Star Wars_ The Jedi Academy Trilogy 02_ Dark Apprentice - Kevin J. Anderson [117]
Instead, with the assistance of Exar Kun, he used his innate skill to power up the controls again, to move control levers, push buttons to alter the course stored in the Sun Crusher’s memory, bringing it out of its entombment.
Kyp continued to watch the weapon’s progress, focusing on the sphere of the enormous planet as it crested the misty treetops. The Sun Crusher appeared as a silvery dot, seeming no larger than an atom as it emerged from the highest cloud layers and streaked across space toward the emerald-green moon where Kyp waited.
He stared upward and waited, opening his arms to receive the indestructible weapon.
The Sun Crusher approached like a long, sharp thorn of crystalline alloy, cruising upright on its long axis. The toroidal resonance-torpedo launcher hung at the bottom of the long hook. It looked beautiful.
The Sun Crusher descended through the jungle moon’s atmosphere, straight down—like a spike to impale the Great Temple. Kyp controlled it, slowed its descent, until the superweapon hovered to a stop, suspended in front of him.
As the sky brightened with planetrise, the alloy hull of the Sun Crusher seemed as pristine as a firefacet gem, scoured of all oxidation and debris by the intense temperatures and pressures at the core of Yavin. The Sun Crusher looked clean, and deadly, and ready for him.
“Thank you, Exar Kun,” Kyp whispered.
Luke Skywalker awoke from another series of nightmares. He sat bolt upright on his pallet, instantly aware. He had felt a great disturbance in the Force. Something was not right.
He got up, moving cautiously as he sent out his thoughts to check on his students: Kirana Ti, Dorsk 81, the new Calamarian arrival Cilghal, Streen, Tionne, Kam Solusar, and all the others. Nothing seemed amiss. They slept soundly—almost too soundly, as if a net of sleep had been cast over them.
When he reached out farther, he was stunned to feel a cold, black whirlpool of twisted Force around the peak of the temple. It stunned him.
Luke sprinted to the door of his chambers, hesitated, then stepped back to retrieve his lightsaber. He marched down the corridors, smoothing his fear as he rode the turbolift to the upper levels of the ancient pyramid.
Calm, Yoda had said, you must remain calm.
But the sight that greeted him under the dawn sky nearly overwhelmed Luke.
The Sun Crusher hung suspended over the temple, still steaming in the morning air, resurrected from its tomb at the core of the gas giant. Kyp Durron spun around to stare at Luke, his black cape swirling with the rapid motion.
Stunned, Luke reeled backward. “How dare you bring that weapon back!” he said. “It goes against all the Jedi knowledge I have taught you.”
Kyp laughed at him. “You haven’t taught me very much, Master Skywalker. I’ve learned a great deal beyond your feeble teachings. You pretend to be a great instructor, but you’re afraid to learn for yourself.”
He looked back at the Sun Crusher. “I will do what must be done to eradicate the Empire. While I make the galaxy safe for everyone, you can stay here and practice your simple Jedi tricks. But they are no more than children’s games.”
“Kyp,” Luke said, keeping his voice even and taking a step toward him, “you’ve been lured by the dark side, but you must return. You were deceived and misled. Come back before its grip becomes too strong.” He swallowed. “I went over to the dark side once, and I came back. It can be done if you’re strong enough and brave enough. Are you?”
Kyp laughed in disbelief. “Skywalker, it’s embarrassing for me to listen to you talk. You are afraid to risk anything yourself, yet you want to call yourself a Jedi Master. It doesn’t work that way. You’ve stunted the training of your other Jedi candidates because of your own narrow-mindedness. Perhaps I should just defeat you here and now, and then I can take over their training.”
With trembling hands and a deep-seated dread in his heart, Luke reached to his side and wrapped