Part 38 (2/2)

Darth Chratis's lightning pa.s.sed through s.h.i.+gar's body and down to his left hand. There it concentrated into a ball, blindingly bright. Waiting to be set free.

Strike me, said the voice, and rise up again, stronger than ever before.

”Die, ” said s.h.i.+gar in a voice that didn't sound like his own. ”Die!”

When he raised his hand, Darth Chratis wasn't even looking at him. The Sith Lord's attention had been captured by a shadow that had fallen across them. The thing that had cast it was enormous and bulbous, like a fist as big as a city rising slowly out of the lake. Lava dripped from it like water.

Such was his shock that the Sith lightning concentrated in s.h.i.+gar's left hand fizzled out. The rest went with it, along with the pain. s.h.i.+gar understood then, with piercing clarity, that he had been the source of all of it, ever since Darth Chratis's initial lightning strike. The voice whispering in his mind-and the doubts it had expressed-had been none other than his own.

His lightsaber lay in blackened pieces at his feet. His suit stank of smoke.

He stood up. The thing from the lake towered over them, no longer rising, just looming, blocking out the sky. The noise it made was deep and resonant, like the song of a deep-sea mammal. It sounded like a summons, offered in the language of worlds.

A small silver dot moved across the sky: Stryver's scout. Beyond that hung the brilliant constellations of the combined fleets. Flashes of light danced among them, indicating that they were returning fire. s.h.i.+gar couldn't tell if they were firing at the hexes or one another.

He looked down at his hands. His gloves were burned right through, but his fingers and palms were undamaged.

This is the path laid down for you, said Master Satele into his mind. They were the same words she had used on Coruscant.

s.h.i.+gar almost wept with commingled triumph and despair. She was alive, but where did that leave him? Was he tainted by the dark side even though he hadn't actually struck out at Darth Chratis? Had Master Satele truly known all along that it would come to this, and never warned him?

Again he thought of Larin, telling him that he was lucky for being lifted out of obscurity to train for the Jedi Order. He had even believed her, and found strength in the knowledge that his Master and the High Council would endure. Whatever happens today, you'll go back to the life you know.

Not anymore.

The galaxy is painted in black and white, he realized, feeling the truth and certainty of it deep in every bone. But from far enough away, it all looks gray.

CHAPTER 40.

Thick red currents pulled Ax irresistibly downward, tumbling her like a red blood cell in a heart attack. Master Satele gripped her wrist so tightly she feared her bones might break, and she gripped the Jedi back just as hard. She could see nothing but her heads-up display and hear nothing but alarms. The precise specifications of the Republic armored environment suit were unknown to her, but she imagined its cooling systems screaming as they tried to radiate the excess heat, only to be overwhelmed and fail.

She waited, but that didn't happen. They were tumbling just as violently as before, but she wasn't getting any hotter.

Instead, a strange feeling came over her, a feeling that was neither entirely physical nor entirely psychic. For all the battering and pummeling going on, she wasn't in any immediate danger of being crushed or burned. The fluid just looked like lava. She wasn't being drowned. Tasted, perhaps? Or embraced... ?

A powerful urge to swim overcame her, but not to reach the surface. There was something in the lake with them, something that wanted her to come closer. She began to kick and struggle against the current. Master Satele was a deadweight until she divined Ax's intention and joined in the effort. They wriggled through the thick, red ma.s.s, body length by painful body length, occasionally striking solid objects being swept along with the flow. Some clutched at her, but Ax couldn't tell if they were people or hexes, or an entirely new manifestation of the Sebaddon phenomenon. Instead of stopping, she swam on, following the only compa.s.s she had: her gut.

Her questing fingers found something hard and stable submerged in the lava-like liquid. It was smooth and slightly curved, like the side of a submarine. She and Master Shan explored it, looking for a way in. They found extrusions that might have been antennas, cannons, and sublight drives.

A s.h.i.+p. That was where she was supposed to go. Something inside had brought her here.

Satele Shan pulled her closer, touched faceplates. The red liquid parted just enough for Ax to glimpse the Grand Master's private universe. Her face was drawn but composed.

”Air lock, ” she said. ”This way. ”

”Do you think it'll work in this stuff?”

”There's only one way to find out. ”

They pulled apart, and Master Satele guided her hand to the panel she had found. The controls were instantly recognizable. Ax had seen them on thousands of s.h.i.+ps. Thousands of Imperial s.h.i.+ps.

She pushed the top b.u.t.ton: OPEN. A sudden current swept them closer as the empty chamber sucked in fluid. When the door was completely open, they swam inside and fumbled for the interior controls.

The door slid silently shut, leaving the unceasing turbulence of the fluid outside behind them. Ax floated in silence for a moment, grateful for the respite, the chance to think. Where were they? What was she doing? What had brought her here? She should be swimming for the surface, not exploring sunken artifacts while the rest of the mission fought around her.

”Are you going to open the inner door?” asked Master Satele, pressing close again.

Of course she was. She'd come too far to turn back. Her instincts tugged her on, despite her misgivings.

When she touched the CYCLE b.u.t.ton, pumps in the walls strained to drain the fluid away. Weight returned, along with light and air. They finally Jet each other go. Ax wiped her faceplate clear, and she saw Master Satele doing the same. In the midst of such strangeness, she looked as small as Ax herself. She was glad she wasn't alone.

The inner door opened, revealing a stock-standard s.h.i.+p's corridor, scuffed and dusty with age. Ax stepped out of the puddle left in the air lock and put her dripping feet gratefully on a dry surface. She checked her HUD. The air was fine. Cracking the seal on her helmet, she swung the faceplate open.

All she smelled was blood.

Master Satele stepped up beside her with her faceplate open, too. ”Any idea whose s.h.i.+p this is?”

Ax kept her thoughts to herself for the moment. She walked along the corridor to the first intersection, mentally plotting the layout. If this was a light cruiser, she decided, the command deck would be to the right, holds to the left, crew quarters down the first ladder, and engineering ahead. She chose to go right, and was rewarded with success. The command deck was small, but felt s.p.a.cious for being so empty. No instrument panels glowed. No holoprojectors projected. The only signs of life were the lights s.h.i.+ning down from above.

”Generator's clearly functional, ” said Master Satele, ”but the control systems have been disconnected. If you're thinking of getting off Sebaddon in this thing, you can forget about it. ”

The floor shook beneath them, and Ax was reminded that, although the fluid that had engulfed them hadn't been lava, they were still standing on top of a giant geothermal drilling site, on a world whose skin was about as stable as a water balloon's.

The s.h.i.+p rattled and creaked around them. The echoing of its many complaints sounded like a voice, gradually fading into silence.

”Comms are blocked by the hull, ” Master Satele went on. ”That wouldn't have been part of the s.h.i.+p's original design. ”

”They never intended to go anywhere, ” Ax said, ”or to talk to anyone. I bet this is Lema Xandret's s.h.i.+p. ”

Master Satele looked around. ”No artwork, no personalized touches, no signs of home. How can you tell?”

”There's a freight air lock aft, ” Ax said, avoiding the question. They headed back the way they had come. ”Let's see what's through there. ”

On the way they pa.s.sed row after row of empty rooms, confirming Ax's feeling that the s.h.i.+p had been abandoned. Xandret and the other fugitives had stripped everything useful or personal and moved it elsewhere. Maybe the s.h.i.+p reminded them too much of what they had left behind; maybe they had built more comfortable quarters elsewhere. Perhaps they had kept it as a memento mori, as a symbol of their isolation and abandonment, and never intended to use it again. When they had returned to the galaxy, they had used a different s.h.i.+p entirely, one they had built themselves.

Nowhere in Imperial records, Ax realized, was the name of this s.h.i.+p recorded. Unless she found a survivor, or some kind of record, she might never learn it. That hole in her mother's history bothered her as they walked and climbed through the s.h.i.+p. She knew it meant nothing, really, and that sticking on this point was a kind of self-defense against the much wider holes that might soon be filled in. But she couldn't help wondering what it had been like to live with the rock-solid reminder of your betrayal constantly at hand. Maddening, probably.

The aft freight air lock was twice as large as the one they had come through on the port side. It was open, a tubular umbilical leading to s.p.a.ces unknown. The tube swayed and rocked uncertainly under the influence of the fluid around it.

Ax pressed forward, telling herself there was nothing to fear. She agreed with Stryver. Lema Xandret is already dead. She has been for some time. There was no life in here. The colony had survived long enough to build the hexes, but then it had failed. Either the hexes had killed them, recognizing that the humans had outlived their usefulness, or they had killed themselves. All the evidence Ax expected to find of them was their bodies.

She wasn't prepared, therefore, for the intimately decorated quarters they had left behind: the pictures, journals, clothes, mobiles, meals, and more that lay scattered throughout the winding corridors of the colony, perfectly preserved in the cool, dry air, as though they had been put aside only an hour ago. There had been children living here. There were memorials to the dead, and to those left behind. Likenesses of the colonists stared out at her from every angle. She recognized her mother's face in some of the pictures. Lema Xandret had grown older here. Her face was lined, and her hair had turned gray. Her stare was sharp.

”You were right, ” said Master Satele with something like admiration in her voice. Concern, too, if Ax's ears didn't deceive her.

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