Star Wars: Crosscurrent by Paul S. Kemp Page A

sound of it, he put their numbers at six or seven. Given their alert status and attunement to the dark side, he would not be able to use the Force to hide from them. He checked one of the nearby hatches, found it locked, checked another, found that locked, too.
    The voices drew closer. He could not make out their words. They were speaking their native language.
    He pulled an overrider—an electronic lockpick—from his suit and attached it to the nearest door's control panel. Lights flashed as the equipment interfaced and the overrider tried to find the door's open code. The Massassi were around the corner. Relin would not get clear in time. He took his lightsaber in hand and ignited it.
    The Massassi fell silent. They must have heard him activate his lightsaber.
    The overrider flashed green and the door opened with a metallic hiss. Moving quickly, he detached the overrider and slid inside as the Massassi rounded the corner.
    A meeting room. A large table surrounded by chairs and dotted with three comp stations sat centermost. A vidscreen, powered down, took up one wall. Transparisteel windows made up the bulkhead, allowing a view of the system outside.
    He crouched with his ear to the door, listening to the voices of the Massassi. They sounded like they were right outside, separated from him only by a thin layer of metal, talking in hushed tones. He winced as his comlink activated and Drev spoke.
    "The transports are returning to the landing bay and both dreadnoughts are moving, Master."
    Relin heard laserfire in the background of Drev's transmission, but his mind was on the Massassi in the corridor outside.
    "Stand by," he whispered. "Stand by."
    The voices outside went silent. Had they heard Drev? A human would not have been able to hear the comlink transmission, but Massassi had keener senses than humans. Relin sat behind the door, lightsaber humming in his hand, the calm of the Force in his heart, waiting, waiting…
    Nothing.
    He glanced back out of the meeting room windows to see the background of stars shifting slightly as the ship moved away from Phaegon III and its gravity well.
    "They are preparing to jump," he said to Drev. He had to get to the hyperdrive, and now.
    "Get off that ship, Master, or you'll go with them."
    "There is still time." He pushed the button to open the hatch. "I'm near the hyperdrive chamber and—"
    He found himself staring at the uniformed chest of a Massassi security officer, who held his lanvarok in one hand. The bone spurs and studs under the Massassi's red flesh gave it a tumorous appearance.
    "Here!" the Massassi shouted down the hall. Roaring, he swung his lanvarok in a downstroke for Relin's head, but Relin sidestepped the blow and it slammed into the deck while Relin drove his lightsaber through the Massassi's abdomen. The Massassi groaned, dropped his weapon. His clawed hands groped reflexively for Relin's throat as he died.
    Shouts from down the hall told Relin the dead Massassi's comrades had heard his call. He took a thermal grenade from his flexsuit, stepped out of the room, and tossed it down the corridor at the onrushing Massassi, each with a blaster and lanvarok bare. Recognition of what he had thrown widened their eyes and they dived for cover, but not before one of them got off a blaster shot.
    Relin deflected it with his lightsaber and ducked back into the room he had vacated as the grenade exploded.
    Flames bathed the corridor in orange. The Massassi's screams were lost in the explosion and the shock wave rattled Relin's teeth. Alarms shrieked, and fire foam hissed out of valves in the ceiling.
    Relin heard shouts from the other direction and the stomp of many boots. The ship's entire security force would be coming. As would Saes. He had to move.
    He drew his blaster with his off hand and pelted down the hall, past the bodies of the Massassi, toward the hyperdrive chamber. The time for stealth was past.
    A pair of Massassi appeared in the hallway before him, both with