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Star WarsThe New Jedi OrderEmissaries of the voidby Greg Keyes###############################################################################Chapter IV : Relic of RuinVega Sepen glimpsed the shadow of death on the long-range scanner. To the untrained eye, it wasn't much, just a pale green oblong blip. To her experienced eye, it was a Yuuzhan Vong frigate.Her experience came from hard lessons. She'd been a junior tactician on the pirate vessel Free Lance with Urias Xhaxin when she first laid eyes on the living ships of the Yuuzhan Vong. Back then, the extragalactic race had been little more than a rumor. The battle-hardened crew of the Free Lance had lost the skirmish in seconds, escaping only by making a blind hyperspace jump.Since then, the Yuuzhan Vong had conquered half of the galaxy.Vega Sepen was no idealist. At twelve she'd been left homeless and friendless on the streets of Eriadu when her Corellian parents were killed in a reactor meltdown. She'd escaped that life at fifteen by stowing away on a smuggler's ship. They'd almost spaced her, but she'd challenged the first mate to a vibrodagger duel. She got her chance because the crew thought it would be amusing to see what an adult Nikto could do to a silver-haired human girl who stood barely 1.3 meters tall. The mate had been tough, and he'd been fast-she still had a scar on her cheek to remind her of that-but he hadn't been fast enough.She'd changed ships often in the next ten years, finally ending up with Xhaxin, which seemed a good place to be.Until the Yuuzhan Vong came along.No, she wasn't a save-the-galaxy type, but for the Vong she'd made an exception. Unless they were stopped, they would certainly kill every sentient in the galaxy that did not become their slave.She'd tried the military, but while her skills were adequate, her attitude was incompatible.So she'd ended up with rescue, and eventually Uldir Lochett and his Jedi extraction-and-transport team, and now here, staring at what might very likely be her death.She scratched her armpit and yawned, then keyed on the Comlink."You two are taking your sweet time," she said. "The frigate hasn't seen us yet, but it's only a matter of an hour or so. When it does see us, we're dust.""We're working as fast as we can," Leaft growled. "This hardware is more than a century old.""And it probably won't work," Vook added, despondently."Wrong attitude," Vega told them both. "It's the Boss's luck that we found this hulk at all, and he's counting on us. So you'll make it work, and you'll hurry."She keyed off the comm and regarded the arid, pockmarked surface of the nameless asteroid the No Luck Required now rested on. It wasn't much as asteroids went, a rock eight kilometers in diameter and too smooth to offer good hiding spots, which was what they had come to the Wayland system's Trojan points looking for. They'd found something better-the crumpled wreck of what had once been a battle cruiser. From the look of it, the ship was pre-Imperial, and a curious part of Vega wondered how it had ended up here, in a system so far from everything that the late, unlamented Emperor had used it as a secret base. She wondered what had brought it down, too, but was grateful that whatever had caused its crash had left three of its hyperdrive motivators intact, because if she and her companions stood any chance of leaving the system alive, it rested on restoring their own ailing hyperdrive capability.Now they had the parts, which was more than they had dreamed of a few hours before. All they had to do was fit them into their own damaged ship, fly back to Yuuzhan Vong infested Wayland, find their captain-if he was still alive-pull him out of whatever trouble he was in, run the gauntlet yet again, and hope there weren't any interdictors in the system.If they managed all of that, and if the Boss had been successful in his mission, then their only worry would be how to keep a dark Jedi captive long enough to get her to Master Skywalker."Life gets more interesting every day," Vega murmured.She watched the shadow of death change course again."Uvee?" She said.Still re-routing shields, the UV002 astromech's reply scrolled across her display. Estimate full efficiency in 6.8 standard minutes.'That's great, Vega replied. "But the frigate just changed course again. Can you run an analysis of their new search pattern?"Sure thing, the droid cheerfully replied.There was a brief pause.Estimate twenty-eight standard minutes before search grid discloses our location, the droid finally offered."Oh, hurrah," Vega grunted. Her hour had just been chopped in half.So it was a pleasant surprise when Vook's voice came back over the comm only a few moments later, sounding a shade less than hopeless, which from Vook might as well have been a shout of jubilation."The installation is complete," the Duro said."Uvee?"Shields to maximum efficiency.'Terrific,' Vega said. "Let's fly.""We don't have the fuel," Vook said. "The tank had a stress fracture. We leaked what we didn't burn coming here. The damage is repaired, but we need more juice.""What about the old ship? Any fuel left in her tanks?""I already thought of that," Leaft growled. His voice sounded like he was inside of a metal box."Leaft, where are you?" Vega asked suspiciously."Where do you think?" The Dug replied, testily. "I'm connecting a fueling hose to this piece of junk. Looks like there's enough left in there to get us going.""You went outside without permission?""Hey, don't go thinking you're the Boss, Sepen," Leaft said. "I already have to take orders from one human. I'm not taking them from two.""Really?" Vega's voice sounded cold, even to her. "We might have to have a chain-of-command discussion one of these days." Maybe with stun batons."Any time, sweetness," Leaft replied. "There. Hooked in."She could see him near the wreckage, an ungainly figure in his vacsuit. She took a deep breath to calm herself. After all, the Dug was only doing what needed done. He should have checked with her first, but-let it go. The last thing they needed at the moment was to fight among themselves.She'd be glad when they got the captain back Though she couldn't imagine how, he somehow managed to keep this ridiculous crew in line. A few silent moments passed, and for five minutes or so, things went surprisingly smoothly. Vega watched the fuel indicators swing beyond the halfway mark.Which was about the time Leaft said, "Oops.""What? What's that?" Vega asked.But at that moment, something flashed outside, sun bright, and the asteroid rocked beneath them.From his mooring station, Uvee stuttered out an electronic shriek.Uldir Lochett aimed his blaster at the oncoming Yuuzhan Vong warriors but didn't fire.They weren't in range yet, so he didn't want to waste any shots. Not that he would get that many when they were in range. Klin-Fa Gi might kill half a dozen of them with her lightsaber if she fought as well as, say, the fabled Corran Horn or Anakin Skywalker. She wouldn't, because she wasn't-she'd had trouble enough taking out a single Yuuzhan Vong warrior back on Bonadan. And she was wounded, and tired.If his own luck held true to form-and it was usually very good luck-he might get three or four with his blaster before becoming fertilizer for the greenware field he stood in.That left the motley fifteen or so sentients who called themselves the Free People. They were armed with bows and stone knives. Against Yuuzhan Vong amphistaves and armor, he figured they had, at best, a chance to take one enemy with them each.That was being highly optimistic, but hey, why not? The addition on his best-case scenario brought him to a grand total of about twenty-four deceased Vong. They faced at least twice that number. They couldn't run, either, because the rocky slopes behind them were several hundred degrees centigrade, courtesy of the superheated rock vapor that had just been sprayed from overhead in a perimeter around the Vong camp. The huge, worm-like tubes that had disgorged the plasma still arched above them, not yet retracting toward the enormous cylinder that had sent them out like so many feeding tentacles."What did you say?" Klin-Fa Gi asked."I didn't say anything," Uldir said, avoiding looking at her. The young Jedi was dark-haired and black eyed. Very pretty. Utterly untrustworthy."Though I have plenty to say to you, believe me," he clarified."You were moving your lips." Then her brows arched. "Oh. You were counting our enemies. You move your lips when you count?""Only when I sum the reasons I should have spaced you when I had the chance." He glanced at her, reluctantly. "Nice outfit, by the way.""It's the latest," she said.Last time he had seen her, the young Jedi had worn a Bonadan game-girl's skirt and tights. Now she was clad in a black, form-fitting garment of Yuuzhan Vong biofacture.The warriors were now perhaps sixty meters away, still too far for a clean shot.He fired anyway. He missed, but he hit a rock that exploded prettily. One of the Vong clutched at his face, evidently with a shard of stone in his eye."Lucky," Klin-Fa commented."Yeah," Uldir agreed, "incredibly so. Not only do I get to die, I get to die in your company." He grinned fiercely. "At least you won't have a chance to use whatever dark side toy you got from the emperor's warehouse." He took another shot. This struck a warrior, but glanced from the Vonduun crab armor he wore."What in the name of the Sith are you on about?""Sith is right, you-" He suddenly noticed the glossy, six-limbed humanoid who led the Free Peo... [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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