"Me, too." I smiled. "And, no, I never imagined I'd be heading out to an Imperial Governor's palace to face down a renegade Imperial admiral."

"Oh."

"For me it was racing off to Nal Hutta to face down a Hutt crimelord in his own den."

"Talk about stacking the odds against you."

I laughed. "I'm Corellian, remember?"

"Right, forget I said anything about odds." Luke finished his drink and crushed the container. "I guess all of us get dealt cards we don't want in life."

"True enough. The trick is in how you play them. Some people have the greatest cards in the world and still lose." I nodded at him. "For a farm boy growing up on dust and dreams, you've not done half bad."

"From a Corellian, that's quite a concession."

The bridge-comm squawked. "Ooryl says we have five minutes to reversion, then about an hour to transit to Susevfi. Better get ready lest our reception be hotter than intended."

I slapped the transmit b.u.t.ton. "We copy, Elegos. We'll be set."

Luke got up, crossed to the shelf where he'd plugged his lightsaber into a recharger, freed the weapon and clipped it to his belt. He likewise unplugged mine and looked it over. "Nice work. Dual-phase?"

I frowned. "Tried to repeat Gantoris' feat of engineering.

Right now only one phase works. Gotta find a real diamond."

"Dual-phase blades seem to be something of a fad among Jedi at certain points." He tossed me the lightsaber. "Still, I like the blade and it seems well made."

"Little bit ugly, but I used what I had available." I caught it and screwed the pommel cap on. Standing, I stretched, then clipped the weapon to my belt. "One question before we get going, if you don't mind."

"Sure."

"Okay, us Jedi, we're only supposed to be using our powers to defend, but we're going to be a.s.saulting a base."

Luke nodded. "Right. We're acting to defend Mirax's life, and the lives of Tavira's future victims."

"I'm with you so far, but I'm wondering if we don't have a little more immediate moral obligation, say, concerning those folks who will see us as aggressors." I frowned. "I'm guarding something and I see a guy coming at me with a lightsaber, I'm going to shoot. You know, it's that 'certain point of view thing.'"

The Jedi Master frowned. "I see your problem. When I had to deal with Jabba the Hutt, I warned him to let us go or he'd be destroyed. He didn't listen and that was, more or less, the end of that."

"So, warn those who might not realize what they're doing?"

Luke nodded. "If we can find any down there. An Impstar Deuce ships, what, ten thousand stormtroopers? I don't imag-ine the Invidious is fully crewed anymore, but she's got plenty of folks at her disposal. Want to guess how many are down guarding the palace?"

"Doesn't matter." I tightened my robe's belt. "The Emperor didn't mint enough of those guys to keep me from rescuing Mirax. They can run or they can die, their choice."

"Corellians." Luke shook his head. "No wonder the other Jedi didn't want you leaving your system."

I winked at him. "The rest of you were just afraid we wouldn't leave anything for you to do after we were done."

"I hope you're right, my friend." Luke hooked his thumbs in his belt.

"Mission like this, we'll both have more than enough to do."

Luke and I had tried, albeit briefly and in vain, to get Ooryl and Elegos to remain behind on the ship and monitor starship traffic in and out of the system. A comlink call could warn us about Tavira's Invidious moving out, or anything else that could cause us to shift our plans. Ooryl and Elegos had antic.i.p.ated us and programmed the ship's computer to pull down all system traffic data, then relay it through a scrambled comlink channel to the datapad Elegos had jury-rigged to receive the signal.

Elegos noted that between his sense of smell, and Ooryl's ability to see beyond what we humans rather arrogantly called the visible light spectrum, we could move through the night more effectively and without having to rely upon our Force-enhanced senses, delaying our detection by the Jensaarai. I had to agree with that point, and having seen Ooryl in a lightfight before, having him with us didn't hurt at all. He carried a blaster carbine and a string of powerpacks slung across his chest.

Elegos hefted a blaster carbine and strapped a belt of powerpacks on around his slender waist. I looked at him and narrowed my eyes. "You don't want to be a part of this, do you? You don't want memories of the killing here."

"I am coming with you, and if I do not carry a weapon and a.s.sist in our defense, I will be just a burden. If you fail because of me, that memory would be worse, and I will not have it. I intend, instead, to have memories of your saving your wife to carry with me." Elegos held the weapon up in his left hand and thumbed a lever. "And the stun function on this weapon seems to work."

I smiled, then looked at him and Ooryl and Luke. "Before we go, I just want to thank you all. Better friends a man's never had. You're all insane, but friends nonetheless."

Elegos looked at Ooryl. "Corellians never know when to stop talking, do they?"

Ooryl's mouthparts opened. "Other Corellians do."

Luke laughed, then jerked a thumb at the egress hatch. "Let's go do something else Corellians never shy from. Let's beat some long odds."

We stalked through the darkened streets of Yumfla with impunity, all but unnoticed. Months ago I would have found that to be curious, but not after the time I'd spent with the Invids. In this city, those who were not part of the Invidious crew enjoying leave, or were not patrolling the streets, stayed home. They lived in an occupied city, and while some of them might make money by supplying goods and services to the blvidious'

crew, most wanted nothing to do with the ex-Imperials. I'd felt the same sort of tension in Vlarnya and was glad of the insulation it provided us from the normal folks.

The crewmen themselves presented no problem since they were on leave and only looking to enjoy themselves. This kept them indoors on a hot and humid evening, where a cantina's environmental control unit could make the night bearable, drinks could make it pleasurable, and company could make it exquisite. Dirt-patrols, meant for picking up sick, stupid or belligerent s.p.a.cers and returning them to the ship, barely gave us a second glance. Elegos' nose picked up the scent of the armor well before we saw the stormies, allowing us time to slip away down a sidestreet, or gather on a corner un.o.btrusively. Finally we reached a building across a small greensward from the Imperial Governor's palace. The building itself had an eight-meter-high wall running around it, with towers at each of the four corners that rose up another two meters. A large, recessed, arched entryway split the wall in two, but had been closed for the evening with two ma.s.sive metal doors. Storm-troopers patrolled in pairs along the walls, and two each stood in the corner towers.

The palace itself had been set up in a triangular pattern with towers at each of the points. Left and right were two smaller towers, each a good fifteen meters in height and twice that in diameter. Directly back from the gate, the triangle's furthest point had a rectangular tower that rose to thirty meters in height. The central third of it had been shrunk by a couple meters on each side, as if a giant fist had closed around it. It made for an interesting architectural look that differentiated the palace from most of the local buildings. A four-story-tall foundational building connected all three towers, and a private shuttle pad had been built into the roof of the big tower-which is why it had blinking lights crowning it.

"Twenty meters to the gate." I crouched down, unfastening my cloak and letting it slide off my back. I boosted a pinch of dust into the air and watched it blow toward the palace. "At least we have a tail wind."

"Good. Ooryl and Elegos cover us, we weave our way there."

Elegos cleared his throat. "The gate is closed. How do you propose to get in?"

We each brandished our lightsabers. "We'll knock," Luke offered, "real loud."

"What are you doing there?" A stormtrooper and his partner appeared from nowhere around the corner of the building shielding us. "Let's see some identification."

"Sure." I stood slowly and held my lightsaber like a glowrod while I motioned with my left hand as if digging for identification. "I know I have something here .... "I thought that I might be able to project an image into his brain that would get him to go away, but my mind blanked.

The stormtrooper took a half-step toward me. "You look familiar."

"Me? No, can't be."

"Trying to be smart?" The stormtrooper's blaster came up to cover me.

"You're coming with us."

I glanced at Luke, then shrugged and depressed my thumb, shooting the silver blade straight through the stormtrooper's chest. I shoved him back into his partner, knocking his blaster aside. The second stormtrooper still pulled the trigger, spraying shots out into the night. My lightsaber came across and trimmed his shoulders down to the level of his armpits, ending his attack.

Luke stared at me. "You need to work on this idea of warning."

"Didn't get a chance with them, no." I ducked down as the stormtroopers on the palace wall started shouting and firing shots in our direction.

Alarms began to blare. "But the others, I think they're all sorts of warned .... I suggest we go, now!"

Luke and I sprinted toward the palace gate, cutting back and forth to make ourselves difficult targets. As I ran I opened myself to the Force and felt a flood of data pour in. I planted with my right foot, cut to the left and whipped my lightsaber around to the right, batting a blaster bolt out into the night. Another two steps, then hesitation as fire from an E-web mounted in the right tower slashed across my path, then a dive-and-roll over the stream of bolts starting to track toward me. I fended off two more bolts, wishing I could manage, as Luke did, to direct them back at the men who had fired them, then reached the sanctuary of the recessed gate.

I pushed my sphere of responsibility to see what was on the other side awaiting us, but found no one. I pushed further and then smiled. "I have her, Luke. This close, I have Mirax. Tower your side, down."

The Jedi Master smiled. "Let's not keep her waiting."

In tandem we slashed left and right from the center of the gate and down through the big metal doors, carving a hole large enough to admit a landspeeder. I stepped inside, then slashed up and through the elbow of a stormtrooper shoving his blaster carbine down to spray us. He screamed and reeled away. I tugged the carbine from his falling hand and triggered a burst of bolts at a stormtrooper hunkering down from Elegos' covering fire. I hit, sending him spinning from the wall, then sprinted after Luke.

Luke scattered a half-dozen bolts fired at him, sending four back at the tower from whence they had come. One storm-trooper went down, the other just ducked but the E-web sparked and started to burn. Luke sliced the barrel from the blaster rifle carried by the lead stormtrooper running from the tower where Mirax lay, then dropped him with a backhand blow that separated the man's pelvis from everything that normally rested on it.

I snapped the selector lever over to stun, then shot the next man in line. Elegos came through the gate and peppered the next three with stun shots. They all tottered and fell. Luke dashed into the tower doorway. I saw a flash and heard a blaster whine, but the green lightsaber continued to hum.

Ooryl came through the gate and laid down a pattern of suppression fire that held off the stormies coming from the far tower. Elegos and I covered him as he retreated to the tower, then we entered and I sprinted straight for the stairs leading down. This took me past two stormies with their a.s.sorted parts scattered in awkward positions. One level down I caught up with Luke at the mouth of an octagonal corridor festooned with sunken doorways.

He stood by a control panel scanning a readout of prisoner names.

"Calling up a prisoner roster now."

I glanced at the list and tapped a name. "That's her."

"Holding cell 02021020."

I nodded and ran down the corridor. "Here it is." I reached the door, shot the lock and watched the door retract amid a shower of sparks. I took all three steps in a leap, then stopped just inside the doorway.

There she was, just lying there, as Exar Kun had showed me. The little grey device on her forehead flickered with green and red lights, and the silver light from above bathed her in a radi-ance that left her skin almost pure white. It reflected true from her black hair. She looked perfect and asleep and I felt my throat tighten. You are incredibly beautifid, Mirax, and you've been away far too long.

Luke squeezed past me and leaned over by her face. "Don't think this is what's keeping her under. Feels like a Jedi hibernation trance. Normally a person can't be placed in one against her will, but if this device broke down her resistance, it might have been possible."

I nodded. "I've had experience with machines breaking down resistance." I set my lightsaber and blaster down on her bier. "Take the gadget off, let her wake up."

Luke pulled the device away and smashed it against the wall. "It'll take a bit more than that to wake her up." He reached his hand toward her forehead. "There's a Jedi technique used .... "

I grabbed his wrist. "Know of it. Read about it in my grandfather's notes." I smiled at him. "She's my wife, I'd like to help. You bring her out of it, and I'll let her know she's been missed."

Luke nodded and waited for me to come around on Mirax's other side.

"Ready?"

"Let's do it." I gave him a nod, then leaned down and kissed my wife on the lips.

Mirax's brown eyes blinked open and she began to smile. She reached up with her right hand, grabbed a fistful of my tunic and pulled me back down, covering her mouth with mine. We kissed with the urgency of lost love found, heart's pain eased. I stroked her hair and she kept me close, then we both had to come up for air.

Pulling back so I could see all of her face, I smiled. "Hi."

"Hi, yourself. You're pretty cute." She smiled back up at me, sending a jolt through me from head to toe and back again. "Of course, if my husband finds out you kissed me like that, you'll be in big trouble."

Luke burst out laughing. "Her, I like."

I kissed her on the tip of her nose. "You remember Luke Skywalker, right?"

"I do indeed. Good to see you again, though I could have hoped for better circ.u.mstances." Mirax sat up, swung her legs over the edge of the bier and stretched. "I don't even want to know where this rock is, I just want to know you have a plan for getting us off it."

The distant whine of blasters accompanied Elegos' entry into the detention cell. "Ooryl has them cut off at the stair landing. We better move before they bring up reinforcements."

Mirax c.o.c.ked her head at the Caamasi. "A Caamasi?"

"Elegos A'kla, Trustant of the Caamasi community at Ker-iit." I looked at her. "He's been taking good care of me."

She laughed and threw Elegos a salute. "You have my thanks and sympathies. Taking care of him can be quite a ch.o.r.e." Elegos shrugged.

"Not really, you have him well trained."

"Still leaves dirty clothes lying about, though, right?"

I cleared my throat. "We can have this discussion later. Any chance we can make it back to the s.p.a.ceport from here?" Elegos shook his head. "Not likely."

Mirax hefted the blaster carbine I'd left on the bier. "Then we go to the top of the big tower. They have a landing pad there-that's how they brought me in after they separated me from the Skate. We steal some speeder bikes or a shuttle and make a dash for your ship."

Luke nodded. "It's a plan."

Mirax pointed at the door. "Let's move, then."

The Jedi Master looked at me. "Notice any resemblance between her and Mara?"

I shivered. "Now that you mention it . . . let's make sure they never get together, okay?"

"Right."

From the far end of the corridor, Ooryl was filling the stair-well with a hail of laser bolts, stippling the wall behind the first landing with little fires. Two stormtroopers lay tangled on the stairs, and others kept peeking around the edge. They snapped their heads back when Ooryl fired at them. Stretching out my senses, I could feel a knot of them waiting on the stairs and toward that end of the corridor above us.

I smiled. "I've got a piece of a plan. Mirax, the blaster, please." I pointed at the ceiling. "Elegos, if you can boost me up there."

Luke held a hand out. "Permit me." With a simple gesture I rose toward the ceiling as steadily as if standing on a stone platform.

I ignited my lightsaber and cored a circle in the ceiling above me, then shoved it out of the way as Luke pushed me all the way up through it.

Taking a step forward, I brought the blaster carbine up and lashed the stream of blue energy darts back and forth over the crowd of armor-sh.e.l.led warriors clogging the corridor's end. Their armor deflected some shots and abated to lessen the power of others-reducing them from stunning to something that just dazed the soldiers, but I had such clean shots at them that they were at my mercy.

Elegos came up through the hole next and blazed away with his blaster.

His blue bolts struck befuddled targets, enveloping them in a collapsing sphere of blue that dropped them easily. Trapped as they were, they were not really a fighting force, just targets waiting to be shot. I scythed my fire over them and together finished them off.

Ooryl came up the stairs, but Mirax and Luke took the quicker route to the corridor. Mirax took the blaster back from me, appropriated a powerpack from Ooryl and kissed him on the cheek. She turned and pointed back away from the stairs. "Along here there's a corridor that goes over to the main building. Landing pad's on the top."