The Cestus Deception Read online

  lifelike keening sounds.

  The droid's struggles ceased. It quivered, vibrating in place until it

  threatened to shake itself apart. Smoke oozed from its slivered casing.

  Then, like some piece of overripe metallic fruit, it simply divided

  into sections. Each crashed to the sand in individual chunks, spitting

  sparks and leaking greenish fluid. The pieces rattled into the dust,

  trembled. A second later, stillness and silence reigned.

  For a moment the crowd was stunned into silence. Obi-Wan could

  well empathize. The tactic had been unconventional, the weapon

  deadly, the result indisputable.

  "Droid against droid," the globe-headed Bith beside him scoffed.

  "Games for children. Surely this is not worthy of a Chancellor summons."

  Beneath them, Lido Shan was unruffled. "Your indulgence, please,"

  she said. "We wished merely to establish a baseline, a reference point

  against an opponent both familiar and formidable. This class four

  combat droid was stopped in less than . . . forty-two seconds."

  Behind Obi-Wan an amphibious Aqualish's translation pod gargled

  a question. "But what of living opponents?"

  The technician nodded, as if she had anticipated such a query.

  "Our very next demonstration involves an Advanced Recon Commando."

  On cue, a single clone trooper, a commando in full battle armor,

  armed with an infantry-grade blaster rifle, stepped forward from

  his hiding place beneath the lip of the arena wall. Clone Commandos

  were specialized troopers. They had been modified from

  the basic trooper template to allow for specific training protocols.

  A blast helmet concealed his features, but his posture bespoke aggressive

  readiness. An uneasy mutter wound its way through the

  crowd.

  The amphibian seemed taken aback. "I . . . would not wish to be

  responsible for a death . . ."

  The technician fixed the Aqualish with a pitying gaze, as if every

  response had been anticipated. "Don't worry." Her motions were

  measured and relaxed as she manipulated a few controls. "The machine

  is calibrated for nonlethal apprehension."

  Although that pronouncement quieted most of the witnesses, Obi-

  Wan felt even more uneasy. This droid, with its ethereal beauty and

  unconventional lethality, had something to do with his mission. But

  what? "What exactly is the trooper's objective?" Obi-Wan called

  down.

  The corners of Lido Shan's lips pulled upward. "To fight his way

  past the JK and capture me."

  The muttering witnesses regarded her with disbelief and something

  more disturbing: anticipation. They knew they were about to

  witness something memorable. But which did they desire most? The

  JK defeated, or this snooty technician given her comeuppance?

  The trooper edged forward warily until he was about two dozen

  meters from the creature . . .

  Obi-Wan shook his head. Creature? Had he really done that?

  Thought creature instead of droid? What had triggered that?

  The trooper raised his blaster to his shoulder and fired a crimson

  bolt of light. The spinning absorption disks reappeared, sucking the

  energy bolts with a liquid crackling sound.

  But the mere fact that the droid needed a force screen seemed to

  encourage the trooper. He feinted to the right and then rolled to the

  left, sprang nimbly off his shoulder to fire again, repeatedly changing

  position as the droid continued its defensive action.

  Obi-Wan opened his senses, stretching out with the Force. He

  could almost feel the man's racing heart, taste his nervousness, sense

  the choices weighed as he wove his evasive web. Left, right, left. . .

  the next move would be to the—

  Left again.

  As the great Jedi watched, the JK spat out a webbing of strands as

  thick as his small finger, ensnaring the clone helplessly in midleap.

  He might have been no more than a wounded thrantcill, bagged by

  any musk merchant with a net. The timing was superb. No. More

  than superb: it had been perfect. What kind of programming made

  such precision possible? Obi-Wan could swear that the aim had been

  almost precognitive, almost...

  But that was impossible.

  Struggling in the net as the JK dragged him closer, the trooper

  pulled his blaster around to draw a bead on the technician. Obi-

  Wan's eyes flickered to the technician: she seemed unconcerned. In

  the moment before the barrel would have fixed on her, an orange

  spark flowed out along the tentacles. The trooper rocked with a single

  hard, violent shiver, thrashed his heels against the sand, and then

  lay still. The JK pulled him close, one tentacle lifting his trunk high

  enough for a second, more slender probe to flash a beam of light

  against the trooper's closed eyes. The JK lowered the trooper back to

  the sand, then stood still and watchful.

  For a moment the crowd's every intake of breath seemed frozen in

  their collective throats. Then the JK's web unraveled, flowing back

  into the droid. The trooper groaned and rolled over onto his side.

  Another moment and he levered himself to his knees, wobbly but

  unharmed. Another trooper helped him retreat beneath the arena

  wall's curved lip.

  The audience applauded, with the exception of Obi-Wan and

  another Jedi who edged his way through the crowd to stand beside

  him. Obi-Wan felt relief as the familiar form approached, and also as

  he saw that the newcomer was no more inclined toward applause

  than he.

  The newcomer was two centimeters taller than Obi-Wan, yellowish

  green in skin tone, with the ropy cranial sensor tentacles and unblinking

  eyes typical of a Nautolan. This was Kit Fisto, veteran of

  Geonosis and a hundred other lethal hot spots. He neither smiled

  nor applauded the JK's actions: no Jedi would ever look at another

  being's injury, no matter how superficial or temporary, as entertainment

  of any kind. Was it mere coincidence that the Nautolan was

  here, or had he, too, been summoned?

  Kit looked down at Obi-Wan's hands, noted their tension. "Such

  displays are not to your liking?" he asked. His voice had a moist sibilance

  even when speaking of mundane issues. The surfaces of Fisto's

  unblinking black eyes swirled. This was repressed anger, but few

  non-Nautolans would have known that.

  "I see little regard for the trooper's welfare," Obi-Wan said.

  Kit gave a humorless chuckle. "The reefs of policy and privilege

  make war seem merely some distant entertainment."

  The globe-headed being in front of them turned his head 180 degrees

  without moving his shoulders. "Come now, sir. It's just a clone,

  after all."

  Just a clone. Flesh and blood, yes, but bred in a bottle, merely another

  of 1.2 million clone troopers born with no father to protect

  them, and no mother to mourn.

  Yes. Merely a clone.

  Obi-Wan had no interest in arguing. To these, who had little fear

  of dying in combat, whose offspring would also be spared a soldier's

  terrible choices, clone troopers were a supreme convenience. This

  troglodyte ha
d merely spoken his honest opinion.

  "Excellent, excellent," said another witness, a leathery creature

  sporting a cyclopean cluster of eyes in the center of his head. "Excellent.

  I now understand how the JKs earned their reputation among

  the criminal class."

  The two exchanged a swift, odd glance, piquing Obi-Wan's curiosity.

  "Which i s . . . ?"

  The two turned back to the arena, pretending not to hear his question.

  Obi-Wan was not so easily fooled. Alarm trilled along his spine.

  These waters ran deep indeed.

  The leathery one spoke again. "You wish us to be concerned," he

  said to Lido Shan. "We are prepared to acknowledge the potency of

  such a device. B u t . . . ahem . . . we are fortunate enough to have Jedi

  among us today. Would it be impolite to request a demonstration?"

  Obi-Wan watched as dozens of eyes turned toward them, evaluating,

  triggering whispers. He watched fingers, tentacles, and claws

  touch furtively, and was certain that credits were changing hands.

  Gambling on the outcome?

  Kit Fisto leaned closer without ever looking directly at him. "What

  do you make of this?"

  Obi-Wan shrugged. "I've little urge to satisfy their curiosity."

  "Nor I," Kit said, and his tendrils swirled with a life of their own.

  He then turned and addressed the technician. "Tell me," he said.

  "Does JK-thirteen have meaning beyond a standard alphanumeric

  designation?"

  There it was, the question Obi-Wan himself had hesitated to ask.

  A thin current of whispers rippled in the arena. The technician

  shuffled her feet hesitantly. "Not officially . . . , " she began.

  "But unofficially?" Obi-Wan prodded.

  The tech cleared her throat uncomfortably. "Among smugglers and

  the lower classes," she said, "some call them 'Jedi Killers.' "

  "Charming," he said, more to himself than anyone else, momentarily

  too stunned to answer. Jedi Killer? What was this obscenity?

  Beside him, Kit doffed his cloak, face set in its implacable pale

  green mask. His cranial tendrils, Obi-Wan noticed, were restless

  even as his unblinking eyes focused on the droid.

  "What are you doing?" Obi-Wan asked, knowing the inevitable

  answer. In fact, almost certainly, this was why Kit had been invited:

  his volatility and courage were renowned.

  "I would feel this thing for myself," Kit said, voice deadly calm. He

  then raised his voice in challenge. "Technician! At your pleasure."

  The Nautolan's head sensors wavered in the still air. The droid regarded

  him without reaction. With a single glance back at Obi-Wan,

  Kit somersaulted to the floor of the arena with a poise and fluidity no

  chin-bret point guard could have dreamed of, landing without a

  sound.

  He stood a dozen meters away from the JK. As before, the droid

  seemed harmless. Master Fisto's lightsaber flashed in his hand, and

  its emerald length rose from the hilt, scorching the air as it blossomed.

  The droid emitted a hum that climbed in pitch and intensity until

  Obi-Wan's skin crawled. It remained motionless except for its surface,

  which once again segmented into an arachnid configuration. It

  seemed to sniff the air. Its insectile whine changed, as if it were wary

  of its new opponent.

  It extended tentacles again, but this time they wiggled in an oddly

  sluggish fashion. Strange indeed. Although previously appearing

  flexible and alert, was it now about to use the same tactics it had used

  against the commando? Perhaps the droid was not so advanced as he

  had initially feared . . .

  Kit's lightsaber swatted the first tendril from the air with contemptuous

  ease. Obi-Wan found his attention straying from the JK, focusing

  instead on Kit, admiring the strength of his stance, the clarity

  of his angles as he chose lines of engagement. Kit favored the Form I

  style of combat, a fierce—

  Wait.

  Warning sirens howled in Obi-Wan's mind. Something was terribly

  wrong. Intellect raced to keep pace with intuition. The JK's repetition

  of previous patterns had lulled him into complacency. The

  tendrils were only a feint. Where, then, was the real attack?

  He leaned forward, examining the droid more carefully. Its feet.

  The spiky protrusions were sunken in the sand. And projecting outward

  from the treads themselves, burrowing under the surface . . .

  Were more tendrils, color-camouflaged to resemble sand. This

  thing attacked on two levels simultaneously, a strategy beyond most

  living warriors. Even more disturbing, it was deliberately misleading

  Kit by performing at multiple levels of tempo and efficiency, literally

  juggling its tactics, luring him to overconfidence.

  The sand tendrils were within centimeters of their target before

  Kit sensed them. His lidless black eyes grew wider still as the sand

  erupted. A stalk snaked around his foot, trying to yank him onto his

  back. Other vines raced to assist the first group.

  The onlookers gasped in amazement as they realized that they

  were about to see the unthinkable: a mere droid defeating a mighty

  Jedi!

  But Kit was far from vanquished. As if he, too, had merely been

  playing a game, he crouched and leapt forward, spinning on his

  body's vertical axis like some kind of carnival acrobat, surging directly

  at the JK. He rode the JK's yanking motion instead of fighting it,

  slipping between the tendrils, the Nautolan's sense of timing faster

  and more precise than conscious thought.

  Whatever its powers, the droid had not anticipated such an assault,

  nor could it adjust in time. It released him and retreated up a

  step, all tendrils lashing at the Jedi. Kit's lightsaber rained sparks.

  Tentacles flopped onto the sand, some of the larger pieces twitching,

  more like separate creatures than severed limbs.

  The Nautolan hit the sand, rolled, and bore in again instantly, his

  face tightened into a fighting snarl.

  Now the JK battled at maniacal intensity, and Obi-Wan wondered:

  What is it trying to do? Again and again the tendrils lashed at

  Kit's head. Had Lido Shan failed to give the droid proper inhibiting

  commands? If so, and the gleaming monstrosity had a single opportunity,

  it would slay the Nautolan. Obi-Wan's hand crept toward his

  lightsaber, the weight of thirty-six grueling flight hours banished

  from his limbs. If the need arose—

  But Kit had entered lightsaber range. At this more intimate distance,

  the droid was at a disadvantage. Now Kit was the predator, the

  JK reduced to the role of prey. Hissing, it retreated on its slender

  golden legs, tentacles wavering, as if it couldn't crunch data fast

  enough to counter the unorthodox attack. Kit's emerald lightsaber

  blade was here, there, everywhere: unpredictable, irresistible. The spinning

  energy disks no longer absorbed the strikes: now they merely

  deflected them, sparks raining in all directions.

  Kit accelerated into a blur of motion complex and rapid enough to

  baffle even Obi-Wan's experienced gaze. The Nautolan Jedi's lightsaber

  wove between the energy shields, descen
ding on the JK's housing

  for the first time. The droid emitted a painfully thin shriek. Its

  gleaming legs shivered.

  It collapsed to the sand. It twitched, struggling to rise. And then

  spilled onto its side, spewing smoke and sparks.

  The arena was silent as the crowd absorbed what they had just

  witnessed. Doubtless, some had never seen a Jedi in full action. It

  was one thing to hear whispered stories about mysterious Temple

  dwellers; another thing entirely to see the almost supernatural skills

  for oneself. A century hence, some might be regaling their greatgrandchildren

  with tales of this demonstration.

  But there was another aspect of the affair that most eyes had

  missed, a strange phenomenon that had manifested first with the

  trooper, but seemed even more pronounced with Kit Fisto: the JK

  had anticipated the Nautolan's responses.

  A bitter metallic taste soured Obi-Wan's mouth, a sensation he

  recognized as the first whisper of fear. "What is this device?" he

  asked. "I note that the shields absorb, rather than deflecting."

  The technician nodded. "And what does that suggest to you,

  Master Jedi?"

  "It is no battlefield implement. It is designed to protect its environment,

  even from ricochets."

  "Excellent," she said.

  "And judging by its cosmetic appearance, the JK is some manner of

  personal security droid."

  Lido Shan held up her hands, requesting silence. "That concludes

  the demonstration," she said. "There will be briefings for some of

  you. As for the others, the Supreme Chancellor appreciates your

  presence."

  The crowd drifted away, a few of them pausing to congratulate Kit.

  Perhaps they had considered descending to shake his hand or slap his

  back, but neither gesture seemed appropriate given the tightness

  around Kit's dark, unblinking eyes.

  Obi-Wan jumped down from the stands and handed the Nautolan

  his cloak. Without a word Kit accepted it, and together they walked

  up the stairs toward the exit. Obi-Wan looked back at the sand,

  where service droids were still vacuuming up oil and fluids. What

  would he, Obi-Wan, have done given the same challenge? He allowed

  himself no doubt that he would have emerged victorious, but

  simultaneously realized that Kit's chaotic, unpredictable approach

  had given the Nautolan an advantage against the machine. ObiWan's