 
STAR WARS: LIBERATION AND REDEMPTION

By

Travis Barr

Chapter 1

The vicious and tiny freighter smacked itself out into normal space and time. It had been journeying through the hyper reality of lightspeed for the better part of two days before reaching its current destination—three sectors outside the Anoat system. Its sentient brain center was a young bounty hunter by the name of Bousch Ardian. Bousch had not travelled here to this remote part of the galaxy on some whim, a simple sojourn of the star-muddled void in hopes of something new and unexpected. Bousch was not on vacation or basking in time off. The hunter was hunting. And the mark was close.

Close but unforeseeable, housed somewhere in the faux-gravity-secured halls of one of the myriad of convoyed ships coasting in front of Bousch's freighter. Theoretically, the mark, the bounty could be on any one of the massive cruisers or frigates in the convoy. But the hunter had been informed from the initial employer that the bounty had been wounded—a hand had been severed. That meant that the target would have been sent to the medical ship for bio-prosthetic hand replacement and therapy. The robotic hand had most likely been attached by this time, but the employer knew (as well as Bousch did) that the patient would be ordered to stay close to medical for at least seven days for extensive observation, in case the melding of organic and synthetic structures suffered a molecular rejection. Or there was a malfunction of the circuitry.

In any case, the young yet focused hunter would start with the medical frigate, trusting that the true employer was correct in his assumptions. Most likely it was true, the loss of the hand had only happened four days ago.

It had only been a split second since Bousch had arrived on the scene and already was firing on the elongated, booster-heavy medical frigate. Not repeatedly and not with laser blasts; with a metallic projectile, disc-like in shape and painted deathly black. It met its intended target—the hull near the frigate's docking bay entrance gap. It did not explode upon impact, merely attached its flatted side to the walling, then flashed electrical-blue tendrils, crooked and searching, from its circular edge. This all happened in another split fraction of time. In the next instant, a massive spread of the energy shielding over the gap materialized, scrambled, then dissipated rapidly. The shield was disarmed, gone.

And immediately after it vanished, the hunter's vessel shot through the bay opening, its landing gear already lowering and locking into position. Just as it cleared the gaping door, a backup metallic barrier slid down with enormous speed and force.

Inside the bay, seven crewers, all with disoriented, shocked expressions on their faces, were flung towards the new barrier between them and the cold fire of space. Had the barrier come shoving down a second later, all seven would have been vacuumed out into the void, into certain death. Immediately after crashing into the barrier, they plummeted into the metallic flooring, no longer feeling the sucking pull of depressurization. They hit the floor with thuds and "oomph's!"

Bousch had already landed. The sleek and compact ship the hunter inhabited rested comfortably among the various inert ships and equipment. It waited. Waited for what it knew would come in the next few seconds.

Three seconds later, armed soldiers—protective guards—exploded into the massive bay and took up perimeter positions around the intruding vessel. All had their weapons poised and ready for any hostile movement from their "gate crasher."

Strapped to one of the wrists of the lead guard, a communicator "shrrted." A transmission-distorted voice inquired, "Lieutenant, can you report?" The lieutenant released an arm from gripping his weapon and brought the wrist comm closer to his mouth. He responded, "Center, ship has landed...no movement or communication thus far...stand by." He yanked the arm back to a clasp of the weapon again. No sooner had he done this, movement from the ship _did_ happen...from the hull's side structures, circular hatches no bigger than three inches in diameter slid open and delivered forth metallic, glinting spheres onto the floor. Instinctively, the guards tensed and backed away, eyeing the spheres with lid-widening fear.

Instead of bouncing, however, the spheres merely stuck to the flooring, glued to where they landed.

The lieutenant began with haste, "Gren—!"

The spheres erupted with instant and consuming light before anyone could leap or run. But there were no white scalding projectiles of piercing flame and shrapnel.

Flash bombs.

All were blinded, and some even dropped there weapons to strap both hands to their light-needled and blinded eyes. Most of them screamed in violent surprise.

"Flash bombs! Just flashes!" the lieutenant hollered to the others. He had his eyes pressed together with great force but could still see throbbing light engulfing his vision. "Can anyone see?!"

"No" came back from all his men. The after-light in his eyes was dampening to a sickening purple and he made a few blinking attempts to open his eyes. Still, the only sight he was allowed was the same ill color. Slowly, however, grayish, ghosting outlines of objects about him began to materialize. Soon, they took more elaborate shape and texture; true colors of the masses ebbed back into his sight. He could now make out the full reality of his surroundings—just in time to hear a meshed metal plating clang to the floor. He looked upward briskly, as did his men, to one specific point in the high walling of the bay. A rectangular chasm used for ventilation just had a booted leg disappear into it.

Bousch was on the move.

"How did he get up there?!" a guard inquired with confusion and alarm.

"Must've had a grappler," the lieutenant said as he brought the wrist comm up again. "Center, intruder is on the move! Do you track?!" And the comm came back, "On site, we track. Intruder is using air ducts to move. Proceed to sector four to intercept." "Copy, center." The lieutenant motioned his men to follow him quickly out of the bay. Shaking their heads to aid in equilibrium and blinking repeatedly, they rushed to trail their leader.

They have more direct paths, Bousch knew; the guards would intercept soon. But that was fine. The hunter knew this ship's design after studying its schematics for four hours during hyperspace travel. Knew that the sublevels could be reached before the guards could be in a position to block movements. Once in the sublevels, the hunter would be able to stand upright and move forward quicker.

Almost there...one more turn, one more duct to crouch down and shuffle forth in...

...And _there_ was the meshed plating which, when removed, would allow access to the sublevels. The hunter shifted then kicked the plate three times. Being of very thin and malleable metal, the plating blistered with the succession of kicks and tore from the duct completely. It dovetailed to the flooring, clacked and shimmied, rested. Bousch eased through the gap created and plopped to the floor feet first. Instantly, she was on the move again.

This had better be it, Bousch thought, the mark better be on this ship. Because if he wasn't, it was highly unlikely that another infiltration was possible—to say nothing about escaping out of here alive. He had just better be here.

Bousch reached a junction where it was now possible to go four ways: right, left, ahead, and back. Bousch halted in the center of the junction and reached into a pouch of the backpack the hunter was carrying. Three devices were produced, activated, then tossed gently into the air. They did not fall to the floor but floated in mid-air (roughly at Bousch's eye level). They stayed in a loose grouping for a second then dispersed down three of the passageways (right, front, and left) while Bousch whirled and backtracked. The hunter was careful to trot at a fair approximation of the rate of speed that the decoy devices were now coasting. The ruse must be convincing.

As Bousch traveled and plotted, a certain thought kept gnawing away within: _You had better be here, Luke Skywalker..._

Though his arm still throbbed with a maddeningly dull ache, Luke stormed with force down the corridors leading to the frigate's bridge. At his speed-demon's rate, he would reach it in a matter of seconds.

Wonder what's going on, he manically worried as he joltingly sprinted forth. Imperials? Some sort of pirate raid? Luke had no clue for certain, only the rumored rumblings of fellow officers he intermittently encountered in the last five minutes. Whatever it was, he determined, I have to help. My arm be damned. The pain resulting from the operation was considerably less than actually losing the hand anyway. He would survive, and he could still be effective in aiding his friends. He still felt the Force and Yoda had taught him well.

"... _But incomplete is your training, Luke!"_

Yoda's voice rang back to him, even now in his mad dash and frenzied state, bringing a twinge of sobering doubt.

But not enough to stop him.

"Leia, what's happening?!" Luke bellowed as he sprung into the bridge and halted to face the bothered and tense princess. She eyed him with the same intensity. "You're supposed to be in medical, Luke."

The bridge was like an angry ant hive with men and women walking fast, even running this way and that. All except Rieekan, Leia, and C-3PO. They were glued visually to the tactical screen that was tracking the hunter...or hunters as the representational blips now indicated.

"Perhaps they were grouped quite close together, and now they are finally separating," Threepio commented, suggested to the others.

"It's a possibility," Rieekan allowed. "But I think it's more likely that there's only one, and that the other three are decoys of some kind."

"If so," Leia added, "then it seems like the tactics of a mercenary or a bounty hunter."

"But which is the real one?" Threepio asked.

"No way of telling," Rieekan concluded. "We'll have to send men after each one."

Leia turned to Threepio. "Inform the detail to seek out every target."

"Yes, your highness." Threepio walked away to a comm panel. As he did, Luke joined the group. "How did they get aboard?"

"And why aren't you resting up in medical?" Leia scolded. "You shouldn't be here—"

"I'm fine, I feel fine," Luke assured with a brisk nodding. His arm was killing him, but he did have mobility throughout the hybrid appendage. Reflexes were on par with the rest of his physical form. So far the bionics had been receiving his neural impulses with the proper efficiency.

Leia, from hearing the medical droid give her the status report, already knew all of this.

But still she felt overly protective and motherly toward Luke and his present condition. Especially since Han had been ripped from her life.

"One is down," Threepio announced. "A decoy. A floating drone from the report."

"Then they'll be two more," Rieekan surmised.

Another inaudible report through the comm. Threepio repeated it. "The other two drones have been destroyed. The detail is now converging on the remaining target."

Luke turned while saying, "I'm going to help them out."

But Leia made him turn back and halt with, _"Why?"_

"Because I have a feeling this has something to do with me."

"If that's true and it _is_ a bounty hunter, then that's all the more reason for you to stay out of this. Let the others handle—"

"But what if they can't and this _is_ about me? Do I just let them die on my account? I have to go..."

They stared at each other, Luke expecting; Leia contemplating with reluctance.

"... _Fine,"_ Leia relented, but as Luke spun back around to exit hastily, she warned to him, "But be extra careful! These hunters usually get what they're after!"

"I will!" he hollered with unfocused reassurance as he ran. The next instant he was gone from the room.

Unconscious, Luke determined as he kneeled down to check the vital signs of a guard sprawled on a sublevel corridor floor. Not dead, thank goodness. Whoever this intruder was, Luke thought, they weren't sloppy. They had a specific, determined purpose; they were professional and well trained. Leia was right, I should be extremely cautious from now on.

Luke spoke softly into his wrist comm. "Center, our men have been stunned. Do you have a location of the intruder?" And Leia's voice came through the comm, "Heading towards medical, just short of junction five." "Copy," Luke acknowledged then proceeded forth.

Just short of junction six, Luke caught up with the hunter. He cautiously rounded a corner and came from behind to point his pistol at the back of the intruder—who, for some reason, seemed to be casually walking the corridor, as if no-one would dare attempt a pursuit.

"Intruder, halt!" Luke barked at the hunter, who froze at the harsh command. "Slowly turn around with your hands raised!" And the hunter did exactly that.

And now Luke got a clear look at the intruder's armored uniform and enclosing helmet. The head gear revealed nothing of the hunter's true appearance, instead it presented a leathery, jutting mouth piece under a dark yet glossy slat of an eye visor. Two tiny parallel lines of flickering light flashed from the visor at opposing intervals. The outfit favored desert-like tones of color—beiges and browns; the helmet followed suit in its tone.

Tatooine?

Focus, Luke.

"Slowly approach me..." Luke instructed, and the identity-concealed figured did so. Once the bizarrely-clad hunter got within five feet distance from Luke, he halted. At this distance it was now easy to see that the man was shaking in his hands... "Now just relax, I'm not going to har—"

And then the helmet spoke in an alien rattle, "Sir, I'm sorry—"

Then Luke joltingly sensed it—a spiderous presence leaping out from behind him. He abruptly tensed his body in a jerking attempt to whirl and attack, but it was an instant too late. The figure already whipped and wrapped an arm around Luke's chest, under the arms. The figure's other arm, its hand, had a snub pistol jammed and pressed to Luke's temple. From very close behind Luke's head, a female voice curtly ordered, "No struggling. Fight me and you die. Then he dies. Say yes."

"Yes," Luke said, unblinking.

"Guard, leave now or he dies."

The Rebel guard hesitated to move. "C-commander?" he said, voice still distorted.

"Do what she says," Luke ordered. "Go find the others."

The guard removed the helmet and his voice returned to normal. "Yes sir, I'm sorry, sir..." He was backing up, quicker and quicker.

"It wasn't your fault," Luke soothed. The guard finally turned and ran off. Luke's eyes shifted to the side where the gun's muzzle seemed glued to his temple. He spoke to the hunter behind him. "You're here for me, aren't you?"

"Does it seem that obvious?" Bousch replied, taunting.

"Vader hired you, didn't he?"  
"Not directly but yes, now KEEP QUIET."

She pulled him back, into the shadows.

"The intruder has Luke!" the guard manically exclaimed as he burst into the bridge to face Leia, Rieekan, and Threepio. The harried Rebel guard was still wearing Bousch's outfit but the helmet was off.

"Then they'll be making their way back to the ship to escape," Rieekan concluded.

Leia added, "And we'll have to let them or the hunter will seriously harm Luke. Blast it, I never should have let him go."

"Stay focused, princess," Rieekan directed. "We have to come up with a plan."

"Any ideas?"

"Nothing solid. But we can at least put armed men in the bay to block the hunter's escape, possibly reason with him—"

"Her," the guard interrupted. "It's not a he, it's a she."

Everyone had been ordered to clear the corridors—particular adjoining the docking bay. There were to be no possible surprises or misinterpreted movements from any personnel that could conceivably get Luke injured.

Thus, Bousch was free to drag Luke along without hindrance or interruption. Nevertheless, the bounty hunter, being consistently cautious, kept her back pressed against the walls, as if her body suit was made of magnet. She slid along sidestepping briskly, halting, sidestepping, halting, repeating. Soon, they had reached the opening to the docking bay, but stopped just short of it.

"All right, Skywalker," Bousch began, "you know what's waiting for us in there, don't you?"

"Armed men," Luke said flatly, successfully keeping his calm.

"That's right. So you're going to do all the talking. You're going to convince them to stand down and let us leave. Or you're going to start having body parts incinerated. Starting with your ears."

"Understood."

"Let's go."

And with that, she quickly yanked him around so that they could be exposed to the hangar bay—and the armed Rebels inside it. But Luke, of course, was still positioned in front, Bousch in back of him, still holding a firm grip and gun to his head. At the very first sight of the two, the guards tensed their weapons, pointing them forth. But none of them had a clear shot at Bousch.

"Men," Luke started in a calm but commanding voice, "It's all right, you can lower your weapons."

The leader of the guards countered with, "We can't let her take you, sir."

"It's all right, I promise you. And besides, I'm giving you a direct order. Lower your weapons to the ground—"

Abruptly, Luke was bent back and to his slight right by Bousch. Caught off guard by this move, Luke's eyes tensed, his brow drew in— _what is she doing?_ But then it became clear. "Corporal, safety your rifle and drop it to the floor."

From further up, where the venting shaft gap was built into the walling—the same one Bousch travelled through—a Rebel sharpshooter was crouched near the opening, pointing a long, slim rifle at Luke's position.

"Corporal," Luke barked with a bit of force.

The corporal lowered his aim and clicked a latch on the weapon, thus rendering it unfireable. With no haste, he let it fall to the floor and clatter briefly.

Bousch pulled Luke back to their original position, but pressed her pistol a little harder to his temple. Luke knew what this meant—" _Men, your weapons..._ trust me..."

None of the guards ahead had lowered their aims yet. But now they had finally deemed it necessary to comply with Luke's demands. They slowly lowered their guns to the floor then came back up to raise their hands in the air. Luke added, "Now step aside." Again, slowly, they broke their formation and moved off towards Luke's left, allowing a clear passage to Bousch's ship.

Bousch now turned Luke to his left a bit so that he still was the primary visual for the guards. Then she forced him to move forward in an angled sidestepping. A straight path to Bousch's ship. As they moved, the guard leader offered to the hunter, "We can pay you more than what the bounty is worth. Much more." Nothing from Bousch but the same forward movement—closer and closer to her ship. A personal proximity sensor must have been alerted for the freighter's hatch slid aside, awaiting entry. Closer now, only six or seven more side-steps...

And Luke closed his eyes in calm focus, meditative...

From a maintenance cart ten feet away and behind the two sidesteppers, a metallic tool began to levitate. It held in a floating position for a second, then soared straight across to bang Bousch in the back of her head. The force of the hit was not enough to cause death or permanent damage.

But it did hurt enough to disorient and distract.

Her guns aim swung away as she emitted a small husky scream. Luke instantly took advantage of the disruption and grabbed for the gun to disarm. But Bousch had recovered, chopping her free hand into Luke's side portion of his neck. A shooting pain exploded into Luke's brain and he winced, clenching his teeth. In the next instant, Bousch brought the gun, with Luke's arm still clutching it, and rammed it into the side of Luke's skull. He staggered forth and bent, leeching his hands to his head just above the ear. With a sharp, extending kick, the hunter sent Luke sprawling to the floor. She aimed her pistol straight at his heart—

FLASH!—a ring of fluorescent, opal-blue energy hit the hunter, fast engulfing her before disappearing. A split second later she crumpled to the floor, her gun slipping from her grasp. Bousch was fully unconscious now.

The guard leader, who had reclaimed his weapon and stunned Bousch only a second before, still had his gun trained on the downed hunter, just in case. He ordered his men, "Check on the commander."

They rushed to Luke's sides and brought hands to him for possible support. One said, "Are you all right, sir?" With one hand to his head and the other on his waist (at the kick point), Luke confirmed, "I'm okay, I'll survive...quite a kicker..."

As they gingerly helped Luke get to his feet, the guard leader finally lowered his aim, confident that the target was supremely under. He walked closer to the heavily sedated figure lying jack-knifed on the floor and stared down with nervous relief jittering his eyes. He drew in a deep breath, let it out slowly.

"Thank you, lieutenant," Luke said.

The lead guard met Luke's gaze and replied, "Anytime, sir."

What in the blazes just happen? Bousch anguished over as she sat in a barren white room. A wide and thick rectangle of viewing glass made up the top section of one of the room's walls. Through it, Bousch could see she was being observed. Like a caged animal, a curiosity.

"She said that Vader indirectly initiated the contract," Luke mentioned to the others as they stared at Bousch on the other side of the glass.

"That means," Rieekan commented, "she works for an intermediary. Typical for some hunters."

Leia, who stood between Rieekan and Luke, eyed Bousch with immense severity. _You. You damn dirty bounty hunters,_ Leia wanted to scream. _You already took one very important man away from me. You're just lucky you didn't take the other. Because YOU in particular—and Fett—I would probably have to hunt down myself. And kill. Slowly._

Leia felt these words in her mind with an unwavering certainty. But knew better of mentioning it to any one in the room. She was a princess, a senator, and a leader, of course. Not the sort of thing a person holding those important titles was allowed to voice in the presence of anyone. The stare, however, did not go unnoticed by both men on her sides. And she simply didn't need to say anything to fully get her message across.

Bousch merely glared back at Leia in defiance.

But only for a few seconds before she flicked her gaze on Luke. "I had you. We were inches away from my ship—and I _knew_ there was no one behind us...so how did you do it?"

Luke's eyes darted to the side, returned, then he answered, "I have...certain abilities."

"What, you mean like that Force business?"

Luke nodded once slowly.

Bousch's head turned away, her eyebrows drew in, contemplative, confused. "...That doesn't make a bit of sense..."

"Exactly _what_ doesn't make sense?" Rieekan asked.

"...Why send me...why not just send him..."

"Him _who?"_ Luke said.

Bousch looked at Luke again. "Jorman Gaarde. He's a bounty hunter who is subcontracted like me. He has your abilities. Maybe even more than you. His father and mother were supposedly Jedi of old."

It was now Luke's turn to look away, ponder. _Another one like me..._

Placing her mental rage aside for the moment, Leia managed a miraculously calm, "So, of course, it would have made more sense to send him after Luke. That's what you meant."

Bousch nodded but didn't look at Leia at all, merely stared at the floor, eyes searching; her mind still trying to connect the proverbial dots...

And then it hit her.

"This was a set up..." Her eyes went odd with realization and she plopped back in her chair. "...Stupid, Bousch, _stupid..."_

The other three eyed each other on the other end of the glass, the hunter's personal epiphany lost on them entirely.

The hunter could see their confusion and offered, "I _botched_ my last job. So this was punishment. It wasn't even my fault that things went bad—not that it matters to my boss."

Nodding a bit, Rieekan elaborated, "I see now. So either you prove yourself with an assignment that was likely above your talents...or you end up where you are now."

"Waiting to probably get sucked out of an airlock, exactly," Bousch assumed.

Leia stepped forth. "You said your name was Bousch?"

"Yes. You might as well have it since I'm dead anyway."

"Well Bousch, I don't know what you heard about us, but we're not what you think."

"Well what does it matter who you are. I'm dead to the hunters now. No one's going to hire me." And Bousch said no more, only stared at the floor.

Luke's eyes zigzagged— _but what if you succeeded..._ then he locked on Bousch. "But what if you succeeded?"  
Rieekan's brow creased as he turned to Luke. Both Leia's and Bousch's eyes bugged.

"Huh?" Bousch erupted.

"Pardon me?" Leia barked in shock.

Everyone was now staring at Luke, which he anticipated. But now that it was actually happening, he felt hesitant about suggesting what he did. But his current uneasiness could not deter his new course of action.

He quickly wrapped an arm around Leia and led her away from the others. As he did, he entreated, "Listen, listen, just hear me out..." And then he stopped her a few feet away, he faced her head on. "Now—"

"Luke," Leia cut in with intensity, "do not even think what I think you're thinking—"

"Now just hold on," Luke tried in earnest. "Now this—this Jorman Gaarde person is supposed to feel the Force like I do—maybe even stronger like she said. If I can somehow convince him to join us, I may be able to help our cause in ways we haven't even dreamed of."

"Or you could get yourself killed on a fool's errand." She looked away, downward as she numbly continued, "And I lose you, too—"

Adamantly, Luke said, "You won't. I promise."

She raised her head to meet his eyes again. "Who's to say you're even going to have contact with him? What if...he's out on assignment taking weeks to accomplish? The Alliance is going to need your command for the Calamari rescue."

"Hold on." He turned his head to face the hunter. "Bousch, is Gaarde on assignment right now?"

Flatly, Bousch replied, "No, he just returned from one and will likely rest for a while."

Back to Leia. "There, you see."

Leia countered, "That still doesn't guarantee you seeing him. They'll obviously lock you up once you get there. Then you'll be shipped off to Vader."

Luke's eyes darted around rapidly as he searched for solutions in his mind. One came. "I'll bring the droids and stow them aboard her ship. Maybe bring them out one at a time to try and spring me if things get tense..." He lifted his brows in the hopes of selling her on his plan.

Leia's eyes darkened, tightened as if to convey to Luke that he was treading into foolishly dangerous territory. And should know better. Her deepest inclination was to flatly tell him no. Instead, she drew in a breath deep through her nose, let it out the same way, then said, "You're assuming this man feels the good side of the Force..."

"Hey!" Bousch piped up, "When do we leave?"

Leia shook her head a bit, hissing a breath. "Mothma's not going to like this."

"I'll make it up to her," Luke quickly assured, " _and_ you..." His head bobbed forth slightly as his eyebrows rose— _Well? What's the verdict?_

"You're crazy, Luke," Leia had to say.

"Hey, if I wasn't, you wouldn't be here."

And a nervous pair of smiles passed between them.

Chapter 2

He failed again, the Emperor pondered with a growing concern. My apprentice, Lord Vader, whom I've spent the last twenty years grooming to become a Sith master, has failed to accomplish a crucial mission. For the second time.

No, a third time, if he was being thoroughly honest with himself. The first being when Vader failed to retrieve the stolen data plans for the Death Star, thereby allowing the Rebels to study the schematics and determine the station's weak spots. From that they knew how to exploit the design flaws and destroy what the Emperor had spent years constructing.

Vader's second disgrace came when he allowed a single pilot through his defenses to actually blow up the Emperor's prized creation.

And now the third failure in letting that same pilot slip through his grasp—this new threat, only a boy. But rapidly becoming a man and growing more powerful as the months passed.

Failure, failure, failure.

Once Vader could be trusted to overthrow worlds, crushing his enemies with relentless might. Time after time. And even just before things began to fall by the wayside for Vader, he had conquered a planet. Which is why the Emperor was willing to give his fractured apprentice a certain amount of leeway, even after the Death Star's demise.

But now things were becoming embarrassing. Now the Emperor was going to have to come up with a new way to carry on the Sith legacy.

Possibly the boy, Luke Skywalker—whom the Emperor now recognized as not a mere unknown, distant relative but, in fact, Vader's very own son—could be finessed, seduced into becoming the new apprentice.

And why not? Vader's son was younger, far less dismembered, and could possess the potential to become more powerful than his foolish father.

Yes, Vader was once a promising prospect for it seemed he could accomplish anything he set out to do. Yes, he had shown great loyalty to the emperor, even before the black armored wretch had turned to the Dark Side of the Force.

But that was many years ago.

Vader was a friend, true, but only insofar as he could be trusted to perform the commands of his master. The Sith union never allowed any true friendships to flourish, however, and both parties fully recognized their part to play.

Yes. Vader would have to be replaced by his son. But exactly how to bring the younger Skywalker over to the more poisonous (yet exhilarating) side of the Force, was a plan still to be formulated. Certainly the boy's compassion for a family member could be woven into the plot. The Emperor's plans for building a new Death Star (already underway) could certainly play a part as well. But he had no concrete specifics to set the plan in motion.

No matter. He was the Emperor, the Sith master, the consummate strategist. The details would come, would fall into place—like the intricate pieces of a three dimensional puzzle.

It will all come in time, he mused as he stood in the center of his office high above the Coruscant surface. Clarity in eventuality.

But one thing he knew for certain. Vader must fall.

The room's doors slid apart and the secretly reviled apprentice himself entered and glided forward to halt a few feet away from his master. The ebony-caped nightmare bowed and kneeled before his robed and paste-white skinned emperor.

Aren't we a pair...

"Rise," the master calmly commanded in his croaking voice. Vader stood and heard him say, "So, despite your elaborate efforts to ensnare Skywalker, he remains out of your grasp."

Vader attempted to save face with, "A small setback to be sure, my master. As I told you, he will join us or suffer his fate."

"I, of course, have every confidence that you will see this through...however, I'm afraid that this affair, troubling though it is, must wait. I have a new assignment for you that demands your immediate attention."

"A new assignment?"

"Yes...do you foresee a difficulty?" _You had better not..._

"No, my master. Of course not."

"Good. I have authorized the construction of a new Death Star. One with far greater capabilities."

"A wise move, master."

"If at first you don't succeed, crush your enemies with greater success."

"And...you wish me to supervise the construction."

"Ah, you understand," the emperor said with his best manipulative grin. "Perfect. If there is anyone besides myself who can drive the men to their full building capabilities, it has to be you, my old friend."

"Yes, master."

"Splendid. You will leave for the sight in the morning."

"And...what of Skywalker, my master...what is to be done? He grows stronger and stronger. And more of a threat to us than ever before."

"You are using bounty hunters, yes?"

"Yes, but I do not foresee great success with them."

"Then continue to attempt a connection through the Force. Permeate his every thought. Make him _need_ to come to you."

"It will be attempted, master."

" _Do not_ under any circumstances try to track him down yourself. I am counting on you to keep a tight schedule with this new weapon."

"Thy bidding will be done."

Chapter 3

This is living death, Han Solo reflected for what felt like the millionth time. How did I get here, sucked tight in this form-fitted tomb and _conscious_ most of the time. Why would a clever smuggler like myself get caught in the proverbial spider's web? Like a fly who didn't even know he could get caught in one?

Because you've changed, he had to admit to himself. And because when all is said and done, you had no choice.

But is that true? And have you really changed? You still planned to take the money and run, didn't you? To repay your pirate's debt.

Yes but I probably would have returned for Luke and Leia's sake. And Chewie's—since this was the life he wanted before the republic fell. And still wants now more than ever.

Does it matter now? You're trapped, viced in an ultra-congealed carbonite slab. On your way to Jabba's lair. Denied a chance at a straight fight, even to the death.

And plagued with thoughts of what had just opened up for me before I was frozen in a pit on Cloud City. Something real and worth sticking around for from a woman unlike any other.

Leia.

We met in another hellish pit, didn't we? Despising one another, ungrateful that we had been thrown together in a very explosive situation. You infuriated me with your brash, arrogant attitude, especially when you landed us in that rusted and dank cube of twisted metal and general filth. We almost lost the kid and then were nearly crushed flat by the compactor.

If we could just avoid any more female advice, we ought to be able to get out of here.

But the truth is your actions, foolish as they were, saved our hides. I _didn't_ have the situation under control and everyone including me knew it. That's what angered me the most, though I could never admit it at the time. I can certainly admit it now, now that I'm confined to the claustrophobic void. Now that there's no way to hold you tight and finally let my walls down. My barricades of stubbornness and distrust in others. _Now_ all I _have_ are the walls...maybe for the rest of my days.

They wouldn't leave me in here, would they? Jabba would want to thaw me, wouldn't he? To curse and degrade me in front of his den of lackeys and leeches? He'd want to see me tortured for defying him, I'm certain of that. Jabba is Jabba after all.

But wouldn't keeping me frozen inside this living suffocation also be a severe form of torture in its own right? Again, Jabba being who he is, it is a distinct possibility I could have to endure this mental madness for many years to come. Until I went completely insane. I wouldn't put it past that putrid slug.

Don't think about it. Think about Leia and how soft her lips were when you kissed her for the first time. Next to the jammed auxiliary conductors of the Falcon...she cringed and insulted when I pulled her close and drew my piercing stare closer to hers. She tensed and trembled right to the instant that I pressed my lips to kiss her still protesting mouth. But once I had the kiss in action, there was no further resistance, her defenses had winked out. Or at least lowered considerably. Now I had the person deep down, past the biting verbal taunts and icy exterior; I had the scared, insecure, desperate girl. One who needed a man to kiss her, wrap her in his arms, and keep the thoughts of imperial vipers at bay.

A girl who needed to be with a man she deeply loved.

The kiss would have lasted longer, I'm certain of it—if only that golden rod nuisance of a droid hadn't interrupted us! If I ever get out of this mess, I'm going to reprogram that blasted walking diode to avoid me at all costs!

But let's face it, the droid is not my major source of anger, anguish, and supreme disgust.

No. that mantle belongs to my old card playing buddy; the man who once cleverly aided Chewie and me to blast our way out of a bottleneck ambush on Tanaab.

The man who sold us out to the empire, and landed me smack dab into the ultra-stifling coffin I'm currently condemned to. There's a special place in hell for you, my friend. Certainly a special place in the darker regions of my soul—the vengeful, cold, and calculating, and exacting venoms of my baser self.

You said you were sorry, didn't you. I wonder how sorry you were when you allowed Vader to torture me to get to Luke. Feeling any twinge of guilt when two of the people that matter to me the most had to witness my violent and agonizing encasement in carbonite. I wonder if you apologized to me merely to save a little face. To make yourself feel a little less guilty for your blatant betrayal. You welcomed us, chit-chatted us, catching up on old times, flirted with Leia, and invited us to dinner. All the while knowing that you were going to feed us to the rabid dogs of the empire.

No matter if it's this world or the next, I'm going to find you, Lando, old buddy.

And I'm going to rip your tiny little heart out.

Were he a less experienced and less savvy bounty hunter, Boba Fett would be feeling a sense of celebratory contentment at this point and time. The bounty was acquired and secured aboard his ship, and he would be paid quite generously for his efforts. Once the mark, Han Solo, was handed over to Jabba, Boba could rest up for a while and enjoy some of the fruits of his labor. His girlfriend, one of Sy Snottles' back-up singers was undoubtedly waiting for his return. Probably in a scant outfit that hugged her silky, flower-pink skin. And the crowds infesting Jabba's palace would likely give Boba a more than welcome reception for a perfect record of mark retrieval maintained yet again.

But the infamous hunter was far from home and was without question being followed. Thus, thoughts of euphoric rewards would have to wait. Boba was still on the job.

Currently in hyperspace, coordinates already laid in, Boba focused on not what was ahead of him, but what was behind, trailing him through the mirage tunnel of lightspeed. Most likely friends of Solo hoping for a reclaiming of the traitorous pirate (traitorous to Jabba at any rate). Or it could be another bounty hunter trying to poach the mark, taking credit for Boba's months of tracking and (finally!) capturing his prize. In either case, whoever it was, their efforts would come to nothing—he knew that for certain. And if the bounty hunter (if it _was_ a bounty hunter) knew Boba well, they would know for certain as well. Boba Fett would self-destruct his ship before relinquishing a mark to anyone. His perfect record, his reputation would not be tarnished, ever.

Make your "father" proud.

Boba was unaware of this, but he shared a similar past with his current bounty. Both had lost their fathers when the boys had been too young deal with it properly, both saw it happen right in front of them. Both had lost their innocence when these tragedies befell them.

From then on, both had to fend for themselves, braving famine and hardship with dogged and relentless bids for survival. Yet where Han had aligned himself with a towering and fierce wookiee, Boba had joined the ranks of the bounty hunter syndicates, groups that organized and coordinated mark tracking and acquiring. All receiving a cut of the payoff. Boba, as a young teen, was content to work within a group, gaining skills from every hunter member, culling from each one's strengths and talents. This, too, Solo adopted as a satisfying approach to collecting a skill set, his larger mate following suit. Both Fett and Solo, over the course of many frustrating yet educational years, were trapped, imprisoned, or outnumbered by savage hoards. And each time they had escaped with a cunning rarely matched by others who lived the underworld life.

But where Solo chose to remain coupled to a solid partner in crime, Boba eventually chose to rip himself free to become a business of one. His father lived and worked as an independent hunter and was fully satisfied with his position in life. True, he brought Boba into the deal, but only as a means of carrying on the tradition _his_ father began. A passing of the torch, so to speak. But Boba never went on assignment with his father. And although Jango Fett had enlisted the aid of informants (and once an assassin) to achieve his contract's completion, they were not full time partners of the trade. Merely contacts—tools. And so it was with Boba when he came into his own.

He would need to refuel soon. Albesh Space Station was his best option for a number of reasons. For one, it was the closest station...and it had a contact in its employ that was willing to bend the rules for the right price. Like his father, Boba used the tools of the trade.

Lando glanced again at the readout display rectangularly pocked along the Falcon's cockpit panel. A representational blip flashed repeatedly on the screen signaling a separate ship. Chewie sat beside him and rattled a question at Lando.

"Yeah, that's him all right," Lando replied, "Signature confirmed. And his trajectory points him toward Albesh Station. I'm guessing he needs to fuel up. That's it, we got him!"

Lando gazed out at the webbed viewport, at the pale blue trance of passing lightspeed, and hoped for the sake of all that he betrayed that this really _was_ it. That they could recapture Han, incapacitate Fett (maybe even kill the ruthless bastard—Lando wouldn't mind that, nor would Chewie!) and redeem himself in the eyes of friends old and new. Quite frankly, the guilt was crushing Lando to the point where was almost an impossibility. But he didn't feel exhausted, he felt charged, pressurized, driven to one purpose, one directive: undo the damage he had done.

Finishing up a procedure on the panels about him, Lando said to Chewie, "Coordinates are set. Drop out on my mark..."

Chewie grunted in acknowledgement.

Lando refocused on the tactical display and noticed that the blip had decreased its insane velocity to more comprehensible speeds; it had dropped out of lightspeed and was approaching a larger blip—Albesh Station.

...ten seconds...five...two, one—

"Now," Lando said. Chewie worked the controls and the viewport showed the shroud of hyperspace receding back to lined, streaking stars, then to normal space. The Albesh Space Station loomed in the distance. Slave One, Boba's ship, was a tiny dot that flew into the mouth of the mammoth station's structure.

"We'll give him a moment to land, then move in," Lando instructed. Chewie grunted in the affirmative.

The soul-wounded wookiee was viced as well—not with guilt, of course, but blinding, writhing anxiety. An eagerness to get to Han that rivaled Lando's, if not even more. Not just because the great beast considered Han family and a trusted partner, but because the life debt bond was the deepest commitment a wookiee could possess. It was the code of codes of honor that was almost never broken—the species had treasured it since eons before.

Through agonies imagined and unimagined, Chewie would suffer if need be to get Han back. There was no question about it.

"That should be good..." Lando said.

Chewie worked his panel and the Falcon boostered forth, engines growling and whining.

They landed in the station's already crowded docking bay. Crewers and customers roamed the pathways snaking the various shaped and sized crafts. As the Falcon spat jets of exhaust steam, Lando and Chewie stepped down the landing ramp to eye the bay port where Slave One rested, inert.

Fett was nowhere in sight.

"Let's move," Lando began with tight, nervous eyes. "Keep an eye out." They both did as they moved toward the hunter's vessel, careful of any ambush. A minute later, they stood before the half-sphere of a tiny freighter. Like the Falcon, Fett's cockpit section snouted out of the curvature. Unlike it, the viewport and control units were featured at the base of the protrusion. Fett did not appear to be inside it.

They rotated their gazes this way and that, scanning. Both sighted Fett near the entranceway to the corridors. He was shaking the hand of man. A security agent it appeared by his uniform. That could be a problem, Lando thought peripherally. The two men released their grips and turned away from each other; Fett entered the corridors and was gone from view.

Lando and Chewie turned back to face the ship. Han had to still be on board, there's no possible way Fett could have off-loaded him in the short time since they landed. But how to infiltrate the ship and get to where Han was stored and extract him? Bypassing doors on ships was easy, both knew the tricks. Yet...

"It can't be that easy..." Lando took a coin version of a credit and tossed it at the hull of Slave One. It couldn't reach the surface, however, as a portion of an energy shield sparked, irradiated to life upon impact of the coin. The tiny disc bounced up, spun as it rebounded back down into Lando's grasp. "Just as I thought, a shield. I'm willing to bet it's remote activated." Chewie rattled a comment. Lando echoed it. "Your right, we have to find him and make him open up the ship. Come on, quick before he gets too far in..." Briskly, they left the docking bay.

Five minutes later, they spotted Fett walking amongst the opposite streams of human and alien pedestrian flows. They trailed the hunter from at least seventy feet behind, careful of being spotted. Both had decided a moment earlier to purchase cloaks which would hide their faces (Chewie especially, considering his height). But this did not make them invisible, however, from unwanted eyes. A peddler sidled up to Lando and held a bag for viewing. The bag seemed to be weighted. The alien offered up, "Bisolian, Sir? Finest quality spice, good sir, _finest_ quality..."

Betraying none of the anxiousness and itching annoyance at the scaly peddler _(don't blow our cover, you desperate twit!),_ Lando calmly replied, "I'm sure it is, no thank you." Lando's eyes never left Boba.

The bulged-eyed alien then extended the bag toward Chewie. "You, good sir—?" the wookiee belched a low, vicious growl— _get away, you filthy leech!_ The peddler quickly retracted the bag to his robed side and sidled off, stammering, "As you wish, good sir, as you wish..."

Boba had not turned back around and all indications pointed to that he was going about his business. Chewie hadn't growled too loudly, just enough for the peddler to get the point.

Unfortunately, someone closer to the hooded pair—in fact they had just passed the observant one—noticed the threatening sound, identified it as emanating from a wookiee, and brought a wrist comm to his mouth. Into it he calmly said, "Code three, B.F. Code three."

Further up, Boba could hear the voice of the observer (who was in reality the same guard that he shook hands with) in his helmet's internal transmitter comm. He knew full well what code three meant—combatants, hostiles in pursuit. Boba coolly, calmly proceeded for another few seconds...and then slammed himself into a full force run, bobbing and weaving people with a haphazard measure of collision avoidance.

Lando and Chewie thrusted themselves into the same actions, a tad more careful not to hit any passer-bys. As the two bolted at top speed, they flung off their confining robes thus revealing who they were to the populace. What did it matter now, Boba knew exactly who was trailing (now chasing!) him; subterfuge was pointless.

The chase snaked on, neither side letting up on speed. Chewie, with his powerful legs pounded forth with greater velocity, was slowly but surely gaining on Boba. The hunter could sense that the towering beast was nearing; feel and hear the thunderous beats of Chewie's fast footfalls. Without slowing, the wookiee made a swipe with his extensive arm—a few inches shy of Fett. Pound, pound, pound! Swipe! An inch gap. Pound, pound, swipe! Grazed Boba's jet pack! The hunter felt that and knew he was almost had. To counter, he joltingly grabbed a woman and swung her behind him and into the path of Chewie. An instant later, Fett was off again, zooming forth. The screaming woman had fallen into Chewie, who had no choice but to halt and break her fall. Once he was able to ease her to the ground with the most expediency of safety, he hopped over her and raced on. Lando had caught up and offered as he passed, "Sorry, ma'am!" then matched Chewie's pace as best he could.

The chase rounded a corner to a narrower passage way—and a more clogged section of life forms. It became more cumbersome, slowing, and strained for both parties to make headway. This continued for a few seconds, then Chewie decided to clear the way.

"R-R-RRRRROOOOOOARRRRRRR!!!"

The Wookiee's scream was deep, piercing, frightening. And above all effective—the thickened muddy sea of people parted without delay, cramping to either side of the walkway.

Chewie plowed forth, gaining again on Boba. But now the hunter also had more time to act—seeing that he was almost caught, he spun around and tossed an object fast at Chewie. The thing exploded with webbed roping an instant before it hit the oncoming beast, then engulfed him in the webbing. It happened too fast for Chewie to avoid; then the rope branchings all raced back together to connect again, fully enclosing Chewie. The webbing trapped him tight constricting his efforts to run or even move. He fumbled and fell, writhing and roaring to get free. Lando caught up and meant to rush Boba. But the hunter was ready for him and pressed a button on his arm panel, at the same time aiming the arm's wrist nozzle at Lando. A small spray of flame lashed out of the nozzle; Lando yanked himself to a stop, looking like he tried to avoid going over a steep cliff at the last second. He managed to halt himself just short of the snaking torrent of fire.

Boba could, of course, generously extend the body of the frenzied spray, burning Lando where he stood. But that would bring too much attention to the scene. Just the presence of the fire alone was already eliciting screams and yelps from squeamish onlookers.

Chewie, meanwhile, had decided he'd had enough of being hindered. With an ominous and heart-shattering roar, he ripped himself free of the webbing and stood once more. Seeing that the wookiee was a threat again, Boba backed up yet kept the flame going for a few seconds more. Once he extinguished the spray, he quickly produced a small orb and tossed it up in the air. Once done, he turned back again and bolted forth. The orb was still in mid-air when it burst violently with thick, expansive billows of brownish-black smoke. The deluge completely shrouded Lando and Chewie's view of Boba— _and_ where he ran off to.

Undeterred, they ran into the coagulating wall of sickening fog, where could have been secretly killed both of them had he backtracked and waited for them to enter the dark haze. But his did not happen and Lando and Chewie shot through the noxious mess to pursue Boba at maddening speeds once more. The chemical structure of the smoke bomb had burned and watered their eyes but they mercifully could still see.

But the hunter was nowhere to be found. There was, however, only one way he could have gone—around a corner, for the structure ended and turned rightward. The pursuers hurried themselves that way, banked the turn—

—And still nothing but beings milling about, chatting, shopping.

Until they looked up—and saw that Fett was climbing a grappling rope to the second level!

This is no good, Lando thought. We're playing _his_ game, falling into his hands... "Chewie, keep after him! I'm gonna try something!" And Lando was off, pouncing back the way they came. Chewie grunted in acknowledgement while bounding after Boba. A stairway to the second level was featured fifty feet ahead, Chewie honed in on it with insane focus and speed.

Boba had hoisted himself over the railing by now and was racing to match Chewie's speed down below. The beast was faster, but the hairy blur still needed to make it up the numerous steps to the next level. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, Chewie leapt up the incline _seven_ steps at a time, keeping a harried, vicious pace. Boba was nearing the stairs just about at the same time Chewie was reaching the top. The great animal bounded the last remaining steps to the level and swiped a fur-flailing arm in a mad attempt to clutch at Boba. But the hunter anticipated the move and fast arched his torso backwards to avoid Chewie's clawed hand. He missed Boba by a centimeter. And the chase raged on.

On the opposite end of the complex, Lando had quickly located an information kiosk, which provided a detailed layout of the station. Within the graphics of the structures and passageways, Lando discovered another route that would connect with the other end. This route would also come after the second level would be ramping down to the first.

Perfect.

And Lando shot away.

Chewie could catch Fett easily—if the slippery bounty hunter would stop bobbing and weaving in and out of scores of life forms, human and otherwise. But there was also the danger of Fett reigniting his flame thrower again, which also kept Chewie at bay. Not that he was going to let up that much—he was not going to lose Fett again. Not a single chance in hell.

Boba tossed another "webber" net device behind him. It snap-opened up to ensnare, but Chewie ducked and swung an arm, which shoved the net crumpling to his side and harmlessly away.

You'll have to do better!—Chewie roared in his mind as he ran, pumping labored breaths. You're going to have to kill me to stop me! Maybe more than that!

Another smoke bomb thrown. Another expansive wall of putrid, blinding fog. Chewie speared through it, but Boba was waiting just on the outer edge of the gaseous sludge to jam Chewie dead center in the throat. The towering beast winced and stumbled, clutching his furry neck. Boba slammed a boot into the small of Chewie's back thus flattening him to the metallic floor. Then the hunter raced off again. Chewie lumbered to rise, puking slapping coughs. He wanted desperately to charge again, to not let that slithery wretch disappear. But catching the necessary breath proved difficult at best. The wookiee kept his feet, managing not to falter back to the floor. But he had to hunch over, rattling off cough after cough.

Further up, Boba was at top speed, easily bobbing and weaving through the crowd (for it had become much more loose and spread out in this section). The wookiee wasn't following, and that was good. But neither was Calrissian, nor had he for minutes now...had he gone back to the hangar bay to try a way into Slave One? If so, good luck, you has-been swindler, Boba thought as he continued his mad sprint through pathways. But even if the human half of his pursuers couldn't penetrate Slave One's shield, he could still lie in wait somewhere in the bay, possibly to spring at the right moment...that could be a problem. For now, however, Fett was roaming free of—

" _AAAAAAAAAAHH!"_ Lando came running and leaping out from the side of Boba. He crashed into the stunned hunter and they crumpled fast to the floor. Both recovered instantly and began to struggle violently with one another. Lando was a decent fighter, but Boba was too well trained in combat maneuvers. The hunter wrestled an arm free and rammed his elbow into Lando's chest. The move knocked the air out of Lando's chest and he gasped. In the next split-second, Boba brought both of his hands together to cradle the back of Lando's skull, then shoved his own helmet-covered head into Lando's forehead. "Ungh!" Lando belched with the impact and was rendered "punch drunk" as a white, shooting pain thrashed his mind. He fell back and lay flat.

Boba rose quickly, gave Lando a vicious kick to his side—"Umph!—then started off for another long jaunt of a run—

" _Imph!"_ This was Boba now as Chewie, now recovered, bulldozed full force into the unsuspecting hunter.

Boba was back on the ground in the blink of an eye, the growling wookiee pinning him helplessly. No combat tactics could be employed in this restrained position. And Boba was too stunned anyway to try a move.

Lando blinked and held his head as he attempted to upright his upper half. Slowly, painfully, he succeeded in the mammoth task. He shook his head and bugged his eyes, trying to rattle some sensible perception back into his brain. A second later, he stumbled over to where Chewie had Boba viced flat to the floor. Leaning on Chewie's shoulder, Lando drew his pistol and pointed it at Boba's helmet.

"All right," Lando breathed. "Where's the damn shield remote for your ship?"

"Not a chance," Boba uttered in defiance. "Both of you think you have me...you're fools. Speaking of which..."

"Holster your weapon, Mr. Calrissian."

From twenty feet behind, the guard from the docking bay, the guard who informed Boba of his pursuers, now had his station-issued pistol trained on Chewie and Lando's backs. "Let Mr. Fett up, wookiee."

Lando had twisted his head back to see the guard and his pointed gun. "Guard, we can't just let this man go. He has something of ours aboard his ship—"

"But that is _exactly_ what you _will_ do, Mr. Calrissian. Or you and your wookiee friend will find yourselves in our prison hold." The guard's tone became a bark. "Now let him go!"

Lando reluctantly, slowly holstered his sidearm and rose to his feet; his eyes were intense, murderous.

Chewie still held Boba fast to the floor, refusing to accept defeat now that they finally had the slippery little slug, finally—

From the guard, _"Let-him-up!"_

"Chewie," Lando calmly called to his furry, unyielding companion. "We have to release him."

With a guttural growl slowly rattling from deep inside Chewie's chest, he eased his grip on Boba's wrists and lifted his weight off of the hunter. Both got to their feet, then Boba walked over to the guard. Still staring at Lando and Chewie, the guard asked, "Mr. Fett, are you all right?"

Boba replied, "I think so. Nothing a little back adjusting wouldn't fix."

Never leaving his gaze on the two he pointed his gun at, the guard announced to Boba, "I believe your ship has finished refueling. It might be best for you to be on your way. Before you go, however, there is the matter of using noxious chemicals on site and causing a pubic disturbance."

Boba immediately said, "For which I will pay the necessary fine."

"Perfect," the guard beamed, "Then I won't keep you any further..." He rose his free hand to shake it with Boba's (who returned the gesture). "...We hope you will make use of our facilities again." And the clasp was let go. Boba walked on and past Chewie and Lando. As he passed them, he held up a tiny remote device—the shield activator!—and waved it a few times for them to see—waved it in the same hand he shook hands with.

_The guard_ had it the whole time, Lando thought with no small measure of anguished irony. Chewie mirrored his thoughts, staring down Boba with frenzied frustration and rage. As Boba continued to stroll on, almost losing himself in the crowd, he still waved the device in clear view of his would-be captors.

Chewie growled with a poisonous rattle.

Seeing Boba disappear from view, both Lando and Chewie turned their heads back around once more to face the armed guard. "Relax, gentlemen. We're just going to wait here until Mr. Fett is safely away."

With eyes of severe disgust, Lando motioned his head to Chewie a slow entreat. "Well Chewie, I wonder what the going rate for police protection is these days."

Chewie warbled, the same distaste burning in his own eyes.

" _Carrrreful,_ Mr. Calrissian," the guard calmly warned. "We just put a couple of very unstable types in the station's hold this morning. I doubt very much that you would enjoy spending even a moment in their presence..."

And so they waited; no more comments were needed. It took an interminable, agonizing twenty minutes for Boba to reach his ship, reenter, and take off for the shroud of hyperspace.

Finally, Lando and Chewie were allowed to return to the Falcon—yet were still escorted by the armed guard all the way back to the docking bay (no chance of hurrying back). The two misfortunate travelers reentered Han's freighter with such dejection and despair that soon both had to sit down: Lando on the seat by the chess game, Chewie in his cockpit chair.

Five minutes later, Chewie took them off and they shot into hyperspace; heading the Outer Rim, to Tatooine...

Where there was slim chance of catching Boba now.

Chapter 4

As Bousch's freighter soared through hyperspace, Luke sat in her main hold and contemplated what was to come. Particularly in meeting Jorman Gaarde. It occurred to him now that he hadn't asked to too many specifics about Gaarde: what he looked like, what his general personality was, or even if he was humanoid and not of a different species entirely. For all Luke knew, Gaarde could be a scaly horned thing with six eyes and eight arms. And a tongue that flicked out long with a forked split for the tip. He could look like anything, a spongy mass, a spikey demon, you name it.

But Luke was most curious about one of the major points Leia had brought up to him—was Jorman Gaarde a practitioner of the more honorable and soul-enlightening side of the Force, or was he sickening wretch dedicated to the ways of the sith, to the Dark Side?

Or did Gaarde simply use the Force to aid himself in accomplishing bounty acquisitions? To avoid censure or imprisonment from authorities? This option seemed to Luke to be the most plausible explanation of who Gaarde could be—self serving (as most bounty hunters were) yet with no obsessive ambitions of conquering the galaxy and plunging it into a reign of oppression and darkness.

If this was the case, then it was possible that Luke had something to work with. He could, with the right approach, instill some real direction and purpose into this rogue feeler of the Force, no matter what he looked like.

Luke had thought of trying to find out more about Gaarde from Bousch, specifically more about his general demeanor. But then he suspected that she might tell him whatever he would want to hear in order to secure her escape. He would simply have to wait until he came face to face with Gaarde in order to flesh out the hunter's persona.

Luke knew he was taking a serious risk. By this time tomorrow he could be staring down Vader, the man who tortured or killed the ones Luke loved the most, severed his right hand (losing both the appendage _and_ his prized lightsaber), and, if that wasn't insult and anguish enough, made an unequivocal claim to be Luke's own father!

At first, Luke vehemently balked Vader's revelation with pure revulsion and rage. But after falling almost to his certain death and then being rescued, Luke had searched his feelings (ironically, this is exactly what Vader had told him to do) and found that the claim sounded more and more plausible...crazy as that seemed, as contradictory to Obi Wan's explanation of the past...somehow...it felt right, true....

" _Luke."_

" _Father!"_

" _Son...come with me..."_

" _Ben...why didn't you tell me...?"_

But was it true? Perhaps what Luke felt was a trick of the Dark Side perpetrated by the very same sith lord who made the shocking claim in the first place. Luke simply didn't know. At the time of his rescue and convalescence, he had felt dazed, almost delirious with physical and mental misery—a most opportune time indeed to influence one's emotional path....

There were only two souls in the universe who would be able to tell Luke for certain whether Vader was his father: Yoda and Ben. _If_ they were willing to tell. Perhaps they had good reasons for avoiding the truth of Luke's lineage; maybe they imagined it would be too much for Luke to handle this early on in his training...or they simply felt it didn't matter at this point. Vader was pure evil sworn to uphold his master's sick and sadistic rule. Better not to burden the boy with how things were, but to have him keep his thoughts trained on eliminating Vader and the emperor altogether.

But it _did_ matter. If it were true about Luke's lineage, then evil or no, Vader was still his father. Still his family. If it were true, then there might be a small sliver of hope that Vader could come back to reason and sanity, to the good side of the force....

"Hey, we've dropped out of hyper," Bousch announced, derailing Luke's deep and conflicted ponderings. She had just entered from the cockpit to approach Luke. "We'll be rendezvousing with my outfit in about five minutes. Which means that—"

"I know," Luke said. "I have to be shackled."

She studied him for a moment, trying to flesh him out, understand his hairbrained notions of grandeur. Finally she said, "What are you really hoping to get here? Someone to help you bring back the glory days of the jedi? You know, I heard stories that they died out because they were too arrogant, too easily betrayed. That they didn't have the brains to see two feet in front of their faces...and _you_ want to bring them back."

With a devil-may-care smile and a small shrug, Luke replied, "Call me crazy."

Bousch laughed with a good measure of sarcasm. "Well, certainly off to a good start." And she chuckled some more. A buzzer sounded. Curbing her laughter, she said, "Here we go." She reached behind her back at the small to bring back around hand cuffs. They approached each other and she shackled Luke.

Boush's freighter now had company. A much larger and certainly more threatening-looking freighter had moved in closer to Bousch's. It positioned its gapped underbelly directly over the tiny ship and allowed it to ascend into the hull's docking bay.

The smaller ship maneuvered to land among several of the other similar-sized vessels. Once it had pressurized with the air of the host structure, the side hatch opened and Bousch escorted at gunpoint a wrist-bound Luke toward a waiting company of men. She motioned Luke to stop in front of the man who stood ahead of the others. This one was the "boss," "the handler" of the bounty hunter crew. His name was Togamil, a rotund, beard and mustached-faced native of Corellia.

Togamil's eyes betrayed a bit of shock, surprise as he said, _"Well..._ Bousch, here we are, mission accomplished, bounty acquired...we always like that, don't we, Orshi, Jorm?"

Directly behind and to the left of Togamil, a lanky alien named Orshi responded to his boss, "Always."

Directly to Togamil's _right_ and behind, Jorman Gaarde, a slender yet powerful looking human, added his own reply. "Does keep the food in the belly."

"That it does, that it doesssss..." Togamil mused, still training his studying eyes on Bousch. "... _Well,_ nice to see an improvement in your skills, Bousch, my dear."

"Thank you," Bousch said coolly. She did not wan to betray any of what she truly felt for her employer. Not yet at least. The time to strike would come...

Togamil shifted his piercing gaze to Luke. "And our esteemed new acquisition..." Togamil began. Luke briefly focused on his addressee, but then flicked his eyes to Jorman. The hunter's eyebrows drew in upon seeing the glance. Luke returned his stare back to Togamil who continued, "Someone has paid more than scale for you, my friend...and their instructions _are_ specific..."

Jorman walked forth to stand next to Togamil, all the while producing a weapon to point at Luke. The hunter fired and a blue ring zipped from the barrel of the gun to Luke's midsection, splashing his entire form with irradiated stun chemicals. The boy fell, head listing. Jorman and Orshi quickly rushed to the comatose Luke to break his fall. They hoisted him up on either end under the arms and began to drag him out of the docking bay.

Luke awoke bleary-eyed and feeling sluggish. He was now in some kind of fashioned prison hold of Togamil's freighter. He blinked repeatedly and tried to get a better hold on his mental surroundings. The room was bare save for the rudimentary bed that he lay on. Bracing himself, he attempted to lift his upper body into a sitting position. Slowly and with a grunt, he did so, and once done, he brought his eyes to rub the lids forcefully. He still did this as the door to the room slid aside and Jorman entered. The door swiped closed after him. Luke dropped his hands at the sound of Jorman entering and tensed his eyes in confusion. This _is_ what Luke wanted, of course, a private meeting with Jorman, but he didn't expect that it would be so soon, this easy...

"You'll be transferred in a few hours," Jorman announced. "If you're hungry or thirsty, a droid can bring you something."

"No," Luke concluded, "Thank you."

And then they stared at each other for a moment, uneasily, as they had upon first encountering each other. It was Jorman who broke the stare and looked off, his expression becoming somewhat jovial and yet searching. "You know, my associates they say that I'm quite the _fool_ for the cards..." Then he laughed a bit. "...and especially a fool for the women..." But then his jovialness faded from his face altogether. "...But one thing I am not known for is being a fool when it comes to the business of business." He locked eyes with Luke once more. _"Why_ are you here?"

"What do you mean?" Luke tried, "I thought it was pretty clear, Bousch captured m—"

" _Don't_ trifle with me, son. We both know you came willingly."

So much for subterfuge. "All right. In truth, I came here to meet you. To see who you are, _and what_ you are."

"You mean..." he began and the jovial grin returned—yet it was shadowed with irony, mocking. "...am I a jedi knight in hiding, just hoping that someone like you—a champion of the cause—would eventually find me? And from there we would bring back the glory days of the jedi and the old republic. The heyday of the powerful yet ignorant jedi order...is that the full extent of your grand delusion?"

With some mocking of his own (that he really hadn't expected from himself) Luke retorted, "Really, your enthusiasm for reforming the galaxy is the most inspiring thing I've ever encountered."

Directing a thumb at himself, Jorman countered with, _"I_ live in the real world, son. I don't meet in some far off tower to ponder the galaxy in silly robes. My abilities have served me well in my profession. And I have profited to the extent that I will be able to retire early...I see no reason to jeopardize that for a cause that is _far_ gone past lost."

"But it is _not_ lost. You and I can be the beginning of something better than what came before. We could reform the jedi order and see with better eyes."

"And we could end the suffering of many oppressed worlds being ruled by ruthless sith lords, right?"

"If we start now, _yes."_

Jorman laughed and shook his head slowly. "Ah boy...you've overlooked one crucial element in your delusions of grandeur..." He laughed a touch more. "...the galaxy _wants_ to be oppressed. It wouldn't know what to do with itself if it wasn't. Besides, young one, there are far too many whose pockets are well-lined under the current administration."

"If it wants oppression, then why are more and more systems joining our cause?"

" _Learn_ your history. Even under the Old Republic there were worlds that revolted, crying out for what they couldn't have. And their pleas falling on deaf ears. Slavery, Death Stick trade, smuggling, you name it. It existed then as it exists now. _And yes,_ they even employed bounty hunters to bring to the government those who threaten their reign of power...sound familiar?" Jorman raised his eyebrows in a "wake up to harsh reality, son" expression as he turned to leave.

Before he exited, however, Luke got out, "Were your parents jedi?"

Jorman halted at the door and twisted his torso to face Luke once more. "What if they were?" he countered with cool defiance.

Luke flicked his eyes to stare off away from the hunter as he nonchalantly replied, "No reason..." Now Luke's eyebrows rose.

Jorman narrowed his eyes in contempt and left the room. The door slid shut. And locked.

Luke stared at nothing in particular, his gaze shifting all around. I hit a nerve, Luke thought with cautious enthusiasm. I think I hit a nerve.

"Something has gone wrong, Artoo," Threepio announced as he sat by his astromech companion. They had stowed away aboard Bousch's freighter, hidden in a compact maintenance room. They still held residence there four hours after landing in Togamil's ship. Threepio worried on, "They should've returned by now had Master Luke been successful..." Artoo beeped and whistled his concern. The gold droid decided, "I suppose it's up to me then...Artoo, if I'm not successful in rescuing Master Luke, then it falls on you to save us."

Artoo whistled a warble, an off-cadence flood of foreign mechanical speech.

"I know," Threepio lamented, looking away. "Why is it always _us_ to the rescue...oh dear, oh dear..."

And with that, Threepio rose and opened the hatch to the cramped room. As he left the cubicle space, he muttered, "Artoo, I have a bad feeling about this..."

Artoo moaned briefly as the hatch closed.

Chapter 5

Only a quarter finished, Vader noted to himself in his poisoned, rage-fueled mind. He stood motionless on the bridge of the super star destroyer, _Avenger,_ staring out the triangular viewport. It gave a good view of what the destroyer was closing in on: the new Death Star. A fourth of the familiar spherical structure had been fashioned, constructed to present a strong hint of what the station would look like. Where building will expand the sphere, tiny (from Vader's perspective of distance) girders jutted from the side and bottom but terminated without much length. The first Death Star had used a guiding skeletal frame which allowed an observer to glimpse the full circumference of the station before any levels or hull were crafted. But the designers of this new station already had the specs for every fabrication needed to complete the mammoth terror. It was simply a matter now of fitting everything in its proper place. And in the end, the new Death Star would be the spitting image of the old one.

There would be a few modifications however. Providing more exterior protection for the exhaust ports, for one. Strengthening the fire power for surface attacks, for another. And if Vader had his way, he would force them to enhance the focus ray weapon to be capable of destroying not only a planet, but a sun—a whole solar system wiped clean. Lord Vader, the rebels are rumored to be on this planet or that moon in the You-Name-It System. Obliterate the entire system, Vader could order an officer, a lackey, a pawn. Why waist time searching here or there—why waste resources?! Just blow the sun and be done with it! And if the Rebels weren't on any planet _in_ that system, then they would find out that billions, possibly trillions of lives were perishing violently... _all_ because those traitors refused to turn themselves in! That would suit Vader fine. He was tired of these games, tired of the "cat and mouse" nonsense. It was time to step things up, to show these rebels who ran things, who truly called the shots, who _truly_ owned the fate of the galaxy.

But Vader would not have his way for he knew the emperor would never allow it. Systems mean trade, commerce, parts for weaponry and ships...new acquisitions for soldiers and officers, scientists and doctors, _and_ construction workers for this very station.

By the looks of it, Vader mulled, it was painfully clear that more workers _were_ needed to build the station and keep it on its tight time schedule. The first Death Star was built over a number of years with meticulous care and attention to every detail. Now the emperor wanted the second one done in a matter of weeks! One could argue that many, _many_ more men were required to adhere to the insane time window of construction. But that person, not even if it were Vader, wouldn't dream of openly voicing that argument to Palpatine (who had merely reasoned that less men working harder was the prescribed plan for creating the new station).

But why is the master doing this to me, Vader asked his tensioned mind, give me so little to work with in so little time? Is he challenging me to see if I can hold up under the pressure? Is this punishment for my recent string of failures? Likely, it was both. And likely the emperor was becoming fed up and impatient, as I am, with this impudent band of freedom fighters.

Fed up with me as well.

What would the emperor do if I managed not to deliver the new station on time? Or the rebels managed to blow the station to a trillion particles yet again?

Why, Vader knew the answer to that. He would be replaced, cut down, killed. But who would take his place? There were no other viable sith trainees identified—that Vader knew of at any rate. Palpatine, with all his covert strategies and shadow agents and officers stashed away on remote, secret locations, was capable, if so inclined, of harboring a fail-safe apprentice that even Vader might be blind to. It was possible...

...or maybe his master intended to replace one Skywalker with another.

Luke. Of course. It seemed so obvious now. All it would take was the right combination of loss and instinctual need for revenge, and the emperor would turn the boy. Vader's master was a genius that way, the former Anakin Skywalker ought to know.

Ought to know first hand.

"Lord Vader."

Vader whirled to face the lieutenant who approached from behind and spoke his name. "Yes, lieutenant."

"Your shuttle is ready, my lord"

"Very good."

The Imperial shuttle had landed in the only docking bay fully constructed for the new Death Star. In straight line rows forming a massive U, storm troopers, crewmen, and officers stood at taught attention in front of the steam-spitting shuttle. The landing ramp lowered to touch the metallic floor, and before it even did, Vader was descending it.

One single officer stood erect, frozen like a statue in the middle of the U formation, waiting for Vader to come close. Once Vader did, halting five feet in front of him, the officer, a Grand Moff named Jer Jerrod, greeted the sith with, "Welcome, Lord Vader. The emperor alerted us to your com— _aaaahh!"_ Jerrod's torso dipped forth and his mouth flew open while his eyes bugged. His knees were weakening, standing became an almost impossible feat. One of his hands snapped to his throat to clasp in a futile attempt at protection.

Vader was choking him through the slithering power of the Force.

Letting the constricting river flow, Vader said to the faltering, staggering Jerrod, "This station appears to be far behind schedule. I expected it to be half built by now."

Using the last slipping grasps of physical and mental energies, Jerrod offered up, "My...apolo...gies..."

"You have a schedule to keep as do your men, is this not correct?"

Spots, dozens of them, danced and swam around in Jerrod's failing vision. "...Yeh...yesss..."

The crowd of men kept their rigid formations, none of them coming forth to offer assistance to their ailing commander. But many of their eyes shifted in shock and fear.

Vader continued, "The first Death Star was destroyed by a single fighter with a single shot. Do you intend to allow this to happen again?"

Jerrod was on his knees now, veins crookedly lining, bulging his head. "...Nnooooo..."

Vader allowed the invisible clench on Jerrod's throat to linger for a few seconds more (which, to the poor, near death commander, seemed like agonizing minutes) then he ended the flow of spidery energies. Jerrod's airways were released and he drew in a wheezing, desperate gasp of air. His mouth then exploded with a series of violent coughs before he could exhale properly.

Vader allowed Jerrod a precious few beats of time to achieve some semblance of circulatory and respiratory equilibrium before he said, "Good. Now announce me to your men."

Jerrod, still battling a few spots in his eyes, willed himself to stand upright and erect again. He turned to face the men and swiveled his jaw in a "tighten up" gesture. When he felt stable enough to speak with full coherency, he cleared his throat and addressed the crowd. "Men, Lord Vader has graced us with his presence to oversee the construction of this station...when it is completed, it will become the invincible hammer that will ensure absolute order in the galaxy."

"And when it is fully operational," Vader chimed in with great baritone, "it will do what the first one could not—bring an _end_ to the rebel alliance."

Chapter 6

The great mass of Sullust beautified the permanent night of space, providing a vibrant, purpled contrast from the star-scattered black. Though Sullust was uninhabitable as a planet, it nonetheless instilled those who passed, in whatever craft they flew, a sense of the grand wonderment of the universe. An intuitive notion that there was a transcendent entity at work in the boundless cosmos; something that favored truly unadulterated art and creativity.

Even from orbit, electrical storms of green, yellow, red, or blue colors could be seen pulsing, flashing, coursing along winding, stretching clouds of varied purples. And these living gaseous structures weaved the entire curving surface of the two hundred million year old glory known as Sullust. To soar among the thousand-mile-long cloud layers would be a foolish venture for any living being for the ship they were flying would not last long. First, the gorgeous light storms would disrupt the vessel's power systems rendering navigation and life support inoperable. Then said storms would soon rip the hull to pieces in a fiery symphony of violence.

Fortunately for the rebel alliance members, however, populating the myriad of alliance vessels now orbiting the tumultuous planet, their pilots knew better than to fly too close to the atmosphere. At their current distance of orbital coasting, all would be serene for the onlookers staring out the viewports, safe in their oxygen-rich cruisers. And the fireworks from the surface would be awe-striking, invigorating, inspiring to any of the planet gazers. It was one of the chief reasons that Mon Mothma, the interim president of the head council for the alliance, chose Sullust to be the rendezvous point for all rebel ships—the planet's ability to keep spirits high; the proverbial morale booster compliments of a cosmic masterpiece. The fact that the planet contained no life forms also factored into the decision to hold orbital camp here—there'd be no one to blow their cover by informing to the imperials.

Recently arrived to match gravitational flow of the other rebel ships, Leia's royal cruiser patiently waited to receive an approaching shuttle. Within the shuttle, Mon Mothma resided eager to dock and meet with Leia and Rieekan. The latters were gathered in an observation room where the meet was scheduled to take place. Through a wide strip of viewport, Leia, as well as the general, could see the storms below; both marveled at the various explosions of multicolored brilliance muted slightly by milky clouds.

I can see why we're here, noted Leia to herself. It's at least providing me with a temporary state of worry-free euphoria...before I have to start answering some tough, stress-inducing questions from Mothma.

A moment more, maybe two (certainly not three) and Mothma will have docked and arrived to this very room. Until then, I'll simply allow myself the brief respite of Sullust's visual feasts. I've earned a break, haven't I? After having my greatest love stripped from my life by the scum of the universe?

Enough. Enjoy. From a brief glance at Rieekan, it was clear he was doing just that very thing.

"Remarkable, isn't it?" he commented.

"Mm..." she responded with enthusiasm.

"I'm glad I got to see this..."

Leia expected Rieekan to say something more on the subject. But he simply trailed off with his words, his gaze fixated firmly on the planet's delightful bursts.

_I'm glad I got to see this...what?_ she mentally asked herself, though she desperately wanted to ask it to him aloud. Instead, she turned to him and tried, "General...? Is everything all right?"

Still visually locked with the planet, Rieekan calmly but thickly said, "Not entirely, but it can wait—"

Before Leia could determine if he was finished with his thought, the doors opened and Mon Mothma gracefully strided forth to enter. "Leia, general, a great pleasure to see you again."

Leia and Rieekan had already turned to face Mothma as she approached to stand before them. Rieekan said with a formal smile, "Senator, a pleasure." Then Leia chimed in, "Madame President. Are we fully amassed yet?"

"Sadly no," Mothma replied with a bit of a sigh. "There are still some of our brethren for who whom it is unsafe to join us at this time. But we must keep the hope that this will soon change..." A bit of confusion lined her brow. "...I'm slightly lost here, where is Commander Skywalker?"

Leia and Rieekan exchanged a loaded, nervous glance before refocusing on Mothma. Leia offered with some strain, "I'm...afraid Luke has, against my better judgment, gone looking for a certain individual."

"Not Captain Solo? I thought you sent others for that, less crucial personnel."

"We did...this is...someone else."

"I have a vague suspicion that I'm not going to like your answer."

"Luke believes...there may be another who shares his abilities, his gifts with the Force."

Mothma's eyes flicked to Rieekan. "General, Luke was under your military command, and you let him go?"

"No disrespect intended to you, Head Council President, but I'm afraid I support Skywalker's actions. If we are to establish the jedi order again, _two_ leaders may have a better chance at doing so."

"Assuming this other is a sympathizer to our cause, without the potential of being a rogue sith. You've taken a serious risk to our survival with this unsanctioned mission, general."

Leia and Rieekan shared another pair of uneasy looks.

"My friends," Mothma began as she stood next to the massive tactical ring (which frequently projected holographic images) built into the floor of the tactical center. Several rebel officers and pilots sat beyond the ring in raised seating, their attention fully on Mothma, their respected leader. Leia and Rieekan stood on her left while the general, Crix Madine flanked her right. She continued, "We have brothers in arms who are being enslaved. Admiral Akbar and seventy of his officers and men are being held captive at an imperial mining asteroid. It is our intention to liberate these men so that they can strengthen our numbers...and so they as well as we can endeavor to never feel the oppressive hand of the empire and its malignant leader ever again.

"General Rieekan will give you the details of our plan."

With that, Mothma stepped aside and backward to allow Rieekan the room to address the group. With his trademark subdued yet commanding voice, he spoke to them, "Ladies and gentlemen, every penal colony of the empire has a strong energy barrier. It therefore becomes necessary for us to have a weapon strong enough to bring down the shield. An ion blast will be our best option."

From the crowd, a rebel officer spoke up. "Sir?"

"Yes, son."

"An ion blast would be stable with a containment field kept underground. But if you attempt to fire one from a ship, it will likely tear that ship to pieces."

Rieekan rose his eyebrows as he said, "Not likely, most certainly. That is why we must rig a remotely controlled, non-personnel cruiser to do the job. We will be able to fire one to two shots before containment is compromised."

Another rebel said, "But sir, with the energy shield down and all the electrical power eliminated, won't that cut off the air supply for everyone on the asteroid?"

"It will," Rieekan confirmed, "but the mon calamari have planned for this and will be using their deep-drill oxygen units to counter the loss of air. However, the imperial guards will also have their breathing units available. So your assault and rescue will still be met with heavy resistance. Any other questions?"

"When do we go in?"

"This is the major difficulty. A 'mole' is amongst Akbar's men and is likely the one responsible for their capture. We cannot begin the assault until we're sure the traitor has been discovered."

Gravely, Mothma added, "We must keep hope that Akbar and his men will find whoever it is soon. We fear the prisoners will not last long under their present conditions."

Chapter 7

There were twenty-four Imperial prison/mining asteroids throughout the known galaxy. Of this number, Shoflar Mas prison was the oldest, the first to be erected and made operational. It was named after the chief engineer who designed the prison; Shoflar was a firm believer in Emperor Palpatine's new order principles. He believed that his designs for the facility would maximize digging capabilities and increase resources for the empire, for his beloved leader. He also oversaw of the requisition of men necessary to run the work camp, ensuring that only the most dedicated and meticulous soldiers were employed.

For years, Shoflar Mas, both the station and the man, received praise and apt recognition for efficiency ratings far and above all other work detail facilities.

Shoflar (the man) had even received a personal accommodation from his cherished emperor. It was the finest day of the designer/engineer's extended existence.

But Shoflar (again, the man) died twelve years from hence, and since then his namesake prison had devolved into an average (at best) efficiency rated outpost. Several administrators had come and gone in the bureaucratic rotation of things and no one had the proper amount of time (or likely the fervent inclination) to raise the station's standards to their former glory. The prison runs and the prisoners work until they finally drop, and what more do you need to consider? was the general consensus among most of the overseers (and guards alike). No one is escaping because they are too weak to do so. And no one is stowing aboard a ship to sneak out—the guards learned their lesson after a pair of escapees (a boy and a wookiee) sheathed their body heat in the engine section of a supply shuttle. Full checks of every inch of every vessel going in or out of the prison were enacted after that particular fiasco.

Still there was a slippage of bravado, of dedication from the echelons of men running the once prized structure. A malaise of day-in, day-out procedure and resentment for being assigned a listless position.

It was this slippage that Admiral Akbar was counting on to aid him in getting his men out of what he considered to be one of the worst hellholes he had ever encountered.

His species had suffered encampment before (and in his own country, no less) for religious disparity. But those internment camps were a breeze compared to Shoflar's sparse rations and darkened, putrid halls.

Akbar and his faithful men had been interned here for only two months, but to them it seemed closer to six. The days were long—sixteen to eighteen hours for digging and hauling detail, a meal (if you could call it that), and then four to five hours of sleep. But sleep was rare when you were housed with several men in cramped quarters on uncomfortable cots, men snoring and talking in their sleep. Some who had lost family in the war woke up screaming a loved one's name.

And the sheer repetitiveness of the work—dig, dig, dig, and dig some more if you please (or if you don't please). And when your arms are practically muscle-locked and grinding with soreness and fatigue, then go ahead and dig even more. Mothma was correct in her assessment: Akbar and his men would not last long.

Akbar tried his damnedest not to think about that as he chopped away at the tibanna-rich borite before him. Tried. On his left, crouched down the same as Akbar, was his personal aide, Dosh, who worked his own scuffed pickax. Vigorously and repeatedly stabbing away at the uneven rock. On Akbar's right, more of his men speedily performed the same actions out of unison. Contact "dings!" could be heard from the swinging axes all about the expansive cave, over and over again.

Akbar snuck a glance at his aide. "How are the men holding up, Dosh?"

Continuing his digging, Dosh breathed, "About as well as can be expected, sir. But I fear that the malnutrition will claim us before another month is up."

"It doesn't make sense to starve us," a digging mon calamari piped up. "We'll work better with food in our bellies."

Dosh countered, "We'll also be able to resist and overtake with food in our bellies."

Akbar added flatly, "And it matters not that we perish. They'll simply find more poor souls to take our place. Any leads on the mole, Dosh?"

"Formulating some promising evidence, sir. But it's still too early to reveal anything conclusive."

Akbar stopped digging and turned more towards Dosh. "Then for the safety of the men, keep things to yourself until you're ready to apprehend."

Dosh ceased the lunging of his ax as well. "Do I keep it even from you, sir?"

"I'm afraid you must."

"Get back to work over there!" barked a guard across the way.

Akbar and Dosh faced forward again and immediately began battering hard at the pitch-black rock carvings. Neither had spoken any more on the subject that day.

Chapter 8

_Twice._ Twice now that unnervingly clever bounty hunter slipped through Chewie's attempts to apprehend him and reacquire Han. The first was on one of the tonguish platforms (the east one as Lando had reported) of the majestic Cloud City. Chewie, along with Leia and Lando, had arrived at the platform a moment too late to see _Slave One_ (with Boba safely in the cockpit and the frozen Han secured in the cargo hold) rocket full thrust off into the atmosphere. Chewie's heart had seized, straining his already labored breaths from running. Sorrow sagged his mind, and not just for himself but because he could see that Leia's desperate hopes had also been crushed.

A quick flash of a thought had entered Chewie's mind—kill Lando. Don't waste time strangling him until his eyes pop from their sockets, just gun him down now, three blasts to the chest!

But that would have been an ill-advised coarse of action to take—the storm troopers had arrived to open fire on all of them. Had Threepio not been on his back (and in pieces no less) and cramped in a harness—facing opposite Chewie, the troopers might have taken out the entire group—Leia, himself, Lando, the droids, everyone. Chewie would have almost thanked them for putting him and Leia out of their misery. But there was still time to save Han if the right time and place presented itself. So Chewie fought to live. _And_ decided that Lando alive gave them a better chance to fight their enemy, escape to the _Falcon,_ and survive to track down Boba Fett another day.

But _now_ that "other day" had come and gone, and as you know, Fett had, like an oily-greased rope, slipped out of the grasp of Chewie and Lando.

The weight of this second failed attempt was now crushing yet paradoxically exploding Chewie's thoughts.

...If Han dies, should I kill myself, I should kill myself, maybe Lando too, but no, I'm bound to Leia. To Luke even, to the possibility of ending the empire...

... _But if I lose Han—NO!!! NO! NO! NO!..._

And so these thoughts recycled and slammed themselves around the wookiee's mid as he buried his face in his hands. His elbows rested on the _Falcon's_ console before him, taking the majority of his head's weight. Chewie moaned intermittently, a pathetic, mournful sound. Like a womprat that was horribly wounded and dying.

The hatch door slid open and Lando entered with a fair measure of haste. The pace of a man with new hope fueling his step. "Chewie, I've got an plan which may just get us to Boba before he can deliver Han," he said as he quickly sat in the pilot's chair.

_You're sitting in that chair...Han's chair,_ Chewie's mind growled. So did his fanged mouth.

Lando's eyes turned cautious but determined. "Now just...hear me out. Now Boba will undoubtedly have to reroute himself to avoid the Kessel Maze. But you and I will fly right into it. I know people who operate out of there; they used to buy tibanna from me all the time. And it's possible I can get 'em to help us navigate through."

His still frayed but attempting some workable level of objectivity, Chewie warbled a question.

"Boba will have to land at Mos Eisley to secure his ship, then he'll transport Han there to Jabba's palace. If we can convince my associates to drop us off undetected at Eisley and ahead of Boba, we may just be able to ambush him at the port—or en route to the palace. It's a long shot, I know—"

Chewie cut him off with another warble, another question.

One side of Lando's mouth tensed. "Well...yeah, they do deal with Jabba as well. So the question will be: if things get heavy, will they feel more of an allegiance to Jabba...or to me?"

One more warble, not a question.

"I agree, it's worth trying." Lando rose from the chair to leave the cockpit. "Get us to the maze while I think up a cover story for us..." And before he passed through the opened hatch door, he turned back to eye Chewie with intensity. "Chewie...we're going to get him back. No matter what it takes, I swear to you..."

Chewie sat there in silence for a few brief seconds, then turned his head to profile, still not entirely facing Lando. He grunted with sincerity, but with some anguish remaining.

"You're welcome..." Lando replied, then a thickness of guilt pulled his eyes and voice downward. "...Least I could do..." And with that he left, the hatch closed behind him.

Chapter 9

"Master! I have great news for you!" Bib Fortuna bellowed as he emerged from the deluge of smoky haze and an alien-riddled crowd to stride towards Jabba the Hutt. The lizard-like eyes planted in the obese, gluttonous head of Jabba tracked his main servant, who was halting to stand before his lecherous employer. "Boba Fett," Bib continued, "is en route to Tatooine and has _Solo_ in his custody."

"Hmmm," Jabba said, comforting warmth radiating throughout his blubbery, worm-like form. He drew in a relieving, cleansing breath, let it out. "Splendid," he uttered in his native Huttese. "I knew Boba would eventually come through. What is the condition of Solo?"

Bib said, "He is alive and well, my master. Apparently he has been successfully frozen in a carbonite encasement. He shall remain in complete hibernation stasis until, of course, you decide to let him out of it."

"Perfect. Perfect. No foolish escape attempts that the boy is so famous for...excellent. And the wookiee?"

Bib's eyes flicked sideways and then back, mentally derailed. "...Pardon?"

Jabba's calm cocktail of mental euphoria was now disturbed as a frustrating tone entered his voice. _"Chewbacca,_ Solo's _partner._ The _other_ one I told you bring in. _That wookiee..."_

Bib's mind stuttered with fear, as did his voice. "It's—it's possible that Fett deemed it too detrimental to securing Solo by acquiring the wookiee as well. And—and I was under the distinct impression that—that the wookiee was not a crucial priority...optional, I believe your words were..."

"Come here," Jabba commanded to Bib with a false calm to his words. The majordomo's eyes sank as he reluctantly lurched toward his massive and seething master. He stepped up to the pedestal level with (and built next to) Jabba's stone-made resting slab. Bib was now close enough for Jabba to reach out his left chubby hand and clench Bib's robes at the chest level. Once he had a fistful, Jabba yanked Bib forth challenging the dual-tentacled creature's ability to keep balanced and on his feet.

" _Dead or alive_ optional," Jabba boomed into Bib's ear. "Dead or alive optional because he is extra dangerous, you incessant MORON!"

Still struggling to keep his footing, Bib managed, "A...thousand apologies, my good master...would you like me to contact Fett...and t—"

"No," Jabba said as he abruptly let Bib go. The "no" was said with the false calm again. Bib almost did fall over now but saved himself with some rapid footwork. Jabba continued, "He is already on his way. There's no point in risking something going wrong now...contact Togamil to handle the bounty. No open contracts this time, I'm not in the mood."

Already positioning himself to stand where he previously had been, square in front of Jabba, Bib offered, "It will be done as you instruct, my master."

Stabbing a stunted finger at Bib, Jabba reprimand with, "And next time be clear of what I say and mean if you want to keep your position in the palace... _and_ your life."

Jittery-eyed and nerve-frayed, Bib attempted to respond with as much professional composure as he could muster. "Of _course,_ master, of course."

Chapter 10

Jorman Gaarde walked the halls of Togamil's bloated freighter. Walked and thought, rattling around the conversation with Luke. The more he played the brief talk in his memory, the more frustrated and irritated he became. This happened, of course, as he would relive the end of the banter: "Were your parents jedi?" "What of it?" "No reason."

And what business of is it of yours, my little deluded idealist? Jorman accused to the version of Luke in his head. Are you trying to bait me into seeing things your way? Well, good luck with that. My parents are dead, dead because they were deluded idealists—just like you, Skywalker. If only you could see that blind idealism and obsessive bids for a utopian community are the cornerstones for massive destruction.

If you knew that, you probably wouldn't be in the doomed position that you are in, dear boy. But I suppose some of us will always have to learn the hard way. Ridiculous youth, never with the foresight to see the larger view of things, the big picture as they say.

Well, I see it all too well, Jorman assured himself. At most a person can look after themselves and a few choice individuals if they're lucky. Not a whole damn galaxy.

I'm doing well, I'm healthy, still fairly young— _and_ about to retire with substantial wealth at my disposal. And Togamil won't balk too much If I leave; he knows there are other hunters out there (even ones who have the gifts of the Force) that could take my place eventually.

Another year and eight or ten more jobs and I'm set; set to go my own way, travel, meet people (a good number of them hopefully women), maybe even start a lucrative business of my own. I've earned my keep bringing in irresponsible and deluded wretches and I'm about to reap the ultimate rewards.

So why am I flustered...?

As Jorman neared Togamil's office, he found that the answer to that question was escaping him, like a dream that was important but couldn't be remembered.

He knew that it originated from his meeting with Luke (or did it? he was starting to wonder), but that wasn't all of it. it would take a lot more than that to disturb Jorman's calm. It was something...else...

Something that grew as he walked into Togamil's surprisingly stylish, plush office (surprising because the rest of the ship was rather aged and dingy) and stood to face Togamil. The rounded employer sat behind his marbled desk and stared back at the creased brow of Jorman.

"You wanted to see me?" Jorman asked in an even tone despite his mood.

"Yes," Togamil answered. "I have another assignment for you. This one's a bit tricky so I want you to handle it."

"I was—"

"Hoping to rest for a week or two, I know. And were it any other assignment I would let you. But I have a strong feeling that this one is going to require your...special talents, as it were."

"I see. Who is it then?"

"The Wookiee Chewbacca."

Jorman's face went taught, his eyes unfocused and drifted somewhat downward.

Togamil, of course, noticed. "Problem?"

Jorman's eyes locked on Togamil again. "No...A Wookiee...quite a formidable target."

"Then you understand why I need you to carry out the assignment."

Jorman's eyes zigzagged, then he nodded quickly. "Very well. I'll leave now."

"Good."

Jorman turned and left without another word.

Togamil stared after with a knitted brow—what was the hesitation for? Tog had no idea but he, at this point and time anyway, had no intentions of investigating the matter further. There was something more pressing that bothered his calm, chipped and dug away at his center.

Bousch.

Had she _really_ brought in a Force-feeler? Someone who likely could have choked her with his mind, or directed her own weapon to point at her head and shoot? Honestly? Tog just didn't think it was plausible...

...No, more likely she was working with Skywalker...but to what end?

And then it hit him.

_Gaarde?_ Is that fool here to try and convert Gaarde? That must be it, it _has_ to be it.

Well, good luck with that now, my foolish young ones. Gaarde is leaving straight away, and _you_ , Bousch, are going to be leaving yourself. Either leaving this existence or as a new slave for Jabba. Which, I haven't decide yet. Perhaps it'll be just a question of how much you beg for mercy. Or beg for either option. Personally, I would choose oblivion over Jabba's ownership. But to each their own, hey Bousch, my sweet?

And with that thought concluded, Togamil hit a button next to the intercom built into his desk. A "beep" sounded and the Togamil spoke. "Orshi, Balin-Bui, meet me in my office immediately."

Chapter 11

Kessel. Maelstroms and nebulas and asteroids in over-abundance. If spacefarers wish to have a fairly incident-free journey across the stars, they are wise to plot a course bending far around the Kessel sector.

However, for those wishing to conduct less than reputable business—or prove themselves death defiers in highly inhospitable conditions—Kessel has become an unwitting heaven.

Chewie had often wished that Han and he would have been quite close to Kessel when the imperials had clamped down on them—thus forcing them to dump their entire smuggling shipment. Thus forcing them into their current predicament. Had they been near enough to Kessel, the _Falcon_ could have dived right into the maze of cosmic death traps (which Han knew how to supremely navigate through—and in record time no less). And no imperial star destroyer, shuttle, or tie fighter would have been able to successfully follow. Likely, they would have perished trying.

But being near to the sector and its numerable deadly anomalies did not fully guarantee the promise of escape. If your pursuers stood between you and the malignant maze...perhaps you could break through, perhaps not.

Curiously enough, this scenario of questionable outcomes seem to fit the current situation near Kessel's border.

As Chewie and Lando pounced the _Falcon_ back into normal space, they came upon a heated battle: fifteen tie fighters were roaring this way and that, encircling a sizeable freighter. Like angry hornets, the ties stung the hapless larger vessel with repeated laser assaults. But the hulk fought back spraying the area with rapid-fire blasts of its own.

Both Lando and Chewie could see that either the ties had hot shot pilots, or the frieghter's gunners were not absolute crack shots. Still, one of the ties met its end in a fire bloom.

"That's Borshan's freighter," Lando revealed, "He's in charge of the group I mentioned. Come on, let's get in there!"

Chewie worked the cockpit controls and shoved the _Falcon_ headlong into the fight. At the same time, Lando rushed through the ships structure to reach the top gun blister. As Chewie neared the chaotic attack and swerved to avoid collision, Lando opened fire, immediately bursting a tie into vicious flame and debris.

The new player in the battle caused a disorientation in the attack patterns of the ties. This aided in allowing the _Falcon_ and the freighter (which Lando knew to be playfully called _The Wild Card_ ) to take out the zipping and hollering fighters one after the other.

But there were still ten ties to contend with. And their trajectories were compensating for the _Falcon's_ presence, offering up new criss-cross patterns to adjust for two targets.

But in the end it wasn't enough; the tide had turned, the confidence of the freighters gunners had heightened knowing that assistance had been given.

Ten minutes later with six ties remaining, the imperials retreated for far sectors (likely wondering how to successfully explain the absence of their fellow pilots).

Fifteen minutes later, Lando and Chewie had pressure-ring docked with _The Wild Card_ and stood before its crew. The leader of the band of smugglers, Borshan, was front and center, smiling at the new arrivals. His associates flanked him a few steps behind.

"Landooo!" Borshan beamed in a jovial tone.

Lando offered his own smooth grin and said, "Borshan, good to see you. what was that all about? You forget to pay port fee or two?"

Borshan fast grimaced as he replied, "Aaaah, those imperials...some of them just like to prove they can intimidate us. Makes 'em feel all superior, like they own the galaxy. They figure if they can take down enough of us hardworking men, it'll look good to their higher-ups."

"So that wasn't a retaliatory strike?"

" _No, noooo._ They're not even acting on orders. 'Course, it's not like the officers frown on it or anything. Thanks by the way. That was getting a bit dicey."

"You're welcome."

"Who's old hairy scary here?"

"This is Chewbacca."

"Chewbacca! Solo's partner in crime. Welcome. And thanks."

Chewie warbled a reply.

Borshan refocused to Lando. "Well what brings you two out this way? And what's with Bespin and your city? We tried to buy tibanna there recently and got a bad vibe. We had to bug out before buying."

Lando's cheek twitched with instinctive disdain. "Well that's why we're out here. Cloud City's been overrun by Imperials."

"I always told you you couldn't stay hidden forever, didn't I?"

"And it turned out you were right in the end."

"Well, since you helped us out here, how'd you like to get in on a sure thing we got coming up? The pay should be quite sizeable."

Lando rose his eyebrows. "I'm intrigued. Especially since I seem to be a man without a city these days. What's the job?"

Borshan casually stepped aside and faced his men. As he spoke to them, he motioned his head towards Lando and Chewie. "Well what do you think, boys? You comfortable with a few extra hands for the operation?"

One of Borshan's main lieutenants, Gogol—who was a Hutt (yet not of the gigantic, blubbery kind, rather a slender, more athletic version of the species)—spoke first. "Sounds all right to me. Lando's always given us a fair price for tibanna. And he did just save our hides."

Then Borshan's only other right hand man, Danmar (a human, short and stocky) gave his verdict. "I don't know the wookiee...but I suppose he would quite useful in a fight, if it came to that. I say good."

"All right," Borshan said. "There's a freighter bringing in some slave guards in stasis for transport to Ansion. When they get close to Kessel to refuel, we'll hijack the ship, extract the guards, and sell 'em to Jabba who's willing to pay, as I said, quite a handsome price."

Lando nodded slowly while pursing his lips briefly, then said, "We're in. When is it arriving?"

"Forty minutes from now." Borshan lifted his brows as he added, "Eventful afternoon, wouldn't you say?"

"Yes, _and_ _soon_ to be profitable."

Everyone either smiled or laughed, but soon, Borshan sobered as he entered in, "Gentlemen. Let's plan."

Chapter 12

"And you're sure the Wookiee was there with Calrissian?" Jorman inquired as he was seated in the pilot's chair of his cockpit.

"Yes," a transmission-filtered male's voice replied from the console's comm speaker. "They both scanned in for refueling."

"Your trajectory records show them heading where?"

"From our base compass, northeast."

"...Kessel Maze..." Jorman remarked to himself, then spoke to the comm again. "Thank you. Four hundred is..." He pressed a button on the panel before him. "...now in your account."

"Pleasure doing business with you. Albesh out."

The comm transmission pinged to signal its ending.

And Jorman was left to bring a few folded fingers to his closed lips in conflicted contemplation. _Should I go through with this,_ he disturbingly pondered. _All the way to the ending of those I've known for a long time?_ _Even respected?_ "

For someone who I've never met (at least as far as I can remember)?

_You must._ A female voice.

_You will._ A male one, commanding.

_Period._ Both voices now.

You will not let one of them fall to great and enduring agony. Ever.

Jorman had heard these voices in his mind's receiving of the Force and its will. The voices of the departed. The voices of his mother and father.

All right, damn you, all right. Just let me alone and I'll get on with it.

Jorman heard no more from the Force. No more of unwavering obligations from the long since past. He directed his hands to work the necessary controls and his vessel pushed itself forth to cut through the icy void of deep space.

Chapter 13

Clean from the mindboggling velocity of lightspeed, a shipment freighter cracked itself into Kessel's body of space. Within the ship's thick, protective, iron skin, a crew of six operated and directed their technological host towards the massive and harsh maze. Their attention: find a refueling substation that kept things off the records. They were, of course, carrying a ship of conscripted male life-forms for shipment and sale to slave-owners on Ansion. Not a practice looked favorably upon by most surrounding systems (despite unofficial indifference by the imperial hierarchy). Therefore, it was best to keep a substantially low profile while transporting illegal cargo.

All six men knew it was a risk to attempt refueling in an environment fraught with potential disaster (not to mention frequent distortion of scanner readout capabilities). But they also knew they had no other option.

Borshan and his men knew this to be true. And they also knew that it was wise to predominantly allow freighters such as this one to refuel and go about their business—better not to discourage their prey.

But this time Jabba was paying too well. Borshan had to strike.

And soon he would, when the timing was right, when the freighter was in the correct position...seconds away...

Hidden deep and dark within a sizeable gaping pore of a jagged asteroid, _The Wild Card_ floated stationary. Borshan, Lando, Chewie, and the rest of the crew compliment huddled half in shadow, half washed in multicolored control lights of the cockpit. All the eyes were fixed on the tactical display before them. It read a mass blip based on thruster heat signature. It was nearing a graphic marker, closer, closer...

"Aaannnd..." Borshan drew out, "... _now!"_ he barked as the blip met the marker.

Danmar punched the accelerator and _The Wild Card_ howled forth, engines bright with full thrust. It spurted from the cave and immediately speared the shipment freighter with blue blasts.

Caught off guard by the surprise assault, the seiged ship began a volley of return fire, yet nothing that marked pure precision of aim. It was more reflex than reaction.

This gave _The Wild Card_ an added advantage of knowing exactly where to shoot and disarm their guns. Which happened immediately after, followed by the blasts that disabled the wounded vessel's engines.

Apparently, Lando mused, Borshan's men were better shots with larger targets that were moving less.

With its prey immobilized and disarmed (at least externally at any rate), _The Wild Card_ moved itself closer to the top section of the freighter. Danmar lowered the _Card_ to close the gap between top and bottom and top. Featured on the belly of the _Card_ was a docking ring. It lowered to magnetically connect with the hapless freighter, like a leech latching onto a sluggish animal.

Stars of sweat dotted the foreheads of the five crewmembers as they stood ready and waiting in the cargo hold of their dead freighter. Their weapons were taught in their grasps and pointed up at the near-full ring of sparks showering down from the ceiling. The welding module built into the _Card's_ docking tube would complete the white-hot cutting of the hull within seconds...

One man wiped his brow, moistening his hand before snapping it back to scup tightly his rifle.

The luminous slicing came full circle. The cut section plummeted to the floor with a deep crash. Smoke ghosted the air in spirals and coagulates.

The men jerked themselves briefly, pivoting their attack stances, tensing their aims...

But their would be no firefight, Borshan's compliment would not be landing to the floor one by one, blasting away.

Instead, a swarm of metallic semi-spheres no bigger than three inches in diameter swooped down from the murky hole and soared fast towards the frenzied men. The crew opened fire, blasting two or three of the wanting, searching half-orbs into bursting scraps.

But most of the whisping, zipping objects met their living targets, sticking their flat ends to the men's torsos and shoulders. The frantic crew spasmatically attempted to pry the horrid things from their bodies. But this was a brief chaos as each device spread from their circular edges a bluish phosphorescence that engulfed the crew's entire forms. Once it seeped and dissipated rapidly into their pores, they fell listlessly in clumps and heaps to the flooring—all catatonic.

From the burnt and smoky hole in the ceiling, an L-shaped, tubular camera eye dropped down with a cautious pace then held to scan the surroundings. Once it made a full sweep, it zipped back up to disappear.

"We're good," Danmar's echoing voice came bellowing from above. An instant later, Chewie shot through the hole to hit the floor on his feet. He then held up his hands to assist Danmar in dropping down, then Gogol, then Borshan, Lando, then the rest.

Once we're all down, they stood staring at the unconscious crew of the freighter. "They look so peaceful," Gogol playfully commented.

"All right, everyone," Borshan began, "grab 'em and get 'em into the escape pods. Except for you, Danmar. Raid the galley and stock the pods with food. Might as well eat hardy while they're waiting to be picked up."

"And if they don't get picked up?" Lando asked with a fair measure of concern.

"Nah, never happen. Always different ships, even medical frigates coming by this way. I wouldn't worry."

Lando nodded, satisfied.

Chapter 14

"The transport shuttle will be arriving in three hours to extract Vader's prisoner, Skywalker," a male voice crackled through the console comm of the imperial transport.

An imperial lieutenant responded with, "Understood, captain."

"Stand ready to assist should any incident or trouble occur. Prisoner is rumored to be a highly volatile and much sought after mark."

"Yes, sir. Preparations will be made."

"Avenger out." And the transmission pinged to off.

"Lieutenant," a corporal called out, whirling in his chair to face his superior.

"Yes, corporal," the lieutenant replied.

"We have an unregistered ship coming into our sector. The pilot is haling us."

The lieutenant's eyebrows drew in as he approached the corporal's station a few steps. "Put me through."

"Yes, sir." And the corporal spun back around to work his console. A beep signaled the readiness of two-way transmission.

"Unidentified vessel, this is Lieutenant Wearl of the imperial forces. State the nature of your presence in this sector."

Jorman's transmission-reduced voice came through the comm, "Ah, my navigational system is malfunctioning. I'm not sure where I am or where to go."

Curtly, Wearl commanded, "Then make your repairs and be on your way. We'll give you one hour."

"One hour! You've got to be kidding me!"

"I assure you I am not."

"Well, I guess it's true what they say about you imperial types."

Wearl's eye twitched. "And _just what_ do they say?"

"That your brains are in your holsters."

"...Better than having your brains scattered throughout the sector."

"Well...I suppose you could do that if you're the coward I think you are...or you could face me in person like a man."

Now Wearl's entire face twitched and quivered with restrained rage. "...Prepare to be boarded."

"I look forward to it." And the transmission went dead.

The corporal dared not look at Wearl.

The door of the semi-spacious bridge of the imperial gunship opened to reveal Jorman. Behind him, two stormtroopers flanking the bounty hunter. Both nudged Jorman forward with their rifles. They walked a few paces then halted in front of Wearl, who appeared to have composed his anger to allow an officious demeanor. _"So..._ this is the one? Our little smart mouth."

"Heyyyy," Jorman began jovially, "You're quite a bit smaller than I imagined."

Wearl, still composed, darted his eyes to the trooper on Jorman's right. With that, the ivory-armored drone jammed the barrel of his rifle into Jorman's waist. The hunter buckled with a harsh grunt and a sharp wince. His breaths became labored and hissed through gritted teeth.

But he remained standing.

"Any other comments about my stature that you care to share with us? Come now, don't be shy." Wearl arched his neck back a bit which allowed him to lower his eyes while still maintaining eye-to-eye contact with Jorman. An air of superiority overcame the imperial's expression.

Jorman grunted a "No..." and then waited for his breathing to subside before going on. "...I would, however, like for you to apologize to me."

"For what, may I ask?" Wearl's brows raised in arrogance.

And then Jorman's stare intensely flicked to all the men before him, finally resting dead center into the confident eyes of Wearl.

A shift happened. All imperial eyes and expressions went blank, stupefied. None of them moved.

Jorman now had them, their wills were his to command through the ethering influence of the Force. _"Apologize_ for not recognizing me right off as a shadow agent for the emperor _and_ that you are quite embarrassed and upset with yourself. And most of all, you are willing to follow my every order as if the emperor himself was _giving_ you such orders. Whether they make sense to you or not."

Jorman waved his hand across at chest level and the imperials "awoke" from their hypnotic stupor, as if nothing unusual happened, no break in their consciousness had occurred. Wearl, from his furled brow appeared to be working through something in his mind. "...Wait a minute..." He stared at Jorman as if the pieces of a puzzle were fitting into place in his thoughts. "...I know you...I've seen you bef—" And then the shock of full realization hit his eyes. _"Sir,_ my _deepest_ apologies, I did not recognize you at first."

Jorman calmly but firmly asked, "And exactly what do you recognize me as?"

Wearl flashed uncertainty from his entire form. "Well..." He glanced nervously around the room then back at Jorman. "...Am I...allowed to reveal your—"

"Yes, I authorize you to."

And Wearl, more confident now, though still viced with jitters, announced to his men, "Men, this is one of the emperor's personal agents. If he has sought us out, we must follow his every command as if it were from the emperor himself..." Then another flash of uncertainty struck Wearl's face as he eyed Jorman once more. "...What _are_ your orders, sir?"

Jorman's face became loaded with purpose.

Chapter 15

They appeared asleep. But even normal sleep would have been interrupted by the armed melee that occurred ten minutes earlier. Or by the transfer of their cryo units from the transport freighter to _The Wild Card._ Or being inserted into new cargo slots (which offered a deep and loud "clau-click" with every securing of a stasis unit). No, the slave guards, being sedated chemically, were too far away from a conscious state to ever recognize that they had just been hijacked. And are now on their way to a new home.

"That's the last of them," Danmar noted as he examined the locking frame of a cargo slot. Its new stasis unit was fully secure and would hold under most adverse conditions. He stared at the slave guard within, at the man's closed eyes and expressionless head. "You be good for Jabba now."

A few of the men chuckled. A little easing of the nerves.

"How many?" Borshan soberly asked.

"Eighteen," Danmar replied, straightening up.

"Two thousand per man," Gogol added, his eyes lighting up.

"Gentlemen," Borshan started with a smile, "Well d—"

An alarm rattled blaringly throughout the hull—the proximity alarm.

Borshan shouted, "Incoming! All to scopes!"

Everyone rushed frantically to the cockpit, maddeningly funneling through the door to hit their stations, consoles.

"A little early for reprisals—" Lando got out.

"It's not. It's likely those damned imperials again!" Borshan announced.

"TIEs for sure, but now we got gunships and transports with 'em!" Gogol belted.

"Those wouldn't be here without orders!" Danmar said.

"I know," Borshan agreed, fear tightening his eyes, "that's what worries me..."

From Gogol, "They're moving in! Flanking positions!"

From Danmar, "They're gonna board us!"

Borshan barked, "Get to the weapons, men!"

Almost ramming into each other, the crewers bobbed and jerked their way out of the cockpit, eagerly searching out the gunports.

"The transports and gunships will overtake us before we can do much damage," Gogol announced with rigid calm.

Borshan's teeth gritted beneath pursed lips, "I had a feeling you were going to say that."

"No run into The Maze?" Lando asked.

"We're not in correct position, we have no clear entry, we wouldn't make it in time."

"I see."

Chewie rattled a challenge.

"I agree, big one," Borshan said with a nod, "we'll see how many we can take down when they board."

"How many before they take us," Lando finished.

_The Wild Card's_ guns shot off as many illuminated blasts as it could before the imperial ships closed the spacing of her outer hull. Danmar was precise in his prediction—the imperials meant to board her.

The crew had abandoned their positions at the guns and had formed up in the cargo/main hold. Grouped with them were Borshan, Lando, Chewie, and the lieutenants. All had their weapons poised and ready for what was to happen seconds from now. they could hear the hyper-welder machines begin their cuts, muffled but shrill and jarring. From the top, the sides, and the bottom, the hull sparked and glowed with what looked to be large and rectangular weld slicings...the shapes almost complete...

Borshan charged everyone to action, "Burn down everything that comes through those holes!"

The cuts completed. The newly made doors, with thudding slams, were catapulted into the room, two of them even crashing into one another in mid air before bouncing and plopping their enormous bulks to the floor. Smoke levels increased in the air. But the crew had a fair tracking visual of the surroundings...

Stormtroopers poured through the charred openings and opened fire.

Two of Borshan's men fell before the return fire cut down every trooper in sight.

More troops arrived, more were abruptly separated from the living, including one more of Borshan's crew.

Yet more troops burned to heaps, two more of Borshan's.

And then a muffled order was given—difficult to say which hole it came from. To Lando it sounded like "fold" or "hold."

Silence claimed the room for a brief moment...

Then Jorman dropped from the top hole and landed firmly on his feet, legs angled outward. His lightsaber (the one his father gave him) immediately ignited in his grasp, a greenish glow that illuminated Jorman's form.

Borshan's brow cinched. "What the devil—?"

The crew opened fire on the sword wielder, never expecting that their blasts would be deflected to blacken spots of the hull.

Or come back upon them.

When the deluge was finished, crewmen had met their fates before they even met the floor. Gogol was among them.

"Cover us!" Borshan screamed, "Danmar, to the cockpit!"

The rest did as instructed while Borshan and Danmar sprinted toward the cockpit.

More deflections off the blade. Two more deaths.

Only Lando and Chewie stood now.

Lando ceased firing but kept his gun poised, more out of irrational fear than the intent of use.

Chewie and threw his thick rifle with full might straight at the swordsman.

Jorman swung his saber aside and jabbed a free arm out in front of him. And as forceful and deadly as the rifle soared through the air, Jorman made the object halt in mid-flight. An instant later, the weapon swung around and zipped directly toward Lando's head.

Lando's eyes popped and he crouched, dropping his gun and bringing his arms up to protect his skull.

But it was of no use, the rifle, while slamming into Lando's arm, still knocked with enough velocity to brain him good. He fell to the floor, asleep to the world.

Chewie stared down on Lando's sprawled and unmoving form, then rushed to hunch low and check the man's vitals.

Still breathing, thank the gods.

"You," Jorman called as he reached into a pocket and pulled out a pair of wrist cuffs. He threw them over toward Chewie and they clanked and slid to the floor near to the beast's bended, furry knee. "Put those on," Jorman commanded.

Chewie pierced a look at Jorman and roared a rattling, angered question.

"I'm Jorman Gaarde, and I have certain abilities, as you have seen, so do not ignore my commands." Jorman's eyes stabbed right back. "Cuffs. Now."

Chewie reluctantly picked up the binders, moaning with anguish and anger; he locked them around his wrists.

"Now, up."

Chewie rose to stand.

Jorman casually approached his captive and stopped a few feet in front of him. He closed down his saber and lowered it to his side. His expression turned penitent. "I am sorry, my big one. I know what you're people went through and what being in shackles must feel like to someone like you."

Chewie's eyes narrowed in confusion.

"But I'm afraid I need you to listen to me. I was hired to bring you into Jabba..." Jorman's became pained, conflicted. He breathed in a deep, cleansing breath, let it out. "...But _now_ I've decided to protect you from any others who might come after you. _And_ I need you to help me free someone." He waved a hand and the binders unlocked and clacked to the floor. "Will you come with me?"

Chewie's eyes zigzagged, contemplating quickly. He warbled another question.

"A young and very reckless fool named Skywalker."

Chewie's eyes lit up, he barked with enthusiasm.

"Good, but we have to leave straight away and very quickly! Skywalker will be transferred in less than an hour!"

The electrically charged wookiee fast twisted his torso to stare down at the listless form of Lando. The beast's mind met an immediate whiplash of conflicting desires: _carry Lando with—but no! He must make it to Jabba (and Han!)—I have to leave now to get Luke—but Han! And to kill Boba F—_

"It must be now!" Jorman barked the final warning.

And with a final visual track of Lando's breathing chest, Chewie whipped back around and hastily followed Jorman out of the hold.

Chapter 16

As an artificial life-form, Threepio always wondered whether organic beings were capable of feeling the levels of anxiousness and physical discomfort that he could. Or was it, in fact, more intense of an experience for natural creatures.

At a time like now, Threepio simply didn't think it was possible.

Lurking around the halls of a foreign vessel, hoping not to be noticed as anything but a new droid acquisition was charging the robot's every sensory nerve circuit. He honestly didn't know if he would be able to take much more of this feeling before an overload occurred—and he would be forced to shut down.

But he knew he couldn't let that happen. Master Luke was counting on him to set him free. The original plan had not come to fruition and now Threepio knew that he may be his master's only hope for escape. Of course, Artoo was a back-up if all else failed...but what could Artoo do that Threepio couldn't do infinitely better. Or at least that was Threepio's feelings on the matter.

The gold-painted droid needed to calm his nerve centers—that tripping of internal circuits simply had to be avoided. _Think of long and warm oil baths,_ Threepio tried as a calming technique. _Think of steam showers and power charger units and nice—_

"You there," came a deep voice from behind the droid.

Oh no.

Threepio whirled around to see a man—an armed man—casually walking toward him. As he walked he continued with, "You a new purchase, protocol droid?"

Doing his unequivocal best not to stammer, Threepio responded, "Oh—yes—master...?"

"Orvel."

"Master Orvel," Threepio said in a passable jovial tone. "Yes. I am a new addition to the—"

"Replacing the old protocol droid who—" and Orvel chuckled a few stunted breaths, "—let's face it, had pretty much had its day and then some?"

"Why yes, of course. It never pays to be without an interpreter," Threepio offered rather quickly. "Wouldn't you agree?"

"Oh, I would, I would," Orvel agreed, matching the droids rate of speech. "Particularly in our line of work..."

There was a brief moment of silence that thickened the air as Orvel and Threepio simply stared at each other.

Then Threepio motioned to move past Orvel. "Well, if you'll excuse me—" Threepio began.

"There _is_ , however, a _slight_ problem," Orvel casually said as his eyebrows rose.

Threepio halted and eyed the human again, the droid's nerve amping up once more, "Er—yes?"

"Thing is, goldenrod...we replaced that droid three months ago...and _I'm_ the one who buys the droids around here..." He pursed his lips until they disappeared, his eyebrows raised even higher.

"Oh," Threepio, his tone a pathetic whimper, "I see..."

The poor droid felt that his overload was only seconds away.

_There's a brick in my chest,_ Luke thought with growing alarm. _There is literally brick in my chest, shoving the air out of my lungs._

According to Jorman's time table, Luke would be annexed by the imperials any minute now. And none of Luke's plans had worked out in the slightest. Jorman was not swayed by Luke's words, the droids were nowhere to be found, and Bousch... who knew what the girl's next move would be. Most likely revenge against Togamil, Luke guessed... _if_ she could make it look like an accident. Her fellow hunters would not look so favorably on her out and out assassination of their handler. They would find her. And make her suffer. Or she might do nothing, letting bygones be bygones...

The door to Luke's cell unlocked and opened. Bousch was promptly and violently shoved into the room by two of Togamil's men. She stomped a foot to break her momentum and twisted her torso to face the men, a snarl exploding from her face.

"Touch me again, Mershen slugs!"

The men merely smiled with a swagger of indifference at her threat. The door closed and the locking mechanism latched loudly into place.

"What happened?" Luke asked briskly and with great concern.

Bousch twisted back around to stab Luke with her eyes, the snarl still there. "You! That's what happened! I _knew_ I should have cut you loose once I was free. But _no_ , I had to delude myself into thinking that somehow your silly plan might work!"

"Will you just—calm down for a second," Luke tried. "What did you do to get thrown in here?"

"Nothing! It's obvious they figured things out! And now I'm going to end up a slave to Jabba or worse!"

"We're not had yet. My droid, Threepio, should be on his way."

" _Really_?! Shouldn't that have happened by now?!" Bousch asked as she began pacing erratically.

"Well—yes, but it's possible that it's just taking him longer to reach us—"

"Oh, get real—"

Suddenly, the door zipped opened again and Threepio did in fact arrive—accompanied from behind by Orvell, pistol in hand and pointed at the droid's waist. Threepio now had a restraining bolt attached to his chest plate.

"End of the line, goldenrod. In you go," Orvell ordered the robot.

Threepio complied and the door closed and locked.

"My deepest apologies, Master Luke. I'm afraid I was caught in a lie."

"It's all right, Threepio. It wasn't your fault," Luke soothed.

"Well _this_ is just _wonderful_ ," Bousch deadpanned. "Now our only hope of escape is dependent upon a squatty repair droid—"

" _I beg your pardon_ ," Threepio said with indignance. "But you happen to be talking about a close, personal associate of m—"

Threepio's rant was interrupted as the room viciously rocked and shimmied. A deep booming thud sounded as the place shook.

"What the—?" Bousch blurted as she glanced all about. Luke and Threepio followed suit.

"Careful to wound only," Jorman ordered Wearl. "Remember, we want Skywalker fully intact."

"Yes sir," Wearl responded without hesitation.

"And everyone, _be advised_ ," Jorman announced as he scanned the bridge of the gunship for officer attention. "The envoy that's going to show up in the next few moments is going to look completely legitimate—imperial ships, weapons, and uniforms, the whole bit... But I tell you now they are pirates who wish to use Skywalker for their own monetary gain. The hunters who have Skywalker _know_ this, but are going along with the ruse to foster deniability. I want them all eliminated, save for one."

"And the wookiee, sir?" Wearl inquired with a measure of caution mixe with confusion.

Jorman, blank faced, looked away to stare out at the viewport—and the sieged freighter. "That part of this is still classified."

The ship was under attack, Artoo knew for certain. And Threepio, if he had succeeded, would have been back by now with Luke accompanying him.

It was up to Artoo now to get his trusted friends out of the mess they were in.

He pitched back a bit and allowed his center leg to hit the floor. Locked into position, the leg's roller moved in unison with the other two side legs, and Artoo proceeded to travel the compartments of Bousch's freighter. Before long, he found the exit hatch.

"Here they come, sir," Wearl alerted Jorman as the imperial lieutenant observed the tactical screen. He faced Jorman. "And you're right, they're even using imperial formations."

"Incinerate them as soon as possible," Jorman ordered flatly.

"Yes sir," Wearl replied immediately and swung about to find his weapons officer. "Corporal, all artillery batteries fire full on the approaching ships!"

"Yes sir," whipped the corporal and set about his console.

From the viewport, Jorman and the other officers could see multiple illuminant projectiles race toward the imperial envoy.

"What the devil is going on out there?!" Bousch shouted to no one in particular as several muffled explosions haunted the room.

Luke tried, "Do you get raided by pirates a lot?"

"Not a chance. We'd rip 'em apart. This is something else..."

"Master Luke," Threepio began, "it might be possible that the imperials have arrived, and are trying to take you without paying the bounty set down in the contract."

Luke turned to the hunter. "Bousch?"

She shook her head briskly. "The empire's so loaded, why would they care about parting with a hundred thousand—" She snapped her head to face the door, Luke and Threepio followed her gaze.

Fast and plodding footfalls were growing louder, coming nearer.

The door unlocked and slid open, and Togamil with a good number of his men, hunters and security, flooded like a broken dam into the room. One half directed their weapons at the door, the other half stabbed theirs at the prisoners. Togamil had his pointed directly at Bousch. "Mador, you got your remote?!"

"Yeah!" Security Officer Mador said.

"Lock us in!" Togamil barked.

Mador pressed a button on his remote device and the door zipped shut to lock securely.

Togamil's eyes seethed as he spoke to Bousch. "So... you... you actually thought you were just going to convert Jorm, and skip off with both him and this foolish idiot—" He flicked his fiery eyes over to Luke, then instantly back to Bousch. "—without so much as a hitch... and maybe even along the way exact a little personal revenge on _me_ if you got the chance... _hmm_?" His grip tightened on his rifle.

Standing next to Togamil was Orshi, who also beamed anger from his stare. "And what was your backup plan, huh? Have a few of this moron's friends drop by impersonating imperials to attempt a forced extraction?"

Through gritted teeth, Togamil added, "Well _guess what_ , sweetheart? Now the _real_ imperials have also arrived. And we're going to see who gets to us first."

Orshi lashed out with, "Not that any of you will be able to find out which."

"Oh, that's right," Togamil tagged on to Orshi's rant with mock matter-of-factness, "I did mention something to the effect that I was going to _kill_ both of you as soon as I could..." He brought the rifle up to chin level aimed directly to Bousch's heart. " _Please_ beg..."

Then a muffled crash penetrated the room. The men tensed, gripping their guns tighter. Togamil momentarily turned his head toward the door...

...Several laser blasts echoed outside the room—and the deep buzzing hum of something deadly being waved sharply, quickly around cold be heard.

And an animalistic, rattling roar seeped through the walls.

Outside, a man screamed high-pitched in agony and mortality.

"What in—?" Togamil uttered.

"Is that a _lightsaber_?" came the whip inquiry of a hunter, befuddled.

"Was that a _wookiee_?!" Orshi blurted in alarm and confusion.

And then the aural hell of battle ceased leaving a maddened silence for a long second; only the bass-ladened humming remained.

Then from right outside the door came the less muffled, "Droid, get that door open!"

Artoo was furiously attempting to access the proper code to unlock the cell door. A moment earlier as he was approaching the prison sector, he witnessed a cluster of running men enter the cell and lock the door behind them. Fortunately for Artoo, they were too desperately distracted that they paid no attention to Artoo's presence or where he was heading. Or what he intended to do.

If only he had gotten here earlier, however, and freed his friends. Now matters were worse. For who knows what the group of men intended to do to Luke and Threepio—merely hide with them? Use them as shields against the attackers who were likely on their way here? Artoo could here their loud battle advances coming on quickly.

Or would the prisoners simply be killed?

If he could find the right code sequence by jacking into the control terminal, he could open the door and... and what? He was just a mechanic unit and not a huge one at that. What help could he possibly provide to his friends who were unarmed ad outnumbered? A distraction at most... but possibly the slightest chance of allowing Luke the opportunity to rush a man or two and obtain a weapon, and then who knows...

The chance was less than slim, Artoo had to admit; it was more like a microscopic sliver.

But it's all I have to work with, the domed droid rationalized as his interface cylinder was extended straight out and injected into the terminal's inlet jack. The metallic rod was twisting to and fro allowing the droid to delve into the inner workings of the computer's operating systems; finding backdoors and loopholes in logic programs. Affording Artoo the matching code numbers to unlock the door. So far, he had found four of the seven numbers.

Normally e could have broken the code sequence in seconds flat, but whoever leapt into the room and locked the door tripped extra walls of access denial.

But Artoo _would_ get through them, regardless of the extra time it took. He _had_ to get that door open. He wanted that sliver of a chance...

Was that a lightsaber amidst the coming sounds of armed engagement?

And what was that rattling howl from? Not a human... Wait a minute, that was Chewbacca! Why is _he_ here?!

"Droid, get that door open!"

Artoo spun his head to track the man who barked the order at him.

The man wielded a lightsaber.

Artoo only had one more number to locate... Got it! He commanded the computer to unlock and open the door. He hoped that by doing this he had not made things worse. He hoped that this man behind him was Jorman Gaarde, the one Luke had hoped to find...

...And that Gaarde was here to help the right people...

The door to the cell slid wide open to reveal Jorman, saber lit and held in attack stance.

"Jorman?!" Mador uttered in surprise, bafflement.

"YOU TRAITOR!" another hunter blasted and opened fire. The others followed suit with impunity.

Each laser bolt, however, was met with blinding, blurring deflections from Jorman's saber; his movements lightening fast and precise. The laser lances angled up and down, blackening the floor and ceiling, yet some came back upon the men, dropping them fatally to the floor.

The firing raged on, and the deflecting and killing continued. Until Jorman had successfully entered the room—and all the hunters and security men were dead.

Only Togamil and Orshi remained alive.

Instead of trying to cut Jorman down, which both knew was futile after what they had just seen, Togamil and Orshi put into action one of Artoo's feared options: they used Bousch and Luke as human shields. Orshi had a headlock on Luke, contacting the muzzle of his gun to the temple of Luke's head. Togamil mirrored this action with Bousch. Their grips on their prey were immense, rage-infested.

"Come closer, Jorman," Togamil baited, sweat beading his brow. "I want you to."

"If you let them both go, Tog," Jorman offered, "I give you my guarantee that both you and Orsh can get out of this alive."

"Your word is _worthless_ now, you backstabbing dog," Togamil advised. "The only way this works now is that Orsh and I are taking our hostages to one of the ships. And no one is going to get in our way... or these two are fried. You get me? I hope so. I hope one of us gets one of us. What happened to you? You had it, only one more year and you would have been free to do anything— _anything_."

"I don't have to explain myself to a _leech_ like you. Now let them go before this gets much uglier—"

" _Make it_ uglier! Come a step closer and Bousch here loses an ear!"

Bousch whistled a grunt in horrid fear.

Jorman flicked his eyes to Luke and his mind reached out to communicate with the boy— _Redirect, if you can, Orshi's gun to point at Togamil!_

_Right_ , came the mental reply from Luke. He closed his eyes and calmed his senses, pulling every energy he possessed into the center of his being. He reached out to the gun pressed to his head and first made it stone, immovable as independent parts—no trigger could be pulled or cartridge rounds could be ignited. Then he willed and nudged the barrel to veer off and away from his head. The maneuver was met with tremoring resistance as Orshi was rigorously attempting to put the muzzle back to Luke's temple. With grunts and verbal protests, Orshi began awkwardly pointing the gun at Togamil.

Togamil of course noticed this. "What are you _doing_?!"

"It's not me! It's them!" Orshi countered.

"Stop pointing that thing at me!"

"I can't!"

"Strangle him! Make him stop!"

Orshi did so, and Luke's concentration was wavering. Orshi was gaining control again... But only for a second, then the gun pointed rigidly at Togamil once more.

Jorman had taken over, drawing from his own well of the Force to control the weapon... and Orshi's hand.

"My finger is about to pull the trigger—!" Orshi screamed.

"Stop now!" Togamil belted in return and in panic, "Don't let 'em—wait! Wait! Wait!" his gun almost left its aim off of Bousch's head as Togmil's instincts fought with one another: fire back—no! don't let your hostage go! But he's going to fire on you!

Jorman willed Orshi to loosen his stranglehold on Luke. And Luke, having his focus of power back, threw all of it into Togamil's gun. It whipped upwards to point at the ceiling, a shot went off to scar a section of it.

Bousch sprung into action, grabbing the fisted hand of the arm around her neck. She pulled it hard against the wrist joint, causing pain to explode in that area. Togamil belched a brief scream. Then, with both hands gripping Togamil's damaged wrist, she yanked and whirled her head out of the lock. In the next instant, she jammed his fist full force into the bridge of his nose. Without missing a beat, she chopped a hand fast into his throat.

Togamil crumpled forth, pounding to his knees, his mouth raking for gasps of precious air. His brain wailed out agony from the bridge hit.

Orshi was viced, he no longer had any control of his arms or legs. Luke slipped out of his grasp and leapt aside—allowing Jorman to simply slam Orshi against the wall. The thrown hunter met with unconsciousness and plopped to the floor in an awkward mess.

Bousch picked up the weapon Togamil was forced to drop while incapacitated by her combat moves.

She pointed it right at the top of his head.

" _No_ , Bousch!" both Luke and Jorman warned in unison.

"Why not?" Bousch argued, wide-eyed with fury. "You said it yourself, he's a leach, a bloodsucker."

"But he's an unarmed bloodsucker," Jorman said. "And trust me, you don't want a dirty kill on your conscience for the rest of your days."

Bousch's aim unwavered. Togamil coughed convulsively and scraped out his breaths. When he was equalized enough, he lifted his head to stare up at the barrel of Bousch's gun.

"If we let him live, he'll just come after us," Bousch justified.

"Oh, I think..." Jorman began as he walked toward Bousch and Togamil; he closed down his saber and stood next to his fellow hunter. "...our friend, our _handler_ here... is going to have a tough enough time running from Jabba."

Though Togamil was still breathing heavy and coughing some, he managed to Jorman, "Oh... I won't run from Jabba... I'm going straight to him... and I'm going to tell him you did all of this, _and_ botched the bounty of the wookiee."

"With what evidence? Your external cameras and sensors show you were raided by imperials and possibly rebels."

"But my internal cameras—"

"Most of them don't work, and you _know_ that. And I avoided the ones that do to get to here."

Togamil looked off, nodding slowly. "...So, you thought I deserved a bit of irony—the handler of bounty hunters becomes bountied himself... What did I do to you to make you hate me so much—?"

"You made me go after someone I couldn't go after." Jorman nodded once toward Bousch. "And then you threw her to the wolves, don't deny it. You think that gun is pointed at you for the fun of it?"

"Well you said it yourself—dirty kills are part of the game. Sometimes there's no choice. Business is business."

"Not anymore. Bousch, Luke, it's time to go before more imperials arrive."

"I'll find you. Make bet I find you."

"Not if Jabba finds you first." Then Jorman raised a hand and calmly swiped it as he said "Sleep."

Togamil's eyes closed, his body slumped to the ground and remained still.

Jorman turned to head for the door, Luke followed after, but then both halted to twist their torsos and glance at Bousch. She still had the gun poised on Togamil's catatonic body.

"Bousch?" Luke called.

She kept the gun pointed, her grip on the weapon intensified, her teeth clenched behind her pursed, thinned lips; her eyes tightened, wanting...

"Bousch, we have to go..." Luke warned.

...And then she whip-holstered the gun and whirled around to follow the others out of the room, trembling a bit as she did.

"Artoo!" Threepio beamed as they exited the cell, "You made it without being captured. I wish I had your luck."

"Good work, Artoo," Luke encouraged.

"Praise later, let's move it, folks" Jorman said heading for the corridors. The others picked it up to match his pace.

But then halted again as a great wall of fur clutching a massive rifle hindered their path.

"Chewie!" Luke bellowed and ran to the towering wookiee to hit him with an embrace. Chewie moved his gun aside and wrapped an arm around the excited boy. The giant grunted with affection.

Luke broke the hug but kept a hand on Chewie's shoulder as he asked, "What are you doing here?! And where's Lando?!"

"There'll be time to explain later, you two," Jorman mother-henned. "Please don't make me beg."

"He's right," Luke agreed, "let's go."

And they ran the halls. The poor, long suffering protocol droid did his best to keep up.

Chapter 17

Slap, slap _._

"Lando?" Borshan tried as he bent over the former Cloud City administrator, lightly hitting the sleeping man's cheek. A few taps and then he switched to the other cheek. "Lando, old friend..."

Lando's closed eyelids bunched then attempted a separation. Clearly, a headache was slowing the effort to open his eyes as he kept having to wrinkle them closed. A few seconds later, however, Lando managed sufficient sight and visual tracking. He found Borshan as well as Danmar.

"There he is," Danmar commented as Lando rubbed his temples and gritted his teeth.

"Hey there, Lando, you okay? How's the head?" Borshan inquired.

Rubbing the side of his head, with a crinkled brow, Lando replied, "Splitting... Where'd Chewie?"

"Gone," Borshan said with an empathetic tone.

"...What? What do you mean, gone?"

"I mean gone, left from here. I'm guessing the swordsman took him. Why, I'm not sure."

Lando's stare trailed off, focused on nothing. He muttered faintly, "Jabba..."

Borshan's look of concern switched to one of contemplation, his own eyes averting briefly from Lando. "...Jabba, right—we can still make a mint on the guards... You still in, Lando?"

Lando's gaze locked on Borshan once more. "Yeah, I'm in..." he responded with an undercurrent of urgency and drive. "In fact I need you to get me _all_ the way in."

Borshan's eyes narrowed, his brow cinched. "...What exactly are you getting at, Lando?"

Though his head rolled with pain, Lando forced his body to rise and eventually stand. The other two straightened up with him. He braced himself with a deep breath and said, "I need you to... allow me to enter Jabba's palace _as_ one of the guards.

Danmar's face screwed up in shock. "What, you mean like wake one of these guys up and put you in hibernation in his place?"

"Yes."

Borshan's skeptical look heightened. "Now why would you want to do stupid thing like that?"

Another deep breath escaped Lando's nose. "Because... I think that Chewie has been bountied... by Jabba."

Borshan's eyes popped wide as he recoiled his upper body. "Now listen, Lando, don't think I don't appreciate all that you've done for us but... you understand, we do a lot of business with Jabba. If it ever got back to him that we helped you like this—"

"It won't, I promise you," Lando reassured with as much sincerity as he had ever used. "I'll tell him that I infiltrated on my own, without your knowledge."

But Danmar countered with, "Jabba's not stupid, Lando. He'll figure it out sonner or later."

"Then..." And Lando's eyes blinked on horrible revulsion of what he was about to propose. "...I give you my word that I won't try anything. But I need to look after Chewie. I _need_ to know what happens to him."

Borshan's head shook in bafflement. " _Why?_ "

Because I betrayed him, Lando tortured himself with. I betrayed him and I betrayed Han—in the worst way possible... "It's-it's too personal to get into... _Will_ you help with this?"

Borshan's disturbed eyes averted in another direction; he slowly walked away to pace in deep, conflicted contemplation. His mind weighed al the crucial factors, benefits and risks, denials and reprisals... Finally he faced Lando again. "All right, old friend. But hear me now and hear me well—you botch this somehow and if you're still alive after... then I'll have no choice but to come after you."

Lando nodded, eyes serious. "I understand."

"But now," Danmar said, "what do we do with the guard you replace?"

Lando shrugged slightly. "You seem to be shorthanded at the moment. I'm willing to bet that whoever we take out would rather work for you than be a slave to Jabba."

Borshan and Danmar stared at each other, their brows rose in unison—Lando had a good point.

Chapter 18

I'm suffocating, Akbar reflected with a strange calm. At least it feels like I'm suffocating. Of course I've never done well in confined, darkened spaces huddled with many others.

And I've never been a prisoner before.

And then obviously there was the hunger brought on by meager rations which wouldn't satisfy a womprat. Why not heap that on to the factors causing his extreme shortness of breath. He felt as if his stomach was puckering against itself, cramping agonizingly to remind him that food was vehemently required.

Naturally, it was doing him no good to ruminate on these ills. He had to accept them as harsh realities tempered by fact that most of his life he had led a fairly pampered existence.

Being a senator used to generate a strong sense of purpose in Akbar's mind. In the early days, much was done in the way of progress for his people. Their wants, needs, and prayers were answered thanks to Akbar and his team's aggressive yet strangely non-threatening strategy of senate manipulation. Service our needs and we promise you three-fold back in galactic benefit for the core systems. And the promise was delivered. Time and again.

But as always with every species that exists with higher sentience, when things are too good, there come the unconscious need to tear them down, to give the devil his due, as they say.

A new supreme chancellor—the timid and easily swayed Valorum Gazarra—allowed a blindness to happen within the interplanetary dealings. And certain mon calamari's struck secret contracts with governmental officials to start receiving far more than was rightfully due them.

And then the Clone Wars eventually came to pass allowing an even greater disparity between the haves and have-nots—despite the concrete policies of the hardlining new supreme chancellor, Palpatine.

And suddenly, Senator Akbar, the once commander of the calamari navy, felt as impotent, purposeless, and suffocated as... well as he did now being a conscripted prisoner. Whose work detail consisted of picking away at rock in the hopes of striking tibanna coal. Pick, pick, pick, stab, stab, stab, dig, dig, dig at the cragged walls of black rock, scarcely finding the precious tibanna. Mindless work for a fruitful, brilliant mind.

Not unlike the situation of course of the galactic senate in the past thirty or so years. As Akbar desperately tried to recapture the greatness of The Republic yet was mired by futile searches for the ones who took too much and left virtually nothing for the rest. In trying to get the calamari voice heard in the in the senate hearings but always being drowned out by endless debate.

How Akbar despised the greedy power elite—the abusers, the betrayers, the callous indifferent to the mass suffering of the galaxy. Yet pitied them for these socialites led in his mind useless and shallow lives.

But mostly despised.

"Admiral!" a whispery voice called out to Akbar.

Though his mind was pained with lack of oxygen and cancers of the past, he twisted his neck to glance at the one who called out to him—Dosh. The personal aide crouched low as he ran toward the admiral and met him, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Sir," Dosh continued, "we found the mole! The traitor!"

As Dosh got this out, three more calamari's lowly trotted toward the two. One was being forcefully escorted as his brethren flanked him and clasped his arms with crustacean-like hands. Once they reached Akbar and Dosh, they shoved the captor to his knees and faced their superiors.

"This is him, sir," Dosh elaborated with conviction. "I have no doubts."

"You have nothing!" the held calamari balked. "You've made a huge mistake!"

Dosh yanked up a small communicator and held it up to the suspected traitor's face. "Then what was _this_ doing underneath your cot?!"

"I told you I have no idea what it was doing there!"

"Of course you'd say that," said one of the calamari's gripping his arm.

"I hate to condemn one of our own," the other calamari captor admitted, "but I'm afraid it fits. Amash here is the only one of us who has been with the regiment for the shortest amount of time."

Akbar pursed his aquatic-featured lips and drew in a deep breath, let it out. "I'm afraid the circumstantial evidence against you is quite strong, Corporal."

"Sir," Amash pleaded, "if I could have been with you longer, I would have. But my family _needed_ me."

Akbar afforded himself an instant or two of mind pouring, and washing down of the facts, the damning evidence. "I loathe to condemn one of our own, myself, but... I'm afraid we must keep you under constant watch from now on, son."

"Sir," Amash said, eyes wide, " _all_ I've ever waned to do is serve you and the alliance."

"If that's true, then you will cooperate fully with us and not attempt to make any trouble. And you cannot know our plans from this point on."

Amash buried his eyes as bowed his head humiliatingly low. "...I understand."

"Dosh, let him go."

"Sir," Dosh began with controlled alarm, "do you really feel that's wise, admiral?"

"He can't alert them now without revealing that we already know he's a spy."

Dosh's eyes darted to the side as his head began one long nod. "And after that they would kill him, I see..." Then he locked eyes on Amash. "...But be warned, young one, we will be watching your every move now."

Feeling like a small fish under a very large microscope, Amash scurried off the moment he was unhanded. Dosh looked after the fleeing calamari, as did Akbar. The other two men followed after Amash, making sue not to lose the suspected traitor.

Dosh turned back to Akbar. " _Hopefully_ , this puts us back on track."

With a bit of a prideful grin, Akbar cheered, "Good work, Dosh. I've always been able to count on you, son."

Dosh bowed his head briefly with a satisfactory smile forming his lips.

Then Akbar turned serious. "Now we have to move up the raid. It is likely that the imperials will wonder why they haven't received any new information from Amash."

"If we succeed in getting out of here, sir, do we still take him with us?"

"Yes, he must stand trial."

"He may slow us down. Possibly even get us killed."

"Nevertheless."

Suddenly, a spray of ebony pebbles stung the backs of the two men.

" _Return_ to _work_!" thundered the guard who had kicked up the stones.

Akbar and Dosh briskly dispersed from each other and set about the endless task again. Dig, dig, dig, dig, dig....

Chapter 19

Eighteen men from Bestine were born into slavery. None of them directly owed debts to their owners fro it was all merely ancestral contracts passed down from those who borrowed far too much. And had the misfortune of being weak in character. Or simply tragic luck in their risky investments.

Bestine had its laws, its traditions, as any world or subculture did. And a longstanding edict for the countries therein mandated that debts be paid in "Tree Branch" servitude. "Tree Branch" referring to slave family trees that "branched" out with their offspring to carry the burden of working off almost innumerable debt.

Some slave owners were honorable, and set down reasonable limits of repayment for "Tree Branch" services. Thus eventually allowing the families to become free of servitude obligations.

None of the eighteen, however, who were to be sold to a baron on Ansion, were fortunate enough to be owned by such fair-minded individuals.

All, as it happened, were conscripted by a ruthless, cunning count who took advantage of an addendum in the law. The addendum stated: slave owners may set terms of the contract for the duration of the conscription. Translation: an owner may set the price for a slave's rate of work; if a slave works a full day of hard labor, it might represent only one credit against the debt.

And if the credits owed amounted in the hundreds of thousands—or even millions... then "tree branchers" likely never stood a chance of seeing freedom.

The owners could also, as had just been attempted, sell their conscripts off world to the highest bidder.

The count who sold the eighteen men hoped to make a sizeable profit while still keeping enough conscripts to perform the necessary menial tasks. But soon he would be receiving a transmission from the Ansion baron that the slaves never arrived. And that the crediting to count's personal bank account would be placed on hold.

Both count and baron were about to reach new levels of rage and accusations.

But that was of no concern to Borshan as he walked the halls of Jabba's illustrious palace. In his hand he held a blaster that was trained on the eighteen slaves who trotted along ahead of him. Danmar similarly held the men in corral with his own pointed weapon. One other man poised a weapon on the conscripts—a man who had very recently been liberated. And was indeed, as Lando predicted, quite pleased to be working for Borshan now—as opposed to joining his fellow Bestinians into Jabba's den of suffering slaves.

The unfortunate indentured were all suited and helmeted in the traditional Ansion guard regalia, complete with bladed gaffee sticks. Although each guard held the impressive weapons, none would be a match for well placed blaster hits. And thus not one of the marching slaves raised their sticks in defiance or protest. They simply walked where Borshan told them to walk, toward Jabba's main audience chamber, to new conscription. To likely a fate worse than death.

And Lando was now one of them.

"Ah Borshan," Jabba bellowed in deep, booming native tongue, "I see you've brought me new security numbers. Excellent, my good boy."

"As promised, as promised," Borshan replied with a profit-induced smile as he herded the slaves into the main audience chamber. "May they serve you well in protecting your grand establishment."

Jabba's lackeys, his hanger-ons, stood around the clearing of the chamber, which was the center of the room, ogling and mumbling comments regarding the new acquisitions. Jabba merely lounged on his massive slab, leaned on his post, and puffed his trusted wire pipe as he observed the scene before him. "I believe we discussed two thousand a head, did we not?"

Borshan jovially nodded once while saying, "That we did, and thanks for a fair price indeed."

"And how would you prefer payment this time?"

"Oh, account crediting suits me fine."

"Very well then. Fortuna..." And Jabba's majordomo, Bib Fortuna came forth to face the hutt. "...see that it is done." Bib nodded and hastily departed. Jabba refocused on Borshan. "Borsh, you seem short of your usual compliment of men."

Sour faced, Borshan breathed, "Aahh, lost them in the acquisition. Risks of the trade."

"My condolences. Stay a while and drink to their memory."

Another nod and a half grin. "Thank you, don't mind if I do."

A servant girl came forth and offered Borshan, Danmar, and the former slave/new employee drinks. All three partook.

Fortuna reappeared and glided up to Jabba's side. "Master, I have favorable news—Boba Fett has arrived at Mos Eisley. And he will be bringing Solo here shortly."

"Excellent," Jabba cracked loudly to all. "A toast, everyone," And he raised his personal stein of ale. The crowd of lackeys raised their own drinks. "To Boba Fett—the bounty hunter who always gets his man!"

The room erupted with, "To Boba!" then they downed hardy gulps their various concoctions.

_Chewie, damn it,_ Lando urged in his mind, as if somehow the wookiee might be able to psychically hear him. _Tell me you've made it to Mos Eisley to intercept Fett! Don't let him reach this palace with Han in tow, PLEASE..._

Chapter 20

"So..." Luke began with strained believability etched in his expression, "they're just simply going to let us go? That's it?"

Luke had asked this on a moment after Jorman had entered to join the stunned boy in the main hold of Jorman's ship. And explained to him that indeed they would be shortly debarking from the imperial convoy.

"That's it," Jorman replied with a shrug. "As I told you, they believe me to be a shadow agent working for the emperor. So whatever I order them to do... they do."

"Incredible," Luke remarked with an impressive tone. "I mean I've seen it done before but... not on this big of a scale."

Once again, Jorman shrugged. "The benefits of dealing with weak minds. I'm sorry, I've interrupted your training session, haven't I?"

"I hadn't got too far into it actually." Luke held up the lightsaber that Jorman had given him to use. "I've just been getting used to this saber, the feel of it and all."

"Well, _if_ you have, let me see what you can do."

"Got it," Luke said as he spun around to ignite the saber, its greenish-white glow served to paint Luke's form in the same color. "Remotes activate," he commanded and the three practice globes lit up and shot into the air to surround the swordsman. He whipped his blade into an attack stance and the remotes sailed this way and that, avoiding collision. They spat shocker blasts—laser lances that provided only a small shock sensation to the subject, to Luke. But he maneuvered his saber in odd spirals to cleverly deflect each bombardment.

Jorman studied Luke's movements, his tactics, his style. It was clear that the boy had training from quite experienced combat saber men. Nothing was getting through his defenses. However, Jorman also noticed that in Luke's swipes, parries, and so forth, a perfection of moment fluidity was missing. It'll come in time, Jorman mused, the boy is still young. And still, what he was seeing from him was quite—

"Impressive," Jorman completed his thought out loud. "Remotes deactivate."

The remote globes ceased their assault and resolved themselves to equidistant positions in mid air.

Luke walked back over to Jorman, breathy from the vigorous activity. "Thanks," he said, acknowledging the compliment. "Benefits of not wanting to get shocked again."

Jorman cracked a half grin, but then continued on with his assessment. "Your movements are predominantly smooth and effective. Perhaps a bit of refinement could be made here and there. But otherwise you're coming along... Who were your instructors?"

"There were two actually. The first one was Obi-Wan Kenobi—"

" _Be_ serious," Jorman spat, "the man has been dead for more than twenty years now. Killed in the Clone Wars."

"That's exactly what he wanted the empire to believe. But in truth he was hiding out on my home planet of Tatooine—"

"Ta-too-ine..." Jorman emphasized in amazement, he stared off. "... All these years... Imagine that... Clever man... Who was the second?"

"Yoda—"

"Yoda!" Jorman's eyes widened. "...Yoda is alive... Well Luke, my good man, with both of them still around, perhaps there is a real chance of turning things around—"

"Only Yoda." And Luke's eyes zigzagged before adding, "Obi-Wan was killed only recently..."

"I'm sorry. Judging by the way you look, it's clear he meant a lot to you." Jorman starred off again, encapsulated in some sort of mental grandeur. "But Yoda lives... Possibly the emperor is not as omniscient as he boasts... we might still have a chance..."

Luke curiously eyed Jorman. "You surprise me. Just a few hours ago you were a totally different man. What changed you in such a short time?"

Jorman smiled knowingly. "It was really the wookiee. See, in the days before the empire and The Clone Wars, my parents fought civil wars on several planets. And one of those was the wookiee planet of Kashyyyk.

"Ocassionally when hoards of lunatic scavengers attempted to overrun wookiee villages, things would get quite intense. My parents were there to assist in fending off the scavengers. But there were a few occasions when the wookiees had _saved them_ ... and I simply couldn't let a wookiee be subject to the tortures of a psychotic hutt."

"And that was all?"

Jorman snorted a breath in irony. "No. There was you of course. I suppose for quite some time now, _I_ have been the one deluding myself."

Luke smiled, pride forming his eyes.

"All right, young one," Jorman tightened up a bit. "enough history and personal revelation."

Luke nodded, switching his mental focus. "You're right, this is the time to be looking forward. The truth is I took an even greater risk to find you than you know. Hopefully we can make it to Sullust before the mission takes place."

"What mission?"

"A group of mon calamari who are Alliance members have been enslaved on a prison asteroid. Our goal is to liberate them before they starve. Or worse. Will you help with the operation?"

"Hmm... I suppose I've committed myself to the cause, haven't I?"

"Looks that way."

"You appear to be without your own lightsaber. Use the one I've given you to train until we reach..."

"Sullust."

"And I will use my other..." Then Jorman drew in closer to Luke, the hunter's eyes intensifying. "...and you and I will go into battle fighting as the jedi of old once did—with sabers charging."

Luke held up his surrogate saber hilt and shifted his gaze to it. A hint of a smile of longing and warm remembrance shaped his lips. "Thank you for this... I miss my original. I just recently lost it—"

"And you'll lose this one, too. After you've studied this saber, you'll be required to build one of your own design. It is the duty of every fledgling jedi to construct their very lightsaber. A right of passage, so to speak."

Luke continued to admire the saber, turning it around in his hands. He then looked at Jorman. "Thanks again. For this... and the opportunity to know another who..."

"Who shares your gifts?"

"...who is trying to be what he was meant to be."

They smiled—a bit awkwardly—at each other. Jorman placed a hand on Luke's shoulder, shaking it slightly. "Come on, Luke, back to practicing. There're still a few pivot refinements to work on. Snap to it, boy."

"Yes sir," Luke said, standing straighter, at attention. But a second later, both of them cracked a bit of laughter.

With a smile still lingering on his face, Jorman backed away from Luke and said, "Remotes activate."

Luke composed himself and returned his body to an attacked stance, reigniting his borrowed sword. The remote globes swooped in the "kill", positioning themselves in wobbling orbits around Luke. And the saber practice heated up again.

Chapter 21

"...And you're _sure_ he intends to strike at Shoflar Mas?" rattled the massive hologram of the emperor down to Vader. The apprentice was positioned in his respectful kneeling stance, resting himself on a circular pedestal. His neck was craned as far up as his helmet would allow to meet the possessed eyes of his master.

"It's likely," Vader began, "that a good number of rebels will join Luke in the assault."

"But why?" the emperor's visage asked with genuine befuddlement. "For a few pathetic slaves? Are they that desperate to increase their numbers?"

"The desperate rarely make the best choices, my master."

"A fact that you, yourself, must keep in mind. I assume you wish to capture the boy."

"As well as prevent the rebels from succeeding, my master."

"But something tells me you would sacrifice that if it meant obtaining Skywalker."

"...Do you not wish me to go?"

"No. Make your way to Shoflar. But if you do not capture him in your efforts to stop the rescue... then you must return to The Death Star immediately to continue supervision."

Vader vowed his head while saying, "Yes, master, thank you."

The hologram scrambled then dissipated to nothing. Vader rose his head to stare in front of him but his eyes were unfocused, his mind detached from what was around him. Only this thought consumed him: _the boy will be mine this time._

Chapter 22

Leia took in the multicolored lightning show performed by Sullust's upper atmosphere. Standing in front of the same viewport as she had a few hours earlier with Rieekan (though alone now), she had let the scenery soothe her mind's mounting concerns. Han plagued her every waking moment, testing her sanity's resolve. In those last moments before Han was lowered into the smoke spewing pit to frozen solid, she had given into the flooding love she felt for him. Which, in retrospect, seemed quite painfully ironic to her. She had for once in her life allowed herself to care deeply for someone other than The Alliance's ideals and goals. And at the moment of that admission of her heart's greatest desire, the object of that desire was turned into a living statue. And flown, taken far, far away from her.

At least she knew Luke was returning within the next few minutes, if not sooner. It was something that would buoy her spirits—if only for a short while. She was also well aware that he was going into battle within a matter of hours. If she lost Luke, her love of a different kind, as well as Han... She had to admit she would never be the same again. Ever.

A ship—a small freighter—snapped out of lightspeed and arced itself to move closer to the very cruiser that Leia was now aboard. She witness the ships approach through the viewport and knew from Luke's description of the vessel that it was Jorman Gaarde's.

Five minutes later, Gaarde's freighter docked in the hangar and both Gaarde and Luke were traipsing toward the hatch door. It opened with a snap-swish and the two were face to face with pensive, nerve-addled princess.

"Leia," Luke said with a warm smile that beamed relief.

" _Why hello there_ ..." Jorman greeted her with a welcome grin of his own—a grin that meant something other than relief.

Luke breathed a breath that mirrored the annoyance fueling the roll of his eyes.

That annoyance also hit Leia's expression as her lips pressed thinly together.

Luke deflected with, "Sorry to have taken so long. Leia, this is Jorman Gaarde, son of two jedi. He's agreed—"

"Leia..." Jorman's voice floated in a dreamy tone as he stepped casually forward. "...such a distinct beauty I've not seen in years. Delighted to meet of course..." His eyes softened in an attempt to disarm a female's defense; a lecherous ploy of sensual hypnosis.

Leia of course was not going to have any of it. "M-hm, thank you. I appreciate your compliments and I'm grateful for your presence, but time is short. You're here to help?"

Still locked in seduction mode, Jorman replied, "In more ways than I anticipated..."

Leia broke her neutral gaze of Jorman's inviting eyes to focus on Luke. "We must get to the tactical center right away. The mission group is assembling as we speak."

"Right. Jorm? Shall we?"

Jorman's attempted spell on Leia obviously for naught, he casually shot out his arm in the direction of the corridor. "Lead the way."

"My friends, the time has come," Mothma announced to the sixty-eight individuals populating the tactical command room of the royal cruiser. Leia, Luke, Chewie, and Jorman were among the group now raptly focused on their acting president. "We have learned that Admiral Akbar has discovered the mole among their men. Before imperial guards catch on to this, we must act as soon as possible. We strike in one hour. The ion cannon is positioned on the remote ship and is ready to go. General Madine?"

Mothma stepped back and allowed Madine to take her former position of addressing the onlookers. "Four cruisers with eight shuttle ships will make the assault. All wings will be on standby in case star destroyers arrive. It is not anticipated but we cannot rule it out."

Jorman raised a hand.

"Yes?" Madine responded.

"Just how did you come by this information from the prison camp? It's not like the guards allow visitors or communication with the outside."

Madine's eyes narrowed, his brow cinched. "And who might you be since I've never seen you before?"

"Jorman Gaarde, bount... jedi knight."

Mumblings of shock and surprise rippled throughout the crowd. A real life jedi knight... Some had never encountered one before, others were too young to remember. The rest simply didn't believe it could be true.

Madine was one of them. "The jedi have been extinct for more than twenty years, my friend."

"I'm here to bring them back," Jorman countered with a scoundrel's hint of defiance.

"And what proof do you have that what you say is true?"

Luke suddenly sat forth and blurted, "Sir, I'll vouch—"

But Jorman silenced Luke by placing a hand on his arm. "It's all right..."

Without warning, the large, thick, and ridged tactical ring before everyone became active. Free from anyone's physical actions, the central holographic imager rose up a foot from the ring and promptly fountained the formulating digital representation of the fleet's current movements.

Murmurs of gasps and "whoa's" flooded the entire room.

Madine, though he remained collectively calm, nevertheless heightened his eyebrows. "...I see..."

The holographic display seemed to fold up into a neon line, then it dug itself down into nothingness. The central imager lowered itself to its stasis position.

Madine continued, "...And Skywalker was about to vouch for you. And since you are here listening to us, I assume you plan to help in the rescue."

"I do."

"Then I will answer your question. Admiral Akbar lifted a communicator and reformatted it to receive private channels."

"And the guards never missed the loss?"

"Akbar knows the psychology of the troopers—since they have the _same_ psychology. He knows that a trooper would admit to accidentally breaking a communicator rather than admit to losing one."

"Clever man, this Akbar."

"He's one of the best. Which is a key reason among others that this mission must succeed. Any other questions?"

"None."

"Very well. Luke, you and Jorman will be on the initial wave of shuttles to land. Do your best to clear the way for the others."

"Yes sir," Luke said with a nod of acknowledgment and respect.

With that, Madine eyed Mothma; and she again moved forth to speak to the audience. "My friends... the end of the perverted rule of the sith is coming... and with the aid of Akbar and his calamari soldiers, that end may come sooner than hoped for. Good luck to you all."

An assault of sounds jumbled the massive, spacious docking bay of the royal cruiser. Whirring bouts from power drills competed with the echoing clanks of fuel pumps attaching and detaching from shuttles and fighters. Coursing human and alien voices rose and fell in the intermittent deluges of venting exhausts.

One more whirring sound of a pitch contributed to other cacophonies, a pair of mini-trams which crossed each other in opposing directions. Once they cleared, Luke and Jorman were fully visible, moving forth with a compliment of rebel soldiers trailing right behind. Jorman motioned for Luke to step aside and allow the others to pass ahead of them. Luke complied with curious eyes. Once the men had walked a certain distance away, Jorman spoke to Luke.

"Listen," And his tone became uncharacteristically innocent, uncertain. "once this mission is over... I wasss wondering if you would allow me to continue your training."

Luke grinned with genuine respect. "Absolutely. Actually I thought that was already implied."

"I know. But I didn't want to be too presumptuous. You're almost ready on your own. Obi-Wan and Yoda did their jobs well."

"I would be honored to have you as my mentor."

"Perfect. Then it begins here. Master and apprentice. And then soon you will find your own to train while I find another. And the ranks will grow."

"And Yoda will return to oversee us all."

"...Yoda... If only I had known... But there's still time to set things right."

"It won't be easy, the emperor and Vader will use everything they have to stop us."

"Yes, but even the sith have their blind spots. Besides, let them come with their best." And a cocky defiance formed his face.

Chapter 23

"How long to Shoflar?" Vader asked with obvious impatience. He stood like an expectant vulture behind the seated pilots as they worked the imperial shuttle's control panels. The bluish, rushing coagulations filling the viewport proved their current journey through hyperspace.

"Two point five hours, my lord," a nervous pilot managed.

"Push her faster," Vader commanded.

"But sir, the engines are only designed to— _agh!_ " The pilot's mouth wrenched open in a horrid bid for air. But none could reach his lungs as Vader employed his power to squeeze the lackey's windpipe shut. The sith allowed this to continue an interminable amount of seconds, then eased the constriction slightly—just enough for the tortured pilot to attempt speech. "...Faster... I agree..." The invisible hold on his throat was released. The pilot, sucking in deep gulps of oxygen, willed his hands to operate his console. And although the shuttle would likely be unable to reach lightspeed afterwords, it shot faster through the hyperspace tunnel.

Chapter 24

Shoflar Mas Penal Colony. The multi-lighted facility encrusted itself within the great porous, cratered rock. The prison camp resembled warts of technology rooted on top of the jagged skin of the oval-spherical mass.

From its exterior, the hybrid structure appeared serene, uneventful—betraying none of the depraved brutality that passed for a "typical day" within its walls.

CRACK!—and the remote unmanned cruiser announced itself into normal space above Shoflar. With its ion cannon attached and injected into the ionic core, the cruiser immediately blew forth an ion burst. It traveled rapidly toward the prison's surface and impacted with an engorging of irradiation. Once the green glowing particles of ion weedled their way into the battery systems of the station, all lights decking the hull winked out. Another ion blast issued hastily from the ship extinguishing the other portion of the penal compound. As predicted, containment of the ionized fields could not be maintained within the cruiser's fairly feeble structure. And only seconds after the second shot was released, the hapless ship exploded. Exactly three seconds later, four rebel cruisers bolted out of lightspeed to position themselves above the now lightless, powerless station.

There was a mad flash of jerking activity as both non-troopers and prisoners alike rushed to position and fasten their breathing masks to their gasping faces. The room without its rafter pitched light fixtures on would have been complete and blinding darkness if not for the searchlights issued to the prisoners. They were strapped to the foreheads of every calamari and were now swinging this way and that, like some frenzied concert of elongated, triangularish rays

"Corporal!" an officer barked at a trooper. "Find out what's going on! Get those lights back on!"

"Yes sir!" And the trooper ran off.

Akbar found Dosh with his head beam and leapt toward him. "Dosh, this is it!" he whispered with force. "Sound the men!"

"Yes sir!" he said with excitement in his eyes and a smile to his mouth. He whipped around and bellowed, "CHARRRRGE!"

And the prisoners began a violent revolt against their captors.

CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!—three ominous star destroyers halted madly from lightspeed and immediately rained down brightly green and massive laser bolts on the just launched rebel shuttles. Two shuttles contacted with the racing bolts and exploded violently. Another was wounded and pitched in a wobbly manner. Before any more shuttles could be obliterated, the rebel cruisers swung about and shoved themselves into an intercept and blocking course. They returned fire causing damage of their own to the destroyers.

The first shuttle to land on the roofing of the prison was Luke and Jorman's. Once it had secured itself firmly on the metallic hull, the side hatch slid up and the two swordsmen vaulted forth, sabers in hand and lit. Rebel soldiers poured out after them, armed with large blasters and assault rifles. All their eyes searched the surface and above for enemy activity.

No enemy troops had emerged from the top hatches as of yet—likely because they were still fumbling in the dark below. TIE fighter squadrons had launched from their parent destroyers, however, and were angling through to attack. Their targets: the ones landing.

Luke pulled out his blaster but Jorman stayed the move with his hand to boy's gun arm. "Watch this," he said to Luke and then cocked his sword arm back to give his throw a measure of velocity. He pitched the glow-trailing saber far into the nighted space and in the direction of the TIE's. From the roof, Jorman held his hand out and used his superior grasp of the Force to guide the sword. With his psychic direction, the weapon of old traveled to the connector section of a TIE's solar fin and all but severed the thing from its central sphere/cockpit. Sparks and smoke ran out from the wound and the ship listed rapidly.

The saber sprinted onward to perform the same detrimental action to four other enemy fighters. Then it switched its tactics to maneuver towards the fuel cells of a TIE slicing through and simultaneously igniting the flammable liquid. The ship burst. Many more TIE's met a similar hellish fate, until only one fighter remained of its group. Instead of hitting its fuel tank, the sword withed gears again and swerved to shoot straight through the webwork viewport—to plunge itself right into the heart section of the pilot's chest. His arms ungripped the controls of ship and flew up in odd, fluttering, jerking motions. This lasted only for a second before he became limp, his head lulled forth. He was already dead as the saber plucked itself out of his cauterized chest cavity and snaked back out of the cracked viewport.

A moment later, the sword's hilt—now closed down of its deadly energy blade—descended at a diagonal charge and landed back into Jorman's waiting grasp. He threw a smirking glance at Luke and briskly announced, "School's in session, boy, let's go!" And vaulted off.

Before heading after Jorman, Luke muttered, "I _have_ to learn that." Then the other rebels kept pace with Luke as they caught up to the hunter jedi.

Another shuttle promptly landed and its hatch opened. More rebels poured forth, all in their pressure suits. One suit was a tad small—Bousch wore this particular one. And one suit was quite large—Chewie donned this one. They followed in the general direction of Luke's group, yet veered off to journey toward the further second blister of the prison.

More TIE's were swooping in but the shuttles were putting their gunners and gunports to use. They now provided the ground troops with adequate suppressor fire.

A new threat, however, presented itself in the form of emerging troopers from the roof hatches. They exchanged blasts with the oncoming rebels; casualties formed on both sides.

Now it was a firefight as calamari soldiers had seized weapons from overrun troopers. Both sides attempted to take adequate cover behind corners and equipment. Akbar and Dosh were among one clustered group of their brethren, firing away at their enemy. For a moment or two the numbers of opposing forces were stalemated primarily—thinning but equally.

But then reinforcements were rapidly trickling in to tip the scales in the troopers' favor. Of course the calamari noticed this.

"Dosh!" a calamari cried while continuing to shoot. "Get Akbar out of here! Find another way out!"

"Got it!" Dosh said and grabbed the unwitting admiral to yank him backward. Akbar naturally fought his attempts. "Let _go_ of me!" he screamed at his aide.

"Sir, they need us to go now!" Dosh pleaded.

The ropers were becoming bold, advancing forth while their fellow shooters provided a deluge of cover fire. It would not be long before the calamari would be overrun.

"Dosh, get him going NOW!"

"Sir!" Dosh roared at Akbar. "Stop fighting me! Go! Go!"

With shock tightening his face and eyes, Akbar awkwardly yet with increasing speed backed away, complying with Dosh's vigorous physical prodding. Soon they were both running to round to a different corridor.

Further down the passageway, Dosh and Akbar continued their frantic retreat. Although they were now a fair distance away from the firefight, the sounds of the battle—the shrills of laser blasts whizzing back and forth—still sounded the confining corridor. Muffled but present.

And the bloodcurdling screams of dying calamari.

Akbar halted. Which force Dosh to do the same and instant later. Guilt-stricken and manic, the admiral blurted, "They're dying back there, Dosh! They're all going to die—!"

"Don't you think they know that, sir!" Dosh countered ferociously. "Do you want their deaths to be for nothing?! Because if you go back now, that's exactly what will happen!"

Staring off with jittery eyes, Akbar stated the obvious, "This is madness!"

"We can't argue about this! We must keep _moving_!"

Akbar knew on some strategic, military level of thinking that Dosh was correct and justified in protecting his superior officer. A man who was gifted in ultra clever and multilayered combat tactics. Not to mention a born leader. Were the persons reversed, Akbar would likely be playing out Dosh's very actions.

Yet Akbar's abandonment of his men, his charges for which he was predominantly responsible, could only be seen by himself as deep mark against his soul. A mark that could never be fully wiped clean no matter what honorable deeds may lay ahead.

"SIR!"

Akbar followed Dosh. As they ran on, the sounds of weapons and death faded out.

Being one of the three destroyer captains to arrive on the scene (after being tipped off by the informant), Admiral Veers was, like the other two, ordering his ship to fire full tilt on the rebel ships.

Unlike them, however, he was using more judicious laser strikes. While the others shot merely to make sure they contacted with cruisers' hulls, Veers, having studied meticulously the schematics of every Rebel Alliance ship in existence, opted or more effective surgical attacks.

Unfortunately for Veers, a rebel cruiser captain was also using that same level of military mastery. On Veers' own destroyer. "Lieutenant?"

"Yes, admiral?"

"Hail the cruiser on the left."

"Patching now, sir... You're through to him."

"Rieekan, is that you?"

And a familiar voice filtered through the overall comm. "Veers, my old friend, is that _you_?" Rieekan.

"I thought I recognized your firing patterns. We spar for real now, _old friend_."

"You had better hope I wasn't holding back in our training exercises."

Veers let slip the slightest hint of a smile before countering with, "I detect deep stress patterns in your voice, general. You had better hope _I_ wasn't holding back." And then he faced the lieutenant and gave the "hand slice" across his own throat—cut the comm. The lieutenant did so and the transmission went dead. "Men, rip the good general's ship in half."

"Yes sir"

Firing on the left hand cruiser intensified, biting into every vital organ of the thing.

But suddenly, it was gone. Cannoned into the hyper-velocity of lightspeed.

To himself, Veers murmured with narrowed eyes, "What's your play, old man...?"

Luke, Jorman, and the rebel soldiers stormed forth, battling the armed troopers. Hits were taken on both sides—but mostly on the side of the imperials! Luke and Jorman's saber defenses had seen to that.

And the troopers were being pushed back, unable to match the superior skills of the two jedi and their "more elegant weapons." Repulsed back towards an operations center, which on its opposite end featured another entrance way. And as fate and timing would have it, another squadron of troopers was being retreated into the center through the dogged persistence of rebels. This time, a group of calamari! A band determined to never feel the shackles of slavery again.

Slowly at first but with increasing flow, the two reversing groups of troopers were integrating into one, forced into union by the oncoming shooters. And the seemingly impenetrable jedi weapon wielders.

Backed into a circle like a driven flock of vipers, the imperials lashed out with desperate rays of blaster fire. They pierced as many calamari as they could before Luke leapt into the air and hit the floor in front of his rebel brothers. His sword maneuvers now protected them from anymore injuries or fatalities.

A moment later, it was over. The troopers had all perished to odd, sprawling piles on the central section of the flooring.

The calamari lifted their weapons to point at the ceiling, Jorman and Luke closed down their sabers.

"Good work, men. We're almost out of here," Luke encouraged.

"Thank you for coming for us, we would not have lasted another week," said a breathless calamari lieutenant.

"I'm glad we got to you in time. Do have any idea where Admiral Akbar is?"

"I'm afraid not. Many of us got separated."

Before anyone could say more, a calamari from the rear of the crowd was whacked forward and to the floor by a blast to his back.

More troopers had arrived through the calamari entrance.

Instantly, the aquatic-like beings re-aimed to fire fiercely while both jedi whip-ignited their swords to deflect otherwise deadly shots.

Ending this new wave of troopers proved more difficult, however, as seemingly endless reinforcements came from behind. All armed and creating a larger spray of firing.

Jorman made a command decision. "Luke! Take 'em out of here!" he belted as he swung and angled his saber, bouncing off blasts with increasing rapidity. "All of them!"

Performing the same intensified actions, Luke countered, "I can stay here with you to hold them b—"

"No! they'll need you on the surface! Don't argue! Do it!"

A breath of air was sucked through Luke's teeth-bared lips, a bid to nurse his exploding frustration. In the next instant, he hissed the breath out and hollered to the rebels, "Fall back behind me! Let's go! Let's go!"

They did so, doing their best twist around and fire at the enemy. The imperials split their weapons focus to encompass both Jorman's position and Luke's retreating force. Luke kept a maddened pace of sword defensive maneuvers, making sure nothing could get through.

The imperials were incurring casualties—but with every one that was downed permanently, it seemed that one or two more were arriving to compensate. Word must have spread that this was a major hot spot.

The rebels were clear from the room—only Luke remained at the hatchway, blocking horizontal rains of blaster lances. "Jorm!"

"Don't worry! Move!"

And Luke whip-receded out of sight.

And now all imperial weapons were trained on the lone jedi.

Strange, thought Akbar as he rounded another corner to madly pound ahead through a deserted corridor. And that was the very thing that was jarring his mind. There shouldn't be any deserted pathways—the guards would never allow the revolters a clear path to anywhere. No chance of escape. It would make sense to flood every hall with troopers to block key hatchways. Akbar wondered if Dosh, who had kept a steady pace behind the admiral, was concerned about the same alarming anomaly...

And then something fit into place in Akbar's mind.

Something infinitely more disturbing.

Abruptly halting himself, Akbar spun about and whip-chopped an arm into Dosh's airmask faceplate. The aide's head recoiled and he stuttered a brief howl. In the next instant, Akbar acted again, thrusting a fist full force into Dosh's sternum. The air from his lungs was shoved out with a hiccupping wheeze. The blunt trauma and the loss of precious oxygen caused the calamari to crumple forth to the floor. Akbar fell toward him and angled to swing his fist for another hit across Dosh's face. The man was sufficiently punch drunk.

Akbar growled, "So now it makes sense to me! 'I think it's this way, admiral!' 'I think it's this way, sir!'" Then he frantically searched Dosh's arms, his wrists for... and he found it under the sleeve— "A guidance tracker, imperial issue... You _think_ you know the way?! And these corridors are empty just for us...?! _Why_ , Dosh? Why did you betray us?!"

Swimming up through the thickened bog of disorientation and misery, Dosh put a coherent thought together to utter, "To... save my boy... and to end an arrogant rebellion that was... doomed from the start."

"To save your boy?! Why didn't you come to us?! To me?! We could have found a way to get him back together!"

Rolling his head from side to side lazily, he countered, "They are too powerful, Akbar. They rule the galaxy with an iron grip. They are willing to do what we won't to win... It is futile... this rebellion."

"Where are you leading me, Dosh? Right into their hands?"

"Of... course, sir... I should think that's obvious by now."

Akbar hissed a breath. "You fool, you miserable fool."

"You should leave now, admiral. They'll be wondering why we haven't shown up yet... Go and escape, be free... with what little time you will have to enjoy it."

Akbar's lips thinned and pressed together to disappear, his lids narrowed in disgust. He drew back a fist then straight shoved it fast into the bridge of Dosh's nose— _THWAK!_ —and the aide's consciousness sunk down deep. Akbar picked up Dosh's gun, stuck it in his belt and rushed back the way he came.

Rieekan's cruiser had not yet returned. And the longer he waited, the more anxious Veers became. Where would the damn traitor pop back in from, and what was his move once he did? It appeared that his "old friend" _had_ been holding back... or had developed new tactics since joining the foolhardy rebels.

The other destroyers were concentrating their firepower on the remaining cruisers, trying to angle in better to take out the elusive barricaded shuttles. But Veers would wait—wait for his old war game sparring partner. For how long he could only guess—

_CRACK!_ —and Rieekan's cruiser reappeared.

Right above the bridge of Veers' ship. Smoothly it diagonaled a descent to position its boosters dangerously close to the bridge's viewports...

And Veers was had.

"ALL BACK F—!" But he couldn't finish for all the thrusters of the cruiser roared blinding, fiery exhaust straight through the protective—and now shattered!—glass and into every corner of the bridge. The forced of the rushing flames instantly incinerated Veers and all of the hapless bridge crew. Their screams couldn't even be heard over the inferno.

The two generators that sat atop the destroyer's almost diamond-shaped bridge promptly burst with chaotic flame and debris. Navigation of the arrowed craft was now eliminated. The head was cut off, but the body could still strike out. All weapons batteries of the ship's functional sections once again focused all firing on Rieekan's cruiser. The assault was like watching bright green rain travel in reverse. The volleys were maddening, interspersed with hail-balls of proton torpedoes. All serving to puncture the cruiser's hull in a dozen places. Pricks of gleaming revenge! Veers had been clearly revered throughout his vessel. Retribution was now their unifying directive.

"Incurring heavy fire from the body section!" a rebel officer yelled over repetitive rocking of the cruiser's command center. Before Rieekan could respond, another loud officer report came as, "Two more star destroyers have dropped out from hyperspace!" And yet another report: "Hull breaches on sections eighteen and twenty-four!"

"Do we still have navigation?" Rieekan asked.

"Yes sir."

"Steer us away and put us on a new collision course with the new destroyers."

" _Sir?_ "

"Trust me."

"Yes sir."

And the wounded cruiser turned away to jet toward the new arrivals. Veers' motionless destroyer continued to fire on the fleeing vessel, yet its aiming became less effective the further the rebels flew off.

Captain Marko was in charge of the destroyer closest to the oncoming rebel cruiser—Rieekan's cruiser. Marko and his men could clearly see the ship was soaring toward them in an apparent suicide run. It was heading for the front section near the angular nose.

With a raised eyebrow, Marko commented, "They're a bold lot."

"What's our approach for avoidance, sir?" came the query of a subordinant.

"Can we blow it apart before it reaches us?"

"Likely not, sir."

"Then... full thrust ahead."

"Yes sir." And the officer worked his console.

And further they fell into Rieekan's trap.

The forward momentum was exactly what the rebel general wanted. And he had calculated the speed and trajectories at a close enough approximation. Now instead hitting the front side near the nose, he would ram the more massive back angle. The collision crumpled both sections of the ships where they met.

And was now causing the destroyer to swing about despite its forward thrust. It was also being shoved toward the other destroyer. Their rear outer points almost lined up perfectly to smash into one another. The pushed destroyer continued its arcing which allowed the other's point to stab into one its boosters.

Rieekan couldn't have planned it better. The two destroyers erupted in a maelstrom of consuming fire. Unfortunately, the general also anticipated a sizeable amount of damage to his own ship as a result of the enormous blast.

The cruiser was thrown off and adrift, losing directional capabilities, fuel propulsion, and fire control. Only life support remained. A half hour's supply.

Akbar hid in a storage locker upon a multitude of rapid clatters of approaching troopers. They were coming on fast. He was confident that they would not be checking the lockers but searching out visible targets. The problem he faced was that his breathing mask made a fairly audible amplification of his breathing. As they were about to pass his way, he held his breath—which was not easy for his heart was pounding from so much running around. But he was managing. And they were almost out of earshot—

"Oxygen reserve down twenty percent. Please replenish," came the robotic voice recording from Akbar's main breathing unit.

The troopers halted. And swung around to focus their weapon aims straight at Akbar's hiding space. A trooper commanded, "Come out of there! Any weapons you have—!"

But he wasn't allowed to finish his demands—a lightening barrage of laser blasts pierced of the troopers' midsections. They crumpled to the floor. The rest spun to profusely shoot at the new threat. But the enemy firepower was overwhelming, and soon the rest of the troopers fell.

A wookiee's roar of triumph reverberated through the halls.

Akbar heard a female voice say, "Come out, it's safe now!"

He opened the locker door and emerged to see a band of armed rebels consisting of ten men, on woman, and a towering Wookiee sporting a huge crossbow rifle.

"I'm Admiral Akbar," he announced to them.

The woman said, "I'm Bousch, leader of this group."

"Have you seen my men?"

"They're mostly on the surface, either fighting or being loaded onto the shuttles."

"Let's see if we can't find more of them."

"Lead the way, Admiral."

And they were off.

Luke made sure the last of the Calamari soldiers were aboard the shuttle. Then he turned to a rebel and said, "Keep up the cover fire! I'm going back for Jorm!"

"Yes sir!"

And Luke, saber lit and poised for combat, ran back to the roof hatch and disappeared below.

The troopers had spread out now in an attempt to make defense more difficult for Jorman. But true to his inherent Jedi abilities, he still managed to expertly deflect every blast. And again the rebounding blasts backfired to kill various troopers. More and more imperials, however, were arriving—from both corridor entryways. The firing on Jorman was increasing, and now his movements—his sword swings—were becoming rapid, blurred. A multi-spiraled light show bouncing off rays of red.

Jorman's entire being strained. His breaths labored furiously. Yet nothing got through his sword.

Abruptly, troopers were cut down from the back section of the latest arrivals—Luke had returned to level the odds.

And had he made it a moment before, the scale-tipping would have been more plausible. But by now, Jorman's concentration for reactions had reached its limit.

A swing of his saber had come a fraction of second too late—a blast stabbed and burned his thigh. He grunted, winced in agony and fell to one knee. Another shot tore into his abdomen.

But no more reached him as Luke landed from a Force-aided leap to block Jorman from his attackers. He fended off the blasts, and soon he was charging forth to bring laser lances back on their guns' owners. And as he had just done to end all of the troopers of the opposing group, he skillfully swung in crisscrossing swipe patterns to cut through the chest cavities of the imperial drones. Within twenty seconds it was over and done.

Luke closed down his saber and raced to kneel by the downed Jorman. The wounded Jedi shuddered with the chills of body-wide shock. His face was beaded with sweat. He was in the process of sagging to the floor when Luke caught him and eased him into his lap.

"How bad is it?" Luke asked with eyes of urgency. "Can you possibly move?"

"I'm... afraid it's not an option— _look out!_ "

More troopers arrived from the corridor where Luke entered from. Luke whipped around—but didn't have to use his saber as—smash!—a trooper was thrown into the room from some unseen force. The living projectile crashed into the backs of his fellow troopers, causing them all to fall. In the next instant, Chewie entered the room and roared heavily at the stunned imperials sprawled on the floor.

One recovered enough to aim his rifle at the behemoth, but Luke reacted quickly using the Force to push the rifle aim off and away from his trusted friend. He then used his power again to fling all of their rifles far across the room. Chewie charged trooper, furiously picked him up, and slammed him back down into the heap of imperial lackeys. They were now out cold. Chewie roared again as Bousch, Akbar, and rebel soldiers raced onto the scene. They halted behind Chewie then noticed Luke and Jorman across the way. "Chewie," Bousch said, directing his attention to the two huddled men. They all sprinted to gather around them, then kneeled down.

"Look," Luke tried, "Chewie's here. He can carry you—"

"To do so would only worsen the injury," Jorman strained to say. "I feel it."

"But I can't just leave you here—"

"You _will_ do that... if I instruct it... My father, my mother... I can see them now... beckoning..." Jorman's eyes began to unfocus, drift away from Luke's. "...It would have been... an honor to train you..." A long breath vented from between his lips and then no more followed. His chest became still.

Though Luke was surrounded by friends and allies, he felt a stark isolation of the soul. A loneliness he knew all too well in the last year.

"Luke," Bousch began gingerly, "let's find the rest and leave this place."

After a brief moment of staring at his fallen brethren, Luke nodded and lowered the listless body to the floor.

"May we see each other again," Luke murmured. And they all fled the room.

"Are the gunners all at their stations?" Rieekan asked.

"Yes sir," the command center officer replied.

The general frowned while pursing his lips. A tight breath escaped his nose. Recognition signs of their bleak situation. "Let me have all decks."

"Yes sir." And the officer punched up ship-wide comm access on his console. "You have all decks, sir."

"Crew," Rieekan gravely began, "we have only a few minutes of air left. It is your choice now to stay at your posts or find an escape pod. There are slim chances of survival with escape considering the heavy firing on us. But it is a chance nonetheless. You have all my hopes. For reasons of my own, I am staying. It has been an honor and a priveledge to serve you and The Alliance... General Rieekan signing off."

Crewmembers around Rieekan promptly left their stations to race toward the exit. Not a one of them left, however, without acknowledging their great respect for the general. And all that he had done for the rebellion.

When he was eventually alone, Rieekan made his way to the tactical console. From its digital marker video panel, he could view the battle progression. Luckily the other three rebel cruisers were still up and running—no propulsion or hyperdrive damages that would hinder escape. Yet two Destroyers remained—Veers' damaged vessel and another. Both were making the rescue more difficult, drawing out the time factor. At any moment, more destroyers could arrive.

He hit the comm button on the console in front of him. "Luke, Jorman, have you got everyone out?"

And through the comm speaker, Luke's pressing voice issued, "Yes! Last shuttle is docking now! We're aboard!"

"All ships converge on mine. I want you to attempt to push me in the path in-between the two Destroyers. I will do the rest. No arguments. These are my final orders for all of you."

Delayed "Yes sir" replies came from all three captains. And despite their hesitations to carry out the orders, Rieekan witnessed that the tactical blips representing the cruisers moving toward his position. He also noticed that the undamaged destroyer was fast spinning about to attempt to pursue. It would begin a forward thrust before the cruisers would be in prime positions to shove his dying vessel. But that was fine, he thought. He would still be able to calculate a plausible midpoint between the enemy ships with which to strike.

Four more minutes of air.

Abruptly he felt massive jolting that reverberated noisily throughout the room. The cruisers were now in hull-to-hull contact with his. And were now pushing his ship forward—the tactical screen confirmed the maneuver.

It also relayed that the destroyer was closing in, firing all it had on his cruiser. It seems that its captain had an idea of what was going to happen.

_No way in hell_ , Rieekan balked in his mind. _You're not going to destroy my ship until I'm good and ready..._

One minute of air.

He reached over and flipped up the translucent safeguard latch covering the red self destruct button. Once done, he poised his finger over the button.

He spoke again into the comm. "Break off! If your coordinates are set, jump to hyperspace!"

The tactical showed the cruisers were moving away. Rieekan's momentum would be constant now—almost in position. Repeated rocking from enemy fire shuddered the room.

The other cruiser blips disappeared, jetting off into hyperspace.

Ten seconds.

And in that fraction of time, Rieekan strangely felt serene, satisfied. Secure in the knowledge that, miraculously, the majority of the escape pods made it aboard the cruisers before they jumped. Confident in the awareness that he would not die slowly of the terminal disease Chromas D that was currently ravaging his body. That he would go out of this existence combating an enemy that he detested—an honorable death in his mind. His only regret now was that he would not be able to witness the full destruction of the bloated and pompous empire.

Two seconds.

One.

Prime positioning. He couldn't have planned it better.

And with his last thought and words, he unwittingly mirrored the exact same sentiment uttered by Jan Dodonna in _his_ last seconds— _Long live The Alliance._

And the glinting red button was pushed.

The cruiser's explosion was massive and blinding. Flame-doused savages of ripped shrapnel took fractions of a second to gouge and puncture the hulls of the two Star Destroyers. The numerous and instant traumas to the ships disrupted their functioning—both in terms of machinery and crew efforts. Where they _would_ have attempted tracking and pursuit tactics toward their enemy, now they were only concerned with mere survival.

Not that any of that would be an issue when Vader's shuttle arrived on the scene two minutes later.

Upon learning from the captain of the still functioning bridged Destroyer that the Rebels had escaped, Vader abandoned all self control and surrendered to his rage. Within minutes, every Imperial crewmember had been choked to death.

Even the men in his own shuttle.

One more failure in the eyes of his ruthless Master.

Chapter 25

A celebration would begin in mere moments. Jabba was the most anxious of all present in his palace's main audience chamber in anticipation. Boba Fett was now on the premises.

And a carbonite-frozen Han Solo was with him.

How the great slug had so been looking forward to what was about to transpire. Finally after months of searching, the most prized weapon in his bounty hunter arsenal, Boba Fett, was bringing the arrogant and defiant Solo.

Yet there was also a twinge of regret, which he would never openly admit, that his once revered smuggler had fallen so far. He even had hope that one day the boy would be an equal one day, running his own crime organization. Without impinging on Jabba's territory of course. Or any of his trusted affiliates. Jabba could have certainly seen the potential in Han—his resourcefulness, his lust for profit... his independent spirit. Traits with which Jabba could supremely identify.

But now the brash pirate had lost just too much ground, and the hutt's disappointment and disgust for him too great. The boy would never see advancement within Jabba's syndicate. Point of fact, he would never see the light of day, the sweet aroma of freedom, ever again.

"Master," Bib announced, "Boba Fett and his bounty."

The majordomo stepped aside to allow Fett to come forth a few feet to address Jabba. By the hunter's side floated a metallic slab. On the top of this structure lay a silvery plaque-like substance, which everyone in the galaxy knew was hardened carbonite. Typically the chemical material was used freezing tibanna coal conversion units required to be kept at cooler temperatures at all times. As well as the more common method of freezing carbon-based liquids. Which was why Lando was so hesitant about carbonite being used on a human being. It had been used on living things before, but mostly smaller, cold-blooded lifeforms—sometimes of a dangerous nature. The freezing of course made it safe to transport them. But a human being? It hadn't been done as far as Lando knew.

Until now.

Rising up from the topside carbonite layer of the hovering slab showed the sculpture of a man's form. The arms were folded up near the head, the hands in a palms out position—as if the man was surrendering. The face of the man was locked in statue of anguish. Yet his countenance was familiar to practically everyone in the room. He was of course quite famous—now infamous—smuggler, pirate, womanizer, scoundrel... fugitive.

Han Solo.

Before Boba spoke to Jabba, he reached over to the side consoles of the floating mass and adjusted certain controls. In the next instant, the slab slowly rotated so that it ended its motion in a vertical position. This allowed Jabba a better view of the bounty, the hunter's prize. And soon to be the possession of the obese Hutt. There had been somewhat restrained cheers and applause from the motley crowd since Fett had entered the room. Yet now that Solo's inanimate form had been brought fully to bare for Jabba, the ruckus increased three-fold, echoing the walls of the low-lit chamber.

The slave guards were not of course allowed to participate in the uproarious praise. They were too low on the societal status pole for displays of emotion. Not that any of them felt like joining in on the celebration. Particularly, one of them felt the complete opposite; the one who intentionally put himself incognito—Lando Calrissian.

With eyes weighted heavily of guilt and crushing defeat, Lando stared at the sickening scene before him. And felt as if his heart might seize.

_I'm so sorry, Han,_ he lamented in his head. _I put you here, it was all my doing._

Jabba was now quieting the crowd and discussing with Bib the details of the acquisition payment (always account crediting for Fett) and what to do with Solo. But Lando was tuned out to all of it now, his mind was caught in a crucifying inner dialogue. _I failed you, old friend, I tried so hard to keep you from making it to this hellhole, the grasp of this bloated devil. I should have tried to save you much sooner, I know that for certain now. I tricked myself into thinking that my business, my city, was more important than a trusted friend. Instead of handing over to the Imperials, I should have warned you and your friends and planned a secret escape for all. Instead I deluded myself into thinking that I had no choice._

I was a coward.

And of my homeworld, there is a Berevanian proverb: cowards die every day.

It was decided. He made one redeeming contract with himself, one with complete resolve: _As long as Han languishes in this viper's pit, I will do the same._

Chapter 26

The three surviving Rebel cruisers, wounded as they were, managed a safe journey through the rigors of hyperspace. Moments ago they had they had dropped out of it and rendezvoused with the rest of the fleet at Sullust. Akbar and his men had never seen a more welcoming site in their lives. Particularly since they had enjoyed a quite satisfying meal during their lightspeed escape.

But more importantly to Akbar, he learned that Amash had made it out and was with the group in the final extraction. True to their duty, the Calamari soldiers obeyed the admiral's orders and secured the accused man to a shuttle. Shortly after, Akbar completely absolved the poor soul of all treasonous suspicion.

The rescue of Calamari would now serve to benefit The Alliance in three ways. One, Akbar's prowess in tactical warfare, two, his men would increase their numbers, and three, their release from Imperial custody guaranteed the acquisition of Calamari missile-class vessels. This was the agreement made with Calamari refugees, with their interim government—get our people out of Shoflar, and you can have all the military support you need. Word had been sent and the ships were on their way. Even now in the midst of leading a war effort, Mon Mothma reflected, _I'm still having to play the politics game._

The shuttles with the calamari—including Akbar—and Luke's company (Bousch and Chewie) transferred themselves to the command cruiser where Mothma awaited them. Leia as well.

As they exited the loudly exhaust venting shuttle craft, Akbar halted and faced Luke. The boy stopped to face him also, Chewie and Bousch were behind them. Akbar spoke.

"Skywalker, Luke, what you and the others have done for us, I can never repay. But I can tell you now, if I can lead The Alliance to victory, I swear I will do so. Thank you again."

Luke smiled. "Don't mention it. I'm sorry we couldn't get everyone out."

"They died with honor, helping their brothers escape. Their memorials will be grand in our native ceremonial tradition. Your men of course will be included in the services. We cherish them equally."

"I'd love to attend if possible."

"Most certainly. I'll give you the details when I have them."

"Of course. I'll see you in command."

"See you there," Akbar said with a hardy grin and shook Luke's hand. He then moved on to join his brethren in leaving the bay for the corridors.

Chewie grunted to Luke—which, thanks to Luke's growing abilities with the Force, he was able to interpret and understand. He therefore responded with, "Right, I'll see you shortly." And the Wookiee moved on leaving Luke and Bousch alone. He noticed a pensive, bothered look on the woman's face.

"What is it?" he asked, cinching his brow.

"This whole mission that just took place..." she began as she slowly trotted for the bay exit. Luke matched her pace beside her. "...don't you find it a bit troubling?"

"In what way?"

"Well, we gained new soldiers for your fight against the Empire. But we also lost just about as many getting them out. _And_ we lost Jorm, a man with great powers that could have gone a long way in aiding the rebellion. So I'm asking myself was it worth it in the end."

"Hmm... Perhaps you should ask yourself this—do you think the men who died would have regretted their actions knowing ahead of time what was going to happen?"

"...I suppose not."

"Helping others who are needlessly suffering and oppressed is never a worthless task. All of us here know there is great risk in any mission we take... And sometimes—" Immediately, Ben and Han flashed through his mind. "—great sacrifice." Jorman's raced into his mind as well, triggering a sense of loneliness again.

As if she had read his thoughts, she remarked, "But you were going to learn from Jorman. He could have completed your training, right?"

"Leaving the calamari to painful death so that I could further my training would have gone against everything a jedi stands for. Besides, I had already learned a great deal from Jorman. Like how a man can change for the better if given the right opportunity... And it's made me realize something else is possible..." And Luke's gaze shifted downward, his thoughts drifting to more troubling, intense, even terrifying rooms of the soul. "...if certain things are true..."

Bousch's brow furled. "Luke? What is it?"

Snapping out of it, Luke said, "Nothing, sorry."

"You can tell me if something's troubling you."

"I'm fine, really. But I guess my question to you is, now that you know what's involved in our fight, sacrifices and all, are you going to join us?"

"Hmm..." Her eyes darted back and forth in serious contemplation. "...why not. It's not like I've got anywhere else to go. And your foolish, silly bravado, I have to admit, is rubbing off on me."

" _That's not quite_ the ultra-enthusiastic response I was hoping for. But I'll take it." They had reached the doorway that led to the corridors. And as they passed through it to enter the flow of pedestrian traffic, Luke added, "But I'll have you know it's that same foolish, silly bravado that allowed me to demolish a space station the size of a _moon_!"

"That was you?!" she said with eyes widening. " _Get_ out of here!"

"Well, me and some others."

"I don't buy that for a second."

"Believe what you like but it's true."

"I think someone is having delusions of grandeur, flyboy."

"Ask around. Ask Leia!"

And their arguing voices faded out the further they traveled down the busy corridor, eventually rounding a corner and out of sight.

"Admiral Akbar!" Mothma said with joy in her eyes. She and the other Alliance officials were standing by the tactical displays in the command center of the main cruiser.

Akbar had just entered with his men and making his way toward Mothma. They reached each other and firmly embraced; both had smiles from ear to ear. "Mothma," he said as they broke apart slightly to face one another. "A distinct pleasure to see you again, my old friend."

"It is a tremendous relief to see _you_ alive and safe. We feared we might never get you out of that forsaken pit."

"My unending thanks to you and your men. And I promise you all my efforts and dedication to the cause. Are the ships on the way?"

"As we speak."

"Perfect. A good number of men should be in them, ready for the next mission."

As Akbar went around greeting and conferring with all the officials (including Leia), Chewie had slipped into the room fairly unnoticed. A moment later, Luke entered and nodded to the Wookiee. He stood beside Chewie and they both glanced with prpose at Leia. She noticed them and returned the same loaded stare. Then she tensely approached Mothma to speak.

"Madam President," Leia began, avoiding successfully enough the urge of stuttering, "I have a great request to make, if I may."

"If I can oblige, Leia, I certainy will. But I'm curious about something. I noticed that your wookiee had returned but not Calrissian or Solo."

"That's... why I need to talk to you. Their mission to retrieve Han has failed. And now it seems Lando has disappeared, possibly captured by Jabba as well. I know that time is short and our assault on the new Death Star must take place before it is operational but—"

"But you wish to mount a new effort to save both men."

Blinking repeatedly, Leia nervously nodded. "I only ask for five days for Luke, Chewbacca, and I to—"

"And what happens if you are all captured, Leia? I wager five days will be nothing compared to how long we would have to wait if that happens."

"But Luke—"

"Is _not_ a full fledged Jedi. And likely cannot storm into a heavily armed fortress and expect to simply take what he wants. These crimelords, Leia, are cunning and ruthless. And you will have wished that they had killed you before becoming their prisoner."

"But Han—"

"I _know_ what he means to you and the others. And if we are successful in destroying the new station, then there may be an opportunity aftwerward to mount a rescue. I'm sorry, Leia. But we need all the vital personnel here in case new intel comes in from the Bothans."

Leia feared as much that this would be Mothma's response. She knew as well as her revered leader that the Rebellion was at a crucial juncture in its fight against the Empire. But Han and Lando, were they _both_ now in the hands of a psychotic, vengeful Hutt? She could not stand to know that this may be true. What tortures could they be facing?!

But she voiced none of this to Mothma. Instead she lowered her eyes in crushing disappointment. And nodded, saying, "I understand."

"I knew you would. I've never questioned your commitment to The Alliance." She gingerly placed a hand on Leia's shoulder. "I am very sorry that it must be this way. Please know that."

"I do. Thank you."

Grimacing slightly, Mothma said, "I must get back to the others."

"Of course."

And Mothma moved away to rejoin the group of officials that included Madine and Akbar.

Leia turned to face Luke and Chewie. Her supremely sullen look was not encouraging. Chewie grunted with massive frustration and stormed out of the room. Luke looked after him with a measure of alarm and concern. He then eyed Leia as she approached quickly.

"We can't go until after the assault," Leia said.

"But Han _and_ Lando might be dead by then!" Luke hoarsely whispered.

"We have our orders, Luke."

"Are they _aware_ of what Han has done for them, for _you_?"

"They are. Nevertheless."

Luke stood there for a second, frozen in a frustrated stare. Then he closed his eyes and expelled a hissing breath. "This can't be happening..." And with that, he left the room.

Leia's eyes darted all about, her mind was searching, prodding, pushing for some angle that solved both problems she now faced. The mental hunt was becoming insane, which reflected in her widening eyes. But ultimately it proved fruitless.

Until something rose up and broke through it all. Something she had not expected and which had at once terrified and exhilarated her. Always in her life she had been so structured and in control, focused on one directive: bring democracy back to the galaxy.

But now a new and reckless drive of purpose overruled all of that. One that was simple yet powerful; it seemed to explode from the core of her heart: _I love you, Han. More than I can stand. And I'm going to save you no matter what._

Her face immediately became set in s tense-filled expression of grim determination. An instant later, she bolted from the room.

And Mothma, who had been intermittently been observing Leia, saw that determined look. And knew what was coming next.

Luke searched the main ship for Bousch. Thus far, he had not been successful in locating her, not even in her newly assigned quarters. He had hopes that perhaps she would be willing to do what she was so adept at—go on the hunt again. With more enthusiasm than likely warranted, he rationalized that if she could somehow extract Han from Jabba's lair, then Bousch might be seen as a greater asset to The Alliance. And the more respect she received from the people here, the more committed to the cause she might become.

That was Luke's grandiose theory, anyway.

Where is she, he asked himself with mounting frustration as he roamed the corridors. He had her paged, commed, but to no avail. He'd checked practically every place on the ship. The last substantial area to check was the docking bay. He might as well, he told himself and headed in the direction of the expansive bay.

Minutes later, he arrived there to witness something he fully did not expect to see. Something that shocked him and tightened his chest.

Far across the bay near the giant, gaping, rectangular hole leading to space, _The Millennium Falcon_ sat, its engines revving up for flight. But this had nothing to do with Luke's sudden sense of utter surprise.

It everything to do with the fact that Bousch, now in her full bounty hunter regalia including her encompassing helmet, was walking straight toward the _Falcon_. She was carrying a bag that likely held personal supplies.

What was happening, his mind pondered. Several possibilities came tripping over themselves in his thoughts: _Did Chewie beat me to her in convincing her to help? Is she just leaving but taking the Falcon to avoid being hunted down in her own ship? Was Chewie merely going to fly Bousch over to her own ship in the medical frigate, where she could take her chances from there?_

Quickly realizing that he had to have the real answer for her leaving, he cried out, "Bousch!"

She halted and twisted around to face him, her helmet's visage making her look supremely alien.

"Bousch, wait!"

And he started toward her but was stopped in his tracks by her outstretched hand. It signaled him to "stay back". His brow furled in disturbing confusion. He clearly didn't expect to be halted. He started forth once more but Bousch tensely shot out the hand again— _Do not come near me!_

He held his position, his brow crinkled further over narrowed eyes, his befuddlement heightening. She stared at him for a brief moment longer, then whipped back around to continue walking toward the _Falcon_. Less swirling confusion and now more dejection filled his expression as he watched her ascend the landing ramp into the ship's interior. The ramp raised up and sealed. The whine of the _Falcon's_ engines became almost deafening seconds later. Luke could clearly witness Bousch enter the cockpit section and take a seat next to Chewie. A few seconds more and the skilled wookiee had successfully kicked on the ship's repulsors, lifting her in the air. As he was laterally rotating the ship, Chewie raised a furry hand to wave at Luke. With a hint of a smile, yet eyes still permeated with tension, he gave a small wave in return. The _Falcon_ then rocketed away and out of sight.

_We're the same size,_ said a female voice that echoed in Luke's mind. It sounded like Leia's.

And then an instinct within him told him that he should visit Leia's quarters. He turned and left for the corridors.

The door to Leia's room opened and Luke stood in the doorway to receive his third shock of the day.

Seated in a chair was not Leia but Bousch. She rose and said, "I told her she could use my outfit to disguise herself... We're the same size it turns out."

It all fell into place now in his clearing head. "So that was _Leia_ I saw leaving in the _Falcon_."

"She's going to help the Wookiee retrieve Solo. She's going to pretend like I'm collecting the bounty on Chewie to infiltrate and, I suppose, improvise from there." She shrugged saying, "I guess she's big time in love with the guy."

Luke stared off realizing that Bousch was probably right. Leia likely wouldn't have done something so rash and impetuous as this if she wasn't.

_So. It is what it is and I'll have to accept it and be happy for them,_ he concluded with conflicting emotions.

Woosh!—the door slid open and Mothma was revealed. Luke whirled around to witness their leader's possibly deceptive look of joviality. His heart bumped jarringly.

"Commander," Mothma said to Luke in a neutral tone.

"Madam President," he managed in response.

Mothma flicked her eyes to Bousch. "Lieutenant, welcome to our outfit. How do you like your new rank and status?"

"Quite exhilarating, I have to admit. Thanks for your confidence in me," Bousch said.

"From what I hear, it is now quite deserved... I wonder, however, if you would give me a moment alone with the commander."

Bousch gave a brief smile. "Of course." She moved forth and, as she passed by Luke, she gave him a slightly nervous look. Mothma stepped inside and allowed Bousch to exit, and the door shut again.

"I should—" Luke blurted but Mothma held up a hand to stop him.

"I know everything already, Luke," she said.

"You do?"

"I didn't get to be where I am without being very observant of things. One only needed to look into Leia's eyes to know what she was going to do next."

"But I don't understand then. Why—?"

"Why didn't I stop her when I expressly forbid her to go and knew she would anyway?" Mothma's eyes descended for an instant, a smile formed on her lips. "I've know for a long time—and perhaps this is a surprise to you—that Leia is hoplessly in love Solo. And would move the heavens to get him back."

"Then... why forbid in the first place?"

"Oh, that was merely for the sake of the officials that might have overheard our conversation. Officially of course I've sanctioned no rescue operation for it is true, as you know, we are at a critical juncture. Where are you with your training?"

A euphoric rise of hope welled up in Luke's entire being. He swallowed and blew a stabilizing breath before responding with, "I'm almost there. A few more refinements. The Force had become a great ally to me as of late."

"I'm pleased... Take another five days to train as much as you can... and if Leia has not returned by then with Solo and Calrissian, then I want you to go. But understand, Luke, your possible mission for rescue is also outside official sanctions. I did not talk to you."

"I understand. Thank you so much for this. I won't let you down."

Mothma moved in her gliding manner closer to Luke and raised her eyebrows, saying, "I hope not. I'm taking a monumental risk in allowing this to happen... _Succeed,_ Luke."

Luke's expression became tense, sobering his rush of hopefulness. "We will."

And the smile returned exuding jovialness to Mothma's face once more. She placed a hand on his shoulder and squeezed gingerly. "You have training to do, soldier."

"Yes ma'am," he said and smiled.

Keeping her soft expression, she removed her hand and turned to leave. An instant later, Luke had the room and his thoughts.

Some now quite guilty in nature. He detested lying to her, knowing that he was leaving soon regardless to return to Dagobah. And Yoda. Now he considered delaying that as well to achieve the retrieval of Han. Bousch would not be needed now.

Get to training, soldier.

Soon he would, but he had one last task to perform before that could occur...

Only a moment before the _Falcon_ had insanely vaulted itself into the whirling cascade of hyperspace. Leia had changed out of Bousch's outfit and now had on a beige and light blue rebel uniform. Having just completed her redress, she headed up to the cockpit where Chewie was seated checking his console monitors. She took a seat next to him.

"How long will it take us to get to Tatooine?" she inquired.

Chewie grunted and pointed to his screen. She leaned over to view what it read.

"Two and a half days... Any chance of getting there faster?"

Chewie grunted again while briefly shaking his head.

Leia stared off and pursed her lips. An anxious breath escaped her nose. Two and a half days... a long time to wait and agonizingly worry.

I'm coming, Han. Please hold on until then!

Chapter 27

The half-built lightsaber currently sparked from a welding device built into a mechanical arm reaching out of Artoo. Delicately, the mech droid secured a component that would aid the weapon's functionality. The saber hilt rested on a table in Luke's quarters. Luke and Threepio stood by behind Artoo, Luke with protective goggles, observing the procedure. Artoo completed the task and closed down the welding flame while retracting the arm back inside himself. With this done, another major component could now be fitted into place.

And the last piece held no technological significance for the weapon—yet it was the most crucial element to a lightsaber in the minds of the Jedi. The glinting stone that not only served to focus the dangerous rays created by the other components, but symbolized the Force's spirituality—The Kyber Crystal. Consequently, it also determined the color of the light blade. Luke's crystal was a brilliant and mesmerizing green, extracted from Jorman's other saber.

He held it in his fingers studying its inherent beauty for a moment more. Then he inserted it into its allotted compartment inside the saber's hilt. With that done, he took the curved and elongated swing-lid and flipped it over to secure it into place. Now it aligned with the rest of the hilt creating a complete cylinder shape. The saber looked finished and ready to do what it was built to do. "Well, you two... here goes nothing..."

The moment of truth...

He positioned his right thumb over the igniter button. He pressed it in—and up shot a three-foot in length blade of greenish light. Much as he did when he first received his father's lightsaber, he waved the vibrant sword around—not so much in fascination this time, but in cherishing his success in accomplishing the weapon's construction.

He had done it. Achieved the next step in becoming a full-fledged jedi knight. Built from scratch his very own lightsaber. The rite of passage for those who train in the ways of the Force.

" _An elegant weapon... for a more civilized era."_

Obi-Wan's words came back to him. An elegant weapon... for an honorable warrior.

_Am I a Jedi now_ , Luke wondered. _I feel as if I am in control of my abilities, my powers... Focused, confident, in tune with the will of the Force._

But am I a Jedi?

Through with his sword waving, he closed down the blade and hooked it to his belt. It wouldn't stay there for long though. He would begin training in one hour.

Before that, he would attempt to contact Leia aboard the _Falcon._ And inform her of the new plan should she and Chewie somehow fail in retrieving Han.

And maybe grab a quick bite to eat—something to fill his grumbling stomach and energize him for the intensive training session.

Luke thanked the droids for their assistance and their reassuring company, then parted with them for the mess hall. As he journeyed the corridors for his destination, he couldn't keep himself from pondering the uncertainty, the possibility of what was true of himself now.

Am I or am I not a master of my abilities? Has my destiny been fulfilled?

" _One thing remains..."_
