Star Wars_ Coruscant Nights II Streets of Shadows - Michael Reaves [34]
Unless …
He still held the damaged datastick in his gloved hand. Without thinking and trying not to give any mental foreshadowing of his intention, he closed his eyes and squeezed his hand into a fist. As the storage device shattered, it released a burst of eye-smiting light and a sound like the bass thump! of heavy artillery being fired.
His glove was sufficient to protect him from the burst of heat that resulted from the globe’s destruction. And his action had the desired effect. With a surprised cry Sing staggered back, momentarily blinded. Typho moved quickly, knowing he had only one chance. He kicked upward, the toe of his boot slamming into Sing’s wrist. The lightsaber fell from her stunned fingers, its shaft shutting down automatically. Typho caught it.
In the course of his tour of duty on Coruscant, Typho had handled lightsabers under the supervision of Qui-Gon Jinn and Mace Windu. As a result, he was far more familiar with them and their capabilities than was the average Naboo officer. Even though all lightsabers were slightly different, the construction of each having been finalized by the Jedi who owned it, there were certain design characteristics that were of necessity common to all. Most crucially, given his present situation, the activator stud was nearly always positioned so that it would fall under the thumb of a gripping right hand.
Typho thumbed the stud and felt the vibration surge up his arm as the unit powered up. The deep hum changed pitch as he moved the blade. If Sing pulled a blaster on him, he was as good as cooked, since he didn’t have access to the Force to warn him of incoming fire.
Instead she did something entirely unexpected; reaching down to her waist, she pulled another lightsaber from her belt and activated it. A second shaft of deadly energy, this one emerald in hue, sizzled into being.
“This is wonderful!” Sing declared. Her eyes were shining, her expression alive with cruel delight—and Typho decided, more than a touch of madness. “It’s been ages since I’ve had a decent lightsaber workout.” Stepping back, she assumed a defensive stance. The glow from her weapon bathed her white skin and pitiless smile in an unholy viridian light. “You know how to activate one. I hope you can handle it well enough to put up something of a fight.”
And so saying she leapt forward, the glowing length of lethal energy upraised to strike.
Typho had no choice but to fall back, swinging wildly in the hope of warding off his attacker. A few hours of desultory practice with the weapon had in no way taught him how to handle himself against a master of the art. Lightsaber combat was quite different from traditional sword fighting in a number of ways, not the least of which was that the lightsaber’s weight was all in its hilt, yet a firm two-handed grip was still needed because of the gyroscopic precession effect that gave the weapon a sense of mass.
He managed to block Sing’s first two attacks. His success was due as much to luck and frantic energy as to any limited skill. He didn’t fool himself into believing that his temporary reprieve was likely to last much longer. His fighting ability was further lessened by a lack of depth perception caused by the past loss of one eye. Not for the first time he found himself wishing that an accident of genetic programming had not rendered him immunodeficient to transplants cloned from his own organs.
Despite all his energy and efforts, he was quickly driven back across the broken remnants of the library aisle. Another moment and he found himself with his back up against the base of a shattered column. Grinning humorlessly, Sing raised her blade.
“On behalf of Lord Vader I was hoping to find evidence here of a Jedi named Jax Pavan,” she said. “If you have any knowledge of his whereabouts, you may continue to live for a few more seconds. No? Pity. Well, then—”
She was preparing