Author Note: Ok guys, you've probably just seen who the pilot is by now, so this is gonna be short and sweet! Thanks so much for all the great reviews! You guys are brill! And as for the huttesse in the last chapter, I'm sorry it was all wrong, but I couldn't find any sites that would translate huttesse, so I had to pick random words out of the books and put them together! Anyways...here's the pilot!

"Mara!" Luke exclaimed as he stared in disbelief.

"Hello Skywalker," she replied with a grin. "Long time, no see."

"What are you doing here?" Luke demanded, anger bubbling up inside him. "Someone else put a price on my head?"

"No Luke, trust me. I'm not like that anymore. Since the Emperor's death, I've changed. I've been living on the fringe of society and I've been forced to become a smuggler pilot. Do you really think I'd go around wearing this tatty thing if not?" She tugged at the tatty brown pilot's uniform in disgust.

"Why should I believe you?" Luke snarled, one hand curling round the handle of his saber.

"Because I've been asked to do something that you would be very interested in," Mara said, leaning casually against a nearby gas pipe.

"What. Hunt another friend of mine? Or perhaps you're after my sister this time?"

"No Luke. I'm not hunting anyone...well not for money anyway. My head hunting days are over. They ended the day you killed my Master."

"I - You what!" Luke was taken aback by this statement.

"You killed the Emperor! I felt his death through the force. And the Force showed me images of his final moments. You were there...and so was your father...you both murdered my Master, my Mentor!"

Suddenly, Mara was close to tears, all her confidence gone. Luke felt a twinge of guilt. She had been as close to the Emperor as he had been to Obi-Wan. Both had lost their mentors to the hands of his father.

Luke felt a sudden surge of anger, not towards Mara, but towards his father. How could such a hate-filled man ever have married someone as fair and as beautiful as his mother...his mother! He had forgotten completely about why he had really returned to this wretched dust-bowl.

But how could he leave Mara now?

Yes, she was his enemy, and had been assigned by the Emperor to kill him. Yes, she was a skilled warrior, trained from childhood and honed into a weapon, but deep down inside her, he could feel the goodness, just as he had felt the goodness in his father before his death.

"Mara, I'm sorry. I truly am. But I don't have the time to explain everything to you now. I didn't kill the Emperor, and someday I swear that I will tell you everything, but now I have an important errand to run which concerns a very close family member."

"Your mother?" she asked, and her face softened considerably as he nodded. Luke found this curious and a little suspicious. How did she know about his mother?

"Luke, there's something I have to tell you...something that you won't like."

"What is it?" he asked, expecting her to tell him something about one of her smuggler friends wanting more money from Han.

"Its your mother. She's gone missing and I've been assigned to find her."

"To kill her?" Luke blurted out. Of all the things he could have asked, he had to ask that!

"No, to rescue her."

"Rescue her? From what? Who? Mara, what's going on? Please tell me?"

"She's being held by a group called the Yuuzhan Vong. No-one knows who they are, what they want, or where their hideout is."

"Then I'm coming with you. She's my mother, and it sounds like you'll need all the help you can get."

"No, I can handle this myself."

"She's my mother! She needs me!"

"Luke, she's spent twenty odd years of her life not even knowing that you exist. What makes you so sure that she needs you now?"

This reality stung Luke worse than any lightsaber cut, and he staggered back against the pipe, causing it to vibrate. Mara watched him for a moment, then made up her mind. They may be enemies, but Mara could see how much Luke cared for this woman that he didn't even know. She was prepared to put their differences aside for the time being if it meant that she could complete her mission even quicker. After all, despite what she'd told Luke about the pay, she was actually being payed, and the quicker she found this woman, the higher her reward would be. Putting on a sympathetic face she held out her hand.

"Come with me. You're right. She's your mother, and you may be able to find her quicker than anyone else can. After all, you are a Jedi."

Luke took her hand after a slight pause and she pulled him back to his feet, kicked her helmet into the air, caught it, jammed it back on her head and led him back to the hangers where their ships sat. Luke couldn't believe how much his fortunes had changed since setting out on this journey, although whether they had changed for the better or the worse, he couldn't decide.