Free Star Wars: Crosscurrent by Paul S. Kemp Page A

seconds. Confirm, Omen ."
    The speakers crackled with Omen 's answer. "Confirmed. Forty-five seconds. Forty-four."
    Dor put his clawed hand on the weapons officer's soft shoulder. "You have twenty-five seconds to destroy that Infiltrator. Or explain to the captain why you could not."
     
     
    Saes's blade spat a blurry shower of sparks as he unleashed a series of powerful blows. Relin allowed the strength of the attacks to move him backward as he dodged left, right, leapt, spun, and parried, biding his time. At last he deflected an overhand strike in a shower of energy, slid his blade free, and stabbed at Saes's middle. His one-time Padawan slid left, spun, and drove Relin's blade to the deck with an overhand strike. Saes threw a reverse elbow with his off arm, augmented with strength from the Force, but Relin anticipated the blow, parried with his forearm, lurched his blade free, and drove a Force-augmented kick into Saes's midsection. The impact lifted Saes from his feet and drove him fifteen paces across the room, though he flipped in flight and landed on his feet in a crouch.
    "Your skill with a lightsaber remains wanting," Relin said, advancing. "You rely on strength over technique."
    Anger tensed Saes's body, darkened his visible skin from crimson to deep red. "It is well, then, that I've learned other methods."
    Blue Force lightning gathered on the black claws of his fingertips, crackled a dire promise. Before Relin could respond, Saes gestured and the energy cut a jagged path across the room.
    Relin dodged too late and the energy struck him, put a cold spike into his heart, and threw him against the far wall. Despite the agony, he managed to use the Force to cushion the impact and fell to the floor, his breathing ragged as the last of the lightning crawled over him and expired.
    He climbed to his feet, lightsaber held low, and eyed Saes. His Padawan had grown in the Force since they had parted.
    As if reading his thoughts, Saes saluted him with his lightsaber. Relin imagined him grinning behind his mask. "More than you know, even."
    The pitch of the hyperdrive's hum changed, accelerated, took on the regular cadence of a rapidly beating heart. Relin felt the vaguely nauseating swirl in his stomach that he often felt when a ship was about to enter hyperspace.
    Staring at Saes, he decided that he would not bother with escape. He had accomplished his mission. Now he would right a wrong before he died.
    He fell into the Force, let its energy course through his body, enhance his reflexes, his strength, his endurance. Saes answered Relin's stare with his own, his eyes black holes in the white mask, and lightning sizzled on his fingertips, tracing a spiral path up the red blade of his lightsaber.
    "We end it," Relin said.
    Former Master and Padawan strode across the chamber toward each other, lethal purpose in both their minds.
    Relin's comlink crackled. "I am hit! Master!"
    Drev's alarmed voice eroded Relin's resolve, carried away the anger that had been driving his thinking. Strength went out of him.
    Saes, sensing the hesitation, bounded forward, lightsaber raised in a killing stroke. Relin parried but too slowly. Saes's blade severed Relin's left arm at the elbow.
    Blinding pain exploded in Relin's mind; a scream broke through the wall of his gritted teeth. He felt himself fall, but as if from a distance. The world seemed to slow. His senses felt attenuated, all except for the throbbing, acute agony of his arm. His heart kept time with the pulse of the hyperdrive, and each beat sent a knife stab of pain up his bicep.
    Saes loomed over him, his lightsaber sizzling, the masked embodiment of Relin's failure.
    "No right, no wrong," his former Padawan said, and raised his weapon. "Only power."
    Relin's chrono beeped a warning, and Relin smiled through his pain.
    The expression caused Saes a moment's hesitation and in that moment the charges in the hyperdrive chamber exploded. A column of flame and a concussive wave burst from