"What am I supposed to tell them?" Leia asked.

Lwothin sang again. "Oh, my," 3PO said. "He wants you to tell them to offer no resistance-to allow them to be captured!" Leia opened her mouth, but her husband spoke his mind first. "No one's giving any such order!" Lwothin explained his plan as best he could in the limited time.

When he had finished, Jaina watched Leia glance down at the body of the Keeramak, the look in her eyes suspicious and dubious.

"How can I be sure that you're not asking me to send those fighters into a trap?"

"You cannot," the P'w'eck sang in reply via C-3PO. "But if you say nothing then those pilots are as good as dead anyway. This is their only hope. " The P'w'eck's eyes were luminous behind their rapidly flickering triple eyelids. "The time for lies and traps has pa.s.sed. We stand before you now as allies and equals. We will not betray you." Every instinct in Jaina's body screamed out to believe him. For the first time, she felt as though they had reached the heart of the conspiracies surrounding Bakura.

Leia clearly felt the same. With a brisk nod, she activated her comlink and called Pride of Selonia.

The conversation was brief and to the point. The next message Jaina heard over the comlink was Captain Mayn's general broadcast to all the Galactic Alliance fighters.

"This is Captain Mayn. I'm addressing you on an open frequency."

When she was finished, Jag's voice came back with: "If we stand down now, Captain, then they're as good as dead anyway." At the sound of his voice, something inside Jama suddenly relaxed. When Lwothin had described the fighting taking place in orbit above Bakura, her first thought had been of Jag, wondering whether he had been among those killed. Or worse, captured for entechment.

"I have an a.s.surance from the Ssi-ruuk," Mayn went on, maintaining the pretense of surrender, "that, once the planet is under Imperium control, we shall be treated fairly."

"Like the P'w'eck were, you mean? As breeding stock for droid fighters?"

"Anything is better than dying." There was a high-pitched groan over the open line as though of a fighter undergoing stresses it hadn't been designed for. Jaina waited for Jag's reply, but it didn't come. She could feel his uncertainty and desperation as though he were standing next to her. His concern for her burned like a small but intense star.

Captain Mayn clearly sensed it, too.

"You have to trust me, Jag," she said. "They have Jaina." The lie cut Jaina deeply, but she knew immediately that it was the right thing to say. If anything could make Jag defy his deepest, most ingrained instincts, then that would be it. His concern for her ran deep-deeper than he had admitted aloud.

He didn't reply, but she knew that he had capitulated.

"I presume you know what you're doing, Princess," the voice of Captain Mayn added on a private channel.

Leia adjusted the comlink to reply on that same channel. "I do, Todra." She glanced at Lwothin with the threat of murder in her eyes.

"Trust me on this." Time seemed to have frozen. Caught in the web of the Ssi-ruuvi shields, Jag vibrated with tension. He had no way of knowing what was happening on the ground or elsewhere in orbit. The jamming had returned not long after the end of Mayn's transmission. He felt isolated and powerless, like all the other pilots trapped in their fighters around him, waiting for their captors to move in and take them...

Then something strange happened. His sensors registered a slight lessening of the tractor beams holding him in place. Suspecting that some of the Ssi-ruuvi escort may have dropped away now that they were safe within the shields, he checked his scope. Their escort hadn't moved.

A second later, the tractor beam readings dropped again. He flexed his controls and found that his clawcraft had retained a measure of mobility.

He sat for a moment, fighting the impulse to pull loose. What was the point? If he did break free, what was he supposed to do? The shields around the carrier would stop him from escaping anyway, so it seemed a pointless exercise.

But then there was yet another dip in the readings, and this time he couldn't help himself: he found his hopes rising. It couldn't just be him, surely. The grip of the Ssi-ruuk on their captives was slipping. A rush of excitement thrilled through him as he realized what must be going on.

The P'w'eck droid ships that had accompanied the Bakuran fighters on the "honor guard" flights were slowly redirecting their tractor beams.

Having delivered an undamaged attack force behind the shields of the enemy, they were now seeing them free-gradually, so the Ssi-ruuk wouldn't notice. The P'w'eck were rebelling against their masters-for real, this time-and using Bakuran firepower as their weapon!

Jag clicked three times in rapid succession to call for attention.

The captured Twin Sun pilots clicked in immediately. There was a growing rustle over the comm indicating that others were noticing the change and wondering what was going on. He didn't have much time; he would have to act fast before the Ssi-ruuk noticed.

When the tractor beams dropped once more, he clicked twice, then twice again. It was the squadron's code for "attack," and the response was instantaneous. Jag and his pilots pushed their ships from a standing start to full throttle at virtually the same instant. Tearing free of the weakened forces binding them, they roared out of formation and swooped around to attack the unprepared Ssi-ruuk. The V'sett fighters were, much to their surprise, caught in the droid ships' tractor beams, reducing their maneuverability. Within seconds, it was over. The Ssi-ruuk were destroyed and the tractor beams holding the remainder of the captives fell away completely.

The formation immediately dissolved into chaos. Communications cleared. Jag opened his comm on all frequencies, hoping to regain order before the jamming returned.

"Stay calm, people!" he ordered. "Maintain your original formations! Do not fire on the droid ships! I repeat, do not fire on the droid ships. They're piloted by the P'w'eck, remember, and they're on our side. They were the ones who got us here."

"What's so good about here?" one of the Bakuran pilots returned.

"Here we have a target," Jag replied, turning his claw-craft in the direction of the alien carrier. "We're inside the shields, and their squadrons are outside. They can't call for reinforcements without opening themselves up for attack from Selonia or Sentinel." He grinned in antic.i.p.ation of the battle ahead; it was so obvious, now that he saw it.

" They've given us a chance, people, so let's not waste it!" The dramatic triple reversal of the P'w'eck- from enemy to ally, then to enemy and now back to ally-left the Bakuran pilots understandably confused, but they obeyed Jag's orders and left the P'w'eck alone. Flights of threes and fives re-formed and swooped down from the inner edge of the shields to attack the carrier. Jag gathered the remnants of Twin Suns around him and did the same. The carrier bays weren't completely empty, and a dozen V'sett fighters soon rose to meet them. Six droid fighters came in close pursuit. Caught from behind, the Ssi-ruuk's defensive charge was soon scattered.

"Go for the tractor beam generators," Jag instructed the pilots swarming around him, searching for targets. "Then make strafing runs across the deflector-shield projectors. Try to keep structural damage to a minimum. We have friends in there, and I'd rather not lose a single one of them to friendly fire." Then he was down in the maelstrom, finding targets and launching laser bolts as fast as he could. He made a couple of pa.s.ses at the ion cannons that ringed the carrier's bulging waist and managed to destroy three. Others from his squadron cleaned up the rest.

The response from the carrier was sluggish, and he put that down to the P'w'eck who were revolting both inside and outside the ship. But he wasn't fool enough to believe that this advantage would last indefinitely. At 750 meters long, the carrier would have been a formidable opponent for even a hundred fighters.

Still, he thought, any amount of damage they could inflict upon the carrier would be something. The more they could do here, he figured, the less work there'd be for Jaina later...

Word of the breakout of the Galactic Alliance fighters came from Selonia within moments of the airwaves clearing. Jaina, however, had no time to hear the details. A sudden blur of motion caught her attention.

Thinking that one of the Ssi-ruuvi captives had made a break for it, she whirled with her lightsaber at the ready, but instead all she saw was the back of the former Prime Minister sprinting off down the corridor. Vyram was lying on his back, rubbing his right forearm.

"I'm sorry," he said, clambering to her feet. "He moved so quickly!" Jaina didn't wait; she immediately set off after Cun-dertol.

They couldn't let him escape. If he got to a communicator, the plan would be exposed and Jag could be captured for real. She followed the rapid pad-pad of his footsteps along the dusty corridors as he looped around the others and headed up toward the hole Harris's bomb had blown in the stadium.

She soon realized what Vyram had meant about the Prime Minister being quick. Cundertol's speed was impressive.

The sound of his footsteps ahead veered off in a new direction. Two corners and fifty meters later, she understood why. A squadron of P'w'eck who had overthrown their masters came down the tunnel toward her, blocking the exit to the stadium. Cundertol hadn't wanted to run into them, so he had ducked down an alternate tunnel, probably heading for the exit Malinza and the others had tried before. Jaina didn't hesitate; she turned down into the tunnel, too, startling the P'w'eck squadron as she ran past but not stopping to explain herself.

Jaina could hear Cundertol running down stairs two floors below.

His footfalls were heavy and, incredibly, unflagging. The source of his strength and endurance concerned her. Even she was beginning to tire, despite having the Force to augment her stamina.

A door slammed somewhere up ahead of her, and she knew that Cundertol had left the stairwell on the fifth bas.e.m.e.nt level. She made herself run faster, hurling herself forcibly at the door when she reached it. The door had barely begun to swing back when something struck out at her from the gloom on the far side. She knocked it aside with a reflexive Force shove and rolled away. As she got to her feet and adopted a defensive stance, she had just enough time to make out Cundertol at the far end of a wide corridor. Something whizzed through the air toward her.

She moved her head just as a small bolt ricocheted off the wall behind her, leaving a deep dent. Her first thought was that he was using a slingshot, but his hands were clearly empty. She didn't have time to dwell on it, though, as another bolt whizzed by her head, so close that she could feel it flick her hair.

He's throwing them! she thought, incredulous.

His strength might have been superior to his aim, but she wasn't about to give him a chance to practice. She sent a Force push that would have thrown an ordinary man off his feet. All it did to Cundertol, though, was make him stagger backward. It wasn't much, but it was enough.

She ran across the open s.p.a.ce before he recovered.

He had no intention of sticking around to fight. Instead he disappeared through yet another door with disconcerting speed. She followed, but more cautiously this time. What was he? Where was he getting his strength and speed from? Whatever was going on, it was obvious she wasn't going to be able to catch him with speed alone. She was going to have to try something else.

His footsteps receded down another corridor, then abruptly stopped.

Jaina hesitated at the corner, warily peering around it.

The dark corridor seemed empty, but she knew he was down there somewhere.

"You must know you're not going to get away with this, Cundertol,"

she called, hoping to get at least an estimate of his position from a reply.

"No?" he responded. His voice was m.u.f.fled by something other than just distance. "And I suppose you're going to stop me, girl?"

"That's my intention, yes." She frowned, unable to place him.

" I'm afraid that the best intentions can often count for nothing,"

he said, suddenly dropping down behind her. "Not when survival is at stake." She spun around to strike out at him, but he knocked her aside as if she were nothing more than a rag doll. His speed and strength were far beyond those of an ordinary man. She shoved off the wall and came back at him with a strike to the head, igniting her lightsaber with the other hand as she did so. He was under the blow before it could connect, punching up at her and knocking her off her feet. She flew five meters through the air, her lightsaber inscribing a wide, black arc on the floor as she fell-but she didn't let go of it.

Cundertol didn't want to waste time with talk. The twisted expression on his face told her that he was concerned with only one thing: escape. As long as she stood between him and that goal, she would have to be eliminated. She back-flipped onto her feet before he could reach her and warned him away with a swing of her lightsaber.

He feinted to her left, then came at her from her right, ducking under the blade and delivering a blow to her chest that felt as though she'd been hit by a force pike. She flew off her feet again and landed on her backside with a painful grunt. This time her grip on her lightsaber failed and the weapon went skittering across the floor. Before she could s.n.a.t.c.h it back with the Force, Cundertol had already stepped up to finish her off.

"You put up a good fight," he said, looking threateningly over her.

"It isn't over yet," she returned, summoning the lightsaber back toward her.

It shot through the air with a whine and a hiss. Hearing it coming, Cundertol rolled away to one side, but not before the sizzling blade connected. He fell back with a roar, clutching his injured arm. Jaina used the moment to climb back onto her feet, albeit with some difficulty.

Her legs were weak from Cundertol's attack, and the world seemed to be swaying crazily around her. Nevertheless, she managed to hold her ground, directing her thoughts once again out to the lightsaber. This time it flew straight back into her hand.

Cundertol, however, had already taken flight. She could see him at the end of the corridor, nursing his arm as he rounded a corner and disappeared from sight. She was about to give chase again, when the sound of feet came clattering up behind her.

"Jaina!" Her mother was beside her, arms coming around her shoulders. "Are you all right?" She nodded. "Cundertol," she said, waving vaguely in the direction he had taken. "He went that way!"

"Don't worry, kid. We'll get him." Her father's silhouette led a mixed group of humans and P'w'eck up the corridor after the former Prime Minister.

"Be careful!" she yelled after them as her mother's hands guided her down onto the floor, where the world was mercifully level. She crouched there for what felt like forever, fighting nausea. Cundertol had hit her harder than she'd suspected.

"You'll be okay," her mother was saying. "It'll be all right."

Jaina knew that it wasn't. Her thoughts were confused, fragmentary.

Something about her fight with Cundertol bothered her. What was it? She had wounded him, she knew that much. She'd cut his arm - Then she saw it, lying in the shadows a few meters away from her. She wriggled from her mother's grasp and made her way over to it, staring at the thing with a mixture of satisfaction and puzzlement.

"What is it?" her mother asked from behind her. "His arm," Jaina said, squinting at the limb. She hadn't just cut his arm, she'd completely severed it below the elbow! "At least the lower part, anyway."

But there was something distinctly not right about it. Apart from a small smattering and some minor seepage about the stump, there was no blood to be seen anywhere. Sometimes a lightsaber could cauterize veins as it cut and stop the bleeding, it was true, but it wasn't just the blood that piqued her suspicions-it was the smell. It stank of cooked synthflesh.

"It's okay, Jaina," her mother said, coming up beside her. "It's over now. They'll get him-especially if he's injured." Her mother's words washed over her as she realized uneasily what it was she'd been fighting.

Cundertol was a droid!

"No, they won't," she said, staring numbly at the artificial arm.

"Even injured, he's going to get away." Before she could explain, a barrage of fluting sounded from nearby.

"Excuse me, Mistress," C-3PO said, "but Lwothin re-ports that Errinung'ka has surrendered to the P'w'eck. Firrinree is expected to follow shortly." That should make up for losing Watchkeeper and Intruder, at least, Jaina thought to herself.

"What about Jag?" she managed to ask her mother. "Has there been any word?"

"There has," she said, nodding. "He's leading the attack on Firrinree even as we speak." Her mother's voice was soothing. Under the words, Jaina knew she was trying to say, It's not your problem; let it go.

Maybe she was right, but Jaina doubted she'd be able to relax fully until she knew for sure that Jag was nearby and they were both a long way from the threat of entechment...

EPILOGUE.

Jacen stared at the result in disbelief. He could feel the combined attention of everyone in the room as the data from Wyn's search through the library's records flowed down the holopad in front of him. Listed was every system that had gained a planet in the last sixty years. Saba and Danni had already examined most of them during their search of CEDF's files, and the rest had turned out to be either ordinary planetary acquisitions or fleeting encounters with the living planet. All told there were fifteen acquisitions and a further forty encounters. But unfortunately-and frustratingly-each of them could be ruled out.

Jacen shook his head in dismay. "It's not here."

"It has to be here," Mara said. "There's nowhere else it could have gone!"

"Unless it's hiding somewhere in the rest of the galaxy," Luke said, wearily.

"But we'd know about it if it was," Mara said.

"Perhaps we just haven't looked hard enough. It might be in one of the smaller backwaters-like the Minos Cl.u.s.ter, for instance."

"Or maybe it left the galaxy altogether." Danni's voice was heavy with gloom. "Or perhaps it just died."

"No," Jacen said. "It didn't die. We have holos of it around two of the systems it visited, remember?" Jacen was finding it hard to keep the frustration from his voice.

"And it can't have left the galaxy, either-not unless it knows something about hypers.p.a.ce that we don't."

"Or it's found a way to exist without a sun," Luke put in.

Jacen shook his head. "I refuse to accept any of those possibilities."

"Then what are you going to do?" Fel's was the voice of cold reason. "If you've looked and you haven't found it, and you've ruled out every other possibility, then where does that leave you? Perhaps Zonama Sekot really is nothing but a legend."

"No," Jacen said firmly. "No, I can't believe that, either. Vergere wouldn't have lied to me."

"Can you be absolutely sure of that?"

"Yes." Jacen met the one-eyed stare of the a.s.sistant syndic with stubborn determination. "Yes, I can. Zonama Sekot is real. All we have to do is find it." He turned back to the hologram. "Somehow..."