The New Jedi Order: A Vision of Confluence

XXV: Slaves to Darkness

Anakin caught a ration bar out of the air, peeling back the foil and taking a bite. Mei passed out the others, even the neophytes accepting two each. Face and Bhindi studiously kept their backs to the mounded rubble that hadn’t been there when they arrived as they chewed on their own. The ration bar wasn’t the best, but as hungry as he was it was as delicious as the home-cooked dinners back at the Praxeum.

The sergeant of course turned down the offering, since it would mean taking off his helmet, and the Astartes seemed to have it welded in place. At least the two neophytes wore helmets with open faces, so they could down some quick calories. Solidian counted out his last rounds, juggling three ‘bolts’ in one hand before slotting them back into a magazine and slapping it into his pistol.

“How many blaster packs?” his uncle asked around a mouthful of dry granola. Face patted the pouches at his waist.

“Six, I think. They’ll last longer if we’re stunning, but that doesn’t work great on the vong.”

Bhindi nodded.

“Hard to stun things that love pain. They probably have ridiculously resilient nervous systems.”

Anakin thought of Ithor, added his own recollection.

“Their armor scatters blaster bolts really well too.”

“Yeah, I’ve noticed,” Face said sourly.

Quiet again fell as they ate and fell into their own thoughts. In some ways, it felt like they’d been on Obroa-skai for weeks, in other ways, like it had been no time at all. Nonstop adrenaline did weird things to perceptions of time. Like that one time he and Tahiri got lost trying to find one of the ‘lost temples’ and thought they were gone for only two hours, only to realize they missed breakfast and lunch. And boy, Kam Solusar had not been happy.

He was sort of looking forward to getting back aboard Samothrace. They had only been onboard for a short time while Penitent Queen was loaded up with the droppods - and that felt like ages ago, now - but the trip back to Eboracum should be a few days, at least based on how the Imperials talked about their own strange hyperdrive. Maybe they’d get to see more of the ship, something he could tell Jaina about.

“Long day,” Mei said, meandering over, chewing on her own bar.

“You said it.”

“Kinda pretty here, though. After the war, it seems like a nice place to visit.”

“You think so?” He tried to imagine the city intact. Squinted and pictured landspeeders cruising down the boulevard, the skyline alight with warm electric light, not smouldering fires. Tried to imagine the ziggurats repaired and elegant towers restored. It wasn’t easy. “Maybe if the vong leave anything standing.”

“Maybe,” Mei allowed. “Ah, it’s killing me staying bottled up like this. Could be a hundred of those little bastards sneaking up on us and we wouldn’t know until-” she waved generally.

“We’re pretty safe here.” Anakin pointed at the collapsed bridge, how it cut across the boulevard in a four meter high snarl of wreckage. “If they came down the road, we’d see them coming. And if they came over that whole mess-” he turned, gesturing up at the great heap of masonry that rose up far above them. “Oh.”

He was pointing right at a figure silhouetted against the setting sun.

Mei followed his finger and her jaw set.

“Master Skywalker,” she called. As one, the Jedi all opened back up to the Force.

They were surrounded. From all sides save down the boulevard itself, and it wasn’t the muted, fuzzy presence of the chazrach but vibrant, full of life, just as Anakin had felt all his life to the point that he barely noticed. That meant one thing: captives.

“Sithspawn,” Face swore.

Chazrach hissed and brandished their coufee daggers. Slaves moaned and groaned, leaning on each other, eyes empty of anything but resignation. Yuuzhan Vong warriors, tall and lean, stood like statues equidistant through the throng, peering down at their cornered prey. They lined the top of the collapsed building, they came out of the abandoned university complex across the way. He counted a dozen, two dozen warriors. At least a hundred reptoids. More slaves than he wanted to consider. The pile of rubble was steep, but navigable. A thirty degree angle and treacherous, but the Yuuzhan Vong never cared about their slaves and their warriors would sooner touch a droid than admit any fear or hesitation.

From the throng, a single Yuuzhan Vong pushed through and Anakin squinted up at him. This one vong was like the others of his kind, he was tall, taller than most humans, wearing the same ubiquitous vonduun crab armor with a massive amphistaff curled around his waist. Where he diverged was in a long, rippling cloak hanging from both shoulders and in his lack of a helmet. Braided hair fell in tresses, catching the wind, woven with tassels from a brightly dyed scarf wrapped around his elongated scalp.

Clearly someone important.

The total silence in the Force from him made Anakin’s skin crawl as the Yuuzhan Vong stared down his nose, one eyebrow gently rising. Such a normal expression, but without anything behind it.

“Hrm. Jeedai. Welcome to Obroa-skai.” He raised his arms, palms up, and Anakin jumped as every other warrior stamped one foot down in unison, barking something at the sky. “I am Commander Malik Carr and I have been a poor host. I must speak in deefense: you come as thieves into my fastness, so there could be no true greeting. You shame me, you make me give insult where I would wish nohn.”

He could feel Mei’s anger but his Uncle - from Luke he felt only intense focus, shorn of almost all emotion. Anakin held his tongue; it wasn’t his place.

“I will be geenerous and overlook. I say: Welcome to Obroa Skai!”

Again the Yuuzhan Vong chanted and stamped their feet.

“Command Malik Carr, I am Jedi Master Luke Skywalker.” His uncle inclined his head and even that much respect to a murderer like that vong seemed wrong. “Will you let us pass?”

Ascratus hadn’t stopped in setting up his teleport homer. As if oblivious to the drama, the Ultramarine still worked away at the machine. Zalthis stood ready with a blade, Solidian with both hands wrapped around his big pistol. The Imperials were ready, at least. The vong would attack, sure as the seasons changed. His uncle could buy time, but those killers didn’t understand diplomacy. Anakin glanced to the two Wraiths, both looking grim and holding their carbines tight. Everyone was low on ammunition. Against the number of chazrach and vong filling the lip of the depression?

And not counting the slaves?

Anakin’s heart pounded against his ribs, just thinking of it. They were slaves. There were children. Men and women with coral growths on their heads, leaning on each other, but every one of them carried something deadly. A club made of duracrete, stuck to rebar. A shovel-shaped biot. Even just simple rocks clutched in fists.

Jacen said the Yuuzhan Vong could control people, but like this? Like this?

They were innocents! Just like the massassi children, damned by their circumstance but none of them deserved death. He could feel their horror and the constant pain that drove them on. It made his gut turn and sweat beaded along his hairline, freezing in the chill wind.

“I must disappoint, jeedai. You cannot pass. You may lay down your blades and you may surrender and I will…be just in your captivity. All my warriors stand against you and your made-ships are broken. The stars are beyond you. Lay down your blades.” Malik Carr slowly lowered his arms down to his sides, running fingers over his slumbering amphistaff.

“We will not,” his uncle said clearly. Anakin envied how sure he sounded.

“A good death is equal in the eyes of the gods,” Malik Carr agreed. “If there can be no accord?”

“Solidian,” Ascratus called. “Kill the thing.”

The neophyte was firing even before the Ultramarine finished speaking. Three booming gunshots and-

Malik Carr’s lips thinned and he shook his head. Solidian’s shock rang through the Force, but Anakin could see where the thin trails of smoke vanished just before the vong commander. A dovin basal, it had to be, sucking down the shots just like they eagerly gobbled up lasers. Solidian slowly lowered his pistol, finger off the trigger.

“Out,” he muttered.

Then the slaves came down.

They rode a bow-wave of suffering that almost doubled Anakin over. Their empty eyes and thousand yard stares were replaced by frantic tears and cries for help. Cries for help. Even as they stumbled and ran and hauled themselves down the loose scree toward them.

“Master Skywalker-” Mei gasped.

“I feel it,” his Uncle said through gritted teeth.

“”I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry-”

“Help me, help, please, help-”

“I have to, I have to-”

Repeated refrains, over and over, from split lips and dried tongues. The yammosk drove them with whips of pain, injected right into their brains. Anakin felt it like ripples of heat, swelling up from nowhere and jamming into arms and legs, spasming muscles tight to keep fists clenched around makeshift weapons. Poking acid stings into backsides and calves to drive beings onward.

Face to face with a sobbing Duro, Anakin barely had to step aside as he weakly swung a broken pipe. He was wearing a ragged tunic, torn at the knees and tattered at the hems, but the young Jedi could see the markings of the Obroan Institute. The Duro, on shaking legs, heaved the pipe around and his arms trembled as he lifted it back in the air. His limbs were like twigs.

Anakin’s lightsaber hummed at his side, forgotten.

It took no effort to soothe the Duro’s pain. He reached out with the Force and smoothed over scalded neurons, he let the soft touch of the Force wash over the Duro’s mind, calming down his fear, his frustration, his helplessness. The being’s red eyes cleared and tears rolled down weathered cheeks. Jacen had taught him how to do this. His brother could calm any animal, soothe any pain, and it worked just as well-

As soon as Anakin’s focus shifted, the yammosk returned.

Screaming and with fresh energy the Duro lunged at Anakin, babbling something, pipe coming around and Anakin reacted. He reacted like he was trained to, he reacted like a boy of sixteen reacts when an adult levels a length of metal weighing several kilograms at his face.

The Duro’s arm dropped, steaming at the elbow.

Cloven by a lightsaber, enough pain to overwhelm the yammosk for just a second, the Duro fell to his knees, choking out words.

“Kill me, kill me please,” he gasped. “I don’t want to hurt you Jedi, please, don’t let them control me-”

His head snapped back in a flash of silver and blood spumed and Zalthis stood next to Anakin.

He felt the Duro’s life wink out.

Zalthis killed the Duro. The Duro’s blood stained the Ultramarine’s blade. And he didn’t care at all.

“Kill or be killed, Jedi Solo. Their lives are already spent. Ours are not.”

Slaves stumbled down the slope. Luke put a half dozen down with a firm shove of telekinesis, trapping them under rubble or pinning their limbs. Stun blasts from Face and Bhindi had others falling flat on their faces.

There were other ways. There were other ways. Zalthis didn’t, he didn’t-

Anakin looked down at the Duro.

The Force sang in his blood. Zalthis stumbled back. The rest of the world dimmed. The Ultramarine said something but Anakin wasn’t listening. He shoved again and the neophyte went to one knee, muscles on his neck standing out as he fought to keep his head up.

“Jedi Solo,” the neophyte ground out through clenched teeth. “Cease this. I am not - ngh - your enemy.”

Anakin let go of the Force, wide-eyed and Zalthis pulled himself back up. Anger warred with humiliation, pulling him in two, wanting to scream at the Ultramarine for his callousness toward life, wanting to apologize for attacking him -

“Don’t kill them,” Anakin spat. “It’s not their fault.”

“They will die regardless. But, as you will.”

The slaves were coming slowly, in ones and twos and small groups while that monster Malik Carr just watched, arms folded over pearlescent armor. But there were hundreds and with caution lost, Anakin opened himself fully to the force and gasped.

Maybe thousands still coming.

They didn’t need the warriors. Enough slaves could bury them under the weight of unwilling but obedient bodies.

Ascratus still hadn’t said they were ready.

“Uncle Luke…” he called. He felt both other Jedi in the Force, both having done away with keeping a low profile.

“I feel them,” his uncle deactivated his lightsaber with a snap. “Sergeant? How long?”

“Minutes until full charge. Then until Samothrace is in position. A quarter hour at most.”

Luke nodded, like he was agreeing with something only he could hear.

“Mei, watch out for Anakin for me.” The Jedi Master sunk down into a cross-legged pose, completely incongruous as more slaves wailed and gave in to the mounting pressure of the yammosk.

“Master Skywalker-!” Mei cried.

“Uncle Luke!”

“Trust in me and trust in the Force, Anakin. Mei.”

His uncle’s eyes fell shut and his presence in the Force suddenly diminished, sinking away and broader, expansive, swelling and thinning out and Anakin grabbed hold, following his Uncle’s focus as he reached out to one slave, two slaves, three and six and twelve and twenty-four and more until Anakin felt dizzy and let go. He felt Luke’s intention at the last moment. He felt the way his uncle reached out for the tangled surge coral threads that wove into each slave’s nervous system. He reached for the spikes of pain and the urging commands.

His uncle was hunting the war coordinator.

“He’s going for the yammosk!” Anakin shouted.

Zalthis struck a slave away with a backhand that left her dazed and on the ground. “Is that possible?”

“It better be.” Mei shoved a human into a Bothan, the two falling in a tangle of limbs.

Then more slaves came at them, begging and sobbing and shouting with anger. Like his uncle had, Anakin looked to the environment, wrenching metal into shackles around feet or sliding burnt out landspeeders to block off avenues of approach. Zalthis kept to his promise, measured in the violence he answered with, but when Solidian joined in the other neophyte cracked skulls and killed without remorse. It was bad enough he had to feel each slave die, but the ones that felt almost grateful left his stomach twisted in knots.

Mei stomped her foot hard, enough to make everyone nearby stumble and a cloud of stones and pellets of duracrete launched up, hanging around her like a planetary ring. She raised one hand, pointed at a Gotal and one stone blurred out of orbit, streaking out to crack into the Gotal’s forehead and the slave went down, unconscious before he hit the ground.

She pointed again and again, stones flying and slaves dropping.

For now, it was enough. It wouldn’t stay that way.

Inside each and every being Luke sensed a cancerous knot of silence. It trailed tendrils and fronds through brain and spine and he could trace their emptiness upwards, converging to single points squatting at the temple. He could outline the surge coral, but he couldn’t quite see it. The same problem of all vong biotechnology, repeated over and over in hundreds if not thousands of innocent Obroans. Through the coral the yammosk could induce pain and physical sensations, giving feedback and punishment as it wished, but it wasn’t enough.

No, Miko told Danni that the yammosk had spoken directly into his mind and the young Jedi never had coral implanted in him. Whatever means the war coordinator used for its telepathy, it wasn’t the Force. Luke’s best hope was that since one had entered Miko Reglia’s mind, that he could perhaps do the same, in reverse. Reach out and touch the biot, distract it or disable it and set free the slaves.

Pain couldn’t be the only thing the yammosk gave. It had to be able to give more detailed instructions. It had to be able to speak to the slaves, somehow. This he pinned his hopes on, probing minds and searching, searching. Here a Herglic lamented his poor luck at stopping over on Obroa-skai for too long as he was rocked with seizure-like spasms, driving him onward. There a Zabrak clutched at her head, blood trickling from her nose as she fought and fought as the skin of her feet melted and bubbled, crackling with white-hot agony even though she reassured herself again and again, with wide eyes, that no such damage was there.

He dug deeper, past the surface, past conscious thought, pushing out, reaching out, grasping blind in the darkness with his hands open and palms up. A beggar in the streets, a prayer in the night, casting nets in darkened seas with only stars to guide him.

Luke had confronted far stranger things than telepathic brains and he would be damned to Corellian hells if he let this be the end of his nephew.

Below conscious cognition he bathed in impulse and reflex, feeling how the Herglic reached for a razor-sharp shard of durasteel without knowing why. He watched the Zabrak stifle the urge to get to her feet again and again, felt her ignore the nagging voice in her thoughts telling her it would all be over, it would all be well if she would just stand.

Like a single loose thread, tickling, itching, ephemeral and evading reach, the yammosk slipped and slithered around Luke’s mental grasp. He couldn’t sense it - yet, it was there, a shadow cast, enough that he squinted and almost saw what formed it, it denied the Force but it whispered sideward promises and he chased it from mind to mind, being to being, flitting across the ruins until he realized he was going about it all wrong.

In the minds and bodies of the surge coral slaves, the yammosk was alien and external. They were learning from the degenerate, mind-broken monsters seen earlier in the war. Now it laid a careful hand on the rudder to steer and in doing so, any time Luke reached for it he snapped glisterweb-fragile tendrils with his clumsy hands.

Luke looked into a chazrach and did not know a smile crossed his face.

He could almost see the yammosk, seething and yowling, nestled in a chamber of the reptoid’s mind. Unlike the Yuuzhan Vong, they had a presence in the Force and they were so intertwined with the war coordinators that the yammosk couldn’t avoid him even if it wanted to.

Luke grasped the mind of the yammosk and

hello jedi ................................................... strange meetings

.................................... bold

.......................................................................... curious

Sunlight slanted in buttery bars through tall windows, bringing warm glow to the Grand Audience Chamber. Just beyond the vast hall Luke could hear excitable chatter as young Jedi trained. If he focused, he might hear the stern tones of Kam Solusar as he walked younglings through lightsaber forms. Flocks of birds rippled shadows as they crossed Yavin’s light and the vibrant life of the moon filled him.

It was good to be back.

Almost as good as it was to see his very good friend, who had come all this way to tour the Praxeum.

Luke turned on his heel and went to one knee, bowing his head. It was only right; his friend didn’t need to come here after all and he was doing such a service to Luke by taking the time out of his very, very busy life to grace Yavin IV with his attention.

Tentacles coiled and curled and unblinking golden eyes gave the Jedi Master their full attention. His friend really was beautiful, a perfect blend of ferocious intellect and careful ferocity. Others might judge his fleshy body as weak, but Luke knew the secret power that lurked behind those understanding eyes.

Really, it was such an honor that his friend came all this way and Luke opened his mouth to say so.

He frowned. Closed his mouth. Opened his mouth again. The words stuck in his throat. Something wasn’t right.

Was there danger? A threat? He - they returned to Yavin after Obroa-skai. The mission to Obroa-skai, with the Imperium. That’s all it was, he still had the leftover nerves from that dangerous infiltration. It had been so close, at the end. Hair-thin. How had they escaped?

How had they escaped?

He knew they did, because he was here with his friend and he couldn’t have been on Yavin if he hadn’t escaped Obroa-skai. So what had happened? The Ultramarines - the Legiones Astartes Ultramarines - had a teleport homer. A teleporter? Was that how they escaped?

That’s right. They teleported. With Imperial - from the Imperium - technology.

And he brought his friend with him here, to show him the Praxeum. It was hard to overstate how proud Luke was of his Praxeum and all the Jedi that filled the halls. All the other Masters, like Kam Solusar and Tionne and Streen and Kyp Durron, who led the Dozen and Two Avengers, and-

Why was he thinking of Kyp? He was going to greet his friend. He had to welcome him to Yavin. Yavin! So many Jedi here to introduce to his friend, who came all this way to Yavin. So far. How far was it? The other side of the galaxy? Where? Relative to Obroa-skai?

But what did that matter? His friend was here, now, and he had to welcome him. It didn’t matter how far his friend traveled, only that he was here. It really would be good to know how far Yavin was, though. So many Jedi.

Like Mei. And Anakin. Who had been on Obroa-skai too. Anakin, who called out his name when he -

Luke slowly rose to his feet. His friend watched him, full of mirth and good cheer. A true friend. Tentacles curled and waves. Nutrient gel slopped. Golden eyes stared. Luke stepped closer and reached out. Touch didn’t bother his friend.

Luke laid two fingers over a thick blue vein that ran between golden, beautiful eyes.

The Praxeum was gone. The Grand Audience Chamber: gone.

A yammosk hung in darkness, dripping crimson fluid. It flexed and breathed and shuddered, tentacles waving. A single tooth gnashed and writhed, unsettlingly fluid in its jawless maw.

Luke stepped back.

your mind or mine

you will not enter mine, infidel

that’s hardly fair

spit on fair and be damned jedi you break you curse you wrong wrong WRONG let go let go go go let go

The yammosk trembled, fleshy body quivering and quaking.

I have a simple request

go go go go let go let go i will feed you to my children my children i will feed you to them let GO

Luke bared his teeth and wrapped hands around the yammosk.

you first

One moment, Anakin was pressed from all sides by slaves, desperately ignoring their cries. An old Bimm, old enough to be his grandfather, came at him with an organic looking shovel. A tool it might have been, but the blade of the shovel looked deadly sharp. He was just resigning himself to taking the old Bimm’s arm when like puppets with their strings cut, every single slave reeled and fell to their knees or even on their faces, digging fingers into the dust or groaning and clutching at their heads.

Silence fell, broken only by muffled sobbing, three lightsabers humming and the guttural noises that only many, many beings in shock could muster. Somewhat dazed, Anakin turned and saw his uncle still crosslegged, deep in meditation, brow creased in a deep frown.

“Mei?”

“Beats me, kid. I think Master Skywalker did it.”

Gently, Anakin took a knee and held out a hand for the Bimm. He helped him up, keeping an eye on the distant Malik Carr and the Yuuzhan Vong warriors and chazrach. The Commander looked apoplectic, barking at a tiny villip at his shoulder. No movement, though, yet. Perhaps the vong were too surprised to act just yet.

“Bless you, Jedi. Thank you. Thank you.” the Bimm murmured, voice hoarse. He felt so light, even to Anakin’s fatigued muscles.

“It - it was my uncle.” The Bimm looked past Anakin to the crosslegged Jedi Master and gasped.

“Your uncle? Luke Skywalker? I asked the Force to save us, but I never expected Luke Skywalker himself.”

Anakin bit his lip.

“What is this?” Ascratus’ voice boomed from his helmet and the Bimm jumped.

“Not a droid…”

“Do you feel the yammosk anymore?” Anakin tried his best to calm inflamed nerves in the Bimm, like Jacen taught him.

“No. The pain is gone, the voice, the urges. Is it dead? Did you kill the bastard?”

Anakin shook his head.

“No. No, or at least, I don’t think so. Sergeant, Uncle Luke is doing something to the yammosk, the slaves aren’t under its control.”

The Ultramarine had something approaching surprise in his voice, pushing past moaning beings to draw up to Anakin and the Bimm. “Truly? I had not expected such a result. The homer is at capacity. I have signaled Samothrace.”

For the first time in hours, the end was truly in sight. With the slaves freed, the homer charged, how much longer did they have?

“Shipmistress Altuzer reports ten minutes.”

And that hope took the latest shuttle to the Outer Rim.

“Ten minutes!?”

“Ten minutes. The battlebarge is on the opposite side of the gas giant.”

“We don’t have ten minutes! If the vong attack us now-”

“Then we’ll fight them.” the Bimm said. He held out a furred hand, missing tufts here and there, crusted with dried blood. Several fingernails were missing. Swallowing hard, Anakin took it and the Bimm shook his hand.

“I’m Vomar. I was an archivist. We’ll fight them, Jedi Solo.”

“You know me?”

“You said Luke Skywalker was your uncle. It’s not that hard.”

“But if you fight, you’ll die!”

It was a stupid thing to say, looking at the emaciated Bimm. He was covered in lash-marks that stripped off his fur, one eye swollen in a brutal bruise, teeth missing. Other slaves picking themselves up looked little better. A Twi’lek trembled, clutching at the stump of a truncated lekku, still oozing blood and pus. And the coral hunched on each and every one of their foreheads, taunting Anakin. Yammosk or not, they weren’t free.

Vomar must have noticed, understood what Anakin saw.

“My life is already over. The vong killed me the day they invaded. It’s just…taken a while for my body to catch up.”

Anakin’s vision swam and he blinked down tears, swallowing hard. It was so pointless, so pointless, such a waste! So evil, so stupid, such stupid, blind evil. A dozen droids could do what all these slaves could without any pain, without any suffering. They could dig up all the ruins and find whatever the vong wanted and not a single person had to suffer.

Vomar smiled as best he could, showing missing teeth. He hefted his organic shovel. Where there had been a miasma of terror and pain, now a cold fatalism chilled the minds of the former slaves. Many overheard what the Bimm had said. They called out similarly, anger overcoming fear, thoughts turning to their tormentors, their captors. Realizing the weapons they had in hand.

“It’s alright. Everyone dies someday, Anakin Solo. Even the stars.”

He didn’t try to speak, to thank the Bimm. He would’ve sobbed. Instead he knuckled away tears, nodded once, firm, like his uncle would.

“We’ll buy you time.” Vomar promised. “It’s time Obroa-skai welcomed the Yuuzhan Vong. Isn’t that right?” he called, louder. Other slaves nodded.

“Damn right, old man. I’d rather an amphistaff than another day in the digs.”

“Frag the vong,” another swore. “I’ll take ten before I go.”

“May the Force be with all of us.”

“May the Force be with us.”

Others took up the call, until all Anakin could hear were beings from a hundred worlds and a hundred species calling on the Force.

From behind him, he heard Zalthis say something quietly in the Imperial language.

Anakin.

“What?” He looked over to Mei, who raised an eyebrow.

‘What, what?”

Anakin.

“Did you say my name?”

“No?”

Anakin.

He looked over to his uncle. Still crosslegged, grimacing, silent.

Anakin.

Anakin.

Realization struck him as a thunderbolt and Anakin reached out and then Luke was there, and

A yammosk hung in the darkness. Tentacles writhed, whirled, curled, twitched and flexed. Golden eyes glared. Veins pulsed ichor. A single tooth, long and thick like a sabre, waggled and wobbled as a jawless mouth worked soundlessly.

Anakin

Uncle Luke?

Rugose flesh pressed up against him. Pressure mounted on his limbs. He was lifted into the air, drawn cruciform, joints popping, tendons stretching. He tried to shout but his mouth filled with ichor and he spat black ink until it dribbled down his tunic and golden eyes glared, veins pulsed, a single tooth, long and thick like a sabre waggled and wobbled as a jawless mouth worked soundlessly.

.....................Uncle Luke!

Anakin........................................................I have

........................Yammosk.....................................................held

..............................................Lend

...............Hand

..........................Uncle Luke!

Tentacles as thick as fuel hawsers wound and twisted and their skin was like grindpaper Anakin grit his teeth as he felt skin tear and blood run and twist and grasp and a tooth, long and thick like a sabre waggled and wobbled as a jawless mouth worked soundless as golden eyes glared and veins pulsed ichor and he spat pitch-dark ink and his uncle called and Mei turned away and Jaina cried out as light flashed and dark shapes scuttled in ruins and he calls to Jacen but Jacen doesn’t hear and turns aside and a lightsaber is not caught and the galaxy turns and his uncle calls as tentacles tighten and skin parts and muscle abrades and Anakin screams in the dark as golden eyes glare and his uncle calls and veins pulse and a tooth long and sharp and thick like a sabre waggles and wobbles and tahiri screams at mei and sannah cries and zalthis wrestles a yuuzhan vong to the ground as comets fall across the sky of a city without end and his uncle calls and anakin screams in the dark as tentacles tighten and golden eyes glare and anakin is a jedi and a single tooth waggles and wobbles in a jawless maw and anakin is a jedi as his uncle calls and anakin is a jedi is a jedi is a Jedi like his Uncle and Grandfather and Brother and Sister and Anakin is a Jedi and darkness is just an absence of light and Anakin is a Jedi so there is light and there is light and there is Light and there is Light and his uncle calls and there is Light and LIGHT and LIGHT and his eyes burn, his eyes burn, his eyes burn in the LIGHT THERE IS LIGHT THERE IS LIGHT THERE IS LIGHT

And then Anakin coughed and retched and spittle splashed on dusty duracrete between his knees. Steam rose from him.

He looked up at Vomar, the Bimm exuding concern and worry.

“Jedi Solo? Are you alright? You collapsed!”

His legs shook and felt like water and a headache pounded between his eyes, a taste like thunderstorms in his mouth. A massive blue gauntlet came into sight and he looked up at Ascratus, the Ultramarine towering over him.

“On your feet, Anakin Solo.”

He saw Mei helping his uncle up, Luke stumbling once while the Jensaarai caught him under the arm, keeping him upright. Two pairs of blue eyes met and Anakin felt his uncle’s exhaustion as well as his pride. Pride in him. In Anakin.

It was enough to put durasteel in his spine and he stood up straight. Malik Carr glowered down at them, amphistaff now in his hands, darkened sacs under his eyes seeming to fill his face with shadow.

He knows what we did, Anakin thought. He knows we killed the yammosk.

“Oh,” Anakin said. “This isn’t going to be good.”

Malik Carr raised his amphistaff high.

“Duwin tur chazrach! Do-ro’ik vong pratte!”

As one the warriors bellowed the same and as one the chazrach charged, Yuuzhan Vong hot on their heels.

“Remember us,” Vomar murmured, as the first slaves threw themselves at the reptoids and the screaming started. The Bimm hefted his shovel, giving it an experimental swing.

“Forever,” Anakin promised, and it was no mean thing.

The warrior, encased in pearlescent vonduun armor, barked out hard-edged words and slashed again, again, again. ‘Sabre caught amphistaff, edges trembling and Anakin pushed at Obroa-skai, shoving down as the world shoved back. Equal and opposite and with leverage he broke the bind, shoving the vong back. Eyes widened inside the alien’s helmet, surprised by the power behind the slighter human.

They always were surprised, Anakin thought, ducking another cut and stroking the tip of his lightsaber across the warrior’s armpit. The vong’s snarls turned into a cry of pain as smoke curled and his arm went limp - not severed, but crippled. Quick as thought, almost faster than Anakin could follow, the amphistaff went limp and coiled around the vong’s useless arm before leaping out, like a crystal snake darting between branches. The warrior caught the living weapon in his good hand - but too late. Almost headless, the warrior collapsed, neck smoking.

His uncle faced two more warriors while a third battled Solidian, amphistaff and combat knife blurred. The neophyte had learned from experience and did not catch the edge of the biot, instead slapping it aside or dancing away. Ascratus flung a warrior with both hands, bodily hurling it a dozen meters to slam into a duracrete wall, the vong slumping boneless. Zalthis, defending the homer, struck out with measured force at chazrach that broke through, sending them down dead from precise applications of his own blade.

Bhindi and Face couldn’t face Yuuzhan Vong warriors, so Mei watched over them, guarding the two as they took potshots at vong warriors from behind a flipped aircar. The Jensaarai’s presence in the Force seared in such a contrast to how he’d known her. Focused, wrapped tight around a ball of anger - anger at the waste of life, anger at the danger to the Wraiths, who were ‘hers’. Anger that she had to take life. Anger at each slave that died.

Anger led to hate, and hate led to, well, everyone knew that, but in the Jensaarai Anakin felt shades of anger he hadn’t realized before. Righteous anger, anger like the clean anger of a bull runyip threatening him and Tahiri for getting too close to his herd. Anger of a protector, those who’d dare hurt the innocent.

Anger driven by being right.

It was the purest chaos. Slaves buried warriors under the weight of so many bodies, screaming wordlessly and frantically, hacking and chopping with debris and tool-biot both. Sometimes they killed the warrior and then there was blood flying and bits of body as they worked out their fury. Other times the warrior ripped free in welters of gore, amphistaff whirling and then even more slaves piled on.

They died in masses, so many that death reeked in the Force around him.

Ascratus said he would alert them when Samothrace was a minute away from range so that they could fall back to the homer’s radius. Every second Anakin waited to hear the Ultramarine’s harsh voice, modulated through his helmet, and every second he was disappointed.

Then he felt surprise from Mei, a bucket of ice-water, surprise and pain and Anakin spun on his heel, knocking a warrior back from him with a telekinetically hurled spray of gravel that had the vong spitting and swearing.

His breath froze in his lungs.

A jet of blood squirted through the air, spattering against a landspeeder meters away. Mei slumped to the right, mouth open and eyes - eye - wide. Her left arm and far, far too much of her shoulder and upper chest went the other way. The Yuuzhan Vong she’d been fighting, triumphant, raised a strangely limp amphistaff in both hands, hooting out a cry of victory.

Anakin reached out his hand and squeezed.

The vong burst. He imploded like a cheap metal can under pressure, bones and armor cracking loud enough to cut through the din. Air popped as it rushed into the void and Anakin let the warrior’s corpse splatter to the ground, already moving. He leapt over battling chazrach and slaves, the Force lending its aid.

Not Mei, not Mei too.

Please. Not another.

A chazrach hooked at his ankles and Anakin flatted it into the pavement. Cracks spidered widely from the carter. Another warrior interposed, blocking his sight of Mei and Anakin reached for the Force again, grabbing the very air itself, the warrior stumbling, suddenly choking.

A red lightsaber burst through the warrior’s neck and ripped sideways.

Mei staggered over its cooling corpse. In her right fist blossomed the argent blue of her own ‘sabre, while her brother’s red blade floated in the air right where her left hand should have been.

Should have been. Her remaining eye was wild, pupil a pinpoint and so, so wide. The Jensaarai was normally pale, but now she was grey, sweat pouring down her face. And her side-

Somehow, she wasn’t bleeding. Somehow, despite the bite taken from her side, her missing shoulder, the way half her face flapped in the air, Mei stood.

He felt her iron grip on the Force and it clicked.

She was holding her entire side closed. Her armor was crackled and bent, warped and jagged where it should have been cleanly cut by the impossible sharpness of the vong biot. She had taken hold of her own body in a fist of telekinesis and squeezed.

“Amakin,” she spluttered through blood, jaw and teeth visible, her left cheek peeled away. “Fey want blood. They can have blood.” Fury boiled off her.

“Mei, no. No! Uncle Luke, Uncle Luke!” The Jensaarai lurched away, stumbling into a Jar’kai stance, red lightsaber held in place by telekinesis as if she still had a hand, an arm, a shoulder. She blurred into a chazrach, slashing it into steaming pieces before whirling on another, impaling it with both ‘sabres and then ripping them free in opposing directions.

“Yew h’want blood? Have it!”

“Uncle Luke! Uncle Luke!”

His uncle was on the far side of the homer, weighed down by a fifth warrior now joining the fray. His blade was a fan of green lightning as it rippled and struck and vonduun crab armor steamed but with chazrach stabbing and bugs flying he saw it was hopeless. His uncle was fighting for his life. Blaster bolts seared past from Bhindi and Face, shooting down chazrach trying to climb over wrecked landspeeders to reach them and now Mei was gone, spitting profanities and wordless screams as she left a trail of death and left the Wraiths unguarded.

She was going to die. She was already unsteady, barely on her feet, held together by telekinesis and adrenaline and anger and it couldn’t, wouldn’t last long. If Anakin left, the vong could get to the Wraiths. And they would die. But if he stayed, Mei would die.

Zalthis skidded to a halt beside him, shoving the young jedi.

“Go! Go to her! I will stay here.” As proof of his words, Zalthis backhanded a reptoid, scattering fangs and then stabbed down through its cranium. “Go! Sergeant, Jedi Taral is wounded!”

Through the vox-connected commlink, Anakin heard Ascratus’ reply.

“How badly?”

“She lost her arm!”

“I will handle this.”

From his post near the homer, Ascratus tossed his combat knife to Solidian, who brandished both his own and his sergeants. Mei waded further into the press of flailing chazrach, slaves and warriors, cutting a ruinous path. Anakin followed. Telekinetic shoves stumbled reptoids and he darted around looming warriors, letting slaves bowl them over or tangle them up. He caught a glimpse of Vomar in the press, the old Bimm bloody but grinning broken teeth, swinging blood-stained shovel at arm’s length until it hissed in the air.

Ascratus reached Mei first. The Astartes shoulder-checked a Yuuzhan Vong, sending the warrior stumbling, arms pinwheeling, before he punched its head clean off. He interposed between Mei and a throng of chazrach, tearing into them with bare gauntlets.

Mei, bereft of targets, wavered on her feet.

“Mei!”

She spun at his voice, eye unfocused, ‘sabres coming to guard.

This time, he called directly into her mind.

Mei!

She blinked hard with her right eye, looked at him. He saw, felt recognition.

“Amakin”, she slurred. “I 'fink I’m dying.”

She pitched forward, both lightsabres cutting off.

“No, no, no, no, not yet, no Mei, you’re not dying. Come on.” He got his shoulder under right arm, hand low to avoid her entire left side. Stumbling, limping, he dragged her back toward the tiny, tiny pocket of calm by the homer, held by Luke and Solidian and Zalthis and careful shots from Face and Bhindi and a growing barricade of dead bodies.

Ascratus took up the rear, strongly discouraging any chazrach or warrior that could pry themselves away from raging slaves.

Anakin lowered Mei to the ground. She hiccuped, blood staining her teeth and he took her hand, guiding it to hold - Anakin swallowed - to hold half her face in place.

“Hey,” she said drunkenly. “Hey,”

“Hi,” Anakin replied. The Sergeant knelt down beside them. “What do we do? What - what can we do?”

The amphistaff had laid her open from mid-rib up through her clavicle. It was wonder it hadn’t split her heart in two. Blood dribbled and pooled under her. He felt her fading, fading fast, her command of the Force waning and the constant grip she had on her own side failing.

Ascratus produced a small pouch from his belt, rifled through it, extracted a single syringe.

“She will die in moments. There is not enough time to wait for Samothrace.”

Anakin’s breath caught.

Ascratus shucked a gauntlet, tossing it aside. He clenched a fist, and then jabbed the needle of the syringe through his bodyglove, drawing out thick, rich, almost black blood.

“This may work. This may kill her.” Ascratus cocked his helmet and Anakin would later swear that Ultramarine smiled, though he would never know. “That appears to be the theme of the day.” Then he jabbed the syringe into Mei’s neck and depressed the plunger.

“We have only minutes now. Colonel Loran, prepare to move. Zalthis, secure the Wraiths. Solidian, I would appreciate-”

Ascratus jerked to his feet.

Anakin looked up.

A thin blade poked through the front of the Ultramarine’s plastron. Another appeared beside it. Then another. Strangely, Anakin felt almost no pain from the sergeant, compared to the wildfire burning through the Jensaarai.

“Neophyte Solidian.” Ascratus held out a hand. “My blade.”

“Sergeant-”

“My blade.”

Anakin pried Mei’s lightsaber out of her hand, whirling to his feet with both his and hers ignited. He’d never used two blades before, but how hard could it be? Two blades, two ‘sabres, twice as much to take down the vong with-

“Jedi Solo,” Ascratus said quietly. “Remain here.”

“Sergeant-!” Zalthis’ cut himself off before he said any more.

Ascratus turned and plunged back into the mob. The three vong warriors that had flung their amphistaffs waded toward him, more behind. They left a bloody path through the warring slaves and chazrach. The first Ascratus put down with a single thrust of his blade, straight through the thickest part of their vonduun armor. The second he grabbed by the arm and head and bodily pulled apart.

The third produced another amphistaff and clove off Ascratus’ right pauldron. Sparks flew. A dozen warriors converged on Ascratus, the only one between them and the rest of the group.

“One minute!”

The Sergeant still sounded as level and calm as he ever did. Bhindi and Face, following Zalthis’ bulk, staggered up to Anakin. His uncle, lightsaber ready, stepped backward, closer, hair matted down with sweat.

All around them slaves and chazrach clashed and raged and warriors hooted battle cries. Landspeeder wrecks formed barricades and barriers, cutting off the homer from easy approach. Bugs splattered as his uncle held out a hand, putting up a solid wall of telekinesis.

Ascratus died by cuts.

He killed another two warriors before one got close enough to take hold of one of the three amphistaves in the Astartes’ chest. The warrior managed to cut it sideways, freeing it by hauling it out of the Ultramarine’s torso sideways. Ascratus killed that one by knocking him prone and then stomping on his chest.

Another thrown amphistaff pierced through Ascratus’ calf and he staggered to one knee before rising again, reaching down to pull the alien biot out and hurl it aside. Then he killed the two still waggling in his chest by crushing their heads in his gauntlets. The biots slumped, suddenly ropes instead of spears.

“Look!” Zalthis cried, pointing up in the sky.

A comet bloomed on the horizon. A ball of flame that grew and grew until shadows formed and lengthened, until evening brightened.

“Samothrace,” Solidian breathed. “Quickly! Secure Jedi Taral. Everyone, as close to the homer as you can. Clear your minds. Clear your minds! Breathe slowly and shut your eyes when I say.”

Anakin knelt down, clipping Mei’s brother’s ‘saber to his belt, trying not to look at her gaping wound. She was half conscious, still holding her face together, but strangely though he no longer felt her exerting pressure through the Force, her wound barely bled. Strange knotted and purplish-crimson clots grew before his eyes, spreading across her severed shoulder.

Clear your minds, Solidian said.

While his uncle kept up his telekinetic wall, stopping razor bugs flat, he and Anakin propped up Mei, leaning her against Anakin as he wrapped his arms around her waist. Her head lolled onto his shoulder, her one eye glazed over.

“Thirty seconds!”

Ascratus kept moving, climbing up the scree, unerring toward Malik Carr. The Commander stood his ground, scowling down as more and more warriors came over the rise. A dozen, at least, lay dead behind the Sergeant. His left arm ended at the stump of his wrist. Blood slicked his armor and amphistaffs waved in the air from where warriors had left them piercing his flesh, each dying just to land a blow.

“Ten seconds!”

The world was noontime and the fireball that was Samothrace parted clouds. Electric whips sprung to life, snapping around them. Purple light glowed from everywhere and nowhere.

Ascratus went to his knees.

“Neophytes!” he voxed, modulated voice strained and thin. “I would have a theoretical on the proper defense of a teleport homer against three sides!”

Solidian laughed, the sound full of grief. “Now! Eyes!”

Anakin’s teeth buzzed and rattled and the last thing he saw was a sudden bright bloom of fire where Ascratus was, blinding, and then

He presses hands against shimmering energy and around his fingers it parts.

Everything is sand, shimmering in mirage and morning haze.

Fingers touch fingers as they fall and green eyes sparkle.

Early rising birds soar the skies, cawing long and loud at unfamiliar creatures stalking in humid heat.

Embers brush from skin, falling in curtains, rising in waves; tidal surge, flames that melt away.

Decay, decay stings the nose as voices wail, voices all the same, voices and hands that reach and reach and fear to be alone.

She takes three steps, each to match the scars.