Star Wars: Dark Nest 1: The Joiner King

by Troy Denning

  Be quick! Mara broke their Force tether, then launched herself into a wild gyre of sweeping blade-light and flashing blasterfire. Han and Leia . . .

  Luke could sense the rest for himself. Han and Leia were almost there—and they would not be so forgiving. He began to retreat toward the tunnel, weaving and dancing as the electrobolts flew thick and fast around him. Alema started after him and had to slow down to dodge and block herself.

  “Alema, your anger has made you vulnerable,” Luke said. “Your sister’s death made you angry, and the Gorog are using that anger to hold you.”

  “Numa was a warrior!” Alema snarled, readily shifting topics—as Luke had known she would—to the still-open wound of her sister’s death. “She would defend the Colony!”

  This time, she came at Luke under control, combining the flashing blades of a speed attack with the driving stomp kicks of a power assault. He switched to a one-handed grasp, parrying her strikes with his own lightsaber, slipping her kicks with a deft trunk twist, deflecting electrobolts with the palm of his free hand.

  “Numa was wise.” Luke continued to fall back, spinning around to slash open a pair of Gorog warriors foolish enough to charge him from behind. “She would have been the first to warn you against your anger.”

  Luke reached out for the Twi’lek, trying to embrace her in the Force and shield her from the Dark Nest’s touch. “She would have been disappointed to see how you have surrendered to it.”

  Alema was too far gone. She attacked all the more furiously, shrieking her grief and rage in Twi’leki, slashing low and high, kicking right and left, her words as hard and angry as her blows. Time and again, Luke forced her to leave her body open for a killing blow he did not want to deliver, and time and again she failed to notice his mercy and spun around in another wild attack.

  Then Luke felt an icy jolt of fear. He looked past Alema to see Gorog warriors closing on Mara from all sides, silver rays crackling at her so fast and furious she could not block them all. The first bolt burned a fist-sized hole in the thigh of her vac suit and filled the air with the stench of scorched durafiber. The second caught her in the chest, and Luke did not see the third. By then he was driving forward, pressing the attack and forcing Alema back toward Mara.

  Suddenly the Twi’lek stopped, determined to stand her ground. Luke tapped her lightsaber aside, then used the Force to pull her hand toward him, drawing her off balance onto his own weapon. Her eyes widened, and the blade sliced down through her clavicle, deep into her shoulder.

  Luke brought his boot up under her chin, snapping her head back, sending her arms flying out to her sides. She began to backflip away, her lightsaber slipping from her open fingers.

  Luke summoned the weapon into his empty hand and continued toward Mara, who had disappeared inside a knot of Gorog. Her weapons were still flashing inside the snarl and her presence was burning hot in the Force, and that gave him hope. He reached out to Leia, urging her to hurry, then fell on the jumble with both lightsabers whirling.

  The battle erupted into a tempest of hissing blades and shrieking blasters and crackling electrobolts. Luke opened a dozen thoraxes in a dozen strokes, then his back spasmed with the paralyzing heat of an electrobolt strike. Mara fired from somewhere inside the tangle of limbs and mandibles, and the acrid stench of melted chitin rose behind him. Luke stretched out with the Force, dragging Killiks away from Mara, hurling them into their fellow warriors or impaling them on crooked forks of energy.

  Luke pulled himself toward a glimpse of red-gold hair, his lightsabers opening a path, filling the air with globules of insect gore. Twice, a mandible slipped through his defenses, one stabbing deep into his thigh, the other slipping a barb inside the face opening of his helmet. Both times, he slashed off the attackers’ heads and moved on.

  Finally, Luke came to Mara’s whirling figure. Her vac suit had been burned to tatters, and she had half a dozen black circles where electrobolts had hit her. A faint aura of gold had arisen around her, a sign she was drawing on the Force to keep her exhausted, wounded body going.

  Mara briefly locked gazes with Luke, then her green eyes slid away, looking overhead. Luke followed her line of sight and was surprised to see Alema Rar pulling herself into the tunnel mouth. Her left arm was floating at her side, a deep, gaping V where she had been cleaved.

  Mara lowered her gaze again and continued her defensive whirl.

  She batted away an electrobolt, then groaned, “This isn’t really taking the fight to them.”

  “Not too late, though.” Luke sent a flurry of electrobolts screaming back toward the Killiks that had fired them. “Got them overconfident now.”

  “Better make it look good, then.”

  Mara sent a dozen bolts screaming toward the Twi’lek. Luke did not see whether any hit. By then, the Gorog were pressing the attack again, and he was too busy defending himself and Mara to worry about Alema.

  Leia’s arms had become deadweights fifteen minutes into the fight, and she was able to wield her lightsaber now only by virtue of the strength Saba was lending her through the Force. Han had run out of power packs—she had not noticed when— and traded his T-21 for a pair of captured assault rifles, which he had taken to firing one in each hand. The bugcrunchers had taken so many hits that Bugs One through Three had exhausted their laminanium repair ingots. With the exception of Saba— who only seemed to grow quicker, stronger, and more joyful as the battle wore on—even the Jedi Masters were slowing, if the tattered condition of their combat vac suits was any indication.

  And the Gorog just kept coming, blocking the way ahead, clattering out of side passages, rumbling up the tunnel behind the rescue team. A limitless swarm.

  “Han!” Leia’s lightsaber swept down to divert an electrobolt streaking toward his knee, then swung up to block one coming at her own head. Her arms were so numb she did not even feel them move. “Do those bugcrunchers have thermal detonators on them?”

  “What do you think?”

  “Use ‘em.”

  “In here?” The assault rifle in Han’s left hand ran low on power and began to shoot sparks. He let it float free. “That’s crazy! If we blow a hole in this ice cube—”

  “Use ‘em!” Leia used the Force to pull a rifle out of a dead Gorog’s hands and floated it up the corridor to Han. “I don’t think we’re going to reach Luke and Mara in time. And we’re not doing very—”

  “YVH bugcrunchers,” Han said over the combat channel. “Go BAM. Use your detonators.”

  “BAM status requires authorization—”

  “Do it!” Han shouted so loudly that his voice reverberated out of five other helmets. “Do it now!”

  “Authorization code do it now accepted,” Bug One said. The soft crump of the droid’s grenade launcher sounded from the head of the line. “By Any Means status—”

  A brilliant flash lit the corridor, and the rest of the report was lost to the earsplitting crackle of a thermal detonator.

  The rescue team surged forward into the crater, and Bug Four called, “Proceed with all haste.” A soft crump sounded as the droid launched his detonator. “Explosion imminent.”

  Leia and the others barely had time to start forward before a brilliant flash filled the corridor behind them. Leaving Bug Four to handle rear-guard duty, they followed Kyp and the other Masters forward. Another crump sounded from the front of the line. Another detonator exploded. The tunnel behind them filled with Gorog, and Bug Four launched a detonator.

  “Blazt!” Saba shut down her lightsaber. “Where is the fun in that?”

  Moving much faster now, they passed through another crater and started around the next corner—then stopped short when a deafening storm of electrobolt fire sent Bug One tumbling back into the adjacent wall. His armor was blasted down to the frame and his internal systems were hanging out, sparking and shooting green lubricant.

  “Major eneeemyyy conceeeee . . .” He raised his arm, and a detonator floated out. “Deeeeee . . . eee . . . e
. . .”

  His systems shut down, leaving the detonator floating in front of him, its red warning light blinking the countdown.

  “Misfire! Misfire!” Bug Two started toward the detonator. “Please seek—”

  “Stand fast!” Leia ordered.

  She raised her finger toward the detonator, but Saba or Kyp or someone had already sent it sailing around the bend. It detonated with a brilliant flash, then Bug Two led the charge forward.

  When the rescue team followed, they found themselves entering a vast, murky vault filled with Gorog warriors. Leia could sense Luke and Mara a dozen meters above, hidden in a tangle of insects so thick and large she could not see the glow of their lightsabers.

  “How about it, Saba?” Han asked. “That enough fun for you?”

  Before the Barabel could answer, some of the Gorog recovered their senses and fired a volley of electrobolts. Leia’s lightsaber came up automatically, as did those of Kyp, Saba, and the other Masters, but there were just too many strikes to block. She took a scalding hit in the shoulder and heard Han curse as he took one, then a pair of crumps sounded as Bug Two and Bug Three launched more detonators.

  “Careful!” Kyp warned. “Master Skywalker—”

  The rest was lost to a pair of earsplitting crackles, and Leia’s sight flashed to white. The air shuddered as the bugcrunchers opened up with their blaster cannons. By the time her vision cleared, both droids had activated their thrusters and were shooting toward the combat tangle above. Kyp and the other Masters were close on their heels.

  Leia looked over at Han. A hand-sized expanse of blistered flesh showed through a hole in the stomach of his vac suit.

  “You all right?” he asked.

  “Fine,” Leia said. She started to remark that Han’s wound looked worse than hers, but stopped when Jaina and Zekk touched her through the battle-meld, wondering what the blazes was happening and assuring her that help was coming. She grabbed Han’s wrist. “Han, there’s something I should tell you.”

  “Now?” He leaned down and kissed her on the lips. “I love you, too, but maybe—”

  “Not that,” Leia said. “I mean, it’s Jaina. She’s on her way.”

  “Here?” Han scowled. “Good thing or bad?”

  Leia could only shrug and shake her head. “I’m pretty sure she and Zekk are Joiners.”

  Han let his chin drop. “Just shoot me—”

  A volley of electrobolt fire crackled up the tunnel behind them. Bug Four retreated around the corner, armor smoking, a deep melt-crease along one side of his head.

  “Okay—I didn’t mean that.”

  Han dropped one of his electrobolt rifles and grabbed Leia around the waist, then activated his belt thrusters. They jetted toward the combat above, plowing through an ever-thickening morass of blood globules and drifting bodies. The largest part of the Gorog swarm had turned to face Kyp and the other Masters, but Luke and Mara were still trapped a few meters above the main combat, their lightsabers weaving brilliant snakes of color as they spun and slashed and killed.

  Leia and Han were about halfway to the fight when she noticed that no Gorog were firing in their direction. Faced with a line of Jedi Masters and bugcruncher droids, apparently Leia and Han just did not seem like much of a threat.

  Leia hated being underestimated.

  “That way!” Leia reached across Han’s face, pointing away from the battle at an angle. “Flank ‘em!”

  “I was just about to think of that.” Han turned in the direction Leia had indicated, then dropped his second assault rifle and drew his trusty DL-44 blaster. “Take the stick!”

  Before Leia could ask for clarification, Han braced his blaster hand across his free arm and pointed the emitter nozzle at one of the Gorog attacking Luke and Mara.

  “Are you crazy?” Leia cried. “You can’t shoot into a hand-to-hand fight!”

  “No kidding?” Han replied. “I didn’t know that.”

  Leia grabbed Han in the Force and, as they continued to approach the battle, tried to steady him. He squeezed the trigger, and a bolt streaked up to blast a Gorog’s head apart. He fired again, and an abdomen exploded. The third shot burned a hole through a warrior’s thorax.

  Han began to fire more rapidly now, always aiming for the perimeter of the battle. The two Masters used the Force to shove targets into his line of fire, and it was only a few seconds before the only Gorog between them and the Solos were dead ones.

  Han stopped firing and waved them down. “Come on! Let’s get outta—”

  Luke and Mara shook their heads, then turned toward the ceiling and vanished into a tunnel surrounded by the five largest, ugliest Killiks Leia had ever seen.

  “Hey!” Han yelled, still trying to wave them back. “The ship’s this way!”

  FORTY

  JAINA AND ZEKK KNEW they were getting close to the launching bay when the broken cylinders of derelict dartships began to appear in the ethmane fog. They could feel Leia and the other Jedi somewhere beyond, deep within Kr, awash in a battle whirl of anger and fear and pain.

  They followed the shaft around a bend and, in the fog below, saw the hazy star of a blasted-out launching bay. From inside came the silver flicker of a small-arms barrage, punctuated at intervals by the brilliant bursts of laser cannons. Jaina and Zekk stretched their Force-awareness into the battle. They felt only four living presences aboard the Falcon, the Noghri and two others they did not recognize.

  As their StealthXs slipped through the entrance, forks of white energy began to crackle across their forward shields. Jaina and Zekk activated their forward floodlights. The launching bay was filled with wrecked dartships and drifting insect parts. In the heart of the carnage floated the Millennium Falcon, taking fire from dozens of positions concealed in the flotsam. Perhaps two dozen insects in the chitin-and-insulfiber carapaces that served as Killik pressure suits had slipped inside the Falcon’s shields. They were blasting it with electrobolts at point-blank range, melting fist-sized pits into the hull armor.

  Jaina and Zekk paused, struggling to grasp what they saw. Despite what they had sensed from Leia through the Force, they still found it difficult to believe that a nest of Killiks would attack the Falcon without reason . . . and all too easy to believe the Falcon might have provided a reason. Only the memory of the unprovoked attacks on the Shadow and Master Sebatyne earlier— and of the illogical explanations provided by the Colony—gave them the resolve to open fire.

  Their laser bolts were blindingly brilliant in such a narrow space, and their canopy flash tinting went to black. Jaina and Zekk instinctively reached into the Force to locate their targets, but the only presences they felt were aboard the Falcon. They had to settle for counterfire, allowing their R9 units to control the laser cannons and target the source of each electrobolt.

  It took longer, but the result was the same. The positions in the flotsam fell silent, leaving only the Killiks on the Falcon’s hull to contend with. Jaina and Zekk sealed their vac suits and moved their StealthXs deeper into the launching bay.

  Before they could pop their canopies, the Falcon’s rear cargo hatch opened and two Noghri in vac suits dropped out of the vessel with a pair of T-21 repeating blasters. The hatch closed behind them, and they turned in different directions, twisting and spinning like Jedi, working their way around the hull, burning the Killiks off the ship. As much as it pained Jaina and Zekk to watch the deaths of so many Kind, they had to admire the artistry.

  The Noghri had almost completed their hull cleaning when the Falcon’s ion drives glowed to life. Jaina and Zekk stretched their awareness into the ship again, trying to figure out why the two presences aboard would do such a thing.

  They did not like what they felt.

  “Help!” C-3PO’s voice came over the emergency channel. “This Ewok is a criminal! He has the death mark on ten planets, and now he’s attemptttiiiing . . . tooooo . . . steeeeeeaa . . .”

  C-3PO’s plea trailed off into a deep rumble as someone tripped
his primary circuit breaker.

  The Falcon spun her bow toward the exit. Still fighting the Killiks, the Noghri were thrown from the hull and began to drift.

  Jaina swung her StealthX in behind her father’s beloved freighter and armed a proton torpedo.

  Zekk began to wonder if this was not overkill.

  The specifications of the Falcon’s military-grade shields rose to the top of their mind, and Zekk understood. He armed a torpedo of his own.

  They activated their targeting computers.

  The Falcon stopped spinning—no doubt as target-lock alarms filled the cockpit.

  A nervous Sullustan voice came over the comm channel. “This is Jae . run, second mate of the Millennium Falcon, requesting the two unseen craft to deselect us as targets.”

  Jaina and Zekk did not comply.

  The glow died from the Falcon’s ion drives. “This is Jae Juun, second mate of the Millennium Falcon. See-Threepio was mistaken. Our only intention was to move the ship out of . . . the line . . . What the bloah is that?”

  Jaina and Zekk did not need to see past the Falcon to know what Juun was talking about. They could feel it in the growing pressure of Unu’s will, in the growing weight inside them.

  The Falcon slipped away from the exit, exposing the old Lancer-class frigate now blocking the way outside. A small, well-armed launch was gliding silently through the jagged entrance, nosing aside ruined dartships and tumbling pieces of Killik.

  Unu’s will grew crushing, compelling Zekk and Jaina to answer honestly—even before they sensed the question.

  Who did this?

  Mara and Luke were ten meters down a sticky, wax-lined tunnel, and every time Mara made the mistake of breathing, she came close to retching. The dank air stank worse than a Sarlacc’s belch, a cloying melange of decay, spice, and free ethmane. And the smell was only growing worse as they advanced.

  “At least it keeps you from thinking about the burns,” Luke said.