Jedi Adept: A Path in the Dark Ch. 13

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Noelani crouched in the burned hulk of a building; she had pushed out with the Force, creating a sort of flattened sphere around her. An imaginary construct in the Force which allowed her to feel all the life in its radius; everything from the smallest bug, to the lumbering feral that was her prey.

This was her twelfth mission to collect a feral, and the first one in which she was the nominal leader. It had been nearly three months of going on raids with others before Gorn had trusted her enough to let her lead her own team out into the wild under-city.

She shifted slightly so she could look out the window with her eyes. She knew that it was not really necessary, but she also knew that it made the others more accepting of her. That it made her seem more human.

On the ground beneath them was the feral. It appeared to have at one time been a human girl, and if Noelani had to guess, she was around twenty standard years old. What was saddest to Noelani was that guessing from the amount of coral growth on the girl's body; she had been a feral for over ten years.

Noelani shuddered at the thought. Having been tortured at the hands of the Yuuzhan Vong, and knowing that everyday with a coral infection was pain of a similar nature, caused her to feel sorry for the girl.

She tightened her grip on her saber, and glanced over at Asyra'mata. The red-skin Twi'lek had proven that she could be quite helpful on these hunts. Noelani then looked past the girl to see Rosen. He was a large man, bulky and muscular. A former bouncer, he had been helping Evir collect ferals for months now, and was now on her team.

Noelani nodded her head once, and then grabbed the window, and heaved herself out of it. As she dropped to the ground, she thumbed on her lightsaber. With a snap-hiss its brilliant light flooded the area, and the feral groaned.

Noelani landed on her feet, dropping into a crouch as she stared at the feral. It raised its arms, and started ambling forward, its moans growing louder, and beginning to echo with subharmonics.

She now knew that this was the newest phenomenon which Evir was studying, and how the ferals communicated with one another.

Suddenly, the heavy titanium-mesh net slashed across her view, folding itself around the feral. Noelani looked over and saw Rosen lowering the net gun from his shoulder even as she thumbed off her saber.

She grinned, and activated her comlink. "Chase, we've got one. Bring in the boat."

A quick double-click came back to her, and she turned off the device. In the distance she could hear an engine turning over. She knew that that would be Chase with the groundcar.

A tremor raced down her spine, and she frowned; every nerve sizzled to hyperawareness. The Force screamed at her: danger!

Slowly, she spun in a circle, her eyes lifting to watch the buildings around them.

From the floor above their level, windows burst out, and a trio of ferals dropped down. They landed nearly on top of Rosen.

"Rosen!" she called out, as she lifted her saber and thumbed it to life. Without a second's thought she rushed forward, running towards her teammate.

By virtue of being closer to him, the ferals reached him first. Rosen screamed as the first one bit him.

A bright red bolt flashed from the window they had been hiding in, slamming into the feral that had latched its mouth to Rosen's shoulder. Its head evaporated under the impact of the blaster bolt.

As Noelani closed with the ferals, she spoke into the comlink's mic. "Nice shot Asyra'mata."

A quick double-click came back to her, but she pushed that from her mind. She was in the midst of the ferals, her blade slashed in a half arc around her; a wide cut which bisected both of the ferals.

They fell away dead, and Noelani slid to a stop next to Rosen. Turning off her lightsaber, she knelt down beside him, placing a hand on his bald head.

He coughed up a mouthful of blood, and as his eyes opened, he smiled at her. "Was nice knowing you Noelani… now kill me. Kill me 'fore I become one of 'em.

She felt hot tears burning her eyes. "I… I don't want to…"

"Ya know there's no cure. Now, do it child. Do it while I still have my own mind."

Noelani lifted her saber, placing its hilt on the side of his head. She could feel the sense of wrongness as it flooded throughout his body. Another tear splashed against his cheek as a jagged piece of coral erupted from his cheek.

"Do it!" he hissed at her.

Still crying, she activated the blade. Its thrum sounded loud and oppressive to her ears, pounding against them. The sound told a story of how she had failed her friend.

She deactivated the blade, and the silence crashed in on her. She curled into a ball, her whole body shaking with the tears. Before long, a tentative hand touched her shoulder; thin fingers caressed her hair, after a moment, the hand snaked around her, holding her tight as she cried.

Then she heard Asyra'mata's voice in her ear. "It's all right… everything's fine. You did the right thing."

Then Chase was there, picking her up off the ground, cradling her to his chest. She leaned against him, comforted by his presence. He gently placed her into the groundcar, and within moments Asyra'mata was there again, comforting her.

A few minutes later, she heard something drop heavily into the bed of the groundcar, and knew that Chase had retrieved Rosen's body. Then he appeared in the driver's seat. He reached out and gripped her hand for a moment.

Once he released her, he put the vehicle into motion, heading towards the compound.

With the back of her hand, Noelani pushed away some tears. "H… how did that happen?"

"We just got unlucky is all," Asyra'mata replied.

Noelani shook her head. "No. That's not it at all. They were waiting for us. Expecting us. That's a new behavior that we hadn't seen in the ferals before. The feral colonies are getting smarter."

She could feel the other two's hesitance to accept her ideas. She understood that. She didn't want to think of what horrors a gathering of intelligent ferals could unleash upon those who lived in the under-city. It was bad enough when they were just a mindless, reactive mob.

She straightened slightly, and wrapped her arms around the younger Twi'lek, and smiled at the girl. "Thank you."

Asyra'mata just shook her head, and turned to look out the window. Before long they were pulling in front of the processing station, and Gorn with two of his assistants were walking towards them.

Noelani sighed, and got out of the car, and felt Gorn's annoyance and anger as he saw Rosen's body lying in the cargo area next to the tied up feral.

His hard eyes flickered among them all, before settling onto Noelani. "What's this? Your first mission and you've already have a casualty in your group?"

Noelani stamped down on her annoyance with the older man. "It's the ferals, they did something new. They ambushed us."

Gorn's eyes narrowed as he watched her for a moment. Then he sighed and looked away. "You're not the first to report that today. Get out of here; I'll have to talk about this with Evir."

Her eyes widened in surprise, as she looked over towards Chase. He just shrugged his shoulders, and together they turned away, and headed deeper into the compound. Before long, they were in front of the building that they shared.

The trio walked in, and two short blond blurs rushed forward and grabbed Noelani around the waste. Noelani smiled down at the two sisters, and continued on into the room. In the corner, she saw Huff, the young mute Bothan who had also attached himself to her.

She smiled at him, and waved him forward. He watched her for a moment, a quiver wavering across his muzzle. Finally, he moved forward and wrapped his arms around her waist in a hug.

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Kor huddled in the cramped confines of the transport. They were all being taken to the spaceport, and a set of Jedi ships waiting there to get them all off the planet. There was no doubt now that the Guard had turned against the Jedi.

Kor closed her eyes, fighting the tears that wanted to come as she remembered Master Kam being shot in cold blood by that sadistic commander.

She scrubbed at her eyes with her paws, and then gave her head a quick shake.

The transport rumbled to a stop and the doors swung open. Kor blinked at the sudden influx of light, and stood up and got off the vehicle. She looked up and saw the three transports on the tarmac a hundred meters away, bright spotlights coming from them, roving the ground.

Kor paused, allowing the rest of the padawans to flow around her, as they rushed towards the transports.

She felt something else though. Something urged her to stay behind.

This was her home, more than Bothuwai had ever been.

She had met her best friend, Noelani here. She had learned so much here.

She had met Poll here.

She had lost Poll here.

Part of her still blamed Ben for what had happened, even though she knew that it had hurt Ben as much as it had hurt her. She bowed her head for a moment, as a fresh wave of pain flowed over her; she accepted the pain, comforted by its familiarity.

First Poll had died in those terrible caverns, and then Thann had informed her that he could no longer be her Master. Not for the first time, she felt lost and alone.

Lifting her head, she stared at the brilliant lights of the closest of the transports, and made up her mind. Moving purposefully, she headed towards one of the maintenance sheds, and with a flick of the Force opened the door.

She slipped into the dark room, and closed the door, waiting.

A few minutes later, she heard the voice of one of the older Jedi calling out, "That's everyone, let's lift off."

Acknowledgments rang out, and Kor could feel a low rumble deep in the pit of her stomach as the starships activated their repulsor engines.

A few minutes later, she heard the transports ignite their ion engines. Before long, the nearly deafening noise had dwindled to a low roar and then was gone all together.

Kor waited another fifteen minutes and then pushed open the door to the maintenance shed. She stared out at the empty starport, and then shifted her gaze to the equally empty Jedi Temple.

Pulling her robe tighter around her shoulders, she began the long walk back to the Temple; oddly happy at the solitude. For the first time since Poll's death, she almost felt at peace.

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