by Jason Fry
“Oh,” Merei said. She hoped that meant Zare was all right. “When will you be finished?”
The Mandalorian girl looked over her shoulder and Merei could feel her glower through the helmet.
“When I’m finished,” she said. “I’m using the decoder as the seed for a decryption subroutine. If you know what that means.”
“I sure do,” Merei said. “I also know you can double that subroutine’s execution speed by shutting down your datapad’s diagnostics. They burn up a lot of processor capability.”
“I’ll do that,” the girl said, her gaze resting on Merei a moment longer. “Thanks.”
“Whatever you’re doing, do it fast,” growled the alien. “I love giving a few bucketheads an evening knuckle-polish, but tonight we ain’t got time for recreation.”
“You can relax,” Merei said. “I tapped into the security drone network for this sector. I can see what they see—and if any stormtroopers head this way I can divert them.”
“You can do that?” the alien asked.
Merei just nodded.
“Finished,” the Mandalorian girl said a minute later, handing a silver square to Merei.
She slotted the decoder into her own datapad and navigated through the Academy files to Dhara’s records, typing in the single-use code generated by the decoder and transferring the mysterious special-assessment file.
“Hurry,” the armored girl said. “Spectre-3 will have to take it back before it’s missed.”
“I’ll be finished when I’m finished,” Merei said, transferring the other locked files from Dhara’s records. “I have to make sure I can actually open them. Unless your friend wants to steal the decoder again.”
“Not a chance, sister,” the alien grumbled.
“Got them,” Merei said. “I’ll be done in a moment.”
She opened the special-assessment file and paged through it.
This is what we went to all this trouble for, Merei thought, trying to make sense of what she was seeing. I can’t believe I’m reading it in a Capital City alleyway with some prickly Mandalorian and a big slab of purple beef.
“Did you get the information your friend needs?” the Mandalorian girl asked, sounding slightly friendlier now.
“I don’t know,” Merei said. “I need to make sense of this. But I hope so. Oh. You need the decoder.”
She handed it to the Mandalorian girl, who bent and placed it in the astromech’s grasper arm, then patted his head.
“What will you do now?” Merei asked.
“Wait until our friend can get away,” the alien rumbled.
“Oh,” Merei said. “Give me a comm code. I’ll watch the drone network for you and contact you if you need to move.”
The alien grinned, then reached down and tousled Merei’s hair. The Mandalorian girl favored her with a nod, while the astromech extended a stubby arm and threw her a jaunty salute.
Jai didn’t believe them.
“No—no way,” he said, staring at Dev and Zare in their storeroom lair. “This is just another dirty trick. You’re trying to get me busted out of the Academy.”
“Uh, yeah,” Dev said. “But not the way you think. The Inquisitor—”
“Please,” Jai said. “I don’t believe this Inquisitor exists. And even if he does, then maybe it’s a good thing. The Inquisitor trains me, I get a top rank in the Empire…”
“Kell, you got a family?” Zare asked from where he’d been watching the argument.
“It’s just me and my mother,” Jai said.
“And how would she feel if she never saw you again?” Zare asked, crossing the storeroom to look in Jai’s eyes. “My sister disappeared from this place, and I’m betting it was the Inquisitor who took her away. So unless you’re ready to say bye to Mom forever…”
Jai reared back, startled—and frightened. He looked at Dev and Zare for a long moment, looking for a way out and finding only grim faces.
“Okay,” he said. “What’s the plan?”
“Simple,” Dev said, putting his arm around the other two’s shoulders. “The three of us have to win tomorrow’s challenge.”
“Not so simple,” Zare said.
“How’s that going to get us out of here?” Jai asked.
Dev smiled. “Because it gets us inside that walker.”
Zare didn’t have the Force as his ally, but all things considered, he thought he was getting pretty good at making his way out of the Well. He was a level below Dev, with Jai right behind him, and he had a clear path to the top.
Which was when Oleg raised his E-11.
Dev jumped down to shove Jai out of the way, and Oleg’s blast caught him in the chest, knocking him off Jai’s platform. He landed heavily, yelling for the others to keep going. Zare looked down, but saw it was no use. He climbed up to the floor of the assessment hall a moment after Oleg, with Jai third. Dev was fourth.
“Well, well,” Aresko said. “Cadets Kell, Leonis, and Oleg win the day.”
He turned to indicate the AT-DP standing over them on its stilt legs.
“And the prize,” he said.
“You were supposed to be on the walker with us,” Zare heard Jai say to Dev in a low, urgent voice. “Now what?”
“Stick to the plan,” Dev said. “I’ll figure out a way to get on board.”
As they raised their faceplates, Zare gave Dev a worried look. But the rogue cadet just grinned his infuriating grin, and looked to the right. Zare followed his eyes and noticed the astromech zipping between the other AT-DPs parked in the assessment hall.
The interior of the AT-DP was cramped—three cadets and an Imperial pilot barely fit in the cockpit.
“So these control movement, and this fires the cannons,” Zare said, gesturing over the pilot’s shoulder. “But what are these?”
“Gyroscopics,” the man said. “Here, I’ll show you.”
Oleg leaned forward, fascinated. As the pilot demonstrated the walker’s function, Zare caught Jai’s eye and slipped the Imperial’s blaster smoothly out of its sling on the man’s seat, then handed it surreptitiously to Jai.
Perfect grav-ball handoff, Zare thought. Coach Ramset would be proud.
Suddenly an explosion in the plaza outside the blast doors rattled the walker.
“What was that?” the pilot asked, rising out of his seat to peer through the viewports.
“My signal,” Jai said. He raised the stolen blaster and stunned the pilot, who slumped to the cockpit’s deck.
“What are you doing?” screeched Oleg. He leapt at Jai, who turned coolly, catching him with the blue concentric circles of another stun bolt as Zare climbed into the pilot’s chair.
“Guess there’s no turning back now,” Jai said.
“No,” Zare said.
Through the viewports he saw Aresko shouting orders into a comlink, while cadets ran back and forth, unsure what to do. The blast doors began to descend.
“Look!” Jai yelled. “Do something!”
Zare grabbed the joysticks, trying to remember what the now-unconscious pilot had shown them, and the walker began striding forward awkwardly. He found the cannon controls and sent a fusillade of bolts at the blast doors, catching another AT-DP that had responded to the earlier explosion. Zare’s guns blew apart its drive engine and the machine crumpled, landing in the blast doors’ path.
“Zare, watch out!” yelled Jai.
A troop transport in the plaza turned around and began firing at their AT-DP. Energy crackled over the bow cannons and the head of the walker slumped forward.
“Fire back!” Jai demanded.
“I’m trying!” Zare said.
He got the walker moving again, marching steadily toward the doors as laser blasts burst around them.
“Well, they’ve figured out which side we’re on,” Zare said.
“Terrific.”
Someone was banging on the hatch.
“Oh, no,” Zare said.
Jai readied his blaster rifle—but then the
y heard a familiar voice over their unit channel.
“Let me in!” said Dev.
The troop transport raked them with scarlet bolts of fire, aiming at the AT-DP’s relatively weak ankle joints. The walker shuddered and the lights on Zare’s control board turned an ominous red. He fought to stabilize the craft, then threw up his arms to protect his face as the walker toppled over face-first and slid across the floor of the assessment hall, the blast door settling atop its battered cockpit with a thump.
Zare struggled to free himself from the pilot’s harness, then crawled over Oleg toward the hatch.
“You all right?” he asked Jai.
“Never been better,” Jai said wearily.
Zare tried the hatch. It was stuck shut. He hit it with his shoulder, grunting in pain, and on the third try the hatch popped open. Dev was waiting on the other side. So was a girl in colorful Mandalorian armor. Stormtroopers were lying motionless in the plaza in front of the troop transport.
“You guys okay?” Dev asked as he and the Mandalorian girl helped Zare and Jai down. The little astromech droid rolled to a halt nearby, honking urgently.
“Yeah,” Jai said. “Let’s just get out of here.”
But Zare stopped.
“Wait,” he said to Jai. “Give me that blaster.”
Jai handed the rifle over, looking curiously at Zare. “Uh, sure. Why?”
“Because I’m staying.”
“What?” asked a shocked Dev.
“It’s the only way I’ll ever find my sister,” Zare said.
“We’ve got bucketheads inbound!” the Mandalorian girl shouted, looking behind them into the assessment hall.
“I’ll keep in touch,” Dev promised. And then he, Jai, the Mandalorian girl, and the astromech were racing across the plaza. A civilian landspeeder braked to a halt and they leapt aboard.
Zare raised his blaster and began to fire, his shots hitting to the left and right of the speeder and ripping craters in the pavement. By the time Aresko, Grint, and a squad of stormtroopers reached his side, the speeder had accelerated and shrunk to a dot.
Chiron waited with Zare during the hours he spent on lockdown.
He began by telling Zare how proud he was of him, and assuring him that he shouldn’t blame himself for what had happened. No one had imagined that cadets Kell and Morgan might be traitors, willing to attack Imperial soldiers and destroy equipment. Zare had behaved heroically, against overwhelming odds, and almost managed to bring the enemies of the Empire to justice all by himself.
Zare accepted this praise with what he thought was the proper mix of pride and stoicism, then told Chiron that he was okay, and the officer shouldn’t feel like he had to worry about him or babysit him.
Chiron just smiled sadly, and then Zare understood: he did need to babysit him. Those were his orders. They were waiting for something—or someone.
Then Zare realized: the person they were waiting for was the Inquisitor, the mysterious Imperial agent Dev had spoken of so fearfully. He was on his way to Lothal, except instead of Dev and Jai, he would be speaking with Zare.
After that he and Chiron said nothing. Zare alternated between wondering if Merei was all right and trying as hard as he could to think of anything else. Chiron just sat staring at the floor, passing his officer’s cap back and forth in his hands.
Finally the door chimed and Commandant Aresko entered, lines of worry etched around his eyes and mouth.
“Come with me, Leonis,” he said, not unkindly. “Don’t be afraid.”
It was those words more than anything that sent fear through Zare’s heart.
The Inquisitor was waiting in Kallus’s office, standing with his back to the door. He was a tall dark shape against the setting sun. Kallus stood nearby. When Aresko and Zare entered Kallus turned and studied the cadet for a long moment. Then he turned back to the window and the endless plains of Lothal.
“This is a black mark, Commandant,” the Inquisitor said at last, lowering a datapad that he’d been studying and looking over his shoulder at Zare. “I don’t know this boy, but this other one I know.”
Zare stared at the slim, deadly-looking being. His skin was gray, like stone, but his eyes were a fiery yellow. They reminded Zare of burning coals, and his smallest movement suggested power kept in check.
And he was angry. Zare could see his rage in the way he held out the datapad to Aresko, its screen filled with an image of Dev. But he could also feel it—it seemed to flow out of the Inquisitor, like ripples from a rock hurled into a formerly quiet pool.
The Inquisitor thrust the datapad accusingly at a stricken-looking Aresko.
“This is the Padawan I encountered on Stygeon Prime,” he said.
“That is Morgan,” Aresko said. “The other was Kell. Cadet Zare Leonis here came very close to stopping their escape. He was part of the traitors’ squad and knew them well—or thought so.”
Zare tried to nod. The Inquisitor’s terrible eyes remained fixed on him as a smile creased his gray skin.
“How admirable,” the Inquisitor said. His voice was smooth and cultured. They might have been discussing some aspect of philosophy, or the latest opera from Coruscant.
He strode around the desk and Zare fought the urge to flee. The Inquisitor stared down at him, teeth bared.
“Well, Leonis,” he said. “Let’s take a walk, shall we? I want to know everything about your former friends.”
Zare looked up into those burning eyes and could only nod.
The two of them walked through the headquarters complex to an interrogation room, every Imperial coming to a stop and standing at attention until the Inquisitor had passed.
Keep your cool, Zare told himself. He’s not interested in you, and you’ve done nothing wrong. You’re the hero cadet.
But his thoughts were screaming at him. This was the being who had ordered his sister to be taken away from the Academy and her family. Perhaps that face was the last one she had seen before she died.
The interrogation room was dim and quiet. Zare nervously eyed a bulbous black droid sitting on its perch in the corner, bristling with needles and probes. But the Inquisitor simply motioned for him to sit.
“Now tell me everything about Morgan,” he said.
Zare could feel the being in his head somehow—he sensed the presence of another mind sorting and sifting through his emotions and seeking his thoughts. The faintest touch of that mind made him want to run and hide.
Zare began talking about Dev, about his doubts about the cadet and who he was. He could feel that other mind’s hunger, its greed. He told the Inquisitor about Dev’s skill at assessment after assessment, and how Zare had grown certain the new cadet was cheating.
All of those things were true, and he knew they were what the Inquisitor wanted. And maybe, just maybe, they would be enough to keep him from delving deeper, into the things Zare desperately needed to keep secret.
“But there was something not right about this Morgan,” the Inquisitor said. “You’re a bright young man—you must have sensed something.”
Yes, Zare agreed hastily. He told the Inquisitor how Dev had never talked about himself or his family, and how sometimes he didn’t respond to his own name.
The fiery eyes blazed even brighter and Zare looked away, fearful of becoming trapped in them.
“There is no Dev Morgan,” the Inquisitor growled. “There never was.”
What would the perfect cadet say now? Zare asked himself. Come on, think!
“Does that mean his victories in the assessments will be vacated, sir?”
“Ask the commandant,” the Inquisitor replied, striding away from Zare with his hands behind his back. Zare felt that cruel intelligence withdraw and knew the Inquisitor now had no more interest in Zare than he did in a Loth-rat fleeing into a sewer pipe in Old City.
He doesn’t care about me because he’s seen the assessment results, Zare thought. He doesn’t think I can use the Force the way Dev and Jai did. And the way Dha
ra did.
And then an awful realization struck him: his best chance to find Dhara—perhaps his only chance to find her—was for the Empire to think he shared her gifts.
“Sir?” he asked timidly. “There was something else. Something…strange. While we were aboard the walker, I felt like something was wrong somehow. Like Dev and Jai were hiding something. Like they were enemies.”
Those blazing eyes turned on him again, and he felt the Inquisitor’s hunger rising, like something boiling.
“If only I’d paid attention to that feeling, maybe I could have stopped them,” Zare said.
“Your sister is Dhara Leonis,” the Inquisitor said with chilling calculation. “Isn’t that right, cadet?”
Zare forced himself to nod.
“It’s a shame your sister ran away from the Academy,” the Inquisitor said. “What an unfortunate end for what had been a promising career. You have my sympathies, cadet.”
The being turned away, and Zare hesitated, knowing he stood on the edge of an abyss.
And then he leapt.
“My sister isn’t dead,” Zare said. “I know it. I can feel her out there somewhere, calling to me.”
The Inquisitor turned, and Zare forced himself to remain still, to wait. If Dhara was dead, he had signed his own death warrant—and Merei’s, too. The Inquisitor would smash his mind into fragments and extract everything he wanted to know, shredding every lie he had told, and exposing every secret.
The Inquisitor said nothing, but Zare could feel that vast and cruel intelligence focused on his.
“Dhara and I have always been able to sense each other, somehow,” Zare said. “We never told anybody that. Because it doesn’t make any sense, does it?”
The Inquisitor’s eyes glittered in the darkness.
“It does make sense, cadet,” he said. “In time, you will understand why.”
When Zare finally appeared on the screen of Merei’s datapad she gasped: his face was gray and there were dark hollows beneath his eyes. He was exhausted, but there was something else—something in his eyes she didn’t recognize.
“Are you all right?” she asked. “I’ve been so worried.”