I'm sorry, she said silently, to all the men and women she'd promised to protect. To the survivors on Delaya. To the Rebel Alliance. To Luke, to Han. To her father.
To Alderaan.
"Ready?" The Pau'an drew the injector and pressed it to the back of her neck.
But before he could inject her, an alarm ripped through the silence.
His comlink blared. "Intruders!" the tinny voice announced. "Institute emergency protocol!"
The man scowled, laying the injector next to Leia's body. "I'll be back, Your Highness."
"Back from the dead?" Leia snarled, drawing strength from the blaring alarm.
Someone had come for her. She wasn't the kind of woman who liked to be rescued.
But it was far better than the alternative.
CHAPTER NINETEEN.
Ferus dodged a laserblast and threw himself across the hall, slamming into the stormtrooper. He jerked his blaster over his head, smashing it into the trooper's plastoid face plate. With the help of the Force, the blow sent the stormtrooper reeling. Ferus waited for a clear shot, then fired.
His Jedi training gave him an advantage over the enemy. His senses were honed, his motions carefully chosen and lightning quick. As he battled through the crush of stormtroopers, time slowed for him. The Force alerted him when the enemy was set to strike. He darted out of the way an instant before the laserfire could hit its mark, and fought with an acrobatic grace.
Still, he was clumsy with a blaster. With his lightsaber, he could likely have taken out the stormtroopers all on his own. What was the point of keeping his identity a secret if it got them all killed?
Luke wasn't using his lightsaber either, Ferus noted. The boy was good with a blaster, but his hand kept straying to the lightsaber's hilt, as if he were resisting the temptation to activate it.
He's afraid of failure, Ferus thought. He's afraid to try. He's afraid to try.
They battled their way down a long hallway, leaving a trail of armored bodies behind them. Ahead of them, the hall branched off in two directions. More stormtroopers approached from behind.
"Chewie, you search that hall, Luke and I'll take this one," Han shouted, signaling for Elad and Ferus to cover them as they rounded the corner.
Two was almost more effective than five in the narrow hallway. Elad seemed to anticipate Ferus's motions, ducking and weaving out of the way, his shots perfectly timed with Ferus's. He fights like a Jedi He fights like a Jedi, Ferus thought.
The stormtroopers surged forward, their boots pounding the ground in lockstep. The air blazed with laserfire. "This isn't working," Elad shouted over the noise. "We need to push back."
Ferus got his meaning. The stormtroopers were advancing toward the end of the hallway-any further, and they'd be able to turn the corner and take off after Han and Luke. He and Elad would have to force them back down to the other end of the hall, and hold them there as long as possible.
Ferus knew he could pull out his lightsaber and dispatch the guards within minutes.
But if there was any other way...
"In there!" Ferus said suddenly, jerked his head toward one of the open doors along the corridor.
"Run and hide?" Elad asked in disgust, dodging another blast. The hallways was filling up with a smoke so thick they could barely see the enemy.
"Neither," Ferus shot back. He pointed at the large cart just inside the storage closet, piled with medical equipment. Elad glanced over, eyebrows raised. Then he nodded, and darted inside. The stormtroopers fell back as Ferus peppered the hallway with laserfire. He drew on the Force to guide his aim, and the stormtroopers dropped, one by one. But there were still too many of them.
"Ready?" Elad said, pulling the cart out of the closet.
Ferus climbed on top, shifting his balance as Elad began to push. The cart gained momentum, plowing toward the stormtroopers.
They couldn't hit a moving target. Especially one towering several feet over their heads, speeding down the hallway right for them. Ferus bounced on the balls of his feet, trying to maintain his balance as the cart hurtled down the hallway, straight into the ranks of the enemy. The high vantage point gave him a perfect shot. Blast after blast hit its mark, until the corridor was littered with armored bodies. Shielded by the cart, Elad took down his fair share of stormtroopers, blasting with one hand as he pushed Ferus down the hall.
He seemed to be shooting blindly, and yet nearly every blast made contact.
Soon only three stormtroopers were still standing. "Retreat!" one of them ordered. In unison, they darted to the edges of the corridor, sheltering themselves behind a series of open doors. Every few seconds, one would peek out just long enough to spray the hall with laserfire then duck back to safety.
Ferus hopped off the cart, feeling a surge of relief. Two against twenty had been daunting odds. Two against three? Even a Padawan could handle that.
But the thought of Padawans made him think of Luke and Leia, and he remembered they were still no closer to rescuing the princess than they'd been before. The relief vanished.
"Cover me," Elad suddenly shouted, dropping to the floor over the body of a fallen stormtrooper. Ferus stood over him, blasting away at the stormtroopers who were left.
Elad ripped off the stormtrooper's armor and dug his fingers into the man's shoulder.
He shrieked with pain.
It was a hand-to-hand combat tactic Ferus had never tried: a precise compression of the parascapular nerve that caused unbearable pain. The rare maneuver had been perfected centuries before, but Ferus had seen it performed only once, by an Imperial officer trying to torture information out of a spice smuggler. The officer's expression had been no more single-mindedly brutal than Tobin Elad's.
This is different, Ferus told himself, trying to block out the stormtrooper's agonized cries. Our cause is just. We have no choice. Our cause is just. We have no choice.
But another, fainter voice drifted through his troubled mind, resonating with Jedi-like assurance. There is always a choice There is always a choice.
"Where is the prisoner?" Elad asked. The stormtrooper just screamed. Ferus winced as the man's pain rippled through the Force. Elad just pressed harder. " Where is she? Where is she? " "
"Hallway on the right," the stormtrooper moaned. "Third door down."
"That better be the truth," Elad warned him. "Because if she's not there, I'm coming back for you. My friend here is going to leave you alive for me."
"It's true!" the stormtrooper screamed, writhing in pain. "I swear!"
"Enough!" Ferus shouted. "I'll hold them off-you go find Leia. Go! Go! " "
Elad didn't hesitate. He took off down the hallway. Ferus activated his lightsaber, and advanced toward the remaining stormtroopers. When they saw he'd dropped the blaster, they abandoned their hiding places and rushed him. Time slowed to a crawl. He struck out with the lightsaber, once, twice, thrusting its glowing blade into the nearest stormtrooper.
He somersaulted through the air, dodging the man's fallen body, and deflected a blast of laserfire. The blue beam swooped and swirled, carving elaborate arcs through the air.
A Jedi never craves violence, never enjoys it.
But Ferus's lightsaber had sat hidden and unused for a long time. Wielding it again, finally taking action action instead of just sitting around and endlessly watching, waiting...it felt like coming home. instead of just sitting around and endlessly watching, waiting...it felt like coming home.
X-7 raced down the hall, pausing to look back just before he turned the corner. Out of curiosity, not concern. Was the fool already dead?
Two bodies lay on the floor, both of them stormtroopers. And between the two still on their feet, was Fess. But a different Fess than X-7 had seen before. He was leaping nimbly away from the blaster shots, with a dancer's liquid grace. He moved so fast that he almost seemed to be in two or three places at once.
But that wasn't the strangest thing.
The strangest thing was the glowing blue blade slashing through the air, deflecting laserbolts, spiraling toward the stormtroopers and effortlessly slicing through their armor.
So Fess, whoever he was, had a lightsaber. A carefully hidden lightsaber. And, unlike Luke, he seemed to know how to use it.
Interesting.
But not relevant. X-7 filed the information away for later use. He rushed down the hallway. As he neared the third door down, a gaunt, gray alien approached from the other end of the hallway. He drew an oddly shaped weapon from his cloak, some kind of whip.
X-7 simply blasted a hole through his head. Then, stepping over the dead body, Elad busted through the door.
"Elad!" Leia cried in relief. "Get me out of here! Before he comes back!"
X-7 took in the durasteel slab, the small table of torture devices, the injector sitting by her head. "What was he going to do to you?"
Leia shuddered in her restraints. "It's some kind of experimental brain agent," she said in disgust. "Designed to wring all the information out of my brain and then destroy it."
X-7 turned his back on the princess and scoured the floor. He seized a twisted piece of metal lying in the corner. He slammed the door shut, then wedged the metal underneath.
He'd broken the lock, but this should hold, at least for a few minutes.
"What are you doing?" Leia asked.
He approached the slab. "The building's filled with stormtroopers," he said, peering down at her. She was completely helpless. "Have to keep them out until we're done here."
"Done with what?"
"Getting you out of these restraints," X-7 said, pretending to look around for something to slice through the durasteel. He had to handle this carefully. She'd been tortured before, and resisted. There was a chance that even the mental agent would fail if she tried to fight it.
Which meant he needed to convince her not to fight.
X-7 palmed the injector, then bent over the cuff pinning her left arm to the table, as if examining the locking mechanism. He pulled out his blaster, switching it to the lowest setting, and pressed it to the cuff. "This could hurt, just a bit," he warned her.
She pressed her lips together, steeling herself.
With one hand, he shot the blaster, careful to miss the cuff and lightly singe her skin.
With the other, he pressed the injector to her arm and injected the drug. The pain of the blaster bolt would disguise the lesser pain of the injection.
She grimaced. "That didn't feel like it worked."
"Sorry, Princess. The binders are stronger than I thought. There must be something in here that will cut them."
"Just hurry," she urged him, "We need to..."
"What?" he asked, pretending to search the lab, while keeping a close eye on her. She was breathing rapidly, and her skin had gone pale.
"Nothing, I just feel...strange," she said faintly. "Lightheaded."
"You've been through an ordeal," he told her. "It's only natural."
The drug was taking effect. He had to get his answers now, before the others showed up. Or before it killed her. "The Empire went to a lot of trouble to get its hands on you,"
he said casually.
"I'll never tell them anything," she said. Her eyes fluttered. "I'd die first."
"It must be a burden, keeping all those secrets."
"Is it very hot in here?" she asked, drawing in deep, ragged breaths. "We have to get out of here. Why don't you get me out of these binders?"
"I'm trying," he lied.
"Can't you shoot out the locking mechanism with your blaster?"
He looked at her curiously. "I just tried that," he reminded her. "You don't remember?"
"Of course I remember," she snapped. "I..." She shook her head as much as the neck restraint allowed, as if trying to clear the fog. "I'm just so tired."
It was now or never.
"Of course you're tired, Leia," he said kindly, switching on the miniature holorecorder hidden in his utility belt. The Commander would want proof. "You've done everything you could to protect the Rebel Alliance. Especially the pilot who destroyed the Death Star."
"The Empire can never find out who he is," she murmured, sweat beading along her forehead. Her pupils had narrowed to black pinpricks. "We have to protect him."
"I'd lay down my life for him," X-7 said. "But I can only protect him if I know his name."
Her eyes rolled back in her head.
" Leia! Leia! " he snapped. " he snapped.
A small sigh escaped from her lips.
"His name name, Leia," X-7 urged her. "Who must we protect? Who destroyed the Death Star?"
"Luke." She smiled. "It was Luke."
Exactly as he had suspected. It would be so easy now to kill her-and then open the door and kill Luke, too. Mission accomplished.
But the Commander had given him strict orders. Learn the name of the pilot and report back. He couldn't act until he got the kill order.
X-7 injected the remains of the serum into her arm. Given what he knew of brain agents, the odds were high that she wouldn't remember any of this when she recovered. If she recovered at all.
"If something happens...you have to take care of Luke," she whispered as her eyes slipped shut.