Chapter 1

"Sage and ochre? Really?"

Sera wore a satisfied smile. "Looks pretty good, doesn't she?"

"If you say so." Beside her, Lyra Nimor looked skeptical and distracted. Her eyes were fixed on the words Allegra's Heart inscribed over the cockpit in flowing black script. "Allegra would have loved it, seeing her name on a ship like this."

Sera smiled at her pilot. "Too bad Rei's not here to see it, but she'll be happy when she gets back."

"Where'd she go?"

"She took Yuzu to pick up the bacta bed Doc bought."

Lyra's typically aloof expression devolved into a scowl. "I still can't believe you let him install a medbay. That's valuable cargo space we're losing. Money out of our pockets." She mumbled the last bit.

"You'll be glad we have it if anything happens out there. Plus, we can charge more for passage if we have a decent medbay."

DYR-214 spun its thick disk of a head and fixed two of its photoreceptor stalks on the pair of women conversing below. "Captain Rendix, I've completed your order," droned the droid in its dual-tone metallic timbre. It descended on dodgy-sounding repulsors, retracting all six of its specialized printing and spraying arms into its bulky body as it drew close to the duracrete landing pad. A plastic card poked out of a slot on the droid's midsection. Below that, a sealed pouch, ten by ten centimeters, sat in a bin. Despite its obvious age, the painter droid was immaculately finished in fresh sky blue, with darker accents. "Please inspect the work," it advised. "I'm sure you'll find the result to your satisfaction."

Sera glanced at the invoice card, then the women walked around the Corellian Engineering Corporation YV-929 freighter parked inside hangar seven at the Taloraan starport. The big droid hovered a respectful distance behind. The freshly applied active nanoparticle coating in sage, with ochre and gray detailing, made the boxy freighter look almost new. White block letters set off with black shadow lines on the cargo hull spelled out RIXON CHARTER SERVICE in crisp Aurebesh. On the tail vanes, their ship's ident code had been printed in plain black characters.

Sera drew her credit chip from her jacket pocket and swiped it across the droid's payment sensor. The remaining fifty percent of the invoice balance flashed on its display. "There you go. Maybe use some of that to get those repulsors looked at," she suggested to the droid.

"Everybody's a critic," the big droid intoned, but it lowered its auxiliary treads and rolled away, paint and various coatings sloshing around in the storage tanks bolted to its open tubular frame.

Sera grinned after it. She opened the packet, withdrew a pair of patches emblazoned with the company logo, and affixed them to the shoulders of Lyra's flight jacket. She applied another pair to her own, just above the Sector Force 767 patch with its stylized image of a Razorclaw. "What do you think?"

"Since we're a commercial outfit I suppose we ought to advertise."

"A little different than wearing the insignia of Imperial Customs," Sera suggested.

"Or the badge of a Rebel cell."

Sera's green eyes narrowed by a degree. She wondered whether the strong-willed ex-Imperial officer was trying to start an argument. "Cargo status?"

"Ninety-four tons of refurbished machine parts bound for the water filtration plant on Mon Titia, all secured, Captain."

"You know, you can call me Sera," the former Rebel commando said. "Everyone else does."

The pilot of Allegra's Heart shrugged. "I'm slow to warm up to people."

"Yeah," Sera said, drawing out the word, "I picked up on that over the past couple of months." She stuck her hands in her jacket pockets. "When's our launch window?"

Lyra checked the chrono on her wrist link. "Little more than an hour."

"Alright. Let's get Allegra buttoned up." The two women trod up the ramp under the freighter's belly and retracted it behind them.

Yuzu and Taz shifted the heavy bacta capsule off the small repulsor dolly and shuffled it into the corner of the compact space that Reiko had partitioned in Allegra's starboard cargo bay. The whir of ventilation fans mixed with the scraping of the medical device along the composite deck plates.

"Just a little to the left, Yuzu," Taz said, kneeling so he could fish the power cable from behind the capsule and connect it to the wall socket.

Using his pale yellow right foot and hand with particular dexterity, the L-1g droid nudged the device a few centimeters left. Some of the translucent bacta that they hadn't evacuated splashed back and forth at the foot end of the encapsulated bed. "How does that look, Oktos-nagrasha? Shall I make further adjustments?"

"That looks good, Yuzu," he assured the droid, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. Standing in the doorway, Reiko Hudson snickered behind her hand. "You had to teach him the honorifics?" Taz complained.

She held her hands up innocently. "Not me, sir— Taz." Weeks after they'd left the military she was still getting used to addressing him by name instead of his officer's title. "Yuzu insisted on learning about Filvian customs. He really has quite the curious streak." She smiled sweetly at the droid, who looked at her with his yellow-green optical sensors and tilted his domed head.

"Curiosity is a virtue is it not, Mistress Reiko-nagrasha?"

"I'd say it is."

Yuzu turned back to Taz. "If the location is correct, sir, I'll go ahead and bolt the capsule to the deck if you'd like."

The medic nodded. "Good idea. We don't need this thing banging off the walls if Lyra decides to bounce the ship around."

"Based on my observations, Mistress Lyra-nagrasha is an excellent pilot, sir. I don't believe she would mishandle Allegra's Heart."

"I'm sure you're right, Yuzu. I was making a joke."

Yuzu tilted his domed head. "Were you, sir? Your vocal modulation and somatic expressions did not connote humorous intent."

Rei laughed aloud this time. She was enjoying watching Yuzu's personality and heuristic matrices mature since she'd reprogrammed him. "That's called deadpan, Yuzu."

"Thank you, Mistress. I'll file that for now and look into it further during my next recharge cycle." Yuzu set to work with a drill and bolt driver while Taz did the same on his side of the medical bed. Over the whine of the drill he said, "Lucky we found that Decimator in the desert. This equipment would have cost a fortune."

"It was a goldmine for sure," Reiko agreed. "Engines, repulsors, hyperdrive, reactor and power converters, sensors—" She ticked items off on her fingers. "A good percentage of Allegra is Imperial." She smiled with a sudden thought. "Kind of like her crew!"

"Don't forget the autochef and food synth. Say what you want about the Empire, they didn't skimp on amenities in their diplomatic transports." He finished bolting the bed's bracket to the deck and stood beside the doorway. Rei swiped her hand over the sensor on the wall and the lights came up, flooding the small medbay with bright illumination. The walls were spotless. She'd installed UV disinfectors to keep the room germ-free, and bio-seals around the door in the event they needed to isolate the room.

They'd packed the small space with equipment and furniture. A folding desk with a data terminal just inside the door, a small meds locker on the back wall between the bed and the bacta capsule, exam lights, and a med scanner on segmented armatures overhead. Gas supply connectors, a vital signs monitor and resuscitation equipment were fixed on the wall at the head of the exam bed. Another cabinet held bandages, dressings and surgical supplies. Drawers beneath the bed contained blankets, bed coverings and towels. Below the cabinet was a small basin with filtered, recirculating water and a sonic lavage. The three-by-four meter space was cramped, but definitely usable. Taz looked it over and smiled, crossing his arms.

"Do you like it?" asked Rei.

"It's perfect," he said. "Couldn't ask for more. Well, maybe a medical droid."

"Ooh," Reiko clapped her hands together. "Like an FX-model?"

"Hmm… too bulky for this space. Maybe an IM-series."

"The new IM-Tens are pricey. The older sixes and eights aren't too expensive, though." The engineer nodded firmly. "I'll keep an eye out."

"Oktos, you back there?" Lyra called from the cockpit.

Taz swore and looked like he'd suddenly remembered something he was supposed to do. "Thanks, Reiko, Yuzu," he said and hurried forward.

Lyra shot him an annoyed look over her shoulder as he entered the cockpit. The scarlet streak in her hair matched her tone. "You're late. You want to learn to pilot or not?"

Taz waved his hands apologetically and sat quickly in the copilot's chair. "Sorry," he said. "Rei and I got working on the medbay and I let the time get away from me."

"Well don't," she said. "My time's as valuable as yours."

"I know it is. I'm sorry, really," he repeated, wondering what had her in such a bad mood.

Nimor scowled, but her tone had lost its edge. "Just be on time, next time."

"I will. So, what am I doing today?"

"Simulated landing vectors for low-gravity bodies."

Taz chewed his lip. "Sounds like… something I won't use much."

"You'd be surprised. Some orbital stations, even the bigger capital ships, carry enough mass to affect an approach. The DS-One station was like landing on a small moon."

Taz gave her a suspicious look. "You were on the Death Star?"

Lyra shook her head, catching the cockpit lights in her dark hair's platinum highlights. She'd let it grow since joining Allegra's crew so that it fell a little past her shoulders. It was long enough that she tied it back in a ponytail when she was flying. "No, but one of the pilots in my patrol group was assigned there. She had some stories to tell."

"I'll bet she did," he responded with a sour look. More than two billion sentients on Alderaan, wiped out in a second by that station. Taz had felt sick and uneasy for days afterward. It seemed like Palpatine's war machine was an unstoppable juggernaut, and Rebel cells like theirs were just insects for the Empire to swat away. He didn't think anything could eclipse the horror of Vrast. Alderaan had shown him how wrong he was.

"Hey, Oktos," Nimor said, snapping him out of the past. "The simulation's loaded on bank four." Lyra let go of the controls. "Your ship."

"My ship," Taz acknowledged and grasped the grips on either side of the control column. They were jammed with controls; triple thumbwheels for the sublight drives, thrusters, and repulsors, plus multi-function selectors, safety switches, and dual triggers for the warhead launchers and guns. A display in the middle of the trapezoidal column managed communications, advanced maneuvering options, and secondary ship functions.

The transparisteel windows went opaque and the projection of the simulation began. Taz steered the approach toward a big orbital platform displayed on the viewports.

"Let's start at one-quarter thrust."

"Quarter thrust, aye." He dialed back the freighter's dual ion drives until the display showed twenty-five percent.

The comm pinged. "Kosbin Station Control to inbound YV nine-two-nine transport. Transmit ident code and state your business." The voice bore an uncanny resemblance to Lyra's.

Taz smirked and keyed his mic. "Kosbin Control from Allegra's Heart," he began, then thought for a second. "We're transporting four passengers and incidental cargo. Requesting approach vector and transmitting ident code now." He flipped a switch on the console beside him to ping out their transponder signal.

After a few seconds, the simulated traffic controller with Lyra's voice came back over the speaker. "Allegra's Heart, your ident code checks out. Our auto-approach system is down for scheduled maintenance. Confirm you can land on manual."

"Uh," Taz stalled, looking over at Lyra.

"Hey, you're flying. Tell the lady if you think you can bring her in on manual."

Taz swallowed. "Kosbin Control from Allegra's Heart. Manual landing confirmed." Nice simulation, he thought dryly. "Awaiting approach vector."

"Allegra's Heart, you're cleared on vector one eighty-seven by two thirty-two galactic north relative. Maintain current speed until Terminal, then maintain below twelve meters per second for landing. Bay six-oh-three is yours."

"Acknowledged, Kosbin Control, one-eight-seven by two-three-two galactic relative for Terminal, bay six-oh-three."

Taz twisted the controls, angling the boxy freighter to align it to one hundred eighty-seven degrees relative to the 'horizontal' plane of what would be galactic north, or zero degrees. He had to fly a third of the way around the big deep-space station to get there. Then he dropped down below the station's midline until he was fifty-two degrees below the galactic plane. A structural spine jutted toward him from the station's central hub. At the end of the half-kilometer spar sat a big gray orb. A wide rectangular bay awaited them, its containment field indicated by the solid white glow around the perimeter. Blue and amber lights blinked at the corners. The platform grew in the virtual viewport, a sprawl of faceted domes connected by transit tubes and a webwork of structural members. Other ships of various classes and sizes floated nearby in every imaginable orientation, maneuvering on their own approaches. A huge pusher tug flew overhead, its six engines driving a train of cargo modules that looked to be about four kilometers long. "Just how much time did you put into this sim?" he asked, impressed by the details.

"Pay attention, Oktos. You're off vector by negative five degrees Y-axis."

"Yes ma'am," he answered. Only five weeks after mustering out of the military he reacted to commands the same way he had for the past eight years. Taz added some lateral thrust to correct the deviation. The ship took an unexpected dip. He was supposed to be going up, not down. He changed his angle of attack. Out of the corner of his eye, the former Imperial pilot nodded ever so slightly. Taz worked the sensor controls on his panel with one hand while he flew with the other. He superimposed his approach vector on the viewport image as a series of light blue squares that diminished in size. The final few that disappeared at the landing bay were outlined in red.

As they approached, the squares expanded off the edges of the display to indicate their forward progress. When only a few remained, Lyra said, "Get your speed down before you pass Terminal, or they'll be on your case."

"Got it," he said, reducing thrust and applying back force via the etheric controls. He made a few minute corrections, drifting around like the inexperienced pilot he was. His shoulders felt stiff.

"Don't oversteer her," Lyra said. "She likes to be coaxed. Relax, Oktos."

"Relax, right," he acknowledged, loosening his grip. The ship passed through the containment field and the coaxial scanner beams that checked for contraband and hazardous cargo. Taz flipped the switch to extend Allegra's landing struts and nulled out the forward momentum. He was just about to put the ship down on the simulated permacrete when a sudden shock behind his eyes made him wince painfully. He drew in a sharp breath and uttered, "He needs help."

"Who?" asked Lyra. "What are you talk—" The comm pinged an emergency signal. Lyra switched off the simulation and looked over at Taz, who was already at work manipulating Allegra's communications system. He looked pale and in pain. "My ship," she said, taking control.

His fingers flew over the controls. "Distress call. It's on a narrow burst subspace carrier."

The speakers crackled. Beneath heavy static a voice said, "...Attack… perial research cent… orbiting… Allegra..." Static followed. The voice sounded tinny, mechanical, and fearful.

Reiko appeared at the back of the cockpit. "Did they just call us by name?"

Lyra poked the intercom button. "Captain, you better get up here."

Taz fought the rising bile in his throat. He'd never felt a Force warning this strongly before. It made his gut twist terribly. He dragged in a hard breath and tried not to think about being sick. He couldn't shake the feeling something had been taken from him. He'd think about that later, though. For now, he wanted more answers. He cut in a filter and tried to clean up the signal, drawing deep breaths to stave off his nausea.

"Sitrep?" Sera asked as she strode in, followed by Kallista, their gold and black BD-3000 droid. Taz stood to relinquish her seat, but she waved him back down and strapped into the gunner's station behind him. Reiko did the same.

"Distress call on a subspace narrowcast," said Taz, looking and sounding a little more like himself. "It's piggy-backed on a frequency band that's normally used for navigational data." He shook his head. "Wish I'd paid more attention to Boragog-aktuu when he showed me how to isolate subspace carrier signals."

"Kalli, can you help?"

"Why, yes I can, Captain," said the luxury droid in a sultry tone that sounded terribly out of place in the current circumstances. Her left index finger opened along its axis and reconfigured into a scomp probe. She inserted it into the data socket on the wall, making its concentric disks spin. "Signal isolated." After a few seconds she added, "I'm patching in the navcomp."

"Why?" inquired Sera.

Taz addressed her over his shoulder. Sweat stood out on his ashen forehead. He'd been monitoring the signal that Kallista was cleaning up. "There are hyperspace coordinates encoded on a subchannel." Over the speaker, the tinny voice repeated its message, still as garbled as ever.

"Doc, you feeling okay?"

"I'll be fine, Sera," he assured her. "We need to go there."

"Go where?"

Lyra punched in the coordinates. "Tozen system, in the Freestanding Subsectors, grid Isk-nine. What do you want to do?"

Rei laid her hand over Sera's. "They asked for us, Sera-sha."

"They also said they're under attack. We might be getting ourselves into a fight." She looked at Lyra. "How far?"

"Two, three hours at best speed, give or take."

"Can we emerge a few hundred thousand klicks from the coordinates?"

"Sure." She entered adjustments into the nav console between the two pilots' stations.

Rendix drew a deep breath and let it out. She glanced at Taz, who had a haunted look. "Let's go see who needs our help."

Taz grasped the hyperspace motivator levers and looked over at Lyra. The pilot nodded and he shoved them forward.

Allegra's Heart emerged into realspace beyond the fourth of seven gas giants that comprised the Tozen system. Tozen 4 was an angry-looking world covered with blood-red and ghastly yellow bands of swirling clouds oriented nearly perpendicular to the system's ecliptic. Taz's sensor sweep started seconds later. He confirmed fourteen moons within range of the military-grade sensors they'd salvaged from the disabled Decimator Imperial assault transport back on Jakku. Most of the contacts measured no more than a few thousand meters. It didn't take long to locate energy signatures on the innermost satellite. Taz narrowed the field and boosted power to the sensor dish below the freighter's cockpit.

"Well, Doc?" Sera asked. She'd swapped seats with Taz during the transit and was staring out the front viewport.

"Energy readings consistent with fusion reactors on or near the innermost moon," he answered from the gunnery station behind her.

"Any sign of ships? Attackers?"

He shook his head. "Nothing big enough to see this far out, although—" he keyed in adjustments, "I'm picking up intermittent flares of radiation. Could be some kind of leak, or plasma blasts."

Sera pursed her lips. "Okay, let's move in for a look, but I want an escape vector and emergency jumps pre-programmed."

"On it, Captain," Lyra acknowledged, tapping at the navcomp while she steered with her other hand.

"Doc, can you transmit back on the frequency that sent the distress call?"

"It's a navigational beam— one-way only. To be honest, I'm not even sure how you'd tap into something like that."

"Standard frequencies, then. Let's see if we can raise someone. Rei-sha, let's get weapons and shields online."

"Weapons and shields," Rei repeated, sounding nervous as she powered up the ship's guns, missiles, and deflectors.

"This is the transport Allegra's Heart, responding to the distress call sent from the Tozen system. If you can hear me, identify yourself and state your emergency." Taz recorded his hail and programmed a transmit loop with a twenty-cycle frequency change for each iteration. There were nearly ten thousand civilian frequencies though, so cycling through them was going to take a while.

"Why hijack a nav beacon carrier?" Reiko wondered.

"Either that's the only frequency the sender had available—" Lyra began.

"Or they didn't want anyone to know they were sending." Sera finished. "If that's the case, then—"

"We're blowing their cover," Taz said. He cursed and shut down the recorded hail.

Sera looked back at him. "Turrets and rear missiles, Doc. I've got the ion cannons. Forward guns and missiles are yours, Nimor."

"Understood," Lyra said tautly. She hadn't fired a ship's guns since TIE training during her academy days. She cleared the safeties, feeling uneasy.

A minute later the gas planet's innermost moon came into view. At fifty klicks Taz projected the magnified view from Allegra's sensors on the center viewport. What had been a quartet of domes near the moon's terminator were little more than ruptured, twisted wrecks of transparisteel and structural tubing. A few hundred meters away, a ship banked tightly and strafed the facility. Green plasma bolts flashed from dual laser turrets on either side of its command module. Its angular wings had the classic downturned style of Imperial shuttles, although the typical high tail was absent.

"That's a Nu-class attack shuttle," said Lyra. "It's an obsolete model, a hold-over from the old Republic."

The comm speakers crackled. "Civilian transport, this is a military operational area. You are ordered to depart immediately." The shuttle continued its attacks, sending gouts of ionized dust into the airless space above the little rocky moon with every laser strike.

Lyra punched in a frequency on the panel. "Imperial pilot, this is Allegra's Heart calling on channel TN dash one-oh-eight dash RQ."

There was a slight delay. "This channel is restricted to military comms only. Who is this?"

Lyra took a deep breath. "Ensign Lyra Nimor, Imperial Customs Office," she said in her best command tone. "We've been detailed to transport a civilian from this facility. Stand down until we've completed our pickup."

"This is Lieutenant Granthen of the Imperial Navy. I don't take orders from ensigns in unregistered civilian ships. Depart immediately," repeated Granthen. "Second warning," he added, with just a hint of malice.

"He's not going for it, Nimor," Sera said. She grasped the control column's handgrips that were driving the dual ion cannons in the chin turret beneath the cockpit. They'd flown close enough to see the ship and the facility without magnification. She looked at Taz. "What do you want to do, Doc?"

Taz was looking sick again, worse than before. "He's still down there," he said, breathing like he'd just run an endurance race. "He's terrified, and in pain."

"How do you know that?"

Taz shook his head and waved his hand. "I can— feel it. I think he's communicating with me. Through the Force. We have to get him out of there, while we can."

"What's wrong, Taz?" Reiko asked. She felt his forehead. "You're burning up!"

"I'll manage," he said in a shaky voice. "I don't think he'll survive another strafing run, though."

Sera gave Lyra a hard look. "I don't want to have to fire on them, Nimor."

Lyra nodded tightly. "Imperial shuttle, that facility is unarmed. You don't—"

Laser fire erupted from the shuttle's cannons as the Imperial ship swept toward Allegra on an aggressive intercept vector. Lyra dialed up the throttles and steered away, diving down and hugging the moon's surface. "Granthen, cease fire!" shouted Lyra, pulling up suddenly and rolling the ship in an evasive pattern. The shuttle stayed on their tail. There was a bright flash and Allegra rocked as the rear shield took a blast. Reiko let out a little yelp of surprise.

"Doc, let 'em know we're not pushovers," Sera said. Taz fired a burst from the dorsal rapid-fire turret, striking the shuttle's underside as it sped overhead.

"Wait Oktos, don't shoot!" Lyra shouted. She keyed her comm. "Granthen, we don't want to fight you!"

"I'm not letting them destroy my ship, Nimor," Sera warned, lining up the shuttle in her sight.

"Let me handle this!" Lyra looked desperate. "Granthen, please, don't make us fire on you. Please." The speaker was silent save for some background static; the shuttle had cut the channel. It started another attack run. With an angry cry, Lyra adjusted her heading to align the Imperial ship in the reticle superimposed on the viewport in front of her. Her index finger hovered over the trigger on her control grip.

Sudden blue flashes erupted as Sera fired Allegra's ion cannons, striking the onrushing shuttle with a blast that enveloped it in a tracery of lightning. A secondary detonation near one of its engines made the shuttle wobble for a second before it spun out of control. It slammed into the moon's bright surface, tumbling end over end before disintegrating amid huge clouds of ice and dust.

Lyra reversed Allegra's thrusters, then circled around the crash site. "Granthen! Granthen!" she called into her comm, to no avail. She snarled in wordless fury, leaped out of her seat and stalked away, swearing furiously. At the back of the cockpit she turned. "You didn't have to kill them!" she shouted, enraged tears in her eyes. "Hasn't there been enough killing?" She fled to the lift tube and disappeared to the lower level.

"What was that about?" Sera asked.

Reiko looked shaken. "I don't know. I'll go find out."

Sera shook her head. "I'll go. Doc, can you get us on the ground?"

His brow was furrowed with pain and covered in sweat, but Taz nodded and took Lyra's seat.

"Rei, prep some suits. You and the doc need to find our guest. Who knows if that Imp called in reinforcements." Nothing made sense to her— not the strange covert distress call, the Imperial's attack, or Lyra's outburst. She wanted answers, but first she wanted to get well away from the Tozen system.

Reiko, Taz, and Yuzu moved carefully in the moon's microgravity, using their bounce frames' miniature thrusters to keep them from floating away. The Imperial shuttle's attack had destroyed the only docking ring that Reiko could see. The four hab domes on the facility had all been blasted. Clouds of freezing gasses jetted silently into the vacuum from ruptured supply lines. The three of them made painstaking progress through the wreckage.

Blinking furiously to keep the sweat out of his eyes, Taz consulted his hand scanner and made adjustments as they went. He'd confirmed life signs and movement somewhere in the facility, probably underground. But more than that, he could feel it in his body. From the moment they'd received the distress call, he'd felt, first ill at ease, and then physically sick. The sensation had diminished during their time in hyperspace, but as soon as they'd emerged, it returned, worse than ever. Enviro suits weren't the easiest things to move in at the best of times. In his current state, he was winded and sweating profusely, and he had to fight hard to keep from vomiting. The nausea and unease only increased the closer he got to the life form, and he'd deduced that his disquietude was related to the being they were seeking. More than that, he had a nagging feeling that the Force was somehow involved. Certainly, it was his sensitivity to the Force that had started them on this insane chase.

"Down there," Taz groaned, choking back a gag so hard that tears leaked from the corners of his eyes. He indicated a doorway at the other end of the blasted structure that had once been a lab of some sort, to judge from what few appliances remained intact. Beyond the open portal they could see a set of steps, but structural tubing and debris blocked the entrance almost completely.

Reiko laid a hand on his shoulder. "Are you okay, Taz?" she asked, deep concern lining the young engineer's round face.

"Just disoriented from the transit," Taz assured her, swallowing hard. "Scanner shows atmosphere and gravity, plus one life sign."

"You're a bad liar, sir," Reiko said, but she smiled warmly from behind her helmet visor. "Yuzu, can you clear that blockage?" she asked.

"Of course, Mistress," the droid answered. He made quick work of the wreckage and they headed down the steps.

There was a short landing at the bottom. Rei examined the set of controls beside what looked very much like a pressure door. After a minute she pronounced, "We're in luck. It's an airlock."

"Great," said Taz, panting hard. Sweat stung his eyes and he leaned against the wall just to stay on his feet.

Reiko looked up at him in alarm. "We need to get you back to Allegra. You're about to pass out, sir!"

"I'll manage," Taz uttered. "Just get that door open, Miss Hudson." There were provisions for vomiting built into the enviro suits, but Taz hadn't bothered donning the required suction mask. If he didn't get somewhere with atmosphere soon, there was a real risk that he'd choke to death if he was sick inside his helmet.

Reiko worked the controls. The door opened to reveal a small, dark chamber. "Yuzu, wait here. Come in after we've cycled through."

"Of course, mistress Reiko-nagrasha. I'll be along presently."

Rei supported Taz as much as she could and they shuffled into the airlock. The door sealed and she keyed the pressurization sequence. Atmosphere hissed into the compact space. The indicator light over the door turned green and she pressed the release. The inner door sprang into the ceiling with a sharp hiss.

Beyond lay a spacious area, carved from moonrock and poorly lit by flickering panels. Storage crates and shelves of supplies lay scattered in disarray. Beneath a heavy-looking shelf lay a being, approximately human-sized, clad in dark shimmering robes. It struggled weakly under the steel shelving but waved to them as they entered. Taz unlatched his helmet, fell to his knees, and vomited violently.

"Are you the ones?" said the deep-voiced being in heavily accented Basic. "Did you hear my cries upon the Life Wind?"

"The ones? Life wind?" Reiko asked, torn between who she should help, Taz or the trapped alien. Taz waved her toward the other being, and she approached cautiously under the refreshing pull of artificial gravity. Rei suddenly remembered to keep her hand close to her blaster. The alien had sent a distress call and been attacked by Imperial forces, but that didn't mean it was friendly. She realized this could all be some elaborate ruse, though what its object might be, she couldn't guess.

The being was humanoid, with smooth mottled salmon and brown skin, a narrow, flat face, and a downturned slit of a mouth. Its prominent brow ridges swept up, following a skull that curved back into a peak. Long thin tendrils grew from the brow ridges and hung to the sides, swaying softly. Its cheeks were sunken as were its round, hazy green-gray eyes on its narrow face. "Yes, I called, upon the Life Wind. Allegra?" it asked.

Yuzu entered and turned immediately toward Taz, who stood with his hands on his knees, breathing hard. He waved the droid away. "Go help Reiko."

Reiko tried shifting the shelf, but debris locked it in place. Yuzu grabbed it and lifted. His artificial musculature made easy work of raising the square steel tubing and shelves. Reiko grabbed the creature's shoulders and helped it to scramble away. When it was clear, Yuzu released his burden with a loud clatter.

"I'm Reiko Hudson, from Allegra's Heart. What's a life wind? Do you mean the distress signal?"

The alien shook its tendrils. "Not you, him," it said, pointing a thin finger at Taz. "He wields the Life Wind. I call to him even now."

Taz looked up, ashen and clammy. He was about to vomit again. "Well stop!" he barked in a ragged voice. "Stop calling!"

The other being started, shocked. "Very well," it said, sounding dubious.

Suddenly the dizzying nausea was gone. Taz let out a relieved sigh. His face relaxed, and a blush of color returned to his cheeks. He straightened and took a few deep breaths through pursed lips. He approached the others, feeling better with each step, and knelt beside the being. "Who are you?"

"I am Nanvarr of Konlac, and you are Tazbarada Oktos of Filve, and you are Reiko Hudson of Filve, and you are Yuzu," said the being, looking at each of them in turn, but going back to Taz. "You have heard of my people, the Fereax, have you not?"

"Can't say I have," Taz answered. "What you call Life Wind is the Force?" His mouth was dry, and burned with the acrid taste of bile. He really wanted something to wash out the sickness.

"Indeed, my boy," said the other. "You heard my plea?"

Taz shook his head. "I didn't exactly hear it, but we received your distress call." Nanvarr looked confused, but Taz continued. "We'll have time for questions later. We have to get out of here before more Imperials show up." He looked over the other being, and didn't note any bleeding or apparent injury. "Can you walk?"

Nanvarr patted himself through his robes. "I think so, Tazbarada Oktos."

"It's just Taz," said the former Alliance medtech, and helped Nanvarr to stand. He was short, barely coming up to Taz's shoulder, and very light. "Do you have an enviro suit?"

Nanvarr looked around and felt at his robes, as if he'd lost something. "No, I haven't any use for such a thing."

"Well you do today," Taz said, pointing. "There's nothing beyond that door but hard vacuum." He started rummaging in his utility bag. "What did you do to earn the Empire's displeasure?"

Nanvarr wriggled his fingers. In a harsh tone he said, "I was betrayed."

Taz made a rueful sound and unfurled a dusky parcel of ballistic fabric into a disk a bit larger than a meter. There was a plastic window and a long zipper of the sort used to seal pressure suits. Taz unzipped it and pulled the halves aside.

"What is that, dear boy?"

"A rescue ball. Not the most comfortable thing, but it'll keep you safe until we get back to Allegra's Heart. Get in."

"I need my things. Fetch them for me."

"What things?" Rei asked. She looked worried; they were taking too long. To Taz she added, "There's no telling when the power's going to fail. We need to move, sir."

"My things, my research."

"Where?"

"In my lab." He pointed overhead.

Taz shook his head. "The lab is gone. Destroyed."

"Oh," said Nanvarr. "Such a shame. So much work."

"Taz—"

"I know, Reiko," he said. "Sorry, Nanvarr, we have to go, now."

With some reluctance, the Fereax stepped onto the fabric and hunched down. Taz sealed the rescue ball and activated a small pump that inflated it. He connected its umbilical to the auxiliary barb on his air supply. He and Yuzu each grabbed a haul loop and picked their way back across the cluttered storage room. Taz put his helmet back on and entered the airlock with Nanvarr; the absence of artificial gravity made it simple to maneuver the rescue sphere. When Yuzu and Reiko joined them on the other side, Taz made a dash toward Allegra but Nanvarr scratched urgently at the ball. He pointed toward a twisted plastic and metal console. Taz shook his head. The rescue sphere had no communication equipment.

Nanvarr was animated, gesticulating. Taz was about to continue when he felt a hard shock behind his eyes, followed the next instant by a wave of nausea, and a thought, shouting in his head: data cylinder.

"Okay," he grunted, nodding and waving at Nanvarr. As soon as he took a step toward the console the sick feeling disappeared and his head stopped feeling like he'd touched an uninsulated power conduit. The console wasn't much bigger than an astromech. The shuttle's laser fire had ripped it from its mounting. "Yuzu, grab that console and take it back to the ship."

"Understood, master Oktos-nagrasha."

They hurried back to Allegra's Heart, bounding up to the starboard airlock in the moon's microgravity. Taz took Nanvarr to the medbay and got to work examining the strange being.

Sera found Lyra sitting on her bunk, looking miserable and furious. The former special forces soldier leaned against the door jamb.

"Not interested in company, Rendix."

"I didn't ask if you were," Sera said evenly. "Want to tell me what happened up there?"

Lyra looked defiant. "They didn't have to die," she snapped.

"They?"

She waved impatiently. "Granthen, and whoever else was on that Nu-class."

"If it's a choice between them or us dying, I choose them," Rendix responded.

"Why does there have to be a choice?" Lyra protested, her voice rising.

Sera kept her tone neutral as she tucked a lock of red hair behind her ear. "They made the choice when they fired on us." The other woman crossed her arms, unconvinced. "Listen, I used the ion cannon because I wanted to disable their ship, not destroy it. They just caught a bad break. If we hadn't stopped them they'd have killed— whoever is out there. Would that have been better?"

"No, but..." Lyra trailed off.

"It was a choice between bad choices, Nimor. Sometimes bad choices are all we have."

"I know that." Lyra pounded the bunk with her fist. "But is it always going to be this way? Us shooting Imperials? That could have been me in that shuttle, not too long ago."

"Would you have fired on an unarmed, unshielded facility housing civilians?" Lyra started to respond but closed her mouth. "I didn't think so. Otherwise, you'd never have joined this crew."

"What if that had been an Alliance shuttle?" she challenged.

"I don't care if it's the Chancellor herself. If they fire on my ship, I'm shooting back. Period."

The two women stared at each other. Finally, Lyra let out a long breath. "I'm tired of seeing people get shot and die. I didn't sign on for that."

"I know, and I'm not unsympathetic. But you pleaded with Granthen and he cut the comm circuit. You knew he wasn't going to stop, right?"

Lyra uttered a sigh and looked down at her hands.

Sera waited a moment, then continued. "This isn't a military ship, but we do need some rules. You endangered Allegra and her crew, and you abandoned your station." She thumbed overhead toward the flight deck. "Doc had to cover for you to get us on the ground. You know that was wrong, right?"

Lyra said nothing, but she made a stiff nod after a couple of seconds.

Sera stood up straight. "You're a good pilot, Nimor, and I think you're a good person too, but that can't happen. Not any of it. Not ever. If you abandon your post or put this ship or her crew in danger again, I'll space you, then shoot you in the head, then grind you up for bantha feed. Not necessarily in that order." She turned to leave. In a less strident voice, she added, "I know sometimes it feels like the universe is heaping all of its injustices on you, but it's not. Take a few minutes to get your head straight. After that, I need you on the command deck. I have a feeling that Granthen got off a call to his friends, whoever they are, and I don't want to be here when they show up."

Being completely unfamiliar with Fereax physiology, Taz was reduced to the most basic of examinations. After some debate, Nanvarr agreed to let Taz remove his robes. Beneath the shimmering fabric, the being's body was as slight as Taz had expected, with spindly arms and legs that ended in extremities with four digits, the first opposable. His belly was unexpectedly round, and he had the stumps of four vestigial tails at the base of his spine. He wore a carefully folded and tied loincloth that Taz assumed had some cultural significance. His salmon skin was covered in subtle mottling. Nanvarr was touchy about the physiology of his species, and to judge by his tone and urgent hand motions, uncomfortable with anyone seeing him undressed.

Taz worked as quickly and clinically as he could. After a few minutes he'd verified that apart from some minor lacerations, Nanvarr had escaped injury. "You're very fortunate to have come through that attack pretty much unscathed."

"The Life Wind guided me, as it has most of my life," Nanvarr said, putting his robes back on. "I had a vision of impending danger and retreated below ground before my benefactors arrived."

Taz looked askance. "Benefactors? Are you sure that's the right word?"

"Indeed my boy. Why wouldn't it be?"

"Benefactors don't usually try to kill you."

Nanvarr rocked his pointed skull from side to side. "I suppose that's true. But until quite recently, the Empire was my patron."

"What were you doing for them?"

"Research. I am a researcher. Can you not see any of this my boy? I know you wield the Life Wind. These things should be clear to you."

"Look, I'm sensitive to the Force, but using it is, well... I don't really have much experience."

"Have you not received training?" Nanvarr asked, splaying his four fingers in disbelief.

"No— I mean yes. I mean, not formal training. I have a journal, from a Jedi Master. I've been studying it, trying to learn as much as I can, but…" Taz wore a crooked scowl. "I'm mostly just flailing in the dark."

"I see. Mm hmm. Yes, I see my boy," said the Fereax.

"Can you...?" Taz asked slowly.

"Train you?" Nanvarr shook his head. "Perhaps in a few basic skills, but I have seen enough years to know that I am a poor teacher."

"How do you know how to use the Force?"

"Ancient sages brought knowledge of the Life Wind to Konlac some millennia ago. We carried on their teachings, but our leaders corrupted the Life Wind, and most of my kind perished, or fled. It is quite possible that I am all that remain of the Fereax race now. I have not felt the presence of another in many years. I do know of the Jedi Order though, and of their age-old enemies the Sith, and other users of the Life Wind that came many thousands of years before those sects."

"How did you learn so much, if you aren't a Jedi?"

"I am a researcher, my boy. It was my job to compile information about the Life Wind, its users, and the myriad ways in which it interacts with everything in the universe." Nanvarr's voice held a note of pride as he wiggled his thumb, but he also looked distraught. At least Taz thought he did; the Fereax's face moved very little, his eyes not at all.

He was about to ask more questions, but the intercom pinged. "Doc, we're clear of the planet's gravity. If you've looked over our guest, bring him to the command deck."

Taz keyed the comm on the wall. "On our way."

In the cockpit, Sera, Lyra and Reiko had been joined by Kallista. Her blue recording indicator blinked. Nanvarr bowed to Reiko and sat next to her in the gunnery seat. Taz made introductions.

"I'm very happy to meet all of you, and most grateful for your timely arrival," began the Fereax in an upbeat but slightly nervous tone. With his right hand he tapped his thumb against his third finger. The fingers of his left hand curled with his thumb extended. He looked from face to face.

"Don't take this the wrong way, Nanvarr, but why are you on my ship?"

"Captain Rendix, as you saw, I was being assaulted."

"You sent your distress call long before that attack began," she countered. "While you're at it, maybe you can explain why you didn't just use a standard emergency frequency."

"Perhaps, my girl, some explanation is in order. You see, my benefactors—"

"He means the Imperials who set him up in that research facility," Taz interjected.

"Yes, quite," Nanvarr said, rubbing his middle finger against his thumb to show his annoyance. "They monitored all of my communications, so my cry for aid had to be made by occult means."

"I'd be interested to know how you did that," Taz mentioned.

"The information is in my mind, my boy. I offer it to you freely."

Taz screwed up his mouth. "I told you, I don't really know how to do that. Can you just tell us, please?"

"We'll get the technical details later," Sera suggested. "Why were they attacking you, and what were you doing there?"

"Well, my dear girl Serasana Rendix of Corellia, captain of Allegra's Heart, I was doing research for the Empire. In particular, for the Inquisitorius Program."

"Doesn't ring a bell."

"Inquisitorius is the group that Emperor Palpatine used to hunt down the Jedi who remained after the Republic's clone armies had killed most of them."

"Wait," Taz said, his eyes flashing, "you helped them hunt down Jedi?"

"Not precisely, no," Nanvarr responded uncomfortably. "I provided information about places in the galaxy where the Life Wind blew strongly, or suddenly appeared. They— the Inquisitors and their henchmen— investigated, based upon my research." He looked at each of them, his fingers curling into the somatic expression for discomfort.

"Why would you do that?" Taz pressed him with an intense glare.

"A choice, cowardly made, between collaboration or death. And a promise that they would return me to my home from which I've been estranged for so many years. You see, I've longed to go back to Konlac.

"My people, or nearly all of them, fled after the last of our Priest-Elders brought our race to ruin. Those who remained were driven from their homes when the Empire came, looking for me. They had discovered my previous cataloging work, and they informed me that I would be 'redirecting' my efforts in the service of the Emperor. When I refused to cooperate they began killing the few Fereax left in my village. I relented then. What else could I do?" He looked from face to face, ashamed.

"For some years they let me stay on Konlac, guarded by fearsome machines. But four years ago they brought me here without a word of explanation. I was given little choice, but the Inquisitors' commander, a terrifying half-machine Sith called Vader, said I might return when I'd finished my work." The Fereax went quiet, tapping his fingers together. "Still, I regret what terror my work unleashed. The death of worlds! Uncounted innocents." He pressed his thumbs hard against the middle fingers of each hand and seemed terribly distraught. Quietly he added, "I would return to my ravaged planet and atone, if such a thing is possible."

"Where is Konlac?" Sera asked.

"Far from the Core, and even farther from here." He looked at Taz. "You have my data?"

"The cylinder?" Taz asked. He looked at Reiko.

The engineer took the stubby silvery rod from her sleeve pocket. "I had to fix some data fragmentation, but it should be readable."

Nanvarr looked happy to see it, touching his last finger to his thumb and even managing something that approached a smile on his lipless mouth.

"What's on it?" Sera asked.

"The way home, a small fraction of my research, and some data that my Imperial minders thought might be useful for my cataloging work."

"A small fraction?" Rei said, handing the cylinder to Lyra. She plugged it into the nav computer's scomp port.

"Most of my work was stored in a data vault at the lab, but it was destroyed when my benefactors attacked and betrayed me."

"I'm not surprised they'd renege," Sera said. "You were dealing with the Empire, after all." She looked over at Lyra. "No offense."

"Whatever," Lyra answered. "I'm sure the Alliance never betrayed anybody, right?"

Taz stared at the two women with his 'can we not do this right now?' look. "Nanvarr, you told me that you had a vision of the attack. Do you mean something like precognition?"

"The Life Wind often blows back to us with glimpses of events that may come to pass. I foresaw my domes in ruins and the agents of Imperial will who caused it to be. So I fled, as deep as I could go, hoping the vision was false. But alas, my boy, it was as you saw."

An indicator light on Lyra's panel blinked, accompanied by an alert beep. "Sensor contact." She consulted the display. "Something just came out of hyperspace, and there's comm traffic on the Imperial military bands."

"Looks like we just wore out our welcome in this system," Sera said. "Do you have the route to Konlac?"

"Navcomp's finishing the calculations now." Lyra switched her display to review the data.

"Where are we going?"

"Pretty much the other side of the galaxy. Galactic grid Qek-eighteen. Looks like somewhere in the Dail sector."

"Transit time?"

"Seven days, give or take, if we stick to the Corellian Run and Llanic Spice routes."

Sera nodded. "Lock in a long-range approach, just in case there are more of Mister Nanvarr's benefactors waiting at Konlac." She turned back to their guest. "This is a charter ship. Hyperfuel isn't cheap, and we're gonna burn a lot of it."

Nanvarr's hand motions indicated his anxiety. "I've had no need of money for decades. As for items of value—" He patted his robes nervously.

"I'll cover the fuel and consumables," Taz said to Sera, then fixed the Fereax with a stare. "In return, you're going to show me everything you know about the For— the Life Wind."

Nanvarr made a move that approximated a bow. "Then you are my new benefactor, Tazbarada Oktos of Filve."

Sera put on her decision face. "Get us to Konlac, Nimor."

Lyra scowled and threw the levers.