Omega was already jumping out as the speeder bike died. Obi-Wan leaped after him, but found himself suddenly contending with a dozen miniature seeker droids hammering blaster fire at him. Omega had released them from a compartment on the speeder even as it came to its final stop.
The first dozen were joined by another dozen. Then another. And, Obi- Wan saw in dismay, another. The blaster fire kept Obi-Wan moving, but he could not get anywhere. He had to leap and defend himself against the blaster fire while taking down the elusive droids, who were now between him and the two criminals.
Zan Arbor ran toward Omega. "Let"s move on to the exit plan."
Omega stood, watching Obi-Wan contend with the droids. Obi-Wan heard him clearly. "I want to see him die. Not even a Jedi can escape this many seekers."
"Don"t be a fool. Come on! Security will be all over us in another minute!" Zan Arbor started to run.
Taking a last look at Obi-Wan, Omega grinned. "Have fun."
Then he turned and started after Zan Arbor. Obi-Wan leaped into the air, barely missing blaster crossfire. The tunnel was filling with smoke from the heavy fire. He began to regret charging off alone to hunt Omega.
Maybe he"d been wrong not to wait for backup...
Jedi do not second-guess.
Especially when they are in a tunnel with thirty-three flying, firing droids.
Three droids in one blow. But there were thirty others, and it would take time.
Instead of running forward, Obi-Wan retreated. He dashed back to the speeder and threw himself underneath it. His face was directly against the hot metal, his arms and legs squeezed inside so that the blasters could get not direct shots at him.
He heard the blaster fire rake the speeder, front to back, searching for his position. He waited until he heard the distinctive sound of several rounds of blaster fire penetrate the fuel tank.
He had enough time, he had more than enough time, thanks to the Force, but Obi-Wan felt the hair on the back of his neck singe as he flew through the air, escaping the exploding speeder bike. The fireball took out twenty- eight seeker droids at once. Obi-Wan slashed the remaining two as he moved through the air, propelled by the Force and the extremely hot air thrown off by the explosion.
He landed on his feet - singed, but fine.
He started to run, whipping out his comlink as he moved. He knew where they were going. The Senate landing platform.
He tried his comlink, but the heat of the blast had fused it. Obi-Wan tossed it away as he doubled his speed. The landing platform must be ahead. Omega and Zan Arbor had mapped out a plan that would get them inside the air tunnel and then out of the Senate as fast as possible.
Obi-Wan saw an air vent dangling off its hinges. He rushed forward and peered inside. Only a few meters of crawl s.p.a.ce separated him from the vast landing platform. He crawled through.
The landing platform was kilometers long, big enough to park s.p.a.ce freighters in, though most often it was used for the smaller transports of the Senators and important guests. Vehicles were parked in orderly rows. There was no sign of Omega or Zan Arbor. They were undoubtedly racing toward their transport and he could waste an hour looking for them and never find them. Omega would escape again. He had prevented the Zone from penetrating the Senate, and had stopped the a.s.sa.s.sination of Palpatine - he hoped. Omega was leaving in defeat.
None of that mattered. Defeat or not, Omega was still escaping.
Obi-Wan gathered the Force around him. He had never needed it more.
To his surprise, he felt it move like a gathering storm, already powerful but hinting at the greater strength to come.
Anakin.
His apprentice moved out from an aisle of transports, racing toward him. Siri was by his side. "Palpatine?" he asked Anakin.
"I left him with Ferus," Anakin replied. "Omega?"
"Here somewhere." Anakin had left Palpatine? He"d given him a direct order! Of course, Ferus must have arrived, and the situation had changed. But he had wanted Anakin to stay with the Chancellor because if he had missed something, Anakin would still have a chance to foil an attack.
"We tracked you through the tunnel," Siri said.
Anakin was turning, his eyes raking the platform. Obi-Wan felt the Force build. He reached out, looking at the platform, searching for the dark Force that was here, concealed, trying to hide.
"There." Anakin pointed. "Third aisle over. Thirty-seven transports down."
They raced down a parallel aisle, hoping to surprise them.
They stealthily moved around a gleaming transport. Across the aisle, Omega and Zan Arbor were already seated in the c.o.c.kpit of a sleek s.p.a.ce cruiser. Omega was quickly inst.i.tuting takeoff procedures.
No time for delay or to make a plan. The Jedi charged. Anakin accessed the Force and leaped straight onto the windscreen, startling Zan Arbor, who screamed. Obi-Wan landed on the roof and leaned over. He withdrew his lightsaber, ready to cut a hole in the door panel below.
Siri leaped up next to him.
"It really gets tiresome to be continually underestimated."
The voice was Omega"s. He was transmitting outside the c.o.c.kpit.
Grimly, Obi-Wan started to cut.
"Do you really think you have foiled my plans, simply by showing up here? If you cut through that door panel, Obi-Wan, you will kill thousands of Senators."
Obi-Wan continued to cut.
"Obi-Wan," Siri whispered.
"That"s right, Master Tachi. This will be a day the Senate will long remember. A bloodbath."
"He has a transmitting device," Anakin said from his position outside the windscreen.
Obi-Wan stopped his effort.
"Ah, better. Let me explain. I have programmed hundreds of seeker droids with the vital information to key Senators as well as to Palpatine. All I have to do is push the b.u.t.ton."
Obi-Wan felt rage build up inside him. He could not, would not let Omega blackmail him into letting him escape. But he had no doubt that Omega was telling the truth. It was similar to the way he had orchestrated the death of Jedi Master Yaddle.
He felt the Force move, a boiling ma.s.s that caused him and Siri to jump to their feet on top of the cruiser. Anakin was up, hanging in midair for the second it took him to slash through the windscreen directly in front of a shocked Omega. He jumped directly on top of the melted material, material that must have been too hot to stand on. Zan Arbor screamed as the melted windscreen fell into her lap.
Obi-Wan had never seen such speed. Even he could not fully track his apprentice"s movement. Balancing on the lip of the cruiser, faster than sight, Anakin reached in and grabbed the transmitter from Omega"s clutches.
"Whoops, no more b.u.t.ton," he hissed at Omega.
With a cry of rage, Omega triggered the powerful engines. The cruiser shot up so fast all the Jedi slipped off. They fell to the ground as Omega took off in a burst of speed, clipping a cruiser"s wing as he went and knocking over a row of swoops and disrupting traffic in the nearest sky lanes.
Obi-Wan watched from the floor, momentarily stunned.
Anakin looked at the transmitter in his hand.
"He lied," he said. "The transmitter is locked in position. He has already programmed the droids."
CHAPTER TWENTY.
"The fastest way back to the Senate chamber is though the tunnels,"
Siri said.
"We don"t know the way," Anakin said.
"If I know Ferus, he does," Siri said crisply.
They ran back to the vent and crawled through, then ran down the air tunnel. As she ran, Siri flipped open her comlink and contacted Ferus. Quickly, she filled him in.
"We"re just entering the main Senate chamber," Ferus said. "There"s no sign of any trouble."
"Stay with Palpatine. Contact Master Windu and request reinforcements. Can you get us through the tunnels to the chamber?"
"Yes. I loaded the Senate utility tunnels onto my datapad."
"Bring us in on a middle tier."
There was a pause of only seconds. "Travel back to the ZM7789 section. Look for vent ZM22899. Go through that one. It will ascend two hundred meters and make a sharp turn to vent UB339. Go through that.
Follow that tunnel straight to vent NW993. That comes out into the Senate chamber."
"Got it."
They moved fast, running now. Siri kicked in the first vent. This tunnel was large enough for them to walk in, but as Ferus had told them, it turned sharply upward for two hundred meters. They used their cable launchers to swiftly vault up.
"A sharp turn here." Siri kicked in the next vent. She ran ahead, and Obi-Wan had a chance to talk to Anakin.
"You left the Supreme Chancellor."
"Ferus was there."
"You could have contacted me."
"There wasn"t time."
"And now there are hundreds of seeker droids heading to the Senate and only one Jedi available to protect Chancellor Palpatine and the Senators."
Obi-Wan saw Anakin"s mouth tighten. He grew less and less open to correction from his Master. It had been the opposite for Obi-Wan. The longer they were together, the more he welcomed Qui-Gon"s remarks, even when they were critical.
"I"m at the next vent!" Siri cried. "I can hear something. Hurry!"
They scurried through the next vent, then ran down the tunnel to the last one, Siri in the lead. Now they could hear it - blaster fire.
Shouts. The random, terrible noise of violent chaos.
They burst out on a mid-level tier of the chamber. The seeker droids were everywhere, looking for their targets. Senators marooned in pods dove to the floor. Bodyguards tried to protect their charges and seeker droids went after them as well.
"I don"t see Palpatine!" Siri yelled. "He"s not in his pod."
"He could be stuck on one of the tiers," Obi-Wan said.
Siri called Ferus on the comlink but there was no answer. He was either too busy to answer or his comlink wasn"t functioning.
They didn"t know where to start, so they started where they were.
Anakin was a flash in the air as he moved, targeting droids as they dipped and revolved, spraying blaster fire toward their targets. Obi-Wan saw a seeker droid homing in on a Senator cowering in his pod, at least fifty meters below. He jumped off the tier into the pod, taking the droid down in mid-leap.
Siri leaped from pod to pod, slashing at seeker droids in the air as she went and ricocheting blaster bolts back into the droids. Many exploded as their fire was returned to them. With a quick glance Obi-Wan saw them flame out and fall far below to the ground floor. They were hundreds of meters in the air, and the droids had the advantage. They could fly. The Jedi needed an edge.
Obi-Wan leaped down to the next tier and found a terrified a.s.sistant hiding among the opulent drapery of the pod from the planet Belazura. It was still tethered to its docking point.
"Show me the main controls for the pods," Obi-Wan said.
"I-I-" the aide stammered, too terrified to speak. "Do it now!"
Obi- Wan barked.
The durasteel in Obi-Wan"s voice caused the aide to snap to attention. "There"s a control on level 125...." "Let"s go."
Obi-Wan leaped into the pod. He pressed the indicator to bring them down ten levels. The pod dropped like a stone.
The pod docked at Tier 125. "Come on," Obi-Wan said.
The aide darted forward, running low to make himself less of a target. Still, every spray of blaster fire caused him to yelp in fear.
Obi-Wan protected him as they ran. The aide quickly leaped behind a large column. He grimaced when he saw a security officer on the ground, but he moved to a panel in the wall. "Here," he said, accessing the panel. "These controls can override the individual pod controls."
Obi-Wan quickly scanned the controls. He pushed several indicators, watching the pods move on a diagram. By moving large blocs of pods, he created a stepping-stone effect throughout the Senate chamber.
"Stay here, you"ll be safer," he told the aide.
With a glance down at the dead guard at his feet, the young aide nodded shakily. "Whatever you say."
Obi-Wan raced back to the tier. He could see that he had been successful. Siri was already jumping from pod to pod, able now to cover more airs.p.a.ce. Anakin was doing the same. When Obi-Wan looked down, he could see, far below, Jedi charging out onto the Senate floor. He saw Shaak Ti leaping onto the pods like steps, moving upward. A team led by Coleman Trebor used the pod controls to move closer to their goal, then leaped into the air to take out two, four, seven, ten seeker droids at once during their descent.
Obi-Wan saw Palpatine at last. He stood on a tier far below, facing out toward the melee. Ferus stood in front of him, angling his lightsaber to fend off blaster bolts fired by the droids. Palpatine hardly noticed the Jedi protecting him. His bleak gaze swept the chamber.
Then Obi-Wan saw Roy Teda on the same tier, making his way forward.