Covalent Bonds

Chapter 25

Grievous cycled one precious crystal cluster into the canister's set-in examination chamber near its handle. The crystals had grown from invisible seeds to a clump of icy asymmetrical facets, similar to the kind of candy grown on a string dipped into a sweet solution. The lattice was beautiful in its larval state, but were its form a fully-operational crystal droid with fluidly-moving arms and legs and a functioning intellect, it would be perfect. 

And since imperfections are created due to gravity, this could very well be the starter batch of my CrystalDroid 1.2. Version 1.1 had contained a few flaws, not that he had informed Dooku of that. Had this mix been one of his own many children that he could no longer remember, he could not have been more proud of his creation. The invigorating Spaarti cloning radiation had surpassed all his expectations and the crystal army would be reality sooner than he had thought. He was pleased for his cause, he was pleased for Dooku's rising to near Milord Sidious' level of devotion to the cause, and he was pleased his calculations for the crystals had worked out. He numbered among his other pleasures on this solitary research expedition the fact that he could gloat over his lightsaber collection in peace. His metallic elbow missed brushing the lightsaber collection inside his cloak, said cloak and lightsabers stowed aboard his transport shuttle tethered some two hundred meters away. In his mind's eye, he fondled each hilt and if they had retained a bloodstain from a Jedi's death, so much the better. He would never clean his collection. Cleaning debased the value of any cherished trophy; in that, he was in complete agreement with Dooku. He wrenched his thoughts from Sith Lords past and present as he clicked a switch on the cylinder's control panel. If the crystal withstood planet-norm gravity without fracturing, the test would be a resounding success.

Grievous activated the residual lights on the platform so he could see to work, but not the gravity because he doesn't need it. He definitely has the advantage here. Could Obi-Wan be right? Siri ordered her thoughts. 

Obi-Wan loosened his grip on Siri's arm. As their bubble-headed helmets touched, he saw that a Jedi Master's restraint looked like sea ice, a rigid cold surface underneath which surged waves of emotion. His face did not look the same; he thought it might soon. He would try reason first.

"Siri, if we could find out what he guards, we could have a leg up on knowing his plans. Dooku could lead the troops if Grievous is taken out now, but knowing their plans, Siri, could allow us to subdue their whole army." To get someone's attention, use their name more than once. Negotiating Basics 101.

"Cloning, something to do with cloning," Siri mumbled to herself and then rounded on him. She bounced farther from him, not angry, not pleased, but reasoning. "Cloning himself, cloning Dooku, this could be devastation for our side, Obi-Wan. All that we've worked and bled for in nearly three years could be abrogated by him getting away today. That's worth the risk."

Stars, there must be a compromise, give me a compromise. "He'll run like he always does if he knows there are two Jedi about to get him. We show ourselves and make our target his getaway ship. Strand him here."

Siri slowly pulled her arm from Obi-Wan's grasp, bracing a hand on the pillar to keep her bobbing body hidden behind it. Obi-Wan's expression was one of earnest debate. She opened her mouth to agree with his assessment of the risk when, fifty meters below, Grievous activated the gravity. Siri and Obi-Wan fully-powered their maneuvering jets to stop their fall, but the jets were not meant to move so much mass in full gravity. The two Jedi fell to the platform deck only a little slower than the mynock bodies and three deactivated dwarf spider droids. Had there been atmosphere, the Jedi's clattering drop would have alerted Grievous, but as it was, an unerring lightning flash from the Spaarti cylinder reflected from Obi-Wan's descending helmet to Grievous' amber eyes.

It can only be Jedi scum. Black Sun wouldn't dare.  Two members of the despised Order that used fascinating weaponry appeared at the base of a pillar twenty meters away on guard stance only, waiting to defend or to attack when his defenses were down. Grievous yearned to acquire the lightsabers glinting to life in their hands. I could take them. I know I could. But the knowledge about the Spaarti cylinder's spurring the crystals' development could not end with him. There are other Spaarti cylinders in the galaxy. And I need a diversion to make my getaway. The panel's red button he pushed without a second thought before running for the corridor that led to his transport, the canister tenderly cradled in his left arms.

Siri blistered Obi-Wan's earbud with her curses. She ran awkwardly in her cumbersome suit after so long a time without gravity, but she could not accept defeat. She scurried after Grievous, leaving Obi-Wan to ascertain the meaning of the blinking red button. Without a doubt, capturing or killing Grievous was her job.

Obi-Wan paled inside his helmet as the shields surrounding the cylinder cycled to nothing, one by one. The red button signaled 'autoshutdown' in Basic while the panel's failsafes, in their shorting-out confusion, sensed that there was no atmosphere. Like any self-respecting circuit would, the failsafes initialized the atmospherization procedures installed by their programmers. Forcefield emitters that were whole spread themselves thin covering for damaged emitters. As their efforts sealed the gaping roof and floor holes with frazzling blue rays, from somewhere beneath the floor an airpump moaned to life to force atmosphere into the sealed area. Obi-Wan would have felt relieved to be in atmosphere once more, were it not for the continued peeling away of the Spaarti cylinder's shields. With the Force, he clamped a stray bit of metal debris onto a spidering crack near the base of the cylinder. He directed the Force-push to meld the debris into the disintegrating structure of the cylinder, but it was slow going. Obi-Wan removed his fogged-over helmet one-handedly and took a deep breath of recycled air that seemed fresher than that in his suit. Flicking back sweaty hair, he pointed his right arm straight at the patch, daring it to fail. He had a bad feeling about the entire situation.

Siri redoubled her efforts in the chase, shocked when Grievous used his right arms and bowed legs to scramble away from her like a Berbersian crab. She Force-leaped in between him and the exit he was trying to reach. They faced off. Helmet steaming up. Must be the rapid change in temperature. She rolled her helmet to the side. The airpump had activated the heating system also, preparing the Kaer Orbital Platform for occupants who would soon be irradiated with unknown amounts of mutating particles. Siri smiled at the irony. "Give up."

"Why?"

"Oh, I don't know. But I had to say it." Siri blocked her stance into Form I, Shii-Cho, the Way of the Sarlacc. He's got no weapon that I can see. He's got claws on both feet and those weird right hands. He also could throw the canister at me. It's like a situation with multiple opponents. And Shii-Cho is simple and strong. In her rare introspective moments, Siri thought of herself as simple and strong. She could not have known that Dooku taught Grievous Shii-Cho as his first Form to master.

I've recently taught Shii-Cho to my IG-100 MagnaGuards. She's mine. Grievous remained in his quadrupedal form, staring past Siri at Obi-Wan, whose back was to them both. Grievous noted the slight lapse in Siri's concentration as she followed his gaze and she could not hide her concern for her partner from him. Fearful bits of meat, thought Grievous, and with a smile in his slitted eyes he twirled the nearest deactivated dwarf spider droid into deadly motion towards the bearded Jedi. Rolling its razor-sharp legs at their unknowing target, it became a pinwheel of cutting edges. Obi-Wan was busy with the Force, bastioning the cracking cylinder's patch. Siri's concentration switched back to Grievous' actions, however, and as the spinning clawed star sped past her to its intended target, she screamed, "Heads up, partner!", Force-pushed its trajectory aside and leaped for the Kaleesh.

Grievous anchored himself even more firmly with his gripping feet, grabbed the cylinder tighter in both his left arms, and decided that discretion was the better part of valor against two Jedi. With a sustained snarl that even Obi-Wan heard, he kicked at her and connected with one taloned leg. There was a five meter-wide gap in the damaged flooring behind her and she fell into the forcefield shielding it from space, clenching her left arm to her side. Before she succumbed to wracking muscle spasms, she swung her violet lightsaber viciously at the prized canister. Leaping back to avoid the blow, Grievous fumbled the canister and dropped it. The viewport to the examination chamber sprang open and the sample crystal fell out, but the lock to the main portion of the crystals held firm. No more crystals left their creche. These are like leaven; I don't need every single one to start the rest of my batch of droids. Grievous scuttled for his transport without delay.

Did he rupture my suit did he did he ... no. A more violent muscle spasm that all the others cartwheeled her free of the field. With a deep moan, she assessed her damage before rising. Arm out of its socket. I can fix that myself ... "Ayeeeeeeugh!" This blasted tight suit will keep it well-supported, anyway. She picked up her helmet and headed slowly for Obi-Wan at his staunch position. He didn't turn around at her approach.

"Grievous?"

"Got away. What's the damage?" Now that the heat had kicked in, it didn't know when to stop and the temperature was balmy enough for a day at the beach. A humid day at the beach.

"I can't reverse the autoshutdown and I estimate we have twenty minutes before this patch fails. Simply destroying this panel won't work because the circuits' commands are coming from the main computer."

Siri rubbed her arm and tried to get feeling back in her fingers. "Where is it? Maybe I can do something." She looked around for a sign saying 'Main Computer Console' until the room swayed. Or maybe it's me. She sat down and put her head between her knees.

"You're not going anywhere. We are getting out of here fast. Siri, don't faint now." I can't tend to her and keep reinforcing this patch ... or can I? He found his center and from an untested source of strength, held the patch firm while reaching down to the top of Siri's head. He eased her incipient syncope away, firming her residual tremors at the same time. Darling Anakin, the things you are capable of and now I am capable of, it's astounding. Siri fluttered her eyelashes and stood.

"'M better now. Wait, there's something I want before we leave." Siri strode back to the gap in the floor, skirting the forcefield with great care. In its coruscating blueness, a blob of crystal glittered on the deck. She sensed no danger from touching it and put it in her belt's pocket, next to her lightsaber.

This situation can't get any worse. A klaxon sounded. The blinking red light stopped blinking and glowed steadily. It's worse. "Siri, hurry up! Grievous may have done something as he left! We need to leave now!" Siri trotted back to Obi-Wan's side.

"Our speeder bikes are that way and what have you done to your suit?" I deflected the spider droid. I know I did.

"Kriff!" Over his lower torso, there was a fifteen-centimeter tear in the outermost layer of five in the vac suit, a smaller one in the fourth layer, and tinier ones in the third and second. Obi-Wan heaved a breath. "I heard your warning and sidestepped, but it seems the claws got me after all." He shrugged. "I was concentrating. Still got one unbreached layer, though. Come on, let's go. I'll -- "

The klaxon doubled its oscillations. Before they could secure their helmets, Siri and Obi-Wan stared in horror at the cracks splintering the cylinder's walls. Helmets in hand, they pelted for the nearest exit, the crack in the floor that now had lost its shielding. The outrush of warm humid air pushed them even faster towards the hole and as they tried to jump through it down to the next level, Siri shrieked, "Use the Force to protect your suit from tearing any further! I'll shield us!" She clapped on her helmet as Obi-Wan donned his. Siri backed into him, jockeying their positions until they each canted their heads to allow the helmets room to be side by side. Their differing heights didn't matter any more because the gravity cut out again. Their legs bent and it was as if Siri were sitting on her partner's lap in freefall.

Obi-Wan hadn't pressed a fellow Jedi this closely since he and Anakin had last had sex -- regularly, at least -- two years ago. Twoyears? Siri had a dip in her waist -- she has Anakin's bright eyes -- and they were turning face-to-face now in the moments before their possible deaths and they couldn't speak, they had no bond whatsoever to sense each other, yet many years ago he had imagined this intimate position. Or something like this, with someone female.

Spaarti cloning cylinder radiation, never thought the galaxy could tolerate more than one of me, must block this. Without gravity, they would need to push themselves down like a scramball towards the goal, past any defense, into the net to score a victorious survival. Siri spared one look below her. There was a landing spot that could hold them steady, yes, that was their target, now to block the offensive radiation. A Force-bubble sprang from her mind, joining with Obi-Wan's in a shared strategy. It was too late to try anything else other than the enhanced static electricity that constituted her weak Force-bubble. Why, oh, why didn't she practice more with it, make it into a true shield and not something to hold back her hair conveniently. It was too late for anything but holding her breath, concentrating on adding her strength to Obi-Wan's. Siri spread herself on Obi-Wan's lap and regretted that she was not a taller, flabbier Jedi, so that her mass could have helped to shield him from the radiation she sensed would be coming their way. She did the best she could, clapping each arm and leg over Obi-Wan's, mashing her limbs to the point of pain so that they spread out and covered his. As much as when she had manipulated the air bubble in his vac suit in the shuttle, she pressed in, ignoring her agonized shoulder and arm. It was bravery, but she didn't think of herself as brave, merely Jedi.

But what was this? Obi-Wan was more powerful than he had been in the Initiates' Hall and on various missions with Qui-Gon and Master Adi and herself. How in the nine hells of Corellia did he manage that? I'm just an adjunct to his shielding us. I don't li--understand it. Working together, they maneuvered the Force-bubble over themselves, Siri working downwards from their heads and Obi-Wan upwards from their feet. They had almost merged the bubbles around their midsections and maneuvered themselves to the level below when the unseen radiation hit them, tingling and sparking nerve endings despite their shielding. Particles caressed their unprotected middles with strange clenching waves that Siri had felt long years ago, with whatever-his-name-had-been, her second lover in Krayn's slaver pack. Siri strained outward and arched her back and grunted. Then it was over. I love it now! Keep it up, Obi-Wan, whatever you're doing.

It's like I've eaten at Dex's Diner. I feel stuffed, and not in a good way. Obi-Wan grunted along with Siri, holding her waist tightly. Over the past few days, he had grown into the ability of perceiving his Anakinesque level of midichlorians and sensed them adapting, flowing, protecting him from the radiation. But they had limits, as did all things. Siri's waist had tensed, then released. She lolled against him, her helmeted head falling backward to his clavicle. She opened her eyes dreamily as she turned, relaxing against him and looking sideways into his range of view. There was vulnerability, a softness he hadn't seen in her before. They blinked in unison.

Siri sighed and moved slightly in his lap. "It's over with." He remained still. What a pulse that was, one big bang of it and then nothing, she thought.  She squirmed again. "Obi-Wan, it's through. You can let go."

"Uh, yes." Anakin would have made a bad joke here, now that the danger was past. But Siri was not Anakin. "On to our current predicament, Siri. The cylinder's shielding failed, Grievous got away, I'm not sensing anything like an explosion building up, Drakas' report said that the cylinder was getting only power from the station and so that is why the computer and the cylinder failed and not the entire platform -- "

"We've got something to take home, Oafy." Siri slowly put her gloved hand to her belt and came up with the glob of crystal. Obi-Wan reached for it, equally slowly, but Siri said, "Nothing doing. You concentrate on that breached suit until we get back onto the shuttle." She let the crystal accretion drift a little out of her grasp until Obi-Wan made a grab for it again, but Siri put it away in her belt. "Back to my bike."

"Just yours?"

"Yes, I'm glued to you like this until the atmosphere is up again in the shuttle. I can provide pressure to reinforce your cut suit's integrity." I've heard that others have had their suits breached and survived because human skin is actually a good pressure suit itself and has a high tensile strength, but I'm taking no chances, my friend.

"I can handle -- oh, very well." Since Obi-Wan's body blocked Siri's jets, he was the only one who could move them towards the bikes. Space. Why did it have to be space. For the second time in as many months, he needed to rely his own wits to survive away from the comfort of solid footing. He dared not look down, though 'down' had no meaning. He looked out, instead. The scene lacked the aurora of Olanet, the pleasant tingle of seeing such beauty closehand, almost of being part of a rainbow himself. This time everything evinced the quality of ice, a clear hardness with no texture of colors.

"I want to get into atmosphere as soon as possible," he said as the two of them sat on her bike. "And I want to retrieve my bike, too." Those mods I simply will not lose. Siri nodded.

"Certainly, Master Kenobi."

Meanwhile, in the Room of a Thousand Fountains ...

As much peace as Tholme was ever likely to know before joining the Force, he found with T'ra Saa. He knew he was a small part of her life, but he believed he was a fulfilling element. She had even told him so, when he was young and vigorous. Life was simpler now in that regard, which was perhaps a good thing, because coordinating the war's intelligence gathering took nearly all his energy. T'ra seemed charmed by his steadfast attention to her for thirty years. She couldn't know how pleasant an interlude with her was for him. Their friendly, fully-cloaked tryst today on Yoda's favorite bench near the Room's waterfall feature was typical of the calm nature of most of their meetings.

"Tholme is weary?"

"Tholme is exceedingly weary. Tholme wants to run barefoot through T'ra Saa's hair." It was a foolish thing to refer to themselves in such a way, but wordplay had replaced other sorts of play for the past year. Tholme was quite certain that T'ra was equanimical about it.

T'ra had perfected the Romin tinkling laugh. "Tholme would get splinters." She tugged playfully at his long tail of grayed hair.

Enough of this. It's not why I came. "T'ra, give me what I came here for."

Tholme had never felt so cocooned with contentment as he did when T'ra's arms came around him, supporting his every move and thought, Force-protecting without pause to augment their cloaks' shield from the waterfall's mist. Tholme and T'ra both fell silent, simply breathing and existing, and Tholme's fantasy when he was newly Knighted, about complete immersion in the Force for the rest of his life, preferably in a cave somewhere, came as close as it ever would or could to reality in this timeless stretch. It was almost better than using the Force himself. Almost.

TBC

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