AN: Well, here's the next chapter up, and I just realized I forgot a disclaimer on the first chapter:
DISCLAIMER: I do not own Star Wars and this fanfic is not sanctioned by LFL or Del Rey or WotC. I only enjoy writing and reading about Star Wars and was inspired to write a fanfic.
This fic is dedicated to JediJessie, Equinox, Rayni Shadowmusic, and ShelleyBelly! You guys rock!
Jacen sat in the rough cock-pit of a pod-racer, thinking how appropriately this vehicle was called, "two engines with a seat." He remembered how his Uncle Luke had been a teenager on Tatooine, and stupidly been walking around Mos Eisley late one summer night. A crazy old spacer had grabbed his arm as he walked past saying, "You're Anakin Skywalker's kid aren't you?" When Luke had nodded, the spacer had muttered, "The kid was the best pod-racer… Won the Boonta Eve… I bet on Sebulba… lost everything…" and moved on.
Now, as Jacen sat in a simple pod-racer, with starfighter engines roaring, holding on to his cockpit with only two energy cables, ready to catapult him down the race track, Jacen hoped that his grandfather's skills might have been passed down through the family. Jacen wished again that Jaina was here, knowing that she would breeze through something like this, loving every second of it. Jaina was an incredible pilot. Jacen was just mediocre.
He snapped out of his lamentations as he heard the sound to the Ryn announcer come over the long distance comspeaker, translating in Huttese, Rodian, Ithorian and countless other languages. He concentrated on the Basic.
"Guests of King Kanortine! Denizens of countless planets! Rabble of the Outer Rim! You are all here today to witness the skills of such superior pilots as can hardly be found elsewhere! We've resurrected one of the fastest, most demanding and deadliest sports in history, gladiators not included! But then, we'll have time for that later, won't we?"
Jacen groaned, as the screaming, shouting, and cheering of the crowd increased in volume at the joke. At least he knew another of the upcoming contests now.
Stow it Jacen, he reprimanded himself, Concentrate on what has to been done now.
He heard the announcer giving the names of all the contestants. His was the last called: "And lastly we have Jacen Solo, our first Jedi contestant in the history of the gauntlet."
Jacen tried to smile and gave what he hoped to be a cocky wave to the holorecorders. Having some crowd support couldn't hurt. He briefly wondered if Tenel Ka had been allowed to watch. She had been dragged out of Kanortine's throne room, fighting and screaming, as the King outlined the first race.
They're probably making her watch it, hoping she'll have to watch me die, thought Jacen bitterly.
Trying to banish such negative thoughts from his head, Jacen concentrated on the five second countdown timer. A good start would be essential in winning this race, a hellish course through the valleys of a mountain range, between trees with trunks twenty meters in diameter, and through icy crevasses only a meter in width. There was only one lap. Most of the contestants died, and left no one to finish if the race was two or three laps.
Jacen closed his eyes.
The computer automated voice was entirely too calm.
Five...
There is no emotion…
Four…
There is no passion…
Three…
There is no death…
Two…
There is only the Force.
One…
WHOOSH!!!
Releasing the brakes, Jacen shoved the double grip control-stick forward, propelling the craft forward down the track at nearly 625 kilometers on hour. He had Jedi reflexes, but he was only human, and no great pilot either, so as the racers hit the first stretch, six others were ahead of him.
There was suddenly a sharp left turn and Jacen hugged the inside rock-face, scraping it so closely he could have reached out and touched the dark black stone. Two other contestants were not so daring, and Jacen past them on the left side.
Expletives and insults were hurled at him as he pushed the controls forward just a little more, trying to get a lead on the next racer.
Faster, so much faster, the pod racer roared and the distance fell away behind him, and Jacen bit back the sudden feeling of panic as he nearly lost control.
The track suddenly twisted like some homicidal waterslide architect had designed it, right left, right, right, and left again, the world around him blurred completely, slipping into one mess of black rock and engine exhaust.
The twisting ended without warning and Jacen had to swerve hard to the right to avoid smashing into tiny flaming bits on a giant tree twenty meters in width. Holding back nausea, Jacen's head lolled to the side for a split-second, his eyes rolling upwards as he nearly lost consciousness from the press of gravity.
I can't black-out, I can't black-out, I must not black-out! He screamed to himself, willing himself to hold on to awareness, to life.
Just in time, he recovered, only to see another massive tree in front of him.
Left!!! Instinct screamed to him, and he wrenched the controls in that direction. The pod missed the tree by mere centimeters.
Focus Jacen, focus! He reprimand sternly, The Force, use the Force!
Somewhere in the back of his brain that wasn't screaming in fear and terror he knew that he had to get a grip. He knew that he had started out just fine, and he had lost his cool in one moment of adrenaline charged stupidity. He fought to reassert his calm and use the Force to anticipate the course and the changing terrain. He flew better almost immediately, ducking deftly between the next group of trees.
He heard the whine and the chug, chug, chug of the pod-racer he'd just recently passed behind him and he slowed his breathing, trying to concentrate on the next racer instead of the growing problem.
Out of nowhere, an overwhelming sense of love and calm filled him, coursing through him with the Force, flowing over him, warming him, soothing him. His breath caught in his chest at the sensation, hardly believing.
Tenel Ka, he thought serenely, relishing in her gift.
Filled with a new determination, Jacen willed the pod to move faster, pushing the starfighter engines to their limits, leaning his entire body forward in the seat as if it would push the vehicle farther forward. Closer, closer, and closer still, he closed on the next pod. As the racers broke the trees, Jacen passed the fourth racer.
Eight down, three to go.
The next parts of the race were tricky. There were tight, suffocating corridors of stone that he had to turn up on his side to squeeze through, combined with rocky valley paths that twisted and turned and convoluted, leaving him gasping for air in at every close call. But the memory of that deep, glowing peace remained with him and he delved deeper into the Force for strength and stamina.
Coming to a flat, open leg of the race, formed by some ancient glacier, Jacen got the chance to catch his breath and throttled the engine again, trying to catch up to the two leaders, who had pulled out some distance before him.
Up ahead, he saw the narrow entrance to a cave in the mountain side, and the two other racers had pulled in, just as he caught up to them.
When the two racers had entered, one had gone to the left, and the other to the right, leaving a space in the middle. It was into this space that Jacen roared, his determination driving him faster and harder than any being could stand against.
Jacen could see the light at the other opening of the cave, but it was blocked by two very large pillars, pillars that were right in his path.
Fighting the sense of doom that swooped down on him, Jacen glanced quickly to either side, but he was wedged in between Bilus Magoda of Sullust on the left and Naulbas the Dug with the quadruple engines on the left.
He was trapped.
There was no way he could move to either side and avoid the pillars unless one of the racers were elminated, or he could get his inferior podracer to outpace them. There was no chance of either, unless…
Jacen retreated into himself, drowning down through the layers of sub-consciousness, spiraling down to his innermost core, where the fiber, the stuff heroes were made up of, lay. Every ounce of will, every bit of power he held with his still inexperienced control of the Force, he channeled in his most crucial moment to the engines in front of him.
His heart nearly came up his throat as the pod gave a gigantic leap forward. Yanking the controls to the right, he cut in front of Naulbus and exited the cave just in time, zooming out into the light, in first place.
Bilus, who had been putting too much pressure on the side of Jacen's pod, slipped wildly to the right, smashing into the pillars that he had been trying to push Jacen into. His engines and then his pod erupted into a ferocious fiery explosion.
Naulbus's luck was not any better. Two of his engines hit the side of the cave as he jinked to avoid Jacen, causing a second explosion. Then, as his pod went spinning crazily towards the left, with only one side of the pod holding on by energy cables as he went careening into the pillars, causing a third explosion.
Tenel Ka watched in horror as the spectacle played out on the view screen in front of her. She saw Jacen and two other racers enter the cave. Her heart stopped and she nearly cried out in rage and anguish as she saw three explosions occur in the cave.
Jacen! Her mind screamed.
But there was nothing in the Force, no sign to indicate the death of a Jedi, the brilliance and the fire that was released when a Force-adept leaves this life.
Tenel Ka held her breath, her entire body completely still.
Then she slumped back in her chair in relief as she saw Jacen's pod-racer come roaring out of the smoke and fire.
The last bit of the race was long and open. At the moment, the finish line looked as good as anything he'd ever seen to Jacen. He didn't slow down at all until he had passed the barrier and he was sure he had won. He had won.
He had expected to feel incredible, or at least take some kind of joy in the fact that he had accomplished a feat that would have been hard for even his famous father to achieve. He felt none of this. The only concern in his mind was to get back to Kanortine, and therefore Tenel Ka, as soon as possible.
He said so to the pirates that had brought him to the race-track. They nodded and opened the speeder. Jacen jumped in.
On the way back to Ruswin, Jacen straightened his robes slightly and brushed some of the dust away from his face, where it was almost cemented on. One of the pirates threw him a water bottle and Jacen took a deep, long drink from it, glad for the coolness running down his throat. He poured the other half over his head, soaking his hair and washing the dirt from his face.
The pirates could barely keep up as Jacen marched forward into the palace and stormed up to the top floor, where he knew Kanortine would be.
Without waiting for an invitation, Jacen ripped the weapons from the door-guards with a gesture and flung the doors open with a hand movement.
"I've finished your little race Kanortine," Jacen said with an ice-like voice, "Now I want to see Tenel Ka."
Kanortine, who had been placidly looking out his window at the skyline, twirled elegantly around to face Jacen, a smile on his face. He motioned for the guards, who had retrieved their weapons and were standing angrily behind Jacen, to leave the room, and they did so, closing the doors.
"What makes you think, young Jedi," said Kanortine coyly, walking swiftly forward so his face was centimeters from Jacen's, "That I would allow you that privilege."
Jacen's eyes narrowed, "I want to make sure she's alive and unhurt, or else I won't race again."
"You'll race again whether you like it or not Jacen Solo," Kanortine mocked.
Without conscious thought, Jacen's hands had flown up and wrapped around the king's neck. Matched for size and height, Kanortine was not in a good position.
A cold, killer emotion ran through Jacen like ice-water. His eyes were frozen and his breath was low and furious, barely contained, "Let me see her now or I swear I'll kill you where you stand."
Kanortine's face remained impassive, though Jacen could feel a tremor of fear at the promised death in the Jedi's voice. Calmly, Kanortine replied, "Fine. No need to get angry. I'll have her brought up at once."
Jacen released his grip on the older man's neck, backing away from him and folding his arms across his chest in a menacing gesture. In a voice edged with steel, he said, "Make it quick."
As Kanortine left the room for a moment to inform the guards, Jacen heaved a sigh and sunk into one of the chairs in front of Kanortine's throne, tired from the race and the adrenaline leaving his blood vessels. He knew he had just lashed out in anger, and anger was of the dark side. He had never done that in other, similar situations. It showed him the depth of his caring for Tenel Ka, and it scared him.
Kanortine returned almost immediately with Tenel Ka walking angrily beside him. The doors opened and Kanortine said in a snide tone, "You have fifteen minutes," before closing the doors with a slam.
Jacen ran to Tenel Ka and she threw her arm around his neck as he wrapped his arms around her waist. Hugging her fiercely he brought his hand up to her head, smoothing the warrior braids, rocking slightly back and forth.
She lifted her face up to look into his eyes, and brought her hand around to touch his cheek, making sure that he was really alive and well.
"I thought you were going to die," she said softly, her eyes wide and relieved.
"Your confidence in me is astounding," Jacen grinned, not releasing his hold on her.
"Are you ever serious?" she said, her tone solemn and grave, not appreciating the joke.
Jacen's smile vanished, and he tilted his head forward, resting it on her shoulder. She had used to be taller than he, but he had grown a lot and she had stayed the same height, so their eyes were level with each other.
"I was serious a few minutes ago when I threatened Kanortine's life if he didn't let me see you," he whispered in her ear.
He felt her shiver, and he leaned back again, looking into her eyes.
"I was scared that I would never see you again," he said quietly, "I was scared I wouldn't live to do this…"
Then he brought his head forward and kissed her, forceful and hard, expressing all the relief he felt at being alive to do this, all his gratitude for her help during the race, and all the emotions that he kept hidden from others.
He expected her to be surprised, maybe even pull away from him and hide her feelings as she so often did, but Jacen realized that she was kissing him back, nearly as strongly as he was her.
"Jacen," she said breathlessly, pulling away, "What about survelliance? What if..?"
He stopped her protests by kissing her again, more slowly and less innocently than before.
She relaxed for a moment, losing herself, then she pulled away, whispering, "But if they realize that there's something going on, then they will use that against us."
Jacen knew she was right, yet his heart was telling him differently. Still clutching her, he murmured in her ear repeatedly, "I don't care, I don't care. You're all I care about."
Tenel Ka sighed and kissed his cheek, snaking her good arm around his neck.
"I know, but we must stop," she admitted reluctantly.
Jacen kissed her one more time, lingeringly, then stood back, and sat back on one of the couches, pulling her with him.
"I have five contests left. Two tomorrow, two the day after that, then the final one on the third day. My question is, can we afford to wait that long in getting to Dathomir?" Jacen asked solemnly.
Tenel Ka considered, and Jacen knew she was thinking about Augwynne's message, the demands on her time. Finally she answered, "I think we can manage to risk it. I just wish that Kanortine would let me race as well."
"I know you do," Jacen said with a slight smile, "But he won't allow it. He wants you as some sort of exotic prize until I can win the races."
Suddenly a dark thought passed through Jacen's head and he was instantly, lethally serious.
"They haven't made advances towards you have they? Assaulted you in any manner?" he pressed, his voice dangerous and deadly. His fists clenched till his knuckles turned white.
"No," answered Tenel Ka calmly, taking one of his hands gently in hers, trying to reassure him, "Don't worry Jacen. I know how to take care of myself. I can deal with Kanortine and his pirates."
Jacen nodded, because to protest would be insulting to her, and looked at his chrono.
"Sithspawn, only two minutes left," he cursed, "Was there anything else?"
A mischievous glint appeared in Tenel Ka's eyes, and she smirked.
"Yes," she murmured, leaning forward, "Quick, kiss me again."
Smiling, Jacen complied.