Tales from the New Republic (40 page)

“Why didn’t you catch a shuttle?” Fen complained from the passenger seat of Zeth’s rented landspeeder.

“I didn’t know where to go,” Zeth responded. His eyes wandered about the bucolic landscape. “Everyone within a thousand kilometers was talking about the wonderful Jedi Ghitsa, but no one knew where she was.”

Fen drummed her fingers on the console. They had sabotaged the ship on Chad, known her route, and set the drive to blow in the first inhabited system. But who? And why?

“A Force-sensitive would be a very powerful asset to a criminal organization,” Zeth interrupted.

“Stay out of my head, spoonbender,” Fen snapped.

“I wasn’t in your head, Fen,” Zeth said calmly. “Just making an obvious observation.”

“Keep it that way, then.” Wanting to be conciliatory, but not apologetic, Fen added, “Lots of bad guys seem real determined to kidnap you Jedi types.”

Fen hadn’t expected Zeth to flinch so obviously. “What is it?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Nothing.”

“Turn right up ahead,” she instructed. He drove through a battered and ancient gate and they both fell silent.

Feeling the speeder steadily accelerate, Fen glanced at Zeth. He was staring ahead. She gave up trying to shake the anxiety mounting since they drove on to the property.

They rounded a blind turn and the farmhouse was only a few meters farther. Fen was out of the speeder before Zeth coaxed it to a stop. It wasn’t just the look of grim concern on his face or the silence which alarmed her. No, it was the clenching feeling in her gut. She’d felt the same way when she’d returned to that Ord Mantell cantina and found the man who had been her father dead on the floor.

She yanked out her blaster and ran to the farmhouse. The door was open, ajar and askew. At the door’s threshold lay a Jedi robe.

“I’m assuming it’s someone from off-planet,” Fen jabbered as they whizzed back through Lesvol. “I wonder why it took them so long?”

“They may have thought once your drive failed you would go to Nad’Ris,” Zeth said. “And when you didn’t, they looked the same way I did. A planet is a big place to search for a single person.”

As the speeder banked hard on a turn, Fen was gratified Zeth was driving only slightly slower than she would be. “Gibb is checking for reports of any strangers. He may know something by the time we get back.”

“What’s next then?” the Jedi asked.

“Listen, Zeth,” Fen began. “I appreciate the help, but I can handle this on my own.”

When Zeth smiled, years seem to fall from him. “Jedi have a responsibility to Force-sensitives, especially those like Ghitsa who have a real gift others would exploit.” His expression darkened abruptly. “It’s hard to explain, but the Force guided me here. I’d like to see it through.”

“Well, who am I to argue with cosmic fate and destiny?” Fen grumbled.

Gibb ran out to meet them when they pulled up at the port. Ignoring Zeth’s reprimanding frown, Fen again clambered out before he stopped the speeder. “What’ve you found, Gibb?” she asked, forcing calm into her voice as they jogged to the port building.

“Not much, Cap’n. I got a couple reports of a skiff going really fast toward Nad’Ris.”

She and Gibb pushed into the tiny port administration building. “How long ago?”

Fen grabbed a chair, but in hands not quite still it slipped from her grasp and clattered to the floor. Gibb waited until she righted it before responding. “Couple of hours.”

Zeth’s voice came from the door. “Why did they notice the skiff at all?”

Gibb eyed the Jedi, as if weighing where his loyalties lay. “It was big, new, fast. Nothing like that around here.”

Fen cracked her knuckles and smirked inwardly when Zeth winced at the sound. “Okay, Gibb, I need to slice into the Nad’Ris spaceport records. I’m looking for the incoming ship registry.”

The mechanic blanched, looking from Fen to Zeth and back again. “But Captain…” he stammered.

“Now Gibb,” she began, popping her finger joints one at a time. “Just ’cause a self-appointed guardian of good is watching is no time to get all moral on me. The only way to figure out where Ghitsa’s gone is to look at where they probably took her, got it?”

Gibb nodded reluctantly, still eyeing the Jedi skeptically. Zeth winked and held out his hands in a “Who am I to argue?” gesture.

Fen scooted up to the data console. After several minutes of work she spun back around with a growl. “Gibb, why do you keep fidgeting?”

“Well, Captain. That will work eventually, but…” Gibb glanced at Zeth, face creased with worry. “I know a quicker way.”

Zeth laughed. “Don’t worry, Gibb. I won’t tell.”

Gibb wilted with relief. Thirty seconds later they were scrolling through the Nad’Ris port entries.

“I need to see the ship names,” Zeth announced suddenly, crowding them at the terminal.

Throwing Zeth an annoyed look and an elbow in the ribs, Fen shot back, “And I need to see what flight plans and cargo they registered.”

Gibb keyed a command and three columns of information appeared. Fen began anxiously searching.

“There!” Zeth suddenly exulted.

He shrank back as Fen pinned him with a favored glare from her extensive repertory. “And why do you think so?”

“Just the name, Rooky,” Zeth hedged. “I have a feeling about it.”

“A feeling? Sorry, Jedi, but we need something solid.” Fen turned back to study the screen. “1 don’t suppose your feeling noticed the
Rook
arrived the day after I did, registered a flight plan from Chad and Nal Hutta, and made no customs declaration, even though a ship that class has over two thousand metric tons of cargo space?”

“Cap’n,” Gibb said, new worry coloring his tone. “See that blinking indicator? The
Rook
filed clearance to leave.”

Fen felt cold dread settle in her stomach like the local brew. “How long?”

“An hour, maybe two.”

Zeth moved in closer, studying the flashing light. “It’ll take us all night to get back to Nad’Ris, unless you’ve got something faster than my speeder.”

There wasn’t anything else. They all knew that. The
Lady
’s drive was still in pieces. Nothing in the port could run, much less fly. Fen began working furiously on the console’s keypad. “If you’ve got any tricks, I could use ’em,” she said to Zeth.

“I told you, it doesn’t work that way.”

Why was a hermetic Force zealot barely out of his teens so gloomy
? Fen pushed aside the thoughts clouding her rapid-fire keystrokes.

“Well, good thing I’ve got a few tricks,” she said.

Behind her she heard Gibb’s low chortle. “That’ll keep them here into the next growing season, Cap’n.”

Fen pushed out of her seat. Seeing Zeth grinning at her handiwork on the terminal, she felt the satisfaction of being able to impress a Jedi.

She tugged on Zeth’s arm. “Come on. Let’s move.”

Songs of lovers lost or left behind and the intoxicants consumed to forget them were woven into the fabric of every culture built around spacefaring and alcohol production. Corellia had a million such madrigals; Fen knew half of them, and had lived the other half. When she’d been a small, dirty-faced child, singing the off-color lyrics in a busy spaceport was a sure way to earn a few extra credits or even a hot meal. Now, thirty-some years later, she sang them when she was nervous, excited, or drunk.

Fen dashed about the
Lady
’s main cabin gathering her gear. “Best I can hope for is a long life and a merry one. A quick death and an easy one.” Singing slightly offkey, she snapped the last drawer closed.

Zeth stood patiently, saying nothing as Fen added two more detonators to the pile on the table in front of him.

“A fast ship and a sturdy one,” Fen sang with more gusto about the ship than the easy death. She began methodically tucking the toys and gadgets into her flight-suit pockets. “A tall ale and another one,” she finished with a flourish.

Fen dropped a vibro-shiv into each boot and added her lucky hold-out blaster to yet another pocket at her sleeve. With a satisfìed sigh she began checking the settings on her heavy blaster.

Zeth ran a hand over his mouth to keep from smirking. He then removed his belt, placed it on the table, and shrugged out of his Jedi robe. Balling it up, he tossed the robe into the corner. He again donned his belt, unclipped the lightsaber hanging there, and slipped it into a pocket at his side. “Well?” he finally asked. “Do I pass?”

“Take that earnest expression off your face and it just might work.”

The smile finally broke out, and he glanced away to hide it.

“You have a sidearm?” Fen asked, circling around him for a more thorough inspection.

“I don’t need one.”

“Wait. Don’t tell me. The Force will protect you.”

“Actually, I figured you were carrying enough firepower to defend me and Coruscant.” When the only reply was Fen’s evil eye, Zeth amended; “I have my lightsaber… and the Force.”

“This is my Force power. It’s called a blaster.” She sent the weapon in its home at her hip. “Let’s go.”

Fen was usually about as communicative as a Gamorrean. But charging along a dark thoroughfare to rescue someone who didn’t deserve saving seemed to inspire confidences. So as she slammed down bottle after bottle of a carbonated, highly charged drink, appropriately dubbed Rush, the words tumbled out of her with a speed rivaling that of their headlong race into the night.

She told Zeth about her youth on the streets of Coronet and even a little bit about Jett.

Zeth’s tale, like hers, began haltingly, then flowed. On learning he had been on Kessel, they spent the past hour trading Moruth Doole stories.

“So, anyway,” Zeth said, taking another long pull on his bottle. “I never would have gotten off Kessel if Han hadn’t shown up.”

“Solo?” Fen choked back a swallow of her Rush.

“Yeah,” Zeth waited a beat before adding, “You know him.”

“Stay outta my mind, Jedi,” she warned.

“I wasn’t in it,” he shot back. “But I can’t help it if you broadcast your feelings like an emotional holovid.”

“Guess I’ll just have to think quieter around you, won’t I?” Fen clamped her mouth shut.

“You have deep feelings and strong loyalties,” Zeth pontificated. “Why do you try hiding them?” Not put off by her stony silence, he pushed, “Because if you don’t, then why are we going after Ghitsa, anyway? Space, you don’t even like her.”

“Because she’s my partner, that’s why,” Fen finally burst out. “And no one harms any partner of mine. Except me.”

“Did someone harm Jett?” Zeth asked gently.

Fen laughed, short and bitter. “If you call a vibro-shiv through the neck harm, then I guess so.”

“I’m sorry, Fen,” he said softly.

She wanted to hold on to the anger, as she would a blaster or a lover. But instead, with Zeth’s unsolicited and compassionate sincerity, she felt the hurt drain away without the energy to maintain it. “Thanks,” she said and sarcasm was the best she could muster. “That’s mighty Jedi of you.”

Fen looked quickly enough to see Zeth smile.

“So from where does this disdain for Jedi spring?” he asked. “Your denigration approaches an art form.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Fen replied, matching his lighter tone. “I just have a problem with authority and earnest self-righteousness.”

“No Sith,” Zeth retorted.

“Watch your mouth, junior. That kind of language could get you in trouble.”

Zeth laughed. “You’re right. If I go back swearing like a smuggler, they’ll never let me out again.”

Fen smirked in spite of herself. “Just tell them you learned it all from a great master.”

His laughter abruptly stopped. Zeth turned away to stare moodily into the darkness.

They rode in silence as Fen tried to work out what she had said to provoke Zeth’s capricious reaction. Giving up, she tried the blunt approach. “So, as long as we’re spilling our souls all over the deck here, what’s this bantha on your back? Did you drop a rock on another spoonbender or something?”

Zeth remained mute, as if weighing what to tell her. His voice was distant and sorrowful when he finally spoke. “I used my power as a Jedi… for revenge.”

Fen glanced at Zeth. He was staring down at his upturned palms as if they were somehow dirty. She tore her eyes from the sight to concentrate again on the road. Vengeance was something she could certainly understand, but Fen suddenly didn’t want to hear any more of this young man’s tortured story. Before she could say anything, Zeth continued.

“In my arrogance I thought the ends justified the means.” Zeth’s voice dropped to a whisper. “My brother and many others paid the price for my fall to the dark side.”

Fen gasped as the pieces began to fall into place. The wild rumors she had heard, the things he had said. When the answer finally popped into her consciousness, she’d never be sure if she deduced it herself or if he had planted it there. “Carida,” she breathed. Millions dead, billions, an entire star system wiped out of existence.

She swerved the speeder to the side, slamming on the brakes as her mind screamed again. “
Carida!
” Aghast, she turned to see the Jedi staring out the window, fighting the tears clinging to his lashes. He nodded ever so slightly.

She was sharing a landspeeder, her life, with the most notorious mass murderer since Palpatine. This innocent looking man, this kid, was another Vader. A butcher.
He killed billions
.

Suddenly claustrophobic in the close speeder, Fen fumbled for an escape. A cool breeze flooded in as she shoved the hatch open. Fen staggered across the road, feeling the universe buckle under her feet.
Billions dead
. And she liked him. That was the worst of it. She had fallen completely for his wide-eyed innocence, the shy smile.

The incongruity hit her like a nova. She lost the battle to control her spiraling emotions and the waves of nausea splashing over her. Falling to her knees, Fen emptied her stomach into the soft, tilled field.

The universe had just stopped spinning when she heard him come up behind her. Fen struggled to her feet.

“So, you’re Sithin’ Durron?” she demanded. “Kyp Durron?”

“Yes.”

“You lied to me.” Fen straightened up and shoved her hands into her pockets, staring down at her feet. She needed new boots, she noted, then mentally kicked herself for allowing such a thought now.

“Yes,” Kyp responded after a long pause.

“They have a word for what you did. It’s called genocide.”

“I know,” Kyp replied, his voice breaking slightly.

Fen spun around, blind wrath overcoming self-preservation. She poked her index finger in the center of his chest. “Then tell me, Jedi,” she choked on the word. “How come you’re allowed to roam the galaxy recruiting others, recruiting my partner, to follow in your footsteps?”

Kyp remained silent, shoulders hunched, staring at the ground.

“Why aren’t you in jail?” she demanded. Giving him another, much harder shove, she shrieked, “Why weren’t you executed?”

He fell to the ground in an unresisting heap. “I don’t know,” Kyp said, his voice ragged. “I should be. I should be dead.”

Fen went for the reassurance of her blaster, bitterly cold to the touch. She raised it, taking aim at the filth before her. She had killed better than this before and for less than crimes against the galaxy.

He finally looked up at her, and she could see tears glistening on his face. “No one would ever blame you, Fen, for killing the murderer of billions of sentients.”

Fen felt an itching in her fingers.
He wants me to kill him
, she abruptly realized.

Please, Fen
, came the wail in her mind. He outstretched his hands to her.

Fen was moved, but not to pity. “You’re a real black-hearted coward, Jedi,” she snarled, thrusting the blaster back in her holster. “Trying to get me to do something you don’t have the courage to do yourself.”

She hauled him to his feet. “Listen, you Sith Lord.” She forced as much venom into the invective as she could and had the pleasure of seeing him wince at an epithet that was no longer amusing. Fen vowed she would never use the curse again. “I don’t give ten credits whether you live or die. I’d gladly cut you down and rid the universe of your miserable existence.” She roughly grabbed him by the elbow, propelling him to the speeder. “But not until after we get my partner out. Got it?”