The Old Republic Series

by Sean Williams

  Something whirred in the laboratory. A cam turned to stare at Master Satele, then tracked to take in Ax.

  “I recognize you.”

  The voice came from all around them. Female, breathless, surprised.

  “I know you.”

  A face loomed closer to the glass wall of the tank, coming slowly into view.

  “I am you.”

  Ax felt her insides turn to water. The face was her own.

  ULA WATCHED THE repulsor platform rising from the planet’s south pole with something approaching awe. The skyhook was huge and well defended, and the hexes had built it in almost no time at all. If Stryver still needed to convince anyone of the reality of his geometric growth theory, the proof was right there in front of him.

  “What’s a skyhook doing at the pole?” Jet asked. “It’d be useless, floating there.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the best place to get to higher orbits is at the equator, and that’s what they’ll be wanting to do. Isn’t it?”

  Ula just shrugged. Skyhooks had many uses, not just as a staging point to orbit, as they were usually employed, hanging motionlessly over points on a planet’s surface. They could provide defense or act as displays of wealth. Who knew what the hexes wanted? He was still learning what they could do.

  “Target that thing,” he ordered the combined fleet, just to be sure. “Bring it down!”

  The Paramount sent a halfhearted salvo in the skyhook’s direction, but it was clear Kalisch was keeping significant firepower in reserve. The Commenor sent nothing at all.

  “Didn’t you hear me, Captain Pipalidi? We need to stop that thing from reaching the upper atmosphere.”

  “And I need to ensure the security of what ships we have left,” said the leader of the Republic contingent. “If the Paramount turns its weapons on us while we’re looking elsewhere, we’ll be defenseless.”

  “If the hexes escape, we all lose.”

  “On Kalisch’s head be it.”

  He punched the instrument panel in frustration.

  Jet looked at him in reproach. “Hey, take it easy.”

  “It’s just so—so pointless! What’s the point of fighting each other? All they have to do is cooperate a little longer and we stand a chance.”

  “They’re too alike. That’s the problem. You see that in primitive cultures when schisms divide religions into similar but not identical sects. They hate each other more than the enemy.”

  “What are you talking about? The Empire isn’t a primitive culture.”

  “No, but the principle still holds. Similar hierarchies, with a dominant high priest caste; similar beliefs but different practices; competing over the same territory—”

  “Stop it,” said Ula. “You’re not helping.”

  “Just trying to point out why it was never going to work.”

  “So we shouldn’t even have tried?”

  “Everything’s worth trying once. And I have been known to be wrong on occasions. Unfortunately, this isn’t turning out to be one of them.”

  “So how do we turn it around? What can we do to stop the hexes from getting out?”

  “There’s always Plan B.”

  “Which is?”

  “I was hoping you might have one.”

  Stryver was heading north, away from the south pole. Ula projected the Mandalorian’s progress across a map of the planet’s surface and found the likely CI location at the end of it. That portion of the map was a mess of activity. Ula used satellite and fighter data to zoom in closer.

  Something was rising up from a lake of lava, filling the crater where the landing site had been.

  “Another skyhook?” he said, pointing at the image.

  “It’s in the right spot,” said Jet, “but I don’t think so. The design isn’t right, and it doesn’t appear to have the repulsorlift capacity it would need to get off the ground.”

  A circular hatch opened on the top of the thing, like an enormous iris. Another space opened up among the hexes directly above.

  Ula waited, but nothing emerged from the hatch.

  “This doesn’t make any sense,” he said.

  “There’s Stryver again,” Jet said, pointing at a solitary blip circling the new arrival.

  “I guess he’s chasing those subspace foci,” Ula said. “That one must be a biggie.”

  “Like the skyhook’s.” Jet pointed at the south of the planet. “Which is moving, by the way.”

  He was right. The skyhook had drifted away from the pole and was accelerating ponderously northward.

  Ula thought fast. If the skyhook kept accelerating at that rate and stayed on that heading …

  “They’re two halves of one thing,” he cried. “The skyhook was at the pole because that’s where the master factory built it. Now it’s coming to pick up the CI and take it offworld. I bet the drives are being built on the moon, as we speak. They’re getting ready to break free. We have to stop them!”

  “I think you’re right,” said Jet, “and I agree that this is serious. Try Kalisch and Pipalidi one more time. Maybe they’ll change their minds.”

  Ula knew it was pointless. The fleet was breaking up. Shots were being fired by fighters passing perilously close to the opposite side’s capital vessels. It was clear that lines were being drawn and beads taken. All it would take was one mistake for open warfare to erupt.

  “If there was only some way to make them do what’s needed,” he said.

  “I knew you had the makings of an emperor.”

  “How can you joke at a time like this?”

  “Who’s joking?” Jet turned in his seat and said to Clunker, “Time for Plan B.”

  The droid inclined its battered head. A series of new screens flickered in and out of the main holoprojector as the droid sent a series of commands through the Auriga Fire’s main computers.

  “Don’t tell me,” said Ula. “You cracked the hex code but have been sitting on it, waiting for the rest of us to figure it out for ourselves.”

  “Believe me, I wouldn’t have waited. Also, there’s nothing to be gained in doing that. Once the code is cracked, the hexes are dead, and I’m out of pocket.”

  “So what are you going to do?”

  “Something noble and probably quite stupid. In return, I need you to do something for me.”

  “Just ask.”

  “I need you to pretend it never happened.”

  Ula stared at him.

  “Watch the screens,” Jet said.

  The combined fleet was breaking up, but not down faction lines. The Paramount was leading one mixed contingent down to a lower orbit, there to target the CI with greater precision. The Commenor was heading for the moon with a smaller retinue and two squadrons of fighters. All internecine squabbling had abruptly ceased.

  Comms weren’t down, but they were suspiciously quiet. No one was giving orders to coordinate the fleet’s movements. It was just happening.

  “You’re doing this,” Ula said, appalled.

  “Clunker is. He’s got a very good head on his shoulders.”

  “You used me to infiltrate the Imperial and Republic networks. You cracked their codes. Now you’ve taken over!”

  “The end justifies the means, right?”

  “That’s what Stryver said. I’m not sure I agree.”

  “Being alive is always better than being dead. That’s my golden rule.”

  “But what comes afterward?”

  “The fleets change their codes. Business goes back to usual.”

  “If you let them go.”

  “Why wouldn’t I? I’m not power-mad like you. There might be money to be had in empire building, but never at the top. You only end up on the wrong end of a coup, or an invasion, or a sniper’s rifle. Your Emperor will learn that eventually, the hard way.”

  Ula was trapped. He had betrayed the Republic, after all, but he had betrayed the Empire along with it. And now he was utterly powerless. All he could do was sit back and watch�
��and wonder if he would intervene if the opportunity arose. Jet was, after all, doing the job that he had failed to do. Who was he to get in the way?

  Maybe Jet, too, was defying his baser instincts and trying to do the right thing.

  A voice crackled from the planet on a Republic frequency. Ula recognized it instantly.

  “—higher now so the jamming might not be as effective. This is Lieutenant Moxla calling Director Vii. I’ve hitched a lift on the back of the skyhook and I’m placing transponders on the vulnerable points. Strike them as hard as you can. Please respond. Let me know I’m getting through. We’re higher now so the jamming might not be as effective. This is Lieutenant Moxla calling Director—”

  “It’s a recording.” Jet reduced the volume. “I see the transponders. If she’s done her job properly, we can hit the skyhook with everything the Paramount has and take it out of commission before it reaches the equator.”

  “What about Larin?”

  “Maybe she’s already ditched.”

  “We can’t know, can we?”

  “No. So what do you want to do?”

  “Are you really giving me the choice?”

  “Not really. Just seeing if you could come up with a decent argument.”

  Tiny points of light flared in the holoprojector as the Paramount sent every missile it had on the way.

  LARIN RAN LIGHTLY over the uppermost dome of the skyhook, keeping low to avoid the occasional potshot. The structure was made entirely out of linked hex bodies. Some of them retained a modicum of individuality and raised a limb to fire as she went by. She couldn’t watch everywhere at once, but she had managed to avoid any serious injuries thus far.

  That would change the moment her message was received, or the fleet opened fire regardless. There was no way off the skyhook now that it was in flight. If it went down, so would she and all her squadmates. Not all of them had jumped aboard with her, but those who had knew what they were getting into. There were perhaps two dozen troopers like her scattered across the moving skyhook, all operating independently.

  Comms came and went; she had set her transceiver to broadcast at the earliest opportunity and let it spool on without her hearing. Each transponder she placed pointed to an air vent or sensor array, or anything else that might suffer from an accurately placed hit. She hadn’t wasted time on trying to sneak inside the skyhook. There would have been little benefit in getting herself killed that way.

  It was ironic, she thought. Telemetry told her that the skyhook was bringing her closer to where Shigar should have landed, but she probably wouldn’t make it, and neither had he, most likely. His transport had gone down in flames. She might share the same fate as he had and never know it.

  Blue light flashed to her right. A trooper had been pinned by three widely spaced hexes, all firing simultaneously. He returned fire, crouching low to present a smaller target, but he couldn’t fire at all of them, and he had nowhere to retreat to. As she watched, taking the measure of his predicament, a shot clipped the neck seal of his helmet, triggering a jet of precious air. He went down, thrashing about to reach the leak, but his shoulder joints wouldn’t flex that far.

  She came in low and fast, shooting the nearest hex first, before getting a bead on the others. They shifted their sights to her, but she was practiced at fighting hexes now. She aimed for the sensor pods first because they were easiest to hit. Without eyes, how could they shoot back?

  Two other hexes joined in before she reached the fallen trooper. She scooped him up with one hand under his left underarm and kept moving, firing as she went. Using gravity and her own momentum, she took him down the dome as if they were running down the side of a hill.

  When they were out of range, she skidded them to a halt. The edge was in sight. Beyond that point, there was nothing but Sebaddon, far below.

  He was still thrashing about. She reached for the repair kit in her thigh pocket and urged him to stay still. He obeyed. As she applied the fast-acting sealant to his damaged neck joint, they recognized each other.

  The trooper looking up at her was Ses Jopp.

  His voice traveled clearly through the material of their suits.

  “You’re the last person I expected to see.”

  She didn’t want to say that the feeling was mutual. “I couldn’t just leave you there.”

  “And I’m grateful, believe me. Thank you, Lieutenant.”

  She couldn’t tell if he was sincere or not, but it was something.

  “There,” she said, smoothing down the last of the sealant. “You’ll live to fight another day.”

  His eyes tracked to her right, over her shoulder.

  “Probably not,” he said. “Look.”

  She turned and stared up at the sky. Clearly visible were the white streaks of Imperial artillery coming their way. It looked as if the crew of the Paramount were giving it all they had—precisely as they ought to, she thought.

  Rather than craning awkwardly up at the approaching missiles, she turned and sat down next to Jopp.

  “Best seats in the house, eh?” she said.

  He laughed. “Yeah. People would kill for ’em.”

  She thought of her former colleagues in the Blackstars, of the bravado and the bonding and the sense of belonging that she had missed so deeply.

  “Grunts like us never learn. Fireworks are only pretty from a distance.”

  Jopp nodded soberly. “Makes a pleasant change to have an officer down here with us.”

  He turned to look at her.

  “Guess you’re not so bad after all, Toxic Moxla.”

  She smiled. That was as close to an apology as she was likely to get, but in the service it amounted to a vow of loyalty that would endure until they died. It was a shame, she thought, that that wasn’t going to be very long.

  EXHAUST TRAILS DREW complex hieroglyphs across the sky. No less than fifteen missiles were converging on the object that had risen out of the lake. The blast radius was going to be so huge, there was no point running.

  Shigar braced himself for the explosion. There was a small chance that he could shield himself from the worst of it, but what happened afterward was the great unknown. There might be no island left at all. He couldn’t float about forever on a sea of lava.

  On the brink of death, he caught a glimpse of how his life would have played out, had he lived. He knew, intellectually and viscerally, that he had earned the rank of Jedi Knight. Master Nobil couldn’t deny him that now. He had fought and made deals with enemies. He had wrestled with the dark side. He had conquered his one remaining weakness. And, most important, he was willing to fight.

  You are a product of your time, he heard his former Master saying. You must confront the times ahead with great care. The Sith are the enemy, but we must not become like them in order to beat them. We must remain true to all that we stand for.

  He couldn’t tell if her voice was in the present, or an echo of the future that would never be. Similarly, he couldn’t tell if she was reproaching him or offering him encouragement.

  I cannot stand by while politicians play their games, he said in reply. It was an act of thievery that led us here—an act conducted on behalf of the Republic. Even in this corner of the universe, privateers and false treaties have endangered billions of lives. When the whole galaxy is at stake, who can stand idle?

  Not you, Shigar Konshi. Not you.

  I don’t understand. Are you telling me that I’m wrong, or that I’m right?

  Perhaps both. The answer is beyond my sight.

  He snapped back to reality.

  A powerful roaring filled the air. The lines in the sky converged on a point. The hieroglyph was complete.

  Darth Chratis vanished behind a shimmering Force shield.

  Shigar stood unprotected, at one with the other troopers staring up at their deaths. He wasn’t afraid to die.

  There was a bright flash, then another, then so many they became one simultaneous assault.

  Shigar shielded
his eyes with his hand.

  That he still had a hand and eyes surprised him.

  He squinted through his fingers.

  The massive structure had generated a broad electromirror shield, and was deflecting the full force of the blasts back out into space.

  Relief flooded him, then dismay. He was still alive, but the plan had failed. What now?

  Darth Chratis emerged from his shield as superhot clouds radiated above them. He looked as surprised as Shigar felt.

  “Unacceptable,” he said.

  A second series of flashes came from the south, where something else was undergoing bombardment from above. They turned to see another work of mega-engineering from the hexes drifting across the sky, trailing explosive streamers in its wake. An identical electromirror shield protected it, too.

  A skyhook, Shigar realized. The other half of the thing looming over him, undamaged by everything the Empire and the Republic could throw at it.

  He almost laughed. “It was all for nothing,” he said to Darth Chratis. “You, me, Larin—everything.”

  “Do you find this amusing, boy?”

  He didn’t, but the moment had a hysterical edge all the same. He could agonize all he wanted about the choices he had made and would make, about the Jedi Order’s role in the Emperor’s plans, and about the Republic’s feet of clay when it came to taking decisive action—but if nothing stopped the hexes, there wouldn’t be a war at all. The future of the galaxy ended here.

  You win, Lema Xandret, he thought, wherever you are.

  CINZIA XANDRET STARED out of her tank at the girl she might have been.

  “Don’t look at her,” whispered her mother.

  “Why not?”

  “She’s not real.”

  “She looks real enough.”

  “But she’s not you.”

  “She’s me as I might have been.”

  “You are not her. You will never be her. She is a lie and she is evil. She is—”

  “Shut up, Mother.”

  The whisper ceased. Cinzia’s attention returned to the two people outside the tank, a mature woman with gray-streaked brown hair and her more youthful companion, both dressed in bloodstained armored suits, both strangers, at least to the complex. One she recognized. She had seen that face all her life. It was her own.