Rogue Planet

Chapter 43

Anakin had done his best to elude the nightmare that rushed forward out of the smoke, but the laser blasts had stunned him as well as Obi-Wan. He could only crawl backward on his elbows and grimace up at the shadow, trying to make his body hurry or time slow. Time slowed, all right, but he did not speed up.

The shadow disappeared in a fresh billow of smoke, reemerged, became clear.

"Slave boy!"

It was the same Blood Carver Anakin had encountered in the garbage pit. He carried a long shaping lance with a wicked blade on the end and moved quick as lightning. He swung the lance down so quickly Anakin hardly had time to begin his roll to one side. The flat of the blade struck the boy across the back of his skull and neck. His head exploded with sparking pain.

The blow stunned him, but he did not lose consciousness. He felt himself lifted by one ankle, like an amphibian delicacy on Tatooine, and swung through the smoke, dripping blood from his nose. As his assailant whirled him about, he saw the Sekotan ship still in her tendril sling, undamaged.

The Blood Carver casually plucked out and threw aside an engineer who poked up from the dilated opening in the hull, then hoisted Anakin over the ship's side lobe and dropped him in. Then he crawled after.

Anakin found he could move a little, but pretended to be inert. Where's Obi-Wan? Is he still alive? How could this all happen so fast?

But he knew. This was the trial, the test no Jedi Temple could provide, no Jedi Master could oversee.

The Force is never a nursemaid.

Anakin was on his own. The first thing he did, while the Blood Carver poked around the interior, looking for any other engineers, was to still all his resentment, all his feelings of failure and inferiority, and most important, his self-anger at having distracted Obi-Wan with his own foolish regard for the ship.

That regard was not so foolish. The ship is part of your power- it is essential in the here and now. It is the beginning of your trial- and it will end with the trial of Zonama Sekot. Your master cannot help you now.

He thought for a moment this might be the suspended voice of Obi-Wan, or even Qui-Gon Jinn, but it was not. If the voice had any quality whatsoever, it was his own-older, more mature. The Jedi I will become. All I have trained to be.

The Blood Carver growled and Anakin heard a small shriek. Jabitha was pushed forward from the back of the cabin, where she had hidden behind a thick cross brace.

She glanced at Anakin, eyes wild with fear like a small, trapped animal. The Blood Carver yanked her arm and tossed her lightly into an alcove beside the rear acceleration couches.

"Be still! He's dangerous," Anakin warned her.

Jabitha dropped her jaw as if to speak, but the Blood Carver slapped her hard across the face, then swiveled gracefully, grabbed Anakin by the shoulders, and yanked him into the pilot's seat. The seat automatically adjusted to Anakin's body, and he felt a greeting from the ship-a tremulous recognition of his presence.

The seed-partners had united. They spoke now as one, reporting the ship's condition, her readiness-and their concern. The ship knew something was wrong, but Anakin was still too groggy, his movements too uncoordinated, for him to hazard any action.

Jabitha crawled into a rear passenger seat, whimpering. Her face was bloody.

Anakin's blood seemed to chill. He felt her pain.

The Blood Carver took the seat that had been made for Obi- Wan. He squirmed uncomfortably, then reached into his jacket pocket and produced a small, glassy green bulb.

Anakin watched through mostly closed eyes, slumped in the couch, as the long, triple-jointed arm swung out and slender, strong, golden fingers crushed the bulb under his nose.

Again, Anakin's head seemed to explode-but this time with outraged life. He flung himself away from the bulb's acrid stench and slammed his shoulder into an instrument panel. He shook all over and stared hard at his kidnapper.

"Young Jedi, there is no time to explain." The Blood Carver's tone of voice changed suddenly, became more subdued.

"Is Obi-Wan dead?"

"Not your worry," the Blood Carver said. "This ship needs you, not him. And I need this ship. You will fly it to orbit above Zonama Sekot."

"What if I don't?"

"Then I will kill your female." He swung the lance around in the close quarters and poked the blade against Jabitha's chest. She gasped but kept very still.

Anakin tried to feel for his master's living presence, but there were too many voices outside the ship, too much confusion-he could not detect Obi-Wan. Uninjured, his master would doubtless survive any attack the Blood Carver could mount. But if he had been hit by the laser fire. .

The Blood Carver climbed up out of the second seat and swung one long arm back to the hatch. "I assume silence means courage and you will not fly. So my mission has failed. I will kill the female now and dispose of her body."

"No!" Anakin shouted. "I'll fly. Leave her be."

He probed once more, and sucked in his breath with relief. He could feel Obi-Wan-he was injured but still alive. Anakin could not imagine a universe without his master.

Good. It would be the end of your trial to lose your master. Now. . begin.

Anakin ran his hands over the controls. They were not marked, but their design and placement were reasonably standard.

The ship once again explained her condition. She was ready to fly, but her fuel reserves were low-the tanks had not yet been filled by the technicians.

"We don't have enough fuel to get far," Anakin informed the Blood Carver. The Blood Carver grabbed the placket of his ritual robe and pulled Anakin close, breathing hot, peppery breath into his face.

"It's true," Anakin insisted. "I'm not lying."

"Then fly to a place with fuel. We must preserve this ship."

"You're the one who couldn't get a ship made! The seed- partners hated you."

"Yes, I am a disgrace," the Blood Carver said coldly. "Now fly."

Anakin brought his hands down over the controls, pulled back on the aft thrusters, and the ship's engines sang to life instantly, smoothly, unlike the engines in any other ship he had ever flown.

The hatch closed.

Some maiden voyage.

Anakin pushed the control levers forward. The console reached up around his fingers and hands. The ship spoke to him, taught him what to do. Anakin, in turn, suggested that the ship should break free of her cradle and fly straight up for a few hundred meters, then level off and head southwest.

The ship did all these things.

He was taking the Blood Carver away from Obi-Wan, giving his master time to recover. It was unfortunate that Jabitha had crawled into the ship. Anakin was more than just concerned for her safety.

He could feel his strength returning, and then building. To his dismay, the primary component of that strength was a red heat of anger.

It is the way, boy. Anger and hatred are the fuel. Stoke them, gather strength.

Again, the voice, terrifying in its power. Anakin could not identify its intent-it was raw, the voice of loyalty and survival, and it seemed to sneer at any second-guessing.

Anakin did not want Jabitha to see what that voice would make him be, what he would become, in order to save Obi-Wan, defeat his enemies, and survive.