Mace said softly, “Thank you.”
He swayed. He had to put out a hand to the wrecked comm console to steady himself.
The bunker had once again gone quiet and dark and full of death.
Quiet except for a low growl.
The growl came from a black shape that rose like corpse-fungus from among the bodies.
So, dôshalo. Here we are. For the last time.
“Perhaps.”
The shape smoked with power. More power than Mace had ever felt.
And he was so tired. So hurt. The lightsaber wound in his belly radiated pain that scraped away his strength.
The shadow beckoned. Come on, then: jungle rules.
“On the contrary,” Mace said slowly. “Jedi rules.”
What are Jedi rules?
“You don’t need to know,” Mace told him. “You’re not a Jedi.”
Vibroshields whined to life. I am waiting for you, Jedi of the Windu.
Mace extended a hand, and his lightsaber found it.
He stood, waiting.
You fear to attack me.
“Jedi do not fear,” Mace said. “And we do not attack. As long as you stand in peace, so do I. You have just learned two of the Jedi rules. For what little good they will do you. You haven’t been paying very close attention, Kar. And it’s too late to start now. It’s over.”
Nothing is over! NOTHING. Not while we both live.
“This is another Jedi rule.” Mace took a couple of steps to one side, to find a space of floor where he didn’t have to fear tripping over a body. “If you fight a Jedi, you’ve already lost.”
The dark shape came closer. Fine words from a man I’ve beaten before.
“The starfighters have been ordered off. The city will stand. They’ve surrendered to the Republic. We have no reason to fight.”
Men like us are our own reason.
Mace shook his head. “This isn’t a big dog thing. If I must, I will hurt you. Badly.”
You can’t bluff me.
“No, but I can kill you. Though I would rather not.”
More Jedi rules?
Mace sagged. “Do you have a move to make? I’m too tired for this.”
Sleep when you’re dead, Vastor snarled, and leaped.
Ultrachrome flashed. Mace could have met him, blade to shields, but instead he slipped aside.
He had no intention of fighting this man. Not here and now. Not anywhere. Not ever.
Vastor was younger, stronger, faster, and immensely more powerful, and he wielded weapons that could not be harmed by the Jedi blade. Mace couldn’t win such a battle on his best day, and this day was far from his best: he was exhausted, badly wounded, and heartsick.
But the fact that his lightsaber couldn’t hurt those shields didn’t make them invulnerable.
As Vastor gathered himself to spring again, Mace reached into the Force. The vibroshield stuck into the wall above Nick’s head squealed against the bunker’s armor as it came to life and pulled itself free and streaked like a missile toward Vastor’s back.
Vastor’s incredible reflexes whirled him, and those same reflexes snapped his shields in front of his chest in plenty of time to block—
But they didn’t actually block anything…
There was a reason why, when Vastor’s shields met to make that metallic howl, he always brought them together back-to-back, instead of edge-to-edge.
The flying shield’s vibrating edge sheared through both Vastor’s shields, through both his wrists, and buried itself in the bone of his chest, stopping less than a centimeter short of his heart.
Vastor blinked astonishment at Mace as though the Jedi Master had betrayed him.
Mace said, “You were warned.”
Vastor’s head shook weakly, suddenly palsied. He dropped to his knees. You’ve killed me.
He sounded like he couldn’t make himself believe it.
“No,” Mace said. “That’s another of the Jedi rules. Killing you is not the answer for your crimes. You’re going back to Coruscant. You’re going to stand trial.”
Vastor swayed. His gaze went blank and blind.
“Kar Vastor,” said Mace Windu, “you are under arrest.”
Vastor pitched forward. Mace caught him and turned him face-up before lowering the unconscious lor pelek to the floor.
Then he pulled himself back to his feet, leaning on the console.
His vision grayed and lost focus; for a moment he wasn’t sure where he was. This might have been Palpatine’s office. Or the interrogation room at the Ministry of Justice. The Intel station, or the dead room at the Lorshan Pass.
Perhaps even the Jedi Temple… but the Jedi Temple wouldn’t ever smell like this.
Would it?
“Master Windu?”
He remembered the voice, and it brought him back to the command bunker.
“Is it over?” Geptun called tentatively from the transceiver chamber. He sounded very old, and more than a little lost. “Can I come out now?”
Mace looked down at Kar Vastor, and the spreading pool of blood in which he lay. He looked at the scattered corpses of clone troopers and militia techs. He looked at Nick Rostu, crumpled against the wall.
“Master Windu?” Geptun’s head appeared slowly over the rim of the hole in the floor. “Did we win?”
Mace looked at the sad, shrunken form of Depa Billaba, and thought about his victory conditions.
“I seem to be,” Mace Windu said slowly, “the last one standing.”
It was the only answer he had.
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