensure that there was no chance of any poison gas being introduced into it. Filtered the life out of it, perhaps, giving it that dead smell.

  The viewer on the other end of the holo-link would see a close-up of the Emperor’s head and shoulders, of an age-ravaged face shrouded in the cowl of his dark zeyd-cloth robe. The man on the other end of the transmission, light-years away, would not see Xizor, though Xizor would be able to see him. It was a measure of the Emperor’s trust that Xizor was allowed to be here while the conversation took place.

  The man on the other end of the transmission—if he could still be called that—

  The air swirled inside the Imperial chamber in front of the Emperor, coalesced, and blossomed into the image of a figure down on one knee. A caped humanoid biped dressed in jet black, face hidden under a full helmet and breathing mask:

  Darth Vader.

  Vader spoke: “What is thy bidding, my master?”

  If Xizor could have hurled a power bolt through time and space to strike Vader dead, he would have done it without blinking. Wishful thinking: Vader was too powerful to attack directly.

  “There is a great disturbance in the Force,” the Emperor said.

  “I have felt it,” Vader said.

  “We have a new enemy. Luke Skywalker.”

  Skywalker? That had been Vader’s name, a long time ago. Who was this person with the same name, someone so powerful as to be worth a conversation between the Emperor and his most loathsome creation? More importantly, why had Xizor’s agents not uncovered this before now? Xizor’s ire was instant—but cold. No sign of his surprise or anger would show on his imperturbable features. The Falleen did not allow their emotions to burst forth as did many of the inferior species; no, the Falleen ancestry was not fur but scales, not mammalian but reptilian. Not wild but coolly calculating. Such was much better. Much safer.

  “Yes, my master,” Vader continued.

  “He could destroy us,” the Emperor said.

  Xizor’s attention was riveted upon the Emperor and the holographic image of Vader kneeling on the deck of a ship far away. Here was interesting news indeed. Something the Emperor perceived as a danger to himself? Something the Emperor feared?

  “He’s just a boy,” Vader said, “Obi
-Wan can no longer help him.”

  Obi-Wan. That name Xizor knew. He was among the last of the Jedi Knights, a general. But he’d been dead for decades, hadn’t he?

  Apparently Xizor’s information was wrong if Obi-Wan had been helping someone who was still a boy. His agents were going to be sorry.

  Even as Xizor took in the distant image of Vader and the nearness of the Emperor, even as he was aware of the luxury of the Emperor’s private and protected chamber at the core of the giant pyramidal palace, he was also able to make a mental note to himself: Somebody’s head would roll for the failure to make him aware of all this. Knowledge was power; lack of knowledge was weakness. This was something he could not permit.

  The Emperor continued. “The Force is strong with him. The son of Skywalker must not become a Jedi.”

  Son of Skywalker?

  Vader’s son! Amazing!

  “If he could be turned he would become a powerful ally,” Vader said.

  There was something in Vader’s voice when he said this, something Xizor could not quite put his finger on. Longing? Worry?

  Hope?

  “Yes … yes. He would be a great asset,” the Emperor said. “Can it be done?”

  There was the briefest of pauses. “He will join us or die, Master.”

  Xizor felt the smile, though he did not allow it to show any more than he had allowed his anger play. Ah. Vader wanted Skywalker alive, that was what had been in his tone. Yes, he had said that the boy would join them or die, but this latter part was obviously meant only to placate the Emperor. Vader had no intention of killing Skywalker, his own son; that was obvious to one as skilled in reading voices as was Xizor. He had not gotten to be the Dark Prince, Underlord of Black Sun, the largest criminal organization in the galaxy, merely on his formidable good looks. Xizor didn’t truly understand the Force that sustained the Emperor and made him and Vader so powerful, save to know that it certainly worked somehow. But he did know that it was something the extinct Jedi had supposedly mastered. And now, apparently, this new player had tapped into it. Vader wanted Skywalker alive, had practically promised the Emperor that he would deliver him alive—and converted.

  This was most interesting.

  Most interesting indeed.

  The Emperor finished his communication and turned back to face him. “Now, where were we, Prince Xizor?”

  The Dark Prince smiled. He would attend to the business at hand, but he would not forget the name of Luke Skywalker.

  1

  Chewbacca roared his rage. A stormtrooper grabbed at him and he knocked the man flying, armor clattering as he fell into the pit. Two more guards came in, and the Wookiee battered them both aside as if they were nothing, a child tossing dolls around—

  In another second one of Vader’s troops would shoot Chewie. He was big and strong, but he couldn’t win; they’d cut him down—

  Han started yelling at the Wookiee, calming him.

  Leia stared, unable to move, unable to believe this was happening.

  Han kept talking: “Chewie, there’ll be another time! The princess, you have to take care of her. D’you hear me? Huh?”

  They were in a dank chamber in the bowels of Cloud City on Bespin, where Han’s so-called friend Lando Calrissian had betrayed them to Darth Vader. The scene was bathed in a buttery golden light that made it seem even more surreal. Chewbacca blinked at Han, the half-assembled droid Threepio jutting from a sack on the Wookiee’s back. The traitor Calrissian stood off to one side like some feral creature. There were more guards, techs, bounty hunters. Vader and the stink of liquid carbonite permeated the air around them all, a smell of morgues and graves combined.

  More guards moved in, to put cuffs on Chewie. The Wookiee nodded, calmer. Yes, he understood Han. He didn’t like it, but he understood. He allowed the guards to cuff him—

  Han and Leia looked at each other. This can’t be happening, she thought. Not now.

  The emotion took them; neither could resist it. They came together like magnets, held each other. They embraced, kissed, full of fire and hope—full of ashes and despair—

  Two stormtroopers jerked Han away, backed him onto the liftplate over the makeshift freezing chamber.

  The words erupted from Leia unbidden, uncontrollable, lava blasted from a volcanic explosion: “I love you!”

  And Han, brave, strong Han, nodded at her. “I know.”

  The Ugnaught techs, not much more than half Han’s height, moved in, unbound his hands, stepped away.

  Han looked at the techs, then at Leia again. The liftplate sank, lowered him into the pit. He locked his gaze with Leia’s, held it, held it … until the cloud of freezing vapor boiled up and blocked their view—

  Chewie yelled; Leia didn’t understand his speech, but she understood his rage, his grief, his feeling of helplessness.

  Han!

  Stinking, acrid gas spewed up and rolled over them, an icy fog, a roiling soul-chilling smoke through which Leia saw Vader watching it all under his inscrutable mask. She heard Threepio sputter, “What—What’s going on? Turn ’round! Chewbacca, I can’t see!”

  Han!

  Oh, Han!

  Leia sat up abruptly, her pulse racing. The sheets were sweaty and wadded around her, her night garment damp. She sighed, swung her legs over the side of the bed, and sat staring at the wall. The chronometer inset showed her it was three hours past midnight. The air in the room smelled stale. Outside, she knew, the Tatooine night would be chilly, and she considered opening a vent to allow some of that coolness inside. At the moment, it seemed too much effort to bother.

  A bad dream, she thought. That’s all it was.

  But—no. She couldn’t pretend it had been only a nightmare. It had been more than that. It was a memory. It had happened. The man she loved was embedded in a block of carbonite, had been hauled away like a crate of cargo by a bounty hunter. Lost to her, somewhere in the vastness of the galaxy.

  She felt the emotions well, felt them threaten to spill out in tears, but she fought it. She was Leia Organa, Princess of the Royal Family of Alderaan, elected to the Imperial Senate, a worker in the Alliance to Restore the Republic. Alderaan was gone, destroyed by Vader and the Death Star; the Imperial Senate was disbanded; the Alliance was outmanned and outgunned ten thousand to one, but she was who she was. She would not cry.

  She would not cry.

  She would get even.

  Three hours past midnight, and half the planet slept.

  Luke Skywalker stood barefoot on the steelcrete platform sixty meters above the sand, looking at the taut wire. He wore plain black pants and shirt and a black leather belt. He no longer had a lightsaber, though he’d started constructing another one, using the plans he’d found in an old leather-bound book at Ben Kenobi’s. It was a traditional exercise for a Jedi, so he’d been told. It had given him something to do while his new hand had finished final bonding to his arm. It had kept him from thinking too much.

  The lights under the canopy were dim; he could barely see the stranded-steel line. The carnival was done for the night, the acrobats and dewbacks and jesters long asleep. The crowds had gone home, and he was alone; alone here with the tightrope. It was quiet, the only sound the creak of the syn tent fabric as it cooled in the arms of the Tatooine summer night. The hot desert day gave up its heat quickly, and it was cold enough outside the tent to need a jacket. The smell of the dewbacks drifted up to where he perched, and mingled with that of his own sweat.

  A guard whose mind had accepted Luke’s mental command to allow him inside the giant tent stood watch at the entrance, blind now to his presence. A Jedi skill, that kind of control, but another one he had only begun to learn.

  Luke took a deep breath, let it out slowly. There was no net below, and a fall from this height would surely be fatal. He didn’t have to do this. Nobody was going to make him take the walk.

  Nobody but himself.

  He calmed his breathing, his heartbeat, and, as much as possible, his mind,
using the method he had learned. First Ben, then Master Yoda had taught him the ancient arts. Yoda’s exercises had been the more rigorous and exhausting, but unfortunately, Luke had not finished his schooling. There really hadn’t been any choice at the time. Han and Leia had been in deadly danger, and he’d had to go to them. Because he had gone, they were alive, but …

  That hadn’t turned out well.

  No. Not at all.

  And there had been the meeting with Vader …

  He felt his face tighten, his jaw muscles dance, and he fought the anger that surged up in him like a hormonal tide as black as the clothes he wore. His wrist ached suddenly where Vader’s lightsaber had sliced through it. The new hand was as good as the old, better, maybe, but sometimes when he thought about Vader, it throbbed. Phantom limb pain, the medics had said. Not real.

  “I’m your father.”

  No! That couldn’t be real, either! His father had been Anakin Skywalker, a Jedi.

  If only he could talk to Ben. Or to Yoda. They would confirm it. They would tell him the truth. Vader had tried to manipulate him, had tried to throw him off balance, that was all.

  But—what if it was true …?

  No. Leave it. It wouldn’t help to dwell on that now. He wasn’t going to be able to do anybody any good unless he mastered his Jedi skills. He had to trust in the Force and move on. No matter what lies Vader had spewed. There was a war on, much to do, and while he was a good pilot, he was supposed to have more to offer to the Alliance.

  It wasn’t easy, and it didn’t seem to be getting any easier. He wished he felt sure of himself, but the fact was, he didn’t. He felt as if a weight were riding on him, more than he’d ever thought possible. A few years ago, he’d been a farm boy, working with Uncle Owen, going nowhere. Now there was Han, the Empire, the Alliance, Vader—