CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Kane Skywalker had heard Mara through the Force. She would be taking Toah and the others off-world, away from Lothal. It would be for the best, he understood, if only to ensure the safety of the map and its contents. Still, there would be the blockade to worry about. Luckily, he already had something in mind regarding that.
He could already sense that one of the Star Destroyers had broken from the formation and was now heading for his position. No doubt that “Ochi of Bestoon” individual, coward that he was, was making his move to take the map. He had little idea as to who this Ochi was or why he had been so frightened of him, though he could wager a guess that it had something to do with the man he was a clone of. In any case, Ochi’s fear had led him to make the mistake that would give Toah Jarsan and the others the opening they needed to get away from Lothal.
As soon as he spotted the Resurgent-class Star Destroyer emerging from the clouds, Kane Skywalker — still sitting in his cross-legged position — raised a hand towards the oncoming vessel. He could feel the Star Destroyer resist against his grip as he struggled to overwhelm and influence the minds of those commandeering the cruiser. Once their minds were his, he would be able to send the Star Destroyer into a dive, away from him and away from—
“Skywalker.”
Kane’s eyes shot open and his heart thrummed against his chest. The pace of his laborious breathing increased as he lost control of the Star Destroyer, allowing it to resume its set path. Jumping to his feet, he broke out into a run, turning his back on the site he had guarded for so many years.
A massive bolt of green energy shot out from the Star Destroyer’s cannon and the world exploded all around him.
* * *
When the Jedi and their allies finally reached the spaceport containing their ships, Toah had suddenly skidded to a halt and collided into a stack of crates, falling to his knees. Rey immediately turned back and rushed over to him while the others hurried to their respective ships.
“Come on, let’s get a move on!” Poe cried as he climbed into his X-wing. “Those stormtroopers are gonna be on us any minute now!”
Rey ignored him and shook Toah by the shoulder. “Master! Master, come on! You’ve gotta get up!”
Toah’s only response was to clutch his head, his eyes wide with… was that terror? She had never seen him look so frightened before. It was honestly one of the most unsettling things she had seen in her life.
“It can’t be,” he said hoarsely, breathing heavily. “You’re supposed to be dead. I saw you die.”
“Master, what are you talking about?” Rey shook him again. “Come on, we need to get out of—”
“Stop right there!” A full platoon of stormtroopers came rushing into the docking bay, blasters raised. “You are all under arrest!”
“Fierfek!” Snap Wexley poked out of the cockpit of his X-wing and opened fire on the troopers with his blaster. “Come on, you blasted Jedi! What’s the hold up?”
As blaster fire rang out all around them, Rey continued to look at Toah with concern. No amount of prodding or shaking got him to snap out of the trance he had fallen into. Not meeting her eyes, he only spoke a single word, one that he repeated over and over again.
“Vorath.”
* * *
Mara Jade cursed to herself as she steered her ship towards the docking bay where Toah Jarsan and the others were being held up at. She could see the stormtroopers firing at them down below; she also saw that Toah was on his knees for some reason, with his apprentice Rey struggling to get him back to his feet. It was because of this that the troopers were starting to overwhelm them, unrelenting in their attack.
“Owen,” she said to her son sitting beside her. “Take the controls.”
The teenage boy looked at her in surprise. “What?”
Without another word, she shifted the control yoke into his hands before getting out of her seat, heading out of the cockpit. She slammed the control panel to lower the ramp and stepped out as the Jade Sabre hovered over the docking bay. Some of the stormtroopers noticed her and redirected their attention to her, firing their blasters as she deflected them with her lightsaber.
“Now!” she cried out to Poe, sitting in the cockpit of his X-wing. “While they’re distracted!”
To her relief, Poe picked up on what she was expecting him to do and fired his fighter’s cannon, sending dozens of stormtroopers flying from the force of the explosion. While Snap and Jessika repeated his actions, Mara reached out with the Force and used it to seize Finn, pulling him up onto the ramp. Nira Maren mimicked this maneuver, using the Force to lift the Abednedo priest Chek onto the ship before jumping up to join Mara on the ramp. Together, the two of them then reached out and used all of their strength to pull up Rey and Toah.
Once she was sure everyone was aboard, Mara pressed the control panel again to close the ramp before shouting to the cockpit, “Get us out of here!”
As her son expertly piloted the Jade Sabre away from the docking bay, the three X-wings started to lift up and follow the ship, leaving behind the remaining stormtroopers as they continued to fire at them. Within moments, the four ships were well away from the city and heading up through Lothal’s atmosphere. For whatever reason, the First Order Star Destroyer made no attempt to stop the fleeing ships, though Mara chose not to dwell on it too much, at least not until they were safely away.
While the others situated themselves in the main hold, Mara returned to the cockpit and got back into the pilot’s seat. As Owen returned the controls to her, he said, “There’s a blockade orbiting the planet.”
“I know,” she replied.
“How are we going to get past it?”
She flipped a few switches on the dashboard, taking her time in answering him. “Set coordinates for Mon Cala,” she finally said.
Owen huffed impatiently but complied with his mother’s commands. While he did that, Mara hailed Poe Dameron on the intercom.
“How fast are those new T-70s of yours?”
“Er, pretty fast,” Poe replied.
“I need a number, flyboy.”
“Fine. About 1,100 kilometers per hour. Why?”
“Just try and keep up. Everyone, fasten your restraints.”
She could only hope that they had done as she had asked as, as soon as they had cleared Lothal’s atmosphere, she punched the accelerator to maximum speed and like a silver dagger the Jade Sabre shot past the Star Destroyers orbiting the planet, moving too fast for their turbolaser cannons or tractor beams to follow. Poe, Snap, and Jessika were close behind her in their X-wings, pushing their fighters to their limit as they struggled to keep up. Just as TIE fighters began to pour out of the Destroyers’ hangars, Mara pushed the hyperdrive lever and the Jade Sabre jumped to lightspeed. She only allowed herself to sigh in relief once she detected the three X-wings following her through the hyperspace tunnel.
Slumping back in her seat, Mara exhaled deeply before looking over at her son. “Promise me you’ll never repeat what I just did.”
Owen looked back at her, looking distraught. At first she thought he was just frazzled from the maneuver she had just pulled off, only to see the fear that had entered his eyes.
“Mom,” he said quietly. “I feel… cold.”
As soon as he said this, Mara felt herself shiver as if an icy wind had just passed over her. She directed her gaze back to the viewport, the swirling blue tunnel reflecting in her green eyes.
“I feel it, too….”
* * *
Kane Skywalker groaned as he came back to reality. The smell of smoke filtered through the vent of his mask as he called upon the Force to give him the strength to get up. As he hobbled onto his feet, he looked over to see where the Star Destroyer had blasted the former site of the Lothal Jedi Temple. The Star Destroyer continued to hover over the spot and a gaping chasm was left in its wake, wisps of smoke continuing to rise from it.
Laughter filled his ears and he readjusted the visuals of his mask to see a familiar figure striding up to him. A dagger in one hand, Ochi of Bestoon spread his arms wide as he approached the clone of Vader.
“I hope you don’t mind the little renovations I’ve made to your home,” the assassin cackled. “I thought it needed a little sprucing up.”
Kane saw his lightsaber laying in the grass and summoned it to his hand, igniting its blue blade.
“I’ll admit,” Ochi went on, “I don’t fully understand what your deal is. I don’t know if you’re a clone or the real deal or just some wannabe impersonator. But whatever the case is with you, you are nowhere near half the man I expected you to be.”
“Elaborate,” Kane said coolly.
Ochi laughed again as he gestured up at the Star Destroyer. “Come on! You have been able to take that ship down like it was nothing! ‘Chosen One,’ my ass. You’re just as pathetic as the man you imitate.”
“You seem to be familiar with Darth Vader.”
“Oh, he and I go way back,” Ochi chuckled, sharpening his knife on his gauntlet. “First encountered him not long after the Clone Wars, as part of a test the Emperor had set up for him involving some weird cult he had found. He actually managed to kill me, though the Emperor found a way to bring me back through some sort of Sith ritual. Guess he saw me as too valuable to let go to waste… unlike some people he knew.”
Kane wasn’t sure if Ochi was trying to goad him with these words. Considering he had absolutely no idea who Ochi was, it was not working.
“You served the Emperor, then,” he said. “And now you serve this First Order?”
“Ah, but see, that’s the thing,” Ochi replied, lowering his voice. “The way I see it, I’m still serving the same people I’ve always been serving. In the span of forty years, not much as changed for me.”
“But the Emperor is dead. You must serve some new master now.”
“Says who?”
The words caught Kane off-guard. This provided Ochi with the opening he sought and the assassin hurled the dagger at him. Still weak from the Star Destroyer’s blast, Kane was unable to move out of the way in time and the blade caught him in the shoulder. He cried out as sparks flew from the open wound and he fell to his knees.
“Interesting,” Ochi murmured, stalking his way over to him. “Did you suffer the same injuries as Vader by sheer coincidence, leaving you in that suit? Or did you make those changes yourself?”
Kane did not answer him and instead threw his lightsaber at the assassin. Ochi ducked, narrowly avoiding the blue blade, before straightening up and resuming his approach.
“Heh. You missed.”
“You are not very smart, are you?” Kane retorted as he brought the saber back with his mind.
Ochi cried out as the blade grazed his right shoulder and he clutched it as he howled in pain. The lightsaber hilt returned to Kane’s awaiting hand and he pulled himself back to his feet, the dagger still jutting from his shoulder.
“It would appear your skills have gotten rusty in the past forty years,” Kane said to the beaten assassin.
Snarling, Ochi staggered back and drew a blaster from his belt. He fired it at Kane but the white-armored knight deflected each and every shot. He then lunged at Ochi and delivered a downward slash which cut straight through the assassin’s wrist, severing his hand from the rest of his arm. As Ochi screamed in agony, Kane swept his blade downward and cut off both of the assassin’s legs at the shin, bringing him to the ground.
“You… you son of a gundark!” Ochi spat out. “I guess you’re not that different from Vader after all!”
“It would appear so,” Kane muttered. After pulling the dagger out of his shoulder, he looked away from the assassin and up at the Star Destroyer hovering over them, which had yet to make a move.
Ochi raised his one good hand to his mask to speak into his comlink. “What are you waiting for, Fellfire? Blast him! Finish him off!”
The Star Destroyer did nothing of the sort, remaining inert as it hung over the two of them like some vast, predatory bird. Kane could sense Ochi’s confusion and was surprised to find himself feeling confused as well. His gaze then drifted over to the chasm that the Star Destroyer had created when it had destroyed the former site of the Lothal Jedi Temple.
From what he understood, the Temple had once held a gateway that led into a realm that transcended both space and time; a world between worlds, as some would call it. That gateway had been destroyed along with the rest of the temple during the Liberation of Lothal… though he had always wondered if all of it had truly perished. After all, it had been this very spot that had drawn him to Lothal in the first place and it had always felt strong in the Force.
A cold chill fell over him, something that should have been impossible given the suit he wore. Behind his mask, his blue eyes went wide as a familiar voice echoed in his ear; the same voice he had heard earlier.
“Skywalker.”
His entire body seized up and his lightsaber fell from his hand. At that same moment, the Star Destroyer Fellfire started to move, angling itself towards the sky.
“What the…? Hey!” Ochi cried out as he waved his hand. “Get back here! What do you think you’re doing?! Are you even listening to me?!”
Clearly the Star Destroyer was not paying the assassin any heed as it continued to rise through the atmosphere and disappeared behind the clouds. Ochi swore out loud as he pounded the ground.
“I guess that does it then.” He glared up at Kane. “Go on, then. Finish me. You know you want to.”
Kane ignored him as he found himself looking once more at the chasm. A figure was rising from it, one that wore the gray and white robes of a Jedi Master. Bearing the appearance of a human male in his fifties, the newcomer grunted as he used both of his hands — one of which was covered with a black glove — to heave himself out of the hole and onto solid ground. As he rose onto his feet, he swiped ash and dust from his bearded face and squinted his eyes as they adjusted to the sunlight. His blue irises finally focused and they landed on Kane Skywalker and Ochi, who were both staring at him in shock and awe.
Long thought dead for sixteen years, Luke Skywalker — Grand Master of the restored Jedi Order — looked at them both and said, “Who the hell are you?”
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