A/N: I apologize for the slow update time, I've recently gotten involved with the fandom Fullmetal Alchemist, which is an AMAZING show, btw, so... I'M SORRY! Here are my reasons:
1. Fullmetal Alchemist
2. My boyfriend broke up with me when I was finishing the next couple of chapters.
3. Finals
4. FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST!
Not to mention I broke two of my toes yesterday. :( Hurts like a bitch. It's times like this I really wish I had my own personal Jedi Healer!
CHAPTER FOURTEEN...
TUTAKA ONE SEPARATIST BASE
Boba Fett and Ona Nobis entered the room in which Barriss and Zeke were being held. "Moving day," the young boy announced, hand on the butt of his blaster. "Dott has finally come to his senses; you're going to the detention area."
"Yippee," Barriss said sarcastically. She rose to her feet smoothly, extending a hand to help Zeke up.
Fett drew his blaster and aimed it at the pair. "Separate," he ordered.
Zeke looked to Barriss for confirmation, receiving a small nod. She briefly squeezed his hand- be ready was clearly written in her eyes.
The Jedi moved five paces away from the commando. "Happy?"
"Never," Boba answered coolly as Ona Nobis approached the clone to put energy binders around his wrists.
As soon as the Sorrusian bounty drew close enough, Zeke lunged and snapped her into a headlock. The surprised female compressed her skeletal structure, sliding from his grip and collapsing to the floor as if boneless. She rolled away and drew her blaster.
After a moment of shock, the commando was sent diving for cover by Nobis's blaster bolts.
Many things happened at the same time. Even before the female had squirmed her way out of the headlock, Barriss had darted forward and snatched the woman's energy whip from her hip. She cracked it once, sharply, pulling Fett's blaster from his grip. With a startled curse, the boy fell back.
Then the Super Battle Droid entered the fray; high-powered blaster shots blowing huge chunks out of the wall.
"Fierfek, fierfek, fierfek," Zeke panted as his cheek was gasped open by flying shards of rock. The female Jedi somersaulted in midair and dropped behind the cover of a terminal.
Fett again made his presence known as he reemerged in the doorway, spraying the room with blue energy bolts from Zeke's DC-17. The kickback from the weapon forced the young bounty hunter to lean back to keep the weapon aimed; unfortunately from Barriss and Zeke, the DeeCee was a very forgiving firearm, requiring very little skill to aim and fire.
And then something completely unexpected happened.
"Halt!" Nobis commanded her partner in an imperious tone that brooked no argument. Fett stopped firing and gaped at the female in astonishment.
Ona Nobis snarled. "I want this fight to be between the myself and the Jedi."
"Are you out of your kriffing mind?" Fett demanded. "This is no time for your petty grievances-"
"It is the perfect time. Fetch the Jedi her lightsaber." Nobis kept her gaze on Barriss. "I've been waiting forty years for this, I refuse to wait any longer."
Boba Fett nodded slowly. "I'll do this, but it signals the end of our partnership." The bounty hunter kept the DeeCee warily trained on the two Republic soldiers before disappearing from view behind the doorway.
Zeke took a deep breath, thanking the Force for the unexpected break. He looked across the room to Barriss, who was kneeling on the ground with her eyes closed, swaying gently back and forth.
She was preparing for what may be the most important battle of her entire life.
Zeke did not know the story of the Sorrusian bounty hunter Ona Nobis. How she had fought Obi-Wan Kenobi several times when he was a mere Padawan under the guidance of Master Qui-Gon Jinn. How finally Kenobi defeated her by knocking her off a rooftop on Belasco, where she had supposedly fallen to her death.
Ona Nobis remained in the shadows, disgraced by this Jedi called Kenobi, until she was approached by a young man.
Boba Fett, the son of the notorious Jango Fett. He offered partnership, and a chance for the female from Sorrus to gain back the reputation she had lost at the hands of the Jedi.
Zeke knew none of this. He only knew that some fringe scum had challenged a Jedi. The commando stood cautiously and walked slowly over to the Jedi, careful to keep his hands where the bounty hunter could see them. He crouched next to Barriss and put his hand on her shoulder.
Barriss's eyes blinked open, and Zeke felt her muscles become more relaxed.
"What do you want me to do?" Zeke asked quietly.
She shook her head. "Nothing. There is nothing you can do."
Zeke accepted this. He had to. She was Jedi.
Fett returned with a silver cylinder- Barriss's lightsaber. He tossed it to Nobis, who caught it and extended that hand toward Barriss. "Give me my whip," she ordered coolly. "And let the games begin."
Barriss stood calmly with all the grace of a sand panther approaching its unknowing prey. She stood in the center of the room, in the exact spot where Zeke had hung suspended and subjected to horrific experiments.
A single flick of the wrist sent the lightsaber flying through the air to clatter to a stop at Barriss's feet. She made no move to retrieve it. "Deactivate the droid," she said, glancing at the Super Battle Droid standing patiently in the doorway. "I have no wish to be shot in the back."
Ona Nobis took the measure of the other woman with her eyes, then nodded curtly. "Boba, the droid."
Fett shook his head in disbelief, but did as she said. The SBD let out a startled "What!" before powering down as the boy tripped the circuit breaker.
Barriss bent down and picked up the fallen lightsaber. She held the blade in one hand, and the whip in the other. After a moment's pause, the Jedi tossed the whip to the bounty hunter and ignited her indigo blade.
Ona Nobis activated her whip to laser mode, the weapon glowing red with a vicious barbed spike on the end.
Complete silence.
And then they struck.
The air filled with the harsh buzz of lasers and scorched ozone as the weapons collided.
The two seemed like complete opposites: Nobis had her lips pulled back over her teeth in a fierce snarl, while Barriss fought with a strange, calm detachment.
But even to Zeke, untrained in the subtleties of Jedi combat, it seemed as if Barriss were a bit... off, as it were.
Ona Nobis flipped backward, out of the lightsaber's range. Barriss lunged forward, batting the whip to the side, saber angled for the killing blow-
At the last second the Jedi dove away as Nobis pulled a vibroblade from its sheath, scoring Barriss's arm with a long but shallow cut. She hissed in pain, falling back under the two pronged assault. Faster than blinking the whip changed from laser mode to a regular whip. It wrapped around Barriss's ankle, roughly yanking her to the floor. The breath whooshed out of her lungs, and Nobis immediately seized the opportunity, leaping forward and driving her knees between the Jedi's breasts, pinning her to the floor.
Barriss gasped as the other woman's knee slammed into her chest, feeling the cold metal of the vibroblade slide against her throat, and in that moment, she knew she was going to die. She felt the cold slitherings of fear turn her blood to ice. There is no death- there is the Force says the Jedi Code, but what if one dies within the Force-less bubble of an ysalamir?
It is a testament to Barriss's own personal courage that she refused to let fear daunt her. She raised her chin, affixing Nobis with her most penetrating glare, and prepared for the end.
"I've been waiting a long time for the opportunity to slaughter a Jedi," Nobis hissed coldly. "Maybe Kenobi will feel your death through your vaunted Force and know pain!" The blade nicked her throat, and one small drop of blood trickled down her neck.
"Get on with it," Fett ordered, and for one critical second, the blaster was no longer pointed directly at Zeke.
The commando drew a plan and prepared to execute it all in the matter of a nanosecond. He ran from behind the terminal, adrenaline pumping in his veins, previous weakness forgotten.
Zeke headed straight for the ysalamir atop the deactivated Super Battle Droid.
A startled cruse flew from Nobis's lips, and she cracked her whip at Zeke. The spiked ball on the end caught him in the shoulder, tearing a wicked gash through his skin, but he was already there. Zeke grabbed the furry creature, pulled it off its frame, and snapped its neck.
With a surprised gasp, Barriss felt as though a light had clicked on in a formerly dark room. Power surged in her limbs, banishing the fear.
The Force was with her again.
With an almost casual wave of her hand, the Jedi allowed the Force to channel through her outstretched palm.
Nobis flew backward, her delayed strike with the vibroblade only slitting open the front of Barriss's navy-blue jumpsuit. The Jedi's indigo eyes flashed with a sudden flame, and she pressed the attack, blade moving in perfect accompaniment to the bounty hunter's laser whip.
With a few seemingly effortless strikes, Barriss knocked Ona Nobis to her knees, the handgrip of the whip laying on the stone floor, neatly sliced in two. The above lights made the bounty hunter's shaved head gleam as she stared back in unabashed hatred of the Jedi standing over her.
The Force sang through Barriss, moving her lips for her. "Do you yield?"
Ona Nobis peeled her lips away from her teeth and spat on the ground. "Kill me, Jedi weakling. When you die, I'll be waiting for you in hell! Remember that!"
The lightsaber wavered. It was against the Jedi Code to kill an unarmed prisoner, but this woman was clearly too dangerous to be left alive...
For better or for worse, the choice was abruptly taken from her as the blue rings of a stunbolt washed over her. Barriss was able to turn and see Fett holding the blaster, Zeke twitching on the ground near him.
And then all questions of the morality of the Jedi Code were swept from her mind as she collapsed to the hard stone floor in a deep sleep.
A/N: Well, if there's anyone out there still reading this, I honestly don't know when I'll be uploading the next chapter. If you review, odds are it will be sooner rather than later. If you happen to like the show and/or manga Fullmetal Alchemist, check out my stories! See y'all round!