Vision of the future

'One of the ships seems to be missing,' Luke pointed out.

'I know—Parck mentioned it was on its way in,' Mara said, swinging herself up onto the ladder.

'Nothing we can do about that one. Go on, get busy.'

She disappeared inside. 'Right,' Luke murmured, reaching out with the Force to lift Artoo up and into the hatch behind her. Then, stepping to the next ship in line, he ran a quick eye over it. The fighter was three times the size of an X-wing, with a set of four TIE-fighter solar panels melding into a disturbing flow of alien lines.

And presumably with a set of repulsorlifts on the underside...

He ducked under the bow. There they were, one pair running longitudinally along each side of the centerline: the subtle but distinctive diamond pattern of repulsorlifts. Four quick slashes with his lightsaber, and they were no longer functional. Ducking around the landing gear, he moved on to the next ship.

He had disabled seven of them, with another seven to go, when he caught the change in Mara's emotional texture. Slowly, with the slightly awkward movements that came of a pilot unfamiliar with her craft, the ship lifted half a meter off the floor and eased forward. His comlink beeped—'We've got company,' Mara's voice announced tightly; and as Luke concentrated he could sense both wary Chiss minds and ysalamiri-created blank areas approaching over the rooftop. 'Snap it up—I'll try to keep them busy.'

And she did. The interior of the hangar was flickering with reflected light from the firefight by the time Luke finished disabling the last of the fighters: soft blue flashes from the Chiss hand weapons, a sharper and brighter blue from Mara's ship. Ready, he thought toward her, sprinting across the line of disabled ships toward the end of the hangar opening where most of the brighter flashes seemed to be coming from. He reached it, eased a careful eye around the corner—

Get ready, Mara's acknowledgment flowed into his mind; and with a sandstorm blast of backwash, the ship dropped past the overhang and bounced to a rough landing in front of him. Luke was ready. Even as the ship bounced up again, he was sprinting around its tail to its far side. The hatchway Mara had used earlier was standing open; throwing Jedi strength into his leg muscles, Luke leaped upward, catching the door and pulling himself inside to land in an undignified sprawl on the deck. 'Go!' he shouted, stretching out with the Force to pull the hatch closed. Mara needed no encouragement. Already the ship was jumping toward the sky, the roar of repulsorlifts not quite drowning the pinging of Chiss shots slapping into the underside and back. Are we safe? Child Of Winds asked anxiously. He was pressed into the aft-most seat, his claws gripping the safety straps.

'I think so,' Luke soothed him, listening to the fading pings of heat-stressed metal as Mara pulled for altitude. 'All they seem to have is antipersonnel weapons down there. Unless they can get their heavier stuff on line quickly —'

'Luke, get up here,' Mara's taut voice called back from the flight deck. Luke scrambled to his feet, his mind reaching out to Mara's. The dark thought was still there, lurking in the back of her mind. But it had now been superseded by something else, a tangle and mixture he couldn't decipher. He dodged past Artoo, gurgling pensively in a droid alcove, and dropped into the copilot seat beside Mara. 'What is it?' he snapped.

'Look at the fortress,' Mara told him, turning the ship into a slow rotation.

'What, the weapons towers?' Luke asked, stretching out with the Force as he looked down at the structure turning lazily into view out the canopy. He couldn't see or sense any indication they were preparing to fire. He glanced at Mara's board, searching for the sensor displays—

'Forget the logistics and strategy for a minute,' Mara said curtly. 'Look at the fortress. Just look at it.'

Luke felt his forehead wrinkling as he gazed down through the canopy again. It was a fortress. Walls; a flat, roundish, angled roof with a hangar in the middle; four weapons towers following the curve of the roof in back, one intact tower farther down in front—

'Look at it,' Mara said again, very softly.

And with a sudden shock, he saw it. 'Stars of Alderaan,' he breathed.

'It's almost funny, isn't it?' Mara said, her voice sounding strange. 'We automatically dismissed the whole idea that it could be some kind of superweapon. Thrawn never used superweapons, we all said.

'And yet, that's exactly what it is. The only kind of superweapon someone like Thrawn ever used. The only kind he ever needed.'

Luke thought about that galaxy holo in the command center, and all the planets and resources Thrawn had gathered under his control. Enough to tip the balance of power in any direction its inheritors chose. 'Information,' he said, a shiver running through him. Mara nodded. 'Information.'

Luke nodded back, gazing down at the fortress now receding into the surrounding hills as Mara pulled the ship away again. The flat-roofed fortress with its four towers in back and one in front stretching upward toward the sky. Looking for all the world like four fingers and a thumb reaching to pluck the stars from the sky.