Jedi under Siege

21

“Down there,” Jaina said, pointing at the jungle clearing that Luke had chosen as a rendezvous point.

From the pilot’s seat of his personal shuttle, Lando Calrissian grinned, flashing his beautiful white teeth. “Sure thing, little lady,” he said. “I’ll take ’er down. Looks like they’re waiting for us. The fighting must be done.”

As Lando brought the ship in for a landing, Jaina used Jedi techniques to relax, but it did her no good. Her muscles remained as tense as if she were still in the tiny TIE fighter flying for her life. For some reason, she just couldn’t loosen up. For the first time, today, she had fought as a Jedi, with other Jedi, against the dark side.

It was what all her training had been about.

When Lando’s shuttle touched down, Jaina wasted no time on formalities. She scrambled out of the ship as quickly as she could, ran to her uncle, and threw herself into his arms. “You made it. You’re alive!” she said, feeling a surge of relief and jubilation.

“Luke, old buddy!” Lando said. “I came to offer you some help, but it looks like you’ve got things pretty well under control.”

“We could still use your help, Lando,” Luke replied. He hugged Jaina back and said soberly, “I’m afraid many of our number were not so lucky.”

Realizing that she had no idea how the ground battle had gone, Jaina bit her lip and looked around wildly, hoping to spot Jacen, Lowie, and Tenel Ka.

What she saw shocked her. As far as she could tell, no student from the Jedi academy had escaped unscathed. Several trainees limped. Tionne’s right arm hung in a sling and the hair on the right side of her head was singed. Others sported scratches and bruises, as well as more serious injuries.

Jaina stared in surprise when she saw Raynar, his face muddy and his bright clothing torn and covered with filth, moving among the wounded and offering assistance wherever he could. He seemed subdued.

When she noticed the patient Raynar was currently tending, she blanched and dashed over to where Tenel Ka lay, looking feverish and bleeding heavily from a nasty gash just above one gray eye. Another shallower wound ran along her thigh and ended at the knee.

Raynar was already tearing strips of cloth from his relatively clean inner robes. Jaina made a pad of the cloth and pressed it to Tenel Ka’s head wound to stanch the flow of blood, while Raynar bandaged the leg cut.

Jaina looked around, still searching for Jacen. Only a few meters away, though she hadn’t noticed him before, Lowie lay flat in the grass, moaning quietly and clutching his side.

Around the edges of the clearing, Tionne, Luke, and Lando helped the injured stragglers. There was still no sign of Jacen, though.

“Lowie, are you all right?” Jaina asked.

The Wookiee rumbled something noncommittal and waved a hand, as if to tell her to finish caring for Tenel Ka first.

“Oh, Mistress Jaina! Thank goodness you’re here,” Em Teedee cried. The little droid’s voice sounded strange, and Jaina noticed that the speaker grille was bent. “You have simply no idea what the three of us have been through today. Master Lowbacca and Mistress Tenel Ka were forced to dive from the battle platform in order to avoid being blown up. Which was a good thing, since the battle platform crashed only moments later.

“When we fell to the trees, Master Lowbacca was able to catch himself, but Mistress Tenel Ka struck her head on a branch. She nearly fell all the way to the forest floor, but Master Lowbacca dove after her, caught her arm, and broke their fall by landing stomach-first on a wide limb. Oh, it was bravely done, I assure you, Mistress Jaina. I’m no medical droid, of course, but I’m afraid you’ll find that Master Lowbacca has a dislocated shoulder and at least three broken ribs.”

Raynar pressed a fresh compress over Tenel Ka’s head wound and began winding a bandage around it to hold it in place. “You go ahead,” he said, nodding toward Lowie. “I’ll finish here.”

When two more wounded Jedi students staggered into the clearing, Jaina looked up hopefully, but neither was Jacen. “Have you seen my brother?” she asked Raynar as she went to Lowie’s side and knelt to examine his injuries. “He went in the Lightning Rod with old Peckhum to call for reinforcements. He should be back by now.”

Raynar frowned and shook his head. “Well … well … I saw the supply shuttle—the Lightning Rod. I … think one of the TIE fighters hit it.”

Jaina gasped. “Did they crash?”

Raynar looked away. “I don’t know. The ship seemed to be going down, but …” He shrugged uncomfortably. “Anyway, it was hours ago.”

Jaina bit her lower lip and closed her eyes, reaching out with the Force, searching for Jacen. “He’s not dead,” she said at last. “But that’s all I can tell. Can’t feel old Peckhum—don’t have a link with him like I do with Jacen—but my brother’s definitely out there somewhere.”

A genuine smile broke out on Raynar’s face. “Well, good,” he said. “That’s good.”

“That’s the last of them, I think,” Lando said, striding up and kneeling beside Jaina. “How are you doing, Lowbacca, old buddy? You look like you’ve seen some hard action.”

Lowie gave an urff of agreement.

“I think we got everybody who’s in the neighborhood now,” Lando said.

“We did find one more,” Luke said, coming up to join them. He pointed toward the edge of the clearing, where Tionne was tending a treelike Jedi with a broken limb.

Jaina looked up at her uncle. “What about Jacen?”

“He’s alive … ,” Luke said slowly. “We don’t know any more than that.”

“Yes,” said Jaina, “but where is he? Shouldn’t we go look for him?”

“We need to get the injured back inside the Great Temple first,” Luke said. “If old Peckhum and Jacen managed to get the Lightning Rod going, the first place they’d head is the landing field. They wouldn’t be able to land in a small clearing like this.”

Jaina’s spirits brightened. It was true. She looked at Lowie. “Can you walk?” she asked.

Lowie groaned an affirmative reply.

“Master Lowbacca believes himself to be quite capable of perambulation with only minimal assistance,” Em Teedee supplied.

“Okay then,” Jaina said, “let’s get back to the Jedi academy.” She was anxious to see her brother again, eager to know that he was all right.

It was close to an hour later when the band of hobbling, limping Jedi trainees finally emerged from the jungle near the Great Temple’s landing field. To Jaina’s dismay, the flat patch of cleared ground stood empty.

“Don’t worry, little lady,” Lando said. “I’ll help you look for them.”

Jaina heaved a sigh and nodded. Even though she knew that Jacen was alive, she had a feeling of foreboding, of impending danger. “All right,” Jaina said. “Let’s get the wounded inside first. They’ll be safe and protected in the temple. We’ll have to take them in through the courtyard door, though. The hangar bay’s blocked shut.”

Crossing the landing field to the flagstone courtyard seemed to take longer than Jaina remembered it, but finally the entrance was only ten meters away. Seeing her goal so close, Jaina smiled and sped up.

Suddenly, a ragged figure lurched out of the shadowy doorway. His face was bloodied and bruised and covered with a thick layer of mud, but Jaina would have recognized him anywhere.

Zekk raised his chin proudly and stood barring the doorway.

“No one goes inside the temple,” he said.