Jedi of Gondor - Here's one just for you. :)

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14. In Which Our Protagonists Flee Coruscant

(the alternate title to this chapter was "Run Away!" but…)

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" -- watch yourselves," Cin cautioned from the doorway. "Close-quarters combat isn't a game -- "

Joclad paid the swordsman no heed, driving steadily at his opponent with a series of cutting moves. He felt strange dueling with just one 'saber; years of perfecting Jar'Kai left him fighting a bit awkwardly with only a single hilt. He had to consciously keep both hands around it, and his companion seemed to realize that.

The fact that she was attacking him so mildly was nothing less than irritating. "C'mon, Billaba, show us that Vapaad."

"Don't goad your opponent; it's unseemly," Cin said.

"Oh, please," Joclad puffed, "you goad your opponents all the time! Depa, you used to be good, what happened?"

She jabbed sharply at his head. "I'm warning you, Master Danva..."

He caught the edge of her 'saber with his, and blue slid down green as he smiled challengingly at her. "You were saying?"

Green light reflected in the darkness of her eyes, and her lips quirked up into a grin. Her lips moved quickly, and Joclad had to lean closer to make out her words.

"What's that?"

Depa clamped her hand around his wrist, and the Force snapped a warning. "I was saying you're a fool."

He cursed himself for being just that as he went flying into a wall. He lay sprawled on the floor for several seconds afterward, waiting for the room to stop pinwheeling colorfully around him. "Cheater," he said.

Depa appeared overhead, and the warmth of her smile belied the mischievous glint in her eyes. "Jedi," she corrected.

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"Time to go!" Arden Lyn whacked Joclad Danva atop the head with a deathstick to punctuate her words and the man leaped several feet into the air before landing directly in front of her, lightsaber at the ready. He looked down at the nozzle in apparent confusion when it failed to activate, and sudden pain drifted across his features. Arden picked up slightly on his emotions: deep regret mixed in with sadness. His master's lightsaber, she decided, broken in battle. The dutiful padawanhad taken it up.

At the moment, the dutiful padawan tossed it aside and glared at her. "You shouldn't have done that. If it had worked-- "

"You think I don't know how to dodge a plasma beam? Please, Danva. I remember when those things were invented." She turned away as he muttered something unflattering and resumed her speedy pilfering of Sleazebaggano's belongings. "Get whatever you need to travel. We're leaving."

"Leaving?" She sensed him looking around the room and trying to collect his thoughts. "Where are we going?"

"Offworld." She picked up an unidentifiable lump of foodstuffs and chucked it into a bag. "You kept saying come get it. Good dreams?"

There was a pause before he answered. "Just memories."

He wasn't telling the whole story, but then, she didn't expect him to. Jedi sometimes needed a little prodding. Arden poked what looked like a furry toy before realizing it was, in fact, something that had once been alive. Doesn't Sleazebaggano ever clean? "Who's the girl?"

He didn't make a sound, but she suspected his back went rigid at the question. "What girl?"

Arden turned around. "The girl. Black hair, pretty. Got the better of you."

"She cheated," he said, before blinking. "How did you -- "

" No, I didn't go into your head, so stop glaring at me. You were broadcasting." She held up a box and shook it, and something inside screeched. She put the box aside. "You can cut yourself off from the Force, but you still need to put up shields. Anyway. Your dreams. Anything we can use?"

The expression on his face was one of imminent displeasure and confusion, but he still seemed able to figure out what she was driving at. "No…my foresight is…terrible, actually…why are we leaving?"

Arden poked through the shelves and decided that Sleazebaggano owned a disturbing amount of medical equipment. "It seems Meridian forgot to shut off his military transponder, and someone connected the ship to Rhen Var."

Danva snorted. "Sounds like him."

She pursed her lips, trying to gauge whether this sudden disloyalty to his friend sprang from the deathstick withdrawal or merely a bad mood. "Real bright young lad, isn't he? Devona is currently distracting a Republic official with her splendid acting skills so we can get aboard and get out."

"That's nice." He sounded a little dazed. "But where are we going?"

Arden swept a few cans of food into a bag. "Somewhere moderately friendlier than Coruscant."

"That shouldn't be too hard," Meridian said as he passed through. He dropped a selection of movie discs into the bag with the cans, returning her frank stare. "What? I've been on that ship. I can't watch any more of those awful trashy romances she loves. Did the dock owner perked up long enough to realize my ship didn't belong there?"

Hmm. So Meridian reacted to unfortunate situations by pretending nothing had happened. Arden supposed it was as reasonable a short-term tactic as any. "Actually, you forgot to turn off your transponder."

Meridian stopped in mid-stride, and a rush of color tinted his face. "I…? Oops."

"Good one," Danva said.

Meridian's jaw tightened. "I'd like to see -- "

"Don't bother. You weren't there."

Arden kept quiet, amused by the exchange. There is no emotion, there is peace…unless you make them angry. She went back to her packing as Meridian shuffled his feet. How did a drug dealer get ahold of a blaster rifle? A check of the barrel revealed why: The thing was wrecked. She tossed it aside.

Somewhere in the background, Danva started moving around slowly. "You're that teräs käsi master, aren't you?" he asked, and Arden rolled her eyes at the wall. Damned Jedi. Always asking questions.

She packed in any portable technology she could find. Running around with two outlaws required as much forward preparation as possible -- maybe Sleazebaggano's broken Alderaanian strength-infuser would come in handy. "Teräs Käsi. Not teräs käsi."

"But that's what I -- "

"No. Capitalize the words."

Danva's overall bewilderment with the situation presented itself in his voice. "You're a master of teräs käsi."

She sighed deeply. "I can hear you not capitalizing it. Teräs Käsi, an ancient Order rivaling your own. Then there's teräs käsi, a severely curtailed version of it popular on the Bloodsports Network. I understand you're quite a master of the latter, Joclad. Congratulations." Arden picked up several empty food tins, sniffed them, and tossed them aside. "Yes, I am 'that Teräs Käsi master,' and have been for longer than your family line has existed. Unfortunately, we've no time to tarry in the past right now, so please get a move on and pack your bags."

His reaction to that comment was not what she expected. The Jedi she'd argued with in the temple had shown signs of a willful personality, and had given the impression that doing things his way was what he did best. Now, when she looked over her shoulder at him, she saw only a lost-looking young man. After-effects of deathsticks, she thought. I hope. Otherwise, he's in trouble.

"I don't have anything to take," he said quietly. "It's all at the temple."

Meridian's signature dulled. Arden continued inspecting the various paraphernalia that comprised Sleazebaggano's belongings. She did not have time to play counselor to either of them, and the fact that she seemed to want to irked her. "Then you get a fresh start."

He didn't answer her, but the thought was clear enough on his mind: I don't want a fresh start. It was backed up by... what? Anger? Not quite -- but close enough to it. She did not look too closely; even disassociated from the Force, Danva would feel her poking around. "You must not think on what you have lost," she said, locating a box of medical supplies and tossing it in without a second thought. "There is work yet to be done."

When it was time to leave, she made the Jedi disguise themselves. Meridian accepted the idea readily enough, immediately donning the persona of a down-on-his-luck merchant. Danva, however, required near-threats to reconnect to the Force, and once he finally did, all hope of conversation flattened out. He hurried along a step behind her, lips pressed into a thin line and teeth grinding together. She suspected some of it was due to the deathsticks.

Armed speeders screamed by overhead, and every now and then a group of clones marched past on patrol. Arden had been planetside long enough to realize that such things were routine, but with two fugitives from the Empire in her wake, the basic security of Coruscant took on an ominous tilt. If either of the Jedi dropped their disguise while in the vicinity of a clone, it would all be over.

For them, anyway.

She had no worries that Meridian would keep it up. Danva, on the other hand...

The walk to the docks was punctuated by frequent stops in dark alleyways to let troops and security officers pass by. Arden smiled to herself as the Jedi kept reaching for cloaks they ought not wear in this situation; she'd outfitted them both with their little drug lord's roughspun overcoats. To Sleazebaggano's credit, they'd at least been tailored to his smaller specifications, necessitating that the larger Jedi make some alterations with their lightsabers. Meridian managed to work it into his persona, but Danva -- after cutting off the arms and tossing it on over his tunic -- simply looked ridiculous. With his hair pulled back into a tangled queue and his half-staggering, half-swaggering gait, he more resembled a bottom-dwelling glitterstim addict than the merchant he was supposed to be.

Arden opted not to share that with him. It was much more fun watching him stalk around like he owned the planet.

"I always thought big cities allowed anonymity," Meridian complained after being shoved behind a pile of cargo boxes. He brushed some unidentifiable goop off the filthy arms of his jacket. "Nobody knows you, so nobody can turn you in."

"You'd think," Arden said. "But I think it's actually the more people there are, the more to turn you in.' Most people are not particularly good at blending into the shadows..." She pressed herself against the wall as an off-duty speeder patrolman ambled by. "To vanish entirely takes skill."

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It didn't take Joclad more than a few hours to decide he didn't much care for Arden Lyn, Master of Teräs Käsi. She was flamboyant, obnoxious, and irritated the delicate hold he maintained on his calming center.

Worst of all, she was right about leaving. Wherever this Wanderer and Devona Swyfte planned on taking them, it needed to be as far away from the civilized seat of the galaxy as possible.

If I changed my hair, he wondered, if I didn't carry the 'saber -- would the people even see me for what I am? Citizens knew a Jedi by his lightsaber. If Joclad simply wore a disguise at all times…. But I don't even like Coruscant, anyway! Why am I complaining?

He tried to pull the shredded-up jacket more snugly about himself, but only succeeded in tightening the fabric around the tender wounds on his chest. Elan had never looked this small up close.

The Wanderer turned out to be a Corellian-class racer, and she looked to be in good order -- aside from the Republic Gunships currently surrounding the landing pad. V-class. Fast, a little armor, not much in terms of shielding units…. Gods, Devona Swyfte went around the galaxy in something that weak? Joclad squinted at the sleek little speedster, with its aerodynamic hull and lack of gun emplacements, and then looked at Arden. "Nice. We'll get blown out of the sky in five seconds."

"It's fast," she said.

"They have guns. Big ones," he emphasized, drawing his arms out to approximate their size. "And unless Swyfte has some serious modifications -- and on that kind of ship, I don't know what you could fit -- "

"Leave the guns to me." She paused, and then held out a hand. "Give me one of your lightsabers. A working one."

The fact that she seemed to expect him to hand one over was almost amusing. He didn't bother responding; just fixed her with his best impassive look. Lady, you are out of your mind.

Dack coughed politely. "Joclad?"

"Stay out of it," Joclad said.

Dack looked skyward and sighed. "Let her have the lightsaber."

"No."

"It's a good idea."

Joclad gave him a warning look. "You got us into this -- give her yours."

"You have two," Arden said. "Three, if you count the dead one. Now fork it over."

"No."

"I'm going to take out the guns so we can escape," she said meaningfully. "I need the lightsaber to keep it quiet."

"Give her the damned lightsaber," Dack said. "Unless you'd prefer she use her power and set them all off. Which she might."

"Now, if you want fireworks," Arden said, "I can happily oblige you…."

Joclad leveled a glare on both of them but yanked one of the hilts off his belt. He shoved it at Arden, who cheerfully slipped it up her sleeve and then tossed Dack a comlink. "Let Dev know you're on the way. When she says it's safe to go aboard, go for it."

She vanished.

Joclad spotted her landing lightly atop one of the gunships, blue plasma extending from her hand. She moved briskly, seemingly jabbing random weapon emplacements and probably doing great damage. Beside him, Dack had already picked up Swyfte over the comlink. "It's me. Is it safe?"

"The hatch is open, but we've got a Rodian locked in the hold." Swyfte's voice crackled slightly. "Elan is currently pretending to try to wrench the door open."

"We're on the loading walkway," Dack said. "Why is there a Rodian in your hold?"

"Erm…I panicked." There was a pause accompanied by muffled footsteps. A tiny figure leaned out of Wanderer's hatch and stared up at them. "I see you...what is Joclad wearing?"

"He claims it's an effective disguise -- "

"It's not. He sticks out like a shaven Wookiee."

Joclad cringed. "You've got her using that line now?"

"What can I say? It's a winner. Which leads me back to my initial question: Why do you have a Rodian in your hold?"

"He was asking too many questions about you," she said flatly. "Seems you're getting real popular around these parts, Merry."

Dack muttered a curse, and then nodded. "All right, Dev, we're coming in. Keep an eye out." He stuck the comlink on his belt and glanced at Joclad. "If we come from that corridor underneath us, we should be able to sneak -- "

"Sneak?" He scoffed. "I don't sneak."

With that, he hopped off the walkway and used the Force to cushion his landing five stories below. He pulled Elan's ratty overcoat closed over his clothing and did his best to stroll confidently toward the Wanderer, though he still had to grit his teeth in response to aching muscles. Still, for all intents and purposes, he projected the purpose of a man ready to debark on an ordinary mission. The clones barely gave him a second look.

Leaving Coruscant under duress was not something he was particularly acquainted with, but he'd made a few daring escapes in his day. This should be easy.

"Sir, that ship is under quarantine until our supervisor clears it."

Joclad stared at the human boy in his Republic uniform, and thought of how many ways he could break him. A blow to the head, a shattered arm...nearly anything would do. "I'm harmless," he said, moving his finger ever so slightly. It didn't even look like a gesture, but it took most of Joclad's concentration to drive the suggestion home.

"Standing orders, sir."

All right, clearly I need to brush up on my mind-tricking. The kid saw a poorly dressed trader skulking around. No wonder his tone was so flippant.

Joclad sighed and tried to go about things the diplomatic way for the sake of Dack and his blasted knee. "I'm just going to go aboard and see my friend," he said smoothly, nodding toward Swyfte in the hatchway. The boy turned around, and Swyfte obediently waved. "See? She knows me."

The boy – no more than eighteen, he supposed – turned back. I was eighteen once, and young. "Sorry, sir. With the Jedi escapees we've taken out, we can't risk it."

"Oh." Joclad nodded, and decided not to leave too much of a mess on the landing pad. Whoever ended up cleaning the place didn't need the added hassle of body parts strewn everywhere. "Of course."

He flattened the would-be officer with an old-fashioned right hook, and felt a spike of pleasure at the way the kid dropped. He stepped over the body, blissfully ignoring the shouts from the nearest gunship. Jedi escapees, he thought as men clattered to attention and rifles came to bear. He closed his right hand around a hilt, unwilling to risk Elan's delicate repair work on his left just yet. Jedi escapees, that's the best you can do...

Swyfte shouted an unnecessary warning before diving behind the bulkhead. Joclad already had his lightsaber in hand when the firing started, and he spun around, sending the bolts flying wildly in all directions.

The Force rippled, and Dack yelped as he landed heavily on the walkway behind him. Joclad whirled around in time to see Dack punch through two clones, face contorted by pain. "Great, Danva! Next time, tell me when you -- " He didn't get to finish his complaint as he nearly fell back under increased firepower, every clone in the regiment having noticed him.

That meant that they turned their attention away from Joclad Danva.

Their mistake. As his blade flashed through the gleaming white armor of a distracted clone, he realized he had no qualms about stabbing them in the back.

The sense of liberation that very feeling gave him was almost frightening in its ferocity.

Joclad sensed, rather than heard, the alarm go out from one of the ships -- Jedi! Jedi! -- and redoubled his efforts, moving in and out of the clones with Force-assisted speed, picking them off as Dack did his best to deflect the bolts.

They move in rather ordinary patterns, he decided as armored limbs scattered. He moved between them, his steps carrying him from one clone to the next with deadly precision. Or maybe I've just been around them for too long...

Soon enough, nothing moved on the landing pad. Joclad toed a severed arm, and then kicked it across the landing pad.

He felt…good.

Dack mentally tugged him in the direction of the Wanderer, and Joclad bounded up the gangway enthusiastically. The workout had chased out the last of the deathsticks, and the result was a most refreshing sensation. He grinned at Swyfte as she emerged from a corridor, awkwardly brandishing a holdout pistol. "Hello, m'lady. Good to see you again!"

She stared at him for a fraction of a second, and then edged away. "Where's Arden?"

"Practicing sabotage," Dack said, grasping Swyfte's upper arm and maneuvering her toward the bridge. "Thanks for the cover fire, Devi. Meant a lot to me."

"I'm sorry; I'm not in the habit of blasting the law enforcement on every planet I come to. You're lucky I found this old thing -- " She paused and tossed the blaster into a corner. Joclad wondered if she knew how to shoot the thing at all -- and if the gun even worked.

Dack leaned forward, whispering something into Swyfte's ear. She blinked, and looked at the hatchway. "Really?"

"Do it."

She shrugged and worked up a screech. "Help! I'm being kidnapped by crazed Jedi!"

"Louder," Dack said. "Pretend it's him." He pointed at Joclad.

"This is stupid," Swyfte said.

Joclad wondered if he ought to be offended by that. "Am I not sufficiently terrifying?"

Dack lowered his voice as he took Swyfte by her upper arms. "They'll kill anyone involved with us. It's for your own good."

Joclad opted to help, and bared his teeth at the pilot while twirling his 'saber menacingly. "We're coming to kill you, Swyftie."

"Help! Crazed Jedi! Shoot them!" Swyfte went up to a higher octave. "Before they -- before they -- do Force-ful-ish things!"

Dack turned around to stare at Joclad, then bent to rub at his knee. "Joclad, once Arden gets aboard, shut things up -- and stop grinning like that, it's creepy. Are we ready to go?"

Swyfte nodded. "Ready as we can be, but I don't know if that converter Elan dug up is going to work." Their voices faded as they reached the bridge -- hmm, Dack's limping again -- and Joclad extinguished his lightsaber.

He checked the outside cameras. No one had sounded the alarm on Arden Lyn yet; likely she was cloaking herself somehow. He'd have to learn that trick.

Maybe she killed the pilots…she seems the type.

"Buzzy, the more you scream at me, the sadder I get...no, I am very sensitive, yes, I'm on lots of medication..."

Elan! Joclad decided a little visit with the man wouldn't be out of order, and found him standing outside the cargo hatch. The dealer gave him a sour look as he banged on the hatch with a hammer, leaving a faint dent. "Sorry, buzzy, I'm trying, but this old ship, she's not what she used to be."

Joclad focused his attention on the cargo hold's occupant: Rodian, upper-aged, and irate. Arden Lyn had said something about trapping a Republic official in there, hadn't she? He grinned, leaning against the bulkhead and tapping gently on the hatch. "You called for a repairman?"

"Get me out!" the Rodian howled from the other side. "Or I'll have the ship impounded!"

Joclad pulled a hilt off his belt and rested the emitter against the faded blue paint of the hatch itself. A lightly built ship like the Wanderer wouldn't have thick walls; his blade would chew through the durasteel and the Rodian easily. "No need for threats, Officer."

The thrum of finely tuned racing engines built up under their feet, and Elan's eyes widened. "Hey -- we're not lifting off?"

"Nah," Joclad said. Elan looked like he believed him in the two seconds before the thrum evolved into a roar.

"Why are the engines starting?" the Rodian bellowed.

"We're trying to hotwire the system by jumpstarting it," Joclad called. "No worries." He grabbed Elan as the Balosar tried to sprint away. "And where do you think you're going?"

"Gettin' off this ship, buzzy!" The deck tilted slightly, and the muted hum of the repulsors increased.

"No one is going anywhere," the Rodian yelled through the door, "until I am released!"

Joclad toyed with the idea of releasing him right into a lightsaber but squashed the thought before it could make him smile. Setting Elan aside, he migrated back to the hatchway, where he watched Arden Lyn nearly slice through the front end of a gunship using a technique he could not quite identify.

This time, her cut was not quite so precise, and red-gold sprouted upward in a narrow jet of flame. Lyn leaped off the gunship before the fire could overtake her and landed in the Wanderer's main entry without even looking winded. She disengaged the blade, tossed it back at Joclad, and ceremoniously wiped her hands off on her jacket. "Gunships are taken care of," she said, thumbing the door controls and shutting the hatch. "Swyfte, get us out of here!"

"With pleasure," Swyfte called from the bridge. The Wanderer shivered slightly as she lifted off her landing skids, powerful racing engines engaging to shoot her out of the atmosphere. Joclad caught Elan as he made a break for the door, hanging onto the squirming Balosar one-handed. "No, no, the party's just getting started!"

"I can't stay here! I have a business! A life! Rent-controlled apartment!" Elan clawed for the hatch, though hope of escape dimmed as Wanderer hurtled away from the city. "Fracking Jedi, just because your life's done doesn't mean mine has to be!"

Joclad flung him into the bulkhead, and Elan yelped as his head slammed back into durasteel. "On the contrary," he growled, "it is now."

A thud and a sickening lurch to port was followed by a shriek from the bridge. Joclad and Elan locked eyes briefly before the Jedi released him and ran down the narrow, cluttered corridor that connected the living quarters to the actual controls.

Swyfte and Dack wrestled at the helm, the former grappling with the actual vessel as the latter apparently tried to help. "Over there, bearing -- three-two-six-zero!"

"Stop saying numbers!" Swyfte swatted him aside with one hand and handled the controls with the other. "I don't operate that way!"

"Sorry!" Something struck the ship, and an alarm went off near the back of the bridge. Swyfte made unhappy noises and flipped a series of switches that hopefully connected to the shield generator. Dack grabbed at the controls again. "I'm just trying to help -- "

This time, she slapped his hand. "Well, don't!"

"What's happening?" Joclad asked, though he read Swyfte's signature easily enough: Something was coming.

"Attack cruisers. Two of them." She managed to keep her voice relatively calm in spite of the situation, which suggested either a stout heart or severe delusions of grandeur. Daytime morphed into twilight as stars materialized, and the Wanderer jolted most unbecomingly from a now-familiar turbolaser strike.

Hah. Joclad leaned a hand against the bulkhead. I just did this yesterday!

Swyfte made a displeased sound. "Annnnnnd a gunship's following us! Motherk -- "

"Arden forgot to disable their communications," Joclad guessed. The deck under his boots swayed and rumbled somewhat ominously as Swyfte ran what she clearly thought were evasive maneuvers.

In truth, all she was really accomplishing was knocking around anyone not strapped in. In that regard, she flew rather like Dack.

"Arden didn't forget to do anything," the woman snapped from behind him. "They had backup generators, clearly."

"I could have told you that," he said as the ship pitched backward.

The look on Arden's face when he glanced at her suggested she dearly wanted to smack him. "Then why didn't you?"

Swyfte shoved Dack off her and pushed the throttle forward. Wanderer spiraled up, up, up, enough for the gravity to waver slightly. Joclad forced his stomach to go back down where it belonged and then lost his balance as the ship snapped sharply to starboard. New pain blossomed across his back as he slammed against the back bulkhead, and something vaguely pointy jabbed at his neck. "Reverse the stabilizers!" he called, pleased to see Arden trying to untangle herself from a similar predicament. The scream of the engines grew louder, overpowering his eardrums. If someone didn't do something soon, they'd just blow. Damned overpowered Corellian ships. "Swyfte, reverse the kriffin' stabilizers!"

"Shut up and let me fly!" But her left hand released the controls long enough to adjust something, and the roar of the engine dimmed somewhat. Good. Good. Don't kill us before we can get away.

"Something big coming up on the sensors," Dack said, his eyes glued to the readout. "Really big. I recommend we run away."

"Noted," Swyfte said. "Believe me, we're trying."

Must… strap… in…. Joclad pried himself away from the bulkhead and fumbled for one of the chairs. Wanderer bumped and jostled, and Swyfte let loose with another piercing shriek. "What the kriff is that?"

Joclad settled for clutching at the back of the chair, and looked out the window.

A massive, wedge-shaped vessel came sailing out of the shadow of the planet. It was a good deal larger than any of the attack cruisers Joclad was familiar with, though he thought he vaguely recognized the design. "Oh..." he paused awkwardly, eyeing the rounded shield generators with respect. "...is that the new destroyer…?"

Palpatine had promised a fleet of them for the Jedi. Brilliant starships, one of the designers promised. Enough firepower for effective orbital bombardment. We won't have to risk the clones anymore...

One new destroyer was worth three of the old attack cruisers, or so the rumor went.

"Uh-oh," Dack said.

Joclad supposed that meant the rumor was fairly widespread.

Swyfte responded to that comment by taking the ship hard to port. Joclad dug his fingernails into the jumpseat and leaned to the right to keep from smashing into the machinery on the other side of the bridge. The artificial gravity overcompensated, and the Wanderer gave a low, rumbling moan of protest.

"Gods, I'd forgotten how badly you fly under duress," Dack muttered.

Swyfte's aura burned white-hot as she concentrated on her task. "I'd like to see you do better."

Joclad leaned toward the sensors. Arden had missed at least one of the gunships, and he suspected their missiles were the reason for the shrieking alarm. "Take us straight up," he said. "The gunship behind us can't follow -- their stabilizers will blow."

"I can't push it that hard unless you want our engine to blow!"

"It's a racer!" Dack yelped as he struck his hand against some piece of machinery. "It's meant for crazy stunts!"

"We'll fry!"

Joclad grabbed Swyfte's collar and pointed at the two bright specks that symbolized approaching cruisers. The fact that he could no longer see the new destroyer made him feel somewhat better, though the long-range cannons on those things were supposedly among the best ever created. "We'll fry if you don't!"

"Let go of me, you nizhe -- "

He reached over to simply yank her out of the chair. "Hell, I'll do it myself--"

With a frustrated screech, Swyfte slammed her hand down on the throttle and hauled the controls straight back. The Wanderer accelerated rapidly as it tilted back, and over the sudden howl of the engines came the din of everything not bolted down plummeting to the back of the ship, including the unfortunate Rodian and the howling Sleazebaggano.

Joclad reached out with his mind, hunting out a road that wouldn't get them vaporized. The Force revealed a haze-draped path to follow, one that he wasn't at all sure was correct. This is not my game, this is not a fight... but it is. It's a fight to survive. He stretched further, and the path glowed a little brighter. Well, I hope the Force isn't lying. Then again, if I get this wrong, we won't know.

He pointed out the window. "That way."

"What?" Swyfte whispered. "That's no way -- "

"That way!" He lunged across the bridge and slammed his hands around hers, and he wrenched the controls as he'd indicated. Swyfte issued a snarling threat under her breath as the Wanderer twirled fully into Coruscant airspace, and a second later, sporadic turbolaser fire splattered across the space where the ship had been.

Swyfte caught her breath. "Let go of me, I can't fly when you -- "

"Then fly," he snapped. "Before you get us all killed!"

"You're on my -- " Swyfte shoved the Wanderer through a hasty pattern of loops that she'd probably seen in a holoflick somewhere. " -- boat, Jedi! Arden, where are we going?"

Yes, Arden, where are we going? Joclad was about to decide he didn't really prefer daring escapes when it occurred to him that he was placing his fate in the hands of a woman who might or might not be a myth. I...am in deep trouble.

"Give me a minute," she replied. She spoke the same way she always did: completely unhurried, and seemingly without a care in the galaxy.

"We'll be bantha fodder in a minute," Dack said. The Corellian's voice sounded almost distant, and when Joclad swung around to better look him over, he realized Dack was nearly tranced out of his mind as he tried to overstretch his power. You're not going to make them go away, Meridian. Kit would throw a fit...

"Coordinates are set," Arden called. "Feel free."

Joclad released Swyfte, and the little pilot hit another button. The sensors flared bright red a a s the destroyer moved within targeting range, but aside from a shudder and a grimace, the Wanderer showed no sign of sudden distress.

And then the stars became starlines, and slowly, abruptly -- he realized they'd done it.

He stepped away from the pilot's chair and retreated to the back of the room. Sithspit. That was…that wasn't very good, was it?

Aside from the ticking of machinery and the heavy breathing of the pilot and two Jedi, the bridge was absolutely silent. Arden, per her habit, just looked bored.

Slow, tottering footsteps pushed their way forward. "What happened?" Elan asked, clutching his hands to his head. Blood ran freely from underneath his grimy-looking fingers. "Did we crash?"

"Devona just had a little panic attack," Joclad said. "Not much else."

"Do us a favor, Danva, and stop talking," Dack said tersely. Joclad raised an eyebrow: Protective of her, aren't you, Meridian? But out of respect for their daring escape, he kept his mouth shut. No need to harangue the pilot further.

Swyfte slumped back into her chair, her hands pressed to her mouth. "I can't ever go back to Coruscant, can I?"

"Not for a few years," Arden said. "No great loss. Too congested."

Joclad realized he knew quite a few Jedi Masters who would envy Arden Lyn's detachment from the galaxy. Or had known, at one point. They were probably fairly detached from things themselves by now. Well, most of them always dreamed about becoming one with the Force. Now they are.

Dack punched the pilot's arm lightly. "Nice flying, Swyftie. Better than I could do."

She snorted. "That goes without saying."