Part 3- The Lord of Pain
"What the—?" Atton said out loud, staring down at the console screen.
Bryony took two painful steps closer and peered around him. Seeing the warning that flashed on the screen, she observed, "The Harbinger." She felt immediately uneasy.
"What's a Republic cruiser doing out here?" Atton wondered, "Unless it desperately needs refueling."
"That is the ship that I was last passenger on,"Bryony told him.
"Then they're here to pick you up?" Atton turned to stare at her, "How did they know you were here? Did you send out any communications? You could have told me that before."
"I didn't," Bryony shook her head. "I don't know how—or what they're doing here."
"How indeed," Kreia mused, "Some beings speak louder in the Force than others."
Atton shot Kreia a distrustful, annoyed look.
The sense of foreboding in Bryony mounted. "Can we hail them from here, find out what their business is?" Bryony asked Atton. She had to know.
"That will do you little good,"Kreia murmured, but Bryony dared not ask her reasons. Despite Kreia's apparent good intentions towards her, she did not yet trust the old woman. Something about her put her on edge—perhaps just how much she knew about Bryony already, but there was something else as well.
Atton seemed to ignore Kreia as well. "Well, the computer is on automatic hail, telling incoming ships to keep their distance until they get asteroid drift charts, so they don't get smashed to pieces on the way in, and then it transmits the drift charts," Atton began, "But we can hop on that signal and send our own personal hail."
Bryony nodded. "Let's do that then," she suggested, "Ask them what their business is." After a pause, she added, "Make it sound as routine as possible."
With a shrug, Atton nodded. "Sure thing," he replied, then, after typing in a few commands, clicked down the comm button. "Harbinger, this is the Peragus Mining Facility. What can we do for you today?" Leaving the comm channel open to receive, they waited. Thirty seconds later, there was still no response. Atton repeated, "Harbinger, this is the Peragus Mining Facility. This is an unscheduled visit. What can we do for you here?"
Only silence on the other end of the comm answered them. All the while, the hammerhead-class ship cruised gradually closer to the facility. Bryony's unease escalated further. Republic ships never—even in an emergency—left their comm stations unmanned. Although their acquaintance was only brief, Captain Quenlin seemed like the sort of experienced officer never to break protocol. Something was very wrong with that ship.
Atton pressed the comm button again and looked about to repeat himself a third time,when Kreia cut him off, "Don't waste your breath. There will be no response."
"Why are you so sure about that?" Atton rounded on her irritably. Still, Bryony could see the unease in him. The ship's silence unsettled him as well.
"It is a ship of the dead," Kreia replied, turning to Bryony, she added, "Can't you feel it?"
Bryony took a deep breath and closed her eyes, stretching out her senses. The Force still felt like a tiny trickle, fighting to seep through hairline crack in a thick duracrete dam. She strained her senses, but could not feel anything. With a heavy sigh, she opened her eyes and admitted to Kreia, "I don't feel anything."
With a disapproving click of her tongue, Kreia replied, "Exactly."
Atton looked between them and sighed, "I won't ask."
The Harbinger, drawing closer now, loomed huge in the transparisteel windows of the command center. As it glided past the windows on gentle repulsorlifts, Bryony gazed into the windows of the bridge at the front. Not a single figure could be seen in the dim lights. Bryony shivered involuntarily.
Another warning began to flash on the console's screen, announcing that docking procedures had begun.
"It's docking with the station," Atton said, "Now what? Is that ship friendly?"
"That depends on one's perspective," Kreia replied.
Bryony's mind raced as she watched the Harbinger slow to a stop, caught by the magnetic pull of the station's docking mechanisms. She really could not sense anything about the ship. After spending a decade without any sense in the Force, that did would not have struck her as odd only a day before, but even the hauntingly empty Peragus Mining Facility had a faint feel of life about it through her tenuous connection to the Force. The docking tunnel extended, automatically sealing against the Harbinger's boarding doors. Several levels below—the level that they should be on by now—a black refueling tube extended from the facility and sought out the the ship's fuel port, latching on.
An idea suddenly struck her and she ran over the layout of a standard Hammerhead-class cruiser in her head. Yes, that just might work. "Atton, can you hack into the fuel systems and stop any fuel from entering into that ship?" she asked suddenly.
"I don't see what good that would do," Atton replied, "If there isn't anyone on that ship, it's not going anywhere anyway. We don't have it take its fuel source away to do that. And I don't know why we'd want to keep it here anyway. Heck, that could be our ride out of here."
"Can you pilot a ship that size on your own?" Bryony asked sharply, growing impatient to an extent that surprised her. She quickly calmed herself, internally reminding herself that Atton did not yet understand what she had in mind.
"Ah, no," Atton backed down.
"So can you stop the fuel line from filling up before it starts?" Bryon asked again.
"Let's see if I can," Atton replied, not asking her reasons again. He turned back to the console and set to work, his jaw set determinedly. Bryony waited, on edge, if the fuel started flowing, it could be too hard to flush out again. They had little time to waste. A minute later, Atton stepped back triumphantly. "It's done," he announced, "I re-routed the source line to a completely empty tank on our side."
"Perfect," Bryony praised, with a relieved smile.
"So why did I just do that anyway," Atton asked.
"That fuel line connects to the fueling depot, on the same level as the hangar bays where our ship is," Bryony explained, "And this level has the boarding platform that connects us to the bridge of the ship."
"Wait," Atton waved his hands defensively at her, "We are not crawling through a fuel line to get down there."
"Do you have any better suggestions, fool?" Kreia snapped dryly.
"No, but there's got to be something else," Atton argued, "That's crazy. Stupid."
"But it will get us where we need to go and off this station," Bryony replied. "If that ship is empty, it should be easy to get out through the ion engines. If it's not, and their systems are simply malfunctioning, we can speak with Captain Quenlin and ask for passage off of this asteroid."
Atton sighed and acquiesced, "Fine. As long as no one gets wise to us and redirects that line to the correct fuel tank, we should be fine. I'm just not ready to die here yet."
"So let's get going," Bryony urged. She took two gentle steps away from the console, masking her grimaces of pain. Her feet still felt on fire, blisters the size of credit chips on the bottom of her feet threatened to pop with every step.
"I would advise you put some kolto patches on those before we go anywhere," Kreia began, producing the small white box that she had been holding in her long sleeve and handing it over to Bryony.
She took it with a sigh of relief, "Thank you." She stepped back again and leaned back against the console. Inside the box was a bottle of kolto gel and several long lengths of gauze. She twisted open the bottle and slathered the gel thickly over her feet. Immediately, the tingling cool was a relief to the bottom of her feet. Then, she wrapped her feet securely in the gauze, first the right than the left. Putting her full weight on both feet again, it already felt better. Although there was still pressure on the blisters, the pain ebbed away. She took a few experimental steps just to be sure that the gauze wraps were secure and noted that she would have to take her steps carefully so as not to slip. It was like wearing socks on laminate floors. She put the box down on the console but pocketed the bottle of kolto gel in her over-sized pants. There was no telling if she would need that again, especially if they were to be cutting through the ship's ion engines.
"Thank you Kreia," she repeated again, "Now, let's go."
"Thank goodness," Atton even seemed relieved at the first-aid kit. "Lead on, Bryony," he urged.
Stretching out her feeble senses in the Force, Bryony left the console station and headed for the corridor that would take them to the station's airlock that connected them to the Harbinger. She wanted to trust that Kreia, with her evidently stronger sense in the Force would warn them of any danger, but she still could not. Kreia kept her thoughts to herself.
Nearing the airlock, Bryony kept her senses extended for anything unusual. After all these years of silence, the tickle at the back of her mind that was the Force speaking to her seemed odd and uncomfortable, yet comforting all at once. They passed out of the main station into the extending walk way without a word. The walkway was hardly wide enough to unload any cargo and bare of anything on the sliding floor and accordion walls. If there was something hostile on the other end of the airlock, they would have nowhere to hide. Bryony sincerely hoped that there was not.
The approached the carbon-scored outer hull and airlock doors of the the Harbinger. Atton pressed his face against the small trainsparisteel viewport, shading his eyes against the walkway's lights with one hand. He stepped back, shaking his head. "There's nobody in there," he said, "How are we supposed to get in?"
"Let me see," Bryony said, urging Atton to step away from the viewport. When he did, she stepped into his place and peered into the dimly-lit ship's interior. Within the airlock was a standard manual release, just beyond the door. Bryony was relieved to see that at least airlock mechanisms had not changed since she last commanded a ship very much like the Harbinger. Pressing her open palm lightly against the viewport, she closed her eyes and concentrated on the lever by the door, willing it into the down position. The lever seemed to protest, as if she was not applying enough force, but slowly, it clicked out of its upward position and shifted down in its tracks, laboriously falling into the down position. Taking a deep breath, she opened her eyes to make sure it had truly happened and she had not just imagined it. Sure enough, the safety lever was down. Next, she turned her attention to the release button beside it. Again, she closed her eyes and applied downward pressure with the Force. She practically had to leap back when the airlock door shifted inward with a hiss of oxygen and shot upward in its tracks.
"Well, would you look at that," Atton marveled, "Handy to have a Jedi around after all."
Bryony did not respond. With the Harbinger open to them, she was again struck with a feeling of deep foreboding. Where is the crew? What is this ship doing here?How did it follow me to a place I was not even aware I was going? Cautiously, she stepped inside, Atton and Kreia following after. The ship felt as empty as Kreia felt it.
Once they were inside the airlock, Bryony closed the outer door behind them, allowing the inner airlock door to be opened. She triggered the second door manually—it was a relief to be able to act without the aid of the Force—and they were finally clear to step into the interior of the Republic cruiser.
Although it was not cold, Bryony shivered as she looked up and down the abandoned corridor. Any self-respecting officer would have noted that the airlock had been breeched without authorization and sent at least a squad down to check it out, and yet there was no one to greet them.
"I hope you know fast way to that fuel line, Jedi," Atton said apprehensively, "Because I have a bad feeling about this. No ship is supposed to be this quiet." He echoed her own thoughts.
"We'll have to head up this way," she began, pointing in the direction of the stern of the ship, "Through the bridge and then down to the crew quarters level. If this is the same design I am familiar with, there should be an engine emergency access at the back of the crew level."
"I hope you're right," Atton nodded, "And maybe we'll find answers up on the bridge, like why there's no one here to greet us."
"Whether you will like those answers or not remains to be seen," Kreia voice, then added, "Come, we cannot linger here." Kreia seemed just as uneasy as Atton and Bryony.
At Kreia's urging, they moved quietly down the corridor to the bridge. Her hand hovered over the mining laser hanging from her belt, ready for whatever might be waiting for them. Bryony was, for once, glad for the gauze wraps on her feet that masked the sound of her footfalls. Both Atton and Kreia's boots clattered loudly on the metal flooring.
The door to the bridge was closed when they reached it, but it was not in lock-down. Atton pressed the activation panel beside it and it slid open without complaint.
Whatever Bryony had been expecting on the bridge, she was not prepared for the corpses.
Dead officers and sailors littered the bridge. Some leaned sprawled over their consoles while many others were sprawled out on the floor. There were signs of blaster scoring on the walls, and more than a few computer terminals sparked and hissed where they had been shot or smashed out. But what stunned Bryony the most was not the carnage. She had seen more carnage that this in her lifetime already. It was that the bridge did not feel like death, which was a sense in the Force she was all to familiar with. It felt emptier than that, more like a complete absence of life. The sensation of it sent goosebumps down her arms. Even with her tenuous connection to the Force, it revolted her.
"Something terrible is at work here," Kreia warned softly, "We need to tread cautiously."
"What happened here," Atton whispered, horrified.
"A massacre," Bryony breathed, "Come on, let's get going. We don't need to know what happened as long as we get out of here alive. Stay alert."
Pulling the mining laser from its holster at her hip, Bryony held it in both hands at the ready as she made her way cautiously from the doorway. They would have to round the corner back towards the central door at the back of the bridge, stepping over several lifeless bodies on their way.
Despite her warnings, Kreia did not seem to move with the same urgency Bryony felt. As they stepped over the first dead man, Kreia paused at his side and knelt down beside him, examining the wound in his chest. "It is the wound of a blade, not a blaster, but cauterized. He did not bleed," she observed. Then, without any further assessment, she reached down and pulled the vibroblade from his lifeless hand where it lay sprawled on the ground. Stiffly she stood, holding the vibroblade at her side. Seeing Atton's questioning look, she responded distastefully, "It would hardly be wise to walk into such a hostile environment unarmed. Bryony, you might find it wise to replace your tool with a weapon."
The mining laser in her hands did seem inadequate, given the slaughter at their feet. She cast her gaze around them and spotted a dead officer, still slumped at his console, with a blaster at his hip. Bryony strode briskly over to him and removed the weapon from his belt. She still kept the mining laser in her holster, as there was no telling what could await them ahead.
Suddenly, the Force tickled at the back of her mind. Something was wrong. Her gaze automatically snapped up to where Atton stood. He was in danger. Someone—or something—was there. "Atton, get down!" she shouted
He did not react quickly enough. "What?" he started to ask, squinting at her.
Bryony reacted as only a Jedi could, letting the Force suggest her movements without question. She swiped her hand to the side with as powerful a Force push as she could muster, sending Atton crashing involuntarily to the ground. With her other hand, she took aim at the space where he had been standing only a moment earlier and pulled the trigger of her borrowed blaster. There was a hiss and a gargle that sounded something like a masked cry of pain and something, still invisible, hit the floor with a soft thud. A figure robed in black and gray, masked, and eyes obscured by red-tinted goggles flickered into vision as the stealth field generator failed.
"They're using cloaking devices," Bryony told both of her companions loudly, "That's how they murdered this crew!"
"Where are they?" Atton exclaimed as he scrambled back to his feet, quickly bringing both the blaster and the mining laser into his hands. He cast his gaze around wildly, "How many are there?"
Bryony yelped as something stung her left shoulder, numbing it. More than the prompting of the Force years of training with the Jedi built in reflexes. She whirled around, arching her leg into a powerful kick. Her foot connected with something soft. There was a muffled grunt of a man, and yet another figure, clothed just as the first attacker she had shot, flickered into her vision. From the sounds of scuffles and blaster fire behind her, Bryony was dimly aware of Atton and Kreia engaging their own enemies.
The attacker wielded something like a retractable Force pike. It could not deal as much damage as a lightsaber, but it was sharp and electrified, easily making any limb it contacted with temporarily unusable, and with as quickly as fights such as these lasted, temporary paralysis often led to mortal injuries.
As he regained his balance and charged for Bryony again, she leveled the blaster at him with both hands and fired. She did not want that Force pike coming anywhere near her again. He dodged out of the way of the first shot, reacting as if through the Force, but he was not quick enough to dodge the second, which caught him in the chest. He staggered and fell. Evidently, he wore little to no armor beneath is black uniform.
She immediately turned back towards Atton and Kreia. Two more attackers lay dead while both of her companions stood warily with their weapons ready for another wave. Bryony, too, waited, blaster ready, but after a tense minute, no more came. "Is everyone alright?" Bryony asked, relaxing a bit.
Kreia only nodded.
"Yes, I'm fine," Atton replied, cautiously re-sheathing the mining laser. She noted that he still held the blaster warily in his right hand. "Who were these guys?"
"Those that killed this crew,"Kreia assessed, "And they act as though they are connected with the Force, however crudely."
Bryony nodded her agreement.
"Creepy, if you ask me," Atton shuddered.
"But this cannot be all of them," Kreia continued.
"No," Bryony agreed with another nod, "Only four stealthed assassins, which we so easily defeated, could not have taken out an entire bridge of Republic officers and soldiers—much less a whole ship. We'll have to be careful the rest of the way. Shielded with stealth generators like that, they could be anywhere."
"My thoughts exactly," Kreia agreed, "We should not linger further here."
"Lead the way, Bryony, you know one of these ships better than any of us," Atton urged, "And I don't know about you guys, but I want out of this creepy place as soon as we can. That fuel tube is looking better and better right now."
Bryony glanced over at him with a shuddering nod, "Agreed." Besides their unsettling masks and stealth field generators, something about the battle set her completely off-balance. The Force whispered to her a distant warning of danger. There was something distinctly unnatural about them. She agreed with Kreia, their attackers has been Force-sensitive, but they had been unlike any other Force users she had ever encountered. Perhaps it was because they did not use any overt displays of the Force, but the way they reacted, fighting with reflexes that were not, in fact, reflexes at all that informed both Kreia and Bryony's assessments. It all pointed to a faceless enemy that did not conform to any picture of Sith that she had ever been taught. But she could be wrong. The Sith could have changed. If Captain Quenlin and others were to be believed, there had been a war between the Sith and the Jedi, which the Jedi only won by Revan turning back to the Light and destroying the Sith herself, which she had once led. Bryony still found it hard to grasp that Roan'ev had fallen so far and done so much damage to the Republic, but on the other hand, she had seen and tried to ignore signs of Revan's fall all through the Mandalorian Wars.
"Bryony, where to next?" Atton asked, startling her out of her thoughts.
Startled, she shook her head to clear her mind and ran over her mental map of the ship in her head again. "Back that way," she replied, pointing to the set of double doors at the back of the bridge. "There should be a lift down to the crew quarters level not far from here."
"In that case, lead on," Atton urged.
Bryony nodded and passed by her two companions on the way to the doors, trying to ignore the bodies—both Republic and enemy—that she had to step around on her way. She had already seen enough carnage in her lifetime, she did not want to encounter any more. As the doors slid open and they entered the hallway, Atton fell into formation close behind her, blaster still ready in both hands. Kreia followed behind at her own pace, still holding the vibroblade in her hands. The large weapon looked out of place with such an old woman, yet she had already proved her skills with it.
There were more bodies of soldiers out in the corridor. Each pair of sightless eyes seemed to accuse her, that their deaths were all her fault. Maybe that was Malachor V still speaking to her, or maybe they were right. She could not shake the feeling that all of this—the attack from the Sith cruiser, the skirmishes on Peragus, and the deaths of this crew—was all her fault. She tried not to look at the dead men and women they passed.
As they reached the lift, she felt that same prickling at the back of her neck again. "They're here," she warned softly, cautiously raising her blaster in front of her. Atton and Kreia halted and held their weapons at the ready. They waited in tense silence.
Suddenly, Bryony felt a sharp stabbing and accompanying tingling just below her right shoulder blade. With a yelp of pain, the blaster fell from her fumbling fingers. She leaped forward away from the weapon and attacker behind her before it could do more damage, but her movement was abruptly cut short, as something caught hold of her long braid. She stumbled as she was yanked powerfully back from the base of her neck. "Help!" she let out a strained yell.
Although she could not see them from the angle she was at, she could hear Kreia and Atton scramble to her rescue. Atton fired of several shots, and with a swift slide of Kreia's vibroblade, she was released from the hold of her attacker. Her hair fell loosely at her shoulders.
Her attacker was dead, still holding nearly a meter long braid of Bryon's black hair in one hand, but there were still others. She could sense it. She heard another hiss behind her, and she Pulled at the first weapon in sight, the dead assassin's force pike. It soared into her hands more easily than she expected, and she spun around just in time to block the invisible descent of another Force Pike. As the weapon vibrated in her hands, the assassin's stealth field generator failed. He was dressed just like all of the rest of their attackers. He was also a full two hands taller than her, and any contest of strength like the were locked in was vastly in his favor. Straining against his pike, she took a deep breath, released her left hand and gave a sharp Force Push. It was not enough to knock him over, but he did stumble back several steps. That gave her enough time to pull the mining laser from her belt and fire off several crude shots. With a gurgle, the attacker collapsed.
Force pike in her right hand and mining laser in her left, Bryony reached out with her senses for more of the attackers. She sense two more negative spaces in the Force. Kreia locked blades with one assassin while Atton leveled his blasters at her attacker. That meant that there was still one sill cloaked by a shield. She dashed towards Atton and shoved him roughly out of the way while she stowed the mining laser. Grasping the force pike in both hands, she swung hard. The assassin that had been trying to sneak up on Atton stumbled with a grunt, his shield failing. His left arm hung limp, indicating that Bryony's stun strike had met its mark. She readjusted her stance before he could recover and drove the sharp point of the charged staff into his chest. His scream, though muffled by the mask, was wispy and airy, almost like a raptor. She pulled the Force pike loose and let him fall.
Kreia had finished off her attacker and Atton had regained his balance.
Massaging a shoulder that could not possibly be bruised, Atton complained, "Are you doing to stop doing that? You could always tell me, 'Hey Atton! Shoot that thing behind you,' you know. You don't need to go shoving me with the Force every time you see something behind me."
"Ah, sorry," Bryony apologized, embarrassed, "I'll try to remember next time."
Atton holstered the mining laser that had been in his left hand and brushed himself off irritably. "How many more of those do you think are on this ship?" he asked of Kreia and Bryony.
"Enough to decimate an entire Republic crew before any of them knew what was happening," Kreia observed.
As she spoke, Bryony reached out her senses, probing and tickling at the area around them, but her limited sense in the Force found nothing. "I can't sense any more nearby," Bryony admitted, "But that does not mean much. I could hardly sense them at all when they were close. They are…different in the Force."
Kreia nodded. "Indeed," she replied thoughtfully, "And seeing as these were certainly not the last of the assassins we will see aboard this ship, we should endeavor to keep moving."
Bryony nodded in agreement. "Well, the lift is just here," she said, waiving at the momentarily forgotten lift doors before them. With nods from both of her companions, she led the way to the lift and found it already at their level, the doors sliding open immediately as she pressed the call button. Their assassins must have came to this level, anticipating them. That thought sent a shiver down her spine, but she pushed it to the back of her mind. Inside the lift, she pressed the level she recalled as being the crew quarters, again hoping that her memory served her well and that Hammerheads had not been vastly reorganized in the last decade.
As they arrived at the lower level and the doors slid open, Bryony was relieved to find that, at least in this, she was still right.
Stepping off the elevator and letting the doors close again behind them, Atton asked, "So where to from here, Bryony?"
She pointed at the long corridor directly ahead of them and answered, "Straight to the back, towards the engines, should be our fuel line access."
Atton nodded with a shrug, "Well, that makes sense, at least."
They started off down the corridor, when a feeling of foreboding suddenly washed over Bryony. She paused mid-step and glanced at Kreia and Atton to her right and her left. Kreia seemed unbothered, but Atton shuddered as she met his eyes. "I have a bad feeling about this," he murmured.
Bryony swallowed down the lump in her throat. So do I. But affirming his concern was the last thing she was about to do. Better he stay wary but optimistic. She took a deep breath and continued. All at once she was struck by a terrible feeling of deja-vu. This was exactly the sort of tense, impossible odds she had led good men and women into time and time again during the Mandalorian wars. She hated it then and hated it now. More soldiers under her command died than she cared to count, but somehow either her Jedi reflexes or the generous providence of the Force allowed her to walk away from each battle, only scarred in spirit. But this time, she could hardly count on her Jedi training to save her from the unknown forces set against them. And, although Kreia and Atton were no soldiers assigned to her care, she still felt responsible in the same terrible way she had for her men ten years ago. Try as she might, she could never truly put those days behind her, and being taken from exile and flung directly back into whatever battle this was did little to heal those wounds.
As they passed by the med bay, walking as fast as they could without running outright, Atton stopped in his tracks, gaping into the lifeless room through the uncharacteristically open doors. "Bryony, look at that," he urged, brave curiosity masking the fear in his voice.
Bodies of medical personnel and even a few soldiers lay strewn across the floors and beds. Anyone who had been there for injuries was now dead. Glittering splinters of glass and discarded medical instruments lay strewn across the glistening wet floor. At the center of it all was a shattered kolto tank.
"I really don't like the look of that at all," Atton murmured.
"I don't either," Bryony agreed, shuddering. Something terrible and malicious had happened there. Only a Sith or a madman would slaughtered the injured and unarmed medical personnel. Mandalorians rarely even went that far. "Let's keep going," she urged.
As they picked up their pace, Kreia observed to herself, "It is good we escaped this ship when we did. It is a pity that we should have to repeat this process once again."
They crossed a wide hallway intersection that marked the end of the administrative portion of the floor and the beginning of the crew quarters. Entering into the empty space at the center of the intersection, Bryony felt suddenly vulnerable, the feeling of foreboding intensifying. Glancing down the hallway to their left, she froze.
Distantly, at the far end of the corridor that spanned the width of the ship, there was a man. He was bald with bare, gray skin and wore only loosely draped black pants. Although he was small to her vision and she could make out little beyond his silhouette, Bryony knew he was Sith, and that he was the Sith responsible for all of the death on this ship. Only the Force could have told her that in only the glance of an instant. From his position, though he seemed to gaze watchfully down the corridor towards them, he did not react to their appearance in the intersection of the hallways. "Kreia…" Bryony stammered, barely above a whisper.
Both Kreia and Atton were already staring in the same direction.
"He cannot fight what he cannot see," Kreia replied, almost as softly, "And he is blinded by his rage."
"Then we should keep on running…?" Atton suggested nervously.
Kreia tightened her grip on the vibroblade she still carried in her hands. "I will deal with him. Go, get to the ship. I will catch up with you."
Bryony regarded her skeptically with concern.
"I am not defenseless, now go!" Kreia snapped, then turned and started cautiously picking her way down the hallway towards the Sith.
Bryony drew in a deep breath, watching her go.
"You heard the old woman, let's go!" Atton urged at a harsh whisper.
Meeting Atton's eyes, she nodded. Loosing all restraint, the took off running down the corridor towards the rear of the ship. Somehow, without Kreia with them, Bryony felt exposed. Is that woman so strong in the Force that I feel protected with her around? As they darted through the crew quarters, the familiar surroundings gave her pause. She slowed, scanning the doors.
"What's the matter?" Atton asked.
"Nothing," Bryony slowed to a walk and shook her head, "I just stayed in one of these while I was aboard this ship. I must have left some things behind me."
"That you want to grab before we run, got it," Atton assessed, "Well, if you have to, but make it quick."
"Of course," Bryony replied, then spotted the door to her guest quarters on the right. "This one," she said, and hurried to the door. If her things had not been brought along with her, there would be a change of clothes, that would actually fit her. It would be a relief not to fear getting tangled in the borrowed, over-sized clothes or losing her pants.
Bryony opened the door and was about to close it behind her when Atton caught the door firmly in his free hand. "If it's all the same to you," he started, "I don't want to wait out in the hall alone to be picked off by invisible assassins."
"Fine," Bryony agreed quickly and released her hold on the door, "Just watch the door while I change."
A look of curiosity twitched across Atton's face. "Fine, got it," he agreed and followed her in, shutting the door.
The room was big enough to bunk two guests and store their things, but hardly much bigger than that, as was to be expected on any starship. Atton set himself up near the door, staring stalwartly at the latched handle. Trusting him there, Bryony turned to the storage compartments beneath the lower bed. Putting down the Force pike she still carried and pulling out the first drawer, she found all of her things just as she had left them, including a change of clothes. Bryony did not waste any time in removing the holster belt and stripping out of security guard uniform. She gratefully pulled on her own clothes: a pair of undyed, soft pants and tunic, then a brown jacket, fastening the holster belt back over the top of it all. Evidently she had been barefoot when she had left the Harbinger, as her nerf-hide boots were still stowed in the compartment, right where she had left them when she had gone to bed aboard the ship. She pulled them on, her blistered feet complaining slightly at the constriction, but it was better to put up with the pain and have better traction and protection. The blisters were enough to remind her of that. She scooped up the remaining cloth bag in the bottom of the drawer—all the positions she had in the world—and prepared to sling it over her shoulder when a red, gray, and gold rectangle of cloth fluttered out of its opening and onto the floor. Impulsively, she snatched it up and tied it around her left bicep, where it had been worn over a decade ago. That done, she slung the cloth bag's strap snugly across her chest and cleared her throat. "Okay, Atton, let's go," she urged Atton, "We've wasted enough time here."
The way Atton twitched when she spoke his name suggested to her that he had been watching her out of the corner of his eyes. Part of her wanted to be indignant that he had invaded on her privacy while changing, but the other part of her knew that he had already had a complete conversation with her in her underwear, and seeing her change was certainly nothing new. It was certainly nothing to get upset about, especially given the urgency of their current errand.
"Right," Atton said, "We're close to the engine access then?"
"It's not far at all," Bryony replied with a nod to the door.
Atton opened the door—right into another group of assassins. Bryony felt them and heard them before she saw the tell-tale flickering, distorted patches in the air.
"Atton, they're here!" she hissed rapidly into his ear, closing the distance between them in the cramped guest quarters, "I'll knock out the shields, you shoot them down."
Before he could respond, Bryony twisted past him in the doorway and darted out, activating the Force pike as she went. The long, charged ends extended in both directions from the handle, which was barely longer than the hilt of a lightsaber. She grasped the handle tightly in both hands and whirled rapidly around, twisting the pike to cover as much space as she could with one movement. All she had to do was make contact with their attackers and the stealth shields would fail, giving Atton a clear set of targets.
Bryony felt the left end of her pike make contact with a cloaked body almost immediately. Not waiting for his shield to flicker away, she reversed her spin to catch any on the other side of her trusting that Atton would take down the first attacker. She completed a full reverse spin without contacting another of the attackers. There can't be just one. At the range of only a meter and a half, Atton had shot the first attacker easily in the chest, yet no others were anywhere to be seen. All the same, Bryony could still sense something wrong in the area, even if her weak sense in the Force was unable to pinpoint their exact location.
"There's still more of them, isn't there?" Atton observed warily while he held his blaster ready.
Bryony nodded silently, standing completely still in the middle of the corridor. Suddenly, she heard two pairs of footsteps charging over the durasteel flooring at her from behind. Again, she spun as quickly as she was able and raised the long, thin pike in a block position in front of her chest. She staggered backward from the force of the impact as two Force pikes impacted with hers. Two masked men in gray and black flickered into view, both significantly taller than her.
"Atton!" she warned before retracting the ends of the Force pike into its handle and tumbled backwards into a reckless reverse somersault. This had the effect of catching the two larger attackers off balance and both stumbled forward. Atton shot one while Bryony shifted into a crouch against the wall. She extended her Force pike again, which pierced directly into the chest of the attacker that had tried to turn his stumble into a lunge towards her. Instead, he impaled himself on her pike. Bryony shuddered and stood up, prying the pike from her attacker's chest.
Panting, Bryony retracted the thin prongs of the Force pike into its handle and surveyed the floor around them. All three of the assassins were dead. Looking at them sprawled unnaturally on the floor where they had fallen, Bryony shuddered. It was not their unnerving masks nor that there were three dead men, it was that she had killed them, and killed them with hardly a thought of remorse. Her body had known what to do. Too much death in one day already…
"Well," Atton began, stowing the mining laser into his holster again, "That puts you at twelve to my seven. Counting the droids, that is, you're still ahead."
"Yeah…" she replied distantly, staring down the hall towards their destination.
"Hey, are you okay?" Atton asked suddenly. He seemed to sense her discomfort.
"Yeah, I'm fine," Bryony tried to shake off the feeling of death, "It's nothing."
"Well, if you say so," Atton replied, still scrutinizing her with uncharacteristic concern.
"We're close anyway," Bryony said quickly, "Let's get going. They seem to have picked up on where we are."
"Right," Atton agreed, "The sooner we get out of this ship and off Peragus, the better. That old fossil of yours had better hurry up if she wants to catch a ship off this place."
Bryony did not reply. She wondered how Kreia was doing or if she could even survive an encounter with that Sith they at seen—yet when she looked at Kreia, she saw subtle power, not frailty as she suspected Atton did. Perhaps she did still see the world as a Jedi did.
They started off briskly down the corridor, wary for more attackers. They passed the remaining crew quarters and turned into the maintenance hallway at the back of the ship. Somehow the narrower corridor, with no doors save the engine maintenance hatch ahead, made Bryony feel safer and less exposed.
The engine maintenance door was exactly where she had remembered it. She had never had to use it before, but during her time as a Republic general, she made a point of knowing her ships inside and out. Her own knowledge of her surroundings had been the one of the few things she had complete control over.
They stopped at the door and she peered through the thick transparisteel window on the door into the dimness beyond. There was neither movement nor red warning lights flashing. At first glance, it looked safe.
She stepped back and glanced at the small security terminal next to the door. It displayed a nondescript login screen. Her computer skills were never at the level of a slicer, and they had gone rusty over the past ten years. Remembering Atton's ease of access to the computer systems on the mine's command center, she turned to him and ask, "Do you think you could slice us in there? That door won't open without an override command, unless we want to waste time here burning it open with mining lasers."
Atton cocked a confident smile and approached the terminal, "Piece of cake." He tucked his blaster into his belt and set to work, mouth set in a thin line of concentration. Bryony tried to watch what he did over his shoulder, but she was soon lost in a shuffling through various screens and long sections of scrolling arubesh. Not a minute later, he looked up and said, "There, that should do it." The door made a slight clicking noise and swung inward. "All Republic computers are encrypted the same way. You think they'd do a better job of protecting themselves," he scoffed, "Do you need anything else while I'm in there? A cup of caf, maybe?"
Bryony chuckled despite herself and Atton cracked a sly smile in response. "No to the caf," she replied lightly, "But if there is any way to force the ion engine to be completely off—not just idle but off and make sure that they didn't somehow restart the fueling, that could save us a lot of pain later."
Atton turned back to the terminal and scrolled through several more windows. "Hm," he started thoughtfully, "The engine functions, at least, are controlled separately from this network, but I assume we'll find that once we're inside. The fueling though, I just completely canceled that request for fuel, but it hadn't started yet anyway."
"Thanks, great," Bryony nodded.
"You should know," Atton replied warily, "I still don't like this idea. We could get flushed full of fuel at any second when we're in there."
"Unless you have a better idea-?" Bryony began to reply.
"And no I don't," Atton replied quickly, "But just so you know. I don't like it."
"Noted," Bryony replied briskly. "Now let's get through here before they've realized we are off the level." She pushed the door more widely open and stepped into the engine maintenance room.
Kreia crept quietly down the corridor towards the broken and blistered man—if he could still be called a man at all—Sion. He stood stalk still, watching warily, but seeing nothing. Oh, certainly, he sensed something, but it was faint and fleeting. Deceiving a mind which thrived only on pain was not difficult, especially not when one knew Sion's mind as intimately as Kreia did. She had known it was Sion who had attacked her ship in deep space, and she had known immediately that the Harbinger had been captured by him and his crew as soon as it arrived in the system near Peragus. One does not forget the screaming presence in the Force of one's own former student. Darth Sion, the Lord of Pain projected his pain and anger around him wherever he prowled, having nothing of the subtlety of presence in the Force as Kreia did.
She had been meticulously masking their presence, particularly Bryony's, ever since the Harbinger docked with the Peragus mining facility. Bryony was nowhere near ready to face one such as him, and Kreia knew of Sion's assassins. She would force them to find their party by sight and sound, not through the Force. So far, that had kept them alive, but she could not pass by her former student without teaching him one last lesson.
Staying close to the wall and tightening her grip on the vibroblade, Kreia stalked nearer, stopping just out of range of the reach of his lightsaber, should he choose to ignite it. "Why do you pursue her, Sion?" she taunted silkily.
Sion tensed, his eyes searching for but passing over her. The deception held, and he despised it. He did not answer her question, instead, he observed, "You are exceptionally difficult to kill, my master."
"For one as weak and broken as you, perhaps," Kreia mused, a smile playing on her lips. She paced boldly to the center of the hallway, still out of reach. Even then, he could not see her.
"You have no power over me any longer," he rumbled, rasping voice echoing through a broken wind pipe. "No longer do you slither through my mind. No longer do you haunt my thoughts."
"And you think that makes you free? You think that makes you powerful?" Kreia scoffed.
"You are weak, old woman," Sion taunted in return. He turned slightly, following the sound of her voice as she paced. "It is your weakness that draws you to her, the weak and broken one."
"Oh, she is so much more than just that," Kreia said softly, "And so I cannot allow you or any of your assassins to hinder her path that she must walk."
"Who are you to get in my way, old woman? The last of the Jedi must die!" Sion suddenly lashed out. His red lightsaber ignited with a hiss and he lunged towards the sound of Kreia's voice.
Kreia raised her vibroblade, but was not quick enough to block his powerful down-strike, cortosis or no. Although his aim was imprecise, still blinded to her, the hot blade of his lightsaber sliced clean through her left wrist. She gasped out a yell of pain, dropping the vibroblade. With her right hand, Kreia desperately grasped at where her left hand had been. She stumbled backwards away from Sion, reeling in pain.
Kreia fought to keep her concentration to continue to mask her presence and the presence of Bryony and that fool that followed her. If Sion found any of them, he would not let them live, and their deaths would be slow and painful. She took a deep breath, willing the pain away, and forced her will over Sion's mind, injecting it with irrational, inescapable terror. He gasped and dropped his lightsaber, grasping at his head. "Get out of my mind you witch!" he roared.
Kreia turned and fled, as quickly as she was able.
Inside the dim engine maintenance corridor, they found the ion engine's control terminal easily. Without a word from Bryony, Atton set to work slicing into the system again, with as much ease as ever, and convincing the computer system that they were indeed about to perform routine maintenance, which would shut down the ion engines' rotors and reaction core. Just to be sure, he checked again to make sure that no fuel was in the fuel lines that connected the ship to Peragus's fuel depot level. Once he had convinced the system that it was safe, he was able to trigger the engine access door to open to them. The radiation airlock hissed open.
"We are clear?" Bryony asked as Atton backed away from the console.
"Clear as the Hydan Way," Atton replied smugly, "Now let's get this over with."
Bryony nodded stoically and led the way to the engine access port. She pushed the heavy door inward on its hinges and stepped inside, Atton following after her. Although the engines were quiet, the air in the engine room was heavy with heat. Bryony had not taken more than three steps down the catwalk from Atton when she suddenly let out a yell of pain and, grasping at her left wrist, crumpled down to one knee. Bent over in pain, she wheezed and panted. Tears whetted the edge of her eyes.
"Bryony!" Atton exclaimed, "What's going on?" She did not respond, too distracted by some mysterious pain, doubling over further. "Dammit, hold on!" he rushed to her side and knelt down beside her, holding firmly onto her shoulders, "We've made it this far. We're almost there."
Rocking back and forth she panted, "Kreia, something's happened to Kreia."
"What does this have to do with that old woman?"Atton asked.
"I—I felt…" she started, wincing, "We're connected in the Force."
"Is she dead?" Atton asked. He was not sure whether he hoped she was dead or still alive.
"No," Bryony replied, slowly uncurling from her ball and brushing Atton's hands from her shoulders.
Atton felt disappointed. Nope, I guess I think we'd be better off with her gone…
"My hand just felt like it was dipped in molten metal," she explained as she experimentally opened and closed her left hand from a fist.
Atton shuddered. Force leave me alone. I don't want that kind of thing going on in my head ever. He stood and offered her a hand up, which she took in her left hand.
She stood and started, "I—well, let's keep moving. I have a feeling we need to get off this ship as quickly as we can."
"I've been having that feeling for a while now," Atton muttered in agreement, then followed her briskly down the catwalk. Following behind her, he could see her still opening and closing her left hand nervously as they went.