Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 01_ Outcast - Aaron Allston [81]
Before the rumbling had quite subsided, the door to her room crashed open and light sprang up, visible at the edges of and through her cover. She flipped her blanket down and saw Lando, groggy and disheveled, wearing only sleep pants decorated with the insignia of Tendrando Arms. His voice was not as smooth as usual. “Are you all right?”
She nodded. “Can I sleep on the Falcon from now on?”
He thought about it. “Yes, you can. In fact, I wish I could.” He began to draw the door closed.
“Good night, Uncle Lando.”
“Good night, sweetie.”
CITY OF DOR'SHAN, DORIN
THE CITY WAS OVERCAST AND VERY WINDY ON THE MORNING OF LUKE'S second day of training. Ben could see that the Kel Dors on the streets were agitated; they walked briskly, said little to one another, and all but ignored the humans.
As they came within a block of the Baran Do temple, Ben learned why. A wail, mechanical and unsettling, rose in the distance from several points in the city. Kel Dors immediately ran for nearby doorways and gateways. As far as Ben could tell, they were rushing to homes that were not their own; no one ran farther than two buildings from his or her current position, and residents of those buildings were opening the outer doors and urging them in as they arrived. Some waved for Luke and Ben to enter. A general announcement in the Kel Dor language sounded across both the Skywalkers' comlinks.
Luke and Ben put on a burst of speed and rushed to the temple. Curiously, the walls there were retracting into slots in the ground, leaving the estate seemingly undefended. Luke and Ben made it into the main building's antechamber, running past Tistura Paan, who was on front-door duty, peering outside and urging pedestrians in.
The general announcement switched to Basic, recited by a woman with a pronounced Corellian accent. “This is a general announcement. A force-four storm front is approaching the city of Dor'shan. All residents and visitors should seek shelter immediately. The storm is approaching from the south and will be at the outskirts of Dor'shan within seven standard minutes. All spaceport traffic is suspended for the duration of the storm event. A force-four storm is characterized by winds of up to one hundred eighty kilometers per hour, periodic funnel clouds in clusters, and rapid lightning strikes.”
She hadn't mentioned rain, but outside the doors the sky was now almost black, and sheeting rain descended as rapidly and unexpectedly as a giant foot. One minute it was dry; the next, rain was hitting the pathway and street beyond so hard that drops seemed to explode upon contact. As Ben watched, the roof of a landspeeder went spinning by as if hurled by a rancor.
Ben whistled. “You don't mess around with your storms, do you?”
Tistura Paan shook her head. “In the old days, the people only had the sages to warn them of storms. Today there are weather stations and satellites, but a storm can still coalesce in moments. Sometimes a sage will know in advance of the most modern instruments.”
“Did you lower the wall to keep it from blowing away?”
“Yes. Most of the time it's up to keep people from wandering around on the grounds, but at times like this we want people to be able to rush in. Besides, a wall is nothing but a big wind sail. One good gust, no matter how strong your welding is, and a section of wall could go flying. And nobody wants to be where it lands.”
She had her attention on the outdoors through her entire speech, constantly scanning for travelers in need of immediate shelter. But the street, now dimly illuminated by lights, was empty of traffic.
The side passage through which they had been conducted on their first night now opened for the Skywalkers. Luke headed through it to his lesson. Ben found a lounge area, packed with Baran Do and a few trapped pedestrians, where a large wall monitor alternated between satellite views of the