New Impyria

by Gia Alexander

New Impyria is now complete. Wilhuff Tarkin returns to lead the Imperial Remnant against the Yuuzhan Vong--and beyond.

18. In Search of a Common Defense

Chapter 18:

In Search of a Common Defense

"I should have never suggested this, let alone agreed to it," the Emperor muttered about the upcoming research summit with scientific and political representatives of the New Republic. Typhani stood behind him, her hands on his shoulders.

"We each have a piece of the puzzle," she reminded him. "This isn't about galactic dominance, you know. You still don't remember anything?" she asked. She had been trying to help him fully recover his memories of the destruction of Alderaan, fearing the disruption to the conference should the memories come flooding back in its midst.

"No," he said, reaching up to take her hand. "And so perhaps this means that I never will."

"But we both know the subject will come up. It has to. It needs to."

"Yes."

"Then perhaps we should put it on the agenda. Set aside a specific time for you and Her Highness to discuss the matter," Typhani suggested, sneering the words "Her Highness" through her nose.

He turned sharply toward her. "What's to discuss, Typhani? The Empire did what it had to do."

"Yes, the Empire, perhaps. But I still remember your call just before, alerting us to security lockdown. You weren't quite as eager or resolute on the matter as you seem now."

"It--it was the potential backlash I was most concerned about--from without as well as from within. Besides, what's to discuss if I can't even recall the event?"

Typhani looked knowingly at him. "Well, then, for Leia to discuss and for you to listen. That could diffuse a lot of tension, you know, not that you have to take anything she has to say to heed."

"Certainly not!"

"So let her have her say, then. If she feels she's been heard, then maybe the issue can be set aside for the duration of the emergency."

"Very well, then," he conceded. "I want the issue of these Yuuzhan Vong resolved as quickly as possible so I can deal effectively with this so-called New Republic! Blast it! I wish Vader were here!"

-- -- -- -- --

As their shuttle put down at Maw Installation, Leia Organa-Solo dreaded coming face to face once again with Wilhuff Tarkin, but she knew it had to be done. She would have to try to bury her anger over one lost world to save many more. "I just don't know if I can do this," she mumbled.

"Hey, it's too late to cop out now," her husband reminded her.

"Han, we can't let our guard down for a single second, not any of us. I still can't believe they had the gall to schedule an evening for just the four of us. I tell you, the thought of sitting down with those two in the same room, breathing the same air . . . I think I might just have to become ill."

"Aw, c'mon, Lady Tarkin isn't that bad. Calus always said good things about her, except for the year after Yavin. From what I've heard, she's still a damn fine businesswoman."

Leia cocked a snide eyebrow at him. "She is a war criminal, Han, not on the same caliber with her husband, but a war criminal all the same. She abused her workforce after Yavin, and she continued to wreak wanton destruction by supplying the Empire with megonite. And who knows what else she may have done. She spent an awful lot of time with Palpatine, both before and after Yavin. If she were to stand trial, she would be convicted."

"You had the opportunity. Why didn't you cut her throat?"

"Oh, I wanted to. Believe me, I did! Not cut her throat exactly, but maybe ram a toilet brush down it! But all the other servants were so damned loyal to her, and protective. Her attitude made me sick. In her twisted mind, she was saving me from the megonite caves because, as she put it, she didn't think I'd last a week!"

"I guess you showed her, huh?"

"Oh, I wanted to do it, all right. To tell her who I really was and then hurt her to her last breath! It would've called too much attention to the place, though. You'd have never been able to come in and get us out."

"From what I've heard, Vader gave her a pretty good hurting after we left."

Leia snorted in disgust as the shuttle put down and the ramp lowered. She'd heard that rumor before as well, but never stopped to consider what it might have meant.

"Well, there they are," Han noted, releasing his safety harness. "You know, I have my own history with them."

As protocol dictated, the two first couples of the respective nations, the New Republic and New Impyria, met in the hangar bay, their best diplomatic faces only thinly disguising their mutual contempt for one another.

"Well, well! She's all grown up!" Adrian thought as he gazed condescendingly at Leia. Then he took the diplomatic initiative and spoke to her directly. "Welcome to New Impyria, and to the Maw Installation, President Organa-Solo, General Solo."

"Thank you," Leia said diplomatically.

"We must express our sincerest condolences for the loss of your son. If all goes well, perhaps we can drive this pestilence from our presence and stop such horrors from happening in the future. I read that Anakin was a very fine young man. May he not have died in vain."

Leia's stomach almost turned at the atrociously fake comments, as she interpreted them. She wanted to slap him and scream out that everyone on Alderaan had died in vain, so why not her son Anakin? She bit her tongue hard, mustering only a nod.

"I have a little something for you," the Empress said, and Leia reluctantly looked over at her. Her contempt only rose at seeing the Imperial matriarch again in person, her tall Phelarian stature, the large, strong hands, the double-pierced ears, and the endless tresses of jet-and-gray hair that she'd been forced to comb and braid when all she wanted to do was pull it all out by the roots. But then she reminded herself of the purpose of their visit, and hesitantly took the small box. "I have every reason to believe it belonged to your mother," Typhani continued, stepping a bit closer to Leia.

Leia opened the hinged box to reveal an amateurishly carved piece of what she recognized to be jabbar snippet on a gold rope chain. She shuddered visibly as she remembered the story Bail Organa had told her about the carving. "Where--where did you get this?" Leia asked, barely above a whisper. Her throat had gone suddenly dry.

Typhani moved closer still. "Your father gave it to me."

Leia clasped the box shut, overcome by the symbolism of the act, of her father's utter forsaking of her mother by making the gift to this--this "dark vixen," as she'd oft heard Lady Tarkin called. Leia wondered what else might be implicated by the gift, and whether Vader would have been capable of such after his fateful duel with Kenobi. And yet she had nothing that had belonged to her mother. What few possessions Padmé had left behind for Leia had been destroyed with Alderaan. Not off the shuttle five minutes, and already reminders of Alderaan. Was this a sincere gift from the Empress, or were the Tarkins already trying to taunt and torture her?

By that point, Qwi and Ghent had also disembarked the shuttle. Qwi faced Tarkin readily, and he returned the glare. But then the resentment seemed to run away from both of their faces, and Qwi averted her large Omwati indigo eyes as the Emperor spoke to her. "Welcome back, Qwi. I understand you've become the finest scientist in the New Republic, if not the galaxy. Congratulations, little one. I always knew you would be."

Qwi nodded, and smiled softly, unsettling the Solos.

"Well, let us proceed to the conference room, shall we? The rest of the group is assembled there, waiting for us."

Leia's sense of illness and unease only intensified as she walked into the room and surveyed the visages assembled around the distinctly Imperial round, black conference table with its holoprojector in the center. Bevel Lemelisk smiled smugly at Leia, and Ohran Keldor, who sat next to him, rubbed the back of his head indicatively where Leia had smacked him with a board on Belsavis. Adjacent to him sat the man who had saved Keldor from the resulting fall, Kormath Lemelisk. Lyscithea showed as much hardness in her face as her father as she elaborately folded her arms across her chest. Nasdra Magrody glanced over at her, and then nudged the Empress Apparent on the arm to indicate to her that the "guests" had arrived. Lyjéa raised her head somewhat arrogantly. Reactor engineer Sabine Northstar wrinkled her nose under her large glasses, her face framed by auburn curls. At the far end of the table sat five individuals in stark white uniforms, Grand Admirals Pellaeon, Tarkin, Flennic, Piett, and, finally, Daala, whose taunting facial expression seemed to say, "I'm still here!" To make matters worse for Leia, Qwi seemingly lost her composure altogether, crossing the room to Daala. The two women smiled warmly at each other.

"I should have never, ever given you my authorization code," Daala whispered to Qwi.

"And with all the horror that has transpired, I should have never, ever used it," Qwi whispered back, taking the empty seat next to her former commanding officer.

"Second time around, ladies, second time around," the Emperor quipped at them.

Leia shot an uneasy glance at Han, who shrugged his shoulders. He assumed his seat along with Ghent and two other New Republic scientists well-versed in Vong physiology, Jil Bramm and Efnero Almuzin. The Emperor assumed his place at the center of the head of the table, his gold insignia catching the light as he sat down. The red-robed Royal Guards flanked the conference room door. The Empress took her place to her husband's left, and all eyes then fell to the empty seat to his right. Leia drew a deep breath and finally sat down, clearing her throat slightly as she did so. Han shot her a reassuring glance.

"Ladies and gentlemen, it seems a mutual threat has brought us together once again. I understand that during my . . . absence, you experienced a similar and successful collaboration with Grand Admiral Pellaeon; hence, I have requested his presence at these proceedings. My wife's homeworld offers us a potential weapon with which to defend ourselves and deflect this invasion, if we can determine an effective way to use it against the Yuuzhan Vong. To this end, she has already devoted a great deal of thought and research."

At her cue, Lady Tarkin rose and activated the holoprojector in the center of the conference table to reveal a chart she had prepared. "The properties of the megonite fall into three basic categories, physical, chemical, and, of course, thermal, combining both physical and chemical properties." For the next hour and a half, the knowledgeable Empress and her daughter Lyscithea enlightened the group on every nuance of the parameters of megonite, showing vids of a number of demonstrations. She had opted not to have live megonite in the room in light of the volatile nature of the group assembled. All of the scientists tapped busily on their datapads as Typhani spoke. The New Republic group asked a number of questions both during and after her presentation, and inquired as to when they could examine live samples of the moss.

Bevel Lemelisk took the floor when her presentation concluded. "To expedite identifying the property or properties most effective against Vong physiology and their biotechnology, I suggest that we gearheads break into committees to investigate the most likely solutions--those being magnetism, conduction, olfactory effect, and vibrofrequency--and then proceed by process of elimination. We've prepared four laboratories for this purpose. Are we all agreed?" With no objections aired, Lemelisk then activated the holoprojector to reveal the roster he proposed, based on everyone's expertise, assigning one New Republic scientist to each committee.

With no objections voiced, the Emperor acknowledged the roster as official. "Be on to your designated laboratories then."

Leia found herself unable to get out of the chair she had so hesitantly taken. Soon she realized herself alone with the Emperor, save the guards, as the others moved on to the labs. Adrian started to get up and go to his own scooter in the corner of the room, but then noticed that the President hadn't moved.

"Is there something you'd like to discuss, Your Excellency?" he asked with his usual clipped tone and prim diplomatic decorum. Then he lowered his demeanor a bit. "Go on, speak you mind, Princess Leia. I don't like this situation any more than you do."

She jerked her head in his direction. She simply couldn't hold it back anymore, especially in light of what had just been revealed. "You should be dead for war crimes for what you did to Alderaan," she spat, "but unfortunately we're fortunate you're not!"

"I don't remember the destruction of Alderaan," he told her, as if that were ample excuse for his worst atrocity. He sat back in his chair and folded his hands in his lap.

"You choose not to remember," she retorted.

"The mind has a way of protecting the soul," he said philosophically.

Leia leaned forward, placing her index finger decisively on the table's surface. "This is your one and only chance to redeem yourself, Tarkin!" she seethed.

He shifted in his chair and smiled that thin, charming smile at her that she hated so much. "I'm amused you see it that way," he taunted. Once again, he had her cornered, and he was enjoying it. Then he glanced down at his chronometer. "Ah, the time. We'll have ample chance to discuss this issue this evening," he clipped.

How badly she wanted to lunge at him, to make him remember, and then strangle him for it! The guards at the door would cut her down, she knew. As badly as she hated to admit it, she needed the man sitting across the conference table from her. She needed his skills and expertise to save those who were her people now. Alderaan was gone, she had to remind herself again. Eliminating Tarkin at this point would not bring it back, and would only lead to the destruction of more worlds at the hands of the Yuuzhan Vong. She wanted to personally drag him to the asteroid field known as The Graveyard, the remains of her homeworld, to make him face what he had done, not that it would phase him in the least. And yet in the same instant she thought about what utter blasphemy it would be for him to visit the place. She still, however, wanted to understand why, how, he could have done such a horrible thing. She wanted to know more about his motivations, and have her suspicions about them clarified. If she could understand that, then perhaps she could at last have some closure. Leia left the Emperor in the conference room and went to the terminal that had been set up for her, downloaded the footage she wanted, and saved it to a datacard.

-- -- -- -- --

"Are you sure you're up to this?" the Empress asked as she fastened her exquisite gown about her waist. "Are you going to be all right?"

"Typhani, I've told you, I feel nothing for Alderaan. It was an act of war," he informed her.

"That's not how you seemed the last time we talked before Yavin," she reminded him again.

"Well, it's the way I am now. I'm fine. Now we have to fulfill our daughter Scythi's prophecy. The blasted Solos are here for dinner!"

"So they are!" the Empress acknowledged, patting a small, inner pocket sewn into the sash of her gown.

-- -- -- -- --

"Well, are you ill, or what?" Han asked as he donned his best dinner jacket.

"Oh, no, I'm quite all right. And that arrogant bastard owes me some answers!" She held up the datacard. "It'll be very interesting to see what he has to say to this."

"I wouldn't deliberately antagonize him, Leia. He ain't exactly well, and we need his ass right now."

"I'll . . . take that under advisement."

"Hey, like I said on the shuttle, I've had my own run-in with him, if you recall. Sure, I'd like to call him on it. But we got priorities right now."

-- -- -- -- --

Their conversation throughout dinner in the small conference room adjacent to the Emperor's office suite proved idle at best, centering on the Vong, and avoiding anything even remotely controversial. So, of course, this mingling of adversaries quickly became very awkward for all four of them. Leia ate very little, disgruntled with the act of dining with the Tarkins, and fearing poison. Her instincts had always served her well, she recalled.

"I'd like to show you something," Leia said, almost conversationally after the servants took the dishes away. "Is there a large display we could bring this vid up on?"

"Yes, certainly," the Emperor responded, and reached over to touch a key on a control panel behind him. The sleek black doors of a wall cabinet slid aside to reveal a large-plate holovision. "Here, let me have that," he said. Leia handed him the datacard, and he loaded it into the reader, then looked up at the display. "An asteroid field? Your point?"

"That's no ordinary asteroid field, Tarkin. That's what's left of Alderaan."

Typhani stared knowingly at her husband.

He let out a sigh of frustration, then took a moment to carefully contemplate his next actions. "I knew this was bound to come up. Let's go into the other room where we'll be more comfortable, shall we?" He then pulled himself up, using the edge of the conference table for support.

"You don't deserve to be able to walk at all," Leia thought. "If you're going to be alive, then you deserve to be nothing more than a vegetable! They ought to re-encapsulate you--conscious!"

The Emperor continued the line of conversation as they sat down on the deep leather sofas in his office suite. "Now if we are going to successfully combat our current mutual threat," he began, "we shall have to put the issue of Alderaan aside for now. I already told you, Leia, that I don't remember the incident. No matter how badly you may want me to recall it, the memories just aren't there anymore. The last thing I remember from that time was my morning staff meeting, and then I have just a few scattered images of running for the shuttle as the station exploded. That's all." He leaned toward her a bit, but this time, she did not shrink from him. "I simply don't remember."

"Just because you don't remember, are you denying you did this?" she demanded, pointing to the holovid display through the open conference room door.

"No, of course not."

"Or that you were going to have me killed?"

"I'm actually very glad it didn't come to that, Leia. Typhani and I, we'd known you since you were a little girl, and that would have been very difficult for both of us, albeit necessary. You were a member of the Imperial Senate, yet you had committed high treason against the Emperor. You knew full well the consequences for that."

"Never mind me, then. What about the 2.7 billion people on Alderaan? What about them? Look at it, Tarkin!" she demanded, pointing to the screen again. He glanced across the conference table. "What if that was Eriadu?"

He looked over at her dismissively. "It's not Eriadu, Leia."

"No, it's not. It's nothing now. Nothing but death and destruction! Dammit, Tarkin! Don't you feel anything?"

He sat back and looked at her for a long moment. "No."

"No?" Han echoed, raising his eyebrows.

Leia's eyes grew wide with disbelief, and she wanted to strangle him again. "How can you not have a reaction to that!" she demanded loudly, her voice starting to screech a bit.

He, on the other hand, chose to retain a calm tone. "I don't know, Leia. I don't know why I don't feel anything, but I do not. It would do neither of us any good for me to pretend that I do." He watched as she visibly fought to control her anger and other emotions. "I simply don't react to these types of circumstances. I don't know why not."

"Then that makes you very dangerous, doesn't it."

"Perhaps. History would tend to indicate so, wouldn't it?"

The Empress let out a tight little chuckle at that.

Then it was Leia who looked away for a moment, as she recalled the conversation she, Luke, Ackbar, Han, and Qwi had had with Rivoche. "Please forgive me if I'm being a bit too personal, but you got awfully personal with me when you ordered my execution." She hesitated for another moment. She wanted to accuse him directly of being a cold and unfeeling sociopath, but she knew that to make him even more defensive would not yield the answers she sought. So she phrased her next question carefully. "Did anybody ever . . . do anything to you to . . . to desensitize you to circumstances such as Ghorman, Calamari, and Alderaan? Did someone harm you in some way, perhaps when you were young?"

Typhani shot him a concerned look. She'd never heard of such.

Adrian had to think about Leia's question for a moment. He'd taken some flack from schoolmates for being small and frail as a child, until those same schoolmates figured out that he was also extremely quick and smart. Other than that, nothing occurred to him. "No, I don't think so. I don't recall anything like that. I acted in the best interest of the Empire, and at the behest of Emperor Palpatine."

"Just tell me one thing, then," she continued. "You owe me that much, at least. Why did you do it? Why Alderaan? It wasn't just to break me, was it?" She had always suspected that more had motivated him than that.

He blinked at her directness. "No, it wasn't. Cos--Palpatine--wanted a centralized demonstration of the station's power--of the Empire's power--to deter other worlds from becoming traitorous in the future. If it makes you feel any better, Alderaan was actually not the first choice."

Leia looked stunned. "It wasn't?"

"No. Palpatine had narrowed the choice down to two planets, then left the final decision up to me. The other choice was Chandrila. Now considering the contentious relationship between Palpatine and Mon Mothma, Chandrila was naturally my initial choice, as I always sought to please my predecessor. But, when you were brought on board the station, uncooperative, I changed my mind to try to accomplish two things at once, you see.

"And I'll tell you something else. In a way, I really hated to squander Alderaan's resources in its destruction. Obviously, it would have been much more beneficial to the Empire to have restored your home planet to Imperial control. What I initially proposed to Palpatine was to detonate some large asteroids or another dead and polluted world such as Despayre, with the threat that the power could be unleashed on a centralized, inhabited world if necessary. He missed my point, you see, of control by the threat of force rather than the actual use of it."

"And so any objection you may have had was all about resources, economics," she observed. She looked away for a moment, then directly into his deep blue eyes. "Doesn't life mean anything at all to you? I know it must. I know how important your family is to you."

He seemed to soften a bit around the edges. "Yes," he admitted, reaching over to take his wife's hand. "But there's a very large difference between one's own and landing pads and planets and such teeming with traitors."

"Full of strangers, you mean."

"Yes, perhaps so."

"Ackbar is right."

"What?"

"Ackbar said you never laid a hand on him in the nine years he was with you. You scolded and taunted him, he said, but you never harmed him physically. Tell me something, Tarkin. Have you ever killed or tortured anyone in combat, or face to face? Have you ever inflicted the pain and death directly yourself with your own hand?"

He thought back for a moment. "Well, no, actually I haven't. I was always in a position of command."

"It seems that just about everyone who has come into close contact with you, who has come to know you, has been spared somehow. As long as you don't have to face your enemy, as long as you can stand on the bridge and give the orders and attack from afar, or get others to do your dirty work for you while you watch and wait from a safe distance, there's nothing to stop your sadistic savagery, is there? Wilhuff Tarkin, you are undoubtedly the biggest coward in the entire galaxy!"

"That's quite uncalled for," the Empress protested.

"It's all right, Typhani. Let her have her say."

Leia rose and marched back into the conference room, taking the holo remote off the table. She clicked it once, and then used it to point at the projection. "There!" she continued. "The man I knew all of my life as my father, who raised and nurtured me, Bail Prestor Organa. You knew him. He was your colleague!"

"He was my enemy--arch-enemy, if you will," the new Emperor clarified, folding his arms across his chest.

"Okay. I'll grant you that." She clicked the remote. "Here. Do you know this woman?"

"Why, no, I don't believe I recognize her."

"This was my Aunt Celly. Was she your enemy?"

"No, obviously not."

"How about this one?" She advanced to the next hologram.

"Well, I may have seen her at an official event, but no, I don't know her."

"My Aunt Rouge. And these? Any enemies here?" She advanced again, revealing a group picture of about eleven children.

"Why, no, of course not."

"That is me," Leia indicated, pointing to her image. "And these were all my cousins. All but two of them were younger than me. Look at the boys, at this one. He sort of reminds me of your grandson Taeodor. He was my cousin Marc. But I am the only one alive now, thanks to you. Look at their faces and tell me you still don't feel anything! Look at them!" she shouted. She leaned over him, and this time he shrank from her. "Every single one of those 2.7 billion people who died on Alderaan had a face, Tarkin! A face, a mind, a soul, dreams and ambitions, just like you, just like Lady Typhani here, just like Taeodor! They weren't all members of the Rebel Alliance! Marc wasn't a member of anything! He was only eleven years old when you stole his life and his future from him!"

He stared into the holovision. "I always . . . I always distanced myself. They taught us to do that, you know, at the Academy. I was . . . very good at it."

"Okay. Distance yourself from this." She touched the remote again.

The next image was of Leia's little cousin Nerah, about seven at the time, Moff and Lady Tarkin, and their two daughters. Nerah had met and made friends with Lyscithea during a Senate retreat held on Alderaan about six years before the Battle of Yavin. Nerah had loved dolls, loved to brush and style their long hair, and so she naturally gravitated to Typhani as well. Leia continued. "Remember the banquet? Remember when Nerah came up behind your wife and pulled the clip out of her hair, and it nearly reached the floor when it fell? Remember how Aunt Rouge was absolutely beside herself, but you and Lady Tarkin just thought it was cute? Remember Nerah with your wife's brush throughout the rest of the banquet, how she sat there and brushed Typhani's hair endlessly, never moved, and never made another peep the rest of the night?" He thought back to that retreat, and Leia thought for a second that she detected a trace of a smile on his face.

Leia continued. "Nerah was thirteen years old on the very day that you killed her. It's interesting what she'd done. She had dark hair too, if you remember, and by the time she was thirteen, it reached her waist--just like her idol, one Lady Tarkin! Now you just think about that! Go on! Distance yourself!" Then she looked decisively at Lady Tarkin. "Both of you!" she shouted.

"Oh . . . " Typhani squeaked, her hand going to her mouth as she turned her head away from the holovision..

"Turn that off immediately! How dare you antagonize her!" the Emperor demanded brusquely.

Leia threw back her head and laughed hard at him, then tossed the remote onto the divan next to him. "Turn it off yourself, Tarkin! Go ahead. Turn Nerah and all the others off, all 2.7 billion of them! By all means, be my guest this time! You may fire when ready!"

He stared up at her, those words reverberating in his head. "You may fire when ready." But they were his words, and now they were coming back to haunt him. He slumped forward, and his hands went to his temples.

"Adrian . . . " Typhani said, concerned, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Does that remind you of anything?" Leia asked him condescendingly.

He didn't answer her, but his obvious reaction served as answer enough. Yes, it reminded him. The moments just prior to Alderaan's destruction came rushing back to him, as well as the memory of what he had realized at the time.

"Good!" Leia snapped at him. "You know, despite everyone's best efforts to stop them, the New Alderaan terrorists may yet kill you--or your wife here. They know she's your weak spot. Would you feel anything then? Or how about if they took out your grandsons!"

He winced. "Don't!"

"Yeah, I thought so. It's about time somebody made that connection for you. I swear, Tarkin, as intelligent as you are . . . "

"Hey, Leia, I think that's far enough," Han interceded. Then he noticed the fiery rage in Lady Tarkin's eyes, and that she had withdrawn a small perfume bottle from a tuck in her gown.

"She's crossed the line, Adrian," the Empress said in a low voice.

"What?" he asked.

Typhani raised the bottle and pointed the sprayer at Leia, pumping it several times. "She bears half of her mother's DNA! I kept it, you see!"

"Hey!" Han yelped, lurching forward and grasping the Empress' wrist.

"Oh, Typhani, no!" the Emperor protested as Solo pried the bottle from his wife's hand.

Leia coughed violently as the acrid vapors of an old cologne she did not recognize filled and burned her nostrils, throat, and lungs. She did not recognize the fragrance, but she immediately recognized the method--and another horrible tale related to her by Bail Organa . . . Her mouth curled into a savage snarl.

"IT WAS YOU!!!!!" Leia screamed, throwing herself on top of the Empress, seizing her about the throat with one hand and grasping a fistful of her hair with the other.

"Stop it, Leia!" Han protested.

"Oh, no!" Adrian uttered, and moved to summon the guards.

Typhani heaved herself up, her size and weight throwing Leia backwards. Leia released the Empress' throat, but her fingers became entangled in her headdress, pulling Typhani down on top of her. Both well trained in self-defense, the two women grappled on the floor as Han attempted to pull his wife from the fray. Tarkin, seeing that Typhani easily had the advantage, stepped back from the foyer entrance for a moment, allowing her to pummel the Rebel princess repeatedly before finally calling for the guards, who took their own time about pulling the powerful Empress off.

Both women flew into their husbands' arms, breathing hard, both scratched, bruised, and bloodied, each brandishing handfuls of the other's hair. The guards then promptly placed Leia under arrest for assaulting the Empress.

"But she started it!" Han protested childishly, pointing at Lady Tarkin.

Leia fought to catch her breath as she shouted to her husband. "It's poison, Han! The cologne in the bottle! She poisoned my mother! She was the first Emperor's Hand!"

"You . . . " Han snarled. Before the guard could intercept him, he was on Typhani, with Adrian trying to no avail to pull her back. Han punched the Empress hard in the gut three or four times before a stun bolt hit him. He was close enough to Typhani for it to affect her as well, and she slumped forward in Adrian's embrace, crying out in pain and fright. Then she went limp.

"Typhani!" Adrian called out, trying to hold her up, not realizing that she'd been stunned. He pulled her back to the nearest sofa and she fell back in his arms. Mindful of her recent injuries from Pedducis Chorios, he clutched her to him, then looked up at the guards. "Don't just stand there, you fools! Get the medics! And lock those Rebels up!" No sooner had he barked those orders than a squadron of white-clad stormtroopers entered the chambers for support.

Typhani moaned slightly as the stun bolt began to wear off, her hand going to her stomach. "Don't move, Typhani. You'll be all right, just don't try to move," Adrian comforted her. As the stormtroopers arrived to drag the Solos away, amid their protests, Adrian eased Typhani back onto the slip the medic droids had brought. He then pulled himself stiffly from the sofa to follow her out, as she was calling for him.

"Hey Tarkin!" Han Solo shouted from the corridor. Adrian looked out at him as everyone else froze for the moment. "We don't need the Vong to destroy us after all! We're doing just fine all by ourselves!"

"Take them away!" Adrian demanded.

But then the image on the holoprojector caught his eye again, and he grabbed his head with both hands. He could see it now--Alderaan--turning to cosmic dust before his eyes, in response to his command, with Nerah's young face permeating the scene, her accusing Alderaani eyes burrowing into his soul. His reaction was about to be bad, he knew, and he had no one to help him through it. He suddenly felt very ill, grasping his chest as his knees buckled beneath him . . .

Typhani had turned her head toward him and saw him go down. "Adrian!" she screamed, throwing herself from the stretcher and scrambling toward him. "No, Adrian! NO!!"

-- -- -- -- --

The Imperial security detail threw the Solos into a holding cell and sealed them inside. group. "Are you okay?" Han asked his wife.

"Yeah, yeah, I think so. This was a trap, Han. What happened back there? Could you see?"

"Yeah, uh, I think Tarkin collapsed."

"Sithspit!"

Han turned on her then. In his mind, she had just ruined any chance of making Chewbacca and Anakin's deaths meaningful. If the Vong win, then Chewie and Anakin died in vain. That had been his mantra since Sernpidal. "You shouldn't have provoked them, Leia! I warned you! Now what the hell are we gonna do?"

"Do? What are you talking about, Han?"

"Did you come here to settle a personal score, or to save the galaxy?"

"Both, actually," she admitted. "They aren't going to back out. They need us as much as we need them."

"Yeah, that's right, we do need them, just like before when we came here to get Pellaeon's help. Thanks to you, that may be all we can get from them again, and you see how long the effect from that lasted, if they even let us outta here! It didn't stop the Vong. It just delayed them for awhile. Dammit, Leia, I know how much you still hurt for Alderaan, but how could you put your personal vendetta above the good of the rest of the galaxy? Figuring out how to use the megonite against the Vong was our best shot, and now you've likely blown it! You just couldn't wait, could you? Nice work, Leia! I don't see you coming up with the technical solution to our problem! Dammit, Leia! Why didn't you just wait! Then you could have blown him away if you thought you could get away with it! Now what the hell are we going to do, huh? If Tarkin croaks . . . "

Disgusted with herself, with her hasty judgment based on emotion instead of logic, she knew the onus was on her. "Look, we still have Daala, the Lemelisks and Lady Tarkin to help our team. After all, she knows more about the megonite than anyone else. You didn't hit her that hard. I saw you."

"Yeah, but I did hit her, thanks to you! How cooperative do you think they're going to be now, Leia! After all, they've got a Death Star! They've got a way to defend their territory! To hell with us!"

"Look, Ghent and Qwi will--"

He cut her off. "It was Ghent and Qwi who said they couldn't come up with anything by themselves," he reminded her. He turned acid. "I don't see Alderaan back on the star charts, Leia. You may well just have brought about who knows how many more Alderaans with your theatrics this evening. Why'd you have to get so damned personal with them? I just don't get it! On the way here, you said it yourself! 'The Vong make Tarkin look like an Ewok!' But once you saw him in person, that was it, wasn't it? 'Just couldn't control yourself! You're going to have a fine time explaining your actions to the Senate, if we ever see the Senate again."

"In case you've already forgotten, I may very well not see them again!"

Han had shoved the cologne bottle into his pocket. He drew it out, and they both gazed down at it. "She used this stuff on your mother? What, forty-five, forty-seven years ago?"

"It's the same type of agent Furgan used on Mon Mothma," she said dejectedly, looking away.

"Aw, gods, Leia!" At that, he drew her close.

-- -- -- -- --

In the Installation's medcenter, the Emperor and Empress doted over each other, tending each other's needs. "Here, Adrian, catch your breath now. You're all right. You're all right now," Typhani encouraged him.

He reached up to cup his hands over her solar plexus. "Did he hurt you badly?"

"No," she reassured him, "but I'll likely be stiff and sore tomorrow."

He drew a few more breaths from the mask she'd placed over his face, then pushed it away as he looked up at her. "What have I done, Typhani! Alderaan . . . how could I .. . . "

She held his head to her shoulder. "You survived, Adrian. You did whatever was necessary to keep us safe, and our families, and to keep our homeworlds out of harm's way. You did what any man would do to protect that most dear to him. You know full well what would have happened had you challenged Cos any further on the matter. You had no choice. You know that."

He pushed back from her, still trying to catch his breath. "No!" he insisted. "No, Typhani, I had a choice, but as Leia just said, I was too much of a coward to use it! I could have easily locked Yularen in his quarters and deactivated his comms. I had the disruptor that Raith and I built in my briefbag. If it had worked as we had intended, it would have completely short-circuited Vader's life support system in less time than it would have taken him to attack me. And then I could have turned the station on Palpatine then and there! But no! I still thought I could avoid all of the risks inherent in that plan, sparing Cos, sparing myself from possible strangulation, sparing Imperial City, and sparing Vader to use in my own way. And with Leia in hand, I thought I had a perfect window of opportunity to end the Rebellion as well! I still thought Cos would abdicate to me, as ill as he was, if I made him think I would carry on as he had, and proved to him that I could quell any threats to his Empire . . . if I did what he wanted. So it was out of my own self-interest and ambition that I--"

"That's enough," Typhani interceded, clasping the oxygen back over his face. "I know what we have to do. I lost my temper. I brought the bottle for protection, but when she suggested hurting the boys, I . . . " She shook her head. She leaned very close to him then. "I doubt the spores are still viable anyway. Please, Adrian, let me settle this! Once she learns of the abdication--"

He shrugged the mask aside and grabbed her by the arm. "No, Typhani! Don't be ridiculous! She knows what you did to Amidala!"

"She can't take me, Adrian. Besides, I'll have the guards bind her. Once she sees the entire picture, when she finally realizes and understands what she's done, then . . . then she may even completely give over to us of her own volition."

"I doubt that," he said, pushing the mask away for a moment. "But tell her anyway. Tell her everything. If I see her again, I'll kill her!"

"Not yet, my love, not just yet!"

-- -- -- -- --

Han and Leia Solo leapt to their feet as the door to their holding cell slid open and six red-robed Imperial Royal Guards rushed in. Two of the guards grabbed Han as a third frisked him for the Empress' cologne bottle. Two more guards seized Leia as a third bound her hands in front of her. Leia made no protest as the guards led her out of the cell, down the corridor, and through one of the transparisteel chutes that connected the pods of the Maw Installation.

On the other side, they marched her into a small conference room, where the Empress sat at the head of the table. Another guard approached her and set the recovered bottle in front of her. "Have the contents analyzed for their viability, and inform me of the results at once," she ordered.

"Yes, Your Excellency!" the guard snapped dutifully. All but two of the six guards left the room, and the remaining two flanked the inside of the door.

"It's all right," Typhani assured them. "You may post outside." The guards nodded to her as the noted the outline of her small blaster pistol under her outer robe.

Leia, not one bit mindful of Han's admonitions, took the initiative, not even waiting to learn the purpose of this midnight audience with the Empress.

"Why!" she spat. "What had my mother ever done to you!"

"She was disruptive in the Senate, and she caused insurrection which undermined the Emperor's goals. You're quite right; I was the first Emperor's Hand, in fact well before he became Emperor. I helped train Mara, and she officially tool over from me when she came of age and passed her trials. That's when I became Chair of the Mining Guild, and could no longer serve as Hand. I proved far more useful to the Empire in the Guild position, as I'm sure you well know. That aside, you're very much like your mother, you know. You have the same eyes and hair, the same face. She was very beautiful in her day. 'The Flower of Naboo,' they called her."

"As I should! As you so cogently pointed out, I bear half of her DNA!" At that point, though, Leia's curiosity tempered her rage somewhat. "Did . . . did you know her well?"

Typhani's guarded demeanor also softened a bit at that. "Not well, no. Shayla did, however. Perhaps we can arrange for her to come out so you two can talk."

"Shayla Paige-Tarkin--she's still alive?"

"Oh, yes, very much so. She's Grand Admiral Valdemar Tarkin's mother, and still as sharp as ever, I assure you."

Leia's jaw set again. "But by the time you made your attempt on my mother's life, she was no longer a threat to Palpatine or the Empire he'd spawned. So why attack her?"

"Because the Emperor willed it. I wasn't the first to try, you know. Zam Wessel and Jango Fett also tried. She was quite strong, and well liked enough to be very well protected. I understand that's how your father--your real father--came to be involved with her, protecting her as a Jedi assignment."

"If Zam Wessel and Jango Fett jumped headlong into a rancor pit, would you have followed? I think not!"

Typhani lowered her gaze a bit. "There . . . was no standing up to Palpatine. He'd . . . you don't know what he would have done. Horrible things. Incomprehensible, some of them." She looked away, her face drawing up slightly.

Leia had to think about that for a moment, the prospect that even the favored and mighty Tarkins had incurred Palpatine's twisted and sadistic wrath--and then passed it along in kind, she reminded herself. "And poisoning someone isn't a 'horrible thing,' Lady Tarkin?" At that point, though, she sensed that the Empress was remembering something rather unpleasant. "What?" Leia demanded. "What would he have done? You were his Hand! If you were that valuable to him--"

Typhani looked up at her then. "Not me." she said, then looked away again. "It wasn't about just me."

"You didn't have any children at the time," Leia pointed out.

Typhani didn't answer, wishing she hadn't gotten into this conversation.

Leia realized then. "He would hurt Wilhuff?"

Typhani winced, though she fought to stop it. "Yes," she admitted softly. "Or . . . more often than not, he would attack us both if one of us failed him or displeased him in some way."

"Well, despite the rumors all those years to the contrary, you two really must actually love each other very deeply, if you'd kill to protect each other--"

"My attempt on your mother was not successful, if you would recall."

"That's only because my father, Bail Organa, figured out what you'd done in time! But you did kill others. We knew of several assassinations and questionable deaths attributed to the First Emperor's Hand. And then it seems that your husband was willing to kill an entire planet's population to protect your hides from whatever reprimand Palpatine may have tossed at you!"

The Empress glared hard at her. "There are things you don't know," she insisted through slightly clenched teeth. "Those 'reprimands' you speak so lightly of, well . . . In any event, my husband never wanted to destroy Alderaan," Typhani revealed, relieved to change the subject to the one she had intended to discuss with the New Republic president..

"No. He wanted to blow up Chandrila instead. He still intended to destroy a planet full of billions of innocent beings to prove the power of his Empire!" she retorted.

"No, dear. You would be shocked if you knew who he really wanted to destroy with that battle station."

"Would I? All right, tell me." Leia sat back decisively in her chair.

"Palpatine," Typhani said flatly, looking directly into Leia's disbelieving brown eyes.

Leia started to throw back her head and laugh out loud again, but then she thought about it for a moment. "He wanted to take over! He was going to use the Death Star to depose Palpatine"

"Yes," Typhani admitted.

"By the stars, why didn't he try!" Leia cried out. Tarkin had done some horrible deeds in his career, even prior to Alderaan, but he was no Sith.

"He would have had to get through your father first. There was a plan for that, but it wasn't failsafe. Another way was in the works, though, but you destroyed the station," Typhani revealed.

"What are you talking about, another way?" Leia demanded.

"Palpatine was ill at the time, very ill, in fact. He had indicated rather strongly that he intended to abdicate to us after your Rebellion had been put down. I know you were very young then, and inexperienced. You see, if you had only given up the location of your base as Yavin IV, in light of its more central location, Adrian just might have been able to get that past Palpatine as a substitute for Alderaan or Chandrila. Even if you had spoken up after he told you that Dantooine was too remote, it might have made a difference. I know you probably didn't think about it at the time, but it was a mere military base that was at stake, not an entire planet's population. The loss of life would have been far less than Alderaan, if not minimal. How many ships did you have at the base? How much personnel-carrying capacity did you have?"

"I don't understand," Leia defended.

"I know," Typhani continued. "I doubt you had enough capacity to get everyone off the base, but this was, after all, a military installation at the ready. The personnel there knew they'd willingly put their lives on the line when they joined the Rebel Alliance. You knew how fast the station could travel at post-light and sublight speed, for you had the technical readouts, and that wasn't very fast, if you recall. You would have known well ahead that the station was coming, and could certainly have evacuated most of your personnel in time. You would have lost the moon base at Yavin and all but your ships, yes, but I am quite confident that your disclosure of the location would have saved Alderaan. Ultimately, you had to abandon the base anyway for fear of the Imperial Fleet. And then if only you hadn't destroyed the station and hurt Adrian so badly, Palpatine would have very likely given it all over to him. As he said after dinner, Palpatine missed his point about ruling through deterrence rather than destruction."

"Then why didn't Palpatine abdicate to Vader after the Battle of Yavin?" Leia asked pointedly.

"Because of his connection to the Jedi. Palpatine hated Jedi far worse than he ever hated Rebels. Also, because Palpatine knew of Luke, and that Luke had been in contact with Kenobi, he felt the passage was still open for your father to go from Sith back to Jedi, and he just wouldn't risk it. No, Palpatine would have never abdicated to your father, or to anyone with any connection to the Jedi. Adrian was his protégé, his favorite. He took the destruction of the station out on your father and Bevel Lemelisk, you know. Your father, he was punished for not taking care of Adrian."

"How did you know about Dantooine, that I said it contained a Rebel base, that your husband said it was too remote? He just told me that he doesn't remember the incident," Leia queried pointedly.

"Your father told me about it," Typhani explained.

"This is . . . all very hard to take in at once," Leia admitted.

"I know," Typhani said reassuringly, moving behind Leia and putting her hands on her shoulders. "Adrian's homecoming has created an awful lot of revelations. But perhaps it is best that everything is revealed. Perhaps we can at last give closure and go on."

"Go on . . . ?" Leia echoed. She stared into her lap, at her bound hands, as she tried to assimilate--then negate--what the Empress had just told her, that it was her own inexperienced error in judgment that cost Alderaan its existence and plunged the galaxy into nearly two decades of chaos and bloodshed. Tarkin had, to his credit, been a diplomat, and a good one for the side he chose. He was no recluse, and he did have excellent leadership and supervisory skills--all things, as Ackbar had said, to which the Rebel leaders could have appealed. Aboard the Death Star, she had been a radical driven by her zeal for the Alliance instead of thinking logically, strategically, as Lady Tarkin had just so simply pointed out to her. "Then it's all my fault!" she whispered, her lips trembling.

"We didn't want to do this to you, but you just wouldn't let the issue rest."

Tarkin's words echoed in her ears again, "In a way, you have determined the choice of the planet that will be destroyed first . . . You would prefer another target? A military target?" A military target. A military target! A target that could have prepared for the attack! A target comprised of decidedly Alliance volunteers, not unwary civilians! A military target! A military target! "Oh, no," Leia cried, despite her struggle not to break in front of the Empress, to not let this Tarkin terror know that she'd gotten through, and that she was right. For years, for all the years since Alderaan's loss, Leia had tortured herself by worrying that she might have made a mistake, that there might have been something she could have done to save her homeworld, but that she just didn't realize it at the time. And now the solution glared plainly before her, set out by one older and more experienced. She had begged her father to allow her to take the mission to intercept the Death Star data, and he had granted her request with his utmost confidence, the last act of pride of a father toward his daughter, and she had failed not only him, but their entire planet. It should have been him aboard the Tantive. He would have known what to do, the right thing to tell Tarkin. And yet, despite everything he'd been told, the Grand Moff did not have to proceed with Alderaan's destruction. He could have aborted the operation, for whatever reason he chose to give Palpatine.

The door alert sounded softly. Typhani stepped over to it and slid it open part way, speaking quietly through it to the guard outside. He handed her something small that she tucked into her robe pocket. Then she closed the door and went back to where Leia sat, head down, thin tears starting to stream down her cheeks. "It's all right, little one," the Empress said, stooping down in front of Leia to unbind her hands. "The spores in the cologne are inert. I should have cast that thing into Lake Phelarion years ago because I knew I would lose my temper one day. Thank goodness you never stumbled across it in my dressing room."

That mention caused Leia to recall her own direct experience with Lady Tarkin, and she desperately wanted to change the subject. "Are Manda, Bharina, and Raycellna still with you?" she asked of her former "co-workers."

Typhani smiled softly. "Yes, Raycellna is. Manda is retired, but lives in and maintains my official Guild condo on Muunilinst. Bharina is now with our youngest daughter and her family. I'll have to tell them that 'Lerna' asked about them!"

"What happened after I left?" Leia asked. "I heard that Vader was very angry with you." Typhani went white, and stepped over to the viewport, her back to Leia. She merely watched her for a moment. "Lady Tarkin? What . . . " Then she realized. "He tortured you, didn't he?"

"Yes," Typhani answered quietly, glancing around briefly.

"Oh, no . . . What--what did he . . . " Leia continued, now sympathetically, recalling her own experiences.

"The usual repertoire. The scan grid and the mind probe. He, uh, he took me aboard the Executor, and he . . . " She looked away again, shutting her eyes tightly against the memories.

Leia knew Typhani was strong, but that? She knew that exposure to the Empire's two premier tortures in immediate succession usually resulted in permanent disability--if not death--and that such outrage was often applied as an execution technique. "How did you ever survive that?"

"I . . . had a good friend with me who helped me through it. He stayed right by my side through it all. Vader allowed that, at least. If he hadn't been there, and if it hadn't been for my daughters, well . . . " She finally came back to the conference table and resumed her seat, but her voice dropped to just above a whisper, and Leia thought she could detect a tremor in it. "Still, dreadful as it was, that session was a mere prelude to what happened once I got to Coruscant. Your escape and the situation with the missing megonite that Sparv and Calus stole rendered the Conclave an utter diplomatic debacle. The Emperor was most displeased, as I'm sure you can imagine." Lady Tarkin tucked her hands under her robe to hide the fact that they were trembling. At that instant, a sudden sense of utter dread came over Leia, she could sense it, feel it--the Empress' memories somehow became palpable to her--fear, cold, pain, confusion . . . She thought it best not to ask for specific details this time, but one other question did come to mind. After all, Palpatine killed wantonly, on whim. "Why did he spare you?"

That probe proved just as deep and personal as would a request for the details. The Empress looked away again. "He had his reasons." she said quietly.

Leia's stomach turned at the thought of all the things that might have meant, and for a fleeting moment, she almost felt a bit sorry for Lady Tarkin. "It was Vader's troops who failed to stop the Falcon," she pointed out in the Empress' defense. "But of course he wasn't quick to step forward to take his share of the responsibility, was he?"

"Vader sought to blame your escape on me because he was afraid that if he failed Palpatine twice in the same way, after allowing you to escape from the Death Star the previous year, that it would be the end of him! I honestly had no idea who you were or where you'd come from--it had been years after all since I'd seen you last--but your father didn't believe me. He actually thought I was sheltering you and shipping all of that missing megonite to the Rebel Alliance. Thank goodness, some of my own workers came forward and told him about Sparv and Calus, else I don't know what he would have done to me. Looking back on it, I don't think he would have risked Palpatine's wrath by summarily executing me. Had I been guilty, the Emperor would have wanted that pleasure for himself. Still, had my foremen not come forward, Vader would very likely have shut down my company. You know, you're very lucky you weren't all blown to dust when you detonated those crates on the other power riser. They must not have been packed properly full. If they had been, that explosion would likely have tossed General Solo's little ship right back into orbit of its own accord, and destroyed it in the process. Megonite is nothing to toy with. If you don't know what you're doing, you shouldn't be near it."

"What do you think it is, that's affecting the Vong?"

"I think it's the vibrofrequency, but Bevel disagrees. He suspects a magnetic disruption of some kind. So, we'll have to run the necessary tests. Can we do that, Leia? Can we at last put the past behind us for the sake of the future?"

Leia looked away. She knew what the Empress meant. "Alderaan . . . " she whispered." He could have stopped! In the name of mercy and sentience, he could have stopped! He had the power to defend himself against Palpatine! He could have brought you and your daughters on board!"

"And then you would have destroyed us all! Don't you see, Leia, there's no easy way through this issue, nor should there be considering its gravity. But our present crisis is far more grave. We must agree to set Alderaan aside for the duration of the present emergency, or we shall all suffer the same fate." Typhani started to get up, then continued. "I don't mean to show you any disrespect, but you have no scientific background. Your presence here is merely diplomatic representation of the New Republic. Now that the meetings are under way, perhaps you'd be more comfortable elsewhere. Perhaps you might want to return to Yavin and reassure your people that the proceedings here are moving ahead."

Leia looked up decisively at the Empress. "I can never set what happened to Alderaan aside, Lady Tarkin, not even for an instant. Your husband did not have to go through with Alderaan's destruction, no matter what I may or may not have told him. However, I must continue to represent the New Republic at these scientific proceedings. I have made my position known. I have spoken for my lost people, and it yet remains my hope that one day the universe will deliver justice. Now, in light of our diplomatic positions, I must insist that my husband and I be returned to our regular quarters."

The Empress rose from her seat. "Very well, then," she said, and summoned the guards.

-- -- -- -- --

Neither First Couple slept much that night . . .

"The spores in the poison were inert," Leia told Han once they were let back into their quarters.

"What a night!" he exclaimed, embracing her tightly.

"Yeah, well, it seems that for the moment we've smoothed things out . . . as long as I keep my mouth shut, that is."

"Leia, I know it's hard for you," Han offered, "but you've always been--"

"I know, I know, I've always been strong. But now, Han, I don't know--" She broke away.

"What?"

"I always knew! You've told me time and again over the years that I've been beating myself up emotionally for no avail, but I always knew there was something I could have done to save Alderaan! And tonight she told me what it was! Oh, Force, Han! The whole war has been my fault! I could have stopped it if I had just stopped to think about what I was doing!"

"Hey, hey, do not let these Imps pin anything like that on you! Whatever they told you--you said yourself what brainwashing manipulators they can be."

She shook her head as if to clear her mind. "I should have sacrificed the Massassi base to save Alderaan! They could have evacuated, almost everyone by the time the Death Star--"

"Hey, yeah, but then what would have happened to the Rebellion, and to the rest of the galaxy? We ended up having to sacrifice the base to kill the Death Star anyway; it's nor your fault!"

Leia looked up into her husband's eyes then. "Palpatine . . . Palpatine was about to abdicate to Tarkin as soon as the Rebellion was put down. I still think Tarkin's a monster, but he wasn't and isn't nearly half as extreme as Palpatine was. It could have ended . . . back then! I could have ended it all, Han!"

"Palpatine abdicate? I never heard anything like that. I don't think so. Did Tarkin tell you that?"

"I haven't seen him," Leia clarified. "It was just Lady Tarkin and me."

"Yeah, un-huh, what'd she want this time? A midnight snack? That mane of hers bead-braided?" Han snorted sarcastically.

"She's right, Han," Leia admitted dejectedly.

"Don't, Leia! Don't! Don't provoke her anymore, but don't let her feed you that shovelful of ronto dung, either! Don't give that scum-lovin' kretch that kind of credit! She's always been as iron-tongued as she's been iron-willed and iron-fisted!"

Leia hesitated at the criticism that, a day earlier, she would have agreed with and he would not wholeheartedly. "Not entirely."

"Huh?"

"She told me some things tonight, Han. It surprised me that she did."

"She's got to you, all right. If the poison she sprayed up your nose didn't work, what she just dumped into your head is workin' just fine!"

"It's not what you think. She told me things about her, about what happened after you picked up Sparv, Calus, and me. You were right, what you said on the shuttle on the way in. Vader put her through hell--a full interrogation, if you know what I mean--and it got worse when Palpatine summoned her to Coruscant. He did . . . horrible things to her . . . "

"Like what?"

"She wouldn't say, and I didn't ask specifically, but I could sense it, through the Force, this awful whirlwind of fear, pain, confusion . . ."

"Do you think she might be a clone, like Lemelisk?"

"No, I don't think so."

"But after what she did to your mom and who knows how many others, plus her uh, activities with the Mining Guild and supplying the Empire with megonite all those years, I say what goes around comes around!"

"Yeah, I'd have said that, too, but you didn't feel it."

"So how'd you feel it? She ain't Force-sensitive . . . is she?"

Leia shuddered in her sudden realization, and one hand slowly rose to her mouth. "I think we better get a message to Luke. We'll have to wake the pilots, and send the shuttle out."

-- -- -- -- --

"No, Cos, no! You're hurting me! You're . . . no, oh, no!"

Adrian had never known his wife to awaken screaming and gasping from a dream before, but that's just what she did when he gently tried to rouse her. As she slowly caught her breath, she realized that she could no longer keep the rest of the Conclave's aftermath from her husband. He took her face in both hands. "What did he do to you?" he asked softly but with steely determination.

She stared back at him wide-eyed. "I can't remember exactly! I--I blocked most of it out! And Darth--he didn't think Cos would harm me, but when he saw what had happened--when he found me--he took the memories from me somehow! I never understood! And I certainly never questioned either of them!"

Adrian didn't realize how tightly he was clutching her. "When he found you? What . . . where did he find you?"

"I don't know precisely, but I remember it was cold, very cold. Vader, uh, he had someone with him, a woman. He called her Shira. She was some sort of adept, an apprentice of his, I think. She kept reaching for me, but wherever I was, I couldn't get to her." Typhani put a hand to her forehead as more fragments of the incident came forth. She could hear Shira's voice again, a distant echo, "We've got to get her out of there . . . she's lost a lot of blood. Lord Vader, go get Ysanne, quickly, and keep Mara out of here! She mustn't see this!"

And then she could see Ysanne's face in her memory, younger, but distraught, reaching for her, as Shira had, "Take my hand, Typhani . . . "

"I think Ysanne may know what happened," she realized. She knew her husband would not stop until he found out. Adrian pressed her head protectively to his shoulder. Palpatine had done some awful things to them, but he couldn't imagine that he would do anything so terrible to Typhani that Vader would find it necessary to block her memories. He knew that was how it worked. Force-users never really "took" anyone's memories; instead, they would block them, inserting an implanted belief that the blocked events never happened.

"I should have been there to protect you! If it hadn't been for those Rebels--for that spiteful little wench!"

Typhani looked up at him. "A downward spiral of never-ending pain, that's what we seem to have inflicted upon one another. And it's never going to stop, is it?"

"I don't know, Typhani. I don't know . . . " Both unable to sleep, they decided to go to one of the remaining observation areas to take in the multicolored splendor of the Maw.

-- -- -- -- --

Han and Leia Solo waited by a lift as they returned from sending out a message to Luke Skywalker. When it opened, they faced none other than the Emperor and Empress, flanked by their ever-present Royal Guards. For the first time, Leia actually saw the Emperor on his scooter, clad in slippers and a casual jumpsuit. He seemed almost human then. For a long moment, the foursome stared at each other once again.

"Oh, no," Leia groaned.

"Hey, haven't we all had enough tonight?" Han offered.

"Yes!" Leia snapped. "I had enough of these two over a quarter of a century ago!"

"Yeah, well, when we've solved our little problem here, then we can all go our separate ways," Han continued, trying to be the mediator before anything else started.

Tarkin chuckled slightly and looked up at his wife.

"What's that supposed to mean, huh?" Han challenged.

"He won't ever let us go our separate ways, Han. Once the Vong are gone, if they are ever gone, then we'll have the New Order to deal with all over again."

"Still as perceptive as ever," Adrian observed of Leia. "What a pity you don't put that insight of yours to better use. Were you in practice of applying your wit, your homeworld might still exist." She blinked, and just stared at him. She'd had about all she could take.

She took a step toward him and leaned close, as the Royal Guards raised their weapons. "If I had told you Yavin IV . . . "

He looked back at her, and some of the hardness of his chiseled appearance went away. "Let's go on into the observation pod."

"Here we go again," Han muttered as he followed the rest.

Adrian could tell they were at last starting to break through Leia's stubbornness, and so he waited for her to select a seat before dismounting his scooter. Then he moved onto the sofa right next to her. She sighed in disgust and looked away. "Leia, look at me. We can end this mutual misery we continue to inflict upon one another right here and now if you will only listen to me." He spoke to her almost as if speaking to a child, and she immediately resented it.

"Don't patronize me, Tarkin!" she warned.

"You're right," he conceded, moving back from her a bit. "It's just that things would have been so very different had it not been for that blasted Kenobi! Did you ever think of what might have happened had that Jedi-vermin not spirited you away in the night? If your father had found out about you, located you? Who do you think would have raised you? Your father certainly wasn't the type for youngsters."

Leia drew back slowly. "You knew!"

"Not until I saw you on the station. I realized it then. I didn't remember it all until earlier this evening, but yes, at the time, I suspected that you were Vader's daughter." He reached out and took her chin in his hand, just as he'd done aboard the Death Star. "Your face, your eyes, it was as if Senator Amidala herself stood before me there on that overbridge. It all made sense then, your mother's presence on Alderaan after your father's transformation, the resemblance, the well-known fact that you'd been adopted . . . Hence I went along with your father's plan to release you and track your ship to the Rebel base. He and I were very close, you see, and had I allowed him to execute his own daughter without voicing my suspicions, he might have reacted most unfavorably if he had ever found out that I knew. I don't think he recognized you himself because he had buried his past so deeply. It was a most forbidden subject with him."

Leia finally drew away, and Han put a hand on her shoulder. More bombshells. An entire fleetload in one night. She looked up at him again. "And if I'd told you the truth?"

"I would have maintained the station's position at Alderaan until we received verification. At that point, then, I would have reported to the Emperor that we had the base in a suitable location for an effective demonstration and were proceeding to Yavin. With the Rebellion ended, there would have been no need to squander the resources of either Alderaan or Chandrila."

Han interceded. "Yeah, but then I'd have been able to deliver the droid and Kenobi to Organa on Alderaan as planned, and the Alliance could have still blown your battle station!"

"Doubtful. We would have blockaded Alderaan, of course, but we would have had no need to tractor all ships attempting to enter the system. You would merely have been sitting out a blockade, upping your price as time passed, I'm sure. Or, you would have expressed the dangers of an Imperial blockade to your passengers and cut out of there. Hence, it's unlikely you would have been able to deliver the plans in time, and even if you had, you most certainly would not have been at Yavin to offer your assistance to Mr. Skywalker. You would have collected your fee and been on your way, no?"

Han shook his head. Indeed, the Emperor knew him well.

And that would have left me aboard the Death Star without hope of rescue--and scheduled for execution. What then, Tarkin?"

"I'd have voiced my concerns to your father. Your fate would then have been in his hands."

"Ha! I told you I was surprised you had the courage to take the responsibility for my execution upon yourself!"

"Some fate!" Han quipped.

Adrian continued. "And then, with the Rebellion ended, I would have ascended the throne shortly after Yavin, order would have been restored--and improved, I might add--our fleet of eight Death Star class battle stations would have been completed, and the Vong would have minded their place."

"And you'd most likely be dead by now." Han pointed out.

"Yes, you're quite right. But how many others might be alive? Marc, Nerah . . . Anakin?"

"Don't you dare drag my son's name--" But then she realized he was right. She shook her head and looked away from him. "And so I should just surrender my nation to you here and now based upon your flimsy speculation of what might have been? Your opinion of what should have been? Your regime would still have been a dictatorship, Tarkin! The Rebellion would have regrouped and risen again to strike you down!"

"In the face of eight stations?"

"We managed to destroy three!"

"Yes, you might have gotten that many. But we would have moved rapidly ahead of you technologically, as my dear friend Raith Sienar quickly did within the decade. Now, as for, how did you put it, a surrender, Leia, for once in your life, be a realist instead of an idealist! We have the station. New Impyria will construct more. We are strongly allied with the Chiss and the Senex. Dozens of systems rejoin our ranks every week because your regime has been unable to protect them--to maintain order. Are you even aware that Ryloth has rejoined the Empire? Leia, your . . . nation, or what you feel resembles a nation, has been ravaged of its resources by the Vong invasion, which, as I just explained, you helped to bring about. If this scourge ends in favor of this galaxy, your New Republic simply does not have to power to stand on its own anymore. You've lost your capital, most of your shipyards, most of your natural resources--why, you've been set back a good two millennia in terms of progress. You can't win. This galaxy is tired of fighting. I shall offer an end to it."

Leia looked out the viewport. "Sure you will, Tarkin. Perpetual fear. That's what you'll offer the galaxy!"

He shook his head slightly at her. "After what this galaxy has just been through, I shant have to. Fear of something of the like happening again--happening without order and a means of defense--will bring the Galactic Empire back together, not fear of me. Over the past half-century, the galaxy has seen its full spectrum of choices. Have you ever stopped to think about what might have happened had the Vong launched a full invasion back at the time of the Battle of Zonama Sekot? The Republic had deferred to the Jedi for its protection. Its defenses were nil. Why, the best possible defense of that day would have been a combination of the military resources of the Trade Federation and the Outland Regions Security Force--both of which, I might remind you, I commanded. But I was only twenty-nine years old then. What did I know? Not enough to defend the galaxy from something like the Vong, I can tell you that!"

"That's right, Tarkin! You have all the answers, as usual," Leia retorted.

He looked away. "I wish I did. We wouldn't be facing disaster right now if I did."

A spark of humility! Leia could hardly believe her ears! But what if he was right?

"So we'll let everybody decide. That's what Gavrisom and Pellaeon did. We'll offer the beings of the galaxy both systems, and let 'em decide," Han suggested.

"And split the galaxy in two again?" Leia queried. "We'd be right back where we were thirty years ago, at the start of the Clone Wars. Besides, he won't settle for anything short of full galactic redomination!"

"That ain't gonna be easy. The Hutts want their own space back, too, and almost lost their slimy asses to the Vong tryin' to get their way. I don't think the Chiss will join either side, and neither will the Senex," Han elaborated.

For the first time in this conversation, Typhani spoke up. "Well, then, perhaps what we need is a galactic consortium of sorts, a Prime Council, or some such."

"Excuse me, dearest, but whose side are you on?" the Emperor asked, looking askance at his wife.

"Wilhuff, Bevel, and Taeodor's. Such a conglomerate would require a strong, experienced leader, of course," the Empress clarified, beaming at her husband.

"I won't share power with war criminals or tyrants!" Leia spat, glaring over at the Emperor.

"Hey, easy! These ain't formal negotiations. But at least we're talkin'," Han moderated.

"Nor will I with idealistic zealots who spawn insurrection and threaten order," the Emperor insisted.

Han held up his hand. "Okay, all right, then neither one of you two get to be on the Council. You can be the emperor of your empire, you can be the president of your republic, Zorba the Hutt can be the king of his clan, and so can Isolder--we forgot about Hapes--and so forth, but you and you send somebody else to the central body or whatever!"

Adrian looked over at Typhani, who nodded back at him. At that, Leia glared at Han. "Yeah, okay, I'll do it."

"You would do well to be ever mindful of your husband's loyalties," the Emperor pointed out. "He's switched sides before."

"Yeah, only after Nyklas nearly killed my best buddy! And while we're on that subject, why me, Tarkin? A hundred officers deserted the Empire every week! Why pinpoint me and set both Vader and Fett on my tail? Was I, uh, special or something?"

The Emperor looked almost admirably at him. "Yes, General Solo, you were. You were at the time, and as far as I know you still are, the best star pilot in this galaxy. Your loss proved a heavy one for the Empire, and for me. I sent Fett and Vader out after you because I knew your value." Then he smiled thinly at Han. "I always felt safe with you at the helm. I entrusted my family to your skills on numerous occasions."

Leia's eyes darted at her husband. "You? Him? Them?"

"You were the one who kept requesting me!" Han realized.

"Yes," Adrian admitted.

"I don't understand," Leia complained.

Han explained. "When it came to the higher-ups, Leia, we usually never knew who we were flying. It was to keep us from being distracted or intimidated. We were always given a code level for security purposes, but most of the time the cockpits were sealed."

"Don't let him stroke your ego," Leia warned her husband.

The Emperor chuckled again.

Leia scowled at him.

"General Solo, how do you do it? I can't fathom where she got that tongue! Her foster-father was a most soft-spoken gentleman," Adrian asked.

"It ain't easy sometimes," Han grinned, patting Leia on the knee.

"You want to know where I got it, Tarkin? Do you remember the first time we met, when you visited my father on Alderaan?" Leia challenged.

He smiled fondly at her. "Oh, yes. You were being quite naughty, as I recall."

"Yes, and when my father mentioned my future service in the Senate, do you remember what you said? You suggested that he wean me first. I was ten years old! I paid you back before evening's end, but I always remembered what a pithy insult it was. I listened closely to your rhetoric from then on. It seems you can't take your own medicine!"

"I can't imagine that you'd emulate me," Adrian observed.

"Only when it serves to undermine you," Leia clarified pointedly.

"You paid him back?" Han asked, moving to diffuse another altercation.

"Oh, yes, she did!" the Emperor recalled with a laugh.

"What'd you do?" Han pressed his wife with a teasing tone in his voice.

"I pelted him with a water balloon from my balcony," Leia admitted with a slight snicker.

Typhani laughed. "I remember this one!"

"Splatt!" Adrian continued jovially. "All over me! I was drenched! And Ackbar! He was waiting outside for me, that was the first time I ever saw or heard a Mon Cal laugh! And Bail, he's standing there, right? Ever the diplomat, he was trying his utter best not to double over with laughter, trying to apologize elaborately for his daughter's misbehavior, and all the while his mouth kept twitching into a smile and his face grew steadily redder with the strain of his containment! Of course, at the time I was furious, but looking back on it, well--"

At last, Leia had started to laugh as well, but then, at the Emperor's description of the man she knew as her father, in that light and happy moment that he and his future murderer had shared with her looking on . . . Her stomach jolted, and she burst into uncontrollable tears as she leapt from the sofa and ran across the room to the viewport. She put her hands on the ledge, bent over, crying openly, a rare moment of grief in a most inopportune situation.

"Oh, my, I didn't--" Adrian gaped at her, suddenly realizing what he'd done, both aboard the Death Star and now. At last, the two galactic adversaries connected on a level they could both understand. How often had his own daughters, during his absence, painfully recalled once-fond memories they'd had with him? Now they had their father back, but Leia had only her memories and her grief. Finally, through empathy for his own daughters' pain, he could at last feel hers, not in the Senate, and not on a political or planetary scale, but in that special place where fathers and daughters connect.

Han had started to get up to go to his wife, and Lady Tarkin had edged forward in her seat as well, but Adrian waved them both back. Han reluctantly and warily resumed his seat, eyeing Tarkin hawkishly. Adrian carefully made his way across the room, steadying himself on the viewport ledge near Leia. He didn't touch her, though.

She thought it was Han--and unwittingly threw herself into the arms of her arch-nemesis. "Let go of me! Get away from me!" she shrilled angrily, writhing and twisting. But he'd grown strong enough to hold her.

He spoke softly to her, something she'd never heard him do. She quieted, mainly so she could hear him. "No, Leia. I wasn't thinking just then, about what that might have brought back for you."

"From that very night, I always knew you would do something terrible to Alderaan! And you killed my father, you bastard! You killed my father!"

He took her shoulders and pushed her back a bit, then took her chin in his hand again, raising her head. "On behalf of the Empire, I did what I felt necessary at the time based on the information and orders I had. Looking back on it, I see that there might have been other options, and I too wish circumstances had transpired differently. But now, there's nothing I or anyone else can do to change what happened. If I could, I would.

"I had always regarded Bail as a spineless weakling and a coward for his disarmament of Alderaan and his idealistic political views. But when one considers the grave risks he took first by taking in you and your mother, and then by supporting the Rebellion, well, those derogatory designations of mine don't seem to fit anymore. His good heart was both his greatest strength and his greatest vulnerability, and . . . I exploited that." She started to twist away again, but he gripped her chin, forcing her to look up at him again. "Leia, I know it will never be enough, but I'm sorry that you lost your father--and your home. Let go of your grief and your anger. Give them to me. I created them, so I deserve them."

At last, he released her, and she pulled back from him, staring at him. At least for the moment, he no longer represented to her the embodiment of everything evil that the Galactic Empire and Palpatine's New Order had been. For an instant, he was just Wilhuff Tarkin, husband and father, unarmed, unthreatening in his jumpsuit and slippers, someone she'd never met, never knew existed. In that instant, she at last saw what Qwi and Ackbar had seen, and in that brief flash of insight, she learned how to reach him.