Star Wars_ Darth Maul 02_ Shadow Hunter - Michael Reaves [64]
None of this seemed to make any kind of sense.
He had spoken to one witness who seemed certain that the two Jedi in the skycar had been a Twi’lek male and a human female. That would be Anoon Bondara and Darsha, Obi-Wan surmised. But he still had no clue as to whether they had survived the explosions. His informant said they had been riding with a human male and a droid.
After some consideration, Obi-Wan decided his best bet would be to investigate the nightclub. If Yanth, the owner, was a member of Black Sun, he might know more about all this than the street rabble.
“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” he murmured to himself as he headed for the nightclub.
As from a far distance, Darsha heard the sounds of a struggle. It seemed to rise and fall, the sounds breaking over her like oceanic waves as her mind struggled to find its way back to consciousness. She wished dimly that whatever was going on would stop, so that she could slip back down into the depths of the black well out of which she was reluctantly rising. She had been through a lot of pain and fear lately, and she felt she deserved a rest.
But the altercation didn’t subside; instead it grew louder. Now she recognized one of the voices: It was Lorn Pavan’s. The other voices seemed to be nonhuman—mostly grunts and guttural bellows.
It was obvious that he was in some kind of trouble. In her semiconscious state Darsha didn’t see any real reason why she should come to his aid. She didn’t like him, and he’d made it perfectly clear that he wasn’t overly fond of her. There didn’t seem to be any personal animosity involved on his part; he just despised Jedi in general. In a way, that was even more insulting. Darsha would rather someone base their dislike on her personality, not on an abstract that she represented. She could deal with enmity easier than bigotry.
It was becoming painfully obvious, however, that the struggle she was hearing wouldn’t resolve itself any time soon. And suddenly, in a rush of returning wakefulness, Darsha remembered what had happened: the attack by unseen foes in the tunnels, the electroshock net that had trapped them. She had been knocked out by the net’s power field. Wherever she was now, it couldn’t be anyplace healthy.
Darsha opened her eyes and managed to raise her head enough to see what was going on, even though doing so sent a stab of pain like a blaster bolt through her skull. What she saw kicked her adrenal glands into overdrive. Pavan was struggling with several creatures—hard to tell in the dim light exactly what they were, other than bipedal and definitely subhuman. He had apparently managed to knock one of them unconscious; the limp form lay on the mossy stone floor next to the droid, who seemed to be out of commission, as well.
Darsha pushed herself up to a kneeling position. The movement attracted the attention of several of the creatures who were circling Pavan, looking for an opening. They turned and shambled toward her, their snarling mouths stretched wide. She saw the undulating skin that covered their eye sockets, and the horror of the sight caused her heart to stutter.
Darsha gathered the Force to her. Still on her knees, she thrust out both arms, fingers splayed wide, hurling twin waves of invisible power toward them. The unexpected surges struck them, causing them to stagger back. They howled in mingled fear and anger, an eerie ululation that reverberated in the chamber.
Darsha took advantage of the momentary respite to stagger to her feet. She reached instinctively for her lightsaber, and wasn’t really surprised to find it missing from its belt clip. She had no time to look for it, because now several more of the subhumans were lumbering her way. Though they moved slowly, it was hard to avoid