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Mara nodded. “The files contained the complete technical specifications for those things. There’s a ton of data there, and we have no idea what they were looking for in pulling them up. The implication, though, is not good.”

Luke sat down at his desk and stared at the list of files. “The reason the control file didn’t list these fifteen requests is because whoever asked for the files went in and deleted the requests, right? Covered her tracks?”

“Or his, yes.” Anakin shook his head. “I tried to go through and see if I could pull the data from memory, but the appropriate memory sectors had been overwritten twice. Whoever did it is very good.”

Luke sighed, then looked up at his wife. “You have suspects?”

She nodded slowly. “I checked our files. There are a handful of Jedi who have the necessary computer skills. I ruled Anakin out immediately, ditto Tionne. Most of the others I’m not concerned about, but Octa Ramis could be a problem.”

Luke called to mind the dark-haired woman. “She was close with Miko Reglia, wasn’t she?”

“Tionne said they had a romance at the academy. She thought they’d drifted apart after graduating and going their separate ways, but the logs of their travels suggest they were able to meet several times.” Mara shrugged. “I don’t recall her being particularly distraught at his memorial service on Yavin 4, but I was not in the best of shape then.”

“I was preoccupied. You notice anything, Anakin?”

“She wasn’t weepy or anything that I saw, but then I didn’t pay that much attention to her. I’m sorry.”

“That’s okay. It’s not your responsibility.” Luke nodded. “Do you think she pulled these files down to try to build a weapon to use against the Yuuzhan Vong? I can’t see the sense in that.”

Mara shook her head. “It would take years to build another Death Star. The fastest to build would be a Sun Crusher, but the facility for doing that is gone. I can’t imagine anyone, no matter how much in grief, would look at building one and causing stars to go nova just to get rid of the Yuuzhan Vong.”

“That would be extreme, yes.”

“But isn’t that what Kyp did?” Anakin frowned. “To avenge his brother’s death by the Imperials, he destroyed Carida.”

“And found out his brother wasn’t dead after all, but died when the planet did, yes.” Luke sighed heavily. “The ends never justify the means. You’ve checked on Octa?”

“She has boarded her ship and is on her way.”

Luke sat back and ran a hand over his jaw. “Interesting. Her associates?”

Mara smiled. “She’s been on a number of missions with Daeshara’cor.”

“But Daeshara’cor is on the Durastar, going off to Bimmisaari. I mean, Artoo reported to me that the Durastar suffered a drive failure so came out of hyperspace early, but Corellia is supposed to be sending ships out to ferry the passengers on to their destination.”

The droid shrilled confirmation of Luke’s comment.

Luke’s wife nodded. “If you look at the standard emergency rescue report appended to the request for aid, you’ll see one rather significant item. There are zero Twi’lek females listed on the passenger manifest.”

“What?”

Anakin smiled. “I figure she boarded, planted some memories on the staff, then left the ship before it departed. The list of passengers was made up based on the folks who reported to evacuation stations.”

“And you’d have to think, Luke, that a Jedi would be very hard to miss in that sort of emergency situation.”

The Jedi Master closed his eyes. “Something here doesn’t make sense. Octa looking for superweapons does make sense. The Yuuzhan Vong killed Miko. I can see her wanting to seek revenge, even if it’s of the dark side. But what is Daeshara’cor’s motive? Were she and Miko ever close?”

Mara shrugged. “I don’t know, but I think motive is secondary right now. We need to find out where she went.”

Anakin laughed. “That should be easy. There are only so many places where a superweapon could be built, right? The shipyards at Kuat . . .”

The Jedi Master stood. “Building a superweapon isn