Ch. 11 Taken

A/N: Now, Ben starts getting some answers!

   The Jade Shadow burst out of hyperspace and headed for New Coruscant. As Vix piloted the ship, a console beeped. She looked at it and saw that it had detected Jaina Solo's Sekotan X-wing in the immediate area. Vix looked up at the viewscreen and saw the X-wing flying rapidly past her field of vision. Vix opened up a comm. Channel. "Master Solo, this is…" but the X-wing vanished into hyperspace before Vix could finish. Why was Jaina in such a hurry? Where could she be going?

    A few minutes later, Vix landed outside the Jedi Temple and ran up the steps. The front door opened before she got there and Jacen hurried over to her. "Vix, what happened to Ben?" he asked. Vix hurriedly told him what had happened…except for the part about the budding romance between herself and Ben, of course. Jacen listened worriedly and when Vix was done, he said, "Your master will be coming with you in the Jade Shadow. I'll be aboard the Falcon with Lowbacca and Tahiri. We're gonna mount a rescue mission. Don't worry. Everything will be okay." Jacen smiled reassuringly at Vix, with more confidence than he actually felt.

***

    Ben groaned as he slowly woke up. He couldn't remember what had happened. He lay there, groaning for a while before finally sitting up in the bed and remembering what had happened. He looked around. He was in a dark, cold room which was empty except for the bed he was sitting on, which was covered with gray blankets. He reached out with the Force to sense his surroundings. Suddenly, the door opened and a lithe, thin woman walked gracefully in. She was covered with tattoos and scars but Ben remembered her face. "Hello, Ben. Long time no see," said the woman softly. Ben gasped and said, "Lania?!" Lania Xarti had once been his first girlfriend.

     She smiled indulgently and replied, "That's right Ben. Tell me, do you like the way I look now? I think it makes me look more…refined, don't you?" Ben didn't respond but stared at her, his mouth still gaping open. "You…you're behind the assassinations, aren't you?" he gasped. Lania smiled in a matter-of-fact way and replied, "Yes, Ben. But only in the interest of progress. You see, I realized that the reason the Yuuzhan Vong managed to devastate the galaxy so much twenty years ago was because their biotech made them powerful. I decided that the only way we could progress to that level would be to become part-Yuuzhan Vong. Look at me. I used remaining Yuuzhan Vong biotech, and a new biological agent called Alpha Green, to shape my body and I started a new Order of people who shared my ideas, using money I had stolen from the old crime cartel of a being known as Boss B. I shaped them as well. The Galactic Alliance would only get in the way if it ever found out. That's why I had to destroy it. But I also organized the assassinations and a kidnapping to help my Hutt partners. You see, after the Vong War ended, the Galactic Alliance took over Hutt Space, leaving the Hutts with no place to run their criminal empire, so many of them had to go respectable. But Hikta the Great, and his brother, who you met on Tatooine, decided they wanted to build a new order. I contacted them and made a deal with them.

    "Their crime organization has been helping me by transporting Vong biotech to cells of my organization all over the galaxy, but especially on Naboo, where I have a slightly larger following, which is why so many assassinations have been going on there. Hikta and his brother also wanted me to help them get revenge on a person who caused them a lot of suffering. The Ssi-ruuk also wanted her, since she committed wrongs against them as well. In return, they provided this base." Lania gestured at the walls surrounding them. "And now it's time for you to meet this prisoner," she said grinning. She motioned Ben to follow her.

   They walked into a hall, flanked by Lania's bodyguards. They finally reached some securely locked doors. After Lania opened them, she pushed Ben inside. "Have a nice time chatting with her," she sneered as she closed the doors. Ben tried to use the Force, but the room was crawling with ysalamiri. He looked up at the prisoner and moved close to her face. It was hard to tell who she was in the darkness, but Lania had not taken away Ben's glow rod. He ignited it and gasped as he recognized the woman who was in chains before him. She had aged, certainly. Her brown hair had turned almost completely gray and her face had a few more wrinkles, but it was still relatively smooth. He gasped as he recognized the rest of the features of this woman. She was someone he had long thought dead.

She was his Aunt Leia Organa Solo.