Star Wars_ The New Rebellion - Kristine Kathryn Rusch [184]
Luke would come back even stronger, and he would guide Leia to defeat Kueller.
Luke’s lightsaber had reached a thirty-degree angle with his chin when he felt as if he were wrapped in a warm, soft blanket. He could still see through his eyes, but the rest of his senses were suddenly dim. He could no longer sense Leia or even Kueller.
His blade came up, and Kueller’s blade swung back, but Luke couldn’t leave his own body. He had lost the Force. It was gone. He was blind and numb without it.
He would die without it.
Kueller’s blade came down, and Luke limped out of the way only to back into the ruined tower wall. Kueller had him cornered. There was no place to go.
Luke was trapped, both inside, and out.
Fifty-two
Kueller felt as if he were moving through mud. The swift grace that had come with his lightsaber training faded as if it had never been. The strength that had flowed through him since he killed the Je’har had suddenly disappeared.
He could no longer feel Skywalker’s anger. Or his sister’s fear.
Or even that strange new wrinkle in the Force he had felt a moment earlier.
Skywalker backed away from him, and Kueller brought his lightsaber down. It slammed into the stone wall behind Skywalker, sending sparks flying and a shimmer up his arm. Kueller staggered sideways.
He didn’t know what kind of trick Skywalker was using on him. He suddenly couldn’t think very clearly. It was as if he had been tossed underwater. All that he relied on within himself had disappeared.
Then he noticed a similar expression on Skywalker’s face. The man looked stunned. He wasn’t manipulating his own lightsaber as he should.
If Skywalker wasn’t doing this, then who—?
Kueller turned, and started when he saw two new figures standing in front of the alley. He couldn’t see them well in the twilight, and as he reached with the Force, he couldn’t feel them. Had they caused this? Who were they? What were they doing to him?
Skywalker brought up his own lightsaber as if it weighed ten times more than usual. Kueller’s felt equally heavy.
This wouldn’t work. Thwarted again, somehow, by Skywalker and his friends.
Anger surged through Kueller, but it didn’t increase his strength. He roared at them, and Skywalker laughed.
Laughed.
All advantage that Kueller had gained was lost.
He let his lightsaber fall to the ground. Not all was lost.
He still had one more trick up his very full sleeve.
The Yavin went vertical as it dove away from the Star Destroyers.
“Ceousa! Karrde!” Wedge shouted through the open communications lines. “Fire on the destroyers! Now!”
TIE fighters were moving his way. Nothing seemed to have happened to the destroyers when his own people had fired on them. All this subterfuge might have been for nothing. And he would lose all of his ships.
And then explosions rocked the Yavin. “Damage?” he shouted to his crew.
“Nothing, sir,” Sela said.
“That wasn’t us,” Ginbotham said. “That was a Star Destroyer!”
Wedge braced himself, rose, and stared at the tactical screen. The destroyer that had been right above the Yavin was simply a sparkle of light. Pieces soared past. Some hit what was left of the Tatooine, and sent her careening farther away from the battle.
“Get Karrde,” he said.
“No need, sir,” Sela said. “He’s using everything he has on the TIE fighters around him.”
The A- and B-wings were also going after the TIEs, and it looked like a rout. Faster and faster and faster they went, chasing the TIEs all over that section of space.
But the other Star Destroyer still lingered above. It had turned on its running lights, and was preparing to dive.
“Blast,” Wedge said. Enough of command. The ship would handle itself now. “Sela, you have the comm.”
Wedge made his way over the toppled droids and smoking interiors toward the gunport. He could blast that Star Destroyer without the help of a tactical computer. He should