by Troy Denning
“I thought I told you to look for pressure leaks,” Han said, relieved he hadn’t caught Ben actually trying to sabotage the Falcon. “I’m still captain of this tub, and that means you do what I say.”
“I’m using my own best judgment,” Ben retorted. He put a finger on the display, indicating the mysterious Star Destroyer. “And it tells me we’re in big trouble. Our only chance of surviving is to make for that Star Destroyer.”
“Are you crazy?” Han asked. “She’s already firing on us!”
“Only because you’re trying to escape,” Ben countered. “She’ll stop firing if you surrender. That’s the Anakin Solo.”
Han’s jaw dropped. “The Anakin what?”
“The Anakin Solo,” Ben said proudly. “Jacen’s ship.”
“Jacen’s ship?” Han actually stumbled back, and not just because the deck had tipped again. He felt like a bantha had kicked him in the gut. “They named a GAG Star Destroyer for my dead boy?”
“Well, yeah,” Ben said, clearly confused. “Anakin was a really great Jedi.”
“I can’t believe it!” Afraid he would lash out at Ben in his fury, Han turned and kicked the wall so hard he felt his toes pop. “The kriffing rodders!”
Ben cringed and began to back away. “It’s an honor. Jacen said—”
“Forget what Jacen said,” Jaina interrupted, returning with Zekk and the patching supplies. “He’s living in his own galaxy these days.”
Ben frowned. “But Admiral Niathal thought it was a good idea, too.”
“Then Admiral Niathal is one dumb fish.” Han snatched the reinforcement strips from Zekk’s arms and nodded him toward the engineering station. “I think we’ve got a pinched fuel feed. See if you can clear it before the engines shut down and we turn into a target barge.”
Without waiting for a reply, Han stepped around the corner. The pressure had fallen far enough now that the air was beginning to cool as it expanded. They had less than three minutes until the atmosphere grew so thin that breathing would become difficult. He dropped the strips on the floor in front of the spatter perforations, then turned one over and tried in vain to scratch off the flimsi-plast backing. It was not something that could be done one-handed—at least not when your only working hand was shaking in fear.
“Uncle Han, surrendering is our best chance of surviving,” Ben said, following. “All I have to do is comm Jacen and tell him I’m bringing you in.”
“So he can torture his parents like his other Corellian prisoners?” Jaina demanded. She knelt at Han’s side and took the metal strip from his hand. “They’re better off taking their chances in the Falcon.”
“But we’re not,” Ben countered. “We’re not traitors to the Alliance—at least I’m not.”
“I’ll forget you said that—because if I don’t, we’re both going to regret it.” Jaina removed the strip’s backing in one smooth pull. “Be careful how you apply this, or you’ll just create more suction. Dad will show you.”
She held the strip up for Ben and reached for another, but he was shaking his head and ignoring her. “No, not until Uncle Han promises to—”
The strip fluttered past Ben and plastered itself into the middle of the spatter perforations. The scream of escaping atmosphere grew shrill and urgent, and a crease shot across the damaged area.
Han’s heart climbed into his throat. “Uh, Jaina—”
“Oh, kriff!” She jumped up, already peeling the backing off another reinforcement strip. “Ben, what’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing—I’m just doing my duty.” Ben snapped his lightsaber off his evac suit’s utility loop. “If we help make repairs, they’re just going to escape.”
“And if we don’t, we’re all going to be sucking a vacuum in about thirty seconds.” Holding the reinforcement strip in two hands, Jaina stepped toward the wall—then suddenly stopped when Ben ignited his lightsaber. Her jaw dropped, and she looked up and said, “Please tell me you didn’t just pull your lightsaber on me.”
“I’m sorry, Jaina,” Ben said. “But you don’t have any discipline—like Jacen says, you’re always making up your own orders instead of following the ones you’re given.”
Jaina glared at Ben for an instant, then thrust the reinforcement strip at Han. “Hold this.”
Ben retreated a step, bringing his blade up behind his rear shoulder. “Jaina, don’t make me—whaaaargggh!”
Ben’s threat came to a surprised end as Zekk slipped around the corner and caught hold of his hands from behind, twisting his wrists forward and forcing the lightsaber blade down toward the deck.
And that was when the shock wave of a nearby turbolaser strike slammed the Falcon. The deck jumped so hard that Han’s knees buckled, and he came down on his wounded shoulder again. Cries of astonishment rang out all around, and his body exploded into pain.
“How’s that feed line repair coming?” Leia asked over the intercom. The air was so thin now that her voice was starting to sound tinny and faint. “If I can’t accelerate, the flight is only going to get bumpier.”
“Just keep us pointed out of here.” As Han spoke, he realized that someone nearby was groaning in terrible pain. “We’ll pass out of range sometime.”
He rolled to his knees and saw Zekk curled on the deck, his hands clutched to a blackened slash in the side of his evac suit. Ben was kneeling next to him with a look of horror on his face, still holding an ignited lightsaber and shaking his head in despair.
“You shouldn’t have grabbed me,” he said. “Why’d you have to grab me, Zekk?”
“Because you were acting like a Jedi wannabe,” Jaina said, coming up behind him. “Give me that.”
She snatched the lightsaber from Ben’s hand.
He looked up at her. “It wasn’t my fault.”
“Then whose fault was it, laserbrain?” She switched the lightsaber off. “I just hope you haven’t killed us all. Now grow up, go help your uncle, and I’ll—”
“No, Jaina.” Han stuck a handful of reinforcement strips into his sling and turned to the damaged area. “You’ve got to get Zekk and Ben out of here.”
“Out of here?” Jaina asked.
“Get into the escape pods.” Without removing the strip’s backing, he held it up to the edge of the perforation circle and allowed the vacuum to suck it into place. “Zekk needs medical help, and I really don’t want you sticking us with the brat.”
“But what about—”
“The Falcon’s only carrying a four-person pod capacity right now,” Han interrupted. “And even if we had more, Leia and I are not surrendering.” He shot a look at Ben that could have melted frasium, then added, “Not to Jacen—or anyone else.”
He held another strip to the edge of the circle and let the vacuum suck it into place. It would be a temporary patch at best, but it might hold long enough to save them. He placed another strip, then looked back to find Jaina kneeling beside Zekk. She had the fingers of one hand pressed to his throat, taking his pulse. But her eyes were fixed on Han, and there were tears running down her cheeks.
She nodded, then chinned a toggle switch in her collar, and spoke into the microphone of her suit’s comm unit. “Sorzo, get back here. We’re abandoning ship again.”
“Good.” Han had never been more proud of his daughter. He could see in Jaina’s face how much she wanted to stay aboard the Falcon with him and Leia, but she was a seasoned spacer who knew better than to question a captain’s orders aboard his own ship. “Don’t worry about your mother and me. Until we get the Falcon patched up, it’ll be good not to have so many noses breathing the air—but we’ll be okay. We’ve been in a lot of fixes tougher than this one.”
Jaina managed a smile, though her fear for her parents remained obvious. “I know, Dad—I’ve seen the holovids.” She motioned Ben toward the rear hatch and used the Force to lift Zekk off the deck, then stepped to Han’s side and gave him a little kiss on the cheek. “Let me know how it goes … and may the Force be with you.�
�
“Yeah.” Not wanting her to see the tears welling in his eyes—and to realize that he was afraid this might be their final good-bye—Han didn’t look as she started after Ben. “You too, kid.”
He turned back to the damaged area and started to lay the rest of the reinforcing strips in place. By the time he had finished, Jaina had everyone loaded into the escape pods and was sounding the departure alarm. The turbolaser strikes just kept coming. The Falcon was bucking and leaping like a wild ronto, and the cabin pressure had fallen to the point that Han was shivering and starting to lose his breath.
He didn’t feel the escape pods go. The launch alarm simply fell silent, and he had a feeling like something had torn loose inside him.
“Han?” Even over the intercom, Leia’s voice sounded as though it was cracking. “You still there?”
“ ’Course I am.” He started forward, sealing the bulkhead behind him. “You’re not getting rid of me that easy.”
“Nothing’s easy with you, flyboy.” Leia’s tone was joking, but a little forced and frightened. “I just wanted to let you know we’re ready to jump.”
Another shock wave slammed into the Falcon, bouncing Han off the wall and eliciting a metallic screech of pain from the old ship. He gulped down a deep breath thinking it might be his last, then was amazed to still be in once piece when he reached the corridor’s forward bulkhead.
“What are you waiting for?” He punched a safety override code into the control panel, then felt a blast of pressure as the hatch irised open. “The sooner we jump, the better.”
“What about poor Lady Morwan?” C-3PO asked. “She’s still locked in the forward hold!”
“And safer than we are,” Han replied, stepping through the bulkhead.
He closed the hatch behind him and hurried across the main cabin into the flight deck access corridor. The jump alarm chimed—sounding higher-pitched than usual in the thin air—then the lights dimmed and an alarming purr rose from the engine compartments in the back of the ship. The Falcon began to chug and slow, and Leia’s voice rolled down the corridor, cursing and yelling like an Aqualish spice smuggler on a bad day.
Han leaned close to the wall. “Come on, old girl,” he whispered. “You’re not ready for the scrap heap yet, are you?”
The purring intensified into a high-pitched whine, then the lights came back up, and Han was nearly knocked off his feet again as the Falcon leapt into a hard acceleration.
He smiled and gave the bulkhead an affectionate pat. “Me, neither.”
He sealed the bulkhead, then made his way to the flight deck, where the engine whine had grown so high that it was no longer audible to human ears. The Falcon’s shuddering had settled into a teeth-tickling vibration, and C-3PO was at the navigator’s station checking their jump coordinates. Leia was in the pilot’s seat, with nothing ahead but dark, empty freedom.
Han went to her side and saw by her glassy eyes that there was no need to tell her about events in back. She had probably sensed Meewalh and Cakhmaim’s deaths through the Force, and Jaina would have commed her to clear the escape pod launches. As for Ben and Jacen and the Anakin Solo, there would be time enough to tell her about that later … and if there wasn’t, it would be just as well if she never knew.
Han leaned down. “It’ll be okay.” He kissed her cheek, then slipped into the copilot’s seat. “You’ve still got me.”
Leia let out a shocked snort, then smiled and looked over. “I guess so.” She reached across and squeezed his arm. “You’ll do.”
The hyperdrive finally kicked in, and the stars stretched to lines one more time.
epilogue
A lively murmur rose near the mouth of the Dragon Queen’s Royal Hangar, then built to a rousing cheer. Tenel Ka, Queen Mother of the Hapes Consortium and uncontested monarch of sixty-three worlds, turned from the newly arrived Jade Shadow toward the sound. Dozens of crewpersons in fireproof refueling suits and tool-draped utilities were looking out through the containment field, pumping their arms and shouting in joy.
But all Tenel Ka saw beyond the hangar mouth was the star-flecked darkness of the realm she ruled. It was strewn with the hulks of wrecked warships and laced with the ion trails of hundreds of rescue vessels, and she saw nothing joyful in that. She had retained her throne, but too many Hapans had died on both sides, and too much of the Consortium’s strength had been squandered on someone else’s fight.
And the ordeal was far from over. Soon, Tenel Ka’s intelligence service would start bringing her names and prisoners, and she would be forced to deal the Queen’s Justice. Her advisers would recommend that it be brutal and swift, and her remaining nobles would expect their loyalty to be rewarded with a redistribution of the usurpers’ holdings. Tenel Ka would consider all their suggestions carefully, of course—but in the end, she would keep her own counsel … and that was bound to disappoint everyone.
After a moment, a GAG-black shuttle slid into view and began to nose through the containment field. The cheering grew even louder, and a marshaling officer stepped forward with a pair of signal batons to direct the pilot to a nearby berth. Tenel Ka reached out in the Force and was alarmed to feel the familiar presence of her daughter.
Jacen was returning Allana—and his timing could not have been worse. Tenel Ka turned back to the Jade Shadow and saw Mara and Jaina already carrying a stretcher down the boarding ramp toward her. It was too late to comm Jacen and warn him. Instead, Tenel Ka reached out in the Force, counting on him to sense her anxiety and figure out the reason. She felt a brief touch of warmth, then had to break off contact as Mara and Jaina reached the bottom of the ramp with their burden.
Lying on the stretcher was Zekk, pale, unconscious, and heavily bandaged around the middle. Tenel Ka’s heart ached to see her old comrade-in-arms wounded so severely, but she forced herself to keep a blank face. It would not do for her ever-present retinue of “loyal” nobles to notice an arched brow or a quivering lip when she had just watched so many Hapans perish in stoic composure.
“Master Skywalker, Jedi Solo, welcome aboard.” Tenel Ka stepped forward to greet them, followed closely by the medical team she had brought to meet the Shadow. “My surgeon is waiting in an operating theater. If you would entrust Zekk to the transport team, they will take him up immediately.”
“That’s very kind,” Mara said. “We appreciate it.”
“Yeah, thanks,” Jaina added. “It means a lot.”
They passed the stretcher to a pair of red-uniformed medics, who quickly placed Zekk aboard a small hoversled then zipped away toward the back of the hangar. Noticing how Jaina’s gaze followed the sled all the way to the lift tubes, Tenel Ka stepped to her side.
“They’ll take good care of him, Jaina.” Tenel Ka could sense that Jaina was a little irritated by all the cheering going on behind them, but there was nothing to be done about it. Even if the Queen Mother called for silence, she doubted the order could be carried out anytime soon. “Once they have prepared Zekk for the operation, we can go up to wait in the infirmary.”
“That’d be great,” Jaina said. “But don’t worry. Zekk’s as strong as a bantha these days.”
Tenel Ka smiled. “I’m glad to hear that—but I am a little confused. My surgeon said he had been told it was a lightsaber injury?”
Jaina glanced at Mara, then said, “It’s a long story.”
“Ben made a mistake,” Mara said.
“Ben?” Tenel Ka gasped.
“It wasn’t an attack.” Mara’s tone suggested she did not want to discuss Ben’s “mistake” any further. “There was some confusion aboard the Falcon.”
“The Falcon?” Growing more confused herself by the moment, Tenel Ka turned to Jaina. “But I thought the Masters Skywalker found you in escape pods?”
“The Falcon’s pods,” Luke answered from the top of the boarding ramp. His cybernetic hand was missing, and his robes looked bulky around the middle—as though he, too, had a bandage wrapped around his chest. “
We’re still trying to figure that out ourselves.”
“Master Skywalker, you’re hurt, too!” Tenel Ka cried. “If you had told us—”
“I’m fine—I’ve just come out of a healing trance.” Luke sounded as haggard as he looked. He glanced toward the GAG shuttle, which was now surrounded by jubilant Hapans, and asked, “Is that Jacen everyone is cheering for?”
“Yes, it is.” Tenel Ka turned toward the shuttle, where Jacen had descended the boarding ramp and was beginning to make his way toward them through the cheering throng. Major Espara was with him, but Allana had apparently been left aboard with Espara’s aides. “After destroying the Galney fleet and saving me, Jacen has become quite the hero of loyal Hapans.”
“A hero?” Jaina asked. “You’ve got to be kidding!”
“Not at all,” Tenel Ka said sternly. Given the warm reception Jacen was receiving from her subjects, she was considering whether it might be possible to reveal Allana’s paternity. Not having the secret to keep would certainly simplify her life, and her nobles—at least the loyal ones—would never be more receptive to the truth than they were right now. “Jacen saved my life—and with it, the Hapan monarchy.”
Jaina’s face hardened as only Jaina’s face could. “Does that give him an excuse to fire on his own parents?”
Tenel Ka frowned. “I’m not sure I heard you correctly. Did you really say that Jacen had fired on Han and Leia?”
“I’m afraid she did,” Luke said grimly. He started down the ramp, followed by Ben and a Twi’lek in Alliance military utilities. “The Falcon had already jumped by the time we arrived from Roqoo, but it sounds like the Anakin hit her pretty hard.”
“You’re sure?” Tenel Ka could not believe what she was hearing. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“We’re having trouble understanding a lot of what Jacen has been doing,” Mara said. As Luke reached the bottom of the ramp, she stepped to his side. “Now that matters are settling down in the Consortium, we’re hoping to have a chance to work some of those things out.”
