Crosscurrent

by Paul Kemp

  He missed badly and threw himself against the wall as the two Massassi tore down the hall toward him, their blasters sending pulses of green energy into the bulkhead near him.

  The spinwheel of a hatch pressed into his back. He fired a couple of shots, forcing the Massassi to slam themselves against the wall for cover, and threw open the hatch. He ducked inside the corridor and closed the hatch behind him. It had no lock. Cursing, he looked around for anything he could stick into the spinwheel’s spokes, but saw nothing.

  He heard the Massassi on the other side of the door, and then the wheel started to spin. Marr grabbed it, but the creatures were far too strong. Desperate, he stuck the Massassi blaster into the spinwheel, wedging it between the wheel and the pull handle. It stuck, halting the wheel’s spin, but Marr knew it would not hold for long.

  Heedless of the danger of bumping into more Massassi, he ran as fast as he could for the cockpit. Adrenaline lent him strength, but the vac suit and oxygen kit weighed him down. By the time he saw the cockpit door ahead, his lungs burned and his legs felt like lead.

  Blasterfire from behind sizzled past his ears and slammed into the bulkhead. The shouts of the Massassi, more than two, rang out behind him. He dug deep, surprising himself when the Force gave him strength and speed, and staggered into the cockpit.

  Pain lit his back on fire as a rain of small metal disks, dozens of them like flying razors, richocheted around the space. Warm blood streamed down his back and he hoped he had not taken a hit to a kidney.

  He threw the vac suit and oxygen kit to the ground, the momentum pulling him to his knees, and turned to close the cockpit security door. Three Massassi sped down the hall, the trunks of their legs chewing up the distance, the thump of their boots like blaster shots on the metal floor. Two others behind the charging three whirled their polearms above their head, jerking them back as Marr hit the security door release. A rain of the tiny metal disks flew from the end of the polearms over the other Massassi, but the door closed and they chimed against it like tinny rain.

  Marr’s breath sounded loud in the close confines of the dark cockpit. A bout of dizziness caused him to sway. He was losing blood rapidly.

  Impacts challenged the security door—shoulders or booted feet—but it held for the moment. Marr did not have much time. He could hear the Massassi growling in their language on the other side of the door.

  He needed to get off Harbinger but he dared not lift the security shields for fear the deck crew would shoot out Junker’s viewports. He would have to fly her on instruments only.

  He climbed to his feet, put the autopilot into launch prep, and methodically donned the vac suit and oxygen kit, all while blasterfire from the Massassi pounded against the security door. Judging from the noise, Marr thought more of the creatures must have joined the first five. Blaster shots challenged the door but did not penetrate it.

  The autopilot completed pre-launch and Marr squeezed into the pilot’s seat. He engaged the repulsorlifts and Junker rose off the deck.

  For a moment, the Massassi left off their attack on the cockpit security door. Perhaps they had felt the liftoff.

  Marr’s mouth turned dry as he rotated Junker on its vertical axis, using only his instrumentation to orient him.

  An explosion from outside the ship rocked it sidelong into Harbinger’s bulkhead. Marr fell from his seat as metal scraped against metal. For a terrifying moment the power on the ship went brown and Junker started to sink, but emergency reserves kicked in and brought it back online.

  He cursed as he climbed back into his seat, fearful that he had perforated his suit, but he had no time to examine it. He checked his board, cursed again when he saw that the explosion had scrambled the readout from his instrumentation. Nonsensical information streamed from the scanners. He activated a diagnostic but could not wait for it to resolve itself.

  In his mind, he pictured the layout of Harbinger’s landing bay. To him, it was all angles, proportions, distances in meters. As he fell into the geometry of his mind, he felt his connection to the Force strengthen. The connection had always been there, but now that he recognized it, he could more readily use it. Mathematics was his interface with the Force.

  Another explosion slammed Junker against Harbinger’s bulkhead. In the corridor outside the cockpit, the Massassi renewed their assault on the door, a more frantic, desperate assault.

  Marr remained calm, though blood loss turned him mildly dizzy. Thinking of Jaden piloting Junker through the rings, he strapped himself into his seat as best he could—his vac suit did not allow for full use of the harness—closed his eyes, trusted his instincts, and piloted Junker in the direction he thought was out. If he was wrong, he was flying not out but deeper into the landing bay. In that case, he would soon be dead.

  He fought down the doubt and continued his course.

  Blasterfire from the landing bay thumped against the ship, like someone knocking urgently for entry. The Massassi outside the security door beat against it like rancors in a bloodlust.

  Blind but not-blind, Marr felt Harbinger’s bulkheads, felt other ships nearby, the faint pulse of Harbinger’s crew around Junker. He was going the right way.

  He understood the interconnection of all things by the Force, understood how Jaden had piloted Junker through the gas giant’s rings. The realization made him smile as Junker flew on its repulsors toward the mouth of the landing bay. He held the smile as blood poured from his back and he began to see spots.

  When he had put some distance behind him and the deck crew, he raised the security shields. The mouth of Harbinger’s landing bay was just ahead and, beyond it, the black of space and the partial arc of the gas giant’s moon.

  The squeal of straining metal turned him around in his seat and sent his heart racing. The Massassi had forced the security door open a centimeter and wedged one of the metal studs they wore in their skin between the door and the bulkhead. One of them must have pulled it from his flesh. Their voices sounded loud and close—too close—through the slit. He could see motion through the gap and ducked as they tried to get the barrel of a blaster through. The opening was not quite wide enough, but it would be soon.

  He heard an exclamation and saw the work end of a pry bar slip into the gap. They had taken it from one of the wall-mounted emergency equipment cases.

  He cursed and engaged the ion engines. Junker raced out of Harbinger’s landing bay and into open space. He presumed Harbinger’s deflectors would work on the same outward-facing principle as their modern counterparts so he did not power down and coast. Instead he kept the engines at full and blew through them.

  The door creaked open more, its springs and levers groaning against the Massassi’s strength. Marr looked over his shoulder and saw the hole of a blaster barrel pointed through the slit, one yellow eye of a Massassi fixed on him.

  Marr hunched in his seat out of reflex, though the seat would not so much as slow a blaster shot. He pulled back on the Junker’s control and accelerated to full as the ship went vertical. The sudden shift in direction and velocity poured him flat into his seat and sent the Massassi backward from the door. The crowbar slipped free and the sound of a blaster’s discharge accompanied their frustrated roars.

  Weakened from his injuries, Marr almost passed out from the maneuver. The view through the cockpit window shrank to a tunnel with a few stars as he tried to hold on to consciousness. His blood pumped like a drum in his ears. The drumming gave way to a soft, steady rush, white noise that reminded him of the surf on Cerea. The tunnel of his awareness reduced to a pinpoint. He was falling …

  He fought his way back, seized awareness with both hands, and reached for the lever and buttons that would activate the emergency vent sequence. He seemed to be moving in slow motion, watching himself on a vidscreen.

  He hit the control sequence and an alarm beeped. Designed to put out an electrical fire shipside, the emergency vent would cause rapid depressurization and vent all oxygen in the ship into space. The
Massassi would be dead in less than a minute while the vac suit would protect Marr.

  In theory.

  The beeping alarm turned into a prolonged keen, indicating imminent venting. Marr realized that he had never had the opportunity to check his suit. His fall could have pierced it, or one of the Massassi’s sharpened disk projectiles could have damaged it.

  There was nothing for it.

  The alarm fell silent as the interior of Junker turned into a vacuum. Marr listened to the sound of his breathing inside his helmet, the hiss of the oxygen kit feeding him air. He watched the life-support readout on the console show the absence of oxygen.

  He turned in his seat and found himself staring at the muscular, red-skinned form of a Massassi. The cockpit door was open behind the creature, an open mouth that had vomited the Massassi into the cockpit. Broken capillaries turned the Massassi’s yellow eyes into a mesh of black. The creature swayed on its feet, already dying from lack of oxygen. For what seemed an eternity, the Massassi stared at Marr and Marr stared at the Massassi through his suit’s visor.

  Baring its fangs, the creature lunged for Marr, clawed hands outstretched. Marr tried to grab the Massassi’s wrists as the creature fell on him, but blood loss had left him with little strength, and the creature got its hands free of Marr’s grasp. The Massassi tried to pull Marr from his seat but the straps secured him.

  Marr reached for his blaster with a free hand, then realized he had no blaster. The Massassi, mouth wide and gasping for nonexistent air, hit the emergency release on Marr’s strap and both of them fell to the cockpit floor in a heap.

  The Massassi scrambled atop, his weight a vise on Marr’s chest. Its clawed hands pawed at Marr’s suit. Marr’s breathing rasped in the echo chamber of the helmet. He tried again to grab the Massassi’s arms but his strength was no match for the alien’s. He punched the creature in the face, shoulders, but the blows were so weak the Massassi barely seemed to notice them.

  The creature’s face loomed into Marr’s faceplate. Droplets of black blood fell from the Massassi’s ears, eyes, and nose, smearing the screen. Marr once more felt the odd sensation that he was watching events happening to someone else on a vidscreen. The Massassi’s claws closed on the suit’s neck ring, then tighter, around Marr’s throat, and started to squeeze.

  Marr’s body failed him. Strength rushed out of him as if through a hole. He could not lift even an arm to defend himself. He stared up through the smeared faceplate, barely able to see, barely able to breathe.

  The Massassi squeezed Marr’s throat, squeezed, then … released its grip and collapsed atop him, dead. The vacuum had done what Marr could not.

  For a time, Marr heard only the sound of his own rapid breathing. After a few moments, he rolled the Massassi’s bulk off him and sat up, feeling instantly dizzy. Every muscle in his body screamed. He tried to stand, but his legs would not support him and he sagged back to the floor. His body seemed disinclined to answer his demands.

  Crawling on all fours, he climbed over the Massassi and went to the instrument panel, intending to deactivate the emvent and repressurize Junker. He tried to wipe away the blood on his faceplate but that only made it worse. His eyes seemed unable to focus. So, too, his mind. He could not remember which buttons did what.

  Only then did he notice the hiss.

  His vac suit was bleeding air.

  He looked down and saw a gash in the suit’s belly, a laughing mouth put there by a Massassi claw. He stared at it dumbly, watching the edges flap as the oxygen kit fed air into the vacuum.

  He put both hands on the instrument console, leaned over it as if he could intimidate it into cooperating. Forcing himself to focus on the instruments, he tried to clear his mind enough to remember which sequence of buttons would repressurize the ship.

  When he thought he had it, he pushed them, then pulled the lever.

  Nothing happened.

  He sagged into the pilot’s seat, his vision fading. He was going to die unless he did something. He flicked on the autopilot and it blinked at him, awaiting a course.

  Focusing on the navicomp, blinking through his pain and dizziness, he hit a random button and stared at the coordinates displayed on the screen. He did not recognize them at first, then realized them for what they were: the provenance of the distress beacon coming up from the gas giant’s moon.

  It occurred to him that he would get shot down by Harbinger’s fighters before he ever hit the moon’s atmosphere but he realized it did not matter. Oxygen deprivation and blood loss were already killing him.

  He transmitted the coordinates from the navicomp to the autopilot.

  He looked out the cockpit window as Junker came around. The moon came back into view, the gas giant and its rings, Harbinger. He wondered briefly how Relin was, then sank into his chair, into the Force, and did not move.

  His mind wandered. He smiled, thinking that Khedryn could have at least allowed a medical droid aboard. But the captain was as stubbon as a bantha when it came to droids.

  He found breathing difficult, tiring. He just wanted to close his eyes and sleep.

  Relin stalked Harbinger’s corridors, more predator than prey. It was as if Marr had been the compass for his conscience, the Cerean’s presence the needle that pointed to right and wrong. Now, alone with his anger, with the Lignan, Relin gave full play to the darkness of his emotions. The shipwide alarm continued to howl but he tuned it out, hearing only the call of revenge. He did not bother to hide his presence in the Force; he transmitted it. He wished for Saes to find him. The power of the Lignan saturated him, eager to be used in service to his rage.

  While thinking through his attack in his time aboard Junker, he had planned to return once more to Harbinger’s hyperdrive chamber and rig the hyperdrive to irradiate or explode the entire ship. But now, flush with power, he had another idea.

  Moving through Harbinger’s corridors reminded him of the last time he had been aboard. He imagined he would hear Drev’s voice over his comlink—Drev’s laughter—but he knew he would never hear his Padawan’s voice again. His anger grew with every step. His power grew with every step. He used his growing connection to the Lignan to steer him through the ship, a left turn here, there a lift down or up.

  Laugh even when you die.

  Laughter bubbled up between Relin’s gritted teeth, steam through an escape valve, venting the overflow of his anger lest he explode from it.

  He turned a corner and found himself staring at three humans, all men, and a treaded mech droid. The humans wore helmets and surprised expressions. They stopped in their steps when they saw Relin and his lightsaber. One of them lifted the portable tool chest he bore to his chest, as if it could protect him.

  Nothing could protect them.

  The droid beeped a question.

  Relin smiled.

  All three of the humans dropped their tool chests, turned, and ran, shouting for help.

  Relin augmented his speed with the Force, leapt over the droid, caught up to the humans, and put his lightsaber through each of them, one after the other. He barely noticed their screams.

  A single Massassi security guard, perhaps hearing the tumult, trotted around the corridor to investigate.

  “You!” the Massassi said, reaching for his blaster. “Halt right there!”

  Relin gestured with his stump, closed a mental hand around the Massassi’s windpipe, and crushed it with a thought. The creature fell to the ground, legs drumming the floor, clawing at his throat.

  Stepping over and past the writhing Massassi, Relin continued on. He looked down at his hand and saw long fingers of Force lightning dancing out of his fingertips.

  He laughed louder, shouting his hate through Harbinger’s walls.

  “Saes!”

  Ahead, perhaps twenty meters, the doors of a turbolift opened to reveal six of Harbinger’s crew, all humans. He did not see a blaster among them.

  One started to step off, saw Relin, and stopped cold. His mouth opened, but h
e said nothing. Instead he retreated into the lift, said something to his fellow passengers, and frantically tapped at the control panel, trying to close the lift doors.

  “Quickly!” another said, while one in the back spoke into her comlink.

  Relin roared, increased his speed with the Force, and sprinted toward them. The six members of the crew flattened themselves against the far side of the lift, made themselves a living mural, but there was nowhere for them to run. Terror filled their eyes and blood fled their faces. The doors began to close but Relin held them open with telekinetic force.

  Seeing that, the crew shouted for help, pressed themselves against the walls as if trying to meld flesh with metal. Relin stepped through the lift doors, laughing. The hum of his lightsaber competed with the screams, but not for long. He spun a circle, stabbing and slashing, pleased when his lightsaber met the soft resistance of human flesh. In a few moments the screams fell silent and only the hum remained.

  Relin stared at the carnage he had caused. Tears warmed his face, mingling with the blood of those he had killed. Without warning he vomited, Junker’s caf and his last meal joining the gore on the lift’s floor. That, too, he stared at for a time, until his eyes dried.

  Whatever had remained of him as a Jedi had just left him in a spray of puke.

  On the control panel he saw a button for the lower-level cargo bay. He knew he would find the Lignan there. The touch of the ore was the fishhook he’d swallowed and it was pulling him along by his guts.

  Ever gone angling, Drev?

  He had said those words a lifetime ago.

  He pushed the button.

  “When is the last time I felt anything?” he said, echoing Saes’s challenge to him in their last duel.

  “When indeed,” he said, chuckling darkly.

  * * *

  Alarms blared from speakers overhead, the sound muted by the erkush bone mask Saes wore. With each step, he felt more attuned to his tribe and ancestors than he had in a long while. He had lost himself entirely when he had joined the Jedi Order, forced by Jedi teachings to renounce the fierceness of character and passionate spirit that made him who he was. He had partially recovered himself when he had spurned the Jedi and embraced the teachings of the Sith. But he had never felt closer to whole than he did now, moments before he would murder his former Master. He was a hunter, a warrior, a Kaleesh.