Title: Joint Strength
Author: Rene
Rating: PG
Notes: See part one
Summary of this part: Bant finds a way out, Qui-Gon tries to end a battle
quickly, Obi-Wan seeks to help, and Molu startles the Council.
Disclaimer: For entertainment purposes only, no profit gained from this
endeavor.
A sort of brief synopsis of part fifteen:
In the last part, Bant refuses to let Bruck accompany her up into the
shafts. Bruck considers following her anyway, but fears provoking her
anger, believing she will then tell the Council at once of his attack on
her. Instead he decided to go and find "Morran". Meanwhile, Qui-Gon and
Obi-Wan are indisputedly glad to see each other alive, although, Qui-Gon can
see that Obi-Wan is injured. Xanatos tries to strengthen his suddenly
weakened position by attacking Obi-Wan's deepest fears. Qui-Gon defends
Obi-Wan by saying that Obi-Wan is more of a Jedi at 13 than Xanatos would
have ever been. This enrages Xanatos, and a fierce battle ensues between he
and Qui-Gon. Knowing he is of no use in battle because of his injury and
realizing that A'ali may be dying as she lies below, Obi-Wan seeks to help
her. Before he can act, however, Xanatos pins him against the railing,
threatening him with a knife. Sensing Obi-Wan's plan, Qui-gon pulls Xanatos
off-balance just enough for Obi-Wan to propel himself into a handstand atop
the railing, and then push himself over, out and down. At the same time,
far above, General Molu shocks the Council by announcing that Qui-Gon has
gone to rescue his apprentice, when, as far as the Council knows, Qui-Gon
has no apprentice. Tel Udrunn attempts to contact A'ali and cannot reach
her. Yoda announces that they must find all of them, at once.
Joint Strength Part Sixteen
Obi-Wan's body fell away, disappearing from Qui-Gon's field of view
even as he brought his saber up to block a slashing horizontal strike from
Xanatos' blade. The deep wound etched into his upper arm by the shiv's keen
edge howled in protest as the skin and muscles stretched and contracted with
his answering swing. He swatted Xanatos' saber aside, face absolutely calm
as he whipped his blade back around toward his opponent's midsection.
Xanatos parried swiftly, and the two blades locked between them, providing a
momentary impasse as each sought to force the other to disengage first.
And then, taking a risk that his disciplined swordsmanship would usually forbid, he glanced away from his opponent, for the barest fraction of an instant, because his heart demanded that he see if Obi-Wan had survived the fall unharmed.
* * * *
The force was strong in Obi-Wan.
As was the memory of a certain teaching exercise, a lesson regarding the use of the Force in acrobatics.
In the moment that remained for thought, his mind gibbered frantically, pointing out the drastic difference between the thickly padded floor of the Exercise Room and the cold metal walkway reaching up to embrace him, but he heard another voice, overlapping his stuttering fears: an aged Jedi Master saying, "In your mind the differences are!"
He flung out his arms, straight and taut from shoulder to fingertips, and visualized the Force winging out from his hands like iron cords. His hands contracted into fists, clenching the invisible strands, and his fall abruptly, visibly, slowed, a scant meter above the catwalk. He pulled his hands in, dropping the last distance as if stepping off a low platform, and grasped the railing to support his injured leg. A few meters away, A'ali lay curled like a withered leaf, and he hopped awkwardly to her, lowering himself unto his good knee, and quietly calling her name.
She did not respond..
Carefully, he cupped one palm under her cheek and moved her head, seeing at once the cause of her distress: a bloody bruised gash along her temple. A flickering glance upward showed a red stain on the railing nearby. She had struck her head as she fell.
I've got to get her out of here, Obi-Wan thought. Got to get help. . .
He looked higher, to the catwalk above, where two figured strained, leaning toward one another, the planes of their faces bathed in the light of crossed sabers.
No help there. Not yet anyway.
With visible effort, he wrenched his eyes away, speaking to his own heart in the short simple words one would direct at a child.
Qui-Gon will win. I know he will. But I must help A'ali now. She hasn't much time.
Pulling himself to his feet again, he peered through the dim light, hunching his shoulders against the angry hum of the lightsabers above. There must be a way off this walkway. He had to locate that exit first and then he would concern himself with how he was going to lift and carry A'ali.
My Master will be all right, he thought fiercely, forcing himself not to stare upward in horrified fascination as he edged his way along the catwalk. My Master is the best swordsman in the Order.
* * * * *
Xanatos leaped back, avoiding a powerful upward stroke, and grinned
humorlessly, his mouth stretching like a gash across his face.
"I'm younger and stronger, Qui-Gon. And faster."
Qui-Gon's only response was pursuit, driving forward and bringing the blade back down again so that Xanatos was forced to block it at an awkward, wrists-bent angle. Bantering during battle was always a mistake of the young and vain, two attributes that Qui-Gon no longer possessed.
* * * * *
Obi-Wan stopped abruptly, staring in consternation at the blank wall
emerging out of the gloom. There was no doorway!
How could that be? Why build a catwalk with no way to access it? Unless there was just one door, at the other end, but. . . that didn't make sense either.
His gaze slid downward and snagged on the turning blades of the gigantic fan. This close, their steady rhythm was hypnotic, soothing. He stared at them, mesmerized for a moment, and then thought slowly, If this walkway was built to service the fan, then there must be some way to get down to it, and if there's a way to get down, then there must also be a way to get up. . .
Intent now, he hopped closer to the dead-end, studying it carefully, and saw at last a set of small, darkened controls set into the railing itself next to the wall. He bent over it, realizing, after a moment's examination, that the railing here was detached from the rest of the catwalk, attached instead to a narrow sliver of platform that jutted out from beneath the walkway. A frown wrinkling his brow as he tried to ignore the desperate sense of **urgency** clawing at his shoulders, he found a likely activator switch, and hit it. Instantly, it glowed green, and the railing slid out and rotated, revealing that the platform it was attached to was two meters square, floating free on antigrav repulsors. A tight grin of triumph lit Obi-Wan's face. The other controls must direct it sideways and down.
And up.
Now he knew how to lift and carry A'ali.
He grasped the platform's railing and pulled himself aboard, familiarizing himself with the controls in a moment, and then piloted it back along the walkway toward A'ali with all the ease of a seasoned technician.
* * * * *
Above, the clash of sabers increased in speed and ferocity, and
Xanatos knew, as slimy fear slithered across the roof of his mouth, that he
was growing fatigued.
His blows were parries and preventive blocks now. Qui-Gon's blade was the aggressor, seeking any weakness in his defenses, like water pressing eagerly at the chinks in a dam. He stared unblinkingly into his former Master's still face, and he knew, with chilling certainty, that Qui-Gon would accept no outcome for this battle except his complete surrender.
Or his death.
He had to escape.
Then, glaring desperately about, searching for any avenue, his eye caught a movement. Down below, he saw Obi-Wan maneuvering a small service platform onto the catwalk next to A'ali's crumpled body.
And his eyes narrowed grimly.
With the strength born of frenzied self-preservation, he hooked Qui-Gon's blade with his own and shoved it down and away. Releasing his grip on the saber with one hand, he pounded his fist into Qui-Gon's wounded shoulder with all his strength, and then thrust back, throwing all the dark power of his fear and rage into the heave. Qui-Gon stumbled backward, involuntarily jerking away from the scream of pain in his shoulder, and Xanatos snuffed his blade and hooked it to his belt. He took an instant to calculate, and then vaulted over the railing.
Like a dark angel, he fell, landing on the platform directly behind Obi-Wan, who recovered instantly from the shock and slapped his hand to his belt, fingers curling to grasp his lightsaber.
Which wasn't there.
Eyes dark with resolve, he brought his hand up again, preparing to strike out with his bare fists, since they seemed the only weapon left to him, but Xanatos' hand moved in a blur and reappeared holding the shiv, tip pointed outward. The mirrored surface of the blade winked at Obi-Wan from beneath a streak of Qui-Gon's blood.
Obi-Wan held himself completely still. He focused on the blade and thought desperately of ways to outmaneuver it, finally bringing his eyes up to regard his enemy.
Xanatos' face was illumined by an incandescent malevolence. Deliberately, he looked down, inclining his head to study the empty clasp on Obi-Wan's belt. Then he murmured, looking back up with a slow smile, "You shouldn't have given it to your small orange friend." The grin grew wider. "It's her death warrant."
Obi-Wan had no time to assimilate the sickened shock that rocked him.
The lightsaber! Bant!
The moment his focus wavered, Xanatos swept him off the platform with a low, vicious kick. He whirled around, shoved the shiv back into his belt, clamped his hands over the platform's controls and piloted it up and away from the catwalk.
Just as Qui-Gon leaped out from the upper railing.
The distance was too great, and the platform was moving rapidly away, and yet somehow Qui-Gon's leap seemed to grow rather than dwindle, as if gravity were lifting him instead of pulling him down. The shock of his landing caused the platform to list wildly to one side before the repulsors could compensate. Xanatos hooked one whole arm around the railing to keep his footing, and Qui-Gon seized it as well, instantly pulling himself forward and locking one huge hand around the outflung wrist of Xanatos' other arm. The platform righted itself, and Xanatos unhooked his arm, a predator’s snarl distorting his face. But Qui-Gon caught that wrist too, as his hand flashed upward with the shiv in its grip, and a fierce, straining struggle erupted, a contest of pure strength, made infinitely dangerous by the small platform on which it was fought, and the slyly winking blade between them.
* * * * *
Obi-Wan had landed almost on top of A'ali, and his hand brushed a slim metal cylinder, fallen halfway out of a concealed pocket in her tunic. He stared at it, and his eyes widened.
* * * * *
Suddenly, as they turned in unison toward the door, moving in the same
current of thought, a metallic buzz filled the Chamber. The old woman, the
one that Molu had inwardly titled 'the Duchess', snatched at a small device
on her belt, breathing out a word: "A'ali!"
She clicked a button and stood listening, head bent, to the urgent murmurs spilling out of its depths. The expression of hope animating her face died quickly.
"Where are you?"
More indistinct syllables.
"We'll be there at once."
She deactivated it with a snap, looked up at the others, and spoke rapidly, the calm strength in her voice mitigated by the anguish in her eyes. "They're in the main power conduit, he's not sure what level. A'ali is injured badly. Qui-Gon is battling Xanatos. His friend Bant is somehow in danger. His voice cut off before he could tell me more."
* * * * *
Obi-Wan dropped the comlink, as A’ali abruptly began to moan and thrash,
in the grip of some violent, pained vision. Fearing the movements might
exacerbate her injury, he slid over to her, trying to pin her shoulders down
as gently as he could. His young face was set in the grim lines of a much
older man as he struggled to hold her still, craning his neck upward
desperately to watch his Master struggle as well.
* * * * *
To Molu's surprise, there were no startled exclamations, no grim
pronouncements. The Jedi Masters merely advanced on the Chamber's door, an
army of twelve. Molu thought that, though he commanded a force of thousands
back home on Triki, he would not want to be pitted in battle against such
foes.
But before they could take more than two strides, a muted chime sounded, and, at the end of the short corridor leading to the Chamber, the lift door slid aside.
Like a diminutive torpedo, a small figure shot out of the lift and along the hall toward them. Around him, Molu could sense the Masters' sudden stillness. As she barreled toward them, her eyes met Molu's through the open door and widened as if in recognition.
Why? he wondered. Do I know this child?
She plunged through the doorway, saying, "Masters, forgive me, but I. . ."
Her words were abruptly drowned by a hideous, high-pitched squeal that seemed to erupt from everywhere, from the air itself. Its directionless scream flooded the chamber, as the Masters instantly began to fan out, searching for its source, and the little fishgirl hunched over, hands clapped white-knuckled to her ears.
Molu stood frozen for an instant, momentarily blinded by a frantic memory of Qui-Gon Jinn standing, hand outstretched toward the cowering _sinna_ in a tree outside of Teek's small round house.
The pitch steepened in tone: explosion was imminent.
Where was the spidermine? Where? Where?
He advanced on the girl, knowing she must be bearing either the trigger or the mine itself, and she scuttled away from him, eyes wide. The Jedi Masters closed in, faces grim, but there was no time to explain to them what to look for.
Where was it?
The _sinna_ was circling, chittering angrily at a remembered enemy, this noise that had assaulted it once before. Suddenly, it bared its teeth, claws scratching against the Chamber's patterned floor. With a snarl-- half angry, half crazed-- the slender creature launched itself at the girl.
Straight at the lightsaber clasped to her waist.
With a flash of comprehension, Molu sprang at her, snatched the weapon off her belt and pushed the shocked girl away.
What now? He whirled, desperately. What to do with it?
The windows! No, they didn't seem to be glass. No time to try to drill through whatever they were made of.
What? Where then?
Spinning, feeling the fear scrabbling cruelly at his throat, he suddenly focused on the open door, the small corridor, the lift at the end, door open. . .
Door beginning to close. . .
With a battlehowl the equal of any uttered by his warrior ancestors, Molu threw himself forward. Two, three, four strides, snapping his muscular torso like a thickened whip, he hurled the saber down the hall with a sideways, cocked-wrist fling.
End for end, it flipped, polished surfaces glinting merrily in the light of the aircars passing oblivious outside the corridor's windows. It sailed in a flat arc down the hall and through the fast closing gap between the lift door and its frame.
As the door eased closed, he caught a glimpse of the saber striking the back wall and tumbling to the floor.
One second passed.
Molu skidded to a stop and pivoted, hurling himself back into the Chamber and punching the door's controls with the back of his fist.
Two seconds.
The Chamber door slid quietly shut.
And then the concussive force of an explosion rocked the Temple to its roots.
* * * * *
Like a distant roll of ominous thunder, a rumble shook the air around
them, and dust from somewhere far above glinted madly in the shafts of dim
light that pierced the conduit. In the contorted face before him, Qui-Gon
saw a fathomless abyss of dark triumph, welling up from the core of Xanatos’
spirit. He ceased his struggle against Qui-Gon’s grip, leaning forward and
whispering, “They’re all dead, Master. Your precious Council. All of
them. And next it will be you and him. I vow it on my father’s name.”
And suddenly, he dropped, throwing himself backward to the very edge of the platform and breaking Qui-Gon’s grasp. A booted foot shot out, seeking to sweep Qui-Gon’s feet from under him, but the Master had seen that ploy before, and leaped over the kick, grasping the railing to stay anchored to the platform. Xanatos scrambled to his feet and lunged forward, shiv held low. Qui-Gon deflected the knife arm away with the back of his fist, and thrust out his other hand to repel Xanatos’ forward movement with the Force. Xanatos stumbled backward, grabbing the railing at the last moment, heels hanging over the edge. Qui-Gon had instinctively stepped forward to seize his arm and prevent his falling, for despite all the evil that shadowed him, this man had once been a well-loved apprentice. But Xanatos thrust savagely forward with the knife, seeking only to kill.
There’s no way to end this quickly, Qui-Gon thought. And it must end. Now. The Council. . .
And he flung out a thought, through the Force: Padawan, I cannot do this alone. You must help me.
Below, Obi-Wan had pulled off his darksuit’s tunic and wrapped it around A’ali’s shoulders, hoping rather helplessly that the extra warmth would help her. He could see the platform hovering far above, with Xanatos poised at the very edge and Qui-Gon standing just out of knife’s reach in a defensive stance, obviously seeking any opening to seize the weapon.
Suddenly, Qui-Gon’s voice filled his mind. Cannot do this alone. Padawan. Help me.
And with the voice came a vision, a sudden blueprint of the action he must take. He opened himself to it, thrusting himself to his feet, and scooping up the discarded comlink, cradling it in his hand like a mother’s last gift. With the Force singing in him, he stepped back once, onto a leg that shouldn’t have been able to support him, and then surged forward. Committing all his body to one fluid movement, he hurled the comlink upward.
Its straight unwavering flight was propelled by more than merely one boy’s arm. Like a slim silver bird of prey, it flew, and exploded in a cloud of miniature lightning as it struck the gravity regulator on the underside of the platform.
For one timeless moment, Qui-Gon’s eyes locked with his fallen apprentice.
Then gravity enfolded the platform, and it fell.
Qui-Gon took one giant stride and leaped off, the force of his feet pushing off sending the platform careening wildly in the opposite direction. He landed on the upper walkway with a graceful roll.
Xanatos released his grip on the railing, falling backward off the platform and flipping in midair, arms outstretched to catch the railing of the lower catwalk, where Obi-Wan watched in frozen horror. As, Qui-Gon regained his footing and whirled around, Xanatos’ fingertips brushed the railing. And found no grip.
With a howl of pure rage, he fell between the massive blades of the slowly turning fan, and disappeared.
TBC--only one more part to go!!
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