while he had some regrets, the situation was what it was. He headed for the
door, opened it-
And stopped in surprise. Jos Vandar stood before him, a blaster in his
hand, pointed right at him.
39
The mortar rounds fell more often, and Den's comment about particle
beam and laser weaponry was proving to be valid-even in the bright sunshine,
the destructive rays of coherent energy were visible in the distance,
reflecting off the dust particles and spores in the air. So far, none of
them had passed close to the dome, but their luck wouldn't hold forever. As
Barriss hurried to find Vaetes and report her suspicion-her certainty-of
Merit's guilt, she noticed that a thunderstorm was heading their way. That
was good-heavy rain interfered with tactical beam weapons, absorbing or
deflecting much of their force. Probably didn't do battle droids any good to
be hit by lightning, either. But as the sky darkened, the weaponry flashes
seemed to be coming more and more frequently, mixed with those of the
natural lightning.
War, in all its deadly aspects, was coming on swift feet.
The sense of impending doom was nearly palpable. It was too late now
for the capture of the Separatist spy to do them much good, Barriss knew. He
could be made to answer for his crimes-assuming any of the Republic forces
survived to do that-but with the attack obviously in full swing, Merit
wasn't Barriss's biggest worry. The survival of the camp was. Unless a
miracle carne to pass,
the combined mortar and energy weapon attacks would pound them all into
paste.
You can stop it.
It was an almost tangible voice in her head. She was carrying a popper
of bota in her pocket. Just take it out, inject it into her arm, and in a
few seconds she would have the ability to turn the tide of conflict, no
question about it. She knew this. She couldn't say how it would manifest,
exactly; probably it wouldn't be as simple as just waving her hands and
watching all the attacking battle droids shut down and fall over. A pity
they weren't controlled by a single orbiting broadcast power source, like
the army the Trade Federation had fielded during the Battle of Naboo, but
someone had wised up since then. Nevertheless, somewhere in the vast and
omnipotent energies of the Force there was a way to stop them, and she
could, with the bota's help, reach it.
She knew this. There was no doubt.
How would it feel to have that much power, to be able to stop a war? To
go from being a Padawan to becoming the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy in
a matter of moments-one who could use the Force in ways no one had ever been
able to even comprehend, much less use, before? To direct vast energies,
primal powers, like an active volcano channeling molten rock and hurling it
in erupting fountains of lava? Nothing could stand before it. There was
nothing in the galaxy that could resist the Force, if it could but be
channeled properly, shaped and primed and driven by her will.
She reached into her pocket and gripped the injector.
Think of all the lives you can save.
Yes. That was what she did, wasn't it? That was her primary mission.
She was a healer. She saved lives. Only this time, it would be on an
enormously larger scale.
The storm drew close. Lightning flashed, thunder boomed, to join the
sound of mortars exploding against the protective force-dome. It was true
that Master Unduli or Master Yoda or Master Windu would be so much better
suited to this task, but they weren't here. Barriss was the only Jedi in a
hundred cubic parsecs, as far as she knew.
The moment had come. She had to choose-now.
Take the bota and save them all, or-
Don't take the bota, and know that countless beings-including some whom
she had come to know as friends-would certainly die.
Barriss pulled the injector from her pocket. By now the environment had
become virtually apocalyptic-the exploding mortars, thunder, and lightning
were almost constant, and in addition lasers and particle beams were
starting to strike the dome itself. One hit almost directly above her, and
the resulting cascade of high-energy pulses along the dome's outer aspect
was nearly blinding. Supposedly the field kept out gamma rays, alpha
particles, and other deadly radiation, but for how much longer? Already she
could feel her skin tingling in the ionized air, could taste the residual
ozone.
The choice was simple enough, wasn't it? Why even hesitate? The gain
here far outweighed the risks; the end more than justified the means. She
had been to the heart of the Force already-how could it be wrong to go back
now and seize it, use it for such a noble purpose? It would feel good, so
good, it was right. . .
She cleared her left sleeve, held the injector in her right hand. She
positioned it over the inside of her wrist. Another buzzing lance of
energy-she couldn't tell if it was a laser or a particle beam-hit, and more
fireworks resuited. Barriss touched the popper to her skin. She put her
thumb on the firing stud-
And, as she was about to trigger it, a memory rose within her, a memory
of Oa Park on Coruscant, of a lesson she had learned there, one that she had
already applied here on Drongar, when facing the deadly fighter Phow Ji.
The memory of a conversation between her and her teacher about the dark
side:
There may come a time when you experience this, Barriss. I hope not,
but if ever it happens, you must recognize and resist it.
It will feel evil?
Ob, no. It will feel better than anything you have ever experienced,
better than you would have thought anything could feel. It will feel
empowering, fulfilling, satisfying. Worst of all, it will feel right. And
therein lies the real danger.
Barriss Offee stood under stormy and violent skies, only the slightest
pressure of her finger away from rejoining the Force in a way that had been
more wonderful than anything she had ever felt, or had ever imagined
anything could feel.
And in that moment-a heartbeat, an eon-she understood what her teacher
had been trying to tell her that day in the park. To give in to the dark
side was the path to ruination, to corruption worse even than death. Dead,
you could not harm anyone. But alive, and with the dark side driving you,
you could become a monster.
She remembered as well something she had told Uli a couple of weeks
ago:
Those who embrace the dark side don't see themselves as evil. They
believe that they are doing the right thing for the right reasons. The dark
side warps their thinking, and they come to believe that the end justifies
the means, no matter how awful those means might be.
Had her previous experience truly been of the dark side? No, she
decided. As she had also told Uli, the Force did not choose sides. But to
wield that kind of power, no matter how noble the intent, would almost
certainly lead to ruination-if not today, then tomorrow, or the day after.
Each time, the temptation to use it woul
d become more compelling, the
reasons for doing so more justifiable. She could feel the truth of that to
her core. That kind of power could not help but be addicting. It would
consume anyone who was less than absolutely pure, less than all-wise, less
than wholly selfless. Barriss was by no means a bad person, she knew that.
But she was not perfect, and such contact with the Force on a regular basis
needed perfection to survive uncorrupted.
Did it make sense to have the powers of a god, without the wisdom of a
god?
"Barriss?"
She had been so deep in her thoughts that she hadn't noticed Uli
trotting toward her. Startled, she looked at him.
"You okay?" he called, through another crash of thunder.
She smiled. Carefully, she lifted the popper from her arm and put it
back into her pocket. "Yes," she said. "Yes, actually, I am."
Another beam strike, another chromatic spill of ioniza-tion. Uli
glanced up nervously. "Everybody is supposed to get inside. Use a dosimeter
to make sure you're not getting cooked by backscatter radiation-they expect
the dome to go soon. And you'd better pack-just the absolute essentials, one
small bag per person. If the droid infantry gets through the troops, we'll
have to move-
fast. Right now, word is that it's an even fight, but who knows which
way it might go?"
"I understand. Thanks, Uli."
He nodded and hurried away into the gathering gloom. She turned to go
as well, but something stopped her. In that moment, Barriss felt something
new rise within her, a certainty as strong and real as her journey to the
center of the Force had been: she was a Padawan no longer.
And the knowledge of why welled in her, equally unmistakable:
You truly became a Jedi Knight on the day when you realized that you
already were one.
Standing there, amid the chaos and cacophony of the storm and the
Separatist attack, Barriss Offee threw back her head and laughed.
40
Merit said, "Jos? What is it?"
He scared at the human blocking his way. The blaster in Jos's hand was
dead still, as if the man's arm had been carved from wood.
"You killed Zan," Jos said, tonelessly.
Fear blossomed in Merit's gut, a flower made of frozen nitrogen. He let
none of it show. Somehow, Jos had become suspicious. It didn't mean his
cover had been blown-were that the case, he would most likely be facing
Colonel Vaetes and several military sees instead of the Rimsoo's chief
surgeon. This wouldn't be the first time he'd had to talk his way out of a
tight spot, and, unless his powers of empathy and persuasion had vanished
completely, it wouldn't be the last.
His expression was mildly quizzical, his tone solicitous as he said,
"No. Zan died when the Separatists attacked. The transport was hit by a
stray round. You were there, Jos. So was I, remember?"
"I remember," Jos said. Another beam of focused energy struck the dome,
and the resulting pyrotechnic display momentarily backlit him. It almost
seemed as if he had come here from some other, higher plane, a demon bent on
vengeance.
"I remember," he said again. "I remember also how you showed me how to
work through my grief, Klo. How your understanding, your ability to do your
job so well helped me heal, helped me put it behind me. I owe you for that,
Klo. Or I would-but, since you were involved in calling in the Separatist
strike, I think that kinda zeros out any obligation on my part. Don't you?"
How could be know? He can't know. He suspects, but he can't know. I was
too careful, I left nothing that would-
Forget about that now. Deal with the present problem. He could turn
this around. He was, after all, an adept at emotional manipulation and
control. Given time, he felt sure he could convince Jos that the man was
wrong, that he had made a mistake.
Time, however, was growing short.
"You're under a lot of stress, Jos," Merit said. "I don't know where
this delusion is coming from, but I think we should table any further
discussion until we're both safely offworld."
Jos laughed, but Merit's empathic abilities sensed no humor. Instead he
sensed rage, held in check by cold determination, like an ice cap plugging a
volcanic vent.
"Sorry," Jos said. "That just struck me as funny-you thinking you're
going anywhere." Thunder rumbled as if echoing his words.
Merit realized two things right then. One, that Jos Vandar wasn't
operating on a hunch or suspicion. He knew. How didn't matter. And that led
to realization number two: if he didn't kill Jos, Jos was going to kill him.
He'd played too many card games with the man to believe otherwise.
He sighed. He genuinely liked Jos, liked and admired the man. He had
wished to leave Drongar without having to kill again. But wishes seldom came
true.
Hidden in his right coat sleeve was a small hold-out blaster.
"Speaking of stress," Jos said, "I have to think you're under a fair
amount as well. How could you do it, Klo? What could possibly cause you to
betray your friends? Your clients? To kill people you knew, people you
worked with, ate with, played cards with?"
Shoot him. Shoot him and go. Every second you waste talking with him
puts you in greater peril.
"Have you ever heard of the Nharl system?" Merit asked.
"No."
"There were five planets around the local sun. One of them was my
homeworld, Equanus. You know why you don't see many Equani in the galaxy,
Jos? It's because there are only a handful of us left-a few hundred, maybe a
thousand at most-of a species that once numbered almost a billion. And do
you know why there are so few of us now? It's because only those of us who
were offworld two years, six months, and three days ago survived."
Merit had never actually told anybody the story before. He knew he was
being foolish, if not downright suicidal. But it was as if a psychic dam had
burst. He wasn't sure he could stop the words now, even if he wanted to do
so.
"Two years, six months, and three days ago, a solar flare burst from
our sun that was over ten light-minutes long. A huge, unheard-of, massive
eruption, far greater than any the star had produced in ten million years. A
flare that jetted forth with such power and force that Equanus was cooked.
The atmosphere and oceans boiled away in minutes; the land was turned into a
burned-out cinder. Our scientists saw it coming, but too late. It arrived
before anybody had the slightest hope of escaping it. They knew it was
coming, and they knew there was nothing that could be done. Every comm line
on the planet was jammed with people trying to say their final good-byes to
each other."
He could sense that Jos was listening; could feel the slightest
mitigation of the rage within him, saw that the impact of so many deaths had
rocked him. Of course it would-he was a doctor. Merit honestly didn't care,
at that moment, just as he didn't care if he was killed by friendly fire in
the next minute. All that mattered was the telling.
"All of t
he Equani, nearly a billion people-our art, our civilization,
our hopes, dreams, everything-all scorched to ash in a few moments, Jos.
Gone. Dead. Forever."
Jos said slowly, "I'm . . . sorry. But what has that got to do with
this?" He gestured with the blaster, to encompass the situation, and Merit
could have killed him easily right then, could have blown open his chest
with the hidden hold-out weapon.
He didn't.
"What has it to do with this? Very simple: that solar flare was not a
natural disaster, Doctor. The Republic, the glorious, wonderful, benign
Galactic Republic's military leaders were testing a new weapon. A planet
buster, a su-perweapon for some kind of ultimate battle station being
developed. They fired it into our sun, and they miscalculated. They had a
base on our moon, the scientists and military who'd created this
abomination. The flare got them, too. Small comfort to me and the few Equani
who were offworld when our planet was murdered."
"I-I never heard about this."
"Of course not. It's not something the Republic's anxious for the
galaxy to know. They kept it quiet, but I made it my business to find out.
"The Republic killed my species, Jos. Even if all the surviving Equani
could be gathered together, there's not enough of us left to repopulate
another world. Yes, you can say that those who pulled the switch died, too,
but what about those who sent them there? What about the bureaucrats who
were responsible for allowing it? They continue to laugh, and love, and eat,
and sleep-and live.
"You wanted to know why? That's why, Jos."
The hand holding the blaster lowered slightly, and for one instant
Merit thought that maybe, just maybe, his former friend and patient would
stand down. But then Jos's expression and stance firmed again. "I can't
begin to understand how you must feel," he said. "But I know how I feel.
Maybe the death of one being can't really compare with the death of a whole
world. But loss is loss. Grief is grief. Do you think Zan's parents feel any
less pain than you do?"
"They lost a son! I lost a world Hundreds of millions of sons,
daughters, mothers, fathers, Jos! You can't compare the two. It was a crime
beyond measure."
Jos shook his head. "Whatever your reasons, whatever your pain-what you
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