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The sound of a light shattering not far away alerted Obi-Wan to how close it was.
They were stuck inside this ship together. Alone. Dead in space.
No one was coming to save them. Not that he would want them to. Obi-Wan Kenobi can save himself, thank-you very much. He always has, he always will.
Boba's breath was warm on his neck from where he's pressed up against Obi-Wan's back. If Boba had been just a couple years younger, Obi-Wan could have imagined the young boy clasping his arms around Obi-Wan's torso, trying to seek comfort in any way he could. As it was, Obi-Wan was surprised Boba had gotten as close to Obi-Wan as he had.
“Do you think it saw us?” Boba whispered, his slight breath moved the hair behind Obi-Wan's ear irritatingly.
“I hope not,” Obi-Wan whispered back. He would use the Force to try to ascertain where that horrific creature is, but he is having a hard time making shape of it with his abilities. It seemed to slither and slip away from him any time Obi-Wan's senses got close to it. And Obi-Wan was worried about arousing its attention if he gripped it too tightly with his senses. Whatever it was, it seemed to have a slight Force sensitivity.
There was a quiet creak of leather as Boba tightened his hold on his laser pistol, but Obi-Wan wasn't judging him. Obi-Wan himself was unconsciously gripping his lightsaber tightly, and had to force himself to relax his grip. His reflexes won't help them if his muscles are frozen tight in terror.
Whatever it was had invaded the ship when a specialized clone squad of 14 men had docked with the light cruiser Obi-Wan had been on. They had been on a top secret mission to gather intelligence about a planet the separatists seemed to have a keen interest in. The landing party had come back up in a hurry, scared of something they'd seen on the ground. And whatever it was, they had brought it with them.
Apparently Boba had been stowing away on the cruiser since the last refueling station they'd stopped at before making the jump to this system. Boba had received wrong information that the light cruiser had been on its way to meet up with Mace, and he'd snuck on board in another attempt to get revenge on the man who killed his father. So now the young teen was stuck in this situation alongside Obi-Wan.
And stuck they were. With the ship dead in space and without a crew or the means to protect themselves. Seeing it kill and then start to ingest all but one of the 16 clones aboard had been horrifying and excruciating to witness. Obi-Wan had tried to hurt it, tried to protect his men to no avail. Now the only clone left alive on the ship was in the medbay, in a coma after he'd hit his head during the landing team's emergency docking. They needed to get to the man and protect him before the creature got to him too.
There was a loud scraping sound down the hall from the closet they'd squished themselves into.
“I'm gonna die,” Boba whispered to himself. “I'm going to die and I never got to look Windu in the eye and let him see what he did to me when he killed my buir.”
Obi-Wan reached his hand back and clasped Boba's smaller hand tightly, trying to get him to be quiet.
A soft, sliding squelch echoed through the corridor. It sounded closer than before.
Obi-Wan had never seen anything like that thing before. It was almost as if it had one goal only: to consume every living organism in its path. It seemed to drain energy cells and eat up fuel too.
They were stuck here and he had no idea what to do. What the fuck could they do?
Obi-Wan took a slow, shuddering breath, trying to gather his thoughts. “Maybe we can lead it to the cargo hold. Open the external cargo door and jettison it into space. It probably can't live without an atmosphere.”
“How are we gonna open the door? That... thing,” Boba hissed the word in disgust, “somehow drained the whole ship of power.”
“There should be an emergency power cell for that door that we can use in the case of ship power failure. It's a safety measure in case you crash land on one of these ships.”
“But what about supplies? Everything we have that could help us live, would then be drifting through space. Even if we jettison that thing and it dies, we're still gonna need those supplies to survive until we're rescued.”
“Fine,” Obi-Wan bit out. “You go to the cargo hold. Get out as much as you can, place it in a closet near the hold, and I'll try to lead it around the ship. I might be able to give you 10 minutes.”
“Alright,” Obi-Wan heard Boba swallow thickly, the sound of his throat working just below Obi-Wan's ear.
“I'll go out first, you hide until I've distracted it away and then run for the cargo hold as fast as you can.”
Boba nodded into the back of the jetti's shirt.
“In three, two, one—” Kenobi pushed open the closet door and exposed himself to the creature, which was lumbering slowly down the hallway towards where they were hidden.
Boba helped the door swing back shut, hoping the creature hadn't noticed him.
There was a loud screech outside the door, and he heard Kenobi's feet running away. The floor of the ship shook at the creature pounded away, giving chase.
Boba took a deep breath, trying to remember his buir's face one last time, but the memory of him was foggy.
Boba mourned the memory of his father almost as much as he mourned the man himself. All he had left of the man was a set of armor that didn't fit and enough bad memories of Jango’s last days to last a lifetime.
Boba quietly pushed open the door and looked up and down the hall. It was quiet and dark, but Boba wasn't sure if that mattered. A few dim, red emergency lights were still burning, but the creature seemed attracted to light and sound and had done something to many of them that broke them.
Boba took off running towards the cargo hold, hoping Kenobi was as good as his word about distracting the creature. He was trying to run as quietly and quickly as possible. He would do his best not to attract attention from the creature. Seeing those men be eaten alive by it might be one of the most horrible things he'd ever witnessed. At least his father's death had been over quickly.
Obi-Wan ran, panting, trying not to draw too much on the Force. The creature seemed to get even more excited when he had used the Force to try and shove it off his men. And the push had rebounded on Obi-Wan instead.
He was in great physical condition, and adrenaline was pumping through his veins, allowing him to keep going.
The creature suddenly paused and let out a loud roar.
Obi-Wan stopped in his tracks and turned, staring down at its black goo face. There were no eyes, it seemed to be an amorphous slimy black mass that somehow skittered along on tiny, sticky legs.
They were near the hallway that turned off from the main route through the ship and headed towards the medbay.
Suddenly the creature made a turn and began to head down the side hallway. In the medbay, the last clone trooper left alive still lay in there, unconscious.
“No!” Obi-Wan cried out, not sure what to do. His lightsaber hadn’t hurt it, Force-push rebounded, getting too close to it meant certain death.
In a fit of panic, Obi-Wan picked up a light fixture that had broken and fallen to the floor and threw it at the creature.
The creature paused and roared even louder. It really didn’t like that.
It bounded back again after Obi-Wan, and Obi-Wan had to turn and run as fast as he could. It was gaining on him.
At one point it caught the edge of Obi-Wan’s robe and Obi-Wan stumbled, trying desperately to get out of it.
He watched, over his shoulder, horrified as the creature gobbled up the material.
Obi-Wan was able to lead the creature through the hallways in two loops around the long hallways of the ship before Obi-Wan’s energy began to wane. He wasn’t sure if he could last another loop. The creature was behind him every step of the way.
“Boba!” He shouted, letting the Force carry his voice down the hallway. “I can’t hold it off any longer, I’m coming to you! Ready the emergency battery for the cargo door! I’ll lead it there!”
The creature let out a squelching growl and tried to increase its pace, the sticky goop of its body trying to catch onto Obi-Wan’s nerf-leather boots.
Finally, the open door of the cargo hold appeared in his view, and Obi-Wan raced through it, the creature nipping at his heels.
Obi-Wan could see the edge of Boba hiding behind a box in the hallway, ready for them to pass by them into the cargo hold.
As soon as Boba saw the creature enter the hold fully, he slid the door shut and hit the emergency release, just outside the door.
The hold opened and the rush of the vacuum of space began to suck out everything in the hold, including Obi-Wan and the creature.
Obi-Wan let himself freefall towards the door, the creature following behind. Obi-Wan could feel it using the Force slightly to aim itself towards Obi-Wan. It was like its instinct for self preservation was gone in the face of its hunger.
He could only hope that his grasp of the Force was stronger than the creature’s.
As Obi-Wan neared the door, he waited until the very last second possible to make a strong Force push against the wall, ricocheting his body towards the walls of the hold. He grasped onto a pipe and pulled himself in, watching as the creature didn’t have enough power to correct itself and fell out into the cold of space.
“Boba!” He shouted into the rushing vacuum, not sure if the teen could hear him. “Close the door! Close the door!”
Miraculously, Boba must have heard him, because the cargo bay door began to haltingly close.
Once it closed, the door to the hallway was wrenched open manually. With the cargo door closed and the hallway door open, the atmosphere of the ship began to flood the cargo bay and Obi-Wan lowered his feet to the ground.
“Is it gone?” Boba asked, looking around in the dark hold, only a couple small emergency lights still glowing.
“Yes,” Obi-Wan panted, letting go of the pipe and clutching his hands in the fabric of his leggings. “It’s gone.”
The two of them were in the dark medbay, trying to check the unconscious clone’s vitals.
“His heartbeat is steady. That’s something, at least,” Obi-Wan whispered, his fingers pressed to the man’s neck. “Shiver, I think his name is.”
“Well we’re all gonna start shivering soon,” Boba bit back. “That kriffing creature ate through most of the secondary emergency life support.”
Obi-Wan sighed. “Well then we need to find a way to set up an emergency beacon with one of the emergency batteries it didn’t drain. And then the three of us will need to find the most insulated place in the ship to hold up until someone comes for us.”
Boba scoffed, there was the quiet sound of rustling as Boba seemed to fold his arms. “Do you actually think someone is gonna come for us?”
“I’m hopeful. I think–”
Obi-Wan cut himself off as the ship began to rock as if it had been pounced on by a krayt dragon.
“What the fuc–” Boba cursed as he was thrown into a nearby medical cot.
A loud, angry scream split the quiet.