Starlight Beacon was not the only place in the galaxy where the Jedi offered refuge to those recently attacked by the Nihil. Some temples in and near the frontier lands opened their doors as well. No instructions went out from the Council on Coruscant dictating this; the decision was spontaneous, echoed by one Jedi Master after another, across vast stretches of space. Those who needed help—those who sought protection and assistance in dangerous times—would find it among the Jedi.
One such temple stood on the thickly forested world of Chespea, just within the border of the space newly sworn to the Republic. It was a temple of considerable age, one that had housed a small contingent of the Jedi for many generations. In some ways, the practices and customs of Jedi Knights here differed—they were independent, and private, and preferred it so—but not in their willingness to provide help to those who needed it.
So on that day the golden-roofed Chespea Temple, normally surrounded by nothing but kilometers of woodland and birdsong, instead was circled by tents and makeshift shelters, through which milled nearly one hundred people of various species and civilizations. In the few nearby clearings were parked carbon-scored, battered ships, the craft that had struggled so hard to reach a place of refuge. Yet the scene was peaceful in its way.
The calm before the Storm.
High in orbit, a Nihil Cloud leader nodded as the schematics zoomed in, tighter and tighter, until the temple’s golden roof shone bright as a bull’s-eye. “Don’t bother with the ships,” he said.
An underling who had not yet learned her place ventured, “But—if the goal is to cause damage and confusion—to leave them unclear of our intentions—”
“That was only for the first wave of our efforts,” the Cloud leader snapped. “This wave is about sending a message to the Jedi. From now on they’ll know—this is about them.”
So Marchion Ro had commanded. So would it be.
Those on the surface of Chespea at first believed that the swirling shapes far overhead must be a flock of birds. But that comforting illusion vanished within seconds. Moans of dismay turned into shrieks of panic as people jumped up, ran for their ships, or simply dashed into the woods in search of someplace, anyplace to hide. Otherwise they would surely be mowed down by the Nihil’s merciless assault.
But none of these travelers were in any danger.
The head of the temple, Master Imgree, looked up and, for the first time in her life, said the words, “Call Coruscant.”
Her Padawan nodded. “And tell them we’re under attack?”
Imgree shook her head. The Force had already told her what was near. “Tell them we are gone.”
The Padawan hesitated only momentarily before bravely doing what he was told. He had not been finished for more than one breath before Nihil fire blasted through the golden roof, incinerating everyone and everything inside, until the Chespea Temple was no more.
“Their target was indeed a Jedi temple,” said aide Norel Quo, bringing up holo after holo to float above Chancellor Lina Soh’s desk—portraits of devastation. “An isolated one, but still, a temple of the Order just the same. It was completely obliterated. So far as we know, no Jedi there survived.”
Chancellor Soh shook her head, dismayed and disbelieving in equal measures. “We’d come to believe the Nihil no longer presented much of a threat. Even if these are only remnants and stragglers, lashing out—the threat they pose may have been reduced, but clearly it remains quite real.”
Quo asked, “Should we inform Starlight Beacon?”
“Surely the Jedi Order has already told them.” Being chancellor of the Republic often meant delivering bad news; Soh never shrank from this task, but she also saw no point in undertaking it when unnecessary.
Quo looked downcast. “It’s hard to hear of this and think that we can do nothing.”
“We’ll send patrols along the hyperspace lanes, at least,” Soh said. Like her aide, she felt better taking some kind of action, even if unnecessary. “If the Nihil send a fleet toward Starlight, we’ll know about it—and we’ll meet them with all the power we can muster. Contact Jedi Masters Adampo and Rosason, send our official sympathies…and unofficially let them know that the next time the Nihil try something, those guys are in for a nasty surprise.”
“Does anyone have a T-7 anx I can buy or borrow?”
“We’re looking for power converters, compatible with a Corellian model YG-2500.”
“Hull plating? Metal that could become hull plating? Hull patches? Anything?”
Affie Hollow stood in the midst of the group at the center of the Starlight docking bay, trying to listen for both the things the Vessel needed and the ones they might be able to provide. Although the Jedi and the Republic were providing what tools, parts, and assistance they had to those stranded on the station, there wasn’t quite enough to go around. So a kind of grassroots bartering place had formed, with everyone offering what they could do or spare in the hope of receiving what they needed in return.
Great in concept, Affie thought, but kinda loud in action.
She’d begun to step back from the huddle when she heard a voice call out, “Anybody here know how to fuse a new coupling?”
“I do!” Affie lifted one hand and looked around. “My shipmates and I can handle that.”
“That’s a relief.” The speaker turned out to be a man of perhaps forty years, with a square but pleasant face. Holding on to his arm was a woman with riotously curly hair. “This is Pikka Adren, and I’m Joss, and are we glad to meet you. Not many people can fuse their own couplings any longer—”
“We can,” Pikka interjected, “but only the couplings that we can build with a polarity torch, and who carries around a polarity torch anymore?”
“Not us,” Joss admitted. “Which will change in future, but that gets us nowhere today.”
“Well, we can help you. I’m Affie Hollow. My pilot, Leox Gyasi, likes to do a lot of things the old-fashioned way, which means he’s been making his own couplings for forever. I’m pretty good at it, too. Of course, we’ll need micrax—”
“We’ve got micrax,” said Joss, with a grin. “Let me guess. You don’t, and are hoping we’ll share?”
Affie smiled back. She’d have teamed up with anybody who had the materials the Vessel required…but it felt better to join forces with individuals who seemed honorable. She was starting to trust her instincts about people.
The news about the attack on the Jedi temple at Chespea would have been a terrible blow coming at any time. Coming at this time—with Starlight both overcrowded and seemingly haunted by some strange disturbance in the Force—it felt like every burden had become heavier to bear.
You’ve dealt with worse than this, Stellan reminded himself sternly as he and the other senior Jedi on board took their places around the wide table. You’re only overwhelmed because something’s interfering with your connection to the Force.
Though he would never have admitted it, he was also reckoning with Orla Jareni’s words earlier. She wondered if he knew who he was without the Order. That made Stellan wonder if he knew who he was without the Force at his beck and call, as it seemed to be no longer…
No. You remain bound to the Force. The connection is simply…disquieted for a while.
Stellan understood this on a purely logical level—nothing could destroy a Jedi’s connection to the energy that linked all living beings. However, the instability in that connection at present was leading to a certain shakiness of his moods and thinking. Looking around the room at a group of powerful Jedi experiencing their own levels of distress, Stellan knew he wasn’t the only one.
But he’d keep it together. He had to, for the good of this station, and perhaps the whole galaxy.
“Why should the Nihil attack such a small temple?” Indeera Stokes asked. “How are they a threat?”
“It’s not about threats, it’s about sending a message.” Orla Jareni stood apart from the others, as usual, distinct in her snowy robes. “The question is why now?”
Nib Assek said, “Do we think the Nihil have something to do with this—strangeness aboard Starlight Beacon?”
With a shrug, Regald Coll said, “How would that even work? In other words, no.”
“Then—with all respect to the fallen—” Elzar took a deep breath. “We need to set aside the question of Chespea for now. The Republic is taking action to police the hyperspace lanes, and the Council is already spreading the word, ensuring that other temples will be able to defend themselves. That means our most immediate concern remains taking care of the people who’ve taken refuge here.”
Bell Zettifar leaned forward, clearly hesitant to speak but compelled to do so. “With all due respect, I disagree. Our first priority should be investigating this disturbance in the Force on the station.”
He was right. Stellan felt a twinge of annoyance, because that was precisely what he ought to have said himself. The constant static at the edges of his consciousness—the prickling absence of his full communication with the Force—kept Stellan from ordering his thoughts as he should. He even had that strange nursery rhyme running through his head over and over, the one that began Shrii ka rai ka rai—
Focus, he told himself. “Is there a locus to the disturbance?” Stellan asked the group at large. He swiftly brought up a holoschematic of the station. “A place where we have each sensed this most strongly?”
From the corner, the logistics droid suddenly piped up, “I would be more than happy to compile all reports and map them on schematics of Starlight Beacon! This data could prove informative.”
Stellan nearly said yes, just to give JJ-5145 something to do. Before he could, however, Indeera Stokes said, “That won’t be necessary.” She rose and walked toward the holo, raising her hand to brush very near the dividing locks that connected the top and bottom parts of the station. “Here,” she murmured. “Somewhere around here.”
Stellan had not known that was the place until she said it, but through what strength in the Force remained to him, the rightness of her words reverberated within his mind. Beyond that—it wasn’t very far from the quartermaster’s office, where he’d been sleeping when the nightmare overwhelmed him. “Yes. Yes, that’s it.”
“Okay, what do we have around there?” Elzar gestured to zoom in on the holo. “Engineering—raw material stores—the main cargo bay—”
“Both Orla and I were drawn to the main cargo bay earlier,” Regald interjected. “We didn’t discover anything out of the ordinary there, and we were soon called away, but I’d say that’s more evidence that we need to center our efforts on that area.”
“Yes. So we search,” said Nib. “We find whatever this is. We learn what it is. And then we form a plan.”
Every bone in Stellan’s body told him not to search, not to get any closer. But that couldn’t be the Force warning him. The Force had been pushed too far away. It was fear whispering to him now, and he refused to give way to fear. Stellan would stand for it no longer. “I realize we all have other responsibilities at the moment, but insofar as our duties allow—yes, we search. Whatever this is, we’ll get to the bottom of it.”
Maybe, if he was lucky, the cause of their trouble would be something he could jettison into the closest star.
Just as Koley Linn had suspected—yes, there stood Leox Gyasi like a chump, waiting with all the other fools in the line for rations. Why didn’t he send the girl to do it? Koley traveled alone, but if he did have an assistant, damned if he’d be doing any grunt work.
(He knew that, supposedly, Leox worked for Affie Hollow. Koley didn’t buy that. That stupid kid had ruined the Byne Guild and everybody who worked for it; even Gyasi couldn’t be fool enough to listen to her ever again. No, probably they pretended she was the boss because it gave them an excuse when things went wrong.)
Still, Leox’s stupidity gave Koley an opportunity—because he was pretty sure he’d seen Affie hanging around with some other pilots, working on some odd job or other. That meant the Vessel was ripe for exploration.
Koley strolled toward the ship, studying it as he went. As much as he ragged Leox about the antiquity of this ship, Koley knew it was also fast, maneuverable, and capable of handling a wide array of work. He also knew that, until recently, the Vessel had benefited from the well-funded maintenance budget of the late Byne Guild. That might yet turn out to be Koley’s good fortune. Yeah, the Vessel had taken some damage, but there were probably some systems in good order—with new, top-quality parts just ripe for the scavenging—
Koley stooped down to check the ship’s undercarriage, then heard a low hum and a thunk. He stood upright with a jolt and saw that the ramp was down, and he was being watched.
Geode stood there, expressionless, never turning away from Koley Linn.
“You,” Koley muttered. “I heard a rumor you’d taken on other work. Though I’m not sure why I thought there would be more than one ship in the galaxy willing to hire a rock.”
His jibe had no effect on Geode’s hard, cold stare.
“Whatever.” Koley shrugged as he turned to go. Not that he was scared of Geode or anyone else, but if he got reported to Starlight command, who knew how long the Ace of Staves’s departure would be delayed?
Still, it stung to turn back empty-handed. The Vessel was far from unguarded—at least, for the moment. But he’d keep his eyes open for other chances.
Koley pulled out his comm receiver, hoping to eavesdrop on official communications and get some better idea when he could get the hell out of here. As he clicked it on, though, static popped through it at strange, irregular, yet somehow ordered intervals. It lasted only a moment, but that was long enough for Koley to know that it was definitely weird.
Something is not right on this station, he thought.
Aboard the Gaze Electric, Thaya Ferr reviewed the scans and smiled. “Our first shipment of cargo is arriving now, my lord.”
“Let us go to receive it.” Marchion Ro normally left such tasks to the lowest members of his crew; they were beneath his dignity. But this was no regular receipt of cargo, and besides…
…the Gaze Electric now stood all but empty. The only living beings present were Thaya Ferr and Ro himself.
They reached the docking bay in time to see the first crate hovering in, guided solely by cargo droids. (Ro noted that Thaya had wisely arranged for droid-only delivery; there would be no wagging tongues spreading word about this.) He watched as the crate settled into the ship’s hold with a heavy, satisfying thud.
The cargo droids flitted away to grab the next crate. If Ro waited, they would unpack all the crates for him, leaving nothing else for him to do. But he wanted to see the items he’d bought. They meant safety. Security. Dominance. They meant never having to waste time wiping out another insubordinate crewmember ever again.
Ro nodded toward Thaya, who quickly punched in the receiving code. The crate hinged open to reveal its contents: row after row of enforcer droids. Their flat, mirrored faces stared back, reflecting Ro’s mask back at him a dozen times over.
Enforcer droids had been made illegal many decades before. This made them difficult to find, particularly in such quantities. Thaya Ferr had found them, however, and at a price he had been able to take from the Nihil coffers without attracting any notice.
If any of my Tempest Runners were as competent as my lackey, Ro thought, only imagine what I could do.