Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 05_ Allies - Christie Golden [125]
One of them slowed, stopped. The other one slowed, but not enough to keep it from its fate. Ben, Vestara, and Luke all watched, not averting their eyes at the sudden bright flash of light. Luke felt the dozens of lives aboard the frigate wink out, some immediately, some more slowly.
“What a waste,” Luke said. “A useless sacrifice. All they’ve done is create more debris.”
He felt a surge of anger, quickly shuttered, from Vestara. “One might expect more compassion from a Jedi,” Vestara said.
“Compassion is for those who deserve it,” Luke said.
“Looks like Lando was able to get one anyway,” Ben said before Vestara could retort. “You’re right, Dad. I’m sure to the crew of that frigate the Rockhound is the most gorgeous thing in the universe.” The Rockhound was now towing the surviving vessel away to a safe distance. It moved ponderously back toward the debris that had been fatal to the Chasemaster, extended telescoping stabilizer legs, and sunk them deep into the chunk of what had once been a station, or perhaps a ship. It was hard to tell.
“Abeloth,” said Vestara, breaking the silence.
“You think she could do this?” Luke asked.
Vestara shrugged. “She has great power. She is very strong in the Force. But the Maw strikes me as an enormous place, so it’s possible something else did this.”
It was, Ben had to admit. No one knew exactly what was contained in this vast cluster. It was large enough to contain Shelter, and Daala’s Maw colony, where she had hidden for many years rebuilding her fleet. Neither organization had had a breath of knowledge about the other.
Ben was not a big believer in coincidence.
“A pity,” Vestara continued, “that we lost the option to explore the station more.”
“I feel pity not for us, but for those beings who were destroyed,” Luke said quietly. “It’s impossible to calculate how many lives were lost in this … incident.”
Lando’s Rockhound continued to clear a path through the debris. It was slow but steady, and after just a few moments Luke felt it was safe to begin moving forward.
“I wonder how long it will take to clear the debris field,” Vestara said. “My people are impatient.”
Luke glanced over at her and wordlessly pointed at the wreckage of the Chasemaster frigate.
Vestara fell silent.
Luke was now more certain than ever that Sinkhole Station had been designed to contain Abeloth, and that she was, as his beloved Mara had said, something very old, and very dangerous. It had probably been suicidal to think that he and Ben could have approached her alone. Even though he had asserted to the Sith that he wanted to try to reason with her, understand her, he suspected that such overtures would not be welcomed. He suspected, in fact, given what he was looking at now, that they might be flattened like insects.
Vestara had reported the bare bones about Abeloth, but now, as they crept through the litter of what Luke suspected was that being’s latest struggle for freedom, he said quietly, “Looks like we have a lot of time to kill. Tell us about Abeloth.”
She looked at him warily. “You have everything I have told my own people.”
“So tell us something you haven’t told them. Tell us about how you felt around her. What she was like.”
She narrowed her brown eyes. “Come on, Ves,” Ben said, and Luke wondered if his son was even aware that he was calling the girl by a nickname, “the only reason you haven’t told the Sith is because you’ve not had a chance. We’re in this together—and it was your High Lord who proposed the alliance.”
Whether it was the logic or Ben, Vestara nodded. “Abeloth … she strikes one emotionally. I know you Jedi don’t like that.”
“On the contrary,” Luke said, “we are taught to trust our feelings.”
“Really? Interesting. Abeloth …” She paused for a moment, then spoke with more sincerity than Luke had ever sensed from her before. “Her world is, as I have told you,