wide. “Let me see what we have in the dispensary.” She took the nurse by the arm and backed off a few more steps. “Nurse, I will need your assistance.”
The nurse, surprised, said, “Uh … of course, Doctor.”
Soldier sank into the Force, drew on the enormous reservoir of power bubbling beneath the surface of his control. He reached out with mental fingers and took hold of the doctor’s mind, of the nurse’s.
“You will both escort us to the lifts,” Soldier said.
Doctor and nurse stopped their retreat and their faces went vacant.
“I will escort you to the lifts,” they said in unison.
“You there,” called one of the security guards from behind them.
“Take us,” Soldier said to the doctor and nurse. “Now. Right now.”
They turned and started walking toward the triage area. He could feel the emotion building in Runner, in Seer, in himself. He felt as if it might lift him from his feet.
“You there!” called the guard again from behind them. “Wait, I said!”
Eyes were on them—doctors’, nurses’, patients’.
Ahead, two other security guards appeared, talking softly into their comlinks. Each had a hand on his blaster. Behind those two, Soldier saw the lift doors.
“Enough of this,” Runner said. He shoved Soldier to the side, the anger bleeding from him. He held out his hands and unleashed a blast of energy that went before him in a wide arc. The triage area virtually exploded. Beds overturned; overhead lights shattered, raining glass; medical equipment toppled; and two dozen bodies—patients, security guards, doctors, and nurses, including those whose minds Soldier had bent to his will—flew across the room and slammed into the far wall. Bones shattered.
Before them, the pile of bodies, bedding, and machinery looked like the aftermath of a bomb blast. The lift doors were crumpled on their mounts; the lift control panel was shattered and spitting sparks. The alarms from medical equipment beeped plaintively. Moans and screams sounded from the wounded.
Soldier drew his lightsaber, activated it, and turned as the two security guards behind them drew their blasters and fired. His blade spun and he deflected both shots back at the guards, opening smoking holes in their chests. They staggered backward, fell, and died.
Screams came from all sides, some of terror, some of pain. An alarm activated and sang in high-pitched notes. The authorities would be coming.
“Come, Soldier,” Seer said, her voice preternaturally calm. She had already scooped up Grace from the gurney. Soldier grabbed Hunter and put her over his shoulders. Runner picked his way through the carnage to the lifts and pressed futilely at the panel.
“You ruined them,” Soldier said.
Runner whirled on him, his lips pulled back to bare his teeth. Caught up in Runner’s anger, Soldier stepped in closer, fists clenched.
Seer interposed her body between them. “We use the stairs,” she said.
Soldier swallowed hard, nodded. Runner said nothing, merely spun on his heel and used the Force to blow open the doorway to the stairs.
“Ruined this door, too,” he said over his shoulder.
Soldier resisted the urge to drive his lightsaber into Runner’s back only because Seer, perhaps sensing his anger, put her hand on his forearm.
“Don’t,” she said.
They left the wounded and dying behind them and started up the stairwell.
As he climbed, Soldier wondered why he stayed with Seer. He could have taken Grace, even Hunter, and left Seer alone on her quest for Mother. Runner could not have stopped him.
But even as he asked the question, he knew the answer: he hated his doubt. He craved certainty, and he hoped, against his better judgment, that everything Seer said would ultimately prove true.
If that happened, he would kill his doubt forever.
Junker came out of hyperspace and the blue churn gave way to black, to Fhost’s system. The system’s star painted the cockpit in orange light. Ahead, the tan sphere of Fhost spun against the ink of space.
“Welcome home,” Khedryn said. “Doesn’t look the same somehow.”
“No,” Marr said thoughtfully. “It doesn’t.”
“The authorities may want us for questioning about The Hole,” Jaden said.
“Reegas will not welcome our return,” Marr observed.
Jaden had intervened in a sabacc game involving Khedryn and a local crime lord named Reegas. The game had turned into a brawl, and Jaden had left several of Reegas’s bodyguards dead.
“We’ll avoid sat pings, and planetary control won’t know we’re in-system,” Khedryn said. He looked back at Jaden. “We’re not staying long, are we?”
“Probably not,” Jaden said.
Khedryn nodded. “You know the headings to use, Marr.”
Marr started plugging numbers into the instrument panel. Jaden noticed that he did it with his