THIRTY-SEVEN.

A sudden darkness had fallen over the Vongformed cityscape. Their lightsabers ignited-glowing blue, violet, green-the Jedi drew on the Force to propel them across the fissured and rain-slicked rooftops and balconies that dangled over what was once the Glitannai Esplanade. Piles of debris, precipitous ledges, and gaping chasms posed no obstacles for the six as they hurdled, vaulted, leapt in a race to reach the Citadel, and the Yuuzhan Vong most responsible for what Coruscant had become.

Thanks to their jet packs, Captain Page's Commandos were just managing to keep up. Rain was falling hard and being driven every which way by fierce gusts of wind. Overhead it was no longer possible to differentiate flashes of lightning from the artificial brilliance of deadly engagements.

It was impossible to distinguish between the lament of the wind and the howl of strafing starfighters; the billowing smoke from scudding storm clouds; the sizzle of fires being extinguished by the rain from the sound of laser bolts cleaving the saturated air. The booming cannonades of distant weapons might easily have been rolling thunder, the red-orange pillars on the horizon, erupting volcanoes or the glowing ejecta of plasma launchers. For Luke, the nebulous nature of the surroundings mirrored his inner state. The darkness was coercing a commingling of disparate realities. Coruscant was fast becoming a void, a singularity into which the very fabric of life was being stretched and distorted.

Was this Coruscant any longer, or was it really Yuuzhan'tar-as the original world had been at its end, when, angered by the Yuuzhan Vong's turn to violence, the G.o.ds had robbed their children of the Force and cast them into a bottomless abyss?

"The quickest route is through the north concourse," Mara told Judder Page when everyone had come to a halt on a puddled ledge. Rain dripped from the visors of their helmets and cascaded down the front of their biosuits. Mara was leading the combined teams from memory, though also relying on Jacen and Tahiri's "Vongsense" to keep everyone from encountering patrols of Yuuzhan Vong warriors.

Page had his gaze fixed on the water-beaded display of a positioning unit built into the sleeve of his biosuit.

"According to this, there was bridge access to the concourse."

Mara nodded.

"The Bridge of Unity. I used to have lunch in the restaurant on the lower level."

Even with all that Coruscant had become, she sounded wistful. Luke could imagine her, thirty years earlier, frequenting the esplanade's expensive shops and restaurants; wandering among the crowds attending the Imperial Fair; a sometime visitor to the Imperial Palace, in her guise as the Emperor's Hand. It was the Coruscant Luke had known only from HoloNet transmissions and the occasional dramas and doc.u.mentaries that had found their way to Tosche Station on Tatooine. By the time he had finally visited the capital world in person, most of the governmental district had been in ruins, following Coruscant's liberation by New Republic forces. But over the decades Coruscant had become his home, as Yavin had, only to have suffered a similar fate. Luke hadn't expected to be so heartsick; but then he hadn't expected to find Coruscant so altered-so remade-in the two years since he and Mara had left. Mara was waving everyone back in motion.

Fifteen minutes of flat-out running brought them to the Bridge of Unity, which had lost the ornamental wirework and inscribed plaques that had earned it landmark status. Now the bridge was little more than a ferrocrete slab spanning the esplanade canyon. Lashed by the gale, vines and slimy vegetation trailed from the edges, and a shallow but fast-moving curtain of water plunged into the frothing river far below. From the bridge's southern abutment, the Jedi had their first un.o.bstructed view of their objective. Several kilometers to the east, illuminated by forking lightning and accented by the laser beams of circling starfighters, Shimrra's Citadel towered above the infernal landscape.

A veritable mountain, it stood where the Imperial Palace once had, encompa.s.sing everything from the Mon Calamari Inglenook to the Pliada di am Imperium, as the eastern terminus of the Glitannai Esplanade was known. The Citadel's base was lost in swirls of dark smoke, but halfway to the rounded summit four walkways approached from separate directions, linking the Citadel to surrounding structures.

This close, the mountain was revealed to be as craggy and pocked as any of the Yuuzhan Vong worldships Luke had seen. But Shimrra's was adorned with a pair of filigree wings that lent something insectlike to its appearance. The way it sat in the crater that served as its cradle, it might almost have been nesting. Flights of X - and E-wings were taunting the crown, but voids blacker than the stormy sky were devouring everything the starfighters hurled at them. Two of the snubfighters were circling closer when plasma projectiles geysered from launchers above the wings. The X-wings might as well have been flying without shields.

Caught on their starboard sides by the superheated missiles, they began to spiral down, S-foils and ion engines slagged. Luke could see pieces fly from the fighters as they struck outcroppings in the Citadel's coa.r.s.e hull. They disappeared into the smoke at the foot of the mountain, and, seconds later, roiling fire mushroomed into view. Luke's silence spoke volumes. As he turned and leapt out onto the bridge, a resonant bellowing issued from the far side, and two huge eyes stood out in the gloom. As if under strobing light an enormous beast waddled into view around the shoulder of a ruined building.

It wasn't the first Yuuzhan Vong creature he had seen since leaving the Falcon-the sacred precinct was literally crawling with escaped animals-but it was certainly the largest.

"A mon duul," Jacen said, yelling to be heard. "If it's been implanted with a villip, the belly can function like an amplifier. It's harmless, either way."

Page kept his blaster rifle raised regardless.

"If you say so, kid." He motioned with the barrel. "But you cross first."

No sooner had Jacen and Luke started forward than the mon duul sat on its haunches, with its tympanum of a belly aimed out over the canyon.

In a deep and menacing voice, someone began to speak in Yuuzhan Vong.

"'Perish,'" Tahiri translated. "'Perish, all of you who would stand between me and exaltation, who would seek to profane me in our finest moment.'"

"Shimrra?" Luke asked.

Jacen shook his head uncertainly.

"Could be."

"'I battle the G.o.ds on your behalf,'" Tahiri continued, "'and you repay me with rebellion. Perish then. Go to your deaths and your G.o.ds, while I remake the world.'"

"Too bad we can't answer him," Mara said.

"We will soon enough," Luke a.s.sured her. Jacen and Tahiri walked slowly toward the seated mon duul. In eerie unison they motioned with their right arms, and the four-metric-ton beast lowered its front legs to the ground and began to trundle off.

Their Vongsense, Luke thought. Jaina hurried forward to drape her left arm around Jacen's shoulders.

"You always were good with animals."

He responded with a wry smile, and hurried forward. The three young Jedi crossed the span together and turned east toward the Citadel. Ahead of them, clad in vegetation, a palisade of named buildings extended all the way to the western access to Shimrra's mountain. Luke, Mara, and Kenth had just caught up with the trio when Jacen and Tahiri called everyone to a halt. Lightning flashes disclosed the presence of a group of skeletally thin humans and humanoids, dressed in dripping, frayed garments and aged robeskins.

"Come forward," Tahiri said in Yuuzhan Vong.

Two Shamed Ones approached, a male and female.

"Jeedai," the young male said, his eyes fixed on Luke's thrumming lightsaber.

More Yuuzhan Vong began to appear, along with a dozen or so Coruscanti who looked as if they had been subsisting on grayweave since the occupation.

The Shamed and the d.a.m.ned, Luke told himself as he deactivated his lightsaber. Pushing through the group came two winded and wounded human commandos, who saluted Captain Page.

"Bacta Squad, sir," the sergeant said. "We've just come from down below. It's a real mess, Captain. The heretics are fighting tooth and claw, but they need reinforcements-and fast. If you can spare anyone, sir..."

Page beckoned to one of his jet-packed commandos.

"Congratulations, Corporal, you've been promoted to squad leader.

Take ten men and go with the sergeant. We'll regroup at the Citadel, soonest."

The commando saluted, spun on his heel, and began choosing his teammates.

The wounded sergeant looked from Page to Luke.

"Master Skywalker, a couple of your people would make a world of difference, not only to us-" He motioned to the Shamed Ones. "-but to them, as well."

Kenth and Tahiri glanced at Luke, who nodded.

"Thank you," the sergeant said as the two Jedi moved to join him.

"We've heard that the Prophet has reappeared, but we haven't been able to locate him. Word has it he was last seen in the Place of Hierarchy."

"Leading them, or helping with the slaughter?" Mara asked, stepping forward.

"Leading them."

Luke showed Mara a skeptical look.

"Maybe he's had a change of heart since Zonama Sekot."

She snorted in derision.

"Only if someone implanted a new one in his chest."

Luke swung to the Shamed Ones who had been the first to show themselves.

"Have you or any of the others ever been inside the Citadel?"

Tahiri translated.

A male in the crowd spoke, and showed himself. He was more hideously scarred than the others, and short horns sprouted from the tops of his shoulders.

"This one says that he arrived in the Citadel," Tahiri told Luke.

She listened for a moment more.

"He was a warrior before the G.o.ds-before his body rejected certain enhancing biots the shapers devised for him."

The former warrior pointed to the walkways that accessed the yorik coral mountain.

"Each caste uses a separate entrance. But all four avenues terminate at the Hall of Confluence, where Supreme Overlord Shimrra grants audience to the elite."

"Ask him if Shimrra is likely to be in the hall now," Luke said.

Tahiri phrased the question and waited for the response.

"He says that you won't find Shimrra there. He'll be in his private... coffer."

The Yuuzhan Vong aimed a thick, truncated finger at the lofty crown of the Citadel.

"Up there is where you'll have to go."

"Thank you," Luke said to the heretic, who asked something of Tahiri.

"He has a question for the Jedi," she said after a moment. "He wants to know if we plan to help them or kill them. He wants to know if the Shamed Ones will be able to find salvation in the Force."

Luke looked at the Yuuzhan Vong.

"We'll help you find your way back to the Force."

Tahiri's translation prompted agitation and a flurry of hushed conversations among the Shamed Ones. Then she and Kenth began to move off with the commandos. Mara shifted her gaze from the Citadel to Luke.

"Ready, soldier?" When he didn't respond immediately, she said, "What's wrong?"

He held her gaze.

"Mara, I want you to go with Tahiri and Kenth."

She almost laughed.

"I want you to go with them," he said again.

Her expression changed, and a twinge of fear came into her eyes.

"Luke, tell me this is the Force speaking to you, and that you're not doing it because you don't want us fighting together-for Ben's sake."

"Would it matter?"

She gripped her hands on his upper arms.

"You promised me on Zonama Sekot that both of us have a lot more living to do."

He smiled and stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingertips.

"You think I'd drop you into the midst of all this to make you a widow-or me a widower?"

She shook her head.

"That's not your style."

"Then go with them."

Reluctantly, she nodded.

"Not because I want to. But because I trust you."

Airborne at the extreme edge of the tempest that was lashing the northern quarter of the sacred precinct, the Falcon banked toward the former Legislative District. Owing to the toughness of its honeycomb and crumple zone engineering, the Senate itself had survived the Yuuzhan Vong barrage, but now the famed edifice was covered by the half-kilometer-high hemisphere that sheltered the World Brain.

"No mystery why we're not taking flak from plasma emplacements,"

Han said, as he and Leia powered the freighter through a reconnaissance fly-by. "Nothing short of a planetbuster is going to crack that skullcap."

"The yorik coral has enzymatically digested and absorbed the Senate's duracrete and transparisteel," Harrar explained from the navigator's chair. "The const.i.tuent materials have been used to fashion a new exoskeleton that goes deep underground and forms an impervious sphere around the dhuryam-the brain."

C-3PO had a tight grip on the chair next to Harrar's, and R2-D2 was securely planted behind his counterpart. Cakhmaim was in the dorsal gun turret; Meewalh in the forward compartment.

"How impervious?" Han asked over his shoulder.

"Sufficient to allow the dhuryam to survive an invasion as a self-contained, and possibly self-propelled, vessel-similar to that which const.i.tutes the crown of the Citadel."

"An escape pod," Leia said.

"But ma.s.sive," Harrar elaborated. "Capable not only of preserving the dhuryam-with all its engineered genetics and learned skills-but also of preserving the lives of any who happen to be in the Well when the sphere launches."

"Oh, my," C-3PO remarked.