Malakili does not move.

Whoever is coming is worse than these two, and so it seems better to play dead. That, a trick he learned from many of the beasts he trained. Prey knows that the best costume from a predator is the already-dead.

Please let me be, please let me be, please...

But why? To what purpose? To be saved-to be spared-is a privilege that should belong to one with purpose.

Footsteps approach. Boots thumping on the sand.

"You can get up." A voice. Male. Gruff, plain, clear.

Another voice: a woman's voice, "Relax. We're not raiders."

"We're law."

Law? On Tatooine? No such thing. The Hutts were the law. Jabba was law. But now, with Jabba dead...

Malakili rolls over and sits up.

There, a man in Mandalorian armor, the suit of it pocked and pitted and streaked with scars. Armor that looks eerily familiar, and Malakili's innards clench at the sight of it. A carbine hangs at the man's side.

Next to him stands a tall woman. Head-tails which means she's Twi'lek-though one of those head-tails is mangled, its end puckered with scar tissue. At her hips hang twin pistols.

"I'm Issa-Or," she says, a sneer to her lips.

The man removes his helmet. His cheeks are lined with salt-and-pepper stubble. He winces against the double suns. "I'm Cobb Vanth. Lawman and de facto mayor of what used to be Mos Pelgo."

"Freetown, now," the Twi'lek says. "A place where good people can come if they're willing to work. If they're willing to stand tall against the syndicates. Against folks like Lorgan and Red Key."

Malakili nods as if he understands. But he doesn't. Not yet.

Cobb kneels down. "You look familiar to me."

"I am no one."

"Everybody's someone, my friend. Thing about Freetown is, to live inside our walls means to be useful. Are you useful?"

And here, Malakili's spirits sink. He is not useful to anyone. He admits as much, his dry eyes going suddenly wet with tears. "I have no value to you. Kill me. My creature, Pateesa, is dead. All my beasts are gone-"

The Twi'lek says, "You a beastmaster?"

Master. If only he deserved such a word. But he gives an uncertain nod. "I train beasts. Yes."

The two share a look. Vanth chuckles: a dry sound like rocks rolling together down the side of a cliff. "We got a couple unruly rontos that could use a steady hand. Can you handle that? There'd be payment. And a homestead for you if you care to claim it."

His sinking spirits are suddenly buoyant. Purpose dawns inside his heart bringing light to darkness once more. "I...can."

"There's something else," Issa-Or says.

"Should we tell him?"

"Why not? If anybody can help..."

Cobb leans in close and as he helps Malakili up, the man says in a low voice as if the sand might be listening: "You know much about Hutts?"

"I know quite a bit."

"You think you could train one?"

"I...they are sentient beings, not pets."

"Fine. Teach one, then."

"I could. I believe. But why?"

Issa-Or grins. "Because we have one at Freetown."

"A baby," Cobb says, scratching his jaw. "Seems that Red Key was trying to sneak one in, install it onto the palace dais. We interrupted that little plan, and now we got this...slug, and not sure what to do with it. If you can help us with the rontos, maybe the Hutt, you've got a place at Freetown. How's that sound, friend?"

"It sounds..." Like purpose. "Most excellent. Thank you."

"You can thank me by doing your job."

"Let's go," Issa-Or says. "Leave the corpses for the others to find. Let them see that law, true law, is spreading across the land."

Sinjir assured Norra that a glass of the korva would do it, and he was right. As soon as she eases the glass under Solo's nose, the vapor hits him. The smuggler's eyes bolt open and he stares back with a turbolaser intensity.

"Wuzza what the," he says, suddenly scrambling to stand. "Leia?"

"No," Norra says. She's alone with him in the main hold of the Halo. "It's Lieu...it's Norra Wexley. We're on Irudiru. Remember?"

He winces. His hand moves to rub the lump forming under his hairline. "Attacked by a droid. A..." He scrunches up his face in disbelief. "An old Clone Wars battle droid of all things. I must be hallucin..."

Movement from behind her. Mister Bones leans around the corner, poking his vulture's-skull droid head out. Han paws at his side for one of his blasters, but Norra holds his wrist and moves to block the view of the droid.

"Go away," she spits at Bones. "Go! Shoo, you bag of bones."

"ROGER-ROGER, TEMMIN'S MOM."

The droid recedes.

Han growls: "That droid is yours?"

"My son's."

"Damn thing knocked me out cold! You bring that rickety clanker back here. I want to shoot its arms off. Then I want to beat it with its own arms. Then I want to take its head-"

Norra eases him back into the chair. "I apologize for the droid. We looked at your head-the injury is superficial."

"Great. Thanks, Doc. Now do as I said: Get out of here and let me get back to work. You're slowing me down."

"We want to help."

"I don't need your help, lady."

"You're alone out here. I think you do."

He scowls at her and sits forward. "Why? Why help me? I don't know you. I didn't do anything for you. And I'm tired of owing people."

"We owe you."

"Not according to my tally," he says, tapping his temple. "I keep the ledgers up here and your name's not in it, honey."

"We could've just shipped you back to Chandrila, you know. Tied you to a chair. But you're a hero of the galaxy. You and your friends. You saved us all. This is how we pay you back." She stiffens. "Also, please don't call me honey."

He stands up.

"I can do this by myself."

No, you can't. But she placates him anyway. "I'm sure you could."

"I work alone."

"Obviously."

His eyes pinch and his hand idly scratches at the beard growth along his jaw. "But I do need Chewie back."

Norra understands-he's trying to ask for help, but he's too callused, too gruff-and-tumble to really ask. She offers it again: "So, let us help. We can offer extra hands, extra guns. We'll follow your lead."

"That might make it easier." He sizes her up with his eyes. "Might. But like you said: You need to follow my lead."

"Done."

"Fine. You can help me get Aram."

Norra stands up, too, offering her hand. "We'll help you get Chewie back, too."

"Well, then. In for a credit, in for a crate." He takes her hand. "Welcome to Team Solo. Hope you can keep up, Norra."

Everything's going according to plan.

That thrills Jas in no small way. The plan is everything. Designing one is like making a clock: all these little parts working together, turning, tugging, ticking. And at the end of the day, it either tells time or it doesn't.

And this plan, it's going along like clockwork.

She got to take out the pulse mines first-Jas took up the same place on the plateau overlooking Golas Aram's compound, and she used the scope on her slugthrower to identify the electronic signatures from each of the mines. Then it was the simple act of pointing the gun, emptying herself of breath, and pulling the trigger.

The first one did what it was supposed to do: It went bang.

And that sound was a signal to get the rest of the plan going.

Kilometers away, Temmin and Bones got to work on cutting the conduit from the wind farm that Solo had identified. That knocked out the fence and the turrets. And it's allowed Sinjir to head down under the cover of night to Aram's compound. She spies his shadow darting through the fence now.

To keep him on his toes, Jas pops off more mines ahead of him-the pulse mines detonate with buzzing explosions, leaving behind small craters and a crackling haze of ozone smoke in their wake.

He's closing in on the compound- Suddenly, from all around, shutters and doors open up. New shadows emerge, shapes that seem human but move with an inhuman stutter-step. Droids, she thinks, and that's confirmed the moment they ignite fire-red vibroblades from their hands. She sees a dozen of these droids. Maybe more.

Advancing on Sinjir's position.

And now, the clock is threatening to break.

Down there, outside the compound, the darkness is lit up by strange, glowing vibroblades. They draw glowing arcs through the air as they advance toward Sinjir-the ex-Imperial dashes behind an old motor-vator tiller, peeling off shots from his pistol. But it's not enough.

That is where Jas comes in. Her slugthrower kicks and barks as she takes out one droid after the next. Hard to see in the dark, but she does her best. The droids offer a satisfying rain of sparks every time she peels the skull off one with a hot tanium-jacketed projectile.

She thinks: I got this.

Confidence, or rather overconfidence, is a blinding force. And it doesn't help that she's got one open eye pressed against the ring of the rifle scope. Which means she hears what's coming one second too late.

Soon as the thirstgrass shakes and whispers, Jas quick rolls over onto her back and points her rifle up-but a thrumming vibroblade ignites in the darkness above her, whipping forward and slicing through the barrel of her slugthrower. It gets stuck there, buzzing and grinding, sparks flying, and the weight of the commando droid presses down against her.

She tries kicking the thing off her, but it's like trying to kick an astromech with its legs grav-bolted to the floor. As she struggles uselessly, the droid's second vibroblade lights up and plunges toward her.

Jas jerks her head to the side just as the blade sticks into the hardscrabble ground. Dust and debris sting her cheek.

The droid starts to spasm.

And glow.

Its mouthpiece offers a loud announcement: "DESTRUCT SEQUENCE ENGAGED."

Oh, slag.

The commando droid shines like magma through a broken mantle of stone, and it's vibrating so hard now that Jas feels like she, too, will rattle to pieces. She struggles to shove the thing off before it detonates-surely taking her with it, leaving her little more than a red streak in a smoking crater. In the distance, she hears Sinjir yelling for her.

I have my own problems, she thinks.

If she can just pivot the gun...

The barrel is broken, the vibroblade still stuck in it-but firing a round out will still make a mess of the droid, maybe. But she needs to aim it toward the thing's head. Her muscles scream as she willfully turns the gun centimeter by miserable centimeter...

"DESTRUCTING IN THREE..."

She grits her teeth, turning the weapon-so close, so close.

"...TWO..."

Her finger searches for the trigger.