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"Stop!" Zan screamed again, nearly breaking free. If it wasn’t for I-Five holding him, the Zabrak would have leapt from the carrier in a futile attempt to save his que-tarra.

Futile, because by the time he’d reached the in-strument all the transports would be too far away and moving too fast for him to catch. He wasn’t an athlete, the Zabrak. And what pilot would risk a ship filled with patients and doctors to rescue just one man, no matter how impressive his music?

As Den watched, I-Five and Jos Vondar hauled the stricken Zan back into the carrier, which continued to move off into the twilight, slowly picking up speed.

Den headed for his own transport at a trot. He looked at the quetarra case. It was only a dozen meters away - if he changed course now, he might possibly be able to grab it up and still reach his transport-Something else blew up, much closer this time. He heard the unmistakable thwip! of shrapnel zipping past him, mere centimeters away. Not as big as the flywheel fragments, but big enough to punch a hole through him and let his life out very quickly.

Your ride is over there, Den! Go, go, go!

But Zan’s anguished cry echoed in his mind-the cry of someone who had just lost a big part of himself.

Without further thought, Den turned and trotted toward the fallen instrument case.

His inner voice went straight to lightspeed: Are you milking insane? Get on the transport, now!

"In a minute," he said aloud. "Just got to grab one more thing-"

His inner voice was not placated. Fool! Moron! Idiot! You would risk your life for a-a-musical instrument? This is beyond lunacy!

"You heard him play," Den said. "A guy like that needs his art to survive."

His inner voice called him names that would make a Slime Sea sailor blink.

But by then, he was there. He grabbed the case with-out slowing down, even though it felt as if his arm was being pulled from its socket-how could such light and beautiful music come out of such a heavy instru-ment? - and veered back toward the transport.

He could see several beings gathered at the open cargo gate, among them Zuzz, the Ugnaught who had spilled his guts-or whatever Ugnaughts used for guts-about Filba. It felt like months ago; hard to believe it had only been a week. They were all waving frantically at him to hurry. And he was trying, but the blasted case seemed to be increasing its mass exponentially every minute. And it was too awkward to carry by the handle. He swung it up and over his head, hanging on to the case’s neck with both hands and letting the body cover his back like a bizarre carapace.

Something big and heavy slapped the case from be-hind suddenly, knocking it into Den’s back and sending him sprawling. The sound of the explosion took half a second to reach him after he was up and moving again, so it wasn’t that close, he told himself.

Just close enough to almost kill him.

Den set his teeth, grabbed the case with both hands, and ran for all he was worth.

Eager hands reached down, grabbed him, pulled him on board. The transport swooped up and forward, leav-ing most of Den’s viscera back on the ground, or at least that’s how it felt. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that the ground where buildings had stood only mo-ments before was now scorched and pitted dirt. As he watched, another mortar hit, producing a blast that nearly burst his eardrums and almost fried his optic nerves. He realized that both of his droptacs were gone-probably knocked out of his eyes when he was hit by that concussion wave. Ditto his sonic dampeners.

Everything was far too bright and noisy. But at least he was alive to notice.

He looked at the case and saw that the top was scorched and pitted with shrapnel. Not enough to pene-trate to the instrument within, but, had that been his back, he probably would not have survived.

"See?" he said quietly. "It saved my life."

If you hadn’t gone after the milking thing, you’d have been in the transport when the blast hit! Fool! Don’t ever try to be a hero again!

Den looked at the case, startled.