"Please, both of you, be seated. Captain Showolter, perhaps you could arrange for some refreshment?"

"Nothing for me, thanks," Lando said.

"I'm fine as well," Luke said. "Somehow going through those corridors didn't leave me with much of an appet.i.te. Not the most appealing odors out there. My apologies if we brought any of it in with us."

"Not at all," Mon Mothma said. "But please, all of you, be seated."

They all took chairs toward the same end of the table. "Tell me, Captain Calrissian," Mon Mothma went on, "was your trip profitable?"

"Very definitely yes, Mon Mothma, although in a personal sense, rather than a financial one," Lando said.

"However, I'm afraid it was cut short somewhat abruptly before we got as far as Corellia."

"How so?" Admiral Ackbar asked, a bit eagerly.

"Please, tell us everything."

"Well," said Lando, "we got as far as Sacorria, but we were there less than half a day before we were ordered off the planet. It was some sort of antiforeigner crackdown. We weren't there long enough to learn much, but Tendra-the local woman Iepoke with, seemed to think there was some sort of crisis coming to a head."

"Could that crisis have anything to do with Corellia?"

Showolter asked.

"I suppose it's possible," Lando replied. "We never got a chance to find out. We were stopped by an interdiction field."

"An interdiction field near the Corellian planetary system?"

Ackbar asked. "Why didn't one of you say so?

How big and where?"

"I was about to say so, but we got a little sidetracked," Lando said evenly. "That's why we never got a chance to learn what was going on in the Corellian system. The field is what kept us from getting there."

"How could that be?" Ackbar demanded.

"The field isn't just near Corellia It completely surrounds the Corellian planetary system," Luke explained.

"at? That's impossible!" Ackbar said. "No one has ever managed to generate a field that large."

"That's exactly what I thought," Lando replied. "But it's there, nevertheless. We were knocked out of hypers.p.a.ce about twenty light-hours out from Corell, Corellia's star. And it's n0t just a big field. It's a powerful one.

It nearly blew out the safeties on the Lady Luck's hyper.

drive."

Luke looked to Ackbar and Mon Mothma. "Wait a second. If you don't know about the interdiction field, why are we here?"

"It's very simple," Mon Mothma said. "We have lost all-and I repeat, allommunication with the Corellian planetary system.

"Communicator silence?" Lando asked. "Maybe, if there's some sort of military situation going on, Governor-General Micamberlecto decided to order a blackout."

"Things would have to be pretty grim for that to be plausible,"

Ackbar said, "but I'm afraid even that is a highly optimistic interpretation. It's not a blackout. It's jamming. System-wide jamming of all communications in and out of the Corellian planetary system."

Lando let out a low whistle. "Whoever is behind all this is not shy about thinking big."

"But you have something else that's got you worried, ' Luke said.

"Otherwise we wouldn't be meeting underground."

"Quite right.

Captain Showolter?"

"Thank you, ma'am." Showolter turned to Luke and Lando. "Even before the communications blackout, we were concerned that someone in the Corellian planetary system had managed to penetrate our communications.

We kept sending agents in, and they kept vanishing. The more carefully we planned the penetration, the faster we lost the agent.

There has to be some sort of leak outside the Corellian system.

Even without the communications blackout, it was getting to be enough to raise a major ruckus back here. It would seem the last two or three agents we tried to insert were shot down or apprehended the moment they entered the system."

"Therefore," said Mon Mothma, "we have decided that all business related to this situation must be dealt with in topsecret, face-to-face meetings, in secure facilities."

"We have also decided we're going to have to go in, ' Admiral Ackbar said in a voice that was gruff, even for him. "I don't see any real way around it. Unfortunately, I don't have any ships available for the job." Admiral Ackbar swiveled his goggle eyes from side to side and shook his head. "Readiness is at an all-time low. We have all the admirals anyone could want, but the fleet is a skeleton force at the moment. And I don't need to tell you that information is highly confidential.

"We must a.s.sume that whoever grabbed our agents and ordered the jammingnd created this interdiction fielddid so to cover something we're not supposed to know about. And they managed to do it at exactly the moment nearly all of our ships were committed elsewhere, or in dry dock.

I don't think that's a coincidence.

But leave all that to one side for the moment. What more do you know about the interdiction field?" Ackbar said.

Luke turned to his astromech droid. "Artoo?" R2-D2 beeped twice and rolled over to stand next to Luke's chair. "Show the graphic images on the interdiction field." Artoo blooped obediently and activated his internal holographic generator. An image started to form.

"We didn't stay around long enough to get much information, but we did pull what we could off the Lady Luck's automatic data recorders and then enhanced it as best we could. And bear in mind that this data has been more than a littlema.s.saged. All sorts of errors could have crept into it.

Artoo projected a standard wire-frame schematic diagram of the Corellian planetary system, showing the star Corell, the planet Corellia, and the other inhabited planetSelonia, Drall, and the Double Worlds of Tralus and ThIus, along with the outer planets. After a few moments a hazy gray cloud appeared around all of it, a sphere that extended far beyond the outermost planet of the system.

"It's not centered on the star," Ackbar said at once.

"Very good, Admiral. It took us the better part of a day to notice that. But you're right, it isn't. As best we can tell, it seems to be centered somewhere in the vicinity of Thins and Tralus, the Double Worlds."

"The Double Worlds?" Mon Mothma asked. "I'm sorry, I'm not as familiar with the Corellian system as I ought to be."

"Don't feel bad about it," said Luke. "I had to look them up myself. They're the least populous and least important of the inhabited Corellian worlds.

They're called the Double Worlds because they are in a coorbital relationship. They orbit about each other, or more accurately about their common center of gravity, or barycenter. And, of course, the system of two planets is in orbit around Corell as well."

"There's some sort of big s.p.a.ce station in the barycenter point, isn't there?" Ackbar asked. "One that might make a base of operations?"

Luke smiled at his old friend. "So there is. Already thinking tactics?"

"Of course," Ackbar replied. "That's my job, after all.

And I might add that our imagery of the jamming looks very similar to this display of the interdiction field."

"So we've got the infiltration of NRI, the jamming, and the giant interdiction field," said Luke. "What in the Corellian system is worth going to all this effort?"

"I should think that was obvious," Mon Mothma said.

"The Corellian system itself. Someone in there, one of the rebel groups, has seized power, and has done everything possible to keep the outside universe from interfering while it consolidates its position."

"Quite right," Admiral Ackbar said, "but I am less interested in their political plans than their military capabilities and intentions.

What they have done suggests that our mysterious enemies have technology far superior to ours."

"I agree, sir," Captain Showolter said. "But that brings up another questiowhere di" the get it? Corellia used to be known as a trading center, not a hotbed of high-technology research and development. I'd be much less surprised if this sort of capability showed up on your own world of Mons Calamari. And yes, obviously, if someone was going to try and sell a superweapon like this to the highest bidder, a trading planet would be the place to go. But Corellia hasn't been one of the preeminent trade centers since before the war. If were trying to auction off a wonder weapon, I wouldn't sell it to a planet that's strapped for cash."

"Unless you consider that the betterif planets might not be interested in buying such a device," Mon Mothma said. "High-power jamming and interdiction systems aren't of much use unless you want to keep the outside univeand the New Republifrom interfering with your plans. Plans for a rebellion, for example. And what is to stop the sellers from offering their wares elsewhere?"

There was a moment's dead silence. "That is a most disturbing thought, Captain Calrissian,"

Ackbar said at last. "If this super-interdiction system is for sale, then we might be in very serious trouble indeed."

"We're already in very serious trouble," Mon Mothma replied. "You're off on about three hypotheticals at the moment.

Let's not go borrowing extra worries until we have to. The Corellian crisis is quite enough to keep us busy for the moment."

"But we must bear in mind that a successful revolt on Corellia might well inspire others to rebel against the New Republic. The name Corellia has influence, even if the Corellian Sector has been little heard of in recent years. A successful Corellian rebellion could be the beginning of the end for the New Republic. It would rem resent not some minor fraying at the edge, but a huge tear right in the center of the fabric.

If others chose to pull on that tear, it could only get wider."

Mon Mothma frowned. "As unhappy as I am to admit it, Admiral Ackbar is quite right. We must get the situation under control. We must get into the Corellian system and find out what is going on. And we must get in there with a force capable of setting things right. A battle fleet, at the very minimum."

"But with the interdiction field in place, you can't use hyperdrive in the Corellian planetary system," Lando said. "It could take months to travel from the edge of the field to the inner planets via normal 5p "Then it will take months," Ackbar said. "I don't have to tell you all the tactical and logistical disadvantages we will have if we can't fly in hypers.p.a.ce, but if we have no choice, then we have no choice. There is, of course, the trffling matter of finding a battle fleet. To put it very bluntly, we don't have one at the moment, and it could easily take us months to a.s.semble one. But that is the very point we wished to discuss with you, the reason we called you here."

"You mean you didn't call us in here because we had just come from Corellia?" Lando asked.

"We thought it possible that you might have made it that far,"

Admiral Ackbar said, "but we had no way of knowing. Your information about the interdiction field is invaluable, of course, but we had another reason to bring you in herer at least, another reason to bring Master Skywalker in. We could certainly make use of your services as well, Captain Calrissian, but-how shall I put this delicately? Master Skywalker has a, ah, certain contact that we need him to cultivate." Admiral Ackbar was a Mon Calamari, and it was far from easy for a human to read his expression. Even so, there was something about the way he spoke, the way he held his head, that gave Luke a funny feeling. "What sort of contact?"

Luke asked.

"An old one," Mon Mothma said. "A personal one. I might even say-a romantic one."

"Wait a minute," Luke said. "I don't know what you're getting at, but-"

"The thing of it is," Captain Showolter said, "there's a lady of your acquaintance, by the name of Gaeriel Captison, out in the Bakuran system. She seems to have a battle fleet in her possession. We were hoping you might ask her if you could borrow it.".

MMUU Al MLLflWIA 4!.

CHAPTER THREE.

Coming In, Going Out The X-TIE fighter lumbered along through hypers.p.a.ce, and Lieutenant Belindi Kalenda of New Republic Intelligence knew she should be grateful for even that much performance. The thing had barely made it into hypers.p.a.ce at the beginning of the flight, and she was more than a bit nervous about how it would handle when the time came to jump back out. But for the moment, at any rate, she was all right, and that had to count for something.

The X-TIE was an Ugly, a chop job made up out of salvaged parts of an X-wing and an early-model E fighter. As best Kalenda could tell, it combined all the worst handling characteristics of the two old adversaries, with maybe a few of its own nasty surprises thrown in.

But say what you might, the thing flew, and it had gotten her this far. Given the way the flight had started, with her stealing the ship on Corellia while Han Solo provided a diversion by blowing up what seemed like half the s.p.a.ceport, it was a miracle she had a ship at all, let alone one that flew. By all rights she should have crashed or been shot down thirty seconds after launch.

But none of that mattered now. She was on her way to Coruscant-nearly there, in fact-and she had information no one outside the Corellian system was likely to have. She had to get through.

Nothing else mattered.

Belindi Kalenda was all of twenty-five standard years old. She was a slightly odd-looking young woman even at the best of times, and she had not been at her best in a long time. Her hair was jet-black, and would have hung nearly down to her waist if she did not normally wear it in an elaborate braid at the back of her head.

Right now, of course, she had her hair jammed up under her flight helmet, and had for some time. Combing out her hair was not going to be any great joy. She couldn't remember the last time she had been really clean and presentable. If only the need for a shower was the worst of her worries.

Her eyes were set a bit wide apart and were a trifle gla.s.sy, her gaze a bit off-kilter, almost, but not quite, cross-eyed. It was disconcerting to many people, and gave them the feeling that she was looking not at them but past them, at something hovering just behind them.

That was not too far wrong, in point of fact. She had never worked to develop it, or had all that much faith in it, but Kalenda had long felt she had just the slightest of skill in the Force, just enough to give her a warning now and then, make her intuitions a bit stronger, more reliable.

Unfortunately, all her intuition was telling her at the moment was what she would have known anyway she was in over her head. The survival of who knew how many planets, how many intelligent beings, had been dumped in her lap. She was the only one with the information.

Her thoughts never strayed far from that point.

It was all there, in the datachip she had tucked into the pocket of her flight suit. It didn't take much imagination for her to feel as if the tiny chip in her pocket were huge and heavy, a ma.s.sive burden pulling her down.

She had to get the message out. And she did not feel up to it.

She felt strung out, tired, scared.

However, aside from being responsible for the fate of millions, she had the un-minor task of jollying this monStrOsity of a s.p.a.cecraft long enough to get her to Coruscant. At least that part of it was almost over.

a.s.suming the X-E didn't blow up or melt down in the next few minutes, she ought to be dropping out of hypers.p.a.ce in the Coruscant system very soon now.

Of course, there was the question of what sort of reception she would receive. The capital had been attacked, bombed, besieged, and who knows what else over the years. The New Republic Navy therefore took its job of defending the place very seriously, and the years of peace hadn't taken the edge off Coruscant Command. If she had learned anything in NRI, she had learned that much. She also knew how suspicious they were of unknown ship typeuch as the X-TIE she was riding in. It might be unfortunate, but it would be understandable if they blasted her out of the sky first and asked questions later.

Kalenda smiled to herself. But why borrow trouble?

The X-TIE's hypers.p.a.ce systems might blow before she got there, and then the problem would never come up.