When the Jade Shadow dropped out of hyperspace to return to the Corellian system, Luke looked out through his ship's forward viewport to witness in horror the raging battle between the Corellians and the Colony.

Master Skywalker! UnuThul's voice echoed through his mind. There were several ships that neither belonged to us or the Corellians that have made their way for Qolaraloq. We weren't able to stop or question them. We fear that-

I understand, UnuThul, Luke sent tersely. I'll stop them.

He throttled the Shadow forward toward Centerpoint Station, where, as the HoloNet broadcasts had previously reported, the battle was fiercest.

Within mere moments of the yacht entering the conflict zone, a pair of Corellian attack fighters disengaged from a small swarm of Killik dartships that they had been in the midst of blowing away and fell on the Shadow's tail. Immediately, Luke threw his ship into a series of tight slaloms and maneuvers to avoid the laserfire that spewed from the two fighters even as he tried not to get hit by stray fire from either the Corellians, Killiks, or Joiners. More than a few times, though, such stray fire nicked away at his forward and broadside shields, but, thankfully, those shields were able to replenish in time while he successfully dodged his pursuers' fire.

But just as he was several thousand kilometers away from Centerpoint, another pair of Corellian fighters dropped down in front of the Shadow and each let loose a concussion missile his way. Gritting his teeth in both fear and effort, Luke stayed the course for several seconds, reluctantly allowing his two pursuers to chip away at his rear shields, as he waited until the last second to wrench his ship off to starboard; both missiles flew harmlessly past him and one of them even blew up one of the rear fighters. The other missile, however, corrected its course even as the remaining rear fighter quickly pulled up to avoid being blown away by the actions of the conc's proximity sensors.

Now, even as Luke continued to gun the Shadow toward Centerpoint, as the fighters who had fired the concs had been forced into dogfights by a duo of Joiner vessels, he tried to shake down the concussion missile that arced for his rear. Every now and then, he zoomed toward the dead hulks of destroyed Corellian corvettes, frigates, and the remnants of fighters from both the Corellians and Killiks, but to no avail; the conc kept on his tail, and despite the speed that he poured into the Shadow, the missile continued to close the distance. It wouldn't be long, he thought, before its proximity sensors went off and caused an explosion that might tear through his ship's rear, never mind the shields.

But just before the conc could have closed the distance to trigger its proximity function, a Killik dartship arced in from below the Shadow's path and struck the tip of the missile, blowing it up.

The resultant explosion bucked the yacht forward by several dozen meters in an uncontrolled spin that Luke desperately tried to correct while alarms and lights went off in the cockpit. Several seconds after the explosion occurred, however, the control stick became easy to use again and Luke corrected his ship's course to return it to a more controlled route for Centerpoint.

We will defend you, Master Skywalker! UnuThul's voice returned in his mind. Now stop those who wish to destroy Qolaraloq!

As dartships and Joiner vessels began to concentrate themselves around the Shadow and fended off attacks from the Corellian ships, Luke continued to arrow his yacht toward the station whose fate may determine the future of the galaxy.

. . .

One of the few things that her Jedi captors would allow Vestara to do whenever she wasn't attending one of those dreadfully boring classes held by Tionne and some of the non-Council Jedi Masters in the Temple was to meditate. Of course, she couldn't access her darker emotions lest one of the Knights who took shifts outside her dorm sensed her doing so, came in, and put a stop to it by Force-pinning her up against a wall even as they called either of the Masters Solusar to let them know of her transgression. And that meant an unwanted visit from one of them that would mean yet another pointless lecture in how everything she had done on Kesh and in her time with the likes of Darth Judicar and Lady Rhea had been poison to her soul that had to be purged sooner or later.

So, to avoid being sensed as if she was trying to access the dark side of the Force, Vestara found herself embracing some happier emotions, as the Jedi had wanted... in a loose sense.

In the few days that had followed her all-too brief discussion with Ben Skywalker, she found her thoughts had trailed to him often. And those thoughts, which she wasn't quite sure of, led her to wonder what exactly had happened to him that made him much more open to the dark side than any of the other students in the Temple; yes, she knew that he had encountered the Sith Meditation Sphere that Judicar had left with the Lost Tribe before she departed to betray them to the Jedi, but Vestara, naturally, wanted to know more. Because the darkness within Ben, unlike the darkness within her and those she cared for deeply among the Lost Tribe, like her father, was not necessarily something that was strengthening the young Jedi; rather, it felt like something that was eating away at him but that he tried vainly to push back against.

Was this something that was part of his Jedi upbringing? Vestara wondered further. Were the Jedi making Ben weak by actively making him believe that the dark side was something to be feared and even loathed rather than wholly embraced? In this regard, Vestara wondered, indeed, if the Jedi could really view themselves as the mighty paragons of truth, good, and virtue that they so-

Abruptly, the door to her dorm opened up again, and Vestara gritted her teeth in frustration as Jedi Knight Nelani Dinn entered.

From her position on the floor, Ves asked, "Look, if you're gonna call either Solusar, can you not pin me against the-"

"I won't call either of the Masters Solusar," Dinn interrupted sharply. "And I won't pin you against the wall like the other Knights."

"Oh?" Ves asked. "Then what will you do, Jedi?"

"I want to talk to you, Vestara," Dinn responded calmly.

"Talk to me?" the girl asked. "About what?"

Dinn remained silent for a moment before she sat down cross-legged in front of Vestara. Then she answered, "About your feelings for Ben Skywalker."

"What about them?" Ves asked cautiously.

"I can sense that you-"

Dinn was cut off from saying anything else as an overwhelming sense of darkness suddenly overcame the room. And when both woman and girl stretched out through the Force, Dinn's fears were shared by the rest of the Jedi on Shedu Maad while Ves' response was one that brought a hopeful smile to her face.

"My father has come," the Sith girl whispered happily to herself.

. . .

"How many of these bloody nets and traps do these people have lying around here?" Sith Saber Jendak, one of the three humans in the Sith party hunting Darth Judicar, asked no one in particular. He had just sprung the fifth net that would have trapped him and the six others with him by suspending them several dozen meters in the air among the trees, and at this point, he was getting annoyed by how pathetically easy this was getting for him.

"Probably more than what we've sprung already," the Zabrak Plekos remarked dryly.

"Are you sure it's much further?" one of the Keshiri Sabers, Restlat, asked the former One Sith member.

"I estimate it should take us another five minutes or so," Plekos answered without taking his eyes away from the darkened path ahead.

"Judicar is still cloaking her presence, right?" the Zeltron Eelos Elbas asked.

"She is," Jendak said. "And she also seems to somehow be cloaking the presences of the Klasses. I didn't even know that could be done."

"Do not underestimate Darth Judicar," Plekos said as he spared a glance at the Saber who last spoke. "Even before she became a Sith, she was renowned as a powerful Jedi, one who even slayed a Yuuzhan Vong Warmaster in one-on-one combat."

"That doesn't sound hard to do," Restlat spoke up, "against an enemy who can't wield the Force."

"It's another thing entirely, though," Plekos replied, "when you can't use the Force to sense them or anticipate their movements. If you ever fought a Vong, you'd understand."

"You fought the Vong?" Elbas asked.

"Yes, but now is not the time to get into that," Plekos said. "Let's just focus on what we have to-"

The Zabrak was cut off from saying anymore when Jendak abruptly placed an arm over his chest, halting his progress forward. Plekos looked with alertness at the human, but the latter only looked forward and flung his shikkar toward another tree. A second after its tip speared into the bark, yet another net sprung up from the ground just two meters in front of them.

"Now what was that about focus?" Jendak retorted as he telekinetically pulled the shikkar back into his hand.

Plekos gritted his teeth in frustration. But before he could make a comeback, everyone froze as the sound of roaring engines coming from the sky were heard. All seven Sith looked back and up, and soon, the shape of a YT-2600 came arcing down from the heavens in their general direction.

"That's the Solo Quest!" Plekos exclaimed. "Jacen Solo's ship!"

"Judicar's brother?" Restlat asked.

Plekos nodded.

"How can you tell from here?" Jendak asked. "Can you sense his presence aboard?"

"No, and that's the thing," Plekos answered fearfully. "I can't sense any living beings aboard that ship! It's a trait he and his sister share through the Force! We have to run!" He quickly grabbed Elbas' wrist and pulled him along as they hurried forward.

After only a few seconds of hesitation, during which the Solo Quest II continued to close the distance with them, the other five Sith followed the Zabrak and Zeltron with hurried steps. As they all ran, though, their shared path zigzagged; with all of their Force-senses on high alert, they deftly avoided the areas where they felt nets and other traps to be.

Less than a minute later, however, the Quest opened up a pair of flashing lights that shined down through the canopy, illuminating the area around the Sith through the darkness of night. The YT-2600 began to hover over the seven Sith's general position as it slowed down to keep pace with them, and, within seconds, it fired a single laser bolt down through the canopy. The projectile of super-heated light struck the area between the five Sith Sabers and their two alien cohorts, sending the former flying back while the latter flew forward from the concussive force.

While Plekos and Elbas collapsed prone to the forest floor, two of the human Sith—Jendak being among them—and both Keshiri landed upon their backs. The last human of the group, Gebzos, ended up being flung against a tree. But before he could have collapsed to his haunches, he must have sprung a Klass trap, as a primitive spear was suddenly launched from the canopy above and impaled him through the torso.

Gebzos grasped vainly at the spear protruding through his chest for a few moments before he slumped forward and died.

From his downed position, Jendak growled in anger and grief as he regarded Gebzos' corpse and looked back up through the canopy to see the Quest adjusting its position. Once it stopped and hovered in place again, another laser bolt lanced out from the ship. Jendak quickly rolled off to his left and was launched forward a few meters, as the bolt had landed right where he had been lying. Still, upon landing, he rolled forward so that he ended up on his feet before he Force-launched himself up toward the nearest tree branch.

Jendak was on that branch for less than a second before he launched himself again for another branch that was just a few meters up. After a few more upward bounds like that, the human broke out from the canopy and was then flying toward the Quest's forward viewport with both his lightsaber and shikkar in hand.

But with a quick and slight adjustment to his ship's position, Jacen Solo, with only determination on his face, fired yet another giant laser bolt for the incoming Sith; Jendak had no opportunity to avoid being utterly incinerated by the projectile.

However, just as Jacen adjusted the Quest's position again to try to get a lock for the remaining five Sith, his vessel bucked down slightly, as if something had impacted against its dorsal side. Jacen opened himself back to the Force, as he feared what it might be, and just as his senses confirmed that one of the other Sith was the object that landed on top of the Quest, he heard the sizzle of a lightsaber cutting through the hull just outside the cockpit.

The Jedi set his ship to hover in place before he quickly unstrapped himself from the pilot seat and hurried to where he heard the enemy's lightsaber. By the time he got there, a meter-wide circular chunk of his vessel's hull fell down upon the deck of the Quest's passenger area and a Keshiri—Restlat-was the one to drop in with his 'saber ablaze in one hand and his shikkar in the other.

Naturally, Jacen unhooked his lightsaber from his belt and activated it in a two-handed grip and stood his ground as the Keshiri began to viciously attack him. The two of them fought in place for several seconds before the last human member of the Sith group hunting Darth Judicar—a man by the name of Yuvan Hefgad—also dropped in through the hole that Restlat had made.

Moments after that, Hefgad's own lightsaber and shikkar were added to Restlat's attacks, and Jacen soon found himself being backed toward the cockpit against the onslaught.

. . .

Before the only other Keshiri member of the Sith group—Vush Keould—could jump up toward one of the tree branches that would take him to the Quest, he was stayed in place when Plekos grabbed him by the elbow. Keould looked at the Zabrak in anger, shook his arm out of his grip, and exclaimed, "How dare you?! I have to help my brethren kill-"

"In case you forgot, Keould," Plekos enunciated, "our mission is to kill Judicar for her betrayal of the Lost Tribe. So let your brethren fight Jacen Solo while we go about our real business; they can buy us some time, at least!"

Keould growled indignantly. "When this is over, Zabrak-"

"Yes, yes, you'll kill me," Plekos interrupted casually. Then, more seriously, he added, "But until then, let's kill a different Sith."

Keould growled again, looked back up toward the Quest, then back at Plekos and Elbas before he followed the other twoi aliens further through the forest.