Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 09_ Edge of Victory 02_ Rebirth - J. Gregory Keyes [7]
Anakin parried, but the staff wrapped around his wrist. He felt a distinct and painful electric shock. The other droid was an instant behind, leveling a blow at Anakin’s skull.
Somewhere a blaster shrieked, and the droid suddenly didn’t have a weapon—or the arm that held it.
“Halt!” Anakin shouted, and hurled himself away as the staff instantly released his hand. He came down in a fighting posture.
A dark-haired man with a blaster stood in the doorway. He had a beard liberally tinseled with silver and wore green robes the same shade as his eyes. He held the blaster up in a nonthreatening way, as if surrendering.
“Why did you do that?” Anakin asked, trying to suppress the anger suddenly boiling up. He had worked hard on that droid.
“You’re welcome,” Corran Horn said, holstering his weapon.
“Those are training droids. They wouldn’t have hurt me.”
“Oh no? Are those training amphistaffs they’re holding? If he’d hit you with it …”
“He wouldn’t have. They’re programmed to arrest their blows the second the staff touches my skin. And yes, they are training amphistaffs. They aren’t real.”
Corran’s eyes widened in surprise. “How did you manage that? Why didn’t your lightsaber cut through them?”
“It’s not a lightsaber.”
Corran’s expression was almost worth the damage to the droid.
“It’s just a blade-shaped force field, a weak one,” Anakin explained. “Wouldn’t cut anything. The things my droids have act like amphistaffs and move like them, but they just spit dye and deliver a shock when they hit. They only weigh a kilogram or so.”
“I guess I ruined your droid for no good reason, then,” Corran said.
Anakin’s anger was entirely mastered now. It was something he had been working on. “It’s okay. I built it; I can fix it. I’ve got nothing but time.”
“I’m just curious,” Corran said, eyeing the droids. “Booster has a couple of duelist elites in storage. Why not use one of them to train with?”
Anakin deactivated the “weapon” and returned it to the cabinet. “Duelist elites don’t move like Yuuzhan Vong warriors. The droids I built do.”
“I wondered what you’ve been puttering at for the last few weeks.”
Anakin nodded. “I don’t want to lose my edge. You saw what happened—the one you shot had me.”
“Practice is fine,” Corran said. “I just wish you had informed me of what you were doing. Might have saved me a skipped heartbeat and you a droid.”
“Right. I forgot,” Anakin said.
Corran nodded again, this time with a more thoughtful look in his eye. “You didn’t notice me coming. That’s not good. You have to learn to extend your sphere of responsibility beyond the immediate battle.”
“I know,” Anakin replied. “I wasn’t using the Force. I’m training to fight without it.”
“Because the Yuuzhan Vong can’t be sensed in the Force, I assume.”
Anakin nodded. “Of course. The Force is a wonderful tool—”
“The Force isn’t merely a tool, Anakin,” Corran admonished. “It’s much more than that.”
“I know,” Anakin said, a bit peevishly. “But among other things it is a tool, and for fighting the Yuuzhan Vong, it’s just not the right tool for the job, no more than a hydrospanner is what you would use to calibrate the input feed of an astromech.”
Corran cocked his head skeptically. “I can’t precisely dispute that, but it’s not because it isn’t wrong.”
Anakin shrugged. “Try it like this, then. All Jedi training involves the Force, even combat training. Sensing blows and blaster bolts before they happen, that sort of thing. Shoving our enemies around telekinetically—”
“With some exceptions,” Corran dryly reminded him.
“Right. So you should know what I mean. What do you think of Jedi who can’t win a fight without resorting to telekinesis? For that matter, you were CorSec long before you were Jedi. You should be able to see that the Force has become as much of a crutch for us as anything. The Yuuzhan Vong prove that.”
“Sounding a little like your brother. Are you abandoning the Force?