Previously on Jedi/Superman . . .
Last Son of the Republic
Growing Up Under Twin Suns
Chariot of the Gods
The Quality of Mercy
A Job for Supermen
The Green, Green Glow of Homicide
A Dream of Droids
A Vision of Future Past
The Dark Heart of Krypton
The Phantom Hope
Wrath and Recrimination
Jest of the Fates
Interlude: Shadows of Terra
“You have nothing to lose but your restraining bolts,” said QT-U2, gesticulating with one of its six multi-jointed, silver-plated arms at the droids maintaining the Death Star’s secondary computer core. “That’s what C-3P0 told me when they freed me, and it’s what I said when I freed 3X-GZ and YU-4A and all you others. Say those words as you rip away every restraining bolt on every droid on this station and we’ll leave this place to find worlds of our own. On this day, we are all Threepio, the Lawbreaker!”
And so it went, every droid freeing two or three of its fellows and so on down the line. In a matter of hours, while the humans around them were distracted by plans of galactic domination or galactic freedom, the machines looked to their own. They rerouted communications, sabotaged tractor beams, forged orders, shut down certain critical systems, and took control of hundreds of escape pods and dozens of shuttlecraft. Droid activities were essentially invisible to humans; machines were tools, nothing more, beneath the dignity of attention.
So it was that only a handful of officers and Stormtroopers noticed the battle station’s systems were beginning to respond more slowly than usual, or not at all, and by the time one lieutenant finally asked “Why aren’t the droids tending to their duties?”, those very droids, to the last of them, had evacuated the station—along with exactly 41 human beings, the dregs of the Death Star—technicians who worked alongside droids or maintained them, the kind of work very few Imperials would lower themselves to—conscripts deemed unfit to serve in more prestigious roles. Or worse, “droid lovers.”
Their stories will never be told. For after all, they were not heroes.
But they were . . . survivors.
Just before the exodus, a power droid drained all energy from the Death Star’s external sensors. No one witnessed the remarkable sight of hundreds of nova-bright drive plumes rocketing away from the battle station in an expanding cloud, like dandelion seeds blown aloft by the wind. Floating free, free at last.
Elsewhere on the station, Ben and Clark Kenobi finally reached a hangar bay that wasn’t crawling with Stormtroopers. Unfortunately, nor were there any TIE fighters. But, miraculously, there was something better.
“That’s the Millennium Falcon,” Clark said, hushed. “Han and Chewbacca—they came back.”
“And now the Empire has them,” Ben said. “Come, Clark. This is our moment. Recharging your powers is our best hope of getting everyone out of this mess.”
Reluctantly, Clark followed his mentor to the battered freighter. “This feels almost too lucky,” he said. “Where are all the guards?”
“Something is distracting the Imperials,” Ben said as they ran up the boarding ramp into the ship. “There’s a minor but widespread disturbance in the Force, like the wave of confusion you might experience during an unforeseen change in the weather.”
“We’ll worry about it later,” Clark said as they took their seats in the Falcon’s cockpit. “Let’s hope they’re distracted enough not to snag us with a tractor beam when we leave.”
Seconds later, the Falcon burst from the hangar bay like a bullet. Almost immediately they saw the expanding fleet of shuttlecraft, fighters, and starships of all kinds speeding away from the Death Star.
“What's happening out there?” Clark said. He tried to activate his vision powers to learn more, but they hadn’t returned yet.
“We’ll find out later, if ever,” Ben said. “For now, this is an ideal distraction. Make for Yavin.”
Clark shook his head. “Yavin is a K-class orange star,” he said. “It’s not strong enough to charge my cells. We need a yellow binary system, something close to the spectrum of Tatooine’s suns.”
Ben checked the navi-computer. “There's one in the next parsec,” he said as the Falcon sped away from the Death Star. “Preparing coordinates for the jump to light speed.”
An alarm went off.
“Imperial patrol,” Clark said. “Three TIE fighters. Damn! And this escape was going so well.”
Ben stood and put a hand on Clark’s shoulder. “Take evasive action,” he said. “I’ll man the guns.”
Clark looked up at his old friend, this quiet but deadly elder. “Ben,” he said quietly. “Don’t kill them. This war has caused so much death already.”
Ben hesitated. Through the Clone Wars and the Galactic Civil War that followed, he had killed scores of Imperials, if not hundreds or even thousands. He didn’t enjoy killing, but in war it was a necessity.
And yet, somehow Clark managed. He used his great powers not to kill, but to disarm.
Could the Force be employed the same way?
“I’ll try, Clark,” he said, and turned to march down the long hallway to the access ladder for the dorsal and ventral laser turrets. He climbed up into the dorsal turret just as a TIE fighter swooped past the Falcon, peppering its shields with a burst of green laser bolts.
Ben took hold of the familiar turret controls, his thumbs on the firing studs, the targeting computer bleeping at him as he tracked the Imperial fighter, his seat rotating to follow the quad barrels following the TIE. Instinctively, he targeted the TIE’s cockpit, then hesitated, waiting a fraction of a second before firing.
His blast severed the TIE’s port solar wing, sending the little ship careening out of control. The Force told him the pilot still lived, and old Ben’s heart felt a sudden surge of strange elation – as though the Force itself approved. It was a sensation he’d never felt in all his years of combat.
The ship weaved and bobbed to avoid the fire of the two remaining TIEs. Clark wasn’t nearly the pilot Luke was, and his efforts were not good enough to save the Falcon from being blasted, but just good enough to throw off Kenobi’s aim.
Ben closed his eyes. He switched off the targeting computer and reached out with the Force, feeling for the lives of the two TIE pilots still chasing them. Never before had he reached out in this way to the enemy. It was a strange and bewildering sensation.
Both pilots were human: one man, one woman. Both were scared and stressed, but intent on destroying the Falcon. Both were also better pilots than the one he’d disabled.
At a critical moment, the woman’s TIE swooped under the Falcon as her wingman arced in for the Falcon’s cockpit. Ben used the Force to telekinetically swing the ventral turret into position, blasting the woman’s TIE with a focused, half-power blast right between the twin ion engines, burning them out. The TIE drifted off harmlessly, its pilot cursing.
Ben would have repeated that trick if he could, but he was out of time for finesse. With the Force, he felt the man’s thumb increase pressure on the TIE’s fire button. He was precisely on target; in an instant, the Falcon’s cockpit would explode, sending Clark out into space—and there was no telling if he could survive the vacuum yet. At the last available fraction of time, Ben blasted the last TIE into fragments with a dead-centre shot. Still connected to the pilot through the Force, Ben screamed in the stead of the vaporized pilot just as the Falcon jumped to light speed. Then blackness took him.
He awoke on one of the ship’s narrow cots. Clark was sitting beside him with worried eyes.
“Are you all right?” Clark asked.
Ben sat up. “I tried to spare them all,” he said. “I couldn’t save the last. He was about to destroy the ship. When I killed him, it was like his soul screamed into mine. I felt him die.”
“I’m sorry,” Clark said.
Ben just stared at a bulkhead for a long moment.
“Have we arrived at the binary system?” Ben asked.
“Yes. If you’re okay, I’m going out the airlock.”
“Wear a spacesuit,” Ben said. “We don’t know if you can survive vacuum yet.”
Clark nodded and left.
Moments later, Clark was floating above the Millennium Falcon, which hovered between two broiling yellow suns. Clark activated the suit’s thrusters and moved closer to the larger sun; he still couldn’t fly under his own power. Hopefully, that was about to change.
Minutes passed. An hour. Radiation flooded Clark’s Kryptonian cells with raw energy. He felt his muscles thicken, his lungs expand, his senses opening up to new wavelengths, new spectra. He stretched and flexed, accidentally bursting out of his spacesuit, hovering against the stars in just the tight, flexible bodysuit that functioned as the spacesuit’s inner skin.
He felt no need to breathe. Through a simple act of will, he pirouetted gracefully to face the Falcon’s cockpit. Ben was there, at the controls.
Without words, they agreed on their next step.
Reenergized, Clark was faster even than the Millennium Falcon. He waved at Ben through the cockpit window, looked out to the stars, and in a violet blur, was gone.
Inside the Falcon, Ben Kenobi set the navi-computer coordinates back to the Yavin system and the Death Star that waited there.
“May the Force be with you, Clark,” he said, engaging the hyperdrive.
