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One station was not a weapons platform. The largest, it dwarfed the others in size. A thick-bodied ring in silvery gray, its surface was mottled with docking ports and magnetic atmosphere barriers.

Vestara, in the navigator’s seat, gave the shimmering sensor image a close look. “They’ve devoted a lot of firepower to keeping that backworld safe from intruders.”

Luke shook his head. “Those stations are to keep ships from escaping, not arriving.”

That earned him an arched brow. “Escaping?” she repeated.

“You’re right that it’s a backworld. But one of the naturalized life-forms, an insect species called drochs, carries a disease called the Death Seed. Heard of it?”

She shook her head. “But no one names a disease Death Seed if all it does is give you an upset stomach.”

“You’re depressingly logical … Drochs are tiny. They start out that way, anyway. They breed at ferocious rates in dark, damp places. When they encounter living tissue, of most species, they burrow in. Their gift is that they sample the host’s body chemistry and electromagnetic characteristics, even tissue density, and mimic them, becoming all but invisible to scanners. They grow in the host’s body, living off the host’s life energy, and when they are numerous enough, when collectively they begin drawing enough life energy from the host, the Death Seed plague manifests itself.”

Ben scrunched up his face, an expression of mild disgust suggesting he’d heard all this before and didn’t enjoy hearing it again. Luke gave him an understanding smile.

“The skin begins to die. The drochs inside the body continue breeding, releasing more drochs to infect others. The victim experiences bodywide aches and listlessness, impaired thinking, impaired breathing … and then dies. The drochs that do not flee the body are seldom detected, so there are no bacterial, viral, or fungal infections to detect, no poison traces … just death. And under certain circumstances—such as control from a very old, very powerful, very large droch—the illness can be accelerated, claiming its victim when only a few drochs are in the body, killing so swiftly that the necrosis of the skin isn’t even under way.”

Vestara looked at the image of the planet with more distaste—or perhaps respect; Luke couldn’t tell. “I’m surprised you haven’t destroyed the world altogether.”

Ben leaned back as if to put a few extra decimeters between himself and the planet’s image. “There are other life-forms on the planet—human settlers, and an indigenous crystalline life-form, the tsils.”

“How can they survive there with these … drochs?”

“The violet light from the sun, processed through the tsils and other crystals, kills the drochs, and they just get absorbed harmlessly into the body. But you have to stay within reach of the tsils and the sun. Otherwise—well, make sure your last will and testament is up-to-date. Dad, are we going in as Skywalkers or what?”

Luke shook his head. “We don’t want to invite scrutiny at this point. Send our Black Diadem ID again. Captain, Vestara Khai. Crew, Owen Lars, Ben Lars. Cargo, none. Purpose of visit, searching for relatives and genealogical information among the Newcomers.”

Ben nodded and turned to his task. A few minutes later, he received transmitted text. “We’re cleared to dock at Koval Station. The port authority sent a list of decontamination options. We can take Jade Shadow down to the surface, but on liftoff we have to return to the station and put the yacht through quarantine and decontamination—minimum of a full day and lots of credits. If we shuttle down as three passengers, the cost for getting offplanet is lots less and with much faster decontamination.”

“We’ll go the cheap, fast route. The other option is mostly for vessels delivering cargo.”

Ben nodded and began inputting a course to Koval Station.

With the young, appealing Vestara up for the task of taking point, interacting with port authorities, and paying for everything with a credcard not traceable to the Skywalker name, it was simple for Luke