11

Luke's Plan

Zeph nearly fell over. Maybe out of exhaustion, maybe out of shock. He would never know. The Dueler's List? Zeph could hardly believe it. Ever sincew he had heard about the list, he knew he wanted to be on it. Only slightly disappointed that he hadn't beaten Vendalla, Zeph walked out of the room.

Vendalla was right behind him. "Wow! Good job!" Beads of sweat dotted her head. "I knew you could do it." She breathed heavily until they had gone a few more steps.

"Thanks." Zeph was too tird to talk much. They walked in silence, a quiet, meditative, peaceful silence. Zeph felt at peace. What an accomplishment. Sure he had lost the duel, but he had proven himself good enough to be on the list.

"Let's find Wotapuk, we have to tell him the good news." Vendalla suggested cheerily. Zeph acknowledged how happy she was. She would never admit it, but was she happy because she had won? It wasn't really that much of a surprise. She had always been a good duelist. Maybe she was just happy for him. It would be more like her.

"Alright. Think he is still in class?" Zeph didn't think so. The length of the last class was too long for Wotapuk to still be in his.

"No, let's head to the mess hall. If he's not there maybe he's in his quarters." Zeph nodded in agreement and the pair headed toward the mess hall. The mess hall was unusually empty. How late was it? But their was a still a few people, eating, chatting amongst themselves. Wotapuk was sitting alone at a table, chewing on the remains of his meat. He looked upset.

"Maybe we should wait to tell him." Vendalla whispered upon seeing him. Zeph silently agreed as they drew closer. They sat down on either side of their friend. Vendalla asked quietly, "Something wrong?"

Wotapuk let out a pitiful groan. "What happened?" Zeph asked. Wotapuk pulled a metal object up from underneath the table. It looked oddly like a transfuser for a speeder. Wotapuk explained in his moans and grunts. Zeph suppressed laughter, for his friends sake. "What was left of it?" He asked, wondering how badly the speeder was damaged.

Wotapuk held up the piece in his hand and moaned pitifully. "That's all?" Vendalla asked, raising an eyebrow. "How did you manage to disentegrate all but the transfuser of the speeder? You must have…ran it into the the temple's power converter or something. Wotapuk glared at Vendalla. She smiled as she realized that indeed, he had done this.

Zeph laughed, and set off a chain reaction. Vendalla joined in , and after a few moments, so did Wotapuk. He might be clumsy, and not the best with a saber, but Wotapuk did have a good sense of humor. And he had other strengths as well.

"Master Skywalker, I have the information you requested."

Luke turned to the droid and nodded. "What do you have on it?"

"The unknown chemical is a poison that enters the bloodstream and lays dormant until it reaches the brain. Then it targets and destroys the midiclorians in your body, mainly the ones in your brain cells."

Luke only stared at the droid. Was it possible that the Sith had come up with a weapon capable of severing a Jedi's connetion to the Force? This was devastating news. "You may go…" Luke said, slightly dazed.

Now he needed not only to finish his plan for infiltrating the base undeteted, create a device to target the Sith lightsaber (while still allowing the Jedi to use theirs), and now, he also had to find a means of protection against this new weapon.

He needed help. He couldn't do all of this on his own, even with the help of the Force. Luke stood from his chair in the lab and pressed a few buttons on a console on the wall. The screen flickered, and Leia appeared. "Sister, I need your help."

Leia looked stressed as it was. Hopefully she would be able to help him. "What can I do for you, Luke?" She asked, a tired, but genuine smile on her face.

"I need a team of two to five people who are good with mechanics. I need some of the brightest minds you can find." Luke replied. Maybe with some help, Luke could concentrate on one or two things on his list of things to do. And the team could take care of the creation aspects.

Leia pressed a button on her desk and nodded. "I'll do the best I can, Luke." She said, already moving to a Communications System.

"Thank you, sister."

Oh my it has been a long time. I'm so sorry for taking so long on this one. I am trying to update all (both) of my current stories, so be on the lookout for more in the near future. Thanks for the reviews and keep 'em coming. I'm sorry this one is somewhat short…