Young Jedi Knights_ Jedi Under Siege Part 10

Brakiss, Tamith Kai, he, and his companions had all been so certain of a quick, decisive triumph. With their training in the dark side, they should have had no problem, ^ Zekktold himself Wasn't that what Brakiss had taught?

A few minutes later, Zekk emerged from thedarkness into a broad clearing where the wide river ran sluggishly between the trees. His spirits rising ever so slightly, Zekk walked to the edge of the river and stooped to take a drink.

Despite the green color of the water, his reflection was clear. Sunken emerald eyes shadowed with dark circles gazed back at him from the rippling surface. Only the barest spark of his former confidence still lurked in his expression. Tangles of filthy dark hair framed a face as pale as the moon of his home planet Ennth. Blood still oozed from the wound on his face, contrasting nicely with the purpling bruises that surrounded it. It made him think of Brakiss and his finely chiseled features.

A wail of despair echoed through the young man's head, knocking him to his hands and knees in the mud of the riverbank. In a futile gesture, Zekk pressed his muddy hands over his ears. "Brakiss!" he screamed. 'What went wrong?"

Hardly understanding what was happening, Zekk turned his face up toward the sky.

For a split second he recognized the spiked ring of the Shadow Academy in low orbit above the jungle moon. Then, without warning, the s.p.a.ce station bloomed into a fireball high above him.

Zekk's jaw went slack at the sight. He had not thought it possible to feel any more pain.

But he had been wrong.

Brakiss. The name whispered now in Zekk's mind. He knew that the Master had been aboard the Shadow Academy when it blew up. He could feel it. He had felt his teacher's despair-his mind crying out.

The silvery-robed Jedi had taken Zekk in when the young man had had no hope for his future and no purpose. Brakiss had trained Zekk, given him purpose, direction, position, and skills to be proud of. At the Shadow Academy Zekk had belonged. He had been its Darkest Knight.

Now what was left for him? All that he had trained for and lived for was gone. Pride, comrades, future... all gone. There was no doubt in Zekles mind that the Second Imperium had been decisively defeated today, and now his mentor-the only man who had ever believed in Zekk-was dead.

No. Not the only man who had believed in Zekk. A fresh wave of anguish washed over Zekk at the thought. Old Peckhum had always believed in him, too. Zekk had promised never to do anything to hurt or disappoint the old s.p.a.cer. Today, though, he had fought on the side of Peckhum's enemies.

Despite all the faults that Zekk acknowledged he had, he had never in his life lied to old Peckhum.

Anger jolted through him-at himself, at having been forced to fight his friend, at having been forced to make such terrible choices. His muscles tightened until the tension inside seemed unbearable. With a cry of anguish he plunged his fingers deep into the mud. It was dark, slippery, treacherous. Yet this was what he had chosen: the darkness.

Today he had stood and watched as his comrades blasted the Lightning Rod out of the skies. For all he knew, the only other man who had ever believed in him might also now be dead. Zekk's hands clenched in the ooze and he jerked up fistfuls of mud and smeared it on his face. The mud stung his cut. Now he could feel pain again. But he didn't care. He deserved it.

He had failed them all-Brakiss, the other Dark Jedi warriors, old Peckhum... himself. Silent tears dropped unheeded from his eyes as he scooped up more and mud and rubbed it into his hands, his forearms, his neck. Dark mud.

This-this was what he had become.

Darkness. He had chosen it, immersed himself in it. He was stained with it.

There could be no turning back for Zekk anymore. He had made his choices, and he was what he was: a Dark Jedi. That could not change now. Though his comrades were defeated or captured, and Brakiss dead, Zekk would never be able to cleanse himself for as long as he lived-however long that might be.

Not even Jaina and Jacen, if they were still alive, would be able to forgive him.

Considering the s.p.a.ce battles above, the destruction of the Shadow Academy, the attacks here on the ground, Zekk himself was responsible for a hundred or more deaths today. Maybe even Peckhum's. The twins would know that. They had never believed Zekk's decision to join the Shadow Academy was the right one, had never believed that he could become anything.

But he had made his choice and he had done his best. He had even warned Jaina on Kashyyyk not to return to Yavin 4, hoping to keep her away from the fighting, though he doubted she had listened.

He pushed himself to his feet and caught sight of his reflection again in the slow moving water. His once-beautiful cape hung in tatters from his shoulders, its scarlet lining shredded. Mud covered his skin. And the sunken emerald eyes were now bleak and hopeless.

But he wasn't finished yet. It might not matter anymore what happened to him, but he still had choices. He would show the twins what he was made of. Turning, he headed along the riverbank toward the Great Temple.

Zekk still had one card left to play.

"DOWN THERE," JAINA said, pointing at the jungle clearing that Luke had chosen as a rendezvous point.

From the pilot's seat of his personal shuttle, Lando Calrissian grinned, flas.h.i.+ng his beautiful white teeth. "Sure thing, little lady," he said.

"I'll take'er down. Looks like they're waiting for us. The fighting must be done." As Lando brought the s.h.i.+p in for a landing, Jaina used Jedi techniques to relax, but it did her no good. Her muscles remained as tense as if she were still in the tiny TIE fighter flying for her life.

For some reason, she just couldn't loosen up. For the first time, today, she had fought as a Jedi, with other Jedi, against the dark side.

It was what all her training had been about.

When Lando's shuttle touched down, Jaina wasted no time on formalities.

She scrambled out of the s.h.i.+p as quickly as she could, ran to her uncle, and threw herself into his arms.

"You made it. You're alive!" she said, feeling a surge of relief and jubilation.

"Luke, old buddy!" Lando said. "I came to offer you some help, but it looks like you've got things pretty well under control."

"We could still use your help, Lando," Luke replied. He hugged Jaina back and said soberly, "I'm afraid many of our number were not so lucky."

Realizing that she had no idea how the ground battle had gone, Jaina bit her lip and looked around wildly, hoping to spot Jacen, Lowie, and Tenel Ka.

What she saw shocked her. As far as she could tell, no student from the Jedi academy had escaped unscathed. Several trainees limped. Tionne's right arm hung in a sling and the hair on the right side of her head was singed. Others sported scratches and bruises, as well as more serious injuries.

Jaina stared in surprise when she saw Raynar, his face muddy and his bright clothing torn and covered with filth, moving among the wounded and offering a.s.sistance wherever he could. He seemed subdued.

When she noticed the patient Raynar was currently tending, she blanched and dashed over to where Tenel Ka lay, looking feverish and bleeding heavily from a nasty gash just above one gray eye. Another shallower wound ran along her thigh and ended at the knee.

Raynar was already tearing strips of cloth from his relatively clean inner robes. Jaina made a pad of the cloth and pressed it to Tenel Ka's head wound to stanch the flow of blood, while Raynar bandaged the leg cut.

Jaina looked around, still searching for Jacen. Only a few meters away, though she hadn't noticed him before, Lowie lay flat in the gra.s.s, moaning quietly and clutching his side.

Around the edges of the clearing, Tionne, Luke, and Lando helped the injured stragglers. There was still no sign of Jacen, though.

"Lowie, are you all right?" Jaina asked.

The Wookiee rumbled something noncommittal and waved a hand, as if to tell her to finish caring for Tenel Ka first.

"Oh, Mistress Jaina! Thank goodness you're here," Em Teedee cried. The little droid's voice sounded strange, and Jaina noticed that the speaker grille was bent.

"You have simply no idea what the three of us have been through today.

Master Lowbacca and Mistress Tenel Ka were forced to dive from the battle platform in order to avoid being blown up. Which was a good thing, since the battle platform crashed only moments later.

"When we fell to the trees, Master Lowbacca was able to catch himself, but Mistress Tenel Ka struck her head on a branch.

She nearly fell all the way to the forest floor, but Master Lowbacca dove after her, caught her arm, and broke their fall by landing stomach-first on a wide limb. Oh, it was bravely done, I a.s.sure you, Mistress Jaina.

I'm no medical droid, of course, but I'm afraid you'll find that Master Lowbacca has a dislocated shoulder and at least three broken ribs."

Raynar pressed a fresh compress over Tenel Ka's head wound and began winding a bandage around it to hold it in place. "You go ahead," he said, nodding toward Lowie. "I'll finish here."

When two more wounded Jedi students staggered into the clearing, Jaina looked up hopefully, but neither was Jacen. "Have you seen my brother?"

she asked Raynar as she went to Lowie's side and knelt to examine his injuries. "He went in the Lightning Rod with old Peckhum to call for reinforcements.

He should be back by now."

Raynar frowned and shook his head.

"Well... well... 'I saw the supply shuttle the Lightning Rod. I... think one of the TIE fighters. .h.i.t it."

Jaina gasped. "Did they crash?"

Raynar looked away. "I don't know. The s.h.i.+p seemed to be going down, but - - ." He shrugged uncomfortably. " it was hours ago."

Jaina bit her lower lip and closed her eyes, reaching out with the Force, searching for Jacen. "He's not dead," she said at last.

"But that's all I can tell. Can't feel old Peckhum-don't have a link with him like I do with Jacen-but my brother's definitely out there somewhere."

A genuine smile broke out on Raynar's face. "Well, good," he said.

"That's good."

"That's the last of them, I think," Lando said, striding up and kneeling beside Jaina.

"How are you doing, Lowbacca, old buddy?

You look like you've seen some hard action."

Lowie gave an urff of agreement.

"I think we got everybody who's in the neighborhood now," Lando said.

"We did find one more," Luke said, coming up to join them. He pointed toward the edge of the clearing, where Tionne was tending a treelike Jedi with a broken limb.

Jaina looked up at her uncle. "What about Jacen?"

"He's alive Luke said slowly. "We don't know any more than that."

"Yes," said Jaina, "but where is he?

Shouldn't we go look for him?"

"We need to get the injured back inside the Great Temple first," Luke said. "If old Peckhum and Jacen managed to get the Lightning Rod going, the first place they'd head is the landing field. They wouldn't be able to land in a small clearing like this."

Jaina's spirits brightened. It was true.

She looked at Lowie. "Can you walk?" she asked.

Lowie groaned an affirmative reply.

"Master Lowbacca believes himself to be quite capable of perambulation with only minimal a.s.sistance," Em Teedee supplied.

"Okay then," Jaina said, "let's get back'to the Jedi academy." She was anxious to see her brother again, eager to know that he was all right.

It was close to an hour later when the band of hobbling, limping Jedi trainees finally emerged from the jungle near the Great Temple's landing field. To Jaina's dismay, the flat patch of cleared ground stood empty.

"Don't worry, little lady," Lando said. 'I'll help you look for them."

Jaina heaved a sigh and nodded. Even though she knew that Jacen was alive, she had a feeling of foreboding, of impending danger. "All right,"

Jaina said. "Let's get the wounded inside first. They'll be safe and protected in the temple. We'll have to take them in through the courtyard door, though.

The hangar bay's blocked shut."

Crossing the landing field to the flagstone courtyard seemed to take longer than Jaina remembered it, but finally the entrance was only ten meters away. Seeing her goal so close, Jaina smiled and sped up.

Suddenly, a ragged figure lurched out of the shadowy doorway. His face was bloodied and bruised and covered with a thick layer of mud, but Jaina would have recognized him anywhere.

Zekk raised his chin proudly and stood barring the doorway.

"No one goes inside the temple," he said.

FACE-TO-FACE WITH HER old friend Zekk again, Jaina could find no words.

Her breath refused to move in and out. It seemed to have frozen in her lungs like a chunk of winter. Her heart raced, and her palms grew sweaty.

Zekk didn't move.

Luke came forward to stand beside Jaina.

On her other side, still partially supported by her, Lowie voiced a soft growl. And behind her, Jaina suddenly felt the presence of all the remaining Jedi trainees-people who had never met Zekk before today when he had led the attack against the Jedi academy. They saw him only as an enemy, without a glimmer of his being anything else.

Her eyes still fixed on Zekk's mud-covered face, Jaina said, "This is up to me, Uncle Luke. I need to handle this alone."

Luke hesitated for a moment. Jaina knew that her request was difficult for him. His voice held an undercurrent of warning when he spoke. "This isn't a broken machine that you can tinker with and fix."

"I know," she said softly. "I'm not sure he'll listen to me, but I know he won't listen to anyone else."

"I remember thinking the same thing," Luke said, "when I set out to turn Darth Vader back to the light side. It's a dangerous thing to attempt...

and success is so rare." He sighed, as if thinking of Brakiss.

Jaina tore her eyes away from Zekk and turned to look at her uncle.

"Please let me try," she said. Luke studied her for a long moment and then nodded.

Jaina focused her full attention on Zekk now, shutting out all other distractions as Luke took Lowie away across the courtyard.