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Lando cleared his throat. “You’re right, of course. Sorry. A bad reflex.” Looking at her now, he had to force himself not to wince. He’d met her for the first time years ago, at the height of the Yuuzhan Vong war, when she was still a teenager, still mourning the death of her sister Numa, still physically perfect.

Still sane.

Now she stood before him, a weird gleam in her eyes, her shoulders at different angles. He’d heard the list of mutilations she had sustained and knew them to be matched by the savage injuries her mind had endured.

Her tone remained curiously friendly, nonthreatening. “Where are the Solos?”

“Oh. Um…Corellia?”

“No. Here. Aboard. Where?”

“If I tell you, you won’t kill me?”

“We would never kill you. We have always admired you.” There was almost a purr to her voice.

“That’s comforting.” He pointed his cane at her.

It, too, was yanked from his grip by invisible forces and flew into her hand.

Now Alema really did look hurt. “You were going to shoot us with a concealed blaster?”

“Not exactly. Zap-zap.”

At Lando’s command word, electrical arcs, tiny and blue, curled from the ends of the cane and flowed across Alema’s skin. Her eyes widening, she convulsed, her muscles locking in a tetany caused by the charge flowing through her.

But she didn’t fall unconscious. Lando cursed under his breath. The weapon maker who’d built the cane to Lando’s specifications had assured him that the charge would take down a good-sized Wookiee.

But the weapon maker had never dealt with Jedi.

Alema fell, landing atop Lando’s blaster, but clearly was still struggling against the shocks paralyzing her even as wisps of smoke began to rise from her body. And the electrical arcs seemed to be getting weaker…

The turbolift doors whooshed open and Lando ran back down the passageway, toward cross-corridors filled with people, filled with light.

He wouldn’t waste breath on a comlink call until he was surrounded by people. He put every effort toward running.

Something seemed to move within his head, as though there were a greased worm writhing in his brain matter, heading toward the exit of one of his ears. He ignored the sensation. He ran.

The first cross-corridor was ahead, lightly trafficked. He turned rightward into it, toward heavier concentrations of people. His rapid movement didn’t attract much attention; a lot of people were running. A few moments later he was in the midst of a thick crowd of Errant Venture personnel streaming out of a casino now being evacuated.

He pulled out his comlink. Now he could…

He could what?

Call someone, he supposed. But who? And why did he need to call anyone? What had he been running from?

And where had he lost his blasted cane?

Shaking his head, and wondering whether age really was beginning to affect his faculties, he put his comlink away and looked around for the nearest turbolift.

CORELLIAN SPACE

Luke had to agree that Wedge’s improvised plan was a good one—or would be, if it worked. But then, he decided, that was true of all plans: in retrospect, they were only as good as they were successful, regardless of how brilliant they might have appeared before execution.

He and Mara were many kilometers out ahead of Wedge and Corran and a few kilometers to one side of the straight-line approach the enemy force was taking. As soon as their sensors detected the incoming frigate, he and Mara shut down all active systems and went dead in space, merely drifting. From this point until they rejoined Wedge and Corran, they would not use their comm systems; their Force-bond, undetectable by sensors, would be their only means of communication.

Passive sensors showed Wedge and Corran approaching the enemy force, showed the enemy’s starfighters arraying themselves out in front of the frigate as a defensive screen. Luke nodded. These were wise, basic tactics. The frigate and starfighter screen passed Luke’s and Mara’s position, and Luke’s sensors showed the frigate to be an ax-shaped Nebulon-B.

The Jedi waited