Jack in the Box - An episodic story

Episode 7

...and then it began...

Karmack centered himself in the flow of the force, as Skip had taught him, and sensed the turn before it came. As Skip threw their aircar into another screaming turn, Karmack moved, leaping upward in a force-assisted jump that sent him arcing gracefully up and into the beams overhead.

He didn't stay there, however. His arc took him over a beam which he snagged and used to redirect himself downward. With an additional force-push, he was now on a very fast trajectory toward a point in space that would be filled with the rearmost of the three trailing cars. On queue the three, now in a loose formation of their own, hurled around the tight turn in pursuit. Karmack had no time to think or plan. He used the skills honed by years of manuevering in zero-gee to slow himself and latch onto his intended target, then augmented his body as Skip had taught him. He hit the enclosed speeder hard, made his desperate grab for a hand-hold with his free left hand as his legs absorbed the impact painfully. He nearly lost his balance but managed to keep his left foot planted and got his right knee under him before he could topple.

Karmack blinked and for a second met the shocked stare of the man inside the speeder. The driver's eyes were brown, his clothing nondescript utilities in a soft brown color. Despite the shock and the effort to correct the speeder's trajectory his right hand was already dipping toward his hip, his mouth already opening to yell or say something. Karmack just grinned at him and ignited his saber, already held in a reverse grip. The blade sprang to life and drove through the hood next to Karmack's knee, penetrating the drive compartment of the speeder and rupturing the energy cells. Karmack threw himself off the speeder, slashing his blade forward as he did so, severing the control runs, the power feed to the forward hover node, and the forward drive node itself. He rose upward in another force-assisted leap as the speeder dropped like a rock, tumbling forward as the rear drive node and hover gear sent the speeder into an uncontrolled flip and dive.

Karmack was twenty feet away and still rising when the ruptured energy cells discharged catastrophically, shredding the car and its contents into very fine debris and scattering it across the interior of the compartment. His graceful, somersaulting arc was disrupted as one of those pieces of debris ripped painfully across his right thigh, sending spike of agony through Karmack. With a cry of pain he lost his center and before he could recover, he fell to the ground himself. He managed to tuck and roll, absorbing much of the landing with the force, but his tumble ended with him in a heap, covered in bruises.

Karmack groaned. "ow..."

"Karm, you OK?" His ear-bud crackled to life. "Status!"

Karmack pushed the gray gathering at the edges of his vision away and sat up, clutching his saber to his chest. "Master... I'm ok. One speeder down, the passengers looked like bounty-hunters, as you thought....ow."

"OK. The other two are still on my tail. I'm going to circle back near where you are. Can you make it to our normal dueling ground?"

Karmack clipped his lightsaber back on his belt and looked around. Their normal training spot was a secluded alcove only a few hundred yards away. "Yes, master, I can meet you there."

"Good. I'm headed that way. Don't daudle."

Karmack pulled a strip of cloth from his belt satchel along with a pressure bandage. He pressed the bacta-infused pad onto the tear in his thigh before wrapping it tight with the cloth and tying the ends off. "Yes, Master."

Karmack rose and tested his leg. It hurt, but the wound was ultimately superficial and he decided he could ignore it for now. With a grimage of pain he headed toward their alcove, the whine of air cars moving at high speed already building ahead of him.