As the landing pad fell away the durasteel walkway buckled and bent, sending Valorum toppling over the edge. Empowered by the Force, Johun leapt forward and landed on his stomach, his arm shooting out over the edge to catch Valorum by the corner of his cape an instant before he plunged to his death. The Chancellor dangled there for a second before Johun heaved him up with one hand, swinging him by the cape so he dropped safely on the listing walkway behind the Jedi.
Johun ignited the green blade of his lightsaber just in time to deflect a blaster bolt fired at him by the woman on the platform, then scrambled to his feet to face his attackers. They hesitated at the sight of his trademark weapon, considering their chances against a Jedi,
Their delay gave Johun a chance to evaluate the situation. Retreat was impossible: the section of the durasteel walkway they stood on now jutted out at a descending angle from the platform where their enemies gathered; the far end had been sheared away and now dropped off into empty sky. The only escape was to go forward toward the cliffs-even if it meant going through his enemies.
"Don't move!" he shouted to Valorum as he leapt forward, landing on the platform even as the woman and both men drew their vi-broswords and attacked. Only the Twi'lek held back.
All three wielded weapons laced with cortosis, allowing their blades to clash with Johun's lightsaber without being sliced in two. It only took the first pass for him to realize each one was a highly skilled opponent. Deflecting a quick slash intended to disembowel him by the first man, Johun wheeled to intercept a hard swipe at his neck from the woman. He delivered a spinning round kick to her side, sending her reeling even as he reached behind his back with his lightsaber to parry a savage thrust by the third man at his unprotected flank.
Johun's training in lightsaber combat was limited to the strikes and parries of Form VI, Niman, the most balanced of all the styles. Colloquially know as the Diplomat's Form, Niman had no specific strengths or weaknesses. Its general versatility had served him well during the unpredictable grand melees of the Ruusan battlefields. But over the past decade he had made only the most basic efforts to maintain his skill with the blade. Instead he had focused his attention on developing diplomatic talents. Yet he was still a Jedi, and a formidable foe for anyone to face.
He may have been outnumbered, but his enemies attacked as individuals, unable to coordinate the timing of their strikes. The woman regained her balance and rushed in, but Johun spun to the side and shoved her toward the first man. Her momentum sent her crashing into her partner, both of them tumbling to the ground in a tangled mess of limbs.
Knowing that the other two were momentarily incapacitated, he focused all his attention on the second man. Attacking as a trio, they had forced Johun onto the defensive. One-on-one, however, he was able to press the action. He came at his lone opponent aggressively, holding nothing back, knowing he was fighting to save not just himself but the Chancellor, as well. His blade danced and sizzled, moving too swiftly for the eye to follow.
The man fell back under the assault, frantically parrying the blows and retreating until he felt his heels dangling over the platform's edge. In desperation he lunged forward with a clumsy stab at Johun's chest. The Jedi simply slapped his blade aside and ended the assassin's life with a single cut of the lightsaber across his chest.
The other two were back on their feet now. The woman rushed toward him recklessly yet again. This time Johun stood his ground, ducking under the wide, flat arc of her blade sweeping in from the side. He reached out with his left hand and seized her wrist as he rolled onto his back, using the momentum of her own charge against her. Pulling hard on her wrist, he tumbled backward and brought both feet up, planting them in the middle of her stomach. He completed the move by kicking out with both legs, sending her flying up and over the platform's edge. She screamed all the way down, her cries ending abruptly when she struck the water and rocks below.
Johun was already back on his feet, bracing for the first man's next attack. But rather than face him alone, his remaining adversary turned to flee, making a break for the walkway leading from the platform back to the shore.
He passed the Twi'lek at a dead run, then stopped as his body went rigid and his hands flew to his throat. He turned around slowly so he was facing Johun, clutching the bloody gash just beneath his jaw as he toppled forward and fell facedown on the platform.
It happened so fast it took a moment to register on Johun. Then he noticed the small, crescent-shaped blades clutched in each of the Twi'lek's hands. They looked like miniature sickles; the one in his left hand was a bright silver, the one in the right dripped with red.
The Chiss and the tattooed man had been making their way toward the platform to join the battle. Seeing the Twi'lek cut their escaping accomplice down, they abruptly reconsidered. Faced with a wrathful Jedi Knight and an ally who would kill them if they tried to flee the confrontation on the platform, they made the only logical choice and raced back up the walkway to their waiting vehicle. Piling in, they fired up the engines and sped away, wanting no part of a plan that had gone so wrong.
Stepping over the still-gasping body of the accomplice he had just killed, the Twi'lek dropped into a fighting crouch. He didn't seem to know or care that the other two had abandoned him. His lekku hung down behind him like twin tails, the tips twitching and curling in anticipation.
"I've always wanted to test my skills against a Jedi," he said, issuing the challenge.
Johun was more than willing to accept. He leapt forward, moving with the blinding speed of the Force as he stabbed his lightsaber squarely at the Twi'lek's chest to put a quick end to their confrontation. With an almost casual grace, the red-skinned Twi'lek merely leaned backward and twisted out of the way, slashing out with the strange crescent blades at Johun's throat.
The Jedi turned his body at the last second, avoiding the first blade completely, but catching the other with the meat of his right shoulder. It sliced deep into the muscle, eliciting a grunt of pain from Johun.
He wheeled back around to see the Twi'lek in the same low crouch, holding the crescent blades up in front of him like a boxer. Johun approached more cautiously this time, recognizing that this opponent was far more dangerous than the other three put together.
Using tight slashes and quick cuts, he probed his enemy's defenses with his lightsaber, trying to learn the patterns and rhythms of his foe's unfamiliar weapons. The Twi'lek slapped each blow aside with contemptuous ease, alternating hands so he could always leave one of the crescents up in a defensive position.
The unusual weapons sacrificed reach for speed and maneuverability, Johun realized. He was vulnerable if he let the Twi'lek get in close, but if he could keep him at a distance he had the advantage. The Twi'lek seemed to realize this, too, and began to move in slowly.
Johun tried to force him back with a sequence of aggressive attacks, but he was unable to penetrate the Twi'lek's defenses. No matter what he tried, his enemy was always able to keep at least one of the crescent blades back to parry his blows.
Frustrated, Johun overextended on one of his strikes, bringing the lightsaber in a fraction of a centimeter too high and wide and putting too much weight on his front foot. The mistake nearly proved fatal.
The Twi'lek swatted Johun's blade aside and stepped forward, closing the distance between them to less than a meter as he slid inside the arc of the lightsaber's effective range. The sickle of his left hand sliced down in a high vertical strike as the one in his right carved a low horizontal slash. Johun was able to backpedal and avoid the initial blows, but he wasn't so lucky when his opponent reversed his attack, allowing the crescent blades to retrace their original paths in the opposite direction.