Those in the lower half of Starlight Beacon had begun congregating in and near the main docking bay. Republic officials, maintenance workers, even droids milled around in the corridors just outside the bay, sharing the few scraps of information they had. The overall mood remained calm. They had faith in the Republic; they expected help to arrive soon; this was a considerable mishap, and the station would require repair, but none of them suspected the situation could be worse than that.
Orla Jareni didn’t know whether to pity them or envy them. What she wanted was to enlighten them. But Stellan still wouldn’t hear of it.
“People have a right to know,” Orla insisted. “In their place, I’d want the truth.”
“I don’t intend to deny them the truth forever,” Stellan said. “Not even for very much longer. But the situation—and some of the individuals within it—it’s volatile. Once we’ve been able to establish contact with the Republic, once we have a plan, then we can make the announcement. Koley Linn and those like him won’t have a chance to make problems if we come to them with a solution already in hand.”
Orla could see the wisdom in this. But she could see the flaws, too. “All this is predicated on the belief that we actually can contact the Republic in the near future. Right now we have absolutely no proof of that.”
“It has to be possible,” Stellan insisted. His eyes had taken on that shine they sometimes had—that absolute, utter faith—that made Orla understand exactly why the Council had chosen him as the public exemplar of all Jedi. “The Nihil are strong, and they’re vicious. But they’re not necessarily smart. They win by brute force and deceit. Any technological sabotage they’ve pulled? We’ll be able to unravel it. We just have to find the right string to pull.”
The Nihil have been smart enough to outwit us time and time again! Orla nearly snapped—but she held on to her temper. Barely. “I hope you’re right, Stellan,” she said. “The stakes are too high if you’re wrong.”
As she stalked off, the angry words she hadn’t spoken boiled inside her. You always need the Council’s approval, don’t you, Stellan? You don’t know who you are without it. It took all her self-control not to turn back, confront Stellan, lash out at him in order to argue the point further, more hotly, until…
I’m not myself, she realized.
Her temper had long been her most difficult companion, but she possessed more self-control than this—or at least she did when she was in communion with the Force.
But her connection to the Force was again disturbed. As was Stellan’s, she’d wager. Whatever had gone wrong before hadn’t conveniently departed when this crisis began. Instead it lay in wait, chipping away at every Jedi on board.
We have to do something, Orla thought. No. I have to do something.
Bell’s first spark of hope came when a droid piped up: “Eiram medical cruiser approaching Starlight.”
“They are?” Bell scrambled to his feet from his place on the floor at Master Indeera’s bedside, waking Ember. Already Burryaga was lumbering closer. “You’ve been able to get through on comms?”
“Negative,” the droid said. “But look.” It pointed its metallic arm at the nearest viewport. Sure enough, the Eiram ship was out there, hovering close, apparently unsure what to do next.
Burryaga growled that if they weren’t docking, that probably meant they couldn’t dock.
“I hate to say it, but I agree,” Bell said. “The docking bays must have been screwed up by the blast, too.” Which he’d more or less guessed before this, but the confirmation was daunting.
Still, the medical cruiser was a potential source of help—the first they’d had—and they needed to make the most of the opportunity.
Bell turned to the droid. “Okay, so, station-wide communication is still a no-go—”
“Affirmative.”
“—But is there some other way for us to send a signal at a shorter range. Say, just to the Eiram vessel?” Bell looked back and forth between the droid and Burryaga, hoping one of them would have the answer that was eluding him.
Burryaga thoughtfully growled that some droids had strong enough arrays—like, for instance, this LT-16 here.
“Why didn’t you say so?” Bell asked the droid.
The LT cheerfully replied, “I’m afraid I’m designed to work in tandem with larger systems for communications. I lack the transmitter strength to send any signal that could cover a distance over one hundred meters.”
“The Eiram ship’s close, but there’s no way it’s going to get that close without docking—which, apparently, it can’t do.” Bell ran one hand through his hair, thinking fast. “But if we can boost the transmitter strength…”
Burryaga went to the nearest wall and peeled off a panel with a metallic clang that startled the patients, exposing circuits and wires. Bell smiled as he spotted a small power cell relay wedged in the works.
“Burry,” he said, “you’re brilliant.”
Modestly Burryaga admitted this was true, but currently beside the point. With great care, he detached the power cell from its relay cable; a couple of the emergency lights dimmed, but it didn’t get too much darker—which was a relief, because Bell very much needed to be able to see what he was doing.
“Could you open your maintenance panel?” he asked the LT droid.
“Affirmative.” LT-16 seemed somewhat reluctant, as well he might be, since he was about to get hit with the droid equivalent of triple adrenaline. But he opened the maintenance panel and allowed Bell to attach the power cell. Once he was done, he opened the energy flow—and the droid’s visor panel glowed brighter and brighter. Its metal body began to vibrate. “Oh my,” it said.
“Can you transmit my voice?” Bell asked.
“Text only.” LT-16 whirred louder. “Oh my oh my oh my.”
“Then tell the Eiram cruiser that there’s been an explosion, that we’re contacting them from this tower, and we still need medical help, all right?” Bell said. Ember whimpered slightly at his side, and he stroked her neck as the droid continued buzzing and whirring.
His eyes met Burryaga’s. If this didn’t work—
“They read,” the droid said. “They read and are conducting scans. Will report.”
“We’ve made contact.” Bell grinned up at Burryaga. This was only the first of many, many steps to bring everyone aboard the medical tower to safety—but at least they’d finally begun.
From the corner of his eye, Elzar Mann saw a flutter of white. He immediately left his post, where he was hotwiring yet more astromechs in the hope of gaining greater computational power, and hurried after. “Orla? Where are you going?”
She stopped at the sound of her name. “Am I in trouble for defying the edicts of Stellan Gios?”
Elzar gave her a look. “I’d be just about the last person in the galaxy to give you a problem for bending the rules. But we shouldn’t be wandering off. The radiation levels from the base of the station are spiking—there’s going to be even more instability soon.”
“I realize that,” Orla said, even as she shook her head no. “But that disturbance in the Force—it’s still out there, Elzar. If anything, it’s growing stronger. Do you truly not sense it at all?”
He had to admit, “If anything, I’ve held myself back from the Force even more than before. Which I know is the exact opposite of what a Jedi should do—”
“Not here,” Orla said. “Not today. Trust your instincts, Elzar. They’re steering you in the right direction.”
For once, Elzar thought, but he remained quiet.
Orla continued, “I’m not myself. Stellan is—better, at least, than he was, but still not operating at top capacity, don’t you agree? Probably every other Jedi aboard Starlight is suffering from the malign influence of…of whatever that is.” Orla sighed heavily. “We must stop it. In order to stop it, we must identify it. In order to identify it, we first have to find the damn thing. Which is what I’m about to do.”
Elzar gripped her arm, unwilling to let her go. “But—what happened to Regald, and even to Indeera—we’d all agreed, nobody else should pursue this until we have more support, and the crisis is over—”
“I recognize the risks,” Orla said. “We’re going to need all our strength to get through this crisis, and whatever this is has sapped away that strength. We can’t save the station without taking it on.” With the shadow of a smile, she added, “Don’t worry. I can be surprisingly careful, when I want to be.”
He wanted to stop her, but she was right. “If you’re not back within the hour, I’m coming after you.”
“I’d expect no less.” With that, Orla gave him a surprisingly easy grin. “Watch your temper until I return to watch it for you.” Then Elzar could only watch her go.
One of the few non-Jedi aboard Starlight who knew the depth of the danger they were in was, at that moment, passionately wishing she had no idea.
If I didn’t know, then this would just be mildly irritating, Affie thought, walking numbly through the crowded docking bay back toward the Vessel. I’d kill time playing sabacc with Geode and Leox. We’d be having fun, right up until a few minutes before—
A shudder went through her as she imagined what it might be like for the station to descend into Eiram’s atmosphere, gravity seizing them ever tighter into its grip until they were plummeting at maximum velocity straight down to—
“Hi there!” Pikka Adren seemed to appear from midair directly in Affie’s path, though Affie was fairly sure that was only because she hadn’t been paying attention. “Listen, thanks for your help with the…the couplings…Affie, are you okay?”
“Not particularly.” Affie tried to smile. She must not have done a very good job, because Pikka’s face fell. “It’s just rough, you know? Being stuck here.”
“Well, it’s no fun.” Pikka leaned in closer and whispered, “Is that Koley Linn guy giving you trouble? We’ve seen him following you around, watching your ship. Looks like he’s up to no good.”
Affie hadn’t even noticed Koley Linn following her. Great. “We’ve had run-ins with him before. Usually he’s more of a nuisance than a danger, but—he can be dangerous, so give him a wide berth if you can.”
Pikka’s eyes widened with outrage. “He is pestering you. Listen, if he ever approaches you and your crewmates aren’t around, come and find us, or just give a shout. Joss and I will be there as fast as we can.”
“You’re good people,” Affie said. The thought of the Adrens being trapped on this station struck her with new force. It was one thing to be frightened for yourself, another to be frightened for others. It was beginning to fully sink in that every single being on Starlight was in mortal danger. “Seriously. Thank you. I appreciate it. But—”
“But that’s not what’s bothering you.” Pikka put one hand on her shoulder, an almost motherly gesture. Affie hadn’t had any mothering in a long time. “Do you want to talk about it?”
As badly as Affie wished she didn’t know the truth, she also didn’t want to lie to anybody else. Besides, she told herself, the more people who know, the more people who’ll be working on a solution.
“We should talk,” she said to Pikka. “But first, you need to sit down.”
“Oh my,” the LT-16 droid chirped, still almost vibrating with borrowed power. “Oh my, oh my, scans incoming.”
“Finally!” Bell connected the droid to the nearest screen; Burryaga bent over his shoulder to look, too. The surge of excitement they each felt dimmed, however, as the scans began to unfurl.
What they were seeing was barely recognizable as Starlight Beacon. The middle of the station had been rendered no more than a glowing blur. Normally scans would have shown Starlight lit up with power in every wall, on every level, but instead large sections of the station had gone all but completely dark. The medical tower wasn’t the only area working solely under emergency lights. Worst of all, to Bell’s eyes, was the darkness around the docking bays. Without those, it would be impossible to evacuate the patients, much less leave themselves.
“Trajectory readings coming in,” LT-16 said. “Oh my.”
I need to unhitch that thing from the extra power soon, Bell thought. The LT-16 was, for now, their one connection to anything outside of this tower; he didn’t want to fry its circuits. “What do you mean, trajectory?”
The droid replied by bringing up a schematic on the screen, which showed Starlight Beacon, Eiram, and some extremely discouraging arrows. It was nothing the station’s positional thrusters couldn’t fix, but on the earlier scans, those thrusters had been dark and powerless. When the schematic’s full meaning sank in, Bell looked up at Burryaga to see, on his face, just as much dismay as Bell felt himself.
According to the schematic, Starlight would enter the planet’s atmosphere within three hours.
Bell willed himself to remain calm. “Tell the medical cruiser that we’re looking at the new data and will get back to them shortly.”
“Message delivered,” LT-16 said, still trembling.
Slowly and deliberately, Bell unplugged the droid from the amplified power. It went still with a long whistle that could only be interpreted as relief. “What now?” Bell said to Burryaga. “What can we do that’s even remotely constructive?”
Burryaga brought the schematic back on-screen. Was he going to show Bell something, or was he searching for any kind of answer? It didn’t matter, because when Bell studied it this time, he spotted an opportunity.
Quickly he pointed to the outline of a nearby maintenance shaft. “This would normally be shut off in case of emergency, but it’s open. Which means—”
Burryaga growled in triumph. They finally had a way to reach the rest of the station—and if that wasn’t a solution, it was at least a place to begin.
Elzar Mann would have been greatly surprised to learn that his warnings to Orla had—in part—been heeded.
As much as Orla liked to think of herself as an exception to most rules, there was no reason to believe that she would be more aware of the danger, or able to defend against it, than Regald Coll and Indeera Stokes had been. Yes, something had to be done, but that didn’t necessarily involve confrontation.
Instead she had decided to simply seal the area off.
We ought to have done that at the beginning, Orla thought. It seemed so obvious to her now, but it should have been obvious to all of them, immediately. This was yet more proof that whatever was aboard this station was affecting their judgment; fear clouded the thoughts as effectively as any Jedi mind trick, if not more.
And sealing off the area would probably contain whatever was causing the problem…but it wouldn’t end those effects. The disturbance in the Force would remain.
Still. Taking this action might not fix everything, but inaction would fix nothing. Once the area was sealed, the source of this disruption in the Force couldn’t get any closer; at least that represented some kind of limit.
And once it’s trapped, Orla thought—still not knowing what it might be—our options for dealing with it increase.
As she approached the spot where Regald had fallen, very near the cargo bay, the air took on a chill. Climate controls on this level appeared to be failing. Soon Orla could see her breath, visible as faint gray puffs. As mundane as this sight was, it always made her smile; it reminded her of a long-ago day when Yoda had taken her group of younglings to the roof of the temple to play in one of the planet’s rare snowfalls.
Orla had toddled close to the side, and he had caught her with his walking stick…
That was what had happened. She remembered it well. But in her mind, the images had changed. Her memory was no longer her own.
Toddling to the side, tripping over the side, crying out as she fell, then tumbling forever and ever down through the gilded maze of Coruscant’s buildings, inexorably toward her death—
Stop it, Orla told herself. There was no point in imagining how that day might have gone if Yoda hadn’t been careful.
As ever, when she was troubled by the stray morbid thought, Orla called upon the Force to bolster and guide her. That still worked…more or less.
Her steps took her into a long corridor marked only by a few random storage bins—some short, some tall. Orla peered into the distance at a taller stack of bins many meters ahead.
Above the stack were grayish-white puffs of breath—far too large to represent the breath of anything humanoid. This was something else.
Doesn’t mean it’s the cause of the trouble, she told herself. It could just be a lost Trandoshan, something like that.
Still, terror spiked through her, threatening to hold her fast.
Orla forced herself to begin walking forward, but each step became more difficult than the last—as though she were trying to walk through frigid water that came up to her calves, then her thighs, then her chest. Instead of the weightlessness that came with being in water, though, she felt infinitely heavier.
Like the waves she’d commanded Elzar to face on Ledalau—but worse, darker, higher, stronger, threatening to toss her aside and crush her on the nearest rocks—
It knows I’m coming, she thought.
And then—without knowing where the knowledge came from—It’s hungry.
Not for her flesh, Orla knew. For something much worse.
She tried to reach out with her feelings, but it was impossible. She couldn’t remember how, couldn’t regain her focus, couldn’t think at all. Her eyes remained fixed on the far end of the corridor, and she saw motion—but without shape.
Or, rather, with a thousand shapes all at once, writhing and vanishing and reappearing and roiling ever closer, and she couldn’t even run.
It’s melting, she thought as the shapes poured downward all around her, falling and falling and falling without end. The station is melting. Or the galaxy. Or—or—
Nothing made sense to her any longer. She sensed that rather than knew it; Orla had slipped past the point when anything in her brain could still be considered thought. Instead she was at the mercy of the hallucinogenic twisting and turning that had swallowed her whole.
Orla’s mind was no longer her own. The Force had gone silent, but it still existed. It had to exist.
Didn’t it?
The Force would find her, it would find her, she wouldn’t just vanish into the void, she wouldn’t just become nothing—or no one—
Cold seized Orla, piercing her flesh, seemingly freezing her very bones. She wanted to hug herself against the brutal chill, but her arms no longer obeyed her commands. Her legs wouldn’t move. Nor her head and neck—she wanted to look down and see what had gripped her, but she couldn’t any longer.
Her face became even whiter. Then gray as ash. She fell onto the floor, unable to move, ever again.
The Force was silent, and nothing was left of Orla but fear.