Part 14 (1/2)
Lorana shook her head. ”I'm afraid I don't understand that kind of thinking.”
”You need to learn to understand it,” Obi-Wan told her. ”Obsession is something that can happen to even the strongest person, and for the best of motives.” He gestured. ”Still, with you and me at this door, Anakin and Riske at the other, and the police and the Corporate Alliance's security watching the sky, we should be able to stop whatever they throw at us.”
”I hope you're right,” Lorana murmured. ”If not, Master C'baoth will never let us hear the end of it.”
Seated on his hotel room balcony, Doriana smiled down at the scene below him. The players had a.s.sembled, and it was time for the performance to begin.
Picking up his comlink, he keyed it on and punched in the proper activation code. Then, setting the comlink aside, he settled down to watch.
Even stretched out to the Force, Lorana's only warning was a burst of commotion at the leftmost edge of the marketplace, a sudden movement of shoppers as they scattered away from one of the booths. ”Something's happening,” she warned, pointing.
The words were barely out of her mouth when the booth erupted in a flash of light and a burst of smoke. ”Watch out!” Obi-Wan barked, the snap-hiss of his lightsaber sounding behind her.
Lorana yanked out her own lightsaber, igniting it as she tried to pierce the expanding smoke cloud. As far as she could tell, nothing else seemed to be happening. ”To the right!” Obi-Wan warned.
Lorana turned; and to her horror she saw a silvery cylinder streak out of another of the booths, flying a bare meter above the ground.
Coming straight toward them.
”I've got it,” she said, jumping into its path and lifting her lightsaber into attack-3 position. Defense against incoming remotes was an exercise C'baoth had drilled her in for hour after wearying hour. Behind her, she sensed Obi-Wan moving back and to her right into backstop position. She settled her breathing, watching the missile approach, trying not to think about what would happen if her attack detonated the warhead . . .
It was nearly to her when, without warning, the front of the nose cone erupted into a cloud of sparkling smoke, and a cone of roiling black liquid sprayed out at her.
She squeezed her eyes tightly shut, instinctively flinching to the side as she did so. She sensed the missile start to pa.s.s, and swung her lightsaber as hard as she could in that direction.
But her sidestep had put her off balance, and even as her blade sliced through the air she knew she was too late. Behind her, she heard the pitch of Obi-Wan's lightsaber change as he took his own shot at it. But the missile's roar changed as fresh thrusters kicked in, and as the heat of the missile's exhaust swept across her she could tell that he, too, had missed.
”Come on!” he shouted. A hand grabbed her arm, and suddenly they were running through the heat and dissipating smoke in the missile's wake. She blinked her eves open, ignoring the sting as the black liquid dribbled into them, to see the missile jinking back and forth down the wide central corridor like a droid seeking a target. Across the building at the far door she saw Anakin and Riske charging in from the other door, Anakin's lightsaber blazing in his hand, Riske's blaster firing uselessly. Letting go of Lorana's arm, Obi-Wan locked his lightsaber on and hurled it at the missile.
But even as the spinning green blade closed on it, the missile's nose dipped and it made a hard turn to the left. She could sense Obi-Wan stretching to the Force, trying to bring his lightsaber back on target.
But she could also sense that he wouldn't be in time.
Which left only one thing they could do. Closing her eyes, she stretched out to the Force, turning her thoughts to her Master. Master C'baoth, she sent urgently toward the room beyond the archway. Danger. Danger. Danger.
The missile disappeared through the archway, and she joined with the others in racing down the corridor after it. She caught up with Obi-Wan just as he reached the opening, and turned the corner with him.
And found herself confronted by an extraordinary sight.
Seated at opposite ends of the table, the mining and Corporate Alliance representatives had turned in their chairs to stare with a mixture of surprise, fascination, and terror at the missile that had intruded into their solemn proceedings. Between them, half risen from his own chair, C'baoth was holding a hand palm-outward toward the missile, his eyes blazing.
But the missile was no longer moving. It was frozen in midair, halfway between the archway and the table, its thrusters spitting fire uselessly as they tried to drive it forward against C'baoth's Force grip.
”Don't be concerned,” the Jedi Master intoned, his voice resonating with power and authority. ”So certain parties believe that they know best what is right and just for Barlok, do they? That killing us will bring them their desire? That the influence of violence supersedes the authority of justice?”
The thrusters gave a final sputter and fell silent, and still the missile hung in midair. ”Thank you, Master C'baoth-” Obi-Wan said, starting toward the missile.
”Stand fast, Master Ken.o.bi,” C'baoth ordered sharply. ”That is what our attackers believe, Magistrate Argente; Guild-master Gilfrome,” he said, sending a hard look at each end of the table. ”Do you believe it, as well?”
Argente found his voice first. ”No, of course not,” he said, his voice quavering, his eyes locked on the missile that had nearly brought a sudden and violent death to them all.
”Then why do you persist in eroding the legitimate rights of the people of Barlok?” C'baoth demanded. ”And you,” he added, turning back to Gilfrome's end of the table. ”Why do you persist in denying the time and expense the Corporate Alliance has spent in developing resources that would otherwise have forever lain uselessly beneath the soil of your world?”
Gilfrome bristled. ”Now, see here, Master C'baoth-”
”No, you see,” C'baoth cut in, looking again at Argente. ”Both of you see. I have listened to your arguments and your positions and your selfish pettiness. It ends here.”
Deliberately, he closed his outstretched hand. With a raucous crackling of stressed metal, the body of the missile crumpled in on itself. ”The people of Barlok demand a fair and just decision,” he said, more quietly now as he gestured Obi-Wan forward. ”I will tell you what that decision is going to be.”
The room was silent as Obi-Wan stepped to the mutilated weapon, stretching out his hand to take its weight from C'baoth. Holding it in a Force grip in front of him, he turned and headed back toward the archway.
Lorana looked a question at C'baoth, got a microscopic nod in return, and turned to go with Obi-Wan.
It was only then that she noticed Anakin standing beneath the archway, his eyes filled with admiration as he gazed across the room at C'baoth.
”That's telling them,” he murmured as she and Obi-Wan reached him.
”Come on,” Obi-Wan said, his forehead wrinkling slightly as he looked at the boy. ”Let's get this thing to the police disposal team.”
”Report,” the gravelly voice of Darth Sidious ordered, his hooded face hovering above the holoprojector.
”The Barlok operation has been a complete success, my lord,” Doriana told him. ”Both sides of the negotiations were so shaken by the attack that C'baoth was able to force them into an agreement.”
”And is of course taking full credit for it?”
”Knowing C'baoth, there was never any doubt on that score,” Doriana said.
”Fortunately, the whole planet seems quite happy to let him have it.
Another day or two, and he'll be the hero of the entire sector. Give him a week, and he'll probably be organizing his own victory parade through midlevel Coruscant.”
”You have done well,” Sidious said. ”And what of the unantic.i.p.ated interference from Ken.o.bi and Skywalker?”
”Negligible,” Doriana said, wondering again at the speed and breadth of the Sith Lord's knowledge. He hadn't even mentioned Ken.o.bi's unwelcome arrival on Barlok, yet Sidious apparently knew all about it. Clearly, he had excellent sources of information. ”All I had to do was add a shroud-liquid sprayer to the missile to make sure they wouldn't be able to stop it until it reached the conference chamber where C'baoth could make his dramatic grandstand play.”
”And neither he nor Ken.o.bi suspect your manipulation of the events?”
”Not at all, my lord,” Doriana said. ”My sources tell me the police a.n.a.lysts could tell the sprayer was a last-minute add-on, but they've concluded that it was added in response to C'baoth's appearance on the scene, not Ken.o.bi's.”
”I don't want Ken.o.bi taking any of the credit,” Sidious warned. ”He cannot be permitted to blunt C'baoth's triumph and prestige.”
”He won't,” Doriana a.s.sured him. ”Ken.o.bi isn't the type to seek public recognition. C'baoth certainly isn't the type to offer him a share.”
”Then all continues to go according to my plan,” Sidious concluded with satisfaction. ”Opposition in the Senate and the Jedi Council to C'baoth's pet project will melt away now before the fire of his newly enhanced stature.”
”And if not, I have other contingency plans for raising it even higher,”
Doriana said. ”The right word in Palpatine's ear is all it will take.”
”Yes,” Sidious said. ”Speaking of Palpatine, you'd best leave Barlok and return to your official business. I also want you to find a way to make yourself the Supreme Chancellor's personal liaison to Outbound Flight's final preparations.”