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Jacen straightened. At last, the Duros was listening—because instead of pushing his demands, Jacen had sympathized. “I agree,” he said. “But they destroy what they despise. There are things you don’t know about the Yuuzhan Vong. I’ve even been their prisoner. I’ve—”

“How did you get away?” Brarun demanded.

Jacen exhaled heavily. He looked down at the floor, then raised only his eyes. “My uncle came for me.” It had been spectacular. Since Master Luke was undoubtedly tracking his feelings, he sent a pulse of gratitude.

“There, you see?” Brarun drew up taller. “Anyone whose mother is a Skywalker cannot stand down from being a Jedi.”

“I’m trying,” Jacen said. “I am seriously trying to find out what I am, apart from all that.”

Brarun rubbed his gray-green thumbs together over his folded hands.

“I’ve seen terrible things,” Jacen continued. He related some of them: the slave-taking, the preoccupation with pain. “And death,” he finished. “We’ve seen them sacrifice whole shiploads of prisoners. We know it’s sacrifice, not simply elimination. I’ve spoken with a woman who was also their prisoner.” Danni Quee’s sad face flitted through his mind. He hoped she was safe, back on Coruscant. “I don’t think you’d be safe, even if you took these habitats to another world. They’d shoot to destroy your technology.”

“Is that a threat, Jedi?”

“No,” Jacen exclaimed. “I’m trying to help you, Vice-Director. To warn you, not threaten you. We have to stand together.”

“The old symbiosis dogma. Did you know that even as your water-treatment settlement tried to become symbiotic with the Gateway dome, Gateway was trying to develop more-dependable water sources of its own and become independent of you? That was in your mother’s weekly report.” He tilted his head triumphantly. “She, a Skywalker, was not working toward symbiosis at all.”

“We are interdependent,” Jacen insisted. “Every settlement’s work will contribute to making the surface habitable again.” A bizarre idea drifted into his head. He wasn’t authorized to do this … but … “Vice-Director, if we settlers, the first people of a new Duro, offered to pay a tariff, a percent of all future goods, would that help ensure delivery? Say … two percent?” That seemed plenty generous.

The Duros stared over his clasped hands. Jacen held his breath. They both knew Jacen wasn’t authorized to offer this. If other settlements called this a betrayal, they’d come braying for Jacen’s blood, not the vice-director’s.

“Twenty.” Brarun waved one hand. Out one corner of his eye, Jacen saw those big human security guards relax.

“Too much.” Jacen felt increasingly awkward. His mother had authorized him to try diplomacy, but did that include giving away goods? “SELCORE negotiated with CorDuro for delivery of supplies,” Jacen insisted. “Your people are already being paid.”

“And you,” the vice-director said, “have been sent to me as a negotiator. Fascinating.” He raised a finger, beckoning one bulky aide away from the two inoffensive Kubaz. “Jedi Solo, I would like to continue these negotiations. Please consider yourself my guest, for the time being. Until I can contact your mother, and Coruscant.”

Did the Duros mean to hold him for ransom, or as a hostage? Or would Brarun really negotiate? Jacen was glad there’d been witnesses in here, though no one could call them impartial. He couldn’t wait to tell Master Skywalker about his vision, too. Finally, he might get some help settling his mind.

“I’ll ask one condition, though.”

Brarun’s brow ridge rose. “I do not believe you are in a position to set conditions.”

“Wait. Listen. Deliver all the supplies you contracted to take groundside, as long as I’m your … guest.” His uncle would like that, even if Anakin was too young to understand.

“You have no way of checking that, Jedi.”

“Don’t I?” Jacen looked hard into the Duros’ large eyes. In fact, he didn’t. But Brarun didn’t know that. “You must help us hold back the Yuuzhan Vong. If we can’t maintain a strong front against them,