Star Wars_ Legacy of the Force 01_ Betrayal - Aaron Allston [145]
“Being famous won’t do you any good if you’re dead,” Ben said.
“True. But it’s something I always wanted, and I’ll die knowing I’ve achieved it. I’ll talk with you until you’re convinced that I can’t be stopped. You’ll use Jedi mind tricks, to which I already know I’m immune, or other techniques, which won’t work. Then I’ll throw myself into the midst of this crowd of wet, frightened, smelling-of-fish tourists, and detonate myself.”
“That’s selfish,” Nelani said. “Destructively, cruelly selfish.”
Arisster snorted, amused. “All decisions are selfish. Your becoming a Jedi? Probably based on your desire to ‘improve the galaxy,’ which is just another way of saying ‘imposing your view of what’s good upon people who don’t agree with you.’”
“What if I promised to make you famous?” Jacen said. “If I gave you my word. I’d take you along with me as a sidekick and put you in dangerous situation after dangerous situation. Believe me, you wouldn’t last six months in that sort of circumstance, and you might actually do some good before you died.”
Arisster blinked at him, obviously taken aback. “I hadn’t considered that. But…no.”
“Why not?”
“Well, you might be lying. Jedi lie. Also, the disease might kill me early, before I saw any action. And third, as a sidekick, I’d merely be a footnote, and I could be forgotten trivially. This way, I’ll be firmly attached to any account of your career.”
“I see.” Jacen fell silent, pondering.
Ben could feel a sorrow, a solemnity growing within Jacen. His mentor was not doing anything to conceal it, and it flowed from him through the Force. It made Ben jittery, and he crossed his arms as if against a cold wind.
“Oh, please.” Arisster stared a rebuke at Jacen. “You can’t have given up already. You haven’t tried any tricks, unless that sidekick offer was a trick, and you haven’t begged.”
“I haven’t given up,” Jacen said. There was a faint sadness in his voice. “Can I speak to your captive, please?”
“Of course.” Obligingly, Arisster swung around, whirling the other man to face the Jedi. The man was pale and looked as though he was on the verge of throwing up.
“Your name is Haxan?” Jacen asked.
“Yes, Serom Haxan.”
“I’m very sorry, Serom.” Jacen began backing away from the aquarium.
Ben and Nelani backed up, too, keeping pace with Jacen. “What are you doing?” Nelani asked.
“What I have to.”
They’d taken half a dozen steps before Arisster noticed. Arisster swung around to face them. “What are you doing?” he asked.
“Getting to what I hope is a safe distance,” Jacen said.
Arisster stood there, transfixed, for a long moment, long enough for the Jedi to take another half a dozen steps backward. Then he turned as if to charge toward the other captives.
Jacen reached out with his open hand and squeezed it into a fist.
Arisster and Haxan disappeared, engulfed in a misshapen ball of fire.
Fire and smoke filled the aquarium, and the crack of the explosion rolled across the plaza—but, confined as it was by the transparisteel walls of the aquarium, it hurt Ben’s ears far less than the detonation at the spaceport had.
And the transparisteel held. The near wall buckled outward slightly under the force of the explosion, but the other three merely distorted for a moment before returning to their proper shapes, and most of the force of the explosion was channeled upward.
Immediately the Jedi charged forward again, up to the transparent wall, and tried to peer through the smoke obscuring the tank’s contents. But the smoke