Star Wars_ Darth Maul 02_ Shadow Hunter - Michael Reaves [37]
However, there was no other alternative. The council had to know of the Fondorian’s death, and quickly. It was her duty to report her failure, no matter how shameful it was.
She had to climb four more flights of stairs before she reached a level that had a working lift tube. This she took up another ten levels, where she encountered a border checkpoint, complete with an armed guard droid, separating the downlevels ghetto from the functioning upper section of the monad. The droid eyed her disreputable appearance with some suspicion, but let her pass when it realized she was a Jedi.
When Darsha emerged from the building, she was in a much more familiar world. She walked out onto a transparent skybridge and looked down through the permacrete floor. The sleek sides of the buildings all around her fell away into darkness and fog. Beneath that fog was the abyss she had just escaped. If she was given a choice between returning to it or returning to the Temple to admit her defeat, she honestly wasn’t sure which she would take.
But there was no choice, was there? Not really.
She made her way to an air taxi stand, aware of the stares that her torn clothing and bandaged wounds drew. Truly I am still trapped between worlds, she thought.
Just enough credit was left on her emergency tab to hire an air taxi that would take her back to the Temple. As Darsha settled into the vehicle’s backseat, she felt suddenly overcome by lassitude. It was all she could do not to fall asleep as the taxi made its short journey. She recognized the drowsiness as not so much a reaction to the trials she had just undergone but as an attempt to escape what lay ahead.
All too soon the commute was over. Darsha paid the driver and entered the Temple. As far back as she could remember, passing through the doors had been a source of comfort to her. It meant a return to sanctuary, to safety, to a place where the cares and worries of the rest of the world were left behind. She did not feel this way now. Now the high walls and soft lighting induced anxiety and claustrophobia.
She shook her head and squared her shoulders. Might as well get it over with. At this time of day she would most likely find Master Bondara in his quarters. She would report to her mentor first; then, in all likelihood, they would both go to the council.
Darth Maul had made an error.
The enormity of that knowledge weighed upon him like a giant planetoid. He had underestimated the bounty hunter because the woman had not been strong in the Force. Such a mistake had almost cost him his life—and how ignominious would that have been, to die at the hands of a common bounty hunter, he who had been trained to fight and slay Jedi!
He could not make such dangerous assumptions.
He would not make them again.
He knew what his next move had to be. Hath Monchar was dead, but there was still the human to deal with. As Maul emerged from the building the police and firefighting droids were already starting to arrive. He could not cloud the cognitive circuits of droids as easily as he could organic brains, and so he had to move quickly into the shadowy surface streets to avoid questioning.
He found a deserted blind alley a few blocks away and activated his wrist comm. A moment later the image of Darth Sidious appeared before him.
“Tell me what progress you have made,” Sidious said.
“The tergiversator Hath Monchar has been killed. He has shared his knowledge with one other—a human named Lorn Pavan. I know where the human lives. I go now to find him and kill him.”
“Excellent. Do so as quickly as possible. You are certain that no one else knows of this?”
“Yes, Master. I—” Maul stopped suddenly in shocked realization. The holocron!
As always, Sidious immediately knew that something was wrong. “What is it?” the Sith Lord demanded.
Darth Maul knew he would have to admit failure. He did not hesitate. The concept of lying to his master never even occurred to