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Luke could feel the heat now; for all the Wraiths’ claims, heat soaked into the descent unit and was transmitted into the pod, cutting through his environment suit, through his armor, causing him to burst into sweat from scalp to toes.

The sensor board before him winked out. Then, beyond it, he saw the pod interior surface go from black to red, to yellow—and then flame was licking at it there, flame that grew and spread.

The pod rocked. Luke knew that friction had to have caused a pit in the bottom of his pod; atmosphere was getting a foothold in the pit, causing greater friction, causing the whole unit to sway. He felt a rumble in his feet as the repulsorlift there increased power output to keep the unit upright.

Abruptly there was a bright flash and the top of the pod was gone. Luke found himself in a column of fire, streaming yellow flames that reached from the edges of the descent unit at his feet straight up into the air; he could see nothing beyond it. For a moment, a memory over twenty-five years old rose before him, the vision of the smoking remains of his Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru, as they lay on the sands in front of his home on Tatooine.

He forced the memory away and tried to gain a little perspective. If this is bad for me, he thought, what is it going to be like for Tahiri? A teenager?

Luke felt a jolt under his feet, sudden deceleration; his knees flexed as he absorbed the shock. The deceleration remained constant and the flames began to diminish, to waver.

In moments he could see his surroundings through them. Mara was no more than ten meters away, her face not visible through her environment suit and Yuuzhan Vong armor. The others were all nearby.

They were less than two kilometers above the world’s surface, still falling, but not at terminal velocity. And though he’d lived on Coruscant for many years, this wasn’t the surface he remembered. Great buildings lay toppled, their angles no longer conforming to those of the structures around them. Everything was coated with green, a poisonous shade of the color. At least the orange-and-brown clouds in the distance, full of rain and lightning, were the same, one reassuring piece of familiarity.

“Interesting ride, farmboy.” Mara’s voice was clear over the comlink; any interference brought on by the atmospheric friction of their decent was now ended.

Luke repressed a snicker. “Not too bad.”

“Face?” That was Tahiri’s voice, faint, full of emotion. Luke winced. He and Mara would need to offer her some reassurance.

“Yes?”

“I want one! I’ve got to have one of these when we get back. Oh, what a ride! Can we do it again?”

Luke shook his head and felt Mara laughing at him.

One-One-A had to use his blaster on the main door into the cargo bay. Once it was shredded and gone, the atmosphere from the passageway nearly blew the two of them into the bay itself, but the combat droid held fast.

Lando poked his head in. The B-wing seemed to be secure. The cargo ramp door was still down, maybe gone, and he could see starry space beyond—space, and, as the remains of the ship rotated, a coralskipper still pouring fire into its side as the ruins descended toward the atmosphere.

Cold began seeping into Lando’s bones. “Let’s go.”

A minute later, just as the outer edges of the Record Time began glowing from friction, Lando’s B-wing erupted from the cargo bay, turning away from the pursuing coralskipper, away from the frigate and other skips that had chosen to hang back once their task was done. With 1-1A silent in the passenger seat, Lando plotted a course that would carry them out of Coruscant’s mass shadow, to a point where he could make a jump, any jump, to hyperspace and get clear.

He turned to look at the combat droid. “And I did it looking good,” he said.

“Is this taunting, too?”

Borleias

The biotics facility was in clear sight now. Jaina could see it, her squadmates, the surviving starfighters and blastboats of the other eleven squadrons defending the site, and fires—dozens of fires raging in the jungle outside the kill zone. She poured her lasers