by Karen Miller
Anakin threw up his hands. “Now he notices.”
“Come along,” said Obi-Wan, and clapped him on the shoulder. “I’m hungry, I’m stinking, and right now that pitiful mattress on the floor of Jaklin’s storeroom looks to me like the height of luxury.”
They could have joined some of the other villagers leaving the mine. There were nods, smiles, half-issued invitations. But by tacit consent they made their excuses, claiming the fatigue of a first day, and kept on walking, stretching their senses to the breaking point. Only they couldn’t put a name to the creeping dread they felt. All they knew was that fresh trouble stalked them… and there was nowhere to run.
Chapter Eight
Back at the cottage, Teeba Jaklin gave them a measured once-over and grudging approval.
“I’ve had good reports,” she said. “Though Rikkard wasn’t pleased it took you so long to reach the mine.”
Obi-Wan pretended anxiety. “We were sorry to vex him, Teeba. He did say we could take a small wander around the village, get our bearings and lay eyes on the place. It’s true we poked our noses into most corners.”
“And kicked a ball around the square with a gaggle of grubby young’uns,” Jaklin added. “So Brandeh tells it.”
“Don’t look at me, Teeba. That was Markl.”
Jaklin’s severe expression eased. “It’s a good heart that likes a young’un. And you were a sweet one to Greti, Yavid. A wild child, she is. No fault of her own.”
“I was sorry to hear her mother is so ill,” he said quietly. “Greti’s young to have that kind of fear.”
“You think fear respects age, Teeb?” Jaklin snorted. “Maybe you’re a fool after all. I’ve got stew for you but no clean clothes. There’s one or two thinking they could spare you a shirt each but they’ll not look till tomorrow. You’re filthy in what you’re wearing but what you’re in will need to do you another day.”
“We’ll manage,” Obi-Wan said. “Thank you.”
She nodded. “Go splash yourselves, then. I’ll get the stew on the table.”
So tired that they were almost dropping face-first into their plates, they gratefully ate the hot, tasteless stew and staggered back to the storeroom.
“See, what did I tell you?” said Anakin, his voice slurring into sleep. “Make friends with the younglings and everyone thinks you’re fine.”
Obi-Wan pulled his blanket over his head.
They jerked awake before dawn to screaming sirens and a howling in the Force.
Even as they fumbled out from under their blankets, Teeba Jaklin pounded her fist on the storeroom door and flung it open.
“Theta storm, Teebs,” she said, turning on the light. “It’s bad.”
One look at her face and Obi-Wan knew that the trouble he and Anakin had sensed was upon them. “How can we help?” he said, reaching for his boots.
Jaklin was thrumming with an ill-concealed fear. “You said you know machines. That’s true? Not fast talk to sweeten us on you?”
“No, it’s true,” said Anakin, dragging on his own boots. “What do you need, Teeba?”
Torbel’s storm sirens were still wailing, a horrible shrill sound like a sand panther’s claws on durasteel. Jaklin pressed a hand to her forehead, as though the shrill sound pained her. “You remember what a theta storm is, Teeb Yavid?”
Obi-Wan nodded. “Sunspot activity agitates radioactive theta particles that have been trapped in a planet’s atmosphere. A storm can last for minutes or hours, depending on the strength of the coronal flare and the concentration of theta particles in any given location.”
Eyes narrowed, Jaklin stepped back. “That’s no plainspoke farmer’s answer.”
Stang. Weary and hammered by the Force’s loud alarm, he’d forgotten for a moment who he was meant to be.
“I read it once,” he said, pretending bewilderment. “Some fancy book-smart fellow’s ramblings. Happened to stick in my mind, that’s all. No harm meant, Teeba.”
“He does that, Teeba,” said Anakin. “He reads things, Cousin Yavid does, and spouts them off after like he knows more than the rest of us. Doesn’t make him many friends. But he’s my family so I have to live with it.”
She looked torn, wanting to believe them, afraid that if she did it might go against her later.
“Teeba, we really do know machines,” said Anakin. “What’s there to be done that we can help with?”
“The storm shields,” she said, rubbing the back of her hand across her eyes. “They drag a lot of power, but so does the mine and the mine can’t close down. Not the refinery, either.”
Because they’re behind on their quota and the convoy is coming. “So you need eyes in the power plant,” said Obi-Wan. “In case of overload. What else?”
“The shield generators need checking, too,” she said. “If we lose one we’ll have folk theta-poisoned, or worse. We do our best to keep the machines working, but—”
“There’s been no money for a long time. You’ve had to patch and make do,” said Anakin. “And hope things don’t fall apart.”
Jaklin stared at him, uncertain. “Yes. It’s hard. Always hard.”
“I know,” said Anakin, his voice softening. “I’ve lived it.”
And because that was true, and she could see it was true, Jaklin abandoned her suspicion. “Your help’s sore needed. Most of our men are down the mine.”
Puzzled, Obi-Wan looked up from tightening his bootlaces. “What about the village’s women?”
“Some know machines. Most don’t,” said Jaklin. “I’m trying to change it, but change comes slow. It’s sure you are that you know machines? I can trust you?”
“Don’t worry, Teeba,” said Anakin, confidently smiling. “We won’t let you down.”
“He’s right, we won’t,” said Obi-Wan, as Teeba Jaklin snorted. “Who do we report to?”
“Well, it should be Rikkard,” Jaklin said, uncertain. “But likely he’s gone down the mine again. Arrad’s his second, but Arrad’s back to working the refinery.” Her breathing caught. “We’ve so far to catch up yet.”
Obi-Wan exchanged a glance with Anakin. “So does that mean if Rikkard and Arrad are busy, there’s nobody in charge at the plant?”
Because that’s what it sounds like and if that’s the case, then may the Force be with all of us.
“No, no,” said Jaklin. “If Rikkard’s not aboveground, it’s Devi you want. She got herself crippled in a mine-fall. Can’t properly walk. So to make herself useful she studied up on the machines. She’ll be doing her best to keep the plant and shields operating sound.”
He exchanged another glance with Anakin. That’s something, at least.
“You’ve got to keep the power plant working, Teebs,” said Jaklin, her fear rippling through the Force. “If the storm shield fails we’ll all be dead within a week. There are portable glow lamps on the kitchen table. There’s no village lighting, to save power. Whoever you find, Rikkard or Devi, tell them you’ve got my leave to do what’s needed. Now I’m off to the charter house. Come storm time it’s where people send for help if there’s trouble.”
“If there’s trouble?” said Anakin, once Jaklin had left. “Obi-Wan—”
“I know. I know. Trouble’s already here and it’s brought reinforcements.” He took a moment to taste the wild night, feeling the Force’s writhing. So much danger. “But we’ll manage. Now, I think we’ll achieve more if we split up. I’ll take the power plant. You keep those shield generators going. But however you do it, don’t let it slip you’re a Jedi. Not just for the villagers’ sake, but because I don’t want us to stand out in the Force.”
Anakin stared. “You still think we’re being hunted?”
Since that awful, sharp stab of awareness in the mine he’d felt no further touch by the presence behind it. But while they slept, his restless dreams had told him they weren’t alone.
“I do,” he said. “Now let’s go.”
They retrieved the glow lamps, left the cottage
in darkness and went outside. Torbel’s storm shields arced overhead in an enormous bluish dome. Beyond that pale barrier the theta storm raged, a writhing soup of supercharged, reddish orange poison.
“It almost seems alive,” Anakin murmured, fascinated. “Like it’s trying to get in.”
Obi-Wan gave him a look. “Less imagination and more focus, Anakin.”
“Sorry.”
They went their separate ways, Anakin heading for the nearest storm-shield generator while he continued down the narrow street, the thin beam from his glow lamp bouncing with every stride. The power plant was on the far side of the village, distant from the mine and the refinery and anything else that could be damaged if there was an accident. Jogging across the square, Obi-Wan resisted the urge to Force-sprint. The streets might be empty now but that could change at any moment. He looked over at the charter house. The front windows were dimly lit with glow lamps, and he could sense the presence of some four—no, five—worried people.
Overhead, beyond the storm shield, the theta particles thrashed and swirled. Lanteeb’s atmosphere must be soaked in the stuff, bloated with it. What a way to live; every day waiting for this madness to erupt. Frantically hoping that the warning system worked, that the storm shields would hold, that the worst of nature’s impersonal cruelty would pass them by. Lanteeb might be a backworld but in its own way it, too, was living through a war.
When this is over, I’ll ask Bail to use his influence to make a difference here. These people deserve better.
He found Devi alone in the small, antiquated power plant’s monitoring station. Strapped into an antigravity support harness, she awkwardly prowled the banks of circuitry and gauges, her worried gaze reading off every tiny fluctuation in core temp, energy flow, and backfill status.
“Teeb Yavid?” she said, surprised. “What are you doing here?”
“I have some experience with machinery,” he said, letting his senses touch the power plant’s atmosphere. Not using the Force, not precisely… just letting it whisper in his ear. “Teeba Jaklin thought you might like a helping hand.”
Devi glared at the ceiling. “Blasted theta storms. On top of everything else. Yavid, when you say you’ve machine experience…”
Something wasn’t right with the generator’s central flux capacitor. A rough note, a hum of warning. Something out of place. Alerted, Obi-Wan began to wander down the bank of monitors, reaching out with his senses to pinpoint the problem.
I have a bad feeling.
“Markl and I didn’t just work lumber on Alderaan,” he said, “we worked for nearly a whole season in a power generation plant. It was Alderaan so their equipment was much more sophisticated than yours—ours—but—” He glanced back at her. “I picked up a few tricks. So if I can be of use to you—”
“All the help you can give me I’ll take,” Devi said fervently. “Now, what are you looking for?”
He trailed his fingertips above the surface of the monitors. Not here… not here… not here…
Yes. Here.
Putting aside his glow lamp, he took a closer look at the monitor’s flickering gauges. Intrigued, Devi joined him, the servomotors in her antigrav harness grinding. It didn’t fit her properly; he could sense the dull pain in her damaged back and legs.
“What’s this do?” he said, tapping the bank of equipment.
“That’s the readout for the conversion chamber mix valve,” she said, alarmed. “It’s the feed valve for the liquid damotite.”
Obi-Wan stared at her. Damotite? Nobody mentioned damotite is being used as fuel. Surely that wasn’t a good idea.
Devi was rapping her knuckles to her forehead, as though trying to encourage rapid thought. “Conversion chamber—conversion chamber,” she muttered. “What can cause a problem with the con—”
“Impurities in the prime fuel source?” he said, feeling the Force’s warning sharpen. “If they’ve clogged one or more of the feed valves—”
“Stang,” she said softly. “Yavid, you’re right. How did I not—stang.”
Turning so fast that she almost overbalanced, she clumped her way across the monitoring station to a bank of equipment heavily featuring levers, manual valves, and dials.
“I need to do a system flush,” she said. “Look at the readout again would you, Yavid? Which specific valves are affected?”
He looked. Eighteen valves in total, red warning lights flashing on four. “Numbers two, eight, eleven, and seventeen.”
Her face screwed tight in concentration, Devi slammed down levers in the order he’d called. Then she activated the valve flush and stood back, eyes narrowed, as the dim, almost subliminal sound of the nearly obsolete hydraulic system kicked into play.
“Come on—come on—” she murmured, singsong. “Yavid, what’s the board reading now?”
He looked again. “No change, I’m—no, no, strike that. Seventeen is green.”
“Oh come on—” Devi implored. “Pathetic it is, one out of four!”
“Two is green,” he said, as another red light morphed into a cooler, kinder color. “And so is eleven.”
Her head snapped around to stare, her eyes intent. “Not eight?”
One last stubborn red light flashed. Flashed faster. Stopped flashing altogether and became a single glaring red eye. Obi-Wan felt a tremor of alarm. “I believe eight has gone critical.”
“Stang!” Devi shouted, and hit the valve flush again. “You blasted—I’m going to smash Arrad, the arrogant little barve, I told him—” With an effort she got herself back under control. “Yavid, is it working?”
A shrill alarm buzzer answered for him.
“Devi, can the valve be flushed manually?”
“Yes, yes, it can, but—”
She looked down at herself, at the bulky, ungainly antigrav support harness that kept her on her feet but made her slow and clumsy. On the monitoring station’s opposite wall a status board started to light up.
Obi-Wan followed her anguished stare. “That’s not good, is it?”
“No, Yavid,” she whispered. “It’s very, very bad.”
“The system’s overloading?”
She nodded, her pale face sweaty with fear.
He pointed to the closed door at the back of the monitoring station. “The plant proper’s through there?”
“Yes,” she said, breathless. “Yavid, have you ever done a manual forced—”
“No.” He managed a quick smile. “But there’s a first time for everything. And I’m a quick learner.”
Devi tried, but she couldn’t answer his smile. “You’re sure? It’s not easy, and it’s dangerous.”
“Do we have a choice?”
“Not really.” Taking a deep breath, she steadied herself. “Through the door, turn right, ten ranks over, then six bays down. It’s number eight valve, right? Then you’re looking for the bank of green equipment. There’s a spigot wheel and two levers. Pull down the left-hand lever. Open the spigot as wide as it’ll go. Pull down the right-hand lever. Wait for the all-clear bell. Yank both levers back up at the same time, then close the spigot. You got that?”
He was already heading for the door. “Yes. I’ve got it.”
“Wait, Yavid!” she called after him. “You need a hazard suit. You’ll find them in—”
“There’s no time,” he said over his shoulder. “Don’t worry. I’ll manage.”
“All right,” she said. “I’ll keep monitoring things out here. Good luck.”
More alarms blared as he grabbed the door’s handle, and turned it.
I’ll need more than luck. May the Force be with me.
The raging theta storm had turned night into nightmare.
Though Anakin could sense the lives in this forsaken village, huddled in their homes, slaving deep beneath his feet and in the ever-hungry refinery, he felt like the only man alive in the world. Working his way around the perimeter of the storm shield, he didn’t need his glow lamp to see or the Force to guide him. The s
torm shield generated its own ghostly light, and the glare of the storm was like a dying sun melting out of the sky.
Though it was frightening, he found the purity of its ferocity compelling. Alluring. It called to something deep inside him. But Obi-Wan was right. Less imagination, more focus. He had a job to do and lives to protect.
There were fifteen shield generators in total, placed at intervals around the village. Each created a section of antigrav plasma that bled into and bonded with the next, forming a seamless, impenetrable whole. He reached the third generator to find another villager already there, checking its power cell and circuitry.
“You’d be Teeb Markl?” the man said, shining a glow lamp into his face. In his late middle years, he had an old scar running right across both sunken cheeks. “I’m Tarnik. Jaklin warned you and your cousin were out to help.”
Warned? That sounded ominous. “We’ve a bit of machine work up our sleeves, Tarnik,” Anakin said, projecting guiless concern. “With the village shorthanded and the mine swallowing men, Yavid and I thought—”
“No need to explain,” said Tarnik. Storm shadows flickered over him, hiding his eyes. “I’m glad of it.” He nudged the generator. “This one’s holding up. I’m thinking, since it don’t take two men to look at one generator, could be you and I need to work in opposite directions.”
“You want me to cross the village? Start from the other side?”
Tarnik lowered his glow lamp. Despite their trouble he was smiling, his wry expression twisting the scar across his face. “If you don’t mind running. Your legs are a few seasons younger than mine.”
“I can do that,” Anakin said. “The two generators behind me don’t show any faults.”
“Glad to hear it,” said Tarnik. “And the village, it’ll be glad to hear you and your cousin aren’t afraid to put your shoulders to the wheel. Torbel can always use good men of your stamp.”
Maybe. But it could use a fleet of Republic Cruisers, the Seps kicked out, and some serious hardship assistance even more.
“That’s good to know, Teeb,” he said. “I’ll get looking at those other generators. Meet up with you somewhere around the shield.”