Return to Ord Mantell

14

As the Millennium Falcon took off with a roar, Zekk heard the villagers crowded in the back of the Falcon moan with fear. His attention, though, was focused on the sparks and flashes of light that signified lightsabers as the young Jedi Knights fought down below.

“Zekk, get into the gun well and start blasting those creatures!” Han Solo shouted.

“I hope your laser cannons are fully charged,” Zekk said, climbing down into the gun well. He dropped into the chair, strapped in, and powered up the Falcon’s weaponry.

Han soared low to the ground, swooping back toward the ramshackle village. The reptilian predators prowled along, moving with the speed of hunger, cunning evident in their intelligent yellow eyes.

“There are so many of them!” Zekk muttered, seeing the sinuous shapes dart forward like purplish-blue shadows. One of the creatures grabbed a young man and swallowed him in a single gulp before Zekk could aim the laser cannons. He wondered if that victim had been one of the brash young men who had tried to act so brave when the knaars were first coming.

Zekk targeted and fired, blowing the reptilian creature to sizzling bits. He rotated in the gun well again, seeking another target. It was difficult to zero in on the dark shadowy monsters—and he didn’t dare risk hitting one of the people.

Below, a knaar advanced along the pale wall of a building. One villager had tried to take shelter around the corner, in the doorway.

The knaar approached, sniffing, its claws extended. Zekk targeted and fired.

The frightened villager scrambled to one side as the smoking body of the enormous reptile slumped to the ground in front of him, its fanged mouth open wide.

A shot now fired from the other gun well, striking one of the saurians in its lower leg. The moment it collapsed, honking and howling in pain, other knaars fell upon their wounded companion.

“Hope you don’t mind, Zekk,” Anakin said through the comm system. “I’ve had a bit of target training myself, but the twins get to practice more often.”

The knaars continued to sweep forward. Two new ones seemed to appear for every one Zekk blasted.

Han Solo circled around and came back for another run. His concerned voice came over the comm system. “What’s she doing?”

“Jaina’s leading them toward the minefield!” Anakin’s voice replied.

Zekk looked down and saw by the glow of the lightsaber blades that the young Jedi Knights had turned and headed with the remaining villagers into the barren fields that were full of burrowing detonators.

He thought of Jaina down there fighting against monsters and running into even more dangerous territory. His heart sank, but he gritted his teeth and grabbed the firing controls. If he couldn’t pull off a spectacular rescue, at least he’d do his part to keep her safe—or as safe as she could possibly be under the circumstances.

Jaina planted her feet firmly on the rough ground and held her lightsaber high. The slavering knaar in front of her did not seem at all intimidated by her violet Jedi blade. The reptilian creature gave a high-pitched bellow, then reached forward with its claws, snapping with powerful jaws that looked strong enough to rip a repulsorpod from a starship engine.

Jaina swung forward and down with her crackling lightsaber, cleaving the monster from its shoulder down to the center of its rib cage.

The creature thrashed and fell down as smoking blood bubbled from its dying heart.

Anja continued to let out loud whoops and shouts of challenge. She ran faster than the knaars, darting from one to another, wounding them with her lightsaber and diving out of the way as their claws slashed at her.

She let the other carnivores do the rest of the work for her. She needed only to wound a beast, then the other knaars would tear it to pieces for the meat.

Anja’s hair flew in the wind, barely held in place by the leather band.

Sweat dripped down her temples onto her flushed face, but she was so full of adrenaline she seemed incapable of slowing down.

Lowbacca let out a loud Wookiee roar as he and Jacen motioned the villagers to follow them into the treacherous cropland. The villagers dropped their farming implements and ran. Panicked, some of them dashed right past the young Jedi.

“Wait! We have to find a safe path for you!” Jacen yelled. But one middle-aged woman clutching a satchel of valuables over her shoulder tore ahead in blind terror as she fled from the knaars. “No! Wait!”

She ran through the uncleared cropland. Jacen felt an intuitive stab and a chill at the back of his neck—a premonition—just before she stepped down on one of the hidden burrowing detonators. The explosion ripped the night with a flash of brilliance and a boom of echoing thunder. The woman fell instantly, but the monsters charged toward the fields and Jacen could not take a moment to determine whether or not she had survived. The villagers screamed in despair, caught between their fear of the minefield ahead and the rampaging predators behind.

Lowie roared something at Jacen about the Force and gestured to the ground. Em Teedee quickly translated. “Master Lowbacca suggests that by using your Jedi senses, you could perhaps determine the locations of the burrowing detonators and thus avoid them. That would give us the best chance of survival.”

Jacen realized that his Wookiee friend was right. If he could calm himself enough to use the Force, he might be able to map out a safe path that the villagers could follow—a path that the knaars would not understand.

“And I do suggest you be careful,” the little droid added. “I have no desire to become a useless lump of floating metal with no one to translate for.”

As his eyes adjusted to a darkness lit only by the green glow of his lightsaber and Em Teedee’s optical sensors, Jacen trotted ahead as fast as he dared, keeping his eyes to the ground. Stretching out his free hand before him, he sensed ripples in the dirt, tiny echoes of movement—and then he spotted a slight trembling where the mechanical explosives had tunneled beneath the surface. Across the fields he could see a checkerboard pattern of places to avoid, and places where it was safe to walk.

“Follow us!” he shouted, holding his emerald lightsaber like a beacon overhead. “We can see a path!”

The ginger-furred Wookiee bellowed a confirmation, raised his own molten-bronze blade, and sprinted ahead on his long legs. A magenta glow from Tenel Ka’s rancor-tooth lightsaber indicated another safe path.

Jaina and Anja remained behind to guard the group’s retreat and to slow down the charging beasts. Overhead, the Millennium Falcon’s engines rumbled in the air. Laser beams lanced out from both gun turrets, striking knaars. Still more of the migratory pack surged like a carnivorous flood out of the rocky hills.

The villagers ran onward, grasping at any shred of hope as they followed Jacen and Lowie through the minefield. Fortunately, the knaars did not understand the explosives. They surged forward on their scaly, muscular legs, ready to snatch anyone who fell behind.

Two of the largest knaars, their silvery razor frills raised and yellow eyes glowing like lamps in the darkness, circled around to the left to charge ahead of the fleeing group and cut off their retreat. Tenel Ka turned to face them, glaring with her granite-gray eyes as if daring them to approach.

The two reptiles kept moving, staying close together. When the larger knaar stomped on one of the burrowing detonators, the explosion knocked both creatures aside, tearing open their rib cages. They lay wounded on the ground, honking and roaring in pain. Tenel Ka would have dispatched them herself, but their noises only served to attract other hungry knaars. Before long, under the double moonlight of Anobis, the two predators fell silent as their roars were replaced by the wet sounds of tearing meat and gnashing fangs.

The Falcon soared above the knaars, blasting more of the creatures.

One of the villagers tripped. Before he could scramble to his feet again, two monsters fell upon him. When another young man turned back with a shout and tried to defend his friend, the knaars attacked him as well.

At the last instant, when it seemed the young man was surely doomed, Anja appeared beside him. Her lightsaber swept out in a blazing swath of acid-yellow to lop off both forearms of the predator. The sizzling stumps of its clawed hands fell to the ground, and the monster roared, flailing about, unable to grasp anything. In blind rage it chomped at the nearest creature—another knaar. The two reptiles tore at each other, wrestling one another to the ground. In moments, other predators came in to finish off both of them.

The cropland stretched ahead, seemingly forever. Jacen continued to run, finding it easier to pick his way around the burrowing detonators now. He saw some active ones shifting their positions underneath the soil.

Beyond, the thick forest looked like a goal line. If only they could get to the shelter of the trees, perhaps they could fight better than out in the open. But Jacen couldn’t be sure. For now they were just running.

He couldn’t imagine how the group could possibly turn aside all the knaars, even with five active lightsaber blades and assistance from the Millennium Falcon.

Two more explosions ripped the night, and Jacen was relieved to see that it was only more reptilian predators stumbling upon the explosives. He looked to one side and saw a bobbing metallic sphere.

Em Teedee had detached himself from Lowie’s belt and drifted ahead on his microrepulsorjets, flitting from side to side in front of the beasts like a remote practice drone.

One of the largest knaars lumbered forward, attracted by Lowie’s molten-bronze lightsaber blade. The Wookiee stopped his headlong run and whirled to face the monster. The knaar charged forward, exposing its razor teeth.

Em Teedee flitted in front of the monster’s jaws, distracting the creature so that it snapped at the silvery sphere and diverted its fiery gaze from Lowbacca. Lowie used the moment of distraction to strike sideways, severing the knaar’s body at the waist; its head still twisted and snapped even though it had no body to move.

The surviving villagers kept running. Ahead of them, the forests loomed taller. Dozens and dozens of the saurian giants had been killed, but though the pack seemed to be thinning a bit, Jacen did not feel at all relieved. The Falcon circled by again, blasting away.

More of the monsters died. The people continued to stumble along on the haphazard path the young Jedi Knights picked for them through the booby-trapped field. Many villagers were in shock, just following, placing one foot in front of another, unable to fully face their peril.

Jacen sensed their fear and could only hope the situation would change once they entered the thick trees. “Hurry up. Get to the forest!” he shouted. With despairing sighs, the people nearest him tried to increase their pace, but they were too exhausted. Weak from malnutrition and years of living in fear for their lives, several of them stumbled and fell, only to be helped to their feet by their equally exhausted companions. Jacen could tell that everyone’s energy reserves were running out.

If they had to continue this battle, they would not make it much farther.