Star Wars_ Coruscant Nights 01_ Jedi Twilight - Michael Reaves [107]
Still, Nick felt satisfied; he had managed to get through his debriefing. Very important; there was a war going on, and he had done his part. Now, finally, he could rest, which was good, because he was just too tired to try to talk anymore. And anyway, the fellow standing there—who had it been? Hard to see his face, what with all that light—had moved away to face another silhouette. Now the two were dancing around each other in slow motion, and there were flashing lights and faint, faraway buzzing sounds. Was one of them Mace Windu?
Nick didn’t know. It really didn’t matter anymore. It was time for him to leave. His new ship was waiting for him, its hyperdrive primed, ready to dust this world. He would lift in just a minute or so. Just as soon as he got his breath back. Just a moment, to rest. He’d earned that much, at least. The war was finally over. It was time to stand down.
The lights hurt Nick’s eyes, so he closed them.
Jax rose and stepped away from Nick’s body. Xizor stood a couple of meters away, still holding the lightsaber hilt. Jax was holding a hilt as well; one of the last things Nick had told him, in a barely audible whisper, had been about the enigmatic device the Korunnai had found in the Far Ranger. It was obviously a weapon; the only problem was, Jax had no idea what kind it was. It looked to be something akin to a lightsaber, but lighter, and built for one hand. Nick had not had a chance to try it, and Jax didn’t even know if it would work.
He didn’t care.
He didn’t care that Xizor had his lightsaber, or that the Falleen prince was a master of teräs käsi, a martial art designed centuries ago and refined through the ages to be particularly effective against Jedi. He didn’t care that, for some reason he didn’t understand, his connection to the Force had grown sporadic. None of it mattered now. It was in the past. The future was not his concern, either. What mattered was the present.
What mattered was now.
Jax glanced over at the others. The avian and Laranth were still forcecuffed, as was Den Dhur. Laranth was either dead or unconscious, but the fact that she was forcecuffed argued for the latter. The only one free was I-Five, who still stood a little way off, forming the third point of a triangle composed of himself, Jax, and Xizor. The droid was still covering Xizor.
“It isn’t against my core programming to severely disable the enemy of my friend,” he said to Jax. “If you want me to, that is.”
“What I want,” Jax said, “is for you to see what’s happened to the other droid. It’s still got the vital data stored within it.”
“But—”
“No buts. Prince Xizor and I will settle this between ourselves.”
I-Five hesitated, projecting concern, then nodded. He crossed to the transparisteel window, leapt nimbly through it, and dropped out of sight.
During the exchange with I-Five, Jax had kept one eye on Xizor. With a grin, the Falleen raised his free hand, palm-up, and beckoned. “Let’s see what you’ve got,” he said.
Jax thumbed the trigger button.
forty-three
From the weapon’s hilt leapt a thin length of supple metal, immediately followed by the proscribed arc wave of an energy field, this one following the length of the flexible metallic cord.
It was a whip. An energy whip. Jax let its bright green length uncoil, then twirled his wrist. The lightwhip’s end singed a larger, ragged circle into the floor in response. He snapped it experimentally, sending a running wave down its length. The tip made a satisfying crack!, louder than its wavering hum, as it broke the sound barrier. Jax couldn’t even begin to imagine the complexity of the modulation circuitry within the handle.
As part of his training, he’d practiced with lightwhips, but not nearly as often as he’d used a lightsaber. He wasn’t nearly as proficient with a whip as he was with a blade. And he wouldn’t be getting used to it under the best of conditions.
“Very impressive,” Xizor said.