Leia dropped, careful to land beside the grate, and not in the open hole that seemed to extend forever.

"What is this place?" she asked.

"From what I can gather," Luke said, "it's some sort of dungeon. The Thernbee has been here a long time." Leia looked at the creature. Its gigantic tail swept back and forth, making a pounding sound each time it hit the wall. "You sent me the map," she said.

"He doesn't speak," Luke said. "I'm not even sure if he understands spoken language. He's psychic."

"And friendly, I trust," Leia said as she made her way to Luke.

"Very friendly. Too friendly, sometimes." Luke watched her walk, which seemed to her a sign that he wasn't well. That and the odd greenish color of his skin. His clothing was torn and blackened, the edges of his hair were singed, and his artificial hand had lost all its skin. He had a splint around his left ankle. As she picked her way across the rungs of the grate, she saw that the back of his shirt was gone. Most of his skin was missing there, too. It was a running, pus-covered ma.s.s of sores.

"What happened to you?" she asked.

"My X-wing exploded," he said. He held a blaster in one hand, and several more were tied to him. The Thernbee was watching them, his tail twitching.

Leia felt her heart skip a beat. "Imperial detonators," she said.

He shook his head. "That doesn't feel right."

"No, Luke, I saw them. They're in the computer systems." He sighed. She hovered over him, uncertain what to do. She had never seen him like this, wounded, exhausted, and hesitant.

"The Alderaan is nearby."

"I know," Luke said. "I'm sure Kueller knows too. I wish-" He stopped himself.

"You wish I hadn't come. But I'm here now. We have to get you out of here."

"He wants to kill us," Luke said. "If he kills us, he thinks he'll be the next Emperor." Leia smiled. "I'm no longer on the Council. No matter what he does to us, he won't be able to influence them."

"It has nothing to do with the Council," Luke said. "It has to do with our Jedi abilities. He thinks that he has to defeat us."

"Then why hasn't he tried to kill you?"

"He needed me to bring you here." She glanced at the Thernbee. He was watching them. "Are you sure you can trust that creature?" Luke raised his head. "I forgot," he said. He closed his eyes. His forehead scrunched with concentration. Leia didn't like the lull. She picked up blasters, and attached them to her clothing as best she could. Then Luke opened his eyes.

The Thernbee was standing. His tail had stopped wagging and was moving slowly, as if in confusion. It looked like a giant puppy, eager and uncertain as to what to do next.

"Go home!" Luke said and waved his hand at it. "Please." The Thernbee took two steps and was suddenly beside him. Luke raised his hands over his head as the Thernbee licked him. Leia cried out, and the Thernbee backed off.

"It's okay," Luke said to her. He smiled at the Thernbee and patted his nose. "Go home," he whispered.

The creature jumped the open hole and ran down the hallway, leaving hundreds of large white hairs behind it.

"Come on," Luke said. "Let's go to the Alderaan." His clothing was dripping.

"Shouldn't we clean you off first?" Luke shook his head. "The Thernbee's saliva has some numbing properties. I know it hasn't healed me, but it improves my strength."

"There's a long ladder up there," Leia said. "Think you can climb?"

"Anything to get out of here," Luke said.

"I don't understand," Leia said. "If Kueller wants us both so badly, why has this been easy so far?"

"For you, maybe," Luke said. "But I wouldn't have gotten all these blasters without the Thernbee's help. Kueller had a dozen guards stationed at this grate. I think this is a lull while they go back for reinforcements. Let's make the best of this while we can." He stood slowly, and despite what he had said about the Thernbee's numbing saliva, Leia saw pain on his face. He gathered the last of the blasters, and tied them to his torn clothing. He limped to the s.p.a.ce below the tunnel, looked up, and took a deep breath. Leia frowned. He would never be able to jump that distance.

Then he closed his eyes, lifted his injured leg, and jumped. He landed gracefully on the ledge, and gripped the rung quickly, using the strength in his arms to brace himself. Extending his injured leg, he hopped up a few rungs.

She frowned. She had never mastered that trick. The hole below was even deeper. "Luke-" she said.

"You've done it before, Leia."

"I can't do it now," she said.

He climbed down the rungs and held out his hand. "I'll catch you."

"Your back won't tolerate that," she said.

"It will handle that better than lifting you up here." He peered at her, and was suddenly her strong, invincible brother again. "Come on. All you need is a bit of faith in yourself." She had little faith in herself, when it came to her Jedi talents. They were intermittent, and she hadn't been able to train them properly.

"Leia." His voice sounded calm, but she could hear the urgency in the way he clipped her name. The old Luke, the boy she had met, would have shouted at her. The Jedi Master knew the value of calm, but the impatience still existed underneath.

She closed her eyes. Instead of imagining the ledge, she thought about the hole beneath, and then realized that would send her into the deep darkness. She took a breath, cleared her mind, and pictured the surface with its broken rocks and high tower. From the corridor, she heard a sc.r.a.ping. Voices. Someone was coming.

"Leia!" She crouched and then jumped, opening her eyes as she went. She was spinning as she shot past Luke. She missed the top of the tunnel by a meter, then started to fall.

"Grab on!" Luke was shouting. Other voices echoed below. "Grab on!" She was still spinning, and that allowed her to move toward the walls. She reached for a rung, missed, and slapped her hand along several more rungs before being able to grab on.

The jolt on her arm sent pain shuddering through her. She stopped moving with such force that she felt it along her spine, back, and neck. Luke was climbing toward her like a Wookiee, moving quickly despite the pain he must have been feeling.

"Stormtroopers in the corridor," he said. "We have to get out before they think of going to the top."

"They'll see the trapdoor is open."

"Yeah, but they may not know where it leads," Luke said. "I don't think this place was built by Kueller."

"I think you're right." Leia put the other hand on the next rung and climbed as quickly as she could. She felt shaken, but oddly exhilarated.

She had done it. She had used the Force to help augment her own physical strength, just as Luke always told her she could do.

The voices were getting louder, but Leia was nearing the top. She could see light ahead.

"Hey, Leia," Luke's whisper sounded loud in the wide tunnel. "Good job."

Praise, from Luke, meant a lot. "Thanks," she said. She glanced over her shoulder. Luke was pale, but he was making it. His back looked raw and painful. When he saw her, he grinned. Then he put a finger to his lips.

Leia nodded and kept climbing. The light was fading near the top-the day had to be ending-but she kept moving. She knew she could find the Alderaan in the dark, but she didn't want to.

The feeling of joy was leaving her. The Thernbee had to be far away by now. In its place was a very real concern for Luke, and an even bigger concern that Kueller hadn't shown up yet. If he thought Luke and Leia were such a threat, he would love to have them both together.

But he didn't.

She crested the top, pulled herself out, and surveyed her surroundings.

The area was in twilight, and the air had a bit of a chill. Nothing had changed near the tower. The streets, the buildings, everything was empty.

She turned and leaned over the opening to the tunnel to help Luke up.

The emptiness bothered her.

She remembered Kueller's words: / prefer simple, elegant weapons.

Weapons that were hard to see?

She grabbed Luke's right hand and pulled him out of the tunnel.

She supposed she would find out.

R2 had followed a maze of corridors, and pa.s.sed a dozen protected computer panels. The numbers of panels had quadrupled. He was nearing the command center.

This corridor was cleaner than the others. There were no other droids. A single scrambled announcement overhead warned about some kind of Terror.

R2 moaned softly.

The computer panels were lower in this corridor, and the protect circuits less sophisticated. The floor no longer had ruts for tread-well droids, but was smooth, designed for human or imitation human feet.

He was close.

He sped up. As he did, the walls all around him suddenly showed holos.

Moving holos of a scene below. R2 kept going, but the information was instantly stored in his systems. He saw a freighter, and beside it, Master Fardreamer talking with Brakiss, a former student of Master Luke's.

R2's highly sensitive electronic sensors picked up a whir behind him.

Then he heard another, and another. They were nearly eight meters off, but closing quickly.

He rolled into a closet off the corridor. As the closet door closed, though, the interior dropped like an express fighter for several floors.

R2's delicate balance systems were thrown off and he tipped on two wheels, catching the top of his head against the wall. He was trapped.

Then the closet hit the bottom of its shaft so hard that he tilted in the exact opposite direction. He brought down his third wheel and managed to balance himself even though his head was spinning. Literally.

His sensors registered dark wall, dark wall, dark wall, door. Dark wall, dark wall, dark wall, door. Dark wall, dark wall, dark wall, door.

Gradually he got control of his head, and found it facing the door when the door slid open.

And revealed a room filled with R2's, R5's, and all the other astromech series, from Rl's to R7's. They were leaning on each other. Some heads swiveled as R2 appeared. Others' electronic eyes flashed. A few moaned, and in the back, one cylinder popped.

The floor catapulted R2 out the door, and he screamed as he flew toward the back of the room. He flew over hundreds-no, thousands-of astromech droids before he crashed on a pile of R5's.

He beeped an apology, but they didn't respond. They were still activated, but listless.

He swiveled his head, and whistled in impressed surprise.

The room extended for at least a kilometer and every centimeter was filled with astromech droids.

The junk heap for unwanted droids that 3PO had always warned him about really did exist. And now he was stuck in the middle of it.

Maybe forever.

FORTY-FIVE.

Han's palms were wet. He had never been so uncomfortable flying the Falcon before. He had to pilot carefully. Most of his injured and dying pa.s.sengers were not strapped in. Any unusual maneuver he made could hurt them further.

Chewie seemed just as uncomfortable and the c.o.c.kpit smelled of nervous Wookiee. The c.o.c.kpit door was open, and through it, Han could hear the moans of the injured. One Run medical droid accompanied them, despite the protests, and one Run medical officer. Two experts for nearly a hundred pa.s.sengers. The Falcon was only built to carry eight people comfortably, but Han had quickly converted the cargo areas, the escape pods, and the secret compartments to accommodate the injured. Loading had taken forever, and when he looked out the door of the Falcon it seemed as if he hadn't made a dent.

It would take days, maybe weeks, just to get through the rubble on Skip 1. That didn't count what would happen on the other Skips.

Chewbacca growled at him.

"I see it," Han said, and dodged a group of rocks the size of landspeeders.

Since he had left the Run, he'd been navigating through the garbage surrounding the asteroid belt. Normally, he flew the Falcon sideways and upside down to get through this area. But this time he had to fly like a Glottalphib ship half-filled with water. Every time someone screamed in the back, Han jumped as if he had been blaster-shot.

They were nearly out. And once they were out, Han had to do two things: He had to find a planet that would take all these wounded, and he had to find out about Leia.

Chewbacca reached over his head and adjusted the navigation controls on the ceiling. The Falcon tipped dangerously sideways, and sc.r.a.pes echoed through the back compartments, followed by shouts of pain.

"Sorry, sorry," Han mumbled under his breath. He was beginning to understand why he'd gone into smuggling. It was a lot easier than emergency medical lifts.

Finally the Falcon broke free of the belt. "Send a distress signal, Chewie," Han said. He opened his own channels, to see what messages he had. Someone would have sent him word of Leia.

He had just gotten to the messages when Chewie yarled. He had hailed Wrea, one of the planets closest to the belt. They had responded to the emergency.

Han identified the Falcon, and then said, "I am Han Solo, husband to President Leia Organa Solo of the New Republic. I have a shipload of injured here. Some of them are dying. Do you have the facilities to deal with this?"

"Our systems have tracked your progress, President Solo. Your ship came from Smuggler's Run." Han didn't try to correct their misconception about his own political position. "Yes," he said. "I was on an investigative mission there when the Run was attacked."

"Are the attackers in pursuit?" The Wreans were notoriously suspicious of violence.

"It was a long-distance attack," Han said. "Their droids exploded."

"Droids? All of their droids?"