A series of soft patters sounded from the middle of the cabin. Insects began to swarm over the “floor” and walls, sweeping their antennae over the bunks and other debris and raising a choking cloud of ash. Jacen made his way forward through the galley and wardroom, dropping into a crouch as the space between the crumpled ceiling and the old floor grew too short for him to walk upright. The walls and other surfaces in these rooms were covered with a thick layer of pink powder, the residue of a fire-fighting foam.
On the bridge, the foam lay so thick that he kicked up clouds of pink dust as he moved. The canopy that had once enclosed the flight deck on three sides was buckled and broken, with dirt spilling through long rents in the transparisteel. A string of gray emergency patches ran diagonally across the forward view-screen, roughly parallel to a line of destruction that had left the navicomputer, sublight-drive control relays,
and hyperspace guidance system in a burned shambles. It was no wonder the ship had crashed; the Dark Jedi crew had done well to escape the Myrkr system at all.
The crash webbing at all the flight deck stations hung down beneath the chairs in a melted tangle, but a faint drag mark beneath the pilot’s and copilot’s seats led through the foam residue toward the engineering cabin. Jacen dropped to his knees to peer through the cockeyed hatchway, and his nostrils filled with the caustic stench of charred bone.
Jacen began a slow breathing exercise. The harsh smell burned his nostrils at first and threatened to make him nauseous, but as he centered himself in the Force and slowly detached from his emotions, the odor grew less biting, its implications less painful. He placed a hand on the wall and imagined it growing warm under his touch.
The staleness seemed to fade from the air inside the wreck, then the smell of old soot turned to the acrid bite of smoke. Jacen’s eyes started to water as he looked back through the Force. His lungs were racked by an endless fit of coughing, and the cabin grew hot and orange. Where he was touching the wall, his palm began to sting and blister. He held it in place and looked over his shoulder.
The flight deck was hidden behind a curtain of smoke and rolling flame. Geysers of fire retardant rose from the ceiling nozzles, creating swirling ghosts of pink fog. Howls of human anguish drowned out the scream of buckling metal.
A single figure crawled out of the smoke, hairless and coughing and blistered raw. His face was unrecognizable, but four gashes ran diagonally across his chest, the wound hanging half open where the fleshglue had dissolved in the heat. One hand trailed behind, dragging a pair of levitated shapes along by their cloak collars. The two shapes were still burning, writhing in the air and flailing against each other in their pain.
Smoke began to rise from beneath Jacen’s palm, and the smell of cooking flesh filled the air. He kept his hand pressed against the wall. Pain no longer troubled him. Pain was his servant; he had learned that from Vergere.
The crawling figure reached the hatchway and paused, turning in Jacen’s direction. The face was too scorched and swollen to recognize, but the eyes belonged to Raynar, questioning and proud and so terribly naive. The two of them locked gazes for a moment, then Raynar cocked his head in confusion and started to open his mouth…
Jacen pulled his hand from the wall. The figures vanished instantly, returning him to a flight deck filled with the stale smell of ash and clouds of pink dust.
An insect brushed its antennae over his scorched hand. “Rurrrrruu,” it drummed in concern. “Urrubuuuu?”
“Yes, it does hurt.” Jacen smiled. “It’s nothing.”
He removed a small canister from his equipment belt and sprayed a coating of synthflesh over his palm. Raynar had been the misfit of their childhood group, trying a little too hard to fit in and often the butt of jokes for his arrogance and showy clothes. He had never impressed anyone as exceptional Jedi material, and there had been a few conversations in which fellow candidates had expressed reservations about his judgment and initiative. Yet what Raynar had done on the Flier, risking his own life to save those who had betrayed his friends and abducted him, was the essence of being a Jedi Knight. Jacen doubted he would have done the same thing-and Jaina would have stayed to watch them burn. Given what the theft of the Flier had meant-that Anakin would certainly die of his wounds-Jacen might even have joined her.
Floating his Force light ahead of him, Jacen crawled into the engineering cabin and followed Raynar’s trail through a cramped maze of toppled equipment. The stench of charred bones grew stronger, and Jacen feared he would only find their burned remains trapped in some dead-end corner, or simply lying in the middle of the aisle where Raynar had succumbed to smoke inhalation. His fears began to seem justified when he started to find scorched bones in the middle of the aisle-first, a few finger and toe and hand bones, then a forearm and a shin, then finally a femur. The space between the floor and ceiling grew smaller and smaller, and he had to drop to his belly, and he began to sense the residue of Raynar’s panic in the Force.