The Crossroads

2002 short story by Louis Turfrey

Thirty-eight years after Episode IV – A New Hope

The contract was legal, but Ranth wondered just how he was going to pull it off. He’d told his agent to pick big fishes, people with a lot of money on their heads, no preference on whether they be brought in dead or alive. His agent had been true to his old form and had given him a really big fish, one that would be difficult to put down.

Three weeks of taking on different identities, meeting and sometimes coercing old contacts, burying himself in what was once the independent Setnin Sector, had brought back many memories, both good and bad. Today he needed to call on the aid of an old friend and confidant; a man he could trust.

Standing quietly, waiting for the subject of his attention to pass by, he relaxed into what he called hunting mode. It was becoming more than second nature to him, and he could feel the changes running through his body and mind. Something had started to happen recently, something both he and the man he used to be, had not envisaged. Whatever people called it, be it second sight or sixth sense, he had developed an uncanny knack for knowing when someone was going to draw a blaster on him. It gave him an edge he hadn’t had since becoming a full Jedi, but that was a lifetime ago.

He had that feeling now.

As he watched from the shadows, the man walked across the street away from his friends and towards the alley where he now stood.  Ranth armed his blasters, setting them to stun. He had received many startled reactions since he had resurfaced. Many of them resulted in misfires; near misses and once he had nearly killed a man. He did not want to kill Jan Lomona.

Jan moved across the street and thought wearily of exactly what he had let himself in for since raiding the Bank of Zelon. His thoughts were still on this subject when he felt a familiar tingling in the back of his mind. He turned quickly, and in one smooth motion brought his blaster around and into the helmeted face of someone when he never expected to see again. He stood there for a second before realising he had two similar looking blasters aimed at his midsection. He smiled and holstered his gun.

   “Ranth? Is that you?”

Tar Ranth nodded in affirmation.  Lomona split a wide grin.

   “Dammit, you old frecker! I’d heard you’d resurfaced.” He patted his friend enthusiastically on his back. Ranth, feeling embarrassed, holstered his guns and released the catch on his helmet, taking it off and slamming his hand on Lomona’s back in a similar greeting.

   “Resurrected would be a better analogy. I notice you’ve improved your fast draw technique.  You were almost quick enough as well.  Old man”

Jan frowned and looked at the man who now stood next to him. His youth was apparent, but this was definitely Tarr Ranth, or Tar Ranth as he now preferred to be monikered, legendary bounty hunter and Jedi. He smiled at the familiar face.

   “What do you mean, almost?”

Ranth looked on as the silhouette of the Berone Sunrise gently lifted off of the surface of the planetoid and back into space. He noted to himself that Lomona hadn’t lost his touch and hoped he would get reinforcements here in time. He started triple checking his armour, knowing that what he was about to do would rely on all his skills and ability. Ranths armour was well suited to movement in a vacuum, being completely sealed off from the rigors of space. Tough environmental controls with quadruple redundancies protected his comparatively fragile body from the extreme temperature ranges and the armour itself was tougher than any conventional spacesuit.

His target was currently located in a large structure that had been half clamped and half buried in the side of the planetoid. He smiled to himself in anticipation, feeling the adrenaline rush that always preceded a kill. It’s time, so he set off on a gentle loping stride. His calculations told him that it would be half an hour before he arrived at the base and he had a comfortable margin of two hours worth of air.

Aaron De’Athe stood at the window that looked out upon his hidden planetoid and watched the sun set over the hills less than ten kilometres away. Something had disturbed him and yet he couldn’t pinpoint what it was. The curved horizon that was the edge of the planetoid showed up clearly as it rotated away from the sun. In three hours it would repeat the process, but Aaron would not be there to see. Their security had been compromised.  Somebody – he didn’t know who – had tortured one of his acolytes into giving the information of their whereabouts.  It disturbed him that there was someone out there who had as little regard for life as he did, for although the acolyte had survived the ordeal, he was a faceless mask of mangled flesh.

Literally.

He was still looking out the window when something caught his attention, the glint of light on metal from the foothills. He enhanced his senses through the Force and looked harder. Nothing, but that sense of foreboding was growing. He opened the communicator on his desk.

   “Re-direct all patrols to area ZZ9 Plural Z - Alpha. Let me know what you find.”

Ranth experienced the feeling again, but this time it was different.  This time it seemed…directed. He dropped to the ground in the low gravity environment and thanked his lucky stars that the surface contained little particulate dust. He waited for fully two minutes before rising again and heading into the shadows of the foothills. Seven kilometres, seventeen minutes, and he would be at the edge of the base. Now was the time to be extremely wary.

Now was the time to arm his weapons.

Patrol 63 slid effortlessly over the surface of the planetoid, the two suited acolytes riding easily on their modified repulsor skiff.

   “I have a feint metallic reading, no bio.  Let’s report it in.”

The acolyte did not seem nervous but his colleague was more experienced.

   “The Master is in a very dangerous mood today.  We should double check everything before reporting it.”

The other man nodded, and the two suited figures turned the skiff in the direction of the reading.

Ranths helmet display came to life as the tracking scan hit the armour. He cursed and set the bio suppression field on. This was not good; he had been detected too early. He set the power on his suit to full, redirected his orientation in mid-stride and engaged his modified jet pack. There was a single burst of flame and the low gravity did the rest. At two hundred kilometres an hour he accelerated towards the hidden base on a smooth parabolic curve. Seventeen minutes became seventeen seconds and as he approached the base his suit scanner told him there were four patrols ahead, one behind. He smiled to himself, knowing full well they didn’t stand a chance.

   “Brotus, what is it?” Aaron walked swiftly into the small operations centre and found his new colleague trying to interpret the garbled signals being sent between patrols. Commander Brotus looked up and swore to himself that he’d seen a brief glimpse of the fury that he knew the man was trying to suppress.

   “One man seemingly covered in black armour is heading in our direction.  He’s evading all your patrols with ease. He seems to know where they are.”

Aaron could feel his face start to pale as the blood drained away and fought to maintain his equilibrium.

   “Images?”

Brotus nodded and flicked a long-range fuzzy image on to the main view screen.

   “Enhance it please.”

Brotus did so and as the computer interpolated a more accurate representation Aaron felt his blood go cold.

Ranth cut the jet pack, released the clips, and remotely sent it up into space. As the pack went one way on full burn he went the other, landing gently on a maintenance hatch. Seconds later he was inside the base and heading towards two Dark Jedi, their lightsabres already activated…

   “Sir, he is inside the base and heading in this general direction. We have engaged him but so far there have been two casualties and several severe injuries.”

The acolyte handed the report to Aaron who drew back as if stung. The flim dropped lightly to the floor. Cursing his weakness he pulled himself up straight.

   “Brotus, stay here and continue to direct the evacuation. I’ll face this…man myself. Ask Agent Omega to meet me in the medical corridor. It seems as good enough a place as any to hold our ground.”

It had been too easy, way too easy. His initial suspicions were correct, he was sure.  He was being directed and he didn’t like it. Ranth turned a corner and this time it was his turn to freeze in place. Something was badly wrong. The corridor widened out, becoming approximately five metres wide and extending for another fifteen metres. The ceiling was at least five metres high, or so his helmet informed him.

That sense of warning was there again and so he moved forwards with caution. He found his hand reaching for his lightsabre, a weapon that he instinctively knew how to use but did not have. He hesitated, then holstered his weapon. Something told him to rely on his wits. The lights had been dimmed at the far end of the corridor and Ranth had to zoom in before switching to low light mode, lest he blind himself. Two figures stood there, silhouetted against the darkness. One of them had an extremely high heart beat, the taller and thinner of the two.

   “Come out where I can see you and you will not get hurt.” Ranth spoke emotionlessly but felt an excitement he had not experienced since his literal rebirth as a bounty hunter. He knew things were changing; that the suit he wore was meshing itself into his sub-conscious mind the more he wore it. And there was something else as well; the Force abilities that had apparently been bred out of him were resurfacing once again. Is this a manifestation of a reintegrated consciousness, a meshing of the old and the new? He thought so. His Force ghost had used the last of its strength to try and reintegrate into his body, and Ranth was sure that the joining had been at least partially successful.

Now would be the test.

There was the snap hiss of two lightsabres igniting simultaneously, and the potential assailants moved forward into the light. Ranth was shocked to see who his second assailant was.

   “Trude? Is that you?”

The woman moved forward, both grace and animalistic strength seemed to ooze from her. Aaron De’Athe held back and grinned as he saw Ranths reaction. She growled in answer to his question and he saw fire in her eyes. Eyes? This couldn’t be Trude; she had lost her eyes years before, plucked out by her insane brother. It must have been an impostor.  Aaron sneered at Tar.

   “I thought I’d finished you off Ranth. I thought you were dead. Today I will make sure of it.”

He signalled for the Trude impostor to move forward, which she did cautiously. “She’s superb isn’t she? Grown using the same technology that helped grow me. Unfortunately for you, although she has an understanding of language, she is still emotionally restricted. She knows only anger, rage and hate; an ideal grounding for a Dark Side acolyte.”

She leapt forward incredibly fast and Ranth barely got out of the way of the blade in time. Something was wrong here and he could feel it. She furiously attacked him, driving him backwards with the speed of her blows. Still Ranth avoided the blows, but he was unable to defend and this time he did not have the Force to guide him – or did he?

Relaxing into the fight and letting his adversary use her energy to the full, Ranth moved around the corridor like a dancer. Pushing off of walls, jumping high and ducking low. Always managing to beat the blade, he continued to look for an opening. All he needed was a chink in her armour, a gap in her technique, but he was having trouble finding one. Then she over lunged in her eagerness and he had her, firing a nerve toxin dart into her midriff. It took only a millisecond to work and she stopped in mid-slice. The blade flew out of her hand, deactivated, and instinctively without knowing why, he reached for it. It landed neatly in his palm, pulled there by the Force.

The energy flowed down the blade and he once more stood before Aaron De’Athe, but this time his aims were different.

   “Move aside Aaron.  Its not you that I have come for.  Its Brotus.”

The Dark Master frowned and Ranth felt his hesitation.

   “I said move aside.  I have no warrant on you but I will destroy you if you stand in my way.”

The Dark Jedi smiled and deactivated his blade, standing to the side of the corridor and raising his hands.

   “Be my guest.  He is in the operations room, two floors up, three doors down.” Ranth was surprised by this turn of events but wasn’t about to look a gundark in the mouth. As he ran past Aaron, he felt a dark wave of cold hatred and knew that the Dark Master had not yet finished with him.

No one challenged him as he ran towards the operations centre, the corridors empty of personnel and droids. Ranth briefly saw a power droid running down a dark corridor, but little else. He slowed as he came to the corridor leading to the operations centre. The feeling of foreboding was rising again, this time much stronger. As he rounded the last turn, he saw Brotus. He waited, in one hand a crimson lightsabre, in the other claw shaped appendage a small energy shield.

   “Ranth. The infamous bounty hunter turned Jedi. How are you alive? Are you as old as you seem, or an illusion projected into my mind?”  Brotus paused as he thought.  “No matter. Either way you will die, Jedi scum.” He attacked without warning, causing Ranth to defend with a weapon he had not used before, his captured lightsabre.

   “I’m no illusion thief.  I’m here to inform you that you are to surrender to me for trial for the theft of Imperial property. If you refuse to comply I am authorised to apply force.  With extreme prejudice.”

The Ki-Ki laughed as he caught Ranth’s blade and deflected it with his shield. A spin on his heals and the clawed hand ripped into the chest plate of Ranth’s armour. Ranth was shocked at the speed. Nothing should have been able to do that and instantly all but the most basic electronic functions shut down. Ranth leapt sideways into an office, slamming and sealing the door behind him. There was the hiss of melting metal as Brotus’ lightsabre started to melt the door seals. Ranth released and removed his helmet, looking for a way out. The only exit was a large observation window that showed the foothills by which he had approached the base.

There was a hiss as the first of four seals dropped off the door. Ranth replaced his helmet and activated his lightsabre. This will have to be timed just right.

Brotus burst through the door and saw Ranth on the other side of the room, standing in front of the window.

   “No way out Jedi.” He reached out and lifted a desk, slamming it into Ranth and almost crushing him against the glass. Ranth fell to the ground, barely able to stand from the impact. Brotus moved over and, abandoning his lightsabre, started to rip at Ranth’s armour with his clawed hand.

   “Did you think this would be easy? How dare you try and arrest a Ki-Ki! You insolent piece of garbage. Die and go back to the pond of slime where you were born.”

The blows kept coming down on Ranth; pieces of body armour started to fly off and beneath his bloody skin was exposed. Ranth fought back, knocking the commanders feet out from under him and planting a hard kick to his jaw. The warrior fell backwards into a storage shelf and Ranth followed up with a high punch and a quick jab. The jab was expertly blocked and a punch came down on the helmet. Two claws pierced the helmet and almost took out Tar’s eye. Ranth was picked up bodily and thrown across the room, where he managed to land without injuring himself. Immediately he was punched, his helmet clasping free of its locks and flying off to one side. Within seconds his face was a mass of pain as punch after vicious punch pummelled into him, each one followed by a scream from the now battle enraged Ki-Ki soldier.

   “Die, die, die, die Jedi!” Brotus kept repeating the litany whilst Ranth fought to keep conscious. He nearly passed out twice, barely avoiding the blows. Then two things happened almost simultaneously. First, there was a large cracking sound from the back of the room, and second; Ranth blocked Brotus’ punch.

Using the force of the punch to throw the unprepared warrior over his shoulder, he reached into the Force and with all his remaining strength propelled the commander across the room and into the observation window. As the warrior hit the window, Ranth leapt sideways, grabbing tightly to the cable he had previously embedded in the floor.     There was a crash, a crack and then the world exploded around him. Brotus gave a brief scream as he managed to lock his fingers onto the window frame, a growing crack appearing in the glass behind him where the centre section had been knocked out.

Ranth attached the cable to his belt. Moving across the room, Ranth could just hear the warrior screaming curses at the Jedi, their forefathers and their potential fatherless ancestors. Something snapped and he struggled over to the window, rage forming an icy fire in his brain. Fighting against the noise Ranth came to within a metre of the warrior and started screaming back at him, accentuating each word with a kick to the warriors fingers.

   “I am not a Jedi! I am a bounty hunter!”

Ranth’s last phrase and the kick that occurred with it knocked the Ki-Ki commander once more into the window. Brotus was held fast by the suction from the hole in the plexi-glass, then the room became momentarily quiet and Ranth watched Brotus’ remaining arm get sucked into the hole, tearing sounds of bone and flesh almost deafening as the powerful suction shredded his limb away.  Brotus’s howls of pain were feral and wild, but Ranth couldn’t contain a smile as he walked towards the Ki-Ki and leaned in close.

   “That’s for making things difficult.” He rasped as he hit the emergency shield and stood back as the metal shutters slammed down like a guillotine, removing Brotus’ arm at the shoulder and casting him into unconsciousness. Ranth stepped back and collapsed on the floor.  For the first time that day he suddenly realised just how close he had come to death. Another grin spread across his face as he picked up the still body of his captured bounty and noticed the man standing impassively in the doorway.

   “Hello Blake.”

The Crossroads

2002 short story by Louis Turfrey

Thirty-eight years after Episode IV – A New Hope

Histories – The true return of Tar Ranth, meeting up with Jan Lomona and being prepared to ignore the evil force user Aaron De’Athe in order to get to his prey, Ki-Ki commander Brotus.  Showing much of the ruthless nature of previous Ranths, this Louis Turfrey tale cements the return of Ranth to Setnin, and the fray that is the Ki-Ki/Setnin War.

Cast of Characters

Tar Ranth

Blake De’Athe

Commander Brotus

Aaron De’Athe

Jan Lomona

Blake De’Athe