Star Wars: The New Jedi Order: Vector Prime (28 page)

Danni and Miko climbed to their feet when the water started to churn, and looked to each other, each trying to confirm that this was the time for action. A slight nod, one and then the other, and the pair moved to opposite sides of the small chamber and waited, with Miko going down into a squat and pressing his palms together before him.

Danni, too, went into a crouch, watching the churning water. But then she looked higher, to Miko, and marveled at his posture and preparedness. She could see the taut muscles of his arms straining under the isometric press, building pressure as if to literally explode into action.

A Yuuzhan Vong head, black hair chopped erratically, fleshy star-shape over the face, appeared, and then the arms,
one hand holding a short staff, came over the rim, grabbing hold and propelling the powerful humanoid out of the water and onto the lichen-covered floor.

Danni circled, and turned and clawed at the wall, as if trying to run, demanding the creature’s attention.

Another Yuuzhan Vong warrior came up, and then a third.

Miko exploded into motion, launching himself sidelong against the three, knocking one back into the water, the other two to the floor.

Danni dived atop one, grabbing his weapon with both hands and pressing her forearm into the warrior’s throat as she did. She drove down with all of her considerable strength, but this was a Yuuzhan Vong warrior, hugely strong, and within a split second, he had Danni up high enough so that her press on his throat was not choking him.

Desperation drove her, though, and so she clung to the staff with one hand, keeping it at bay, and she freed up her other hand enough to get a grip on the warrior’s face, working frantically to avoid his snapping jaws as she wedged her fingers under his star-shaped mask.

Miko and the other alien scrambled to their feet and squared off, and then the third practically leapt out of the water, staff at the ready.

“Unworthy,” they kept saying, circling, circling, waving their weapons, but shortening the blows, more to measure the Jedi’s reaction than to initiate any real attack routines.

Miko kept his cool and his balance, taking care not to overreact. He saw Danni struggling with the remaining soldier, the warrior rolling over atop her and gaining the upper hand.

He dismissed the image, reminding himself that he couldn’t begin to help Danni until he had first helped himself. The Yuuzhan Vong behind him thrust his weapon like a spear, and Miko jumped ahead and to the side, and when the warrior before him took that as an opportunity to come in hard, the skilled Jedi dropped one foot back and turned sidelong to the blow, deflecting it harmlessly aside with his open palm. Like
a snake, he struck, with that same blocking arm, elbow flying up high, arm snapping straight, the side of his hand knifing into the Yuuzhan Vong warrior’s throat.

Even as that opponent staggered backward, though, Miko felt the pressure from behind and could not finish the attack, forced instead to turn his attention to the newest foe, scrambling and slapping, barely deflecting the thrusting staff, and not enough to avoid a stinging clip on the side of his chest.

Danni heard the rush of Miko’s blowing breath and found herself in a tight corner, with the heavy Yuuzhan Vong warrior, staff horizontal above her, pressing down hard, overpowering her, bringing the weapon shaft across her throat. With strength born of desperation, Danni wriggled and drove her knee straight up between the alien’s legs, and when his breath came out in a rush and he froze—whether startled or in pain Danni couldn’t tell—she yanked the staff away from him. Hardly slowing, she punched out, left hand, right hand, left hand, swiveling the staff, smacking it against her opponent’s head on alternating sides.

The Yuuzhan Vong brought a hand up to block, and Danni slipped in one last hit and kept pushing, turning the warrior’s head aside and wriggling out from underneath. She planted the bottom of the staff on the ground as she turned sidelong and pushed up to her knees; then, not daring to break the movement, she scrambled up to her feet and turned in a spin, letting her hands slide down the smooth weapon to the end, then coming around with a mighty swing that caught the warrior on the shoulder, then bounced up to the side of his head, launching him into a sidelong flip that left him dazed on the floor.

Miko, meanwhile, worked frantically, one hand slapping after another, to parry the barrage of attacks from the staff-thrusting Yuuzhan Vong, using the same always-balanced twists and maneuvers he would with his lightsaber when battling a remote. He fell into his meditation, anticipating instead of reacting, trying to follow the telling movements,
disturbances, of the Force as an aquatic creature might sense the shifting currents displaced by another.

He tried another tactic, as well: to use the Force to get a better feel of his opponent, an understanding of the alien’s tactics and intentions.

He might as well have been trying to read the intentions of empty deep space.

But still, even without that intuitive advantage, Miko found that he could anticipate the movements enough to keep up with the attacks, blocking, slapping, occasionally trying to grab or twist. He kept his foot movements minimal at first, trying to conserve energy, trying to lure his opponent into a state of advantaged complacency.

But the warrior he had chopped was regaining his footing, and Miko was out of time.

In came the staff, a straight thrust for his belly, an attack Miko had slapped out and dodged with a subtle hip twist three times already. This time, though, he knifed his hand down under the weapon and backhanded it up over his shoulder as he stepped forward and to the side of his enemy, leaving him an open punch for the Yuuzhan Vong’s masked face.

He chose instead to insinuate his free hand between the warrior’s arms, rolling over and grabbing onto the staff, while his other hand, up high from the parry, rolled over the staff the other way and grabbed on. Miko pulled down with that upper hand, yanked up with the lower, but at exactly the moment his opponent tried to apply counterpressure, the Jedi suddenly and viciously reversed his momentum, shoving down with his low hand and rolling his upper hand back under the staff and forcing it up and over, to slam hard against the alien’s forehead.

A sudden and vicious yank tore the staff free of the warrior’s grasp, and Miko quickly thrust its butt end into the Yuuzhan Vong’s face, closing one eye and sending him staggering backward.

Up came Danni, right behind the stubborn warrior, and
even as Miko turned his attention to the remaining enemy, the one still clutching its chopped throat, Danni brought her staff down hard on the back of that one’s head. The warrior dropped like a stone.

The remaining Yuuzhan Vong broke for the hole in the floor, thinking to dive into the water, but Miko came alongside in a rush and kicked out the warrior’s trailing foot, tripping him headlong.

Danni caught him in midfall, looping her staff about his throat and turning brutally, bending his head to the side and putting him in a helpless choke. He grabbed at the staff and tried to punch at her, but his air supply was gone and he went limp in a matter of a few seconds.

“Get their cloaking creatures,” she instructed, but Miko was already trying to find some way to extract the creature from its host.

The first Yuuzhan Vong Danni had clobbered started to get back up. She walked over and slammed him in the back of the head, dropping him to the floor.

Finally finding the pressure point beside the nose, they managed to strip two of the aliens of their ooglith cloakers, but it took them a long while—and several more smacks to the heads of waking warriors—to figure out how to lure the creatures onto their own bodies. When they did, they shivered with the intense pain, the little flickers of exquisite agony, as the creatures enwrapped them.

Then they turned their attention to the star-shaped breathers, but it took time to muster the courage to actually put the things on. Danni gagged repeatedly, fighting revulsion, as the creature sent its joining tendril down her throat and to her lungs.

When she was done, she saw that Miko was already wearing his.

“Are you all right?” Miko asked, his voice watery.

Danni nodded. “They won’t recognize us easily with these on,” she replied. “We’ve got to find some pattern to this place.”

“Where they keep their ships,” Miko agreed. He didn’t finish the obvious thought—once they found the ships, how would they possibly fly them?—but he didn’t have to.

Danni knew the score, and she led the way, diving headlong into the frigid water. As soon as they got under, the two could see the distant lighting of the core area of the main Yuuzhan Vong base. Within that glow resided the main bulbous portion of the long-tentacled yammosk, they knew, and so, neither wanting to be anywhere near the horrid thing, they gave the lights a wide berth, picking their way to a point above it along the ice, walking their hands on the rough surface rather than swimming, until they came in sight of the tubular creature holding open the pathway to the surface ship.

Surprisingly, the bottom end of that tube did not appear guarded, and so they worked their way down its side. They paused at the lip and stared at each other, sharing their trepidation. Danni started to go under, but Miko grabbed her shoulder and held up his hand. He closed his eyes, finding his center, then rushed down and around the bottom, into the tube, leading with the staff he had taken from one of the soldiers.

Danni held her breath, and just as she started to follow, Miko poked his head around and motioned that the way was clear.

They inched their way up perhaps twenty meters before they cleared the water. Then they climbed, appreciating how well the tubular creature was designed, with riblike bones, easy stairs, encircling it. And the path was clear, all the way up; both thought this, too, remarkable, but neither voiced the fear openly.

Up they climbed; and then above, Miko, who was still leading, noted the wider opening and the multicolored hues of the alien worldship. Again the Jedi led the way, but this time without hesitation, for Danni was right behind, pressing on. They came into a large chamber and spent a long moment letting their vision adjust to the change in light. At first, they
thought they were alone, but then Danni’s eyes widened and she pointed to a small alcove to the left, where a single, tattooed figure stood quietly.

“You need not your gnullith here,” Prefect Da’Gara told them, turning about. He was not wearing one of the star-shaped creatures—and his lips curled into a smile. “The worldship produces its own atmosphere.”

Danni glanced at Miko, and then all around, looking for other guards.

“It took you longer than I had anticipated,” Da’Gara calmly stated.

Miko broke into motion, leaping forward, staff twirling above his head.

But Da’Gara, too, moved quickly, extending both his arms, throwing with one hand a pie of goo that hit the floor before Miko, and merely opening his other hand, from which flew a small, ball-like creature, its wings humming fiercely.

Miko skipped aside, dived into a roll to recover his balance, and came up to his feet in a rush, thinking to close the last few steps to Da’Gara. But the goo had moved with him, had somehow expanded, widening like a stream-fed puddle, its surface rippling with waves. The Jedi moved again, a step back, then skittered back the other way, and then, the gooey substance pacing, even gaining on him, he took a step forward and leapt into a somersault, trying to clear it.

No such luck. The goo reared up and caught Miko’s feet as he came around, and though the Jedi moved with such agility that he was able to land standing, he was caught. He retracted his arm to throw the staff like a spear, but the goo reacted with frightening suddenness, a portion of it flowing right up Miko’s legs and torso, enveloping his arm, even reaching out to catch and hold the missile as it left his grasp.

Danni cried out for him, but her call was cut short, a gasp of air blasted from lungs, as for the third time she tried to dodge the ball-like creature that had flown from the prefect’s hand. The buzzing thing had come back at her each time. This
time, the living missile seemed to anticipate her movement, altering its course accordingly and slamming her right in the chest with such force that she was knocked back onto the floor. For a long moment, she lay stunned and very still, staring at the multicolored chamber ceiling. Then she heard Da’Gara’s mocking laughter.

She knew she had to get up now, to help Miko, and she rolled to the side, pushing up on one elbow.

And then she was standing, suddenly, hoisted to her feet by two other Yuuzhan Vong barbarians. Before she could begin to try to fight back, she felt something wet and sticky on her wrist, and then that arm was wrenched back behind her and slammed into her back, sticking fast. A similar movement from the other warrior had her other arm pinned, as well, and they jerked her about to face Da’Gara, and to see Miko stuck firmly in place.

“Did you believe that you had a chance?” Da’Gara calmly asked Miko. He advanced to stand right before the trapped Jedi. “I told you honestly that you were not worthy. You cannot begin to resist us.”

A growl escaped Miko’s lips, and he struggled futilely against the goo’s hold. Da’Gara, his smile wider than ever, leaned closer, pulling free Miko’s gnullith with one hand and using the other to flick a finger up under the Jedi’s nose, hitting the exact spot to send a wave of pain through the man. “Too easy,” Da’Gara whispered into Miko’s ear.

He motioned to his warriors then, and they hauled Danni behind him as he moved back toward the alcove on the left. “It is good that you have come,” he explained to her as they turned the corner. Around that bend, the wall was translucent, offering a superb view of the frozen surface and the multitude of stars beyond.

And one of those “stars” was approaching, growing larger and larger.

Danni’s eyes widened as she realized what she was seeing:
the huge coral ship extending its membranous parachute, the ice below it beginning to vaporize and fog and fly away.

“Oh, there will be more, Danni Quee,” Da’Gara whispered into her ear. “Do you see the truth now? Do you understand the futility?”