[Dark Nest] - 3(115)

By the fourth go, Luke’s faceplate had returned to its normal tint, and he could see a steady stream of captured food containers, membrosia waxes, and chunks of spitcrete gushing out the breach into space.

“Grand Master Commander?” the lead droid asked.

“Thanks.”

Luke ducked through the hole into the interior of what had once been the junior officers’ mess. The lights remained on, so he could see that the chairs that had once been bolted into place along the tables had been removed by the Killiks. The far half of the room had been converted to a nursery, and the larvae were lying half out of their cells, writhing in pain from the decompression blow. Membrosia waxes and Alliance foodstuffs were still tumbling out of their lockers-or rising out of spitcrete bins-and flying out the breach with the cabin’s air.

Raynar’s heavy presence returned, this time summoning Luke.

The Jedi Master started toward the interior exit, where the first bugcrunchers were already trying to override the decompression safety and open the hatch. He was happy to go to Raynar. Again, Luke exerted his own will through the Force, incorporating UnuThul’s wishes, but turning them toward his own ends. He recalled his dinner with Aryn Thul, when she and Tyko had asked Luke to spare her son’s life. It was time to stop the killing, to end this war, and the Jedi Master would gladly go to Raynar to accept his surrender. UnuThul wished Luke to come, and Luke wished to end the war, and so Luke would come and accept the Colony’s surrender.

Again, Raynar withdrew, this time so violently that Luke had no chance to prevent it. UnuThul was coming-not to Luke, but after him. The Master would have to fight. He had known it would come to this, but knowing did not make his heart any less heavy.

The interior hatch finally irised open, and the decompression blow brought half a dozen Killiks tumbling out. The bugcrunchers opened fire with their blaster cannons, shattering the tough pressure carapaces before the bugs could react, then pushed through the doorway with weapons still blazing. By the time the fourth droid had gone through, a synthesized voice was already sounding the all-clear inside Luke’s helmet.

Luke stepped through the hatchway and found himself in a narrow corridor littered with dead Killiks and pieces of shattered carapace. A closed hatchway sealed either end of the short passage. Two confused boxy little mouse droids were trying to make their way through the debris, determined to complete some errand that no longer mattered. A row of sealed hatches lined the opposite wall, which-if Luke recalled the Ackbar’s bridge schematic correctly-concealed storage lockers, officers’ lounges,

and exercise facilities. Each was a dead end, as well as a potential hiding place for ambushers.

The corridor was hardly the ideal place for a lightsaber duel, but it would have to do. Luke could already sense a furious Raynar Thul at the far end of the passage, using his brute Force-strength to wrest open the safety-sealed hatch.

As soon as the last of his platoon had entered the corridor, Luke pointed to the hatch through which they’d come. “Make that hatch airtight.”

“Airtight, sir?” Stomper One asked. “Are you certain? As Sseries droids, we enjoy a significant tactical advantage in a nonpressurized environment.”

“But I don’t.” Luke plucked at the sleeve of his vac suit. “And I don’t want to worry about ripping this. The fight is about to get rough.”

“Rough?” Stomper One looked up and down the corridor, appraising their position and apparently reaching the same conclusion that Luke had: the corridor was a bad place for a firefight. “As you wish, sir.”

The droids quickly went to work, sealing the hatch to the officers’ mess and using their blaster cannons to spot-weld the others closed so the platoon could not be ambushed. When Luke noticed they were leaving the hatch directly behind them open, he pointed to it.

“Fix that hatch, too.” He started up the corridor toward the hatch at the far end. “We won’t be retreating.”

Stomper One’s synthesized voice assumed a note of approval. “Very good, sir.”

Luke felt the Force stir as Raynar made a final exertion. “They’re coming. Prepare for-“

The far hatch suddenly ruptured inward, bringing with it a short-lived decompression squall that rocked Luke back on his heels and hazed the corridor with airborne dust. He glimpsed a tall figure in a black pressure suit.

Then the figure flicked one of his hands, and Luke found himself flying backward, bouncing off YVH droids and tumbling out of control. He reached out in the Force, grabbing at passing hatches, the ceiling, even Raynar himself, but he was whirling too fast to catch hold of anything.