Star Wars_ Rebel Force 05_ Trapped - Alex Wheeler [5]
Or you could figure it out for yourself.
It wasn't Ben's voice in his head. It was his own.
Luke slowed his breathing. He relaxed his muscles. This time, he didn't try to focus his mind on Div, or on anything. He let his thoughts roam freely, as they did when he was drifting off to sleep. Instead of blocking out the world around him, he soaked it in. The soft mud beneath his boots, the chirps of the chucklucks, the rich, heavy scent of the purple Massassi bark. If the jungle had something to tell him, he was listening.
Again, nothing happened. But when Luke opened his eyes, some impulse drove him to look toward the southwest. And he noticed something he hadn't before: a regularity, almost a pattern, in the randomness of the jungle growth. But in one spot it was broken, more branches were bent and more flowers trampled than should have been. Something had come through the trees here. Maybe an animal.
But Luke didn't think so. "Come on, Artoo." He urged the astromech droid to hurry through the trees. "I sure hope this works."
He didn't know if it was the Force that made everything seem sharper, made every twisted branch and shallow footprint jump out in a way they never had before. But he didn't question it. He just followed his instincts. They brought him to a clearing, where a beat-up Firespray ship was powering up its engines. Three men loaded an unconscious figure into the cargo bay. It had to be Div.
Luke was outnumbered and outgunned, with no time to wait for reinforcements. He was going to have to handle this himself.
"Go find the others and tell them I went after Div," Luke said to R2-D2. "Tell them I'll be back."
The droid beeped in alarm, but Luke ignored it. He crept closer to the ship, careful not to let the men see him. Two of the men climbed into the cockpit while the third climbed into the cargo bay. The doors began to slide shut.
It was his best chance. Also his last chance.
Luke ran toward the ship as fast as he could. One man caught sight of him and began to shout, but the noise was drowned out by the thundering engines. As the man fumbled for a blaster, Luke threw himself into the cargo bay. The doors shut behind him as blasterfire sprayed the bulkheads.
"What do you think you're doing?" the man shouted, taking aim at Luke.
Luke activated his lightsaber and struck out blindly. The laserfire bounced off the blue beam and slammed into a large stack of heavy crates. They toppled over, landing squarely on top of the man with the blaster. With a loud " Oof," he collapsed to the floor.
Luke rushed to Div, who lay in a corner, bound and unconscious. "Come on, wake up," he muttered. "We need to get you out of here before—" The engines flared and the ship lifted off the ground. "Before that happens." Luke braced himself against the wall as the ship rocketed through the atmosphere.
It seemed they were going for a ride.
CHAPTER THREE
Luke used his lightsaber to cut through Div's restraints. "Div, wake up!" he said again, careful to keep his voice down. But Div didn't move.
Luke was on his own.
He nudged the fallen kidnapper with his foot. The body didn't stir. But there were still two more on the other side of the bulkhead. He'd have to deal with them—preferably before they figured out they had a stowaway.
A narrow retractable panel separated the cargo bay from the cockpit. Luke inched it aside and peeked through the slender gap. One of the men bent over the controls, programming something into the autopilot. He ran a hand through his dark red hair, then hesitated over the control panel, as if nervous about the flight path.
"Just do it," growled the other. Tall and muscular, he looked uncomfortable, cramped in the narrow copilot seat. "We got what he wanted. Time for our reward."
"Never heard of him rewarding anyone," the redhead muttered.
"First time for everything," the big one said. " Now. "
There was a rustling behind Luke. He whirled around. Div was stirring.