by Troy Denning
Han glanced down at the grime-caked floor, trying to see what he might have kicked or snapped. In the weak glow-panel light, he could see compressed dust and not much else—no stray fusioncutters or beamdrills, no slashrat skeletons or breemil carapaces. He couldn’t even see any dead muxi carcasses, and as bad as the place smelled, there ought to have been a thousand of them.
Still walking, he twisted around enough to look back. Leia and Anji were about ten paces away, bringing up the rear. Allana and R2-D2 were following closer behind, almost on his heels. They were both coated top-to-bottom in dust and grime, and Allana looked every bit the combat veteran she had become in the last few days of running, skulking, and fighting. Her big gray eyes were getting that hard, wary edge that Han had watched develop in his own kids as their Force talents and galactic strife conspired to make them warriors when they were barely into their teens. Now Allana’s destiny was coming for her at an even younger age. She was learning to kill at the age of nine—and to watch friends die—and it broke his heart. If he could have changed her fate, he would have done it in an instant. But the choice wasn’t Han’s, or anyone’s. She had been born into her role, and the best he could do was prepare her to shoulder the burden.
Han was still looking behind him when he reached an intersection and triggered a set of motion-activated glow panels a few meters to his left. With a company of Sith still somewhere behind them, he knew better than to let himself cry out in surprise—but he couldn’t help whirling around and pointing his blaster pistol down the adjacent hallway.
“Grandpa!” Allana whispered again. “Quiet means no blasting, either!”
Han stopped and turned to face her. “I didn’t pull the trigger,” he said. “And I was being quiet.”
R2-D2 flashed a couple of status lights, using the Jedi blink code to contradict him, and Allana shook her head.
“You were muttering again,” she whispered. “And I heard someone behind us.”
Han raised his gaze, looking back down the way they had come. Anji and Leia were still behind them, Anji keeping a wary eye on their backtrail while Leia used the Force to smooth the dust. There was no sign of anyone else.
“Are you sure?” he asked.
“Of course, I’m sure,” Allana replied. “You were saying something about the little smooka, and how she was going to pay. What’s a smooka?”
“Just another word for bad news,” Han said. “I meant, are you sure about hearing something?”
“I’m sure,” Allana replied. “There was a yell behind us. I think someone was surprised.”
“I heard it, too,” Leia said, joining them and also whispering. “And I can feel them, maybe a dozen presences about half a kilometer back.”
“What about Zekk and Taryn?” Han asked. He glanced down at Allana. “You’re sure you activated your tracking beacon?”
She turned her arm over, revealing an orange glow where the subcutaneous transmitter had been implanted. “I’m sure.”
“Blast,” Han said. “They should have caught up to us by now.”
“Maybe they have,” Leia said. “The Force has started to feel empty behind that first group—maybe a little too empty.”
“Like Zekk is hiding his Force presence?” Han asked.
“Not quite,” Leia said. “If that were the case, he’d just be drawing it in around himself. This feels more like a bubble—like he’s trying to hide more than himself—Taryn, perhaps.”
“He can do that?”
Leia shrugged. “Luke can,” she said. “I’m not sure about Zekk.”
“But if you can feel the bubble, then so can the Sith. Right?”
“I’m afraid so,” Leia said. “They probably know someone is behind them—just not who, or how many.”
“Great—so they’re probably thinking they need to make a move on us before it’s too late.” Han looked up the corridor into the darkness beyond the active glow panels, trying to guess how far it continued before reaching someplace mazy enough for them to lose their pursuers. “Looks like we need to make a run for it.”
“We can’t,” Allana said. “We’re too close to the Barabels’ nest.”
“We are?” Han glanced down at her. “How close?”
Allana studied the floor. “When was the last time you saw a slashrat or breemil?” she asked. “Or a granite slug or a muxi? Or even any sign of one?”
“I don’t know,” Han said, looking around the corridor again. “About thirty minutes ago, I guess.”
“I see what you mean, Allana,” Leia said, also looking around. “This area has been hunted out.”
“Right,” Allana said. “But the way it smells—we’ve got to be close to the nest.”
“Good,” Han said, starting up the corridor again. He wasn’t sure how the smell fit in, but he did know that Barabels were voracious hunters, so being close to the nest would explain why they weren’t seeing any vermin. “We can use some reinforcements.”
Allana caught hold of his trouser leg. “Are you crazy, Grandpa? If we lead those Sith any closer to the Barabels’ nest, we’re the ones they’ll eat.”
“I thought you had to warn them about your vision? That’s what got …” Han caught himself, realizing that if he was not careful about what he said, Allana would end up blaming herself for Bazel’s death. “That’s what we’re doing here, isn’t it?”
Fortunately, Allana didn’t seem to catch his near slip. “I need to warn them about what I saw, not make it come true.”
“Yeah, well I’ve been having visions about Sith and little girls,” Han said. “So I say we take our chances and team up with the Barabels while we still can. We’ll all stand a better chance.”
“Han, this isn’t a decision we can make for Allana,” Leia said gently. “It’s her vision. She has to decide what path the Force wants her to follow.”
“Since when did the Force become the parent around here?” Han demanded, struggling to keep to a whisper. When Leia only looked at him, he took a couple of breaths and turned to Allana. “Fine. Maybe I can stay here and hold them off while you and your grandmother go find the Barabels.”
“Hold off a dozen Sith—alone?” Leia shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
Han scowled. “I thought you said it was Allana’s decision.”
“It is, and Grandma’s right,” Allana said. “We have to stick together.”
“And do what?” Han demanded.
Allana frowned in thought, then finally turned to look back along the wall. “Something crazy,” she said. “That’s what you would do if I weren’t here, isn’t it?”
Han followed her gaze to the intersection they had just passed. “An ambush?” He rubbed his chin, then looked toward Leia. “That’s not a bad idea—not if Zekk and Taryn are coming up behind them.”
“That’s a big if,” Leia said. She thought for a moment, then laid a hand on Allana’s shoulder. “But it’s the last thing they would expect.”
“Good.” Allana started back toward the intersecting hallway. “We’ll set a trip line about five meters in. That way, if something goes wrong, we’ll have a chance to run off and draw them away from the nest.”
Han rushed to catch up with her. “Not bad,” he said. “Mind if I add a couple of things?”
“Not at all, Grandpa,” Allana said. She flashed him a little smile. “Han Solo’s ideas are always welcome.”
Han shared his suggestions, and the two of them went to work. By the time Leia had used the Force to spread a fresh layer of dust over the main corridor, he and Allana had strung the trip wire, disabled the overhead glow panels, and lodged a durasteel door across the hallway, forming a makeshift breastwork that ran between two rooms located across the corridor from each other. Leia joined them, Allana summoned Anji with a hand command, then the three Solos checked their blasters and knelt down to await the Sith.
After half a minute or so, the glow panels in the main corridor flickered off automatically and they were plunged into to
tal darkness. Han knew that this would be the hardest part for Allana, since it was always the moments before a battle when most people’s thoughts turned to the possibility of death—and to the friends they had lost in previous battles. And he was right. They had been kneeling in the darkness only a short time before he began to hear sniffles, and he knew she had to be thinking of Bazel Warv’s incredible last stand. It was a sacrifice Allana would remember forever, and he knew she would spend the rest of her life trying to be worthy of her friend’s heroism.
With the Sith coming any moment, he could not risk trying to comfort her with words. Instead, Han just wrapped an arm around her, wishing that he could use the Force to reassure her that it would get better—that in time she would start to focus more on the good times with Barv than how he died. And maybe Han did have the Force, at least with her—because the sniffles stopped, and Allana leaned into him for a moment, just long enough to acknowledge the hug and let him know she was doing better.
Then a glow panel flickered to life out in the main corridor, and Han felt Allana tense for battle. Normally, he would have slipped over to one side of the hall to avoid becoming a target cluster for the enemy, but he wanted to stay within arm’s reach of his granddaughter. She had done pretty well in the ambush back at the Falcon—great, in fact—but that had happened with no warning. This time, there had been a chance to think, and in situations like these, too much thinking was usually a bad thing.
A dozen heartbeats later, a pair of Sith scouts reached the intersection and cautiously poked their heads around the corner. When the leader narrowed her eyes and leaned close to whisper something in her partner’s ear, Han knew they had sensed the trap. He wasn’t surprised. Even if the Lost Tribe wasn’t quite up to Jedi combat standards, most of them used the Force a lot more naturally than their light-side counterparts—and that was their weakness, to Han’s way of thinking. Members of the Lost Tribe had a habit of relying on the Force instead of themselves in a fight, so when they ran into someone who could really fight, they usually found themselves in trouble.
Han felt Allana tense as she prepared to open fire, and he quickly placed a restraining hand on her arm. Had he been able to speak to her through the Force, he would have told her to be patient and wait for her grandmother to do her thing—because Leia Solo always had one more trick up her Jedi sleeve.
And sure enough, a gentle clang came down the main corridor. The gazes of both Sith swung toward the sound and rose toward the ceiling, and they quickly backed out of sight and vanished down the corridor.
“They got away!” Allana complained.
“Never shoot the scouts,” Han explained. “They’re expecting it.”
“So?”
“They’ll deflect your shot,” Leia said. Judging by the sound of her voice, she had already slipped into the room on her side of the hallway. “You’ll just reveal your position,”
“But they have the Force,” Allana said. “They can already feel our positions.”
“Yeah—that’s what we’re counting on.” Han took Allana by the arm and pulled her through the dark doorway on their side of the hallway, where he had already stowed R2-D2.
“Hand me your blaster.”
Allana’s voice grew suspicious. “What for?”
“Because you’re going to need both hands.” He pulled her into the far corner, where R2-D2 stood faintly illuminated by his status lights. “Now hand me your blaster, call Anji over and lie down over her head, then cover your ears and close your eyes.”
“What?” Allana demanded. “Grandpa, I’m not a Jedi yet. I can’t sense anyone in the Force that well.”
“Trust me. You won’t need to.” Han thought about telling her what he expected to happen next, but decided against it. In his experience, it was better not to know some things were coming. He nudged her shoulder, then said, “Blaster … now.”
With a heavy sigh, Allana handed over her weapon—a petite Q2 that they had lifted from a dead Sith woman a little smaller than Leia—then did as she was instructed. Han tucked the pistol into his belt, holstered his own weapon, then did as he had instructed his granddaughter and pressed his own torso down over Allana and Anji.
Han had barely gotten his hands over his ears before he saw an orange flash through his eyelids and heard the crackling bang of an incendiary grenade. He peeked down and saw Allana staring up with a gaping jaw and eyes wide open. Anji was pressed flat to the floor, squeezed as tight to the wall as possible for a nexu her size.
“Keep your eyes closed!” he said.
She obeyed immediately, and a second later came the deafening crack and blinding white flash of a thermal detonator. Han counted to two, then opened his eyes to see a four-meter circle of corroded durasteel missing from the chamber’s front wall. Flashing up the corridor outside was a steady stream of blaster bolts.
Han pulled Allana’s blaster pistol from his belt and passed it back to her. “Don’t leave my side.”
“Not if a rancor tries to drag me off!” she assured him. “Grandpa, how did you know—”
“Experience.” Han pulled his own blaster. “Lots and lots of experience.”
Pulling Allana along, he stepped to within a couple of meters of the hole. On the opposite side of the hallway, he saw Leia looking through an identical hole, her face flashing green in the light of passing blaster bolts. She gave them a smile, then slid out of view behind the remnants of the wall.
It was a smile that said volumes to Han. He quickly had Allana command Anji to stay with R2-D2. He wouldn’t normally have given the command much chance of sticking when things got wild, but Allana and the nexu seemed to have some sort of Force connection that might help. After Anji was in place, he positioned Allana in one of the room’s front corners and told her what he was planning. He explained what he needed her to do—including hiding her presence in the Force, like her grandmother had taught her—then crawled on his hands and knees past the hole in the room’s front wall to the corner opposite Allana.
Over the din of screeching blasters, Han began to hear Sith boots pounding up the hallway toward him. He kept his head down, hiding the whites of his eyes and listening to the footfalls grow louder, until they reached the other side of the hole. By then, the steps were beginning to slow, and Han raised his gaze to find a straight-nosed Sith male leaping toward him through the hole in the front wall.
Han ignored this one and opened fire on the next Sith in line, who was spinning around to cover Allana’s side of the room. The attack took the woman so completely by surprise that she did not even have time to activate her lightsaber. A smoking hole simply appeared in one side of her head, and she went down like a holograph losing power.
In the same instant a trio of blaster bolts sounded from where Allana was hiding, and the first Sith pitched forward, his still-ignited lightsaber falling so close to Han that he nearly lost an arm.
Paying the close call no attention, he continued to fire down the hallway into the line of charging Sith. Having the benefit of the second and a half it had taken their fellows to die, the first three in line ignited their lightsabers and quickly began to bat Han’s bolts back toward him. He kept his head down and continued to fire, and a couple of heartbeats later they were coming through the hole into the room.
Which is when Leia leapt out of hiding. Han continued to pour fire down the hallway behind her, occupying the rest of the Sith just long enough for her to cross the hallway. Her lightsaber droned twice, and two Sith heads went flying.
Allana’s blaster screeched again—then Allana screeched as the third Sith spun on her, batting her bolts aside and lunging for her.
Before Han could switch targets, Anji slammed into the woman’s flank, knocking her back toward the corridor—and her head straight into Leia’s blade. The woman’s knees buckled immediately, and Han shot her through the spine on the way down.
Allana made a retching sound and rolled away from the woman’s still-descending lightsaber.
; Han switched back to firing down the hallway, and Leia stepped into the hole beside him, using her lightsaber to deflect the steady stream of bolts the Sith sent back at him. When the enemy realized they had lost nearly half their number, the leader—a brown-bearded Keshiri with pale eyes—yelled something in their own language, and the band began to fall back toward the intersection.
And that was when Zekk and Taryn arrived, rounding the corner behind a wall of blasterfire so intense that all Han could see was flashing light. Several Sith voices cried out in agony and surprise, then the brown-bearded Keshiri and three other Sith came racing up the hallway. As they drew near, Han saw the brown-bearded one thrust his hand into his pocket, no doubt reaching for a grenade or thermal detonator. The Sith behind him was doing the same.
Han yelled for Leia at the top of his lungs, but he could not make himself heard over the din of screeching blasters. He pointed at the leader and opened fire on the other one. With Zekk and Taryn firing from behind and Han from the front, the Sith never had a chance. He fell with his hand still in his pocket.
Brown-beard fared better. He managed to pull a grenade from his pocket—and even get it armed—before Leia hit him with a Force blast that sent him tumbling back down the hallway.
The grenade, however, remained in the air—and came sailing straight through the hole into the room where the Solos were hiding.
“Grenade!”
Diving past Leia, Han hurled himself on Allana and wrapped her tight in his arms—then felt himself reverse course and go soaring back at an angle. His shoulder banged against the edge of the wall so hard that his arms nearly opened, and then he found himself spinning across the hallway upside down, with Allana on top of him screaming in surprise and fear.
They were airborne the better part of a second before the small of his back struck something that felt like a table and sent him tumbling. Allana flew from his arms, then someone else—someone big and furry—landed on his chest.
Only then did the orange flash of an incendiary grenade fill the darkness—and it seemed to be coming from across the hall.
