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Lowie rumbled his enthusiastic endorsement of the plan.

"I think that's a terrific idea," Luke said.

"Good," Jaina answered, slamming an access hatch on the outside of the Rock Dragon and fastening it. "Then what are we waiting for?"

Lowbacca growled a comment, and Jaina nodded. "The Rock Dragon's ready to go when the rest of you are."

ON THE HELLISH world of Ryloth, half of the planet broiled under sunlight hot enough to soften rock, while the other side crackled with a cold so intense it would make a glacier shiver.

The Twileks, the only sentient beings ever to make a long-term home there, had settled in the narrow band of shadow between daylight and darkness. In this twilight region, surface temperatures above ground remained hospitable enough to support life, but the Twi'leks preferred to build shelters by burrowing into the mountain ranges.

They'd carved great warrens, cities beneath the ground, where their clan system had evolved into a complex male-dominated political structure that had remained unchanged for thousands of years.

Until the Twi'lek woman Nolaa Tarkona had implemented sweeping changes through a swift wave of bloodshed.

Forming the Diversity Alliance had been her key to freedom and power. She was the political movement's outspoken and charismatic leader, uniting downtrodden alien species that had suffered for so long under human domination.

Now Nolaa held the deepest, most defensible chambers beneath the mountains, and had set up her headquarters there.

After her rise to power, her followers had excavated an underground spaceport adjacent to the grotto that allowed her powerful allies direct access to Ryloth, and from there, out to the galaxy at large.

The Twi'lek leader sat in her cool, expanded grotto, a throne room of sorts. She had a great deal of work to do. Managing a galaxy-wide political movement required constant effort, concentration, and vigilance.

Here, deep underground, she had to rely on chronometers and assistants to tell her when it was time to stop working and begin the sleeping period.

Of late, though, she had curtailed her rest hours.

Plans she had set in motion continued to brew; their demands weighed heavily upon her, and she had far too many obligations to bother with sleep. If her revolution failed and she was killed, then she could sleep for all eternity.

Nolaa sat comfortably in her stone chair, not allowing the seething thoughts and emotions inside to show though her facade of outward 'calm.

In a sense, the rich red lighting in this room spoke for her.. It reflected the deep-seated anger and thirst for revenge that boiled in her heart, and the multitude of ideas for bringing about the ultimate triumph of the Diversity Alliance that whirled through her mind.

She clacked her finger claws together, feeling their tough hardness, like the spines on the shell of a sidrek megapede. Nolaa could rip out the throat of any enemy or unsuspecting friend--with one sweep of her hands.

Although she kept herself physically ready for combat, her primary arsenal consisted of the words she used to forge the emotions of crowds into weapons, turning her followers into a fighting force. Nolaa Tarkona had become good at getting her way.

Hovrak, her wolfman Adjutant Advisor, marched into the room, his fetal eyes bright in the grotto dimness. Nolaa kept the reddish lights turned down, but her rose-quartz eyes focused well in the shadows.

She could see that he bore a dispatch in his hairy paw.

With his other hand Hovrak brushed down the dark brown fur that bristled on his face. He bared his teeth in a gesture of respect and said,

"Esteemed Tarkona, I have excellent news--dispatches from two more candidate worlds."

"Good." Nolaa bowed her head, twitching her one remaining head-tail in satisfaction.

The burned stump of the other jiggled in a reflex of long-remembered pain.

Hovrak kept a long and detailed list on an electronic datapad, recording all known nonhuman species. It was his intent, and hers--to recruit members from each one of those species