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“Where is everyone?” Kyp said. “We’ve got to find Master Skywalker.”

Dorsk 81 looked up at the enormous stepped pyramid where the Jedi praxeum had been established. His face grew calm, and he closed his yellow eyes, reaching out with the Force until he sensed the group of Jedi trainees across a narrow tributary of the river at one of the other temple ruins.

“Over there,” he said. “At the Temple of the Blueleaf Cluster.”

Kyp nodded, his dark eyes flashing. “We have to warn them and begin preparations.”

They rushed through narrow jungle paths, crossing the river to the tall Massassi ruin, a cylindrical tower made of crumbling stones, much in need of repair. Dorsk 81 saw the Jedi trainees working together, nearly thirty in all.

He recognized Kirana Ti, the warrior woman from Dathomir and the older, somewhat-confused hermit from Bespin, Streen, working to haul fallen rocks from a collapsed portion of the temple. They used Jedi powers to lift broken slabs out of the way, and to keep themselves safe from the pebbles that continued to shower down as they removed debris. Kam Solusar, the hard-bitten Jedi veteran, sternly watched the activities, directing the work of the lesser-trained Jedi students who had arrived at the praxeum in the last year.

The silvery-haired Jedi scholar, Tionne, spotted them first. “Kyp,” she called. “Dorsk 81. You’re back! Good, we could use some help.” Tionne smiled, and her mother-of-pearl eyes lit up. She explained breathlessly, gesturing with small, quick movements of her delicate hands. “With all the new students arriving, we had to find additional living quarters. This old temple is—” Then she finally registered the alarm and emotional turmoil emanating from them.

“What is it?” Kam Solusar said, breaking through the conversation. Kirana Ti stepped beside him, tall and imposing in her reptilian armor.

“Where’s Master Skywalker?” Kyp said. His voice cracked, and the words came out in a cold, strained tone.

“He and Callista left more than a week ago,” Tionne said. “It’s only us here. I’m directing a few training sessions while he’s gone but—”

“The Jedi academy is in great danger!” Dorsk 81 blurted. “Admiral Daala has assembled a new Imperial fleet, and Yavin 4 is their target this time. The Star Destroyers could be here any moment.”

“No,” Streen said, shaking his frizzy gray head and blinking red-rimmed eyes as he gazed up into the pale blue sky. “No. They’re already here.”

As the old hermit said this, Dorsk 81 also felt a brooding oppressiveness far overhead, like a stain of starless darkness across the canvas of space.

“Look,” one of the new trainees said, extending a clawed finger as her bright bluish frill rose up in alarm. A snakelike hiss came from her wide, scaly mouth.

A shower of bright streaks danced through the upper atmosphere toward the jungles—lines traced in fire by sharp fingernails made of lava.

“Landers and ground assault vehicles,” Kam Solusar said.

“We must prepare to fight them,” Kirana Ti insisted.

“But Master Skywalker isn’t here!” cried one of the new trainees.

Kyp Durron drew himself up, though he was smaller in stature than many of those gathered at the ruined temple. “Master Skywalker will not always be here to help whenever we are in trouble. Dorsk 81 and I have already sounded the alarm, and New Republic forces should be on their way. For now, though, we must defend the academy ourselves.”

“But there are so few of us,” a birdlike trainee squawked, his hard beak gaping open, then clacking together.

“Yes,” Kyp said, “so they won’t expect much resistance. We’ll have to prove them wrong.”

Dorsk 81 stood beside his friend. “We are Jedi Knights. Remember what Master Skywalker has taught you: There is no try.”

The Imperial landers crunched into the jungle not far away, then dep oyed giant vehicles from drop shells.

“Here comes the air strike,” Kyp said, just as a flurry of black dots in the air screamed closer with a roar of twin ion engines, a full wing of TIE