Because Gavar Khai could sense that his daughter was located somewhere in the depths of the Jedi Temple, one of the first things that he and his remaining Sith Sabers did was locate a turbolift even as they continued to deflect laser bolts fired by the Temple's ceiling-mounted turrets; it had only taken a few minutes after their entrance into their mortal enemy's sanctuary. Unfortunately, Khai had lost a Saber to an explosive booby-trap, like the one that had taken out the Sabers who opened the door that allowed them into the Temple.
"Get away from there!" Khai shouted as he saw two Sabers head toward the smoky entryway; he was still swinging his lightsaber to deflect more bolts back toward the turrets above. So, with no time or breathing room to express words in an efficient way, Khai sent a quick sentiment through the Force to his remaining Sabers that succinctly conveyed the idea that if they were to use a turbolift shaft—with or without an actual turbolift on the way down—the Jedi could still use that against them somehow.
"Emergency stairway!" Khai finally concluded. "We need to find one!"
And they also had to hope that whatever traps the Jedi could have laid for them at such a stairway could somehow be circumvented.
From there, it took Khai and his Sabers another fifteen minutes of slowly advancing their way against the fire of the ceiling-mounted turrets before they finally came upon the entrance to an emergency stairway. And by that point, the Sith were reduced to 27, including Khai, just as a deflection from his blade was the one to destroy the last turret above them.
But standing directly opposite from the Sith were two dozen Jedi in battle-ready stances; their lightsabers that varied in color from person to person were ablaze and stood in stark contrast to the Sabers' uniform red blades. Khai and his subordinates mirrored the Jedi's stances, prepared for the inevitable battle to come.
"I say this only once," an elderly human male Jedi with a green-bladed lightsaber said; he stood in the middle of the group. "Lay down your weapons and surrender."
"You waste your breath," Khai replied, "by saying it only once, Jedi."
Nothing more had to be said as the Sabers charged in toward their foes, who stood resolute as they blocked off the entrance to the emergency stairway.
. . .
Despite the harrowing ride that brought about several scrapes, close calls, and even a few minor hull breaches, the shuttle ferrying Luke and the Colony passengers who saved him from Centerpoint Station's destruction made it safely to UnuThul's nestship Oroboro's Memory. Once they settled down, FealaTaar helped Luke off from his resting place along the three passenger seats, placed one of the human's hands along his shoulder, and carefully but quickly guided him toward the shuttle's exit with the Killiks.
"We will loan you this one's own ship, Master Skywalker," FealaTaat said, "so that you may escape from this system and live to fight Abeloth when she finally emerges."
The Mon Calamari Joiner's words only registered fully in Luke's mind once they stepped foot in the hangar bay of the Oroboro's Memory. And when they did, a horrible realization struck Luke that made him falter in step, prompting FealaTaat to steady him and ask, "What is wrong, Master Skywalker?"
"My ship," Luke whispered; he was looking ahead to nowhere in particular in the hangar. "The Jade Shadow. It's... gone."
In getting to Centerpoint, he had docked the Shadow in one of the station's bays before he departed to try to save their chance of keeping Abeloth in the Maw. And since the Shadow was in that bay when Centerpoint was destroyed, Luke realized that not only had he lost that ship, he had lost a very important piece of his late wife Mara.
"You can get another ship, Master Skywalker," FealaTaat responded hastily; it was clear that since they were all in the midst of combat, the Mon Cal had clearly missed how distraught Luke truly was. "But right now, we must get you out of this system."
Gritting his teeth in both frustration and determination, Luke looked at the Joiner and poured a little bit of vindictive venom into his tone as he said, "The Corellians have their interdiction fields up. There's no way we can get out of this system."
"We will find a way, Master Skywalker," FealaTaat said as they moved toward a small F8 freighter docked several meters before them. "Even if it means that the Prime Unu must be sacrificed."
"UnuThul would do that for me?" Luke asked; for the moment, he had forgotten about the Shadow's destruction.
"You are our greatest hope in stopping Abeloth," FealaTaat explained. "If it means the survival of the Colony, if not the rest of the galaxy, the Prime Unu would gladly give their lives for it."
"No," Luke protested weakly; his injuries from that thermal detonator blast on Centerpoint were then acting up. "You don't have to do this. There are other Jedi, great, powerful Jedi who can take on Abeloth. I'm not-"
"Yes, you are, Master Skywalker," FealaTaat said as he stopped them in their tracks and glowered at Luke. "You are. If any Jedi has the power to destroy Abeloth, it is you. The Prime Unu knows it to be so. We know it to be so. Thus, you must be the one to take on this responsibility."
Punctuating the Mon Cal's statement was a shaking of the Oroboro's Memory from what was no doubt a critical hit from a Corellian war vessel.
"We have little time," FealaTaat said. "We must get you aboard immediately."
"But the interdiction fields..." Luke trailed off as they closed the distance to the freighter.
"Like we said," FealaTaat muttered grimly, "we will find a way."
. . .
Jacen knew it was his responsibility to bring Judicar directly back to Shedu Maad now that he had her again. But right now, he didn't see any reason for the hurry. He could report in on his success later; for now, he just sat next to his sister in the Solo Quest II's passenger compartment within one of the rows of seats. He didn't know how long they had sat there after he set the ship down on the forest floor; they didn't say a word to each other, nor did either of them try to commune through their twin bond. Jacen just looked at her profile while she sulked mournfully, her head bowed in grief, waiting for her to say or do something that could somehow make him feel useful to her emotional healing.
Because, for the first time since she was captured on Centerpoint Station all those months ago, Jacen was really starting to see the old Jaina Solo shine through the Sith that she had become.
From where he was seated, Jacen had a pretty decent view of the cockpit, and he couldn't help but notice that dawn was approaching this side of Adumar. When that happened, Judicar said, "I didn't think much of him, you know."
"Herush Klass?" Jacen asked as he brought his view back to his sister.
She nodded before she turned her tear-streaked gaze at him. "At first, I just saw him as nothing more than a useful tool for me to use. He was getting me away from you, the Jedi, the Sith. But as soon as I found out I was..."
"Pregnant?" Jacen asked.
She nodded again as she closed her eyes, as if she was absorbing that information all over again. When she opened them again, she said, "Something changed in me. I felt life in me, Jacen, when I had only felt a desire to bring death to those around me. And at first, I thought, 'I have to get rid of this thing. It's not me. All I have to do is just use the Force, and maybe I could...' But when faced with that decision, I realized I couldn't do it. Whatever was in me, that led me to kill Mara, the World Brain, all those people on Coruscant and the Errant Venture, suddenly became so... small and... insignificant. It's still there, don't get me wrong. I still feel all the rage, all that hatred, that Mara and Jag brought out in me, but now... it's as if it became something that I could just.. put away. Do you know what I mean?"
"I think I do," Jacen said. "Maybe not completely, but I think I do." He didn't want to reiterate his own experiences with Vergere and the Yuuzhan Vong; right now, he didn't think Judicar—no, Jaina, he was starting to realize—would have been particularly interested. And besides, he wouldn't have been, either.
She nodded in response. "So when I realized that I couldn't just do that to the life within me, it felt like my eyes were opened again. The man who had saved me was no longer a useful tool I could use; he was the father of my child. And he had been willing to save me just because he cared about me, loved me, for that matter. Now I may not have loved him like he did me, but that doesn't change the grief I feel. I don't know. Maybe I'm just... feeling that grief for Zekk that I wasn't allowed to feel after he died. Maybe I'm feeling the grief for the man Jag used to be before I saw him over Qoribu. Whatever the case, though, I can't help but feel this for Herush Klass, a man I probably would've never thought twice about ever again if I hadn't seen him after the Dodonna. It's all very weird, very strange, I know, but still..."
When it became clear that Jaina didn't have anything else to say, Jacen said, "You don't have to explain to me. Just know that I'm here for you now... Jaina."
Tears welled up in her eyes as she looked at him again. But before either of them could make a move, they both felt two familiar presences enter the Adumar system.
It was their mother and father, Leia and Han.
With a small smile, Jacen said, "Let's go say hi to Mom and Dad."
Minutes later, the Millennium Falcon had set down in the same clearing that the Quest occupied. Jacen and Jaina waited patiently for the legendary YT-1300 to lower its landing ramp and for their parents to step down from it.
When they finally did, Han and Leia stood a wary distance from their twin children, but with both their gazes resting firmly upon their daughter. That moment felt longer than it actually was before the elder Solos approached her to close the distance.
"Jaina?" Leia was the one to ask as she looked deep into her eyes.
"Yes, Mom," she whispered. "It's me. I'm back."
Leia's face scrunched up with emotion before she quickly took hold of her daughter in a fierce hug that Han was also fast to join. The three of them stood that way, sobbing wordlessly, while Jacen stood apart from them, not knowing if he had it in him to do it.
But then he joined them anyway.
. . .
Over an hour passed since the fighting in the corridor that led to the emergency stairway had started, and by then, the number of Jedi had been all but reduced to three while Khai still had four Sabers—all human—at his call. And once again, as they all stood surrounded by the maimed and cauterized bodies of the fallen Jedi and Sith around them, Khai panted with exertion alongside his surviving Sabers. The three Jedi—among them being the one who gave the offer to surrender, a silver-haired human woman, and a female Mon Calamari—panted just as fiercely as they stood before the entrance to the stairway.
"You cannot win, Jedi," Khai said. "As you can see, you are clearly outnumbered. So step aside and I promise to spare you and your younglings, for all I want is my own."
"Oh," the silver-haired woman spoke up. "So you're Vestara's father, aren't you?"
Khai nodded with a twisted smile. "And like any father, Sith or otherwise, I am willing to kill to protect her. But then, I don't suppose any of you would understand that."
"We understand more than you would think," the Mon Cal said. "We are not like the Jedi of old."
"No?" Khai asked. "Well, even if you do allow for families now, you are still nevertheless self-righteous, arrogant do-gooders who can't accept that the lesser beings of this galaxy must be subjugated, not defended."
"Lesser beings, huh?" the male Jedi retorted. "Simply because they can't use the Force? There are plenty of these so-called lesser beings who can-"
"Enough talk!" Khai interrupted. "Die, Jedi!"
Quickly, with his free hand, he unleashed a torrent of Force-lightning for the trio of enemies, which they all absorbed with their lightsaber blades. But as the Jedi stood in place to disperse the deadly energy into their weapons, Khai's four remaining Sabers circled away from him to approach the trio not with their lightsabers, which they had hooked back to their belts, but with their unsheathed shikkars.
However, before any of Khai's subordinates could strike, the silver-haired woman turned and, instead of dispersing the lightning into her blade, redirected it at her two intended attackers. They flew off their feet and struck the wall behind them to collapse unconscious to the floor.
The Mon Calamari, however, took one shikkar to her ribs, and another right into her back.
"Cilghal!" the human woman screamed as the fish-like alien collapsed to her knees while her attackers pulled their shikkars out of her.
That caused the human woman to lose her concentration in absorbing Khai's lightning attack, and she, too, was blown off her feet and sent flying back to the wall behind her. And like her would-be attackers, she landed upon the floor unconscious.
Which only left the elderly human Jedi, who had to work more than ever to disperse the lightning attack now that Khai had to focus only on him.
Thus, that human Jedi, acting Grand Master of the Jedi Order Kenth Hamner, had no chance of defending himself before the Saber who stabbed Cilghal in the back slit his throat.
Khai ceased his torrent and watched with malicious glee as the Jedi before him brought his free hand up to his bleeding throat in a vain attempt to staunch the fatal wound's effect. He took a few steps back before his back hit the wall behind him; then he slid to his haunches, and even from this distance, Khai saw the moment when the Jedi's life faded from his eyes.
Mere seconds later, the silver-haired Jedi, Tionne Solusar, awakened from her unconsciousness and gasped in shock when she saw the acting Grand Master's corpse on the opposite side of the entrance to the emergency stairway.
Then, without warning, an invisible grip appeared around her throat, and she was lifted into the air through that choke-hold.
Khai held his hand up as he closed the distance to Tionne. "Now, Jedi," he said, "you will have no doubt secured your younglings, including my daughter, in a bunker underneath your Temple. All I need from you is the information to get to her."
Khai lowered Tionne down to his level and placed his free hand up to her head to begin the painful, coma-inducing process of extracting the knowledge of the bunker's code from her mind.
