The first thing that Chris noticed when he came to was how dizzy he was. That came with the realization that he was hanging upside down. When he turned his glance upward he realized that his feet were frozen into the ceiling of his prison. The next thing he noticed was the prison itself. He was in a giant ice cave……and the floor was littered with the skeletons of meals past!

Chris tried to keep calm and think of a way out of his predicament, but it was difficult to do, as he suddenly heard the growls of his captor coming from not too far away. He tried to yank his feet out of their icy cases but that didn't work. Just then, he noticed something half-buried in the snow just out of his reach. It was his father's band saber. A piccolo with a trombone mouthpiece attached to it that packed quite a punch when used in battle.

Chris tried to reach the saber but to no avail. It was just too far. There was only one other option. Chris had used the Drill very few times before and had little control over the mystic energy pattern. But now it might be the only thing that could save his life. So Chris let his conscious mind slip away. He did not reach for the energy of the Drill. He waited for it to come to him, just as his dead mentor, Jason Kenobi, had taught him. He blocked out the growls of the hungry polar bear. Suddenly he felt the pulsing energy of the Drill flowing through his body. He held a picture of the band saber in his head and suddenly the weapon was in his hand. He snapped out of the trance state just in time to see the polar bear rushing at him!

Chris quickly activated the band saber, slashing wildly with the blue blade at the ice that imprisoned his feet. Ignoring the pain in his body when he crashed to the ground, Chris leapt up and slashed at the advancing beast, somehow managing to score a hit.

Chris was up and out of the cave entrance before the bear's head even hit the ground.

XxX

"Sir, all patrols are in. Still no-" a warrior started to report to Section Leader Nick. But the Section Leader silenced him with a quick glance at Princess Amanda, who stood beside him.

"Still no contact from Skywalker or Solo." the warrior whispered.

"Mistress Amanda." A-10 cut in as he approached the small group. "Tim2 says he's been quiteunable to pick up any signals. Although, he does admit that his own range is far too weak to abandon all hope."

"Your highness, there's nothing more we can do tonight. The shield doors must be closed." Nick told her.

Amanda lowered her head, but finally nodded her agreement.

"Close the doors." Nick commanded.

Bruchacca came to stand with Amanda, A-10, and Tim2 as the giant hanger doors slid shut. When they were finally closed Bruchacca let out an inhuman wail.

"Tim2 says that the chances of survival are 725...to 1."

Amanda didn't speak. She turned her head away so that no one would see the small tear that leaked out of the corner of her eye.

"Actually…Tim2 has been known to make mistakes." A-10 said, trying to console her.

"From time to time."

XxX

Chris stumbled blindly through the driving sheets of snow that assailed his frozen body. Night had fallen and the temperature only continued to drop. Chris now realized how foolish he'd been to leave the polar bear's cave. He had no idea where he was or where he was going. If he kept wandering like this, it wouldn't be long before he…

The poor boy finally collapsed upon the frozen ground, unable to take another step. As he lay there, semi-conscious, hazy thoughts and images drifted through his head. Home. Back in the Littleton System. His Aunt and Uncle. Jason.

Yes, Chris would die here. Even in his narcosis-like state, he knew that much. Already the hallucinations were taking over his numb mind. Chris could have sworn that he saw Jason Kenobi standing before him.

"Chris." the mirage called out to the dying youth. "Chris!"

"Jason?" Chris said stupidly.

"You will go to the Heritage System." the spirit commanded.

"Heritage System?" Chris asked, still not comprehending that the spirit before him was very real.

"There you will learn from Keena. The Band Master who instructed me."

"Jason!" Chris tried to cry out as the apparition vanished into the shrieking winds.

But it wasn't Jason who answered. It was Keoni that appeared to Chris out of the driving snow, hurtling towards him on a reed scooter.

When Keoni saw Chris' limp body he leapt from his reed and landed next to his fallen friend.

"Chris!" he shouted, trying to rouse the younger boy. But nothing worked.

"Don't do this, Chris. Come on! Give me a sign here."

"Jason. Jason." Chris mumbled.

Keoni breathed a quick sigh of relief, grateful to know that Chris was still alive. But relief quickly turned to despair when Keoni looked up at his reed scooter. The thing had finally cracked, literally. The primitive machine could no longer stand the cold and had fractured under stress. A foul-smelling goop was already dripping from the guts of the reed.

"Hang on, kid." Keoni coached Chris as he reached over to the reed and pulled the crack open wider.

"Heritage System……Heritage." Chris continued to rave drunkenly in his dream-like state.

"This may smell bad, kid," Keoni said as he shoveled fistfuls of the reed goop onto Chris' body. "But it'll keep you warm 'til I can get the shelter built."

"Keena." Chris driveled on.

Keoni backed away from the reed and his charge for a quick breath of air. He felt ready to throw up. The smell of the reed's innards was so nauseating.

"And I thought they smelled bad on the outside." Keoni griped. He knew that the task of saving them both would last long into the night.

XxX

"Penguin base. I've got something. Not much, but it could be a life form." Jesse reported back to the storage room. The moment the sun had risen a small contingent of warriors was sent out to search for Chris and Keoni. The speeder cases were finally ready for travel in the bitter cold air. That made the search that much more efficient.

"Commander Skywalker. Do you copy? This is Penguin2. Captain Solo?" Jesse waited a few tense moments before trying to hail them again. The silence was unnerving.

"Commander Skywalker. Do you copy?" Jesse asked, her voice growing more urgent by the minute. "This is Penguin2."

Suddenly the radio on the console of Jesse's case crackled to life.

"Good morning. Nice of you guys to drop by." Keoni's voice said sarcastically.

Jesse's face split into a grin of relief as she reported back to the base.

"Penguin Base. This is Penguin2. I found them. Repeat. I found them."

XxX

"Master Chris, sir. It's so good to see you fully functional again." A-10 said happily to Chris as he entered the room. It had been two days since incident and both Keoni and Chris had made full recoveries from their night out in the blizzard. The only exceptions were a few scars on Chris' face from the polar bear.

Tim2 came in right behind A-10 and whistled excitedly.

"Tim2 expresses his relief also." A-10 translated.

"How you feelin' kid?" Keoni asked as he and Bruchacca also came into Chris' room. "You don't look so bad to me. In fact, you look strong enough to pull ears off an elephant."

"Thanks to you." Chris said gratefully.

"That's two you owe me, junior." Keoni said as he turned to leave. But what he saw standing in the doorway stopped him dead in his tracks. Amanda had come to see Chris as well.

"Well, Your Highness, looks like you managed to keep me around a little longer." Keoni commented, referring to the ban on letting cases leave base.

"I had nothing to do with it. Section Leader Nick thinks it's dangerous for any cases to leave the system until we've activated the energy field." Amanda said triumphantly.

"That's a good story. I think you just can't bear to let a gorgeous guy like me out of your sight." Keoni said sardonically as he leaned casually against the wall.

"I don't know where you get your delusions, trumpet brain." Amanda said, the warning in her voice plain to be heard.

As he listened to all of this, Bruchacca began to snicker and laugh. Keoni and Amanda? It was just too funny.

"Laugh it up, fuzz ball." Keoni said to Bruce as he went to stand beside Amanda. "But you didn't see us alone in the south passage. She expressed her true feelings for me."

Amanda's mouth fell open in shock. This guy had some nerve!

"Why…Why you…stuck up, half-witted, scruffy-looking……reed killer!"

Keoni turned to look at Amanda, anger etched into every facet of his face.

"Who is scruffy looking!" he shot back at her. "I must have hit pretty close to the mark to get her all riled up like that, huh kid?" Keoni said to Chris as he walked back over to him.

Amanda nodded to herself, finally seeing a way to get back at Keoni. She crossed the room in two swift strides and came to face Keoni.

"Well I guess you don't know everything about women yet."

As she said this Amanda leaned down and kissed Chris full on the mouth. When she pulled away she smirked at Keoni once before leaving. Keoni just stood there, glaring.

"Take it easy." he said gruffly to Chris before leaving the room with Bruchacca right behind him.

XxX

"Princess, we have a visitor." Section Leader Nick reported to Amanda as she entered the storage room. "We've picked up something outside the base's zone twelve moving east."

"It's metal." one of the students said from his place at the computer.

"Then it couldn't be one of those creatures." Amanda said.

"It could be a case. One of ours." Keoni reasoned.

"No, wait. There's something very weak coming through." the student reported. He turned up the volume on his head set and allowed the others to listen in on the signal that was coming in over the line. After a few tense moments A-10 looked up from the computer.

"Sir," he said to Nick. "I am fluent in over six million forms of communication. This signal is not used by the Brass. It could be a Woodwind code."

"It isn't friendly, whatever it is. Come on, Bruce. Lets go have a look."

Less than ten minutes later, Keoni and Bruce were piloting a case out to the coordinates of the unidentified object. They disembarked a good distance away from it and then snuck up on it. Bruchacca took cover behind a snow drift directly across from where Keoni was hidden.

Suddenly Bruchacca stuck his head up in view of the machine and growled loudly. This drew its attention long enough for Keoni to take a shot with his trumpet. The probe was destroyed immediately.

"I'm afraid there's not much left." Keoni reported back to the storage room via his walkie talkie.

"What was it?" Amanda asked him.

"An instrument of some kind. I didn't hit it that hard. It must have had a self-destruct."

"A Woodwind probe piccolo." Amanda sighed heavily.

"It's a good bet the Empire knows we're here." Keoni said.

Amanda and Nick shared a silent, worried glance.

"We'd better start the evacuations." Nick said gravely.