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Chapter Seventeen
Morning came particularly early at the Jedi base on Zihrent, but then Ben hadn't exactly gotten much sleep. He rolled over in his bunk, eyeing the wall chrono with increasing annoyance as the comm unit next to it blared out a tune that was meant to wake everyone.
"Shut up," he groaned, covering his head with his pillow.
A moment later the pillow was yanked from his grasp. "I thought you were a morning person?" Anakin said, flinging the pillow onto the opposite bunk.
Ben glared up at him. "What gave you that idea?"
A thoughtful look crossed Anakin's face. "I don't know. Come on, we're going to miss breakfast."
"I'm not hungry."
"Just get up already. Sleeping in is not the Jedi way."
Ben lifted his head and continued to glare. "I don't think I would have done well in your old Jedi Order, Gramps."
"Stop stalling and get out of bed. You'll feel better once you've eaten."
Ben swung his legs over the edge of the bunk and sat up, rubbing his eyes as he did so. "Why are you so eager?" he said with a yawn.
"The truth?" Anakin bounced up on the balls of his feet. "I've been up all night, and I'm starving." He walked over to the door and waited for Ben to join him.
"You know you could have gone without me," Ben grumbled. "And I'm pretty sure staying awake all night is up there on the list of things you shouldn't do when you're recovering from serious injuries."
"Getting into a fist fight with your grandson is probably high on that list, too, and I've already done that."
Ben held up a finger and aimed it at him. "Watch your mouth." He pulled his boots on and yawned again. "Glad to see you've got your sense of humor back."
"It's a work in progress. What about you?"
Ben shrugged and shot him a grin. "Same, I guess."
Anakin had just opened the door when a powerful tremor rolled through the base, shaking the floor beneath them and rattling the walls and ceilings hard enough that the ancient durasteel supports groaned.
"What the hell?" Ben said as he and Anakin both grabbed the door frame to keep from falling over.
Once the violent rumbling ceased, the two men stared at each other. "An earthquake?" Anakin asked.
Then a shrill alarm started to blare through the comm system. Ben froze as he listened to the deafening sound for several seconds. When he did move again, it wasn't Anakin's voice that spurred him to action, but Deekmawr's.
"We are under attack. Evacuate; I repeat, evacuate!"
Ben called his lightsaber to him and took off toward the mess hall at a dead sprint. He sensed Anakin on his heels, but that wasn't who he was concerned about. He stretched out with his feelings, searching for the rest of his family.
The mess hall ahead was a tangle of fear and panic as the younglings reacted to the alarms. Ben felt Allana's presence as a bright and surprisingly steady beacon amidst a wave of chaos. When he and Anakin barreled into the dining area, they found Allana doing her best to gather up clusters of half-asleep children and lead them toward the exit.
"Allana!" Ben met her eyes over the younglings' heads as he hurdled over a table separating them. He landed near her and scanned the room. "Where is everyone?"
The look on her face betrayed her concern. "I don't know."
Ben looked at Anakin. "We need to get to the hangar." He pulled out his comlink. "Artoo? Get the Daybreak ready to fly."
The order was met with an affirmative whistle. Ben quickly switched frequencies.
"Is anyone there? What's happening? Tahiri?"
Anakin and Allana were herding the children toward the exit; Allana turned back and waved for him to hurry.
"Ben?"
"Elias?"
"We're coming from the sleeping quarters with the rest of the children. Karanya and her kids are with us. Kohr and Ames, too."
Ben motioned for Allana to keep moving as he ran to catch up with her. "We'll meet you in the hangar," he said into the comlink. "Any sign of the others? Tahiri and Valin?"
"Not down this way."
Ben pressed his lips together in frustration as another rumble shook the base. "All right, just hurry." He looked up and met Allana's concerned stare. "It's fine," he said under his breath, not sure if he was trying to reassure her or himself. "They can take care of themselves."
They started down the dim, winding corridors that led to the main hangar, Anakin leading in front and Allana at his side, murmuring encouragements to the children. Ben brought up the rear, trying every few seconds to contact their missing companions. They had just turned the final corner when a dark figure appeared out of nowhere, blocking their path. Several children screamed at the sight of the Noghri.
"You cannot go that way," Matabakh said, her gravelly voice strained.
"Is there another way to the hangar?" Allana asked.
Ben closed his eyes and felt the ripples of an explosion as it tore through the shield doors. "They're in the hangar. We need another way out."
Matabakh motioned for them to follow her. They retraced their route back toward the mess hall, stopping at an intersection about halfway there when they collided with Elias's group. Ben could see Karanya at the back, clinging to her son's hand, while her daughters carried the smallest of the children. Ames had also picked up one of the younglings, and Arden had an arm slung around Kohr's waist, supporting the still-weakened teenager. Force, there were so many of them, and if the Daybreak and the other ships had been destroyed with that explosion…
"Hangar's blocked," Ben said quickly. "Matabakh has another way out."
"Another way?" Elias sounded skeptical and more than a little sleep-deprived.
Matabakh nodded. "A small maintenance hangar. We have a freighter and a few fighters there."
"Maintenance?" Ben said as he looked around at the children again, trying to get a rough count. "Are those ships able to fly?"
A pause as Matabakh shifted her stance. "They're able."
Why didn't he find that answer at all reassuring? Ben took a deep breath. "Okay. Let's get—"
"Ben!"
He instantly recognized Davin's panicked voice calling out from the rear of Elias's group, and in that moment, he realized he didn't sense Dolan among them. Ben turned to the Noghri. "Keep going, get them all out."
Matabakh acknowledged the order with a grunt and began leading the children down the intersecting corridor. Ben waved at Allana and the others to follow, and he pushed through the group until he got to Davin. "What happened?"
Davin's brown eyes were wide. "Some of our friends were missing, and he went to find them. I was supposed to tell you."
A hand on his arm startled him. He twisted to see Anakin at his side. "I'll find Dolan," he said. "You get Davin and the others out of here."
Ben thought to argue, but there was something in Anakin's tone that staid him. "You're sure?" he said, quiet.
Anakin's grip on his arm tightened. "Trust me."
Ben nodded at his grandfather and grabbed Davin by the hand. "Come on, buddy, let's get out of here."
They turned down the side corridor, Ben practically dragging Davin after him as they sprinted to catch up with the group ahead. He could hear their footsteps against the duracrete, and soon enough they had caught up. Kala Di and Dira had moved to the back with their mother and were gently encouraging the children to keep moving.
"We're almost there," Karanya was saying as Ben and Davin ran up behind her.
Another explosion hit the base, causing stone and dust to rain down on them. Ben pulled Davin against his body and bent over to shield him. All around, children cried out in terror.
A light filled the corridor, and when Ben looked up through the haze of dust and debris, he saw a doorway had opened ahead of them. He couldn't see who it was on the other side, but he knew Tahiri's presence anywhere.
"Come on, come on!" she yelled, waving them forward urgently. "Get to the ships!" Her eyes swept past Ben, scanning the children. "Valin's kids?"
"I've got them, Master Veila," Kala Di called out.
Tahiri pulled out her comlink. "They're here, Valin."
"Thank the Force." Valin's voice was edged in static, but his relief was clear. Ben thought he sounded a little winded, too. "The Daybreak and the Ho'Din are ready to fly."
The adults stayed back while the younglings climbed through the doorway, which was little more than a hatch. Ben brought up the rear, and as he lifted Davin up to Tahiri, he saw a crack in her usually collected exterior.
"Where's Dolan?" she said, a trace of panic in her voice.
"He got separated," Ben said. "Anakin went back for him."
Tahiri looked like she wanted to strangle him. Instead, she turned to the other Jedi. "Elias, you're with Ben and me. The rest of you get to the ships. Take off if you have to."
Kohr and Ames hesitated, stepping away from the hatch. "We can help," Kohr said.
Tahiri blew out a frustrated breath and jerked her thumb over her shoulder. "You get on one of those ships right now, Tredo, or I swear that head injury will be the least of your problems." She looked over at Ames and shook her head. "You, too. You want to help? Protect those kids."
Kohr and Ames exchanged a look before acquiescing. Arden helped Kohr through the hatch, then turned to kiss Elias before following the boys through. Karanya put a hand on Tahiri's arm as she brought up the rear. "What happened to you?"
Tahiri looked over her shoulder. "Valin and I were up early, training outside. An advance team got the drop on us, but we managed to fight them off. They'll be inside the base soon, if they aren't already."
Karanya nodded. "Be careful," she said before disappearing through the doorway. Tahiri closed the hatch behind her and stepped down next to Ben. Together with Elias, they ran back the way they had come.
Just before they came to the mess hall, Ben felt the corridor come to an abrupt end.
"Whoa!" He looked up at a wall of stone and crumbled duracrete, spilling down from a hole in the ceiling.
"Now what?" Elias said breathlessly.
Ben braced himself as another explosion hit and caused more of the ceiling to cave in. Then he felt them enter.
He looked at Tahiri, and she looked back, green eyes wide. Her words were a whisper.
"They're inside."
.
.
Anakin ran full speed through the mess hall, vaulting over tables to get to the passage where the council room was. He could feel something there, and it made sense that some of the kids might have gone back there to play despite yesterday's warning. The ground shook beneath him as another explosion ripped through the base. He staggered a little, then righted himself, reaching for the door to the council room.
"Dolan?" he called out as he entered. Anakin looked around in surprise as four children stepped out from behind the council members' chairs. His eyes stopped on the one closest to him. "Dolan!" He exhaled the name as he kneeled down in front of the dark-haired boy and put his hands on his shoulders. "We've got to get out of here."
"I'm sorry, Master Anakin, I didn't know what to do." The boy sniffled as tears welled up in his green eyes.
Anakin pulled Dolan into a hug and ran a hand over his hair. "It's all right, you didn't do anything wrong." He lifted Dolan's chin with one finger and looked into his eyes. "But we do have to go, now."
Dolan's eyes were wide. "There were too many of them," he said, his body trembling. "We came here to hide."
Anakin frowned. "How many did you see?" When Dolan didn't answer, he stood up and looked to the other children. "How many?"
The council room door slid open, and Anakin twisted around to block Dolan and the others. Standing in the doorway were two humans, one female and one male, as well as a Chagrian and a Weequay.
"Hello, Jedi," the human male said in a deceptively pleasant tone. "Care to play?" The four Sith ignited their lightsabers and grinned.
Anakin pulled out his borrowed saber and activated it at his side, glaring up at the Sith. Behind him, he sensed Dolan flinch and take a step backwards. The other children ducked behind the chairs.
"Don't come any closer," Anakin said, leveling his weapon at the line of Sith. "I'm warning you."
The Chagrian chuckled. "Big words for a Jedi, but it's four against one."
"Time to have some fun," the human woman added.
They fanned out in a semicircle, the Weequay guarding the door while the others closed in from the sides. Anakin adjusted his grip and watched them advance. The two humans were on either side of him when they both charged, lightsabers held high. Anakin ducked and spun around, catching the man's blade on his as he kicked the woman's feet out from under her. She recovered quickly, springing up to challenge him again while he exchanged blows with her companion.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw the Chagrian advance on Dolan and the hidden children. Anakin grabbed the woman's wrist and flung her toward the man, buying himself a few seconds to yank the Chagrian back with a violent tug from the Force. Then he flipped backward over the chairs, landing amidst the terrified younglings.
"Stay behind me!" he yelled as his three attackers moved forward as one. Anakin raised his left hand, and one of the chairs went flying toward the Sith. The closest one – the man – smirked as he stepped out of the way and sliced the chair in half.
"Is that the best you can d—" His words cut off and became a scream as Anakin darted forward and caught him on the upswing, lightsaber slicing through his elbow. The Sith dropped to his knees, still howling as Anakin plucked his weapon from the air.
The woman and the Chagrian were on him immediately, but now he had two blades. He was able to fend them off, but how long until the Weequay jumped into the fray and things started to get really messy?
If he were alone and uninjured, this would have been easy, he didn't doubt that. Ever since he'd arrived in this world, in this time, he'd been struggling to tap into the true depths of his power. One thing after another, drugged and beaten and broken. He was hardly even a shadow of himself. Ineffectual. Weak. Afraid. It wasn't right that he should hold so much power and not be able to reach it now. It wasn't fair that these monsters could break the galaxy and murder his children and try to rip away the only family he had left. What good was being some kind of mystical savior if he couldn't save the ones he loved?
Anakin sank deeper into the Force, closing his eyes to shut out everything but the movements of his opponents. He'd never tried this in combat, at least not on the front lines, where he needed his troops to be confident in not only his abilities, but his sanity. Now, though… now he needed the clarity afforded by the Force alone, not his own limited vision. He was going to show these Sith exactly why he was chosen.
It was amazing what he picked up on by shutting out one of his senses and handing its duties over to instinct. He felt the Sith's shock and confusion, then their anger because they thought he was toying with them. He blocked each of their attacks quickly and with minimal effort, relying on the whispers that guided his two blades. He was gaining strength when he should have been distracted by his fears.
Then he felt a spike of pure terror as one of the children screamed.
Anakin's eyes snapped open to see a young girl dangling in the air, clutching at her throat. Between parries, he saw the Weequay still in the doorway, one hand outstretched.
"Let her go!" He tried to twist away from his opponents long enough to disrupt the Weequay, but like predators smelling blood, they attacked him with renewed fervor, heedless of their own safety as they refused to give him an inch.
The Weequay Sith smiled a wicked smile and raised his other hand, fingers closing into a fist as he did so. Dolan rose into the air, legs kicking wildly as he scratched at the invisible grip on his neck.
Anakin felt something inside him tear wide open, frenzied and raw; and with a primal scream he flung his two lightsabers through the air like spears as lightning exploded from his hands. The Chagrian fell to the floor, a charred hole through his chest, while the Weequay and the human woman flew backward from the force of the lightning, moaning and writhing where they'd landed. Behind him, Dolan and the little girl dropped to the floor. As the lightning abated, Anakin stared down at the cracked and blackened palm of his left hand. He could still feel the power surging through him; he could easily let out another blast, and part of him was desperate to do so. Instead, he reached out, calling both lightsabers back to him.
"Are you okay?" he shouted over his shoulder at Dolan and the girl.
"They're okay," one of the other children answered.
On the opposite side of the room, the Weequay and the human woman struggled to get to their feet. The man whose arm Anakin had sliced off had crawled to the door and was reaching for the control panel when it slid open. On the other side, Ben, Tahiri, and Elias stood with lightsabers drawn. Before any of the Sith could react, the three Jedi sent out a combined blast of energy that pummeled them to the ground. Tahiri used those few seconds of disorientation to rip their weapons from their hands.
"Everybody all right?" Ben asked as he and Elias hit the Sith one more time with another wave of energy, knocking them out cold.
Anakin dropped the Sith lightsaber and staggered backward a couple of steps. He turned to see Dolan leaning against one of the council members' chairs, still panting. Anakin went to him and scooped him up in his arms.
"These two were attacked," he said. "I think they'll be all right, but they're definitely shaken up."
Elias ran over to the little girl and picked her up. "There's no time; we've gotta get out of here."
Tahiri strode forward quickly and brushed her fingers across Dolan's cheek, then leaned forward to place a kiss on his forehead. Anakin stared down at her, and her eyes rose to meet his; and he was startled by the depth of gratitude he saw there.
"Thank you," she said.
He wanted to shake his head at her. Don't thank me, he thought, still feeling the adrenaline from the fight – no, from the lightning that had poured from his hands, burning and vicious and exhilarating. The rage he'd felt, the red haze of emotion he'd tapped into in that moment… it had felt so good. All guilt and uncertainty swept away for a few pure, agonizing seconds, and everything was suddenly within his power and ability to control, to choose.
"Don't mention it," he murmured, averting his eyes. He found Ben watching him, and the guilt returned, washing away the angry fog and leaving something cold and heavy in its place.
Pull it together, soldier, he told himself, repeating a phrase he'd often heard from the clone commanders who served under him, though it had never actually been directed at him. The mission's not over.
Tahiri led the way from the council chamber, navigating through a field of debris that had once been the mess hall before climbing up through a hole in the ceiling.
"You okay to carry him?" Ben asked, nodding toward Dolan as Anakin prepared to jump up after Tahiri.
Anakin ignored the twinge in his side from still-healing wounds. "I'm fine."
They finally made it back to the hallway outside the maintenance hangar, where Tahiri slid back the hatch and allowed them to climb through. "Hurry," she said, helping the younglings up. "I can sense more of them closing in."
They emerged in a brightly lit hangar, complete with a light cargo freighter and a few starfighters. Anakin didn't recognize the model, so it was definitely after his time, but it did resemble the ARC-170 fighter he knew so well. He thought of the last time he'd seen an ARC-170, when he'd brought the Invisible Hand crashing down on Coruscant. That battle seemed so distant now, it might as well have happened in another life.
Deekmawr emerged from the freighter and waved them over. "The ships are fueled and ready to depart. There is little time."
"The Daybreak and the Ho'Din?" Tahiri said.
"No word since they left," Deekmawr replied. "But I repeated your instructions to head for Haven."
"What are we up against?" Ben asked while Elias guided the children up the ramp. Anakin lowered Dolan to the ground, and Tahiri took him by the hand.
Deekmawr's expression was grim. "Three Star Destroyers with unknown fighter contingents, I fear."
"Star Destroyers?" Anakin said. So they still had those in this time? He doubted they were the same class of warship he'd known, but he wondered just how much they could have changed in seventy years. He noticed Deekmawr giving him a puzzled look just before he sniffed the air.
Ben answered before the strange alien had a chance. "The Sith are really bringing out the big guns today. We'll have to outrun them, or at least buy the others some time."
"We?" Anakin glanced at the closest starfighter. For the first time in days, he felt a spark of genuine excitement race through him.
Ben quirked one eyebrow. "That's right." He put a hand on Anakin's shoulder and leaned in close so that no one else could hear. "Time to see what made you the best starpilot in the galaxy."
.
.
Ben settled into the cockpit of the old X-wing fighter and pulled on a helmet as the ship's systems came online. He wished he had Artoo with him, but the astromech Deekmawr had scrounged up would do for now. Several meters away he saw Anakin settling into a fighter of his own. His grandfather pulled a helmet on as well, and the comm crackled with static.
"I wish I had Artoo with me," Anakin muttered, catching Ben's eye.
Ben smiled and shook his head. What they were about to do was crazy, but if what Obi-Wan had told his father was true, there was no better pilot to have at his side. He just hoped the man lived up to the legend; Ben had known plenty of incredible pilots, so the bar was set high.
As his fighter lifted off the ground, he saw Tahiri in the freighter's cockpit. She nodded at him, and he nodded back.
"All right, boys," Ben said, rotating his ship toward the hangar entrance, a door that opened in the ceiling above. Anakin and Elias's fighters lined up behind him. "Time to go."
The trio of X-wings ascended to the surface, and Ben caught a face full of sunlight as they emerged from the foliage. He winced a little and squinted at the dark forms silhouetted in the light. Sith bombers, at least a dozen of them. Below them a troop transport had landed – probably where those four Lessers had come from. And several of the helix fighters were flying low over the trees, moving too fast for a standard patrol…
Ben felt his eyes go wide as the Daybreak burst out of the trees in the distance, cannons blazing, the Happy Ho'Din right on her tail. The two freighters pulled up at impossibly steep angles, shooting straight for the atmosphere.
"Glad you could join us, Skywalker!" Myri's voice practically sang over the comm.
Ben shook his head as he and the others adjusted course to follow. "What are you guys still doing here? You should be on your way to Haven."
"We've got a problem, Ben." Valin's voice was strained, and Ben felt his stomach plummet.
"Tell me."
"It's Haven. We think… I felt it through Jys…"
Ben's fighter shuddered as it began to break through the planet's atmosphere. "Valin," he said through gritted teeth. "Spit it out."
"The Sith are at Haven," Syal cut in, taking over for the distressed Jedi. "It was probably supposed to be a simultaneous attack on both bases, but I'll bet they were delayed by all the jumps it takes to travel around the nebulae, and they obviously didn't count on the connection between Valin and Jysella acting as an advance warning."
"I think she escaped with some of them," Valin added, "but I don't know how many. I'm sorry, Ben, but Haven is lost."
Ben rubbed a hand over his jaw, holding it there for a moment as he remembered the children who'd been kidnapped from the Denon enclave, the ones they'd left in Jysella and Orion's care on Haven. Tahiri had warned him, hadn't she? All of that effort, only for them to end up right back in the hands of the Sith. And what about all the other apprentices and Knights who lived there? Stars, was this his fault? Had he led the Sith to Haven? To Zihrent?
"We can't worry about that right now," Tahiri broke in. "We've got more immediate concerns, like what to do about those."
As the fighters and freighters left Zihrent's atmosphere, wispy clouds gave way to the darkening blue-black of space, and three Star Destroyers appeared suspended against it.
"Here we go," Ben said under his breath, pushing his doubts way down.
"Whoa." There was a hint of awe in Anakin's voice. "Those are huge."
Ben tightened his grip on the stick. "Yeah," he said. The three Destroyers had formed a pincer and were already surrounding the Jedi ships. Squadrons of fighters deployed from each ship's belly, filling in the gaps between them. In a minute or two, the Daybreak and the other transports would have nowhere to go.
"How do we get out of this one?" Elias said, his voice barely audible across the comm.
Ben's chest was heavy. Their starfighters might be able to slip by, but the freighters were a different story. As his mind raced to come up with a solution, he saw Anakin's fighter surge forward ahead of the group.
"I've got an idea," his grandfather said.
.
.
From the bridge of the Star Destroyer Warhammer, Lord Dominius watched as a handful of Jedi pilots plowed through a squadron of his starfighters, adding insult to injury by flying in the shabbiest trio of X-wings imaginable. Personally, he'd always felt that the Sith Empire did a mediocre job when it came to training pilots, its basic policy being to take a Force-sensitive, regardless of talent or training, and stick them in a starfighter. Such a terribly wasteful and ineffective method of filling the navy's ranks, and it was so very irritating to be proved right on this subject, in the midst of battle.
Dominius didn't have any particular affinity for piloting, but he knew how deadly some of his fellow Lords – and even some of the Lessers – were behind the controls. It was a pity they were used only sparingly for that purpose. Still, as he watched the trio of Jedi in their starfighters, particularly the one in the lead, he found himself doubting that even the best Sith pilot would be a match. That realization filled him with about as much admiration as it did frustration.
The Sith Lord turned to the viewport on his left and watched as that same X-wing broke away from the others and began to skim the surface of the Nihilus. None of its guns were able to take down the Jedi, who was flying dangerously close to the hull. The X-wing changed course abruptly, doing a barrel roll as it pulled up and climbed toward the bridge. The Sith fighters on his tail were unable to keep up with their prey's suicidal pace. The Jedi pulled away from the tower, narrowly dodging blasts from the forward gun battery. Those same blasts tore through the pursuers. The X-wing did a tight loop to reverse course before firing repeatedly on one of Nihilus's bridge deflector shield generators.
Dominius sensed increasing apprehension behind him as the exploding generator dome lit the space around it for an instant. He looked over his shoulder at Warhammer's command officers, including its captain, a middle-aged Zeltron man with black tattoos zigzagging the left half of his dark pink face. "Captain Bateer," he said quietly, nodding for the captain to join him at the viewport.
"Your orders, my lord?"
Dominius steepled his long fingers together in front of him. "Kill that Jedi for me."
There was a moment's hesitation as Bateer swallowed. "My lord, the Master's orders—"
"Captain."
"Yes, my lord?"
Dominius bared his sharp teeth in a cool smile. "As Lord Krayt's emissary, it is left to me to interpret his will. I am giving the orders today, and I trust you won't forget it again."
Bateer's movements were crisp as he bowed his head and shoulders. "As you wish, my lord." He turned to the rest of the command crew. "Concentrate fire on the X-wings."
Dominius watched as two squadrons of helix fighters veered away from the freighters and moved to converge on the three Jedi starfighters.
If nothing else, he thought, it would make for an entertaining show.
.
.
Ben couldn't pinpoint the exact moment he'd realized his grandfather was slightly insane. It might have been the moment he destroyed one of the Star Destroyer's bridge shield generators and then flew straight through the flaming wreckage. Or it might have been when more than a dozen Sith fighters peeled away from their targets to chase after him, and he laughed under his breath, daring them to take him down. But even though Ben still wondered how the hell they were going to make it out of this mess, he felt strangely comforted by Anakin's staggering confidence. It reminded him of flying with Jaina, and for the first time in a long time, that thought didn't hurt at all.
It also made him intensely glad that he hadn't inherited what was apparently a Skywalker predisposition toward thrill-seeking, but that was another matter altogether.
"This is getting really annoying." Ben checked his radar, and sure enough, two more fighters had decided to latch onto him. "I can't shake these guys."
"I see you," Anakin said. "Just keep flying straight, I'll be there in a minute."
"Wait, where are you?" His scope was so hopelessly cluttered, he couldn't tell allies from enemies. He looked forward, swerving a little to avoid another gun battery as he flew as close to the Star Destroyer's hull as he dared. "Anakin?"
"Fly straight, full throttle, and don't let up." A pause as he heard Anakin take a breath. "Trust me."
Laser blasts seared past him, and one or two crashed against his shields. I'm gonna be dust, he thought, eyes narrowing at the fast-approaching edge of the Star Destroyer. Another quick glance at his scope showed he was on a collision course with a massive cluster of light. What the hell—?
He was almost to the edge of the warship when his proximity alarm screamed at him. Then a starfighter shot up from below the belly of the Star Destroyer, crossing directly into his path.
"Frag!" Ben almost let up as panic gripped him, but Anakin's instructions rang in his ears, and he punched forward, his canopy narrowly missing the back of his grandfather's X-wing. Their ships broke away from the Star Destroyer, and behind them, their numerous pursuers collided in a brilliant and enormous ball of fire.
A low chuckle filtered across the comm. "You're not half bad," Anakin said, and Ben could just picture the cocky grin on his grandfather's face.
"And you're a fragging lunatic," he shot back, taking a breath to steady himself against the rush of adrenaline. Dammit, that was close.
Anakin swung his fighter around, bringing it up alongside Ben's as another wave of enemy ships descended on them.
"I think you made them mad," Ben said, tightening his grip on the controls.
"How do you know it wasn't you?" came the wry retort.
Ben groaned inwardly at the callback to Heibic, and then he groaned audibly as he sensed a few more fighters approaching from the rear. Great. "You're sure this plan is going to work?"
"I'm positive that it can work."
"That's not what I asked."
"I know." There was a pause, and he lost sight of Anakin's fighter as his grandfather dipped below him. "It'll work. We just have to keep our freighters out of range of their tractor beams while we take out that Destroyer's stabilizers."
"You still haven't explained how we're going to draw the ship into Zihrent's atmosphere." Ben weaved through a barrage of enemy fire, slipping past the wave of fighters. "We're going to need a damn miracle for that," he muttered.
"You don't need a miracle – you've got me."
Ben couldn't help the grin that spread across his face. "You don't know how much I want to punch you in the mouth right now."
"You mean you haven't gotten that all out of your system yet?"
He bit back a laugh. "Just tell us your brilliant plan, already."
"It's an idea I've had for a while… I've never flown with enough Jedi to consider attempting it, but I think now, with our numbers, it might work." There was a brief pause as Anakin exhaled. "Once we hit the stabilizers, we're going to pull that Star Destroyer toward the middle of the formation and crash it into the command ship."
There was silence across the comm, enough to make Ben wonder if the others had heard. Finally, Elias's voice broke that silence.
"We've never done anything like that," he said with a trace of anxiety. "That's way too big…" He trailed off, as if unable to wrap his mind around the enormity of Anakin's plan.
To his credit, Anakin seemed completely unfazed by Elias's doubts. "You see those ships? Next to the power of the Force, they're nothing. If the Force is in everything and we're one with it, then size doesn't matter. There's nothing they can throw at us that we can't knock down."
Ben felt the hairs on his arms stand on end, and all he could think was, This is the Anakin Skywalker who led armies.
And then he thought: Okay, Gramps. Lead on.
"You know what?" Tahiri's voice crackled across the comm, and Ben swore he heard a hint of laughter in it. "Why the hell not? Let's do this."
.
.
It had been many years since Tahiri Veila had attempted any kind of battle meld with another Jedi. It wasn't that she lacked the willingness to enter one again – even after the whole Killik mess and how it had fractured the surviving Myrkr strike team members, Tahiri was practical enough to recognize that the battle meld was a powerful tool in a Jedi's arsenal. The bond had always amplified her senses, allowing her to see and feel what her companions experienced, giving her an advantage that even traditional Jedi training did not.
But in the years since the reemergence of the Sith, use of the meld had waned. As the Jedi spread across the galaxy in separate, hidden enclaves, almost completely cut off from one another, the need to work together in battle dwindled. The technique, while not truly lost, was seen as a relic of another time, another war.
Tahiri had never instructed her students in the use of a battle meld, and now probably wasn't the time for a lesson. And yet, as she stretched out with her feelings and touched the minds of her fellow Jedi, she sensed something familiar – not a meld, exactly, but a closeness… no, a unity, one of purpose, of spirit. Individuals joined together, realizing in the same moment what incredible feats they might be capable of, and perhaps more importantly, that they weren't alone. That as separate as they might have seemed for all these years, the Force still bound them together.
She could feel each of their minds humming with intense focus, little lights pressing back against the darkness. Valin's steadiness and Karanya's gentle warmth, Elias's determination and Allana's quiet yet powerful radiance, Ames and Kohr's bright enthusiasm and eagerness to prove themselves, even Dira and Kala Di's bewildered awe at the enormity of what they were experiencing. The Jedi expanded outward in the Force, brushing against each other's senses, lifting one another up.
Ben Skywalker, a brilliant solar flare as he finally allowed his presence to be felt, lending strength to the bond between them all. A power so great it easily dwarfed most of the others out there, and was matched only by the man in the lead X-wing.
She felt it, then. The unbridled fire that was Anakin Skywalker, so different from the Anakin she'd known and loved, and yet in many ways the same. For a long time, her Anakin had feared his grandfather's legacy, often wondering if he was destined to one day walk that same dark path. She'd always believed in him, had never doubted that he would become an amazing Jedi Knight, a beacon of light for others. And even though his life ended too soon, she'd been right about him.
Ben's strength and compassion… his grandfather's certainty in the face of impossible odds… she knew it didn't really make any sense, but as she perceived them both through the Force, she could almost believe she was feeling an echo of Anakin Solo between them. Not just him, but Jaina, too, and Luke, and Leia…
She smiled for one instant at that thought, then pushed it from her mind as she concentrated every ounce of her will on the Star Destroyer looming large in the viewport.
"Size matters not," Luke Skywalker had been known to say, words he attributed to a great and wise Jedi Master named Yoda. "Luminous beings are we."
Tahiri had to admit, she was feeling pretty damn luminous right now.
"How close do you need to be?" Deekmawr said in a gravelly murmur as he took over the controls from her.
She shifted over to the co-pilot's seat and lifted a hand toward the viewport. "This is fine, Deekmawr. In the Force, things like size and distance and time… they're all one."
Then she closed her eyes and took hold of the Star Destroyer as though grasping it in the palm of her hand – and every Jedi Knight in that fighter-strewn expanse of space did the same.
.
.
Were he to live a hundred more years, Darth Dominius didn't think he would ever forget this day.
It took about fifteen seconds for the bridge crew of the Warhammer to recognize that something was wrong with the Nihilus. It took another ten seconds for them to realize that Nihilus was not only veering radically off course, but that it was being pulled by the collective efforts of the ragtag assembly of Jedi scattered across multiple starships.
It was about five more seconds before the proximity warning blared and everyone on the bridge realized that Nihilus was flying right into Warhammer's path.
Captain Bateer was an experienced commanding officer, and he handled the situation with a cool grace that Dominius found completely atypical for one of his species. Ordering evasive maneuvers, he steered the Warhammer out of the way enough that the impact was more a glancing blow than a shattering one.
Dominius braced himself against the viewport as the ship trembled beneath him. The Nihilus passed under them, and he saw the top half of its bridge sheared clean off from the collision, sending debris bouncing against Warhammer's shields. Without its bridge or stabilizers, the Nihilus was pulled into the planet's atmosphere, unable to correct its course. Dominius's skin grew hot at the sight of the vessel bending under the stress, twisting apart at the seams as it tumbled toward the surface. There would be no question of survivors; anyone who failed to such an extent as the crew of the Nihilus didn't deserve to live. Should they return to the Master, they would wish they'd burned alive in their ship's wreckage.
The group of Jedi starships had disappeared from view the moment the Nihilus crossed between them and the Warhammer. They reappeared now, practically in open space; and by the time Dominius's fighters could reach them, every single ship had made the jump into hyperspace.
The bridge of the Warhammer was silent as the Falleen Sith loosened his long fingers from the edge of the viewport and stared out at the empty patch of space where the Jedi had been just ten seconds ago. Instead of increasing, the slow boil of rage that had begun with the Nihilus' demise started to cool off; when he looked down at his hands they had returned to their usual green pigment.
"Captain Bateer," he said as he turned slowly and with calm precision to face the officers on the bridge. The ship's captain stepped forward.
"Yes, my lord?"
Dominius clasped his hands behind his back. "Signal our fighters to return to their bays, and hail the Wyyrlok. We're rejoining the fleet at Hapes immediately."
Captain Bateer bowed his head quickly. "It will be done, my lord."
As the captain and his officers carried out their orders, a Miralukan lieutenant approached him with a datapad in hand. "Message from Ossus, my lord."
Dominius took the datapad and read the message, quickly at first, then again slowly so he could savor the words. Once he was finished, he turned toward the viewport and smiled. The Jedi had lost two more hiding places today, and – if Lady Varice's intelligence proved correct – they were about to lose even more.
It was turning out to be a good day after all. One he would never forget.
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