[Last Of The Jedi] - 04(5)

Trever glanced down through the grate to the black sea below. “Below?” he squeaked.

“Are you ready?”

Ready? I’m ready to run the other way.

No - keep it together.

Trever nodded.

“Follow me.”

Oryon took two strides and suddenly flipped himself over the catwalk railing. Trever moved cautiously forward and hung over the railing in astonishment. He saw that there were handholds and footholds below the grating, just random pieces of metal that you could hang on to in order to scrabble your way across, moving underneath the grating like a crab. Far, far below he saw the moving black sea.

There was nothing else to do but go over. A small part of him was pleased that Oryon was treating him as a comrade, assuming without question that he would do this. Ferus would have told him to continue hiding behind the speeder.

Trever swung one leg over, searching for a hold underneath. Then he slowly slid his hands down until his other toe found a hold.

They made their way upside down, looking up through the grating. Sometimes they had to curl their fingers through the grating itself to make progress. He just hoped that a stormtrooper didn’t step on his fingers. Those boots looked pretty lethal. Trever knew his fingers would be raw after this, but strangely, the fear had left him and a grim determination to finish the job was pushing him forward.

When they were close, Oryon signaled him and spoke in his ear. “You have to go ahead. Set the timers for thirty seconds. That will give you enough time to get back. Then I’ll throw the proton grenades from here. Set the charges carefully so only that catwalk blows.”

Trever scrabbled forward, his fingers aching. He would have to find a good place to anchor his feet and one hand while he reached into his utility belt. He made his way more quickly now, used to the feeling of being upside down. When he saw the white stormtrooper boots above, he set one charge, wedging it into the catwalk, then another and another, his biggest alpha charges. By the time he finished, his fingers were scraped raw.

Counting in his head, he went backward to where Oryon waited. “Five seconds,” he grunted to the Bothan.

“Go,” Oryon whispered.

Trever quickly scrabbled back in the direction he’d come. But he couldn’t resist stopping to watch Oryon toss the grenades.

Oryon dropped one powerful arm and lobbed the grenade. It shot straight out then curled around the edge of the catwalk, sailing over the railing and onto the platform above. Without pausing, he threw the other three grenades.

Trever felt the explosion against his eardrums. Oryon was moving fast toward him, hand over hand. The catwalk had become a living thing, buckling and waving. It could break at any moment.

He risked another look back. The platform above was cracking, metal parting from metal with a groaning, scraping sound. The stormtroopers were starting to fall into one another as they desperately searched for traction. Some were trying to vault to safety to the catwalk or the platform below.

Solace was the only one who used the explosions to her advantage. She had ridden the blast like a wave and had shot into the air. Trever watched, breathless, as she somersaulted away from the stormtrooper army and fell - no, not fell, soared, completely in control - past the stormtroopers, over the groaning metal, over the heat, over the smoke, and down, down to the sea below.

“Hurry,” Oryon urged Trever, his voice hoarse. “We’ve got trouble.”

To Trever’s horror, he saw that the catwalk was melting from the heat, shaking loose from the platform above. It must have been weakened from the battle’s blaster fire. They couldn’t make it to safety, he could see that. The catwalk began to fishtail as the platform above broke into pieces, sending stormtroopers sliding into the sea below.

“You’ve got to let go!” Oryon shouted. “We’re not going to make it!”

“Let go? Are you nuts?” Trever felt his fingers cramp from trying to hold on to the twisting catwalk.

“It’s the only way!” Oryon looked at him, his eyes intense. He suddenly flipped his legs forward and wrapped them around Trever’s waist. Then he let go with one hand and pulled Trever against him. Trever felt the strength of Oryon’s arms and legs, pure thick muscle. “I’ll be with you.”

Trever looked down. The sea looked black and dangerous. And very far away.

“I just want you to know something,” he said to Oryon. “I can’t swim!”

And then he let go.





CHAPTER FOUR


That brief conversation turned out to be one of the few Ferus had with his cellmate. Ferus knew his number - 934890 - but his cellmate never confided his name or anything else about himself. The only sentences he uttered were along the lines of “Move your boots.”