Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 14_ Traitor - Matthew Woodring Stover [103]
He motioned for Vergere to follow, and went in.
Yorik coral gave way to age-grimed duracrete; the corridor became a labyrinth. As they threaded their way along, Nom Anor congratulated himself on the cleverness of his escape plan. No one had been within the Well except master shapers and their assistants since its initial conversion had begun; no one was willing to risk the homicidal wrath of Ch’Gang Hool—except for one shaper whose greed had overcome his cowardice. Of all the Yuuzhan Vong, only that shaper and Nom Anor himself had been aware that immense chambers—once the offices of the Old Republic’s Chancellor—lay below the World Brain’s pool.
These chambers were blasted and broken. Damaged in the destruction of the Senate above, they had never been repaired. Nom Anor picked his way over mounds of rubble and through a jungle of twisted durasteel and dangling cable, leading Vergere through the wreckage. Down here some of the New Republic glow globes still functioned; they had not been destroyed as heresies because only Nom Anor and his pet shaper had known of their existence.
He pulled himself over a bent girder, and there it was: long and sleek, sculpted for atmospheric speed, twinned dovin basals—one for motion, one for defense—surfaces angled to deflect sensors, flat matte black, nonreflective to defeat visual targeting.
The shaper who had grown it had guaranteed this coralcraft would be as fast as any in the Yuuzhan Vong fleet; Nom Anor had used the concealed hatch sphincter above to secretly visit the craft on several occasions while it grew, so that its pilotbrain could be imprinted with Nom Anor’s mental signature. While visiting, Nom Anor had often amused himself by contemplating how he had found a new use for the chambers that had once belonged to the legendary Palpatine …
The defensive dovin basal would collapse a tunnel through the duracrete and yorik coral alike, opening it like a gate to the sky. The pilotbrain was trained with the necessary recognition codes to pass the fleet cordon around the planet, and had coordinates for the jump into New Republic space already memorized. Once inside, nothing could touch him.
Once inside, he would be safe.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” he murmured as he put his hand to the coralcraft’s nosetongue. Its hatch gaped wide, instantly obedient. “This is the result, Vergere, of contingency planning. I never assume success. This is why I always survive. I always have a contingency plan, to cover any possible disaster—”
“Do you always?” Something in her voice froze him in place. “Any possible disaster?”
Before he could even draw breath to ask what she meant, his unspoken question was answered by a sickeningly familiar sound—
snap-hiss hummmm
Slowly, glacially, afraid of what he’d see but unable to stop himself, Nom Anor turned toward a new light in the ruined office: light that sizzled green and struck white highlights off the black curves of his coralcraft.
To find himself staring into the terminal curve of a lightsaber’s blade, one centimeter from his nostrils.
“A lightsaber is an interesting weapon,” Vergere said conversationally. “A blade unique in the history of warfare. A paradox, not unlike the Jedi who wield it: those peaceful warriors, who kill in the service of life. Have you ever noticed? The blade is round. It has no edge. But it is a lightsaber—which means it is nothing but edge. There is no part of this blade that does not cut. Curious, yes? Symbolic, one might say.”
“What?” His mouth opened, closed, opened again. He wanted to ask what she was doing. He wanted to ask where she had gotten a lightsaber. He wanted to ask any number of things, but all