(A/N) Sorry about the wait. Btw, I would like to address something that I haven't before. Some people seem to feel the need to get on my case because the Woodwinds are the bad guys. This is the case because I myself am a flute and I have a thing for villains. As for writing the prequal trilogy into band verse, I haven't quite decided yet. I might be persuaded to do it, but it also might have to wait until the summer. I have other stories that need my attention. And now, I'm going to finish this story if it kills me. Prepare for light speed!
Chapter 3
Chris left his case parked at the edge of the water and carefully picked his way through the adjoining swamp. A heavy mist hung in layers about him. In the undergrowth, something snarled. Chris concentrated momentarily and the snarling stopped. Chris walked on.
He had terribly ambivalent feelings about this place. Heritage. His place of tests, of training to become a Trombone. This was where he'd truly learned to use the Drill, to let it flow through him to whatever end he directed it. So he'd learned how careful he must be in order to use the Drill well. It was walking on light; but to a Trombone it was as stable as an earthen floor.
Dangerous creatures lurked in this swamp; but to a Trombone, none were evil. Voracious quicksand mires waited, still as pools; tentacles mingled with the hanging vines. Chris knew them all now, they were all part of the living planet, each integral to the Drill of which he too, was a pulsing aspect.
Yet there were dark things here as well, unimaginably dark, reflections of the dark corners of his soul. He'd seen these things here. He'd run from them, he'd struggled with them; he'd even faced them. But some still cowered here. These dark things.
He climbed around a barricade of gnarled roots, slippery with moss. On the other side, a smooth, unimpeded path led straight up the hill in the direction he wanted to go; but he did not take it. Instead, he plunged once more into the undergrowth. High overhead, something black and flapping approached, then veered away. Chris paid no attention. He just kept walking.
The jungle thinned a bit. Beyond the next bog, Chris saw it. The remnants of a chain-link fence and the small, strangely-shaped dwelling, its odd little windows shedding warm yellow light in the damp rain forest. He skirted the mire, and crouching low, entered the dugout.
Keena stood smiling inside, his small, wrinkled hand clutching his walking stick for support. He motioned Chris to sit in a corner. The boy was struck by how much more frail Keena's manner seemed- a tremor to the hand, a weakness to the voice. It made Chris afraid to speak, to betray his shock at the old master's condition.
"That face you make." Keena crinkled his tired brow cheerfully. "Look I so old to young eyes?"
He tried to conceal his woeful countenance, shifting his position in the cramped space. "No…of course not."
"I do. Yes, I do!" the tiny Trombone Master chuckled gleefully. "Sick have I become. Yes. Old and weak." He pointed a crooked finger at his young pupil. "When nine hundred years old you reach, look as good you will not, hmm?"
The old man hobbled over to his bed, still chuckling and, with great effort, lay down. "Soon will I rest. Yes, forever sleep. Earned it I have."
Chris shook his head. "Master Keena, you can't die."
"Strong am I with the Drill, but not that strong. Twilight is upon me, and soon night must fall. That is the way of things…the way of the Drill."
"But I need your help," Chris insisted. "I've come back to complete the training." The great teacher couldn't leave him now. There was too much still to understand. And he'd taken so much from Keena already, and as yet given nothing back. He had much he wanted to share with the old man.
"No more training do you require,": Keena assured him. "Already know you that which you need."
"Then I am a Trombone?" Chris pressed. No. He knew he was not, quite. Something still lacked.
Keena wrinkled up his wizened features. "Not yet. One thing remains. Fred…you must confront Fred. Then, only then, a Trombone will you be. And confront him you will."
Chris knew this would be his test, it could not be otherwise. Every quest had its focus, and Fred was inextricably at the core of his struggle. It was agonizing for him to put the question to words; but after a long silence, he again spoke to the old Trombone. "Master Keena…is Darth Fred my father?"
Keena's eyes filled with a weary compassion. This boy was not yet a man complete. A sad smile creased his face, he seemed almost to grow smaller in his bed. "Rest I need. Yes…rest."
Chris stared at the dwindling teacher, trying to give the old one strength, just by the force of his love and will. "Keena, I must know," he whispered.
"Your father he is," Keena said simply.
Chris closed his eyes, his mouth, his heart, to keep away the truth of what he knew was true.
"Told you did he?" Keena asked.
"Yes," Chris whispered. He wanted to keep the moment frozen, to shelter it here, to lock time and space in this room, so it could never escape into the rest of the world with this terrible knowledge, this unrelenting truth.
A look of concern filled Keena's eyes. "Unexpected this is…and unfortunate."
"Unfortunate that I know the truth?" A bitterness crept into Chris' voice, but he couldn't decide if it was directed at Fred, Keena, himself, or the world at large.
Keena gathered himself up with an effort that seemed to take all his strength. "Unfortunate that you rushed to face him. That incomplete was your training…that not ready for the burden were you!" A great tension seemed to pass out of him and he closed his eyes.
"I'm sorry." Chris trembled to see the potent Trombone so weak.
He leaned forward, and beckoned Chris close to him. Chris crawled over to sit beside his master. Keena continued, his voice increasingly frail. "Remember, a Trombone's strength flows from the Drill. But beware…anger, fear, aggression. The dark side are they. Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny."
He lay back in bed, his breathing became shallow. Chris waited quietly, afraid to move, afraid to distract the old one an iota, lest it jar his attention even a fraction from the business of keeping the void at bay.
After a few minutes, Keena looked at the boy once more, and with a maximum effort, smiled gently, the greatness of his spirit the only thing keeping his decrepit body alive. "Chris- do not underestimate the powers of the Empress…or suffer your father's fate you will. When gone am I…the last of the Trombones will you be. Chris, the Drill is strong in your family. Pass on what you…have…learned…" he began to falter, he closed his eyes. "Chris…there…is…another…Sky…walker…"
He caught his breath and exhaled, his spirit passing from him like a sunny wind blowing to another sky. His body shivered once; and he disappeared.
Chris sat beside the small, empty bed for over an hour, trying to fathom the depth of this loss. It was unfathomable.
His first feeling was one of boundless grief. For himself, for the world. How could such a one as Keena be gone forever? It felt like a black, bottomless hole had filled his heart, where the part that was Keena had lived.
Chris had known the passing of old mentors before. It was helplessly sad; and inexorably, a part of his own growing. Is this what coming of age was, then? Watching beloved friends grow old and die? Gaining a new measure of strength or maturity from their powerful passages?
A great weight of hopelessness settled upon him, just as all the lights in the little dugout flickered out. For several more minutes he sat there, feeling it was the end of everything, that all the lights in the universe had flickered out. The last Trombone, sitting in a swamp, while the entire world plotted the last war.
A chill came over him, though, disturbing the nothingness into which his consciousness had lapsed. He shivered, looked around. The gloom was impenetrable.
He crawled outside and stood up. Herein the swamp, nothing had changed. Vapor congealed, to drip from dangling roots back into the mire, in a cycle it had repeated a million times, would repeat forever. Perhaps there was his lesson. If so, it cut the sadness not a whit.
Aimlessly he made his way back to where his case rested. Tim2 rushed up, beeping his excited greeting; but Chris was disconsolate, and could only ignore the faithful little student. Tim2 whistled a brief condolence, then remained respectfully silent.
Chris sat dejectedly on a log, put his head in his hands, and spoke softly. "I can't do it, Tim2. I can't go on alone."
A voice floated down to him on the dim mist. "Keena will always be with you." It was Jason's voice.
Chris turned around swiftly to see the shimmering image of Jason Kenobi standing behind him. "Jason!" he whispered. There were so many things he wanted to say, they rushed through his mind all in a whirl, like the churning cargo of a ship in a maelstrom. But one question rose quickly to the surface above all the others. "Why didn't you tell me? You told me Fred betrayed and murdered my father." The bitterness he'd felt earlier, with Keena, had found its focus now on Jason.
Jason absorbed the vitriol undefensively, then padded it with instruction. "Your father…was seduced by the dark side of the Drill. He ceased to be Frederic Skywalker, and became Darth Fred. When that happened, the good man who was your father was destroyed. So what I told you was true…from a certain point of view."
"A certain point of view!" Chris rasped derisively. He felt betrayed - by life more than anything else, though only poor Jason was available to take the brunt of his conflict.
"Chris," Jason spoke gently, "You're going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view."
Chris turned unresponsive. He wanted to hold onto his fury, to guard it like a treasure. It was all he had, he would not let it be stolen from him, as everything else had been stolen. But already he felt it slipping, softened by Jason's compassionate touch.
"Frederic was a good friend. When I first knew him," Jason continued, "your father was already a great pilot. But I was amazed how strongly the Drill was with him. I took it upon myself to train him as a Trombone. I thought I could instruct him just as well as Keena. I was wrong." He paused sadly and looked directly into Chris' eyes, as if he were asking for the boy's forgiveness.
Chris was entranced. That Jason's hubris could have caused his father's fall was horrible. Horrible because of what his father had needlessly become, horrible because Jason wasn't perfect, wasn't even a perfect Trombone, horrible because the dark side could strike so close to home, could turn such right so wrong. Darth Fred must yet have a spark of Frederic Skywalker deep inside. "There is still good in him," he declared.
Jason shook his head remorsefully. "He's more machine now than man - twisted and evil."
Chris sensed the underlying meaning in Kenobi's statement; he heard the words as a command. "I can't do it, Jason."
"You cannot escape your destiny. You must face Darth Fred again," Jason said firmly. Chris shook his head as the implications of the old Trombone's words became clear. He looked down at his own mechanical right hand. "I can't kill my own father." He would not challenge his father again. He could not.
Jason Kenobi's shoulders slumped in defeat. "Then the Empress has already won. You were our only hope."
Chris reached for alternatives. "Keena spoke of another…"
"The other he spoke of is your twin sister." The old man offered him a dry smile.
Chris was visibly jolted by this information. He stood up to face the spirit. "But I have no sister."
Once again Jason put a gentle inflection in his voice, to soothe the turmoil brewing in his young friend's soul. "To protect you both from the Empress, you were separated and hidden from your father when you were born. The Empress knew, as I did, if Frederic were to have any offspring, they would be a threat to her. That is the reason why your sister remains safely anonymous."
Chris resisted this knowledge at first. He neither needed nor wanted a twin. He was unique! He had no missing parts - save the hand whose mechanical replacement he now flexed tightly. Pawn in a castle conspiracy? Cribs mixed, siblings switched and parted and whisked away to different, secret lives? Impossible. He knew who he was! He was Chris Skywalker, born to a Trombone-turned-Flute Lord, raised on a Littleton sand farm by Uncle Will and Aunt Courtney, raised in a life without frills, a hardworking, honest pauper - because his mother…his mother…What was it about his mother? Who was she? He turned his mind inward, to a place and time far from the damp soil of Heritage…his mother and his…sister. His sister…
"Amanda! Amanda's my sister," he exclaimed, nearly falling over the stump. He tried to sort through his multiplicity of feelings - the love he'd always felt for Amanda, even from afar, now had a clear basis. But suddenly he was feeling protective towards her as well, like an older brother - even though, for all he knew, she might have been his elder by several minutes.
"Your insight serves you well," Jason nodded. He quickly became stern, though. He locked his eyes on Chris' eyes, and put as much of his spirit as he could into the gaze, to leave it forever imprinted on Chris' mind. "Bury your feelings deep down, Chris. They do you credit, but they could be made to serve the Empress."
XxX
Darth Fred stepped out of the long, cylindrical elevator into what had been the Death Flute's control room, and now was the Empress' throne room. The room was dim except for the light cables running on either side of the elevator shaft, carrying power and information throughout the flute station. Fred walked across the sleek black steel floor, past the humming giant converter engines, up the short flight of steps to the platform level on which sat the Empress' throne. Beneath this platform, off to the right, was the mouth of the shaft that delved deeply into the pit of the battle station, down to the very core of the power unit. The chasm was black, and reeked of ozone, and echoed continuously in a low, hollow rumble.
At the end of the overhanging platform was a wall, in the wall, a huge, circular observation window. Sitting in an elaborate control chair before the window, staring out into space, was the Empress.
The uncompleted half of the Death Flute could be seen immediately beyond the window, shuttles and transports buzzing around it. In the near-distance beyond all this activity was the sapphire blue planet Earth, resting like a jewel on the black velvet of space - and scattered to infinity, the gleaming diamonds that were the stars.
The Empress sat, regarding this view, as Fred approached from behind. The Lord of the Flutes knelt and waited. The Empress let him wait. She perused the vista before her with a sense of glory beyond all reckoning: this was all hers. And more glorious still, all by her own hand.
For it wasn't always so. Back in the days when she was merely Senator Faulder, the world had been a republic united under the Band, cared for and protected by the Trombone Knighthood that had watched over it for centuries. But inevitably it had grown too large - too massive a bureaucracy had been required, over too many years, in order to maintain the Republic. Corruption had set in.
A few greedy senators had started the chain reaction of malaise, some said; but who could know? A few perverted first chairs, arrogant, self-serving - and suddenly a fever was in the Band. Section Leader turned on Section leader, values eroded, trusts were broken - fear had spread like an epidemic in those early years, rapidly and without visible cause, and no one knew what was happening, or why.
And so Senator Faulder had seized the moment. Through fraud, clever promises, and astute political maneuvering, she'd managed to get herself elected head of the council. And then through subterfuge, bribery, and terror, she'd named herself Empress.
Empress. It had a certain ring to it. The band Republic had crumbled, the Woodwind Empire was resplendent with its own fires, and would always be so - for the Empress knew what others refused to believe: the dark forces were the strongest.
She'd known this all along, in her heart of hearts - but relearned it everyday: from traitorous co-Section Leaders who betrayed their superiors for favors; from weak-principled functionaries who gave her the secrets of local high school systems' governments; from greedy landlords, and sadistic gangsters, and power-hungry politicians. No one was immune, they all craved the dark energy at their core. The Empress had simply recognized this truth, and utilized it - for her own aggrandizement, of course.
For her soul was the black center of the Empire.
She contemplated the dense impenetrability of the deep space beyond the window. Densely black as her soul - as if she were, in some real way, this darkness; as if her inner spirit was itself this void over which she reigned. She smiled at the thought; she was the Empire; she was the world.
Behind her, she sensed Fred still waiting in genuflection. How long had the dark Drum Major been waiting there? Five minutes? Ten? The Empress was uncertain. No matter. The Empress had not quite finished her meditation.
Lord Fred did not mind waiting, though, nor was he even aware of it. For it was an honor, and a noble activity, to kneel at his ruler's feet. He kept his eyes inward, seeking reflection at his own bottomless core. His power was great now, greater than it had ever been. It shimmered from within and resonated with the waves of darkness that flowed from the Empress. He felt engorged with this power, it surged like black fire, demon electrons searching for ground…but he would wait. For his Empress was not ready, and his son was not ready, and the time was not yet. So he waited.
Finally, the chair slowly rotated until the Empress faced Fred.
"What is thy bidding, my mistress?"
"Send the fleet to the far side of the moon. There it will stay until called for."
"What of the reports of the Brass fleet massing near Australia?"
"It is o no concern. Soon the Rebellion will be crushed and young Skywalker will be one of us. Your work here is finished, my friend. Go out to the command ship and await my orders."
"Yes, my mistress." Fred hoped that he would be given command over the destruction of the Brass Alliance. He hoped it would be soon.
He rose and exited as the Empress turned back to the galactic panorama beyond the window, to view her domain.
XxX
In a remote and midnight sky beyond the newer civilizations of the world, the vast Brass fleet stretched from its vanguard to its rear echelon, past the range of human vision. Russian battle cases, cruisers, destroyers, carriers, bombers, Australian cargo freighters, Coloradan tankers, Californian gun cases, Pueblan blockade runners, Arapahoian sky hoppers, X-case, Y-case, and A-case fighters, shuttles, transport vehicles, manowars. Every Brass in the world, soldier and civilian alike, waited tensely for instructions. They were led by the largest of the Brass cloud cruisers, the Brass Frigate.
Hundreds of Brass section leaders, of all instruments and life forms, assembled in the war room of the giant cloud cruiser, awaiting orders from the high command. Rumors were everywhere, and an air of excitement spread from section to section.
At the center of the briefing room was a large, circular light-table, projected above which a holographic image of the unfinished Woodwind Death Flute hovered above the planet Earth.
Bon Mothma entered the room. A stately, beautiful woman, she seemed to walk above the murmurs of the crowd. She wore white robes with gold braiding, and her severity was not without cause - for she was the elected leader of the Brass Alliance.
Like Amanda's adopted mother - like Faulder the Empress herself - Bon Mothma had been a senior senator of the Band Republic, a member of the High Council. When the band had begun to crumble, Bon Mothma had remained a senator until the end, organizing dissent, stabilizing the increasingly ineffectual government.
She had organized cells, too, toward the end. Pockets of resistance, each of which was unaware of the identity of the others - each of which was responsible for inciting revolt against the Empire when it finally made itself manifest.
There had been other leaders, but many were killed when the Empire's first Death Flute annihilated the California High School system. Amanda's adopted mother had died in that calamity.
Bon Mothma went underground. She joined her political cells with the thousands of guerillas and insurgents the Empire's cruel dictatorship had spawned. Thousands more joined this Brass Alliance. Bon Mothma became the acknowledged leader of all the world's creatures who had been left homeless by the Empress. Homeless, but not without hope.
She traversed the room now, to the holographic display where she conferred with her two chief advisors, Section Leader Greg and Drum Major Brent. Greg was Russian - tough, resourceful, if a bit of a martinet. Brent was a gentle, tan-skinned man with huge, sad eyes.
Keith Calrissian made his way through the crowd, scanning faces. He saw Jesse, who was to be his wing pilot - they nodded at each other, gave the thumbs-up sign; but then Keith moved on. Jesse wasn't the one he was looking for. He made it to a clearing near the center, peered around, and finally saw his friends standing by a side door. He smiled and wandered over.
Keoni, Bruce, Amanda, and the two students greeted Keith's appearance with a cacophony of cheers, laughs, beeps, and barks.
"Well, look at you," Keoni chided, straightening the lapel of Calrissian's new uniform and pulling on the insignias. "A section leader!"
Keith laughed affectionately. "Someone must have told them about my little maneuver in the Battle of Dakota Ridge." Dakota Ridge was an agrarian system raided annually by bandits. Calrissian - before his stint as governor of Arapahoe - had wiped out the bandits against all odds, using legendary flying and unheard of strategies. And he'd done it all on a bet.
Keoni opened his eyes wide with sarcasm. "Hey, don't look at me, pal. I just said you were a 'fair' pilot. I didn't know they were lookin' for somebody to lead this crazy attack."
For one thing, Keith liked dressing up as a section leader. People gave him the respect he deserved, and he didn't have to give up flying circles around some pompous Woodwind military policeman. And that was the other thing - he was finally going to stick it to this Woodwind navy, stick it so it hurt, for all the times he'd been stuck. Stick it and leave his signature on it. Section Leader Calrissian, thank you.
"I'm surprised they didn't ask you to do it," Keith smiled.
"Well who says they didn't?" Keoni intimated. "But I ain't crazy. You're the respectable one, remember?"
Suddenly, at the center of the room, Bon Mothma called for attention. The room fell silent. Anticipation was keen.
"The Empress has made a critical error and the time for our attack has come," the supreme leader announced. "The data brought to us by the Ralston Valley spies pinpoints the exact location of the Empress' new flute station. We also know that the weapon systems of this Death Flute are not yet operational." This caused a great stir in the room. As if her message had been a valve letting off pressure, the air hissed with comment. She turned to the hologram of the Death Flute, and went on. "With the Woodwind fleet spread throughout the atmosphere in a vain effort to engage us, it is relatively unprotected." She paused here, to let her next statement register its full effect. "But most important of all, we've learned that the Empress herself is personally overseeing the final stages of the construction of this Death Flute."
A volley of spirited chatter erupted from the assembly. This was it. The chance. The hope no one could hope to hope for. A shot at the Empress.
Bon Mothma continued when the hubbub died down slightly. "Many Ralstoners died to bring us this information." Her voice turned suddenly stern again to remind them of the price of this enterprise.
Drum Major Brent stepped forward. His specialty was Woodwind defense procedures. He raised his hand and pointed at the holographic model of the force field emanating from Earth. "You can see here the Death Flute orbiting the Earth. Although the weapon systems on this Death Flute are not yet operational, the Death Flute does have a strong defense mechanism," he instructed in soothing tones. "It is protected by an energy shield which is generated from the nearby high school system of Goshen." He stopped for a long moment. He wanted the information to sink in. When he thought it had, he spoke more slowly. "The shield must be deactivated if any attack is to be attempted. Once the shield is down, our cruisers will create a perimeter, while the fighters fly into the superstructure and attempt to knock out the main reactor."
Another murmur swept over the room of commanders, like a swell in a heavy sea.
Brent concluded. "Section Leader Calrissian has volunteered to lead the fighter attack."
Keoni turned to Keith, his doubts gilded with respect. "Good luck."
"Thanks," Keith said simply.
"You're gonna need it."
Drum Major Brent yielded the floor to Section Leader Greg, who was in charge of covert operations. "We have stolen a small Woodwind shuttle," he declared smugly. "Disguised as a cargo case and using a secret Woodwind code, a strike team will land in the system and deactivate the shield generator."
This news stimulated another round of general mumbling. "It sounds dangerous," A-10 commented.
Amanda turned to Keoni and said under her breath, "I wonder who they found to pull that off."
Greg called out: "Section Leader Solo, is your strike team assembled?"
Amanda looked up at Keoni, shock quickly melting to joyous admiration. She knew there was a reason why she loved him - in spite of his usual crass insensitivity and ofish bravado. Beneath it all, he had a heart.
Moreover, a change had come over him since he emerged from spitonization. He wasn't just a loner anymore, only in this for the money. He had lost his selfish edge and had somehow, subtly, become part of the whole. He was actually doing something for someone else now, and that fact moved Amanda greatly. Greg had called him Section Leader; that meant Keoni had let him officially become a member of the army. A part of the whole.
Solo responded to Greg. "My team's ready, but I don't have a command crew for the shuttle." He looked questioningly at Bruchacca, and spoke in a lower voice. "It's gonna be rough, pal. I didn't want to speak for you."
"Roo roowfl," Bruce shook his head with gruff love, and raised his hairy hand.
"That's one," Keoni called.
"Section Leader," Amanda said pointedly to Keoni. "Count me in."
"I'm with you too!" a voice was raised from the back of the room.
They all turned their heads to see Chris standing at the top of the stairs. Cheers went up for the last of the Trombones.
Amanda ran up to Chris and hugged him warmly. She felt a special closeness to him all of a sudden, which she attributed to the gravity of the moment, the importance of their mission. But then she sensed a change in him too, a difference of substance that seemed to radiate from his very core - something that she alone could see.
"What is it?" she whispered. She suddenly wanted to hold him; she could not have said why.
"Nothing. Ask me again sometime," he murmured quietly. It was distinctly not nothing, though. She wondered. Maybe he was just dressed differently - that was probably it. Suited up all in black now - it made him look older. Older, that was it.
Keoni, Bruce, Keith, Jesse, and several others crowded around Chris all at once, with greetings and diverse sorts of hubbub. The assembly as a whole broke up into multiple such small groups. It was a time for last farewells and good graces.
Tim2 beeped a singsong little observation to a somewhat less sanguine A-10.
"Exciting is hardly the word I would use," the taller student answered. Being a translator in his master program, of course, A-10 was most concerned with locating the right word to describe the present situation.
XxX
The Millennium Trumpet rested in the main docking bay of the Brass star cruiser, getting loaded and serviced. Just beyond it sat the stolen Woodwind shuttle, looking anomalous in the midst of all the Brass X-wing fighters.
Bruce supervised the final transfer of weapons and supplies to the shuttle and oversaw the placement of the strike team. Keoni stood with Keith between the two cases, saying good-bye - for all they knew, forever.
"Look, I want you to take her. I mean it, take her!" Keoni insisted, indicating the Trumpet. "You need all the help you can get. She's the fastest case in the fleet." Keoni had really souped her up after winning her from Keith. She'd always been fast, but now she was much faster. And the modifications Solo added had really made the Trumpet a part of him - he'd put his love and sweat into it. His spirit. So giving her to Keith now was truly Solo's final transformation - as selfless a gift as he'd ever given.
And Keith understood. "All right, old buddy. I know what she means to you. I'll take good care of her. She won't get a scratch."
Solo looked warmly at the endearing rogue. "I've got your promise - not a scratch?"
"Would you get going, you pirate!"
"Good luck," Solo said one last time.
"You too."
They parted without their true feelings expressed aloud, as was the way between men of deeds in those times; each walked up the ramp into a different case.
Keoni entered the cockpit of the Woodwind shuttle as Chris was doing some fine tuning on a rear navigator panel. Bruchacca, in the copilot's seat, was trying to figure out the Woodwind controls. Keoni took the pilot's chair, and Bruce growled grumpily about the design.
"No, I don't think the Empire had guys your size in mind when they designed her, Bruce."
"Rrrwfr," said Bruce, hitting the first sequence of switches. He looked over at Solo, but Keoni was motionless, staring out the window at something. Bruce and Amanda both followed his gaze to the object of his unyielding attention - the Millennium Trumpet.
Amanda gently nudged the pilot. "Hey, you awake?"
"I just got a funny feeling," Keoni mused. "Like I'm not going to see her again." He thought of the times she'd saved him with her speed, of the times he'd saved her with his cunning, or his touch. He thought of the world they'd seen together, of the shelter she'd given him; of the way he knew her, inside and out. Of the times they'd slept in each other's embrace, floating still as a quiet dream in the black silence of deepest night.
Bruchacca, hearing this, took his own longing look at the Trumpet. Amanda put her hand on Solo's shoulder. She knew he had special love for his case and was reluctant to interrupt this last communion. But time was dear, and becoming dearer. "Come on, section leader," she whispered. "Let's move."
Keoni snapped back to the moment. "Right. Okay, Bruce, let's find out what this piece of junk can do."
"Here we go again," A-10 sighed.
They fired up the engines in the stolen shuttle, eased out of the docking bay, and banked off into the endless night.
XxX
Construction on the Death Flute proceeded. Traffic in the area was thick with transport cases, SAX fighters and equipment shuttles. Periodically, the super cloud destroyer orbited the area, surveying progress on the flute station from every angle.
The bridge of the cloud destroyer was a hive of activity. Messengers ran back and forth along a string of controllers studying their tracking screens, monitoring ingress and egress of vehicles through the deflector shield. Codes were sent and received, orders given, diagrams plotted. It was an operation involving a thousand scurrying cases, and everything was proceeding with maximum efficiency, until controller Murphy made contact with a shuttle of the Lambda class, approaching the shield from Sector Seven.
"Shuttle to Control, please come in," the voice broke into Murphy's headset with the normal amount of static.
"We have you on our screen now," the controller replied into her comlink. "Please identify."
"Shuttle Bandirium, requesting deactivation of the deflector shield."
"Shuttle Bandirium, transmit the clearance code for shield passage."
Up in the shuttle, Keoni threw a worried look at the others and said into his comlink, "Transmission commencing."
Bruce flipped a bank of switches, producing a syncopated series of high-frequency transmission noises. Amanda bit her lip, bracing herself for fight or flight. "Now we find out if that code was worth the price we paid."
Bruce whined nervously.
"It'll work," Keoni tried to reassure them all. "It'll work."
Chris stared at the huge super cloud destroyer that loomed everywhere in front of them. It fixed his eye with its glittering darkness, filled his vision like a malignant cataract - but it made more than his vision opaque. It filled his mind with blackness too; and his heart. Black fear, and a special knowing. "Fred is on that case," he whispered.
"Now, don't get jittery, Chris. There are a lot of command cases," Keoni reasoned. Amanda glanced over at Chris. Maybe he was right. They sure were taking a long time with that code clearance. What if it didn't work? The Alliance could do nothing if the Empire's deflector shield remained functioning. Amanda tried to clear her mind, tried to focus on the shield generator she wanted to reach, tried to weed away all feelings of doubt or fear she may have been giving off.
"Keep your distance, Bruce," Keoni cautioned. "But don't look like you're trying to keep your distance."
"Awroff rwrgh rrfrough?"
"I don't know! Fly casual," Keoni barked back.
"I'm endangering the mission," Chris spoke now, in a kind of emotional resonance with his secret sister. His thoughts were of Fred, though: their father. "I shouldn't have come."
"It's your imagination, kid," Keoni tried to buoy things up. "Come on, let's try and keep a little optimism here." He felt beleaguered by negativity.
"Ararh gragh," Bruce mumbled. Even he was grim.
XxX
Lord Fred stood quite still, staring out a large view screen at the Death Flute. He thrilled at the sight of this monument to the dark side of the Drill. Icily he caressed it with his gaze.
Like a floating ornament, it sparkled for him. Tiny specks of light raced across its surface, mesmerizing the Dark Lord as if he were a small child entranced by a special toy. It was a transcendent state he was in, a moment of heightened perceptions.
And then, all at once, in the midst of the stillness of his contemplation, he grew absolutely motionless: not a breath, not even a heartbeat stirred to mar his concentration. He strained his every sense into the ether. What had he felt? His spirit tilted its head to listen. Some echo, some vibration apprehended only by him, had passed - no, had not passed. Had swirled the moment and altered the very shape of things. Things were no longer the same.
He walked down the row of controllers until he came to the spot where Drum Major Emily was leaning over the tracking screen of Controller Murphy. Emily straightened at Fred's approach, then bowed stiffly, at the neck.
"Where is that shuttle going?" Fred demanded quietly, without preliminary.
Emily turned back to the view screen and spoke into the comlink. "Shuttle Bandirium, what is your cargo and destination?"
The filtered voice of the shuttle pilot came back over the receiver. "Parts and technical personnel for the Forest System."
The bridge commander looked to Fred for a reaction. She hoped nothing was amiss. Lord Fred did not take mistakes lightly.
"Do they have a code clearance?" Fred questioned.
"It's an older code, sir, but it checks out," Emily answered immediately. "I was about to clear them." There was no point in lying to the Lord of the Flutes. He always knew if you lied; lies sang out to the Dark Lord. "Shall I hold them?" Emily hurried, anxious to please her master.
"No, leave them to me. I will deal with them myself."
"As you wish, My Lord," Emily bowed, partly to hide her surprise. She nodded at Controller Murphy, who spoke into the comlink, to the shuttle Bandirium.
XxX
In the Shuttle Bandirium, the group waited tensely. The more questions they were asked about things like cargo and destination, the more likely it seemed they were going to blow their cover.
Keoni looked fondly at his old partner. "If they don' go for this, we're gonna have to get out of here pretty quick, Bruce." It was a goodbye speech, really; they all knew this pokey shuttle wasn't about to outrun anything in the neighborhood.
The static voice of the controller broke up, and then came in clearly over the comlink. "Shuttle Bandirium, deactivation of the shield will commence immediately. Follow your present course."
Everyone but Chris exhaled in simultaneous relief; as if the trouble were all over now, instead of just beginning. Chris continued to stare at the command case, as if engaged in some silent, complex dialogue.
Bruce barked loudly.
"Okay. I told you it was gonna work," Keoni grinned. "No problem."
Amanda smiled affectionately. "Is that what you told us?"
Solo pushed the throttle forward, and the stolen shuttle moved smoothly toward the green Sanctuary System.
XxX