Atton stepped, and the Remote hovered, out of the hallway from the security zone and into MSG Control, which they found darker than the rest of Singularity Base. There were no guards in sight, no distant footsteps or murmurs, not so much as a peep from a roachrat. But Atton knew damn well that they weren't alone. He could still sense the windbag Headmaster as plain as day, along with two other Sith—they were deeper inside, close to the very rim of the artificial crater, around which the master control consoles were spaced.
They didn't worry him that much. Neither did the ten-ish assassins, though his sense of them was imperfect. Between their power to hide themselves in the Force and his knack for finding people who were hiding, it averaged out to him just knowing that they were around somewhere.
The only thing that gave him a bad feeling was Visas. Though her presence was equally as indistinct and vague as her sidekicks', the threat she posed was anything but uncertain. Too bad things hadn't gone differently in the Ord Lonesome system, or else she would've been sucking vacuum right then… Well, at least now he had time to fix that, along with another mistake or two.
He surveyed the junction they had arrived in, casting long, careful looks down the passages to the left and right. It was actually the same passage curving along the entire length of MSG Control's outer wall in order to link each of the entrances from the security zones.
Atton looked down the corridor right ahead of him, where a distant silver-green light flickered beckoningly—on a few seconds, then off a few, then on again. In synch with the light's pattern, the floor beneath him vibrated, as though a subtle electrical charge was running through it.
Totals are three, one. Totals are seven, seven. Play the plus-three card, totals are ten, seven…
"It's showtime," he whispered out the corner of his mouth. "Break a leg." The Remote gave a soft beep in reply, and they parted ways.
Unlike the outer ring of the base, which was haphazard and labyrinthine, everything in MSG Control was oriented toward its center, symmetric and methodical. A series of wide corridors, such as the one Atton was progressing down, led inward from the ring linking each of the five entrances, separating blocks of dozens of rooms where scientists and operators had once been stationed. The same layout was repeated for eight levels down, like a stack of wheels atop one another, but smaller access ways for maintenance and repair extended much farther than that.
Singularity Base had been designed to be a superweapon, but it was no less a laboratory, and the rooms housed in each block had multitudinous purposes. Many were dedicated to operating gargantuan sensor systems that monitored any phenomena which could affect the Mass Shadow Generator's operation, ranging from the Malachor system's natural gravitonic anomalies to solar activity and cosmic rays, all the way down to local meteorological activity and atmospheric disturbances. Other rooms hosted sophisticated computer labs where teams of scientists had once spent hours or days running and analyzing weapon simulations. Still others were control centers for the facility's power management and distribution. To name a few.
Those years ago, when the Loxley had ferried him into battle over Malachor, Atton had had no idea that there was any Republic base on the surface, let alone its purpose. None of the grunts had been told. All they'd heard was whispers that Revan had "something special" in mind for Mandalore's fleet. It felt strange to be walking those halls now, strolling alone and with full knowledge into the very center of this gigantic death trap.
First in, last out.
Halfway down the hall, he felt something—a little twinge or twist in his sense of danger, a disturbance in the Force, a more specific bad feeling on top of the regular one, whatever one might call it—and decided to take a small detour. Fishing a sticky mine out of his backpack, he headed into a room on his right, leaving the device in the doorway as he passed through. To be safe, he thought about hyperspace routes. The Entralla Route's a pain in the ass if you want to get to Ord Trasi. Better to start at Yaga Minor and cut over to Mygeeto…
The subtly curved room before him stretched on for a bit. Rows of computer stations ran down its entire length on either side, their security-locked monitors glowing softly. Giant screens covered the walls, displaying cross-sections of the superweapon's subterranean machinery and setting the room awash with yellow, orange, and red light.
What interested Atton more, however, was the door across from him sliding shut with a slight hiss. He advanced into the room cautiously, his rifle up, looking for the slight ripple in the air that betrayed the work of a stealth field generator.
After a few seconds he just lost his patience and started spraying the room, sweeping his rifle from side to side. Glowing metal fragments ricocheted about, and the sparking, flaming death throes of exploding computers cast brilliant shimmers through scattering shards of glass. Screens cracked by shrapnel sputtered or went out, deepening the room's shadows. On a certain level it felt good to wreck something, but what he wanted to see was a dead body flopping about in the devastation.
The Force hissed a warning at him. Without question he spun as a vibro-knife flicked out of the shadows between two consoles on the right. He felt a jolt go through his arms as the blade embedded itself in his rifle's power cell. Glad though he was that it hadn't gone into his chest, he was also annoyed—the Force had ruined a perfectly good blaster.
He chucked the rifle at the assassin and dug out his lightsaber, calling forth its blade just in time for the mine he'd left behind him to go off with a satisfying bang, sprinkling the floor with more debris. But as the one assassin closed in with a vibroblade, he spared a glance at the mangled doorway to see a second coming to join the fight. Either the murglak had set the mine off from a distance somehow, or he had just gotten a promotion.
Atton forgot about that quandary as the first one closed in, slashing at him with double-bladed vibrosword, but he was at the top of his game. He met the whirling volley of blows with a minimalist defense, his saber deflecting each one off-course rather than going for a straight block. When the assassin slowed just a little, Atton went for a middle thrust that burned through the middle of the vibrosword's handle and left a glowing arc from his chest down to his belly.
As the man fell and died, his buddy closed half the distance. Rather than spend an extra half-second putting his saber away, Atton simply dropped it and yanked two pistols from his belt. The remaining assassin ducked under the first two shots and sidestepped the third. The next two were half-absorbed by his armor, but stopped him in his tracks. Never one for doing things halfway, Atton kept firing until the guy was laid out on his back, his body full of holes.
He holstered his guns and bent down to snatch up his lightsaber—carefully, since it had no auto-off and was still scorching its way down into the floor. "Bet you wish you had one of these."
Powering down the weapon, he finished crossing the room, emerged into the corridor beyond, and continued down the corridor toward the rhythmically crackling green light. As he went farther, the vibration in the floor and walls grew stronger, the rumbling more pronounced. It made him think of maglev cars roaring by underground. He slipped into the Force for a moment. Things were no clearer than before, but no less, either, and the minds he felt were charged with a new alertness. The racket had drawn more than its share of attention.
As usual, Atton's feelings were mixed. That's good… I guess.
The hallway and the blocks of work stations came to an end, and MSG Control expanded into a concourse of sorts. Beyond a chasm bridged by a spider's-web of catwalks and platforms, a transparisteel window twenty meters high ran wide enough to provide an ample view of the artificial crater.
Set into its surface in clusters and rings, long antennae and other sensitive-looking instruments jutted skyward. They were taller than the Republic's tank droids, but stood like grass compared to the looming figures of the massive energy pylons. As Atton gazed up at them, it struck him at they bore some resemblance to the claw-shaped megaliths at the center of Trayus Core. Arranged in three concentric circles, they all faced inward toward the black maw in the valley's center.
Thick power lines and data cables snaked from that opening, crisscrossing and tangling like creeping vines as they linked the various protruding structures with the inner, kilometers-deep guts of the Mass Shadow Generator.
All of the pylons were inactive, folded down against the valley's floor, except for the five that made up the inner ring. Every few seconds they were wreathed in bursts of silvery green energy that threw harsh light against the clouds, as though they held lightning imprisoned within themselves, and the facility trembled.
Atton thought he saw something flying low against the flashing clouds, but he put it aside and lowered his eyes. On the other side of the chasm, a walkway ran around the window, hosting yet more computer readouts and instruments and among them he spied the master control console—well, one of them, actually.
And right between him and it, standing on one of the platforms, was a certain lanky, deathly pale, goggle-eyed Nautolan. "Rand!" he bellowed theatrically.
Atton waved, feigning a look of pleasant surprise. "Professor! Good to see you again! How's classes?"
"The depth of your boorishness is matched only by your stupidity," the Headmaster replied.
"Takes one to know one." Atton edged his way onto a walkway that rimmed the outer edge of the chasm and looked around. A Sith Marauder stood on either side of him, an Iktotchi and a Lethan Twi'lek.
"I hope that our Master learns from her mistakes after this day," Silbus mused, gesturing at the ceiling. "You should never have survived my training. You would not have, had it not been for her shackling me. Her unreasonable demands are what led to this catastrophe."
"I can't argue with you there," Atton admitted. It was hard to say whether the Nautolan was genuinely chewing him out or just trying to stall. Knowing him, it was probably the former, but that ultimately made no difference. And even if it was the latter, two could play that game.
Atton's lightsaber flared to life, and the two Marauders drew bloodshine blades to match. He gave them each a brief glare. "Let's get this over with."
Scoffing, the Headmaster raised a hand, and a jagged arc of blue-white lightning split the air. Atton's blade caught it at the last second, but the impact was a rough one, and only his two-handed grip on the saber kept it from being forced back into his shoulder. The unstable beam spat sparks and surged almost pure white as the lightning poured into it, and at that moment he wondered if it had been a bad idea to settle for good enough.
The Headmaster's two stooges moved on him—the Iktotchi was lining up a chop at his legs, the Twi'lek another at his back. Unable to think of anything else to do, Atton ran backward a few steps, letting the force behind the lightning carry him. Still grounded on his blade, the bolt flashed and writhed, and the Sith Marauders skidded to a halt, wary of running into it. Gnashing his teeth in frustration, Silbus let off. His Marauders rallied, then flung themselves on Atton, and light flared as their blades crossed.
Corridor D-27 soon turned onto the main one. The automap made it easy to retrace the route taken by the survivors from Security Zone C, but even without it, Kaevee was certain she would have found her way. She only ran faster as her sense of urgency sharpened—and more than one thing sharpened it.
Aside from the need to help Atton, she was trying to outrun all thoughts of Cole—his ingratitude, his selfishness, and her own inability to move him. And the farther she went, the more corpses and wreckage she saw, and she wanted to put them behind her as well.
And she was feeling, more and more irresistibly, that she was being followed. By who or what, by an enemy, or Republic troopers, or even a penitent Cole, she couldn't tell. But each time she looked back or stretched out with the Force, there was no sign of pursuit. No company at all but the dead.
The blaster in her robe bounced heavily against her as she ran. She tried to stay alert, but each time she got her focus together, something would break it. Atton's voice seemed to rattle around inside her head in a tedious, chastising monologue. What did I tell you, kid? Turn around! Don't be stupid! No heroics! That one Sith on Dantooine almost killed you! You're not even a Jedi, just some half-trained Padawan…
The words kept rising up within her, and she forced them back down, over and over. It didn't matter what Atton wanted, or Cole, or Major Hawkins, or anyone else. She couldn't run away again. She had to trust the Force. She had to be brave.
She didn't feel brave when she reached the security zone.
Five long, blaster-mangled scanning aisles ran down its length toward the area before an open circular blast door. Debris carpeted the floor—shards of glass, twisted shrapnel, ruined weapons and equipment. Over the debris was a layer of bodies. Burned, bloodied, quartered, shredded by explosions, they were thick enough in the aisles that Kaevee wouldn't even be able to step between them. Gray smoke clung to the ceiling, swirling slowly.
She stared at the ruination, forcing herself to shake her head for fear that her body would freeze completely. In the Force, she felt something passing over her and into her; she took it to be a kind of echo of the panic and rage and desperation and insanity of battle. It sounded like Dantooine, but worse than Dantooine, it sounded like Malachor, sounded like the thing that she could not bear to listen to.
So many people dying so quickly, so close together—and just left there. The sight was torturing, but Kaevee continued to look even as she felt her thoughts slowing down, her heart beating weaker. She felt powerless in many ways, some of them strange ways.
Fire, she realized distantly. That was the answer. She needed fire, Jedi fire to take all these bodies away. They deserved the fire. It was the Jedi thing to do, she was certain… But how could she do it? Where could she possibly get enough fire, when she had no one to help her…
She flinched as though someone had stuck her with a pin, and that train of thought fell away. Atton needed her help. She needed to get through.
"Atris… can you hear me?" She wanted to scream, but it only came out as a whisper. "Atris, help. Help me now."
But she didn't wait for Atris to help; maybe the old woman had helped her already. She fixed her gaze on doorway at the other end of the room and began to move.
"I am a Jedi, the Force is with me, I am a Jedi, the Force is with me, I am a Jedi, the Force is with me…"
The terrain was uneven and impossible to traverse properly. It wasn't supposed to be terrain; they were supposed to be alive. Kaevee stumbled down the aisle, bracing herself against a wall the whole way, not looking down, feeling the world spinning and hoping it wouldn't spin faster, wishing she could tell the corpses she was sorry.
Past the scanning aisle, she tripped over one person, fell across another. Not thinking, not able to think, not wanting any more horror to grapple with, she stood up and shut her eyes, willing the Force to map out the contours of the room for her. For just a few seconds a shaky, fuzzy path laid itself out in her mind's eye, and her clumsy steps carried her down it. She opened her eyes when her outstretched hand met something solid—the wall right next to the blast door.
A weak laugh of relief fell from Kaevee's mouth as she edged her way into the portal. As the Force poured strength back into her spirit, her mind began to clear again, and she had the feeling, again, that she was being followed—not watched, but followed. But it was impossible to look back. She sprinted down the dark hallway.
Just inside MSG Control, she stopped to catch her breath and get her bearings. There was a staggered, irregular interplay of light up ahead, a strange rumbling beneath her feet…
And the dark side was stronger here, she realized, because the Sith were very close. She hastily pressed herself against a nearby wall, hiding from the dazzling green light that came down the corridor. Her mind raced; she had actually made it, and now she had to find Atton.
At this point, getting him to turn back probably wasn't going to be an option. Being this far inside already, he was going to activate the weapon. Kaevee's job, then, was to help him get through the Sith to one of the master consoles…
The Padawan's courage—if it was courage—wavered. She remembered again how easily she had been defeated by the Sith on Dantooine. She would've liked to believe she had grown stronger in the Force after the exercises Atton had put her through. Either way, now it would be just her and Atton against more Sith. And she had no laigreks to help.
And she had no weapons except for that stupid blaster. There had been a lot of dead Sith back in the security zone, she realized—if only she'd had the presence of mind to pick up one of their lightsabers. She couldn't use it well, but it would have made her feel better.
Her trepidation growing, she peeked around the corner. Squinting against the strange, intermittent silver-green crackle, she was able to make out several silhouettes down at the end of the hallway, before a wide-open concourse. They quickly moved out of sight, but not before she had glimpsed the colliding arcs and flashes of lightsabers, two bloodshine and one blue.
Kaevee's heart pounded, her stomach twisted, and her sense of naked dread and vulnerability intensified. But it was far too late for second-guessing, too late to consider the possibility, however remote, that she ought to have gone back to the hangar with Cole and the others. She had chosen to go and now she was there, and Atton needed her help. She had no choice but to trust the Force to carry her through to the end. There was no going back.
Just then there was a low mechanical whir as the door she had come through opened again, and Kaevee looked and found a second reason why there was no going back.
This reason had to do with another lightsaber that appeared with an electric snap-hiss, its brilliant red-white gleam reflecting off polished armor as its wielder brought it to guard. He was a bald Human, pale and hard-nosed. Taking a hand off the lightsaber, he wiped sweat from his brow and let out a harsh laugh. "A Jedi—at last!" He sounded a little winded, but there was no doubting the malice and relish in his words.
The Padawan froze, her look drifting from the Sith's blade to his hellishly-lit face, and for a brief moment there was silence. As it wore on, his gleeful leer was tinged with annoyance, as though he was impatient for a reply. "You fear me," he observed, inclining his head.
Having no scruples at all about proving his point, Kaevee bolted. Apparently the Sith hadn't expected it, and she got a few seconds' lead down the curved hallway as he indignantly shouted, "WHAT?! Come back here, coward!" But in the next few seconds, the noise of heavy footfalls and the buzz of the lightsaber quickly gained on her. Close to panicking, she stopped at a random door to her right and slammed the panel. Mercifully it opened, sliding up into the ceiling, and she bounded through, finding herself in a control room of some kind.
Without thinking she spun around, grabbing the door with the Force, and its machinery squealed in complaint as she yanked it closed—a half-second too early to bring it down on the head of her pursuer. She held the door in its place, but a second later the Sith's lightsaber pierced the durasteel and deftly sliced a molten rectangle through it. The Padawan let the door go and scampered back as he kicked it in with a crash.
"Really, this is pathetic," he sneered as he came through the opening. He still held his saber to guard, but it was clearly more relaxed than before. "You don't even have a lightsaber, do you? Why else would a Jedi run from battle?"
Backing away down the length of the room, Kaevee raised both hands and threw a telekinetic push at him, but the Sith brought up his forearms as though blocking a punch; it rocked him and he grunted as Force collided with Force, but he quickly regained his balance. "You'll have to do better than that," he goaded.
The Padawan pushed again, as hard as she could, but this time her opponent swept his hand and the blast was deflected away completely. Beside him, one of the control panels which lined the walls crumpled inward, vomiting sparks and fragments of glass and plasteel. The Sith turned away, shielding his face from the debris.
He came at her again, this time at a brisk walk. Spying a plasteel drum to the side, Kaevee latched onto it with her mind and flung it. The Sith crouched—though even if he hadn't, it would have sailed a foot or two over his head—and it crashed on the other side of the room. Sucking in a breath, the Padawan tried to concentrate better, tried to remember what Atton had taught her. One at a time, more containers and chairs flew through the room, but their target was more agile than he looked. The Sith ducked, sidestepped, or hopped over them, often contemptuously slashing them to pieces as they blurred past.
Kaevee felt her grasp on the Force slipping, but it wasn't her power that was lacking; desperation chipped away at her focus even as she continued to lash out. Illuminators, gauges, comlink chargers, and levers sparked as she ripped them out of their fixtures. The Sith continued to dodge the missiles, occasionally slapping one away with the Force. He flinched as a few bounced off his chest armor, but they only seemed to annoy him. Finally Kaevee grasped at a large metal cabinet that almost reached to the ceiling, trying to throw it; but it only wobbled and fell over with a boom as the Sith strolled past, several feet out of range. At a loss, the Padawan hesitated, and at that moment he broke into a run, lightsaber raised.
A frantic scream tore from Kaevee's throat as she pushed one more time; even in mid-charge the Sith absorbed the brunt of the energy, but it disrupted his precision enough that his diagonal chop sliced the air just over her head and right shoulder instead of splitting her from shoulder to hip. While he was still on the downswing, she turned to run again.
The Force warned her of an obstacle before her conscious mind could process it; it was a square holotable half as tall as herself. With no time for grace or calculation, she dived onto its surface, scrambling across on all fours. Again the Sith narrowly missed, his blade slicing deep into the machine just behind her. Its innards sizzled and gouted smoke, and the man snarled in frustration.
Kaevee was almost across the holotable when she was hit from behind by a wave of telekinetic force that knocked her over the edge and spilled her onto the floor. Before she could regain her breath, the Sith hurdled the obstruction and landed right next to her. As he readied to swing again, his mad yellow eyes blazed with contempt.
Then they widened in alarm and he looked back the way he had come, responding to some arcane warning—or perhaps being drawn by a strange sound, a rapid-fire sort of metallic clacking. With just as much desperation as Kaevee had flung herself across the holotable, the Sith flung himself away from it. He was chased by a shuddering molten cloud that erupted from over its edge like a burst from a flamethrower.
Suddenly blinded, Kaevee cried out and hid her face in her robe to shield it from the searing heat. As it withdrew she rolled over and crawled blindly, away from the familiar clacking and the dopplering hum of the lightsaber. Reaching a wall console, she pulled herself to her feet and turned around, her vision starting to clear.
The Sith was stumbling about near the opposite wall, one hand rubbing his eyes, the other waving his lightsaber before him, trying to keep his new assailant at bay. The laigrek darted in under a horizontal swing and then leaped at him, thrusting one of its scythe-like mandibles at his thigh; the armor there seemed to stop it, but the man still roared. He strafed to the side, swinging again, and the laigrek let out a buzzing shriek as red plasma raked along its side. It fell writhing to the ground and the Sith hopped awkwardly away, checking his leg.
The same loss Kaevee had felt back in the Y-junction lanced through her again, but anger and fresh resolve quickly swallowed it up. Reaching out with the Force, she tried to yank the Sith's lightsaber out of his hand. The man wobbled as his weapon jerked forward, but he maintained his grip on it. Then he looked at Kaevee as though suddenly remembering she was there, and his face, now a sort of blistery red, darkened further. He made a savage throwing motion with his hand, and Kaevee leaped aside as the laigrek soared across the room and smashed against the console where she had just been standing.
Staying close to the wall, the Padawan retreated again, and now she did feel her power waning. After blindly turning a corner, she found herself running down a narrow, short corridor—thirty feet long at most—toward a lone door at its end. She caught herself against it, wheezing and gasping, and slapped the panel beside it.
Nothing happened. Noticing that the door had a viewport, she looked inside and found what looked like a closet, holding a wall of yet more computers—except these computers looked different from the others she had seen. More importantly, there was nothing else inside the room; it was a dead end.
She turned and threw one last wave of Force power down the hall just as her pursuer jogged into view. The corridor mostly just shuddered, but a few small devices burst from the walls and flew at the Sith, who stopped and flinched back. Hissing through gritted teeth, he righted himself, and Kaevee saw blood begin to flow from a tear that crossed his cheek and almost reached back to his neck. But he didn't even bring a hand to the wound, and now fire seemed to be in his eyes.
As he brought his sword arm back, the Force rushed upon Kaevee. It was not power from within, which she had all but exhausted, but wordless intuition from without. In the critical split second of choice, she surrendered to it and threw herself flat against the floor as the lightsaber came spinning down the corridor at her, haloed by a tempest of gold and scarlet sparks as it cut into the walls.
Bloodshine light flashed over Kaevee's head. Behind her, glass shattered and electricity writhed and crackled. Still under the Force's guidance, she pushed herself up to her knees. The Sith stood with one arm outstretched, one side of his face glistening in the haphazard light that splashed its way up the corridor. They both froze for a brief moment, staring at each other dumbfoundedly.
As the moment ended, Kaevee noticed that she had one hand in her pocket, grasping something tight. Feverishly hoping that the Force would be with her for just another second or two, she drew the blaster pistol and brought it up. The Sith's eyes bulged and his fingers opened wider, calling his weapon back to him, but something had gone wrong.
Kaevee's finger twitched, then twitched again. The first bolt blinked into the man's throat and blew out the back of his neck. By the time the second one went through his head, he was already falling.
For some minutes the Padawan remained where she was, catching her breath and marveling at her survival. Then she put a hand against the wall and stood up, careful not to touch any scorch marks, and went back to the door. The lightsaber was nowhere to be seen, but there was a wide, gold-glowing slit in one of the computers. It must have slashed through and embedded itself somewhere inside. Electrical discharges belched from the wound, and Kaevee smelled burning metal. She decided against trying to retrieve the lightsaber.
As she shambled back to the control room, she looked first at the Sith she had killed, then at the blaster still in her hand. Maybe this is what Atton was talking about, she realized.
A muffled, warbling croak brought her out of her thoughts. Putting the blaster away, she followed the sound back down the wall to the laigrek.
It was a pitiable sight. The Sith's blade had severed all three of the creature's left legs and left an awful burn wound down that side of its belly. Its impact against the console had partly caved in the right side of its head and reduced the compound eye there to an oozing, pulpy mess. Amazingly, it seemed that it had tried to rejoin the fight, dragging itself on its remaining front leg and leaving behind streaks of its ochre blood in a trail several meters long. It tried to stand up as its master drew near, but the motion only ground its wounds against the floor, and it collapsed with a whimper.
Kaevee stood hunched over the animal, watching and trembling as it wriggled the charred little stumps that remained of its lost legs. The thought of putting it out of its misery crossed her mind. It certainly couldn't help her any more, and there was nothing else she could do to ease its suffering. But the time she had spent living alone on Dantooine went through her mind as well. For all those years, the laigreks had been with her; these simple, ignorant, unquestioning animals had waited, watched, killed, and died to protect her, to protect what little remained of the Jedi.
Then, for reasons she could not fathom, this single, unremarkable specimen had followed her from home—and, after crossing the galaxy in her company, it had now given its life for hers. She knew that the power of the Force had compelled its actions; it had not been the laigrek's own choice to be elevated above the mere demands of its nature, to be given a higher purpose. Yet even knowing that, even seeing its terrible pain, she simply could not bring herself to kill it.
And every moment she spent there hesitating was a moment she was leaving Atton to fend for himself against the Sith.
Holding her breath, she reached out through the Force and took hold of the laigrek's mind, trying to pour her gratitude in and wishing, willing, hoping that the creature would somehow be able to understand. She gave a little gasp and shook as something poured back into her which she took to be its sense of pain; perhaps, then, she had been able to ease its suffering a little.
Guilty that she had taken even those few seconds, the Padawan drew back, steeled herself, and ran back out to the main corridor.
Silbus had long considered lightsaber combat to be brutish and conceited, not a fit activity for a true Lord of the Sith, and so he customarily left it to others. Still, most of the times that he had occasion to observe it, he was able to take some enjoyment in doing so, much as a common being from the Outer Rim would enjoy watching a kreetle-fight.
This was not one of those times.
Even after making concessions for fighters in general, Atton Rand was a ridiculous creature to behold. As Zanjo and Yaiban pressed their assault, he scurried along the walkways like a womp rat, retreating one way, then twisting between them or dashing around them and falling back the other way. He leaped over the railing and onto a catwalk a level or two down; the Sith Marauders gave chase, their blades clashed a few times, and then he led them back up. He sometimes threw grenades or other explosives as he went about, telekinetically guiding them to structural weak points that sent sections of platform tumbling down to the abyss, nearly taking one or both of his opponents with them.
These were only a few examples of the absurd stunts that he indulged in. At least Zanjo and Yaiban had had the decency to practice and hone their skills; though their choice of weapon was inferior, Silbus respected the care they had put into their training. The Iktotchi was the more aggressive one, falling on Rand with blistering volleys of powerful blows, giving him as little breathing room as possible. The Twi'lek was more careful, more measured, calculating. He favored Niman, the form of balanced defense and offense. Coincidentally, this seemed to be the same style Rand was using—when he bothered to actually engage in the duel at all.
It was only comical for the first moment or two; there was no real entertainment to be had. The Headmaster tried a few more times to end it quickly with Force lightning, but each time he did so, the boor caught it on his amateur's blade and strafed behind one of the Marauders, forcing Silbus to cut the current again.
He agonized over whether it would be best to simply kill all three of them at once. Rand might be able to use his two adversaries as shields, but it wouldn't be too difficult to hurl lightning into their backs, then channel it through them to their real target and end these shenanigans.
But no. It would be inexcusable for Silbus to deliberately dispose of two of his more capable minions, particularly since he now possessed considerably fewer than he had the previous day. And besides, Rand's moments were numbered; Zanjo and Yaiban had him clearly outclassed, and he couldn't possibly reach his precious computer terminal while trying to fight them off. And as for his Jedi allies…
Leaving his body alone for a moment, Silbus delved into the Force. The far-off light he had sensed before was where it had been, no closer, no farther. The other, littler one, was almost startlingly close—inside MSG Control, it seemed. But just as close there was Gorbus, exuding ferocious anger tinged with the thrill of pursuit. So much for the Jedi.
There were the remaining assassins, who still prowled about near the exits spread across the inner ring of the base, wary of any trickery or infiltration, though it now seemed such vigilance was unwarranted. But one other presence showed a particular urgency. That was Marr, rushing to join the duel—coming from the opposite side of MSG Control. She'd thought that Rand would not be stupid enough to come in on the end where the Headmaster and his Marauders were waiting.
Silbus chuckled aloud as he took up his physical senses again. Apparently the Miraluka's much-vaunted Force sight had once again shown its imprecision. The duel might well be finished by the time she arrived.
Speaking of which, the spectacle had moved out of the Headmaster's sight. Following the scintillating sounds of the clashing weapons, he strolled left to the railing of the platform on which he stood. They were across from him and some twenty feet below, the next level down. Rand was pinioned between the two Sith Marauders, whirling back and forth madly as he deflected and parried, their blades slicing sections out of the nearby railing.
Smirking down at the scene, the Headmaster reached into the Force again, more subtly than before, seeing if he could find some fissure in Rand's thoughts and send a spike of phantom pain into it. His probing met only a solid wall—it was pazaak. Though surprised for a brief moment, Silbus' mind soon went back to Rand's training. The Human had not long been able to hide the uncanny discipline that he used to shield his inner thoughts and intentions. The only thing that confused Silbus was the notion that the depths of Rand's mind really contained anything worth hiding or, by extension, worth uncovering.
Things soon took an alarming turn.
Zanjo lunged yet again, putting all of his strength into a power blow that would have taken off Rand's head and shoulders. Knowing he couldn't block it head-on, the Human opted to dodge in a positively ridiculous manner, leaning backward so far that he came close to falling, and the red blade missed his forehead by inches. Before righting himself, he blindly and awkwardly swung his sword arm back over his shoulder, flicking his own lightsaber at Yaiban's face.
The Twi'lek howled and recoiled, his legs nearly giving out beneath him. The very end of the unstable blade had only barely nicked one of his brain-tails, but those were an exceptionally sensitive part of Twi'lek anatomy and certainly a liability in close combat situations. One more reason Yaiban shouldn't have been a Marauder, Silbus thought with a frown.
Rand regained his balance surprisingly quickly after his contortionist gambit. Having more room to maneuver, he retreated a few steps, dodging another sweeping slash from Zanjo, and made an upward motion with his hand.
Still rapt in dismay over how clumsy the Twi'lek had been, Silbus took slightly longer than he should have to comprehend the Force's warning of the small metal sphere which was now arcing up toward him. With no time left to alter its trajectory, he willed the Force to shield him and fell back.
Muffled though it was, the sonic grenade's detonation sent him sprawling across the platform and into the railing on the other side. A pulsing, mind-flaying ringing sound subjected his skull to a veritable cataclysm, passing back and forth from one eardrum to the other, as though it was eager to shred both sides of his cranium but unable to decide which one should go first. A sensation comparable to fire spilled down his olfactory tentacles, which seemingly tried to leap from his head.
A miserable moment later, the Headmaster grasped the railing and climbed back to his feet. The agony of a hundred bones vied for his attention, but he wasn't certain if any were quite broken—he wasn't sure he ever had broken a bone before. He writhed and gnashed his teeth, letting the dark side feed on his many pains.
A Force-leap carried Rand onto the platform a stone's throw away, between Silbus and the master control console. A second after landing, he was moving again, responding to a dark shape that was sailing in a greater arc over his head. Blue fire flashed. The dark shape parted in two, and Silbus observed as a pair of legs and the lower half of a torso fell on the guard rail, tumbling over the edge as the rest of Zanjo flopped to the catwalk nearby.
The Headmaster's spirit quaked with fury, and he lashed out; Rand turned toward him, bringing his defenses to bear, but the surge of dark power passed by him and went to the master console up by the viewport. Silbus clenched his bony hand into a fist, and the machine buckled and collapsed in on itself amidst a shrill cacophony and a brief rain of sparks.
As Rand looked at the wreckage, then back at the Headmaster, his mask of smug confidence was finally swept away by a grimace of outrage.
Though his legs were still somewhat shaky, Silbus stepped away from the railing. "To have fought so hard, and all for nothing!" he crowed, barely hearing himself over the torturous echo from the sonic grenade. For good measure, he raised his fist in a sufficiently imperious gesture of triumph. "You fool! Your animal strength and crude technology cannot compare with the power of the dark side!"
The boor said nothing and began to reassemble his mask. Staring blankly, he passed his saber from one hand to the other and twirled it a few times, as though warming himself up for something. The moment dragged on, and Silbus found himself wondering exactly why in Chaos Yaiban had not followed his adversary and continued the duel. Was the weakling in too much pain even to attempt the jump?
Before Silbus could call to the Twi'lek, a soundless warning came to him as Rand raised one of his hands, a blaster pistol appearing in it as if by magic. The Headmaster telekinetically grasped the weapon at the last available nanosecond before a glaring red pulse emerged from it; its aim jinxed, the bolt went past Silbus' shoulder, and in the next instant he broke the pistol's barrel.
On account of Rand's crudeness, Silbus thought that another insult was in order. But then there was a thickening in the darkness of the Force between them, and the Human charged him with a speed and rage as palpable as that of any Sith Marauder.
The Headmaster's hand shot to his belt. Then his eyes did the same, and he gasped as he finally deciphered the riddle that had so tormented him back in the command center. He had forgotten something: a little-used but nevertheless occasionally useful tool which he had last seen on the greel wood desk in his private library back in the academy, namely his lightsaber.
In a silent shriek of desperation, he drew all of the power that he could possibly muster. The Force thundered into him until its sheer concentration momentarily swept away all crude material sensation and even seemed almost to destroy his mind; conscious thought and decision would prove far too slow to save his life when the Human was only strides away.
The Force found Zanjo's fallen lightsaber, snatched it into the air, and zipped the weapon over Rand's shoulder; the Force brought Silbus' hands up to catch it. The ecstasy stretched on for perhaps a full second, then flung him back into his body just as his adversary closed in.
As Rand fell on him with savage speed and power, it was plain to the Nautolan that there was no hope of recalling the techniques of swordplay that he had forgotten a decade ago. He relied on the Force alone to guide his blade, simply willing himself to survive with petrified determination. His red blade met the Human's stroke for stroke, but new jolts of pain shot through his body with every blow he weathered, and he hemorrhaged energy in order to maintain his defense. He ran backward as fast as he dared, but Rand stayed on him, light clashing and sparking between them at a blistering pace.
Until, all of a sudden, Rand halted in his tracks. Silbus continued his retreat for several more paces and stopped, wheezing, his lightsaber wavering in the air before him. He stared, slowly taking in the altered scene before him: Rand had let off in order to trade blows with some other saber-wielder who had come at him from behind. Bloodshine and blue clashed several times, and then the newcomer flipped elegantly over the Human, landed, and began to drive him back down the walkway with a series of thrusts. Of all people, it was Marr.
Amazed at how close he had come to death, Silbus deactivated his lightsaber and managed to clip it to his belt after trying a few times. The duel left him behind, and farther down he saw Yaiban at last leaping up from the lower level to belatedly join in.
The Headmaster's breaths came and went in agonized, sickly hisses. He ran his hands over his ornate robe, smoothing it out, in the process discovering not a few singe marks that had not been there before. But as for his body, there seemed to be nothing but a few bruises, and they too would pass with time. And already the power of the Force began to flow back into him; it was strong here on Malachor, and he was very well-attuned to it besides.
After spending a few more seconds observing the now-distant duel, he decided to leave its conclusion to Marr. Clumsy though she was when it came to finding people, there was no doubt that she would put an end to her former ally soon enough.
The Nautolan began to put his thoughts back together as he shuffled along the catwalk, toward a wide hallway leading to one of the exits, which in turn led to one of the security zones. He needed someplace to rest, secure from any last-minute close calls. First he would return to the command center and retrieve Fulminius Graush's text and his datapads, and then… Trayus Core? Or should he leave Malachor altogether and immediately see about getting a head start on acquiring the academy at Thule? Then again, he would first need to make sure the Republic fleet was routed before attempting to leave the system…
He had just entered the hallway when an odd ripple in the Force stopped his thoughts and brought him to a halt. Raising his eyes, he saw a small creature rushing toward him, its arms flailing as it came to a halt just a stone's throw ahead. It was a thin, dirty little Human in a roughly-treated brown robe. A snarl of grimy hair fell over one of her widened eyes, and she brushed it away with a shaking hand.
Silbus frowned at the creature, annoyed that she had interrupted his contemplations. Still in the process of emerging from them, he muttered, "Where is Gorbus?" But then recognition shot through him, bringing him the rest of the way into the here and now, and the darkness inside him coiled.