Star Wars_ Darksaber - Kevin J. Anderson [15]
“Excuse me, Emperor?” Lemelisk said. “Is there something further you wish to discuss with me? Another project perhaps? Anything else I can do for you?” Lemelisk swallowed again.
“Yes, my servant,” Palpatine said. “You may die for me.”
“Uh—” Lemelisk could think of nothing else to say. “I was hoping for something else, actually,” he said stupidly.
Palpatine glowered at him. “I just received word that your Death Star was destroyed at Yavin. A puny band of Rebels with outdated fighters found a weakness in your design—a thermal exhaust port that allowed a single X-wing pilot to strike a fatal blow. One pilot obliterated an entire battle station!”
Lemelisk pursed his lips. “Thermal exhaust port, eh? I knew I must have forgotten something. I’ll have to fix that in the next design.”
“Yes, you will,” Palpatine said with an icy voice. “But first, you will die for me.”
Lemelisk blinked his watery blue eyes and reached out to touch the fine, tough wires of his cage. He looked around, and nervousness raged like a whirlwind around him. Though he had shaved, his neck itched fiercely.
The Emperor sat completely still, yet he must have manipulated a set of controls because with a sharp snick at Lemelisk’s feet tiny openings appeared in the polished stone floor, orifices that led down to a black unknown. He heard clicking sounds, the scrabbling of sharp, hard feet.
“I am most displeased with your performance, Lemelisk,” the Emperor said.
Bevel Lemelisk shuffled aside as something small but iridescent poked out of the opening: a beetle of some kind. The eight-legged, hard-shelled insect shone a deep blue as it clambered into the light and paused to probe the air with waving antennae. From other openings five identical beetles emerged. They fluttered their wing cases, then took flight, buzzing around the enclosed space. Lemelisk swatted at one, but the blue beetle detected the motion and swooped toward him, sinking mandibles with serrated razor edges into the thick flesh of his palm.
“Oww!” Lemelisk flailed his hand until the beetle lost its hold. He stomped on it, cracking its carapace. But the scent of blood attracted the other beetles to him. He watched in horrified fascination as a dozen more of the insects emerged from the floor holes, fluttering their wing cases and buzzing toward him.
“Those are piranha beetles,” the Emperor said, lounging back in his swiveling black chair. “They are native to Yavin 4, and I considered them too precious for extinction when your Death Star was expected to destroy the moon. So I rescued them.”
The beetles swarmed over Lemelisk now. He slapped at them, shouting, paying little attention to Palpatine’s words. “Stop this!” he yelled.
“Not yet,” the Emperor said.
The beetles sliced through his clothing to the skin on Lemelisk’s arms, his thighs, his chest, his cheeks. Blood flowed around him, drenching his shredded clothes. He could not keep up with the new injuries. Hundreds more beetles swarmed out, battering themselves against the cage mesh.
“These fine insects are not in danger of becoming extinct after all, though,” Palpatine said, “since your Death Star did not work! You have failed me, Bevel Lemelisk,” he said, slowing his words. His wrinkled, rubbery lips bent upward in a fiendish grin.
“And now, I’m going to watch these beetles devour you, bit by bit. They are very hungry, you see, and don’t get satisfied easily. But if they gorge themselves and begin to slow down, don’t worry—I have plenty more.” The Emperor let out a glacial laugh, but Lemelisk could no longer hear.
The beetles buzzed in his ears, tearing at his flesh, his hair, his clothes. He struck at himself, throwing his body against the cage mesh. In the process, some of the beetles were stunned, and their own companions fell upon them, cracking through the iridescent shells and chewing to the soft organs within.
Lemelisk screamed and begged—to no avail. The agony went beyond his comprehension, beyond his imagination. His vision turned black after the piranha beetles devoured his eyes