Disquiet in the library
They left the spaceport the way Ben had entered it, through the narrow tunnel which had been delved under the security fence to the back of the Bolt Hole. Ditto followed along, looking somewhat confused by the route, but if he had any objections he kept them to himself.
Ben was not the least bit surprised to find Reett waiting for them as they came through the dim, crowded bar, sitting at a grubby table by the door with her mud-splashed work boots up on the bench opposite. She looked up as they approached.
"Well hello again, handsome," she said, staring at Ditto with a look on her face that was downright predatory. Ditto did not seem impressed.
"Oh," he said. "It's you."
Reett stretched, dramatically, and looked to Ben. "So, what's next?"
"Ditto and I are going into the City," Ben told her. "But you are free to go wherever you wish."
Reett, of course, asked immediately, "What's in the City?"
Ben bit back an acerbic reply, and just said,. "We are meeting some friends."
Reett narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "For a half-starved penniless vagrant, you got a lot of friends all of a sudden."
Ben just sighed.
"What?" Reett said. "Just saying it's suspicious, that's all. And what happened to your accent?"
"Look," said Ditto to Ben in a low voice, having clearly decided it was safest just to just ignore Reett entirely. "Whatever we do next, let's get away from here. I don't know how long it'll take Marcovee to get your story out, and best case scenario, everyone believes it immediately. But worse case, in just hours the space port will be crawling with Lawkeepers."
"Or bounty hunters." Ben said, but nodded. "You're right, we shouldn't be seen here. Let's go." He turned away and went over to the door, leading the way out of the noisome, gloomy bar into the street outside. Ditto followed, and Reett came right after.
"We'll need to lie low tonight," Ditto said in an undertone as they weaved their way up the narrow street. "Until the news is out. Then it should be safe enough tomorrow to head to the University to meet the others. We can go back to my apartment now and–"
"Bad idea," Reett chimed in from behind them.
"Excuse me?"
"They're watching your place. I saw them yesterday, when I took Zak's letter. You didn't notice? At least one, maybe two. Whatever this shit is you've gotten yourselves into, of course the first place the Lawkeepers are going to look for you is your boyfriend's apartment."
"Does she have to be here?" Ditto muttered to Ben.
"Not that I'm not grateful for the information, Reett, but aren't you supposed to be at work?" Ben said, exasperated. There were still hours of daylight left, after all. What was she doing still following him around?
In response, Reett pulled up her sleeve to show the dark skin of her forearm; it was marred by a blistered, reddened burn. "You're not the only one who knows how to fake a tarva burn," she said, cheerfully. "Though I gotta say, your use of jubaberries was inspired. This way to the conveyor?"
Ben did not follow her. "Reett, for stars' sake—what are you doing here? Why did you follow me in the first place? I don't have any more money."
She faltered a step, and looked back. Her arms went stiff at her sides. She looked almost upset. "Look," Reett said. "What with the Lawkeepers sniffing around at the farm, and now this guy…" she gestured at Ditto. "...And I know you're sleeping rough. Well, I thought you might be in trouble. Might need some help. We're mates, aren't we? That's why I came after you. I wanted to help."
"Reett…" Ben said, not knowing quite what to say. "I promise I am fine. Or very nearly. There's just a…misunderstanding I have to clear up. But if you don't go back to the farm now, you'll lose your wages for the whole day."
She shrugged. "Then you can pay me back later if it bothers you." Leaving the other two stunned in her wake, she set off again, calling back over her shoulder, "I'll add it to your tab. It's at nineteen credits now, by the way."
"I just gave you five!" Ben hurried after her, not knowing if he was outraged, infuriated or rather touched. Reett seemed quite regularly to inspire that mix of emotions.
"You gave me five to go away," Reett explained, like he was simple. "The rest is still owing, Zakkari Neipho! Now, let's get going. And who's Marcovee?"
Ben didn't know much about himself, and one thing he did know was that he wasn't a quitter. But Reett was one force of nature that he wasn't quite prepared to fight. Not right now, not when he had too much else on his mind.
"Marcovee is a journalist," Ben explained reluctantly as they weaved into the back streets that would lead them to the nearest conveyor station, "one who, I might add, has some extremely questionable ethics about journalistic integrity, but will shortly be convincing every reader of the City Star that I just left the planet for good. Or at least that is the hope."
Reett huffed. "Who believes anything they say in the media these days? It's all trash."
"In this instance, even more so," said Ben. "But perhaps it will throw enough dust in enough eyes that I can walk down a street without feeling constantly pursued."
Ditto glanced behind them at the words, and saw a shopkeeper leaning against a wall across the street was still staring at them even after they had passed by. Ben turned his face away, pulling his headscarf forward to shadow his face.
"This way." Reett ducked into a smaller side alley, quickly leading them on. The shopkeeper was quickly lost from sight.
Ditto looked anxiously at Ben. "So what are we going to do now, if we can't hide out in my apartment? Is she right that you've been sleeping rough?"
Reett laughed before Ben could answer. "You two are hopeless. But it's okay; you're staying at my place."
Ben raised an eyebrow. "Are we, indeed?"
"You have a place?" Ditto said, sceptical.
"Rude," Reett said, cheerfully. "Yeah, I got a place. Come on. Unless you got a better idea?"
They didn't.
Reett led them onwards, weaving through the busy streets to the conveyor that would take them across the City. Streets and buildings rolled by as the platform trundled back past the farms and orchards of Green District and into an area of homes and warehouses, interspersed by the occasional park or city garden. In the distance were larger structures; the water treatment plant and the hydroelectric power station which stood at the centre of Black District. After an hour or so they changed onto a second conveyor that passed through an area of small businesses and homes that grew larger and more elegant the closer they grew to the core of the City. Reett said this area was named Blue District, and housed the main administrative centre and buildings of the state bank. The Judiciary was also located here; Ben kept his headscarf pulled forward shadowing his face as they travelled but he saw no Lawkeepers, at least none wearing the uniform he recognised. The Force hummed a low awareness in his mind, but there was no sense of danger. Not yet.
Blue District ran right up to the edge of the Spires themselves, and even curled around the eastern edge of the first massive stalagmites, the only area of the city where the cavern floor sloped and undulated. The conveyor rolled along between the lower foothills and then right between the stalagmites themselves which towered up on all sides like small mountains. Many of the other passengers, clearly wealthy or important Kheelians in elaborate robes—and they were almost all Kheelians—got off the conveyor here, continuing up formal avenues lined with potted trees or coloured stones into doorways in the stalagmite buildings. Reett pointed out the parliament building and the Gallery of Arts as they passed by, both each occupying an entire stalagmite, carved into astonishing peaks and towers, and glittering with ornamented windows. Beyond, the two great roof pillars emerged from amidst the forest of spires and disappeared up to the shadows above.
Soon they passed out from between the towering structures of the Spires onwards towards the darker, shadowed area near the rear of the cave city. By now all the well-dressed Kheelians had departed the conveyor, leaving behind the humans, Twi-lek, Rhodians and other sentients, all dressed not dissimilarly to Ben and Reett in worn workwear. The neighbourhoods around them grew shabbier and meaner, trapped in a perpetual twilight in the shadow of the Spires and too far from the cave mouth for much natural light at all. They disembarked the conveyor near a small market, and Reett led them on through narrow streets. Here there were no stone-carved buildings, and everything was made of repurposed bricks or tattered pre-fab panels packed closely together. The streets were quiet but no-one gave the trio a second glance, and for the first time he could remember, Ben felt truly anonymous.
Reett's place turned out to be a single room in a densely populated accommodation block constructed in an old industrial building. Ben had been in and around Kheelian architecture as long as he could remember, and the biped-sized doorways and hallways felt oddly airless and claustrophobic. There would be no way for the lawkeepers to even get inside a building like this, let alone search it. Not unless they, like the train guards, had pechnar agents of their own. Something to consider.
As they entered the accommodation building, a group of noisy teenagers loitering in the stairwell smoking deathsticks greeted Reett with raucous shouts, whistling suggestively at Ben and Ditto as the group went past. Reett cheerily responded with an obscene gesture, and the kids scattered, laughing. Inside, Reett's room was tiny, shabby but clean, with a hotplate for cooking, one chair, a little corner table, and a lumpy bed that folded into the wall. Ben tried not to look too intently at the array of odd little knick-knacks arranged on the table and windowsill—a green feather, three knives, a clay rancor, a crystal, some electrical doodad with all the wires sticking out, what looked like a tiny piece of krayt dragon ivory...It seemed intrusive to pay too much attention to such personal mementoes. The air smelled strongly of cooking spices, damp washing, and sweat; there was the sound of a baby crying in another apartment nearby, and from the bar across the road came a heavy beat of music that could be felt through the walls. Through the little window that let in a gleam of artificial light Ben could see a dozen bipeds in the street below, muffled in scarves and hoods, loitering in doorways or hurrying by on business of their own. The perfect place to hide. Nevertheless, there was no need to take chances, not when they had no idea who might be out there. Not now they were so close to success. So while the other two went out to find somewhere selling the City Star, Ben stayed behind in the apartment, sitting in the window and watching the street below, as the flocks of skreatbats swooped and dove over the city as the evening lights came on.
Ditto and Reett returned just before midnight with dinner and with news. The food—pancakes made of the familiar orange flour filled with some kind of thick, salty blue bean paste—was lukewarm, rubbery and rather tasteless, but it was filling and hadn't come from a vending machine, which was more than good enough for Ben.
As for the news…well, Marcovee might have been a shameless manipulating scoundrel, but at the very least there were some things the Dhosan hadn't been lying about, and journalistic skill was one of them. The blistering article, "The Power Con: False Jedi implicated in train death", had made the front page of the City Star's evening edition, and soon all news outlets had picked up the story, although their focus was mainly on the fate of the fugitive two-walker Ben Waken. "Maligned or murderer?" the evening holo bulletin had headlined. "Fugitive pechnar flees planet." None of the reports mentioned Shaarm or her family, which was an enormous relief, and Ditto was referred to only as "a brave trainline employee". The pic they had shown of Ben was the one the guards had taken of him on the train, the one where his face was washed out by the harsh lights, looking dirty, hollow-eyed and hunted. He had to get rid of that beard.
They waited out the night, sleeping curled up on the floor, bed or chair of Reett's tiny apartment. It was early in the morning and still dark when Ben woke the others and let them know he was going out. Today was the day he was going to meet Shaarm and Pakat again, and he was not going to risk being late. Of course Reett and Ditto both insisted on coming with him, and soon they were all up and dressed, and heading south on the conveyor towards the silhouette of the Spires rising like black and jagged teeth against the sullen pre-dawn glow of the cave mouth, miles and miles away.
They disembarked near to the Gallery of Arts as the cavern mouth was starting to glow with the first glimmers of sunrise. Ditto led them on foot through broad streets weaving between the stalagmites of the Spires, heading towards the University. Though the conveyor had been busy with Paper Town biped labourers on their way to work, the streets of the Spires were still quiet at this early hour, and they made good progress. There were no Lawkeepers to be seen anywhere.
He was so occupied watching the passers-by for any sign of recognition or attention, Ben was quite startled when he looked up to see the street suddenly opening up as they walked into a huge open plaza. It was vast, yes, but somehow its size was difficult to comprehend, being as it was utterly dwarfed by the two enormous pillars of red stone planted right at its centre, extending up to the cavernous roof far above. Craning his neck back, Ben could now see that the pillars themselves were each perhaps 20 or 25 metres wide; practically slender in comparison to the height of the cavern. But from this angle, standing at their roots, they were colossal.
Ben suddenly noticed Reett was laughing at him. He closed his mouth with a snap.
"What?"
"You look just like an ooba-fish."
Ben huffed. "Well, I've never seen anything like this before. It's an impressive sight."
"The quaddies call them the Saviours," Ditto said, as he ushered them on across the plaza. "On account of them keeping the whole roof of the cavern up."
"Or," said Reett brightly, "Is that just what they want you to think the pillars are for? That way no-one looks too close for the hidden radio masts. That's how they control the skreatbat attacks."
"This way," Ditto said, rolling his eyes. "And keep your hood up. Reett's right about one thing, the skreatbats are a menace."
They bypassed the grand front entrance of the University, whose elegant façade on Saviours' Square was inlaid with shimmering pearlescent tiles. Ditto took them down a smaller side street to a locked gate, which he opened up a via a keypad code he presumably recalled from his student days. They wandered on through the buildings and quads of the campus proper, and eventually came to a small garden with beds of decorative grasses between lines and spirals of laid stone. Ben was reminded of the municipal park in Tszaaf, the place where he had said goodbye to Ooouli and Tiki. The memory of it cut like glass.
But this garden was empty. Shaarm and Pakat were not here.
That wasn't necessarily something to worry about. It was early still, very early, and Ditto hadn't arranged a meeting time with the others, just that they would meet today. But there were so many things in play, and so much at stake Ben could not help but ruminate on all the ways his plan could have gone wrong, even though Ditto had seen the Kheelians the day before yesterday, and they had been fine, not arrested and under no suspicion. They had to be alright. They'd be here. They would.
So Ben set himself to wait, forcing himself into calmness. After a while, Ditto began balancing the decorative stones into little stacks. Reett pulled out a knife from somewhere and set about picking the dried mud from her boot treads. In due course, Ben gave up on sitting and began to pace.
"You don't have to stay," he said aloud. The calmness wouldn't come, and he was feeling more anxious by the minute. Something about that didn't feel right. It was an odd, alien emotion, almost like it was coming to him from somewhere else. He tightened his mental shields, and glanced to the others. "Seriously. I appreciate your company, but this could take a while."
"Are you kidding?" scoffed Reett. "You're the most interesting thing that's happened around here in years. I'm going nowhere."
Ditto perhaps picked up on Ben's emotional turmoil and started pointing out various peaks and spires they could see amidst the massive glittering stalagmite buildings around them, describing at length what building or department each housed within its carved interior. Ben allowed himself to be distracted, and tried to focus on the conversation by asking questions.
"Ditto, when did the Kheeli-Dhosi war end?"
Ditto gave the answer with the eagerness of one who is the specialist in a particular subject matter but is rarely called upon to demonstrate it. "18 planetary years, and 29– no, 30 days."
Ben waved towards the Spires. "But those buildings must have taken longer than two decades to carve out. They're enormous. People must have been living here before the war, surely?"
Ditto nodded. "I don't know about living, but before the Upper City was rendered uninhabitable, this used to be an old Kheeli sacred site. The stalagmites were first carved out millenia ago, then they got adapted and expanded as the war went on and more people came to shelter down here. Though they didn't use the cave mouth so much in those days because there were tunnels running up to the surface and the Old City. But they all got filled in after the war."
"The ones I know aren't blocked," Reett countered immediately. "There's two behind the power plant, one over in Gold District, and one in Paper Town. Probably more. Waste contractors use them for dumping stuff up on the surface for cheap. The smugglers use 'em for bringing stuff in from off planet for the Black Market. People too, sometimes."
"How does anyone survive out there?" Ben said, drawn in despite himself. "I thought the land above was contaminated."
"The smugglers use rebreather suits. The tunnels are ray shielded, basic cheap decon shields that have basic radiation, air and dust filters, but let big stuff through, like people. But it's the gas you really gotta worry about."
"This whole area is volcanic," Ditto explained, seeing Ben's questioning look. "During the war, the shelling opened up fissures in the plains. There's a big one right on the west edge of the City, where the ground is lower. Whole place is a big pool of carbon dioxide. That's why the Scarred Plains will kill you so fast."
"Then isn't there a gas risk here as well?" Ben gestured around. "This place is below ground."
Ditto pointed up to a post beside a street corner. There was an unlit electric beacon on the top. "Detectors in every house, lights on every street corner," he said. "The sirens go off and everyone makes for high ground while they vent the gas out. Has never happened as far as I know, but they're prepared."
"So these tunnels to the surface. They're well known, then?"
"Apparently," Ditto muttered, looking away.
Reett sat back. "Maybe," she answered. "Depends on who you are."
"But if you know about them, don't the authorities know too? Why doesn't the Syndic Prime have the tunnels blocked up?
"Ah-ha!" exclaimed Reett. "Well, that's it, isn't it? She has to keep them open so they can bring in more skreatbats!"
Ditto huffed. "You're nuts, you know that?"
Reett laughed. "Everyone's nuts," she said. "Least I'm not nuts and boring."
Ben and Ditto shared a look. "Well, you can't say she's wrong–" Ben began, and then he cut himself off, spinning around.
He could sense his friend's arrival long before he actually saw her, like the sun coming out from behind a cloud. Then Shaarm came through the archway and into the garden.
"Shaarm!"
Ben dashed over and wrapped his arms around her middle. The Kheelian was wearing a new teal green coat with copper piping and looked magnificent. Pakat wasn't with her.
"Pakat is fine," Shaarm reassured immediately, stroking Ben's hair in greeting. "He is fine, Ben; he went straight to the library to get started. We will meet him there. Good morning, Arendet'ti. Now, let me look at you, Ben—you clearly have not been looking after yourself. When did you eat? And what did you do to your arm, for stars' sake; is that a tarva burn?"
"Who's this?" said Reett to Ben. She was hanging back, not quite hostile but not friendly.
"Reett," Ben beckoned her over. "Meet my very dear friend, Shaarm. Shaarm, this is Reett. She's a…friend from work."
"Good morning Reett," Shaarm greeted, politely. Reett just sniffed. She clearly didn't think much of Kheelians.
"Are you ready to go?" Shaarm asked Ben.
"Go where?" Reett asked, immediately. "Where are we going?"
"Shaarm is going to show me the university library," Ben explained. "I have some research to do, though honestly it might be rather a long shot."
"Research?" Reett repeated, wrinkling her nose in distaste. "In a library?"
Shaarm leaned down towards Ditto, holding out a handful of credit chips. "We did not have time for a first meal before we left the inn, and if the way Ben looks is anything to go by, you could all use something to eat as well. Perhaps, Ditto, you and Reett would not mind fetching some breakfast for everyone?"
"Then come and meet us in the library," Ben suggested. "It's likely this won't take long."
The pair launched upon the idea, and the credits, with gusto, and soon were heading back the way they had come towards a deli Ditto knew. As they went around the corner their heads were conspiratorially close, but Ben found he didn't mind the thought of being discussed as much as he had before. Reett had proved trustworthy enough, in her own way.
Shaarm and Ben had their own catching up to do, and as Shaarm led the way on through the university buildings, she quickly recounted her and Pakat's actions since the train—which mainly seemed to involve hotel rooms and harassing journalists and members of the judiciary about Ben's innocence—before she turned to quizzing Ben. As Ben gave his own rapid account of the days they had been separated, they passed in through a wide doorway and then down long stone-cut hallways, brightly painted with angular, mathematical patterns and intersecting spirals. They crossed another open courtyard and then Shaarm led them into Library Spire, a freestanding stalagmite apparently dedicated entirely to the store of knowledge. First there was a wide entrance hall, scurrying with thirty or forty students deep in an air of academic distraction. Half a dozen doors led away to other rooms, but Shaarm headed straight for the furthest left without hesitation. They wove their way through a cavernous room of towering cases of bound paper books and thin drawers of precious parchment sheets and maps, and finally turned off into a smaller room which was more bare than any they had so far walked through, fitted out with just a handful of bookcases carrying esoteric-looking journals, soft reading cushions around the walls and a row of data terminals on low tables. A closed door at the far end of the room presumably led on to further hallways.
There was only one sentient in the room, lit up blue by the light of a data screen, elbows deep in piles of flimsi, datapads and other documents. Pakat glanced up as Shaarm and Ben came in, and then beckoned them quickly over. As they approached, Ben realised that Pakat was talking to someone on the vidscreen.
"...Here they are," Pakat was saying. "Yes, Shaarm has him. Here…"
He got up and reached for Ben, gently pulling the man forward and down in front of the low viewscreen.
"Ben!" cried a familiar voice, and there on the screen were three faces that Ben hadn't even wanted to acknowledge how desperately he had missed; little Tiki squished up too close to the screen on the right, Ooouli beside her leaning in, a blur of excited motion, and behind them Chana's giant form filling all the rest of the image.
"Ben, it's you!" yelled Ooouli again. "We missed you. Where have you been?"
"Where?" Tiki echoed. She waved Benben the doll.
"Hello Ooouli," Ben said. His throat felt tight. "Hello Tiki, hello Chana. I've missed you all so much."
"Grandmother is here too," Chana leaned in beside Ooouli, and a blurry blue face briefly leaned across the screen to wave before disappearing again. "We are at her office in Tszaaf."
"Papa says you have been having adventures!" Ooouli interrupted, all but vibrating with excitement and envy. "Tell us all about it!"
"Oh," said Ben, slowly, as he felt Shaarm and Pakat settle down behind him. "It's not much of an adventure really. There was a huge storm that held up the train. Then when we arrived at the city, someone dropped a lot of fireworks and it made a tremendous noise. I made two new friends called Ditto and Reett—Ditto is a Twi'lek, which is a different kind of pechnar—and I have a job now, out in Green District working on the farm. Like your garden at home, though much, much bigger. But I want to know about you all, what have you been doing?"
Ooouli began to recount their own adventures in Tszaaf and Thet, making repairs to the house, exploring all the hidden places in the Dhosana enclave, playing in the fields. Tiki chimed in with the occasional excited laugh or observation, and there also was Chana's gentle rumbling voice, but Ben found he couldn't take in any of their words, too focussed on trying to remember the gestures of their hands, the emotion in their eyes, and the play of light and shadow on their faces. He loved them with a desperate, painful ache.
It was Ooouli's voice again that broke him from his reverie. "It feels like you have been gone ages, Ben. When are you coming home?"
"Soon," he promised. "I don't know when, Ooouli, but soon, I hope. There are some things I must do first. You look after your Dada and Tiki in the meantime, okay?"
"Of course!" Ooouli said, looking almost offended.
"Hug," announced Tiki. "Hug for Ben and Mama and Papa."
The two children wrapped themselves around the vid recorder which of course had the effect of merely blocking the lens with a dark blur. Ben laid his palm on the screen where their image was, feeling the flat, smooth warmth beneath his palm. Pakat and Shaarm leaned in and fitted their giant hands beside his own, and when the children pulled back they copied the gesture.
"Children, we must go now," said Chana gently, as he lifted his hand from the screen. Reluctantly, the others followed. "We are nearly out of time. It is your bedtime, and Mama and Papa have many things to do. Say goodbye now."
"Bye!" cried Ooouli, on her feet again, her livewire energy unabated.
"Bye-bye," said Tiki, and added, "Don't be sad, Ben."
"I'm not sad," Ben said. "I'm happy that I got to see you today. And Benben too."
"As are we!" said Grandmother's voice off camera. Tiki smiled, and stuck her thumb in her mouth, the cloth doll tucked in his usual place under her chin.
"Shaarm, take care," said Chana, looking intently into the screen. "Be safe, all of you."
"We will," Ben promised.
The call ended and the screen turned a neutral grey. Ben saw himself and the Kheelians reflected in the dark surface.
"I would swear Ooouli has grown since we last saw her," Ben said as he turned away, trying for a lighthearted tone.
"Do not be silly," said Pakat. "It has only been twelve days!"
"Twelve?" said Ben. "It feels so long I can barely remember. Years, perhaps."
"Oh!" exclaimed Pakat. "Here is a thought; would you like a picture? I can get one from our official residency record. Here…"
He tapped something into the data terminal, and after a moment a page appeared on the screen, headed SHAARM RESIDENCE, THET. Below it there were a number of data entries, and an image. Pakat tapped on it, and then got up, going to a flimsi printer at the end of the row as it hummed into life. He handed the resulting flimsi to Ben, casually. It was a family picture, a flat static image rather than a hologram. It must have been taken some months ago, perhaps half a year, for Tiki was notably younger, more round in the face and her fur sticking out in adorable tufts. Standing beside her, with long arms wrapped around her sister, was Ooouli wearing brand new school robes, beaming at the camera. Behind sat the three parents, Pakat in the centre, flanked by Shaarm on one side and Chana on the other. Chana was laughing, his head thrown back. Sitting beside him, a little distant but connected, was Grandmother, a slight, knowing smile on her face.
"Here," said Pakat. "This is from the Festival of Middle Growing last year. Ooouli had just started school in Tszaaf. We have not had time to update the pic; we must do that as soon as we are home so you are in there too! But this is for you to keep for now, if you would like."
"Yes," said Ben, gripping the flimsi tight. "I would like it, very much."
Pakat beamed, and for a moment he looked just like Tiki. Ben carefully folded the flimsi and tucked it away in his satchel.
"Now," said Shaarm, clasping her hands together. "We came here to call home, but also to learn what we can about you, Ben. This library is the biggest in the City, and it is one of the only places we can access any of the Republic holonet. I do not know that we will be able to find what you are looking for; if there are answers anywhere, it will be here. But before we begin looking, we just wanted you to be sure this is what you want."
Ben frowned. "Yes," he said. "I want to know who I am, where I came from. Of course I do."
Pakat held up a hand. "We understand," he said. "And we are not saying you should not, if it is truly what you want.
"Then what are you saying?"
"We are saying," continued Shaarm, patiently, "that you do not have to know. That is not the only possible future, Ben. Perhaps…well, perhaps it is time you stopped worrying about who you were, and looked instead at who you are now. Who you want to be from this point on. You can leave that old life behind and make yourself anew. Not many people get that chance."
"I…" said Ben, dumbfounded by the suggestion. This had been his goal for so long, and he had thought his friends supported him in it. But they were right, of course. He could walk away. He had a new name, a new home. Connections and friends and family. Even a job! But if he turned away now, went back to that without knowing what and where he had come from…well, it would not be choosing that life. It would be settling for it. And though he knew whatever he learned he would always want this life, here, with the Kheelians, he was also certain that there would always be a hollow place in him that would ring with the absence of that truth. He would not really be able to find peace here without first knowing what he had left behind to gain it.
"I understand," Ben said. "But I have to know."
Shaarm smiled. Of course she understood.
"Well then," said Pakat, clapping his hands. "Let us get to it!"
Shaarm nodded. "Very well. Pakat, Ben's new friends are going to come here shortly with food. If we are staying a while, I will leave a message in the entrance hall telling them where to find us. Can you show Ben what we have found so far? I will be right back."
As Shaarm disappeared out of the main door, Ben turned to Pakat. "You have found something?"
Pakat gestured to the papers spread around. "It is not actually very much," he admitted. "I started trying to learn more about the Jedi, but I admit I got distracted, and fell into a narm burrow reading some articles about phytoremediation. I was about to start searching the holonet, though we do have quite limited access because we are not in the Republic. Where do you think we should we start?"
"We are looking for evidence of who I was before, in my old life," said Ben, stroking his beard as he thought. "Some hints of where I came from. But given that all I know is my age and that I am probably human, that limits things somewhat. Can we start by looking for anything about the ship we found crashed on the moor?"
But that got them nowhere, and neither did searches for bounty hunter, lightsaber or Jedi. They were too general to be useful as search terms, with millions of results. Ben took out his list of memories but it contained only vague recollections of places and events, nothing concrete enough to act as a starting point.
"What about Skywalker?" said Pakat, suddenly.
Ben furrowed his brow in confusion. "Skywalker? What is that?"
Pakat nodded as if to himself. "Of course, you will have forgotten. He is the leader of the pretend Jedi who are chasing you, the ones who attacked you on the train. Or at least that is what he said his name is. You did not believe him."
"Well, it's a start," said Ben, doubtfully. "Although it could just as easily be an invented alias. I'll look through these papers and see if anything is familiar…"
It was only a few moments though before Pakat sat up. "Well," he said. "It is not made up! Skywalker is a real person."
Ben put down the flimsi he was holding. "Oh?"
"There are quite a lot of records," said Pakat. "Anakin Skywalker, leader in the Republic war for the Jedi. Human male, Jedi, born on a planet called Tatooine….hmm." He scrolled through some more entries.
"Is there a pic?" Ben asked as he came over. Pakat was pointing at the screen. "Yes, lots. It seems he is a bit of a poster child for the Republic. There are lots of holonews vids. We can probably access some of them. But here, there is a still pic."
Ben stepped around and looked down at the screen. The man, Skywalker, was young, perhaps 25, though the prominent scar across his right eye might make him look older than he perhaps was. He was probably thought handsome, and his expression suggested he knew it too; there was a proud tilt to his chin, a brash confidence in his stance. Sandy hair curled in effortless waves around his ears and shoulders, too long to be practical. The screen was not clear enough to see what colour his eyes were, but Ben thought they were probably blue.
"Did you know him?" asked Pakat.
Ben looked at the picture for a long time, and then slowly shook his head. "No. I don't think so. It's certainly not the man from the train. There was…something, perhaps. A fragment of a memory but…it's gone now." He leaned in. "Is there any more information?"
"Let us see," said Pakat, and went back to the main page. "Hmm. Well, it says he is attached to the Jedi Order Temple on Coruscant. He has a student…hmm…Commands the 501st Clone Battalion…Oh, and it says in this holonews article that he often works with his former Jedi master, someone named Obi–"
The Force cried out in warning, and at the same moment the door opened. Ben spun around as Shaarm came in. She paused slightly, seeing the look on Ben's face and the 'saber in his hand.
"Ben," she said, looking between them. "Pakat. What in all the stars is wrong?"
Then, three bipeds pushed into the room behind her, slamming the door closed. They each had a blaster raised and trained on Ben.
The 'saber ignited. Ben's memory might be about as safe to rely on a leaking fuel reactor, but about these three sentients he had no doubts. There was a petite human woman with close cropped red hair, face swirling with blue tattoos. A Zygerrian with a newly severed hand. And there was the tall man with the light brown hair and the cruel mouth. The one whom Ben had fought on the train. The one that called himself…
"Skywalker."
The three came forward into the room, blasters unwavering. Ben kept the 'saber raised.
"Ben," said Shaarm in Kheeli. She looked stricken. "I am sorry. I did not see them follow me."
"It's alright," said Ben, calmly, even as he tried to keep all three within his line of sight. "Shaarm, it's alright." He beckoned to her with his free hand. "Just get behind me, both of you."
"Touching," said the leader in Basic, and then as Pakat began to step sideways, he snapped his blaster round to train it on the Kheelian. "Ah, don't move! What do you think this is, amateur hour?" He glanced back at Ben. "As if we wouldn't know how to recognize your furry friends after that banthershit on the train. Daveed has been following them for a week. I knew they'd lead us to you eventually." He stepped forward, blaster back on Ben now that the others had stopped moving. "Now, how about you hand the lightsaber over to my associate, and no-one has to get hurt."
"Oh, I don't think so," said Ben, eyes flicking between the enemies slowly closing off all escape. "I've tried your idea of hospitality before. I'm not eager to repeat the experience."
"You remember that do you?" said the man with a grin that had no humour in it at all. "Well, I'm sorry but what you want doesn't really enter into my considerations. Put down the lightsaber. I won't ask again."
Ben didn't move. His mind was spinning. Three enemies. Three blasters trained on him. Two exits to the room, one behind his enemies, and one behind him and his friends, but they would never make it in time. The Zygerrian was wounded, his wrist stump was bandaged up into a sling across his chest. A weakness to be exploited. If Skywalker fired, Ben knew he could deflect the shot. But if a fight broke out would Shaarm and Pakat run towards him, or away? If he tried to reach cover, rolling to the side to dive behind the data terminals, would the Kheelians move fast enough to get to safety? If he ran towards the false Jedi, would the two other accomplices standing behind him start shooting too, or would they hesitate just long enough?
Whatever happened, he refused to make this easy for them. He'd go down fighting or not at all. Ben gripped the lightsaber and met the man's eye, defiant.
"Very well," the man with the blaster said with a sigh, like this was all a minor inconvenience. "Then we'll do this your way."
He raised his blaster and Ben tensed, ready to deflect the shot, but then the false Jedi turned. He took aim briefly, and fired.
"No!"
Shaarm staggered for a moment, and then she crumpled to the floor without a sound. Pakat leapt for her, skidding across the floor and falling to her side. Ben took two steps to follow, but the false Jedi was raising the blaster again.
"Ah! Wasn't one enough? Stay where you are. Drop the lightsaber on the floor and kick it over."
Ben froze, but his eyes were fixed on Pakat, on Shaarm, on the charred cloth and scorched smoke coiling up beneath Pakat's hands. The stench of burnt fur tainted the air. There was a ringing sound in his ears, louder almost than Pakat calling Shaarm's name, over and over.
"Please," Ben said, but he wasn't even sure what he was pleading for.
The man with the blaster shook his head, once. The barrel was aimed at Pakat now. "Drop the 'saber," he said, shortly. "Or they both die. This is the last time I will ask."
Ben looked between the false Jedi and his two accomplices. They had spread out, covering a wide semi-circle, greater than the range of his vision. No matter how he turned, one would always be at his back. Even then, he was sure he could disarm two, but the third? The outcome was certain. His friends would die before he could move.
He didn't have a choice.
Ben deactivated the lightsaber and slowly lowered the device to the floor. The hilt made a gentle clicking sound as it rolled across the cold stone, slowly coming to a stop as he intended halfway between himself and the bounty hunter.
The man didn't rise to the bait. "Alianda," he ordered, and the female accomplice stepped forwards, blaster aimed straight at Ben. Keeping herself well out of his reach, she collected up the lightsaber and handed it back to her boss, who attached it to his own belt.
Pakat was leaning over Shaarm, pressing desperately over her torso. She was still alive, but Ben could see her moving, shuddering with agony. Anger burned up inside him, more fierce and more destructive than he could ever remember having felt before. He looked at the false Jedi.
"I don't know who you are," Ben said, low and cold, "but if my friend dies, I promise you; I will destroy you so utterly that no-one else will ever know, either."
"No idle threats, please," the fake Jedi said. He sounded resigned, but his eyes glinted with a mad, maniac light and Ben thought he was amused. "It is unbecoming of a Jedi. The binders, Ali."
"On it," said the woman, Alianda. She handed the leader her blaster, so there was no chance for Ben to grab it when she got close, and pulled out a pair of binders.
"Kneel on the floor," the female bounty hunter ordered. "Put your hands behind your head."
Ben gritted his teeth, but behind him, he could still hear Pakat calling to Shaarm, low and desperate. He knelt down and raised his hands.
Alianda and the Zygerrian both moved towards him, slowly and carefully, while the false Jedi covered them both. The Zygerrian moved behind Ben and the Force was thrumming with warning. Alianda stepped in, raising the binders, and took hold of his wrist. That was when Ben smelled it, the thing she was carrying in her pocket, something that had a sharp chemical scent, something dangerous. The Force thrummed with warning, and visceral fear ignited the instinct to fight; he threw the Zygerrian aside with a Force push and launched himself backwards, taking the woman off her feet. He hit the ground with her beneath him; rolled, ready to strike out.
"Hey!" shouted the False Jedi, loud and sharp. And then, much quieter, he heard another voice whisper:
"Ben."
He froze. Looking up, he saw Pakat was still crouched beside Shaarm's body but the man who had called himself Skywalker was standing right over them. His blaster was pressed up against the back of Pakat's head.
Ben didn't move, barely dared to breathe. "All right," he said, slow and even. "All right. Don't shoot." He let go of Alianda's jacket and raised his hands, slowly.
The woman scrambled to her feet again, and grabbed at his arms roughly, clearly furious. She yanked his wrists back behind him and slammed the binders shut, tight and unyielding. Then, before Ben had a chance to move, the Zygerrian grabbed his arm in a vice-like grip, twisted it to the side, and a hypoinjector was shoved against the muscle.
A drug. That was what he had smelled before.
The injection site burned, and then rapidly turned ice-cold. They let go of him and, unable to block his fall, Ben fell forward onto his face. Cold tendrils like icy vines crawled out into his blood, and coiled up in his veins. He reached for the Force but it was like trying to grasp oily water with his bare hands. His head spun, his mind slowed and his limbs felt like heavy stones.
Slowly he managed to roll on to his side, heart thudding slow, too slow in his chest, hands going numb. Whatever the hell was in that syringe, it acted fast.
"What…" he mumbled, trying to lift his head.
"A Force suppressant, mixed with a mild sedative," the false Jedi answered his incomprehensible question. "Enough to keep you compliant. It's a shame you destroyed the inhibitor cuff. It was rather expensive, and chemical Force suppressants can have so many unpleasant side-effects. But I am not in the mood to play any more silly games, General. We are going to wait here, nice and quiet, for my pilot to bring our transport in and then we will be leaving, and these poor creatures can get on with whatever they were doing before you showed up and ruined their lives."
With a strength of will that he didn't know he possessed, Ben reined in his anger and fear, clamping it all down deep within himself under locks made of durasteel. He had to think, think through the numbing fog of sedative, think through the painful cold of the Force suppressant. He didn't need his fury at this man's words, or his terror for Shaarm, clouding his mind. If he couldn't keep control, keep alert, the others would certainly die. He forced himself slowly up onto his knees, swaying dizzyily. The room swam.
"Tell me who you really are," Ben managed to get the words out. If he could keep the man talking, there was a chance, maybe, that he could still come up with a way to get out of this. That something could save Shaarm before her time ran out. "I know you aren't Skywalker. Tell me who you are. You at least owe me that much."
"I suppose that's only fair," the false Jedi conceded, polite now that he held all the cards. He had taken his blaster off Pakat's neck and moved a few metres away from the Kheelians but the weapon remained unwaveringly trained on them. "I'm Seth-Lorka Kaiden. My friends call me Seth. I'd bow, but–"
"We are hardly friends," Ben pointed out.
"No, I suppose not," Kaiden agreed. "Who knows, in another life perhaps..." He glanced over at Pakat and Shaarm. "Speaking of friends, I'm not a total monster, you know. Your furry yellow friend may fetch a first aid kit. I believe I saw one on the wall in the last room, but if he tries anything I'll shoot the other one in the head. Do these creatures understand Basic?"
Ben neglected to answer, and called out to Pakat in Kheeli, his tongue heavy and clumsy in his mouth.
"Pakat...He says you can fetch the medical kit from the next room. I'm sorry."
Pakat didn't reply, but Ben saw the Kheelian get up and move across the room. The woman Alianda hid her blaster under her jacket and followed Pakat out of the room. The other two didn't take their eyes off Ben. Oh, they were professionals all right.
A few moments later Pakat returned, with the bounty hunter following closely, and Ben heard the click of the medical case opening.
"How bad is it?" Ben called over in Kheeli.
"I do not know. Bad," was all Pakat said in reply, before Kaiden snapped:
"Enough talking. Don't take advantage of my generosity."
"Transport in five minutes, boss," said Alianda, touching an earpiece. Ben closed his eyes briefly, fighting back against the weakness and crippling numbness. The Force was gone once more, torn from him. Pakat was held hostage and Shaarm...Shaarm was dying. The fight was over before it began.
"Why are you doing this to us?" he found himself asking. "What did I do to you?"
To his surprise, Kaiden laughed, short and bitter.
"Kenobi, don't act the innocent. For one thing, you've killed four of us. There was Tam, Bos'caldine and Zsalot back on the ship, and then Gurra on the train. They were my friends, you bastard!" It took Kaiden a moment to get his fury back under control. "They didn't have to die. But I suppose I can't blame you for defending yourself. And yes, it's true that before this little escapade, before we snatched you on Feraxiya, you didn't do a thing to me. In fact, our paths have never crossed."
"Then why, for stars' sake?"
"Ah, well," Kaiden said. "What you should have asked is what did the Jedi do to me? Nothing. They did nothing either. Not one thing, while villages and towns were slaughtered and burned and crumbled to ash. But I don't hold a grudge. Honestly, I don't. I'm a grown up. I know that you can't be everywhere. It's a large, large galaxy after all. You have a war to win, and you're not the aggressors. It's not like the Jedi started it. It's not as if they grew a slave army in secret; it's not as if they launched that first invasion at Geonosis. The Jedi are not to blame."
Ben felt himself grow dizzier the longer Kaiden spoke. He tried to focus, tried to force urgency into his sluggish pulse, to keep drawing in breaths through the numbing sludge of the chemicals suffocating him from the inside. There was no time even to wonder if any of Kaiden's words were true. He pushed it all away, dragging his thoughts into order. He needed every fragment of his attention on watching Kaiden. The man had so far been speaking for about fifty seconds and he hadn't relaxed a single muscle. His blaster muzzle never wavered, and none of his henchmen so much as glanced away from Ben. There would be no taking them by surprise. There was so much at stake and they had no way out. Kaiden's pilot was coming.
"I don't remember any of that," Ben said, slowly. These enemies were too professional to let their guard down but Kaiden was clearly a talker. Sooner or later he'd let something slip, something personal, maybe even a way for Ben to get beneath his skin and rattle him enough to make a mistake. If Ben could do that in less than four minutes, and if he could keep from passing out.
"I don't know what you're talking about," he said.
"Poor, blank little Jedi," Kaiden sighed. "Of course you don't. I expect you don't remember how much the Seppies pay for captured Jedi, either. And as for you...well, your bounty goes up by the hour."
"So this is just about money?" Ben sighed and shook his head. "How unutterably dull."
Kaiden laughed again. "I like you, Kenobi; it's a shame, really. Yes, money was part of it. We might be idealists, but we still have to eat. Turns out there's not a lot of credits in righteous indignation."
"So now what?" Ben said. "You take me back to your ship, strap me to that machine..."
Kaiden looked surprised. "Hmm, you remember the machine, do you?"
"A little," Ben said. "Not much. Your invention, I take it?"
"I kill people for a living," said Kaiden, raising an eyebrow. "I'm not an engineer. No, it came from a...benefactor, if you must know. Prototype, very new, very hush hush. They told me it could read minds. Display a person's thoughts, their actual memories, up like a holonet show and yet do no harm to the subject. I tested it first, of course. On myself actually, to make sure it wouldn't cause the subject any damage, and it worked perfectly. We aimed big. If we could capture someone high-up in the Republic and read their mind, access their memories...all that information! Troop movements, intelligence contacts, clearance codes, new weapon designs, tactics, hyperspace routes…No torture necessary, just quick and painless results. Humane, one might say. We could sell the prisoner to one buyer, and then sell the data from their memories to someone else. Half the effort, twice the reward. One step closer."
"Closer to what?"
"Ah, now you're getting it." Kaiden's eyes gleamed with that now familiar mania. "You see, I have one very simple goal. This war ends. I don't care who wins or who loses. But it ends, by any means. And, let's face it, I think it's clear it won't be the Republic that walk away the victors. That's fact, not defeatism. But the war ends. I will end it."
"Why?"
Kaiden stared at him hard. "Before the fighting started and the invasions began I had- well, I won't bore you with the details of my common little tragedy. Safe to say, take away everything a man has, and you're left with someone who has nothing left to lose. And a man with nothing to lose is a very dangerous thing, don't you think?"
If there hadn't been children in that house, Kaiden had once said, I would have burned it to the ground.
Ben didn't answer. Suddenly the emotions he was controlling weren't anger and fear, but sorrow. Pity. What horrors did it take to create something like Kaiden? To forge grief and loss into a living weapon, into a man so cold and so unforgiving that he would choose such a road as this to peace? But there was no time now to even wonder. It was clear that, even if driven to this madness by some unspeakable tragedy, any compassion Kaiden might once have had had been burned out of him, and there was nothing hesitant now about his actions or his resolve. He would slaughter the Kheelians without a second thought, wade through rivers of blood, to reach his goal. To pity him now would only end in death. Ben drew his focus in for a moment, sensing the drugs flowing in his system, pooling in his limbs, dragging him down. But he was still conscious, still holding on. Still fighting. The Force flickered and pulsed weakly. He pictured the chemical molecules in his blood, reached clumsily for them. Driving his own metabolism on, flooding his system with enzymes…
Behind him, he heard Pakat rustling in the first aid kit, heard him humming, low and desperate, trying to keep himself calm. He couldn't hear Shaarm breathing any more.
The bounty hunter Alianda went to the door, and looked out. The Zygerrian crossed around behind Ben again, out of sight. Kaiden turned to glance towards Pakat.
"So your entire plan to end a galactic war hinged on just me," Ben slurred out, trying to keep Kaiden's attention away from the Kheelians. "How unfortunate for you."
"Don't be so modest, General. You may have been laughably easy to capture, but to give you due credit, you were tough to crack," Kaiden said, turning back and he sounded genuinely impressed. "I've learned many useful skills in my time, but we still got nothing out of you the old-fashioned way. No matter what we did, you didn't talk. But it softened you up nicely for the machine and that...that worked beautifully. You resisted it at first and it was pretty hard on you, but it didn't take long for us to start getting what we wanted. Then Gurra persuaded me to give you a little more time to recover between sessions and the next time we opened up your cell you'd just...lost your mind. We never had time to figure out what happened – if you were faking, if it was stress or the torture, or whether the Jedi themselves did it to you. After all, Skywalker was already sneaking about on the space station by then. Maybe he somehow attacked you, zapped your brain clean, just to keep their secrets safe."
"So you really didn't...erase my memories?"
Kaiden shook his head. "I told you before. That would be kind of counter-productive, don't you think? We wanted what was in your head, not the rest of you. No. But before we knew what was going on, Skywalker snatched you out from under our noses and you were gone. Well, at first I was furious. I'm kind of unbalanced anyway, you might have noticed, so it wasn't that pretty. After a while these guys," Kaiden gestured to the other bounty hunters. "They almost convinced me to give it up—we'd find ourselves another Jedi. After all, capturing you had been easy. But then I realised just what a gift we'd let slip through our fingers. A Jedi with no memories. Someone with the intelligence and cunning, the strength, muscle memory and Force abilities of General Kenobi, but without all that pesky, rigid, conceited, morally-superior Jedi Code? Oh, what a weapon that could be! Take you in, teach you, train you. Wind you up and set you loose. How many Jedi could you slaughter before you were stopped, do you think? Ten? Twenty? More, if you took them truly by surprise. Enough to cripple the Republic's last defenders. Enough to bring an end to this war."
Something of Ben's thoughts must have shown on his face. Kaiden's mouth twisted.
"You think me a monster." He shrugged. "I suppose perhaps I am. War makes monsters of us all, doesn't it? Monsters or corpses. Yes, even the Jedi. How many lines have you crossed, for the sake of an easy victory? Don't answer that, I know you don't know. The Jedi might twitch along on loftier strings than the rest of us, but they are still puppets nonetheless. You see, we're both peacekeepers in our own way. I'm just willing to acknowledge what measures are necessary to save lives. You are not."
There was a little electronic beep and a light started to flash on Kaiden's communicator.
"They're here," said the Zygerrian.
"Time to go, General Kenobi," Kaiden said. "Get up."
Ben looked over to Pakat and their eyes met.
"Ben," Pakat said, and then fell silent. His palms were pressing on Shaarm's wound but there was clearly nothing more he could do. Shaarm lay silent and unmoving.
Ben turned to Kaiden, "I can save her," he said low, urgent. "I'll go with you, willingly. I won't fight, but please, let me save her first. A last request."
Something flashed across Kaiden's face for a moment. Was it some compassion at last? Regret?
"No," Kaiden said, shortly. "No, I don't think so. But if you come with me right now, I won't shoot the other one too, and there might be time for him to get help for your friend."
Ben glanced back at Pakat. The Kheelian met his look, wide-eyed and frightened. Desperate. His hands fluttered nervously.
"Get up," Kaiden snapped at Ben again.
Ben didn't move. Someone grabbed him under the arm and began to drag him up to his feet. His legs gave out and he almost fell.
"Kriff's sake," muttered Kaiden, and gestured Alianda over too. She holstered her blaster and then she and the Zygerrian hauled Ben up to unsteady feet. The woman pushed his bound wrists up painfully behind his back so he couldn't straighten up or pull away from her grip. Ben couldn't see Shaarm or Pakat any more.
"Move," said Kaiden. His voice held a grim satisfaction that made Ben feel nauseous, or maybe that was the sedative. The two bounty hunters dragged Ben, stumbling, to the door. He twisted to glance back and caught one last look of his Kheelians and beside them was Kaiden, blaster still aimed at Pakat. Ensuring Ben's compliance until the very end.
They arrived at the door, and the Zygerrian let go of Ben's arm to reach for the handle. In the very corner of his vision, Ben saw Kaiden turn towards the door, his back to the Kheelians.
"Now!" cried Pakat.
Ben didn't waste a second for thought or doubt. He threw himself forward, yanking his arms out of the woman's grip and dived into a forward roll. He came up, less than a second later, to see Kaiden turning back towards his hostages, saw Shaarm—impossibly, fantastically—alive and breathing and standing up. She reared up on her back legs to her full, magnificent three-and-half metres of height, bringing up her arm and then there was a sudden flash of blue like a flare, and the second lightsaber was in her hand and bursting into life.
Kaiden fired and Shaarm slashed the 'saber through the air towards the blaster bolt; slow and unfamiliar, but just fast enough to deflect the shot into the wall. Then she leaned back and simply threw the glowing lightsaber into the air over the bounty hunter's heads, sending it arcing high towards Ben.
The bounty hunters scattered. Ben dashed forward, reaching for his 'saber with the Force but the power was sluggish and unresponsive in his grasp. He was going to be too slow. But he could already see Kaiden aiming the blaster again towards the now defenceless Shaarm. He fired twice, but then Pakat was there, yanking Shaarm aside. She fell back and Pakat came around, swinging. The medical box in his hands smacked into Kaiden's face with all the strength Pakat's giant form could muster; it was probably like running face-first into a wall. Kaiden dropped like a stone, the blaster clattering away.
The second lightsaber landed two metres from Ben, floor steaming as the blade melted a strip into the inlaid stone floor, and now Alianda was firing too.
"Run!" Ben yelled at the Kheelians, dodging her blasts, only for the Zygerrian to grab him round the throat from behind and drag him back. Ben choked and slipped, and then as he fell he rammed his elbow back hard into the Zygerrian's chest, grinding the bony joint down onto the bounty hunter's severed wrist stump. The Zygerrian gave a catlike screech and let go.
Ben threw himself into a clumsy somersault to avoid another spray of blaster bolts and sprinted for the 'saber where it lay on the floor, steaming and spitting. He calculated the angle as best he could, skidded down beside the blade and rolled straight over the searing plasma. A sharp flash of agony flared through his right forearm where the blade nicked him, but as he came up on his knees, the binders melted and fell away. He snatched up the 'saber just in time to counter two blaster bolts aimed at his head. Alianda gave a yell and stumbled back.
"Ben!" A Kheelian voice yelled and he ran blindly towards it, skidding under a high table and then leaping over the row of data terminals. Blaster bolts were flashing past him; he cut two more from the air and then he was at the rear doors, right on the heels of his Kheelians. He sprinted through, just as Shaarm yelled, "Now!"
Both Kheelians both threw their weight behind a massive bookcase which stood in the next room. Pakat braced his feet against the wall and pushed, sending the huge unit toppling, crashing down across the doorway trapping Kaiden and his crew, for the moment, inside.
"Go, go!" Ben yelled as the dust and flimsi pages billowed up into the air. Pakat grabbed Shaarm's hand and the three of them ran.
TBC