Angela forced the tears away, wiping them with her forearm. The tears had flowed for over an hour, but now was the time for resolve. Her Master…Ran…gave his life for something they did not yet understand. She would not let it end like this—she would see this mystery through. She took up Ran's clothes and threw them into a backpack. It was her duty as his apprentice to give him a funeral pyre later.
She deactivated the force fields and let the mercenaries into the chamber where the warrior had died. One look at the carnage and her tear-streaked face told the story plainly enough. It was well that this was so, for she lacked the strength of will to relive those horrifying last moments again.
Kanig said in low tones, "Ran was a strong person. I…I know I didn't know him long, but I think he was someone I could have grown to admire. Um. I'm sorry."
Ooroosh laid a hand on her shoulder. "You're the leader now," he said simply, reminding her of her duty. Duty was all she had left—without Ran she had no guiding force except her responsibilities.
"My love," she prayed quietly, "give me your strength." She turned to her mercenaries, looking them in the eye. "That warrior over there was a guardian. And a guardian has to guard something. Fan out and look for it."
They searched in silence. Then Kanig called out, "There's a control panel on this floor plating. It must be how these rings started floating." Sure enough, as the Zabrak fiddled with the plate, the rings returned to the main floor. A little more fiddling opened a section of the wall, leading into a glowing room beyond.
The team moved in, weapons at the ready. They entered a small cubical recess made of plated gold, with a pedestal made of three circular blocks in the center. Each block had a single oddly-shaped slot. "Some kind of keyhole," Ooroosh reasoned.
"The keyholes are out of alignment with this marking on the top," Kanig added. "I can't read it, but it looks like a black dot with four diamonds around it."
"My ancient languages is rusty," Angela said dryly. A thought struck her. Kanig had spoken, as had Ooroosh…. "Where are the Al'was?" She turned and saw that they were in the outside chamber, with one speaking into a comlink while the other was slapping something onto the edge of the door. Angela recognized it at once as a plastic explosive.
"Watch out!" she cried in warning, reaching out with the Force. The explosive ripped out of its placement and struck one of the Al'wa brothers, detonating loudly and violently. When the smoke cleared, only one of the Al'was remained. Angela was looming over him in a heartbeat.
She grabbed the comlink out of the terrified Bothan's hand, cycling through its recent conversations. "All right, time to play question and answer. And after the day I've had, you don't want to toy with me, understand?" The glare she leveled on the Al'wa was so hard it may well have been a sledgehammer.
The Bothan revealed all. "Who do you work for?" Angela demanded.
"Admiral Adguard," he replied. That caught her by surprise, but it only allowed anger and resentment to rise like bile in her throat. She lost her Master for a set up.
"What's Adguard's plan?" She put in such vitriol into the question that it slammed the Bothan into subservience. Any resistance to interrogation would crumble like burned paper before her.
"He wants the Fall of Empire, just like Admiral LeFrein."
"And what is the Fall of Empire?"
"I don't know. I don't think the Admirals know either. But LeFrein found out about it from a treasure hunter three years ago and tried to find it without anyone noticing. That's why he kept up martial law, so that no one would see him. But Adguard saw and got curious—he wanted whatever LeFrein was looking for, because he's certain that he can use it to secure his ascendancy."
So her Master had died for a political game. Hot tears welled in her eyes. His death seemed so meaningless, just another victim in a politician's bid for power.
"I take it that Adguard was the one who sent the sniper and the assassins," Angela reasoned. The Bothan nodded. That made sense—the Jedi came of their own accord, to settle a possible secession from a fledgling galactic government. Destroying the Jedi meant that eliminating any interference. But Adguard made a mistake.
He made Angela angry.
"The comlink," she growled, rage seething through her words, "I suppose you tried to contact Adguard and tell him that you've killed us and that the Fall of Empire is waiting for him. So when's his men going to get here?"
"About an hour," the Bothan whispered, balking from her growing emotions.
That was not a lot of time; it took almost two hours to get back to the surface. It would be a fight to escape. "Kanig, Ooroosh, tie this scumbag up and get ready to run. We're going to have company soon." She thought fast. Adguard's troops would probably try disabling the Nebula Dancer and the other mercenary ships with some manner of electronic lock. If they were smart, there would be a tracking device as well, in the event that the lock was defeated. She could slice a lock easily enough—but finding a small tracking device would be difficult, especially considering the time constraints involved.
She, Kanig, and Ooroosh ran through the underground complex at full speed as she explained their predicament. They were surprised that their mission was all a set up, that they were pawns in a planetary game of chess and politics. "So now we're fleeing for our lives," Ooroosh summarized, "and we might not even have a ship to flee in. Sounds like my trip to Felltara Nine."
"How'd you get out of that?" Kanig asked.
"We stole one of our enemy's ship, of course."
"I'm afraid that won't be an option," Angela said stiffly. The Nebula Dancer was Ran's pride and joy, the home he had never had. In turn, it was Angela's home as well and all of the good memories in her life were embedded in its metal walls. She would burn in hell before she left it behind, logistics and common sense be damned.
They were halfway through the tunnel system when they encountered the first patrol of Rakarisian soldiers. Laser fire spat out from the other end of the hall; Angela drew Ran's lightsaber and sent the blasts flying right back. Ooroosh was laying covering fire with his rifle while Kanig held back, one hand on his force pike and another hand taking aim with a small pistol. The patrol was small and easily defeated; the party pressed forth—right into the arms of a second patrol.
And so it went: A bloody rampage through the complex. Angela sincerely wondered if they were going to run into a trap on the way out. The patrols were merely inconveniences against her—and since Adguard was the one sending them, he knew that she was a Jedi. But she did not voice her fears to her comrades. If they were indeed running into a trap, she was resolved to get them all out of it.
They cut down the last patrol barring them from the exit. Sunlight poured through the cave entrance, but Angela's brows frowned as she saw the silhouettes—a score of them—standing out front. Each of them had blasters. Kanig cursed and Ooroosh sighed. Angela growled.
Admiral Adguard, resplendent in his uniform, strode past his minions. "I noticed that you intercepted my Bothan spies," he said simply. "Really, you're resourcefulness is astounding. It would be better if you just surrendered. Indeed, it would have been better if you simply hadn't gotten involved."
Angela remained silent.
"Where is your Master, Tonno-Skeve?"
"Dead," she said coldly. Because of your tricks, she thought nastily.
The Admiral sighed and shook his head. "I'm sorry. He was a great man, your Master. Admiral Arclite thought highly of him as a soldier. Many who fought in the war did." He sounded so sincere. Angela's hatred of the man wavered. Was he such an evil man? Was Ran's death truly just a sad misadventure?
"Miss Marshair," the Admiral said, "surrender. Leave the Fall of Empire to me. Those assassins I sent were to scare you off, to get the Jedi out of the way. I never meant for anyone to get killed."
At those words, her uncertainty vanished. She leveled a hard gaze at him, like a vibrodagger. "You're a man who sent men to their deaths, Admiral. You know very well that common killers would never be able to beat two trained Jedi. There's an element in this play that you're not telling me, but I'm sure of one thing—I wouldn't trust you as far as I can throw you." She raised her lightsaber defiantly.
"You don't have to join me," she whispered over her shoulder to the two mercenaries. "If you surrender, he won't harm you, I'm sure of it."
The Aqualish gurgling laughingly. "One more adventure it is, then. It has been a while since I got involved in a mystery."
Kanig quietly gripped his force pike. "I don't understand what's going on, but it looks like you're in the right. As trite as it may be, I'm sticking by the right."
Admiral Adguard shook his head. "You've all made a very poor decision." His hand slashed through the air, and a score of blaster bolts scorched the sky.
But none of them landed.
The bolts turned in midair and cut into the Admiral's ranks. Soldiers fell, their flesh burning and smoking. "What's going on?" Adguard cried, looking around at the carnage. Angela herself was shocked—the Force surged through her as it never had before, filling her with the power to bend the universe to her every whim.
The Admiral was regrouping his minions and ordered a second assault. But again the red blaster bolts turned aside, hitting rock and dust with a wave of the girl's hand.
"Run for the ships!" she shouted at her comrades. She stretched out her hands, fingers spread wide, and then parted them. The Admiral's troops flew through the air, parted by the strength of her mind. They were like rag dolls in her hands, toys that were hers to with do with as she pleased. She reveled in her power—she would avenge Ran by crushing every one of these insignificant creatures!
But then she felt Ooroosh's hand on her shoulder. "Snap out of it!" he told her sharply, cutting through the euphoria of energy dancing within her. "We've got to go, now!" Angela nodded numbly, seeing clearly—for the first time, it seemed—the carnage she had wrought. Men lay still around her, others moaned and nursed broken limbs and bleeding wounds. She had done that with a wave of her hand. When a shudder ripped through her, she did not try to hide it.
It took only moments for Angela to disable the electronic locks on the Dancer. She would have liked to hunt down any tracking devices that the Admiral had put on board, but time was of the essence. She throttled the temperamental ship into orbit, all the while calculating the jump to lightspeed. Kanig and Ooroosh both sat in passenger seats on either side of her.
When the Dancer was safely surrounded in the blue-white light of hyperspace, Angela breathed a sigh of relief. Exhaustion seeped into her bones. It only reminded her of just how much she had lost that day. She wanted to cry again.
"Sadness is a human emotion," Ooroosh said. "Jedi are taught to be above humanity. It is good that you remember that you are human."
"What the hell do you know about it?" she snapped.
"Because I've been there," the Aqualish replied easily. "You cry for a loved one. You cry for your friend. I have too. This is good."
"How is this possibly good?" Angela screamed at him. "I just lost the man I love!"
"You cry because you remember him. It means he was worth knowing."
The simple words drove her to silence. After a long moment, she apologized. "Ooroosh, I'm sorry. I lost my head there."
The Aqualish merely nodded his bulbous head. "It is understandable. Cry, Angela Marshair. It means that he was worth knowing."
She sighed and rubbed her head and then stood stiffly. "I'm in no mood to talk about this, Ooroosh. Kanig, take the controls. I'm getting a shower."
The hot spray of water loosened her muscles, washed away the burdens of the last few hours. Ran lay dead, the mission was a disaster, and Adguard was probably in pursuit. Things had gone from bad to worse and the seriousness of it all made her shoulders leaden and heavy. She just wanted to curl up in her bunk with Ran lying next to her.
But there was still a mystery to unravel: the Fall of Empire. Men had died for it, men are fighting for it—but none knew exactly what it was. Angela was certain that the pedestal she found was the final piece of the puzzle. But those keyholes in it suggested that she had a long search ahead of her before she could use that last piece.
She finished her shower, toweled off, and wrapped her homespun robes around her. While tying the strings of her robe, she saw Ran's clothes wrapped in a bundle at the bottom of her bag where she had left them. Tears threatened to pour down her face once again. "Sorry, Ran," she murmured, forcing her sobs away. "You won't be getting a funeral pyre until I'm done." She raised his blue tunic to her lips and kissed it gently. "I promise that I'll finish this—whatever it is."
Kanig and Ooroosh were waiting for her in the cockpit. "Um, Angela," the Zabrak said carefully, seemingly cautious of her fragile emotional state, "I was wondering if you had a destination in mind."
She sighed again. "Sorry if I seem out of it, Kanig. Don't tiptoe around me; I'll be…I'll be all right. I just needed to think some things through."
He nodded. "I'm sorry about Ran, Angela. It was obvious that you were real close."
"More than you can ever know." She slumped into the co-pilot's chair and let the Zabrak handle the flying. "Anyway, we have work to do. Remember the pedestal we found? It had three keyholes in it. I'm pretty sure that that pedestal is this Fall of Empire thing everyone's looking for. Logically, those keyholes need keys to fill them."
She turned on the ship's computer and began a search through all the databases she could access. "There was that strange marking on the top of the pedestal. Let's see what a linguistics check can tell us. Hmm. It's a derivative of ancient Kinachi, a Core World dialect that died out before the Great Hyperspace War."
"What does it mean, though?" Kanig asked.
Angela read the readout. "Roughly translated, it means 'Sword of Light.' Sounds like a superweapon of some sort, but that doesn't help us find those keys."
"Perhaps not by itself," Ooroosh agreed, "but try searching for worlds that used that dialect." Angela typed in new parameters and waited for a new readout to appear.
"Well, that narrowed it down considerably," she whistled. "Nice thinking, Ooroosh. It was used on three worlds—Bespin, Corellia, and Hoth. A gas planet, an urban jungle, and an ice world. You could hide anything on worlds like those."
"This will take a while," Ooroosh noted. "I hope you're paying a thousand credits for this," he joked.
Angela closed down the computer and settled into her chair. "You'll get your money and more," she mumbled, sleep beginning to caress her weary body and wearier heart. "This isn't over yet."
End Book One