Chapter Seventeen
Fligh dived behind the sleep couch as the Jedi ignited their lightsabers. The droidekas unfurled and snapped into attack position, blaster bolts firing. Obi-Wan's lightsaber was an arc of moving light, deflecting the shower of blaster fire. Beside him Siri's lightsaber swung in a continuous arc of precise movement, with Siri's two-handed grip and her graceful footwork. Ry-Gaul did not move. He did not need to. His long arms were a blur in the air as his lightsaber shifted from hand to hand.
The three-legged droidekas were built for battle and close to invincible but these droidekas weren't shielded. Their heavy armor shells and volts of firepower as well as their maneuverability made them capable of cutting down opponents with fearsome efficiency.
It wasn't as though their power alarmed Obi-Wan. But he still was not especially pleased to see them. There were twelve of them, so he was glad to have Ry-Gaul and Siri by his side.
The air filled with smoke as the blaster bolts zinged, but the Jedi deflected them and struck blow after blow at the heavy armor plates on the droids. Because the doorway was narrow, the droidekas began firing through the wall itself, quickly tearing gaping holes in the structure. After a sweep from Siri's lightsaber, one droideka smoked and fell, and another, its legs gone, bobbled and spun until it crashed against a wall. Obi-Wan sliced a droideka in two and sent one piece flying over the sleep couch and crashing into the wall. Fligh shrieked as pieces of hot metal rained down on him.
Droidekas had control centers, not brains. They could not feel fear or apprehension. The amazing skill of the Jedi was lost on them. They continued to advance and fire, continued to evade by rolling themselves into balls and repositioning themselves to fire again. Time after time they attacked, and time after time the Jedi struck blow after blow until the harsh smoke and the heat caused Fligh to have a coughing fit. The Jedi did not react to the smoke. Their minds and bodies were focused on battle, and nothing else mattered but the moment.
Suddenly all three Jedi exchanged a glance. They leaped back as the flimsy wall collapsed on the remaining droidekas. Ry-Gaul, Obi-Wan, and Siri finished the rest off, disabling them with lightsaber thrusts. At last the droidekas lay around them in pieces. Fligh raised his head from behind the sleep couch.
His voice was hoarse. "Can I go now?"
"He can't help us," Obi-Wan told the others. "He's told us everything he knows." He deactivated his lightsaber. "Yes, Fligh. You can go."
"Until next time, Obi-Wan," Fligh said fervently.
"I certainly hope not," Obi-Wan answered. Wherever Fligh was, trouble was soon to follow.
With a last bow, Fligh ran from the room, his belongings trailing from his packing case.
"If they're sending Destroyer Droids, they must be worried," Siri said. "Whoever they are."
"One of us should attend each event," Obi-Wan said. "The Padawans are already at the Podrace and it's scheduled to begin in… fifteen minutes.
Can you head out there, Ry-Gaul? I'll contact Anakin and tell him that something is supposed to go wrong, but I'd feel better if you were there."
Ry-Gaul gave a short nod and left the room, stepping over a pile of droidekas in the doorway.
"I'll take the bowcaster skill contest," Siri said. "It's at Stadium Seven."
"That leaves me with the obstacle course," Obi-Wan said, nodding.
"Stay in touch."
"I just wish I knew what I was looking for," Siri said. Obi-Wan tucked his lightsaber into his belt. "That makes two of us."
Obi-Wan was able to give Anakin an update on the way to Stadium Nine.
There was nothing much for Anakin to do except what the rest of them were doing — being mindful, and watching.
Obi-Wan strode into the stadium. He felt the heat and the noise of a crowd eager for the event to begin.
As the Euceron hero and record-setter for the event in the last Galactic Games, Maxo Vista was here as well. Obi-Wan found a seat as close to the judges as he could and watched on a viewscreen overhead while Vista's podium zoomed to the center of the stadium.
"Welcome, all," he said, his voice amplified throughout the stadium.
"I'd like to introduce myself. I am — "
"MAXO VISTA!" the crowd roared.
"You may not remember me — "
The crowd roared once again.
— but I was at this event seven years ago — " A cheer went up.
" — I didn't do too badly — " Vista paused and waited for the cheers and laughter "- and I truly hope that today, my record will be broken.
I'm just a Galactic Games official now, seven years older and seven years slower, so I'd better make way for the next generation of athletes."
The broad grin still on his face, Vista suddenly vaulted off the platform. The crowd gasped, but a cable launcher hidden in Vista's belt let out a long line, and he bounced at the end of it, only centimeters away from the ground. With a powerful thrust, he flipped his body upward, then twisted, flew through the air, and landed on his feet. His movements were so graceful it was more like a dance than an athletic feat.
The crowd erupted in cheers and applause. The cheers went on and on.
The cheers fell away for Obi-Wan. He heard only the absence of sound, the silence of concentration and revelation.
The lines of Vista's body were suddenly familiar, the fluid, powerful way he moved. The way he made something that took great effort look effortless.
Maxo Vista was the air-taxi pilot who had tried to kill them. And he was the speeder driver who had run down Aarno Dering.
Which meant that the great hero of Euceron was the insider who was behind fixing the Games.
Chapter Eighteen
It was his fault. If he hadn't been so irritated at not knowing who Maxo Vista was, he would have looked closer at him. He had made a mistake worthy of a Jedi Temple student, not an experienced Jedi Knight. He had allowed his own perspective, his own emotion, to color his perception.
Perception comes from not one but all angles at once.
Yes, Qui-Gon.
Obi-Wan raced down the moving walkway that circled the stadium. He had to make it down to Level Twenty, where Maxo Vista would enter the VIP box.
He could not risk losing Maxo Vista the way he had lost Aarno Dering.
He was almost at the door of the box when Astri dashed toward him, curls bouncing and robe swirling. "Obi-Wan!"