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A special gift for her mother.

When the bizarre asteroid showed up on her screens, Jaina knew instantly that she had found their target.

"Lowie, here's our new course," she said, highlighting one of the blips among the green lines on the navigational projection panel.

The large asteroid reflected light from the Alderaan system's distant sun. Its surface was pockmarked and pitted, but it gleamed with a metallic sheen. The readings indicated that this asteroid % almost pure metal, with a higher concentration of precious elements than any other in the asteroid field.

They had discovered a lump from the true core of Alderaan, the heart of her mother's world. The other young Jedi Knights leaned forward to see as the Rock Dragon approached the asteroid.

'That's the one," Jaina said.

AS HE SCANNED the surface of Ennth, Zekk was surprised to find scattered settlements in the same locations where previous cities had been destroyed eight years before.

Zekk adjusted the Lightning Rod's course and guided it into the stream of shuttle traffic toward the main settlement, where his parents had lived, where they had made their dreams.... He remembered that the colonists optimistically renamed the villages each timeNew Hopetown, Newer Hopetown, and Newest Hopetown. He wondered what they would do once they ran out of qualifiers.

Powering up the ship's comm system, Zekk transmitted a message to the central control barracks, identifying himself. He briefly told his story, that he was a prodigal son from Ennth who had now returned.

The communications controller greeted him with surprise, but her voice held the breathless urgency of someone burdened with too many responsibilities. She put on another man, an operations commander named Rastur, who was in charge of the evacuation activities. Zekk thought he remembered the man: during the previous disaster, a brave young soldier named Rastur had been decorated for his heroic feats.

He had apparently risen in importance and now had the primary responsibility for preserving the persistent colonists of Ennth.

As he brought the Lightning Rod down into the belt of stormclouds, Zekk hoped the ship wouldn't prove to be aptly named.

He passed through knotted black thunderheads, roiling weather systems churned up by the oncoming moon's tidal chaos.

Below, the landscape of Ennth lay black and jumbled. Hardened lava rock stood out in cracked scabs. The broken outcroppings looked fresh and solid, laid down in the eruptions of only eight years ago.

Zekk saw green patches in the hardened rocky landscape, small jewels of farmland fertilized and tilled. To his astonishment, workers still frantically combed the fields to finish one last harvest before they had to depart from their doomed world. Those food supplies would have to last the people on the refugee stations until the Ennth colonists could reestablish their settlements on a piistine landscape in another year.

Fighting against the turbulent wind, Zekk's ship approached the remains of a bustling spaceport, a stripped-down landing area surrounded by dismantled buildings and partially torn down warehouses.

Zekk brought the Lightning Rod in as several cargo ships, heavily loaded with people and supplies, lumbered into the air.

Barely aerodynamic, the ships wobbled as they gained altitude. Other ships came in and circled, scouting for any available landing space.

He secured the ship, opened the hatch, then bounded down the ramp, ready to help. @oops and rescue workers scurried about-volunteers, colonists, everyone doing their part. The air, smelling of smoke and sulfur, was heavy with humidity and ozone from the stormclouds overhead.

In the city square Zekk saw huge statues, colorful paintings along the sides of lava-brick walls, vibrant artistic expressions everywhere he turned-all being left behind. Each masterwork of sculpture and illustration had been carved or painted in the past eight years as an expression of thanksgiving by the colonists when they had rebuilt their demolished town.