Star Wars - Hammer - Edward M. Erdelac Read online

  The hilt of the lightsaber hummed in Telloti Cillmam’’n’’s hand as the blade hissed to life and cast the wall of inscrutable carvings in a green glow.

  It wasn’’t Telloti’’s lightsaber. He would never build one of his own. And yet here was Master Ryelli, content to use his own lightsaber as a light source.

  “Hold it steady,” Master Ryelli directed, muffled by his breath-mask, wrinkling his balding brow as he stooped and ran a three-fingered hand across the ancient stone. Master Ryelli had lost those fingers in the Petranaki Arena on Geonosis three years ago, just as he had lost his Padawan, Lumas Etima. Telloti had known Lumas. They had been initiates together in Boma Clan as younglings at the Jedi Temple.

  Although Telloti had dueled and bested Lumas and most of the other Initiates during the Apprentice Trials — before finally succumbing to Wollwi Enan, a girl from Berchest — Master Ryelli had selected Lumas as his Padawan learner. No Master had claimed Telloti. He had been transferred by the Council of Reassignment to the Explorer Corps. For seven years he had been a Pathfinder pilot in the Corps. What else could he do? He had never known any other home but the Jedi, had been taken too young to remember his parents or his home on Taanab. He had nowhere else to go. From infancy, he had been told he was special, that the Force had chosen him. But the Force had apparently changed its mind.

  The war was in its fourth year. A war against a real Sith Lord, the kind Masters Piell and Nu had told him stories of as a boy. Telloti ached to join the fight. He thought maybe if he could prove himself a warrior, the Council would reconsider its decision not to train him. It wasn’’’t unheard of. Master Kenobi had languished in the AgriCorps on Bandomeer before Qui-Gon Jinn had finally seen in him what others had missed and taken him on as his apprentice. Look at Kenobi now.

  But there was little chance of that under Ekim Ryelli. After being wounded at Geonosis, after Lumas’’’ death, Ryelli had requested this duty. He was an archaeologist, and wanted to be as far from the war as possible, digging in the dirt and scrutinizing pottery shards.

  The war was close. Closer to Telloti than it had ever been. Ord Radama, where they had departed for their latest expedition, had belonged to the Separatists only last year. But he knew it was winding down. Soon his chance to prove himself would be lost. He had always thrilled to Master Piell’’’s stories of the Jedi Knights and their clashes with the Sith. It seemed unfair to him that he should be sidestepped by history, even as it was unfolding only parsecs away.

  ““I don’’t recognize these letters,”” Ryelli admitted.

  ““Really?””

  That was a surprise to Telloti. If it was old and forgotten, surely Ryelli was familiar with it.

  ““Can’’t you read them?””

  “““Given time,”” Ryelli said. He captured images of the wall with his datapad, then reached for his lightsaber. Reluctantly, Telloti handed it over. It receded into the hilt, bathing them in darkness.

  “““Check your light now,”” Ryelli suggested.

  Telloti pursed his lips. He had forgotten to charge the portable torches before they’d left the ship, and had recharged his own battery with his datapad rather than turn back. He flicked the torch on, and a cone of light spilled across the floor.

  ““Good,”” said Ryelli, keying his comm. ““Staguu, do you read?””

  Their Givin astrogator’’s voice crackled over the comlink. He had remained aboard their ship on a flat area outside the structure.

  ““Everything all right, Master?”””

  Staguu Itincoovar had failed his Apprentice Trial as well, but Ryelli had requested him for the Explorer Corps. His race had a gift for astrogational computation which his latent Force ability enhanced. It was an exceptional talent, but the only one the bony, awkward humanoid possessed.

  Ryelli called Staguu his best kept secret. He had plotted the course here to the remote world of Nicht Ka almost without the aid of the navicomputer. Ryelli joked that the Navy would snatch him away for service on some cruiser if they weren’’t careful. That kind of talk rankled Telloti. What if Ryelli was thinking of training him? Telloti’’s heart shriveled to think he might be passed over again. He had a destiny. He knew he did. They had told him so, ingrained it in him. Why had the Jedi, why had the Force itself, abandoned him?

  ““Yes. I’’m going to upload some images to the ship’’s computer. Can you run them through the philology database and transmit me any results?””

  ““Certainly.””

  Ryelli hunkered down on a broken column and Telloti watched his face in the glow of his datapad. His eyes went to the scarred, three-fingered hand holding it. A droideka had done that on Geonosis, blown the lightsaber from his grasp. Ryelli could have had the fingers replaced with cybernetics, but he refused. Once Ryelli had told him it was a reminder, but of what, Telloti hadn’’t asked. Lumas, maybe? Weren’’t the Jedi supposed to forgo past attachments? How had a man like Ryelli ever become a Jedi Master? And why hadn’’t Ryelli chosen him as an apprentice that day? He had never asked. After a moment, Ryelli looked up.

  ““This may take some time, if you want to look around.””

  Telloti nodded and turned away from the older man. He wandered the corridors of the ancient structure, his torch-light sliding along the stone. Nicht Ka was a world lost to memory along the old Nache Belfia loop that had marked the frontier of the ancient Sith Empire. Ryelli, excited by the prospect of re-surveying it, had jumped at the chance now that it was once again within Republic space, ostensibly inside the 11th Army’’s expanding lines. It was no Korriban scattered with forbidding tombs and ancient statues, however. It was a cold, barren rock, lashed by ammonia rains and uninhabitable. Yet Telloti’’s sensors had detected this hexagonal stone structure set into the broken foothills of the southern mountain range upon entering the atmosphere.

  Why anyone would bother to engineer a shelter on this desolate rock was anybody’’s guess. No one had been here in ages.

  Telloti followed the dark corridors aimlessly, hearing the voice of Ryelli and the squelches of Staguu echo behind him. The light of his torch caught a reflective glint from a dark chamber. Telloti tensed and touched his sporting blaster, but remembered the sensors had detected no lifeforms.

  He passed into the room cautiously. The air was cooler here. There was a dais and alcove set into the back wall. A stone block chair stood atop the dais, and seated on that was a colossal figure forged in reflective black metal. Strange, that metal. He had made tracks across millennia worth of dust on the chamber floor, but the surface of that giant figure shone undimmed, as though nothing would settle on it.

  Telloti shined the light across the dais. The broad shoulders of the figure were adorned with wicked spikes, its head an upswept, sinister great helm. A skirt of plated steel encircled its upper legs. It had apparently been vandalized at some point. There was a crooked molten scar across the neck, and the right arm was missing entirely from the elbow down, the stump hollow. It was no statue, he realized, but an archaic suit of battle armor.

  He came closer, fogging his breath-mask in excitement. Ryelli would be ecstatic at this discovery. Telloti started to call him, when his eyes fell upon a long object lying on the dais between the metal-shod feet of the figure.

  It was an archaic, two-handed lightsaber. Telloti hesitated. He could take the weapon, slip it into his pack before Ryelli came. It probably didn’’t work, but he could tinker with it, get it working again, maybe. Ryelli would never know.

  He knelt down and reached out to take it.

  As soon as his fingertips touched it, a wave of cold air blew over him, through his clothes, his skin, through his very soul. He shivered.
/>
  The right-hand gauntlet fell from the bent knee of the seated figure and clamped down over his hand, the whole suit lurching forward, suddenly animate.

  No, just shifted, that’’s all.

  He pulled away, skin rippling, but the metal fingers groaned and closed tightly around his wrist.

  He put his foot on the dais and pulled. The suit fell forward with a clatter, the great helmet tumbled from the shoulders, and a fine white cloud of bone dust roiled from the neck. Telloti clenched his eyes against the stinging chalk even as it filled his nostrils, choking him. Behind his eyelids, he saw things. A shimmering shadow towering, legions of red skinned warriors spread out to the horizon of an alien world, chanting. ““Adas! Adas!”” He saw enormous alien warships cast their shadows across the multitude, which raised their pikes in defiance. He saw a gleaming axe cutting down gray amphibian warriors seven at a time, wielded by his own red hand. He saw fire rain down, decimating cities, smashing towers flat. He saw strange stars and the darkness in-between, and a thick book of strange writing, like what they had found on the wall. The axe became a hammer, ringing blows on sheets of glowing metal in a dim workshop, bending it into the form of the ebon armor. He heard a voice.

  ““Do not worry, my disciple. You will have your place in the history of the galaxy. You will go where I cannot and help restore the glory of the Sith, Warb Null.””

  He felt pain, searing, his flesh pressed against superheated iron. Was it real? No, more images. Roaring beast riders. Jedi. The clash of battle, just as Master Piell had described it. Exultation. Blood. Then, a single Jedi [Ulic Qel-Droma! his brain screamed) fighting ferociously towards him, cutting away his hand, passing his green blade through his neck.

  He shrieked.

  Died.

  When Telloti opened his eyes again, the helmet was in his hands, poised over his head, its dark iron hood casting a shadow over his blinking eyes. Inside, secret glyphs glowed with orange light, waiting to brand his cheeks, imbue him with their power.

  He had shed his clothes. He was wearing the armor. Only the brown skin of his right hand and face were uncovered.

  ““Stop!””

  He whirled.

  Master Ryelli stood in the door in his brown robes. His lightsaber hummed in his malformed hand. ““Take that off, Telloti,”” Ryelli urged, a tremor of something in his voice. Fear? It excited him to think a Jedi Master was afraid of him.

  ““It’’s of the Sith. This place… it’s a tomb of some kind. That armor… it’s infested with the dark side of the Force.””

  The dark side? With this kind of power, he could be a hammer to crush the dark side. What did Ryelli know? He had no insight at all. Why shouldn’’t he take this armor for himself? It had power in it. Real power. He could feel the Force like never before. With it, he could be a warrior. He could join the war, cut his way through legions of battle droids and take the Count of Serenno’s head, be the hero the Republic needed.

  ““Why did you choose Lumas over me that day, Master Ryelli? What did you see in him that you didn’’t see in me?””

  ““We can talk about that later,”” Ryelli said, advancing into the room.

  ““Maybe you were afraid I’’d be a greater Jedi than you. Is that what you thought?””

  “““You’’re not thinking clearly.””

  “““You’’re afraid now, aren’’t you? Were you afraid on Geonosis? Is that why Lumas died?””

  Ryelli shook his head, grimacing. He would not let Telloti leave with the armor. That was plain. He would send it off to EduCorps to sit in some corner of the Archives.

  ““You have your lightsaber out. Master. Do you want to fight? I have a lightsaber here…””

  ““Telloti, it’’s the armor…””

  ““No. You’’re wrong. You’’ve always been wrong. If I’’d been at your side on Geonosis, there’’d be no war now. I would’’ve killed Dooku. I would’’ve crushed the Confederacy in its cradle. As a matter of fact, you’’ve only been right about one thing, Master,””” he grinned as he slid the helmet over his face and felt the runes inside burn his flesh. He did not cry out. It was no more than a fervent kiss. He ignited the long green blade of the ancient lightsaber. ““This is a tomb.”””

  Ryelli charged.

  The armor was like a web of conduits. It drew the Force into him. Telloti felt it surging through his blood vessels, contracting muscles, swinging his arms up to defend the downward stroke of Ryelli’’s lightsaber almost before Telloti could even think it. He was fast. So fast. And strong.

  He drove Ryelli back with shuddering blows. The emerald sabers flashed and buzzed as they clashed and were batted aside, inadvertently hewing chunks of glowing stone from the walls. Telloti grinned ecstatically behind his grim metal face. His heart thundered.

  Ryelli seemed so small now. Was he himself larger? He felt immense. Ryelli’’s blade skimmed his shoulder, sending sparks cascading into the air. He laughed. He hadn’’t even felt it. He forced Ryelli out into the corridor, and there locked blades with the Jedi Master. Master. What right did he have to that title? This squinting bookworm? This ditch digger? He looked for greatness in small, broken things, and failed to recognize it when it towered over him. The blades squealed and sizzled. Something strange happened. Ryelli forced him back. The Jedi Master with the mangled hand was winning. His expression grew serene. Why was he so calm? It was infuriating, like the face of that girl Enan during the Trials all those years ago, when she’’d made a fool of him. Ryelli’’s blade angled ever closer, forcing the great two-handed lightsaber of Warb Null down. Telloti’’s left knee buckled and clanged against the stone floor.

  The archaeologist was stronger. How could that be?

  Stronger… perhaps, but not smarter.

  Telloti knew the weapon in his hands. Somehow, he knew it. He had fashioned it. millennia ago. Or rather, the man in his vision, Shas Dovos, the man who became Warb Null, had, inspired by the dark teachings of Freedon Nadd and dread King Adas before him. He knew these things. He had their memories, their wisdom, the cunning of the Sith.

  His bare thumb felt along the length of the two-handed hilt to a small toggle, and as Ryelli forced his superior position, bearing down with all his strength, Telloti triggered it and sidestepped.

  The extra-long green blade of the ancient lightsaber retracted into the hilt. In the same instant, the butt sprang open like the maw of a sarlacc, revealing a hidden, secondary emitter. A blade of red energy erupted from it, the ingenious mechanism within realigning and refocusing the power in a nanosecond.

  Without the resistance of the green blade, Ryelli stumbled forward, dangerously off balance. Telloti shifted his grip and flipped the new red blade over, slicing neatly through the nape of Ryelli’s neck. The Jedi Master tumbled to the floor. Telloti straightened, listening to the sound of his own breathing, feeling his heart pounding deep behind the black shell of his breastplate.

  Ryelli’’s comlink began to beep.

  He stooped and picked it up with his bare hand. He would need to fashion a new gauntlet to replace the one Qel-Droma had destroyed.

  He triggered the comm.

  ““Master,”” said Staguu. ““I’’m getting an urgent message from Coruscant. It’’s from the Jedi Temple beacon and it’’s repeating. It says the war is over!””

  The comlink slipped from Telloti’’s fingers, clattering beside his steel boot.

  “““Did you hear that, you two? It’’s over! We’’ve won!””

  The glee in the Givin’’’s voice. He laughed. He was actually happy.

  Telloti raised his foot and crushed the comlink beneath his heavy heel.

  He roared unintelligibly behind the metal helm, ignited the red-bladed lightsaber once more, and chopped at the stone walls and floor in his fury, carving deep gouges, like the marks of some caged beast.

  This couldn’’’t be — not when he finally had the power to seize his destiny.

  It had to be a lie.

  He stalked d
own the hallway toward the exit.

  Telloti wrenched the body of Staguu from the chair at the communications console, and replayed the message himself.

  ““Calling all Jedi. This is Supreme Chancellor Palpatine. The war is over. I repeat, the war is over. All Jedi are ordered to return to the Jedi Temple immediately. You will receive further instructions when you arrive.”” He drove his mailed fist into the speaker, silencing the wizened voice in an explosion of sparks.

  He stood then, alone in the cramped cabin of the Pathfinder, over the broken body of the astrogator, listening to the rain pattering the hull, watching the acrid-smelling ammonia streak from his shining metal hide as though repelled by its power, thinking furiously, feeling his heart slide into the deepest pit of his stomach. The old man’’’s words played and replayed in his fevered brain.

  Calling all Jedi. The war is over. All Jedi are ordered to return… The answer was there.

  That message was not for him. He was no Jedi. He went to the controls and fired up the converters, chuckling to himself.

  Maybe this war really was over. But it was a big galaxy. There was always war somewhere. There were voices in his ears, whispering of glories and triumphs past and yet to come. Dark, hissing voices that promised him secrets, and bade him use those secrets to great and terrible ends.

  But not in the name of Telloti Cillmam’’’n. That was not even a Jedi’s name, and he was now something more.

  He was Malleus. The Hammer of the Dark Side.

  From Star Wars Insider 147 (02-03-2014)

  11-6-17-15-14-5/1

 

 

  Edward M. Erdelac, Star Wars - Hammer - Edward M. Erdelac

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