In that waving hand of Khadur's is a fang dangling on a leathery cord.

Lug.

She turns toward her cam operator- No.

No.

Where he stood is a wing panel from one of the TIEs. Bent up and smashed into the ground. Tracene cries out and runs toward it-if anyone can survive something like that, it'll be Lug. Trandoshans are built like steel rebar swaddled in scale armor. She once watched him head-butt a jukebox in half because it wouldn't play his song. Didn't make a mark on him.

But there, she sees an arm-his arm-splayed out across the broken stone. She sees his face, too, Lug's head half crushed underneath the metal. Tracene hurries over on her hands and knees, calling his name, that name dissolving on her lips into a blubbering gush. His eyes are open but empty. Blood runs from his mouth. He's gone.

She weeps for a time. How long, she doesn't know. Long enough that night starts to creep in, like a thief. Someone comes over, checks on her, and she shoos them away with a swipe of her nails.

Eventually, she stands and feels the cold reality settle into her veins. Then she does what she does best: She goes, picks up the cam droid, hits it a few times until it's working, then she brings it back to Lug's body.

She crouches down, turns on the cam, and speaks into it, trying very hard not to cry: "This is Tracene Kane, HoloNet news reporter embedded with the New Republic Thirty-First. And I'd like to tell you about a friend of mine. A friend the Empire just stole from me."

Ashmead's Lock goes dead.

All his cams, all his connections, they go dark in perfect simultaneity. The feed is gone. The prison is liberated.

Admiral Rax smiles.

It is time.

- "Your ribs," Jas tells Norra. "They're broken."

Norra struggles to breathe. "Am I going to be all right?"

"Eventually. Doesn't feel like they punctured the lung-though I'm betting it feels that way to you." Jas manifests a rare smile. "I've been there, Wexley, more times than I can count. You'll make it through."

All around them, pocket lights spear through the darkness of the now derelict Ashmead's Lock. One by one, her crew rescues the prisoners from their docks. It's literally dozens. Maybe even a hundred or more. Many of them are dressed in the uniforms of the Rebel Alliance-officers and pilots and doctors from the days before the second Death Star fell. Some even before the first one blew thanks to the farm boy from Tatooine.

Bodies shuffle past. Weak and confused. They all get the same instructions-head outside and wait. Oh, and don't stray. Because who knows what waits out there in the dread Kashyyyk forest?

Norra grunts, winces, and tries to stand.

"Sit down," Jas says.

"You're not a doctor. I want to help."

"You can help by sitting down."

"Would you stay seated?"

In the half darkness, she sees Jas's shoulders shrug. "No."

"And neither will I. So help me up already."

The bounty hunter does as asked.

All around, the shadows of droid carcasses surround them. Once the power cut out, they all slumped and fell like okari junk-puppets with their dancing wires cut. Clatter and collapse.

"We find Sinjir and Jom yet?" Norra asks.

"Jom's outside, helping keep people together. Sinjir, we haven't-"

From somewhere in the darkness, an all-too-familiar voice reaches their ears. The voice is hoarse but clear. "Everything tastes like licking a blasted battery. Someone please come get me."

Sinjir.

Jas retreats into the darkness, then returns with the ex-Imperial. In the glow of Jas's pocket light, Sinjir looks like he just woke up from a weeklong bender: hair amuss, the whites of his eyes red, the skin around gone bruise-dark. He is licking his lips and making a wrung-washrag face.

He nods. "Norra. Been a while. You end up in one of those...pods?"

"Yes. Well. Almost?"

"Not restful at all. Would not recommend." He leans in between both Jas and Norra and in a low voice asks: "Either of you fine upstanding New Republic citizens happen to bring a jorum of skee with you? A nip of korva? I'm feeling a bit dry over here."

"Anyone ever tell you you have a drinking problem?" Jas asks.

"My only problem is I'm not drinking."

She shakes her head. "Go help Temmin and Solo get more of the prisoners free. I'll go with you." Jas turns to her. "Norra, you take it easy-"

"I'll go help the prisoners outside. Make sure they stay close." Jas starts to protest, but she cuts her off: "I need to stay busy. Need to keep focused." The way her mind was going in that dock, it feels like she's on stable ground but too close to a rain-slick edge-it wouldn't take much to tumble down again into the darkness of those terrible thoughts. "Okay?"

Jas sighs and nods.

Norra grabs the light off her belt and makes her way outside.

Out there, the dead forest is filled with life. Prisoners. Rebels. A Rodian in a flight suit stands staring off at nothing. A woman ties the sleeves of a cold-weather coat around her middle. A Sullustan in blue Dantooinian robes leans for support against a pudgy old Corellian in a tattered rebel army jumpsuit. Norra limps along, shaking hands and clasping arms, offering words of wheezy encouragement-all the while trying not to cough, because coughing just feels like she's being punched with pistoning fists. She tries to share the good news with them that they're free, that they can go home soon, that the Rebel Alliance has become the New Republic- "Is he out here?"

Solo comes out of the prison ship with the fury of a storm. He steps into the middle of the crowd, not far from Norra. "Yeah, yeah, hi, yeah," he says to those gathered. "I'm looking for a big guy. Hairy as anything. Wookiee. Name of Chewbacca." Desperation shines on his face like a beacon. He spies Norra. "Norra. Where is he? He's...he's not in there-"

"Han, I'm sorry..."

"Don't say sorry, just find him!"

The panic on his face is clear. And she feels it, too. Rescuing all these prisoners is a victory for the New Republic-but it's an accidental one. For Solo, the only thing that matters is paying what he owes.

And that means finding his friend.

Just then- A gurgling roar cuts the air.

Solo spins around. There, coming out of the ship-alongside her son-is the massive walking fur-beast. The Wookiee, Chewbacca.

"Chewie!" Solo calls, and laughs as he breaks into a run. The Wookiee looks bedraggled and beaten down, but that doesn't diminish Chewbacca's enthusiasm. The Wookiee tilts his head back and ululates a loud, joyful growl, then wraps his impossible arms around the smuggler. Solo looks like a child snatched up by an eager parent-for a moment his whole body lifts up off the ground, his legs kicking as the Wookiee purrs and barks.

"I messed up, pal," Solo gasps as the Wookiee sets him back down. The Wookiee yips and barks. "No, no, I gotta own this one, big guy. I shoulda been there with you. But we'll make it right. I promise." Then, a moment as the Wookiee looks around. His body goes slack like he's taking it all in. Everyone goes silent.

The Falcon's copilot utters a low growl.

Solo nods. "Yeah. You're home, Chewie."

The Wookiee stands there, stock-still and dead silent as he stares up at the trees. As if he's just realizing where he is. He makes no movement and utters no sound, as if nothing could convey what he's really feeling. Everyone waits to see what he'll do, but Chewbacca does nothing.

More Wookiees emerge behind Temmin. "Found another chamber of prisoners in the back. I think they're with you, Solo."

"Thanks, kid. Thanks."

Those Wookiees join with Chewie and together they stand with one another, staring up into the darkness of their damaged world.

Norra watches it all. The tears that warm the corners of her eyes are ones she tells herself belong to the pain in her side and not the one in her heart. She steps forward, intending to go to her son, hug him, ask him about Bones-but then behind her, someone says her name.

"Norra? Is that...is that you?"

Her knees go weak. She almost falls. Temmin rushes to her, helps her before she falls. That voice...

She turns to see if it really could be him.

It couldn't be-after all this time- "Brentin," she says.

He's standing right there. Surely just a phantom. He's thinner, older, his skin pallid and his eyes bloodshot. But it's still him. Temmin's voice is small at first when he says: "Dad?"

Which means Temmin sees him, too.

He's not a phantom at all.

Brentin is real. Her husband is alive. And he's standing right there.

On the bridge of Home One, the Mon Calamari cheer. Out there in the expanse of space, the wreckage of ships floats above Kuat-Imperial ships, mostly, though the Republic lost some of its own over the last several weeks.

The bombing campaign against the shipyards and supply bases of Kuat is complete. The sector governor-Moff Pollus Maksim-and the guild head of the Kuat Drive Yards have surrendered. The scopes are clear with no further intrusions expected by the Empire.

It has been a long, protracted fight.

And now it's over.

"Congratulations, Admiral," Leia says to Ackbar-she is not physically present, but she stands there as a holographic communication: an avatar summoned by the Mon Calamari. "You and Commodore Agate have won the day for the New Republic." With a plucky smile she adds: "Again."

Ackbar, though, is not one to cheer. Leia knows that he shares in the optimism of his fellow officers, nodding and smiling along. He wouldn't dare darken their light with the shadow of cynicism and worry. Just the same, he remains steadfast in reminding everyone that every battle has its costs. The battle for Kuat Drive Yards is no different.

Next to Leia, the other hologram-this one of Commodore Kyrsta Agate-nods and smiles stiffly. "I'm glad we accomplished something today," the commodore says. "Taking weapons out of the Empire's hands was a worthy goal and one I'm glad the Senate supported."

Battles with the Senate, Leia thinks. She knows that this is the nature of democracy and she welcomes that struggle. Just the same, this will be a chaotic time, and though it is the soldiers who experience the true trauma, the galaxy's citizens are war-weary. Theirs is a deeper, more sustained trauma-a fear and suspicion embedded like a splinter under the skin. This time with the Senate will be a tumult of indecision. They're understandably gun-shy. And, Leia knows, this is why Kashyyyk remains enslaved.

Through the viewscreen the front, hatchet end of the Starhawk battleship cleaves its way through the open space above Kuat. A considerable ship, the Starhawk, and one that belongs exclusively to the New Republic forces. Getting the vote from the Senate to approve the scrapping of Imperial craft in order to build new ships, droids, and weapons was its own battle that may have been harder fought than the orbit-to-ground battle here at Kuat. A not-inconsiderable number of the current senators still remember when Palpatine formed the Empire out of the ashes of a Republic they didn't even know was burning. He quickly commissioned ships, too, to serve his new military order. Their fear is born of good reason.

It is a credit to Mon Mothma that she was able to marshal the votes-despite her own doubts about creating new weapons of war.

Kyrsta Agate, for her part, has mitigated her accomplishment today with a heavy brow. It's one of the reasons both Leia and Ackbar like her so much: Agate understands that the costs of war are heavy even in victory. The balance on that bill is not easily paid off-and it shows in the suffering of soldiers decades after fighting ends. It manifests as political fear. It is demonstrated by criminals, terrorists, and other sympathizers. Only peace-protracted peace, true peace!-balances those books.

Just the same, Leia wants both the admiral and the commodore to feel proud.

"The shipyards at Kuat were a vital resource for the Galactic Empire, and their loss will be keenly felt," Leia says. "We have hamstrung the production of new fighters and capital ships. Further, we can turn these resources around and use them as our own."

Agate smirks. "I know all this, Princess Leia. But I appreciate what you're trying to do."

"Take the victory and enjoy it, Commodore. You too, Admiral."

Ackbar harrumphs. "I will. But I want to keep my eye on what matters most: ending this conflict. Nobody wins a war, Leia. Best we can do is find a way to stop fighting."

"In that, Admiral, we are agreed."

Just then, a new communique incoming-Ackbar nods to Comm Officer Toktar, and she puts the visual through.

Another hologram appears: Chancellor Mon Mothma.

"Chancellor," Ackbar says, giving a deferential nod. "I did not expect to hear from you so soon. Is today not the Senate budgetary proceeding?"

"It is." Even in hologram, the chancellor looks weary. This is taking a lot out of her. It's taking a lot out of them all. Leia notices a moment when Mon Mothma's gaze flicks toward her. What is that there? What forms the backbone of that hesitation? Suspicion? Irritation? As fast it came, it's gone again, and Leia wonders if she's just imagining things. Mon Mothma, anxious, says: "There is another matter. Something pressing. We have received a communication request from the Operator."

The Operator-the shadowy operative from deep within the Empire who has periodically appeared in order to direct the New Republic to Imperial vulnerabilities. Leia has never properly trusted that source. After all, the destruction of the second Death Star was born of a ruse concocted by Palpatine-one that perhaps should have been more easily seen. This, though, feels different. It has gone on too long. The Operator's intel has afforded them a dozen victories already, and it's hard to imagine exactly how this could be a deception-it would have to be a very long confidence game. And even then, to what end? Why would the Empire hobble itself?

They have all come, however reluctantly, to trust the source.

But it's been some time since the Operator has revealed himself. Since Akiva, as a matter of fact. Mumblings inside the New Republic have pondered at the fate of that mysterious agent. Was he caught? Killed? Did he flee?

Who was he, after all of that?

"Has the Operator set a time for this communication?" Ackbar asks.

"Now, actually," the chancellor answers.

Hm. "So be it." To his comm officer, he says: "Toktar, please, if you will: Open a channel. Old Alliance frequency Zeta Zeta nine."

A new holographic image shimmers into view.

And it is not the Operator.

"Grand Admiral Ackbar," says the vision of Rae Sloane.

On her end, Leia feels everything clench up. The Operator is gone. The Empire has surely discovered the traitor. The appearance of Sloane-one of the heads of the Imperial remnants, the strongest remnant if their intel is accurate-only confirms it.

"Grand admiral is an Imperial ranking," the Mon Cala says. "I, like you once did, identify as fleet admiral-but you seem to have taken the title 'Grand Admiral' for yourself."

Sloane stiffens and shrugs. "No one above to promote me, I'm afraid, Admiral. In this new order one must take what one deserves."