Star Wars_ Rebel Force 06_ Uprising - Alex Wheeler [38]
Luke gritted his teeth. "It'd be worth it."
"Nothing's worth that," Han argued. "We'll have another chance. And when the time comes, we'll be there. We'll have your back."
"The galaxy needs you," Leia said. "We need you. And you need us."
Luke had learned something from his imprisonment: No matter how many friends you have, no matter how determined they are to remain by your side, some things have to be faced alone. Sometimes you only had your own strength to draw from; you only had yourself to rely on.
And something told Luke that the day he finally faced Darth Vader would be one of those times.
But not yet.
Not today.
Luke watched the black-robed figure getting smaller and smaller as he swept toward his ship. I will watch you die, he thought. I will make you pay for everything you've done.
But today, instead of taking Vader's life, he would save his own. "Let's get out of here," he said, and began climbing into the Falcon. Leia and Han stood in the hatchway, watching him board. Suddenly, Leia's eyes widened. "Behind you!" she cried.
Luke whirled around, fumbling for a weapon. A bloodied and ragged Soresh stood at the base of the ship.
"Did you really think I would let you leave this moon alive, Luke?" Soresh shouted up at him. "You will always belong to me!" Soresh raised a blaster—just as a bolt of laserfire hit him squarely in the chest.
He toppled to the ground.
"See what I mean, kid?" Han asked. He slipped his blaster back into its holster and grinned. "That's another one you owe me."
The shock wave blasted through the star system, steamrolling everything in its path. A small, dead moon was no match for its explosive power. The storm of fire and radiation overwhelmed the moon, blasting it to dust and ash. Within seconds, the moon was gone.
Only glowing radiation and swirling debris were left behind. And still, the supernova's thirst was unquenched. The shock wave rolled on, killing one planet after another. Until what had been a star system was nothing more than a blinding glow, stretching across billions of kilometers of space.
It almost looked alive, pulsing and expanding, constantly reborn.
But looks were deceiving; it wasn't a life. It was a long and fiery death. For the sun, for the system—and for any living creature foolish enough to be caught in its wake.
"There it goes," Luke said, as the white dot on the viewscreen swelled into a luminous smear, brighter than a galaxy. Hard to believe that he was watching the death of an entire star system.
Harder still to believe that Ferus and Div were lost in the inferno, and would never be seen again.
"You think Vader made it out in time?" Leia asked. They'd left the moon with only minutes to spare and fled the system without looking back.
"He was cutting it close," Han pointed out. "Maybe Soresh did us all a favor and toasted the guy once and for all."
Luke shook his head. It was a nice dream, but he knew better. "He's still out there,"
Luke said. "I can feel it."
There was a tense silence. Then Han cleared his throat. "You know what we all need?"
"Sleep," Luke said. He suddenly realized how exhausted he was, emotionally and physically. This was the first time in a long time he'd had a chance to think—and he didn't like the thoughts that were crowding into his head. "I'll be in my bunk," he said, standing up. "I need to be alone for a while."
"That's the last thing you need," Han insisted. "Follow me."
Luke was too tired to argue. He waited as Han set the ship to autopilot, then followed him and the rest of his friends to the main hold.
"You, too, grease buckets," Han told the droids, when they hesitated. "Consider it an order."
Everyone settled around the large table in the middle of the main hold, and Han poured them all glasses of lum. Then Han raised his own glass. "To absent