• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

“We are independent of the worrrlds at great distance.”

The answering “Yes!” picked up volume.

“Symbiosis,” she cried, “interrrdependence. They are for the weak. The weak must stand togetherrr to stand at all!”

The Duros cheered.

She crouched down, pressing her palms together. “Like the point of a duha spear, like the blade of a knife, strrrength lies where metal comes to a point. Where worrrlds stand alone, with no need to wait for other fleets to defend them, there is trrrue might. Each of us,” she concluded, sweeping an arm out over the crowd, “must be strrrong. Strong enough to take what she wants … and defend it!”

Loud cheers.

Mara backed up against Luke and turned her masked head slightly. “This kind of talk could finish what’s left of the New Republic.”

She caught just a shade of Force energy spinning around him, extended to protect her. Evidently he wasn’t trusting completely to their disguises, but taking a basic defensive stance, blurring the orator’s view of their faces.

“I’ve heard enough,” he said.

Anakin hadn’t gone far. R2-D2 couldn’t roll sideways in a crowd, so when Mara caught Anakin’s attention and flicked a gloved finger, he nodded and backed away from the podium in a straight line. R2-D2 rolled beside him, wearing a new coat of copper-hued glaze.

The avenue inbound from Duggan Station was lined with planters that served the obvious dual purpose of aesthetics and air-scrubbing. Most local traffic seemed to travel on one- or two-passenger hoverbikes or enclosed hoverpods.

They found an inexpensive hostel, where Luke took a two-room unit. It had three basic cot-over-storage units and a refresher. One wall was programmable to several flatscreen images, including—according to its instruction panel—an exterior view of Bburru City, hanging majestically in space over the dull-brown planet below; Coruscant’s night side, with or without an overlay of auroral displays; or shipping traffic entering and exiting hyperspace near Yag’Dhul, at the intersection of the Corellian Trade Spine and the Rimma Trade Route. Mara left it blank.

R2-D2 rolled straight to a data station and plugged himself in. Mara peeled out of her goggles, mask, gloves, and dark robe, emerging in a comfortable flight suit.

By then, Anakin’s disguise lay strewn all over his cot. He sat down, stretching and flexing his fingers. “After all the New Republic has done for them, how could they think that way?”

“That’s just one troublemaker,” Mara said. “But sometimes, it only takes one. Remember Rhommamool, and that firebrand Nom Anor.”

“Fortunately,” Anakin said, “I didn’t meet him.”

For Mara, Rhommamool had been a second encounter. Serving as a minor diplomat’s bodyguard to festivities on Monor II, she’d endured Anor’s rhetoric until even the gentle native Sunesi couldn’t tolerate him. They’d asked him to leave.

“Anor fanned an intrasystem resentment into open warfare at Rhommamool. Got most of his own people killed … and himself, too. But one troublemaker can sometimes be reached.”

Luke nodded. “Reasoned with. I hope that’s what we’ve got here—”

R2-D2 bleeped urgently.

Luke paused halfway through pulling off one boot. “What is it, Artoo?”

Mara couldn’t follow the stream of toots and whistles.

Evidently Luke couldn’t either. “Hold on, hold on.” He pushed up off his cot and crossed to the readout over R2-D2’s data port. Mara felt a sudden, somber change in his mood.

“Nothing serious,” he told her, “everyone’s all right. But Han and Jacen’s dome just got evacuated into Leia’s. Some kind of infestation.”

“Jacen’s probably collecting again,” Anakin said.

“Not funny,” Mara muttered. “I don’t think Duro supports much life.”

Luke’s eyes unfocused for a moment. “They’re all fine,” he said. “And Jacen just arrived up here on Bburru.”

“Great,” Anakin muttered.

“Anakin,” Luke said softly, “Jacen has to find his own path. It’s part of hitting maturity. Sometimes that takes a while.”

Anakin sniffed. Mara wondered if she’d ever had a sibling, and if they would’ve gotten along.

“All right,” she said. “We’ll bump into him sooner