"Thank you," Luke nodded. "But as your patrol ship pilot pointed out, my presence on Honoghr is a danger to you. If you can provide my ship with replacement power cells, I'll be on my way as quickly as I can. I would pay, of course."
"We could accept no payment from the son of Vader," Ovkhevam said, looking shocked at the very idea. "It would be merely a single line of the debt owed by the Noghri people."
"I understand," Luke said, stifling a sigh. They meant well, certainly, but all this guilt about their service to the Empire was going to have to stop. Races and beings far more sophisticated than they were had been equally taken in by the Emperor's deceits. "I suppose the first step is to find out whether you have spares that'll fit my ship. How do we go about doing that?"
"It is already done," Khabarakh said. "The cloudcars will carry word of your need to the spaceport at Nystao. The power cells and technicians to install them will be here by nightfall."
"Meanwhile, we offer you our hospitality," Ovkhevam added, throwing a sideways look at Khabarakh. Perhaps feeling the younger Noghri should let his elder do the talking.
"I'd be honored," Luke said. "Lead the way."
The hut under the cliff overhang was as small as it had looked from the landing boulder. Most of the available space was taken up by two narrow cots, a low table, and what appeared to be the food storage/preparation module from a small spaceship. But at least it was quieter than outside.
"This will be your home while you are on Honoghr," Ovkhevam told him. "Khabarakh and I will stand guard outside. To protect you with our lives."
"That won't be necessary," Luke assured them, looking around the room. Clearly, it had been set up for long-term occupancy. "What do you two do here, if I may ask?"
"I am caretaker to this place," Ovkhevam said. "I walk the land, to see that the plants are growing properly. Khabarakh clan Kihm'bar—" He looked at the younger alien, and Luke got the distinct impression of a grim humor in the glance. "Khabarakh clan Kihm'bar is a fugitive from the Noghri people. Even now we have many ships searching for him."
"Of course," Luke said dryly. With Grand Admiral Thrawn threatening to subject Khabarakh to a complete Imperial interrogation, it had been vital that the young commando "escape" from custody and drop out of sight. It was equally vital that knowledge of the Empire's betrayal be passed on to the Noghri commando teams scattered around the galaxy. The two objectives dovetailed rather nicely.
"Do you require food?" Ovkhevam asked. "Or rest?"
"I'm fine, thank you," Luke said. "I think the best thing would probably be for me to go back to my ship and start pulling those power cells out."
"May I assist?" Khabarakh asked.
"I'd appreciate that, yes," Luke said. He didn't need any help, but the sooner the Noghri worked out this supposed debt of theirs, the better. "Come on—tool kit's in the ship."
"There is further word from Nystao," Khabarakh said, moving invisibly through the darkness to where Luke sat with his back against the X-wing's landing skid. "The captain of the Imperial ship has decided to complete minor repairs here. He expects the work to take two days." He hesitated. "To you, son of Vader, the dynasts express their apologies."
"No apology necessary," Luke assured him, looking up past the shadow of the starfighter's wing at the thin band of stars shining down amid the otherwise total blackness. So that was that. He was stuck here for two more days. "I knew when I came here that this might happen. I'm just sorry I have to impose further on you."
"Your presence is not an imposition."
"I appreciate the hospitality." Luke nodded toward the stars overhead. "I take it there's still no indication they might have spotted my ship?"
"Would the son of Vader not know if that happened?" Khabarakh countered.
Luke smiled in the darkness. "Even Jedi have limitations, Khabarakh. Distant danger is very hard to detect."
And yet, he reminded himself silently, the Force was obviously still with him. That Strike Cruiser up there could easily have turned up at a far more awkward time—say, while the Noghri tech team had been in transit to or from the valley, or even while Luke himself was heading out to space. An alert captain could have picked up on either, and brought the whole thing crashing down right there.
There was a whisper of movement, felt rather than heard over the sound of the river, as Khabarakh sat down beside him. "It is not enough, is it?" the Noghri asked quietly. "This place. The dynasts call it our future. But it is not."
Luke shook his head. "No," he had to admit. "You've done a tremendous job with this place, and it'll certainly help you feed your people. But the future of Honoghr itself . . . I'm not an expert, Khabarakh. But from what I've seen here, I don't think Honoghr can be saved."
The Noghri hissed between his needle teeth, the sound barely audible over the racing water below. "You speak the thought of many of the Noghri people," he said. "Perhaps none really believe otherwise."
"We can help you find a new home," Luke promised. "There are many worlds in the galaxy. We'll find you a place where you can begin again."
Khabarakh hissed again. "But it will not be Honoghr."
Luke swallowed hard. "No."
For a minute neither spoke. Luke listened to the sounds of the river, his heart aching with sympathy for the Noghri. But what had been done to Honoghr was far beyond his power to change. The Jedi, indeed, had their limitations.
There was another ripple of air as Khabarakh climbed back to his feet. "Are you hungry?" he asked Luke. "If so, I can bring food."
"Yes, thank you," Luke said.
The Noghri left. Stifling a sigh, Luke shifted position against the landing skid. It was bad enough knowing there was a problem he was helpless to solve; to have to sit here for two days with the whole thing staring him accusingly in the face only made it worse.
He looked up at the thin trail of stars, wondering what Leia had thought of the whole situation. Had she, too, realized that Honoghr was too far gone to save? Or could she have had some idea of how to bring it back?
Or had she been too busy with the immediate concerns of survival to even think that far ahead?
He grimaced as another small pang of guilt tugged at him. Somewhere out there, on Coruscant, his sister was about to give birth to her twins. Might have already done so, for all he knew. Han was with her, of course, but he'd wanted to be there, too.
But if he couldn't be there in person . . .
Taking a deep breath, he allowed his body to relax. Once before, on Dagobah, he'd been able to reach out to the future. To see his friends, and the path they were on. Then, he'd had Yoda to guide him . . . but if he could find the proper pattern on his own, he might be able to catch a glimpse of his niece and nephew. Carefully, keeping his thoughts and will focused, he stretched out through the Force.. . .
Leia was crouching in the darkness, her blaster and lightsaber in her hands, her heart racing with fear and determination. Behind her was Winter, holding tightly to two small lives, helpless and fragile. A voice—Hans—filled with anger and the same determination. Chewbacca was somewhere nearby—somewhere overhead, he thought— and Lando was with him. Before them were shadowy figures, their minds filled with menace and a cold and deadly purpose. A blaster fired—and another—a door burst open—
"Leia!" Luke blurted, his body jerking violently as the trance broke like a bubble, one final image flickering and vanishing into the Honoghr night. A faceless person, moving toward his sister and her children from behind the shadowy evil. A person edged with the power of the Force . . .
"What is it?" a Noghri voice snapped beside him.
Luke opened his eyes to find Khabarakh and Ovkhevam crouching in front of him, a small glow rod bathing their nightmare faces in dim light. "I saw Leia," he told them, hearing the trembling of reaction in his voice. "She and her children were in danger." He took a shuddering breath, purging the adrenaline from his body. "I have to get back to Coruscant."
Ovkhevam and Khabarakh exchanged gl
ances. "But if the danger is now . . . ?" Ovkhevam said.
"It wasn't now," Luke shook his head. "It was the future. I don't know how far ahead."
Khabarakh touched Ovkhevam's shoulder, and for a minute the Noghri conversed quietly in their own language. All right, Luke told himself, running through the Jedi calming techniques. All right. Lando had been in the vision—he distinctly remembered seeing Lando there. But Lando, as far as he knew, was still out at his Nomad City mining operation on Nkllon. Which meant Luke still had time to get back to Coruscant before the attack on Leia could happen.
Or did it? Was the vision a true image of the future? Or could a change in events alter what he'd seen? Difficult to see, Master Yoda had said of Luke's vision on Dagobah. Always in motion is the future. And if someone of Yoda's depth of knowledge in the Force had been unable to sift through the uncertainties . . .
"If you wish it, son of Vader, the commandos will seize the Imperial ship," Ovkhevam said. "If its people were destroyed quickly, there would be no word from it that would point blame at the Noghri."
"I can't let you do that," Luke shook his head. "It's too dangerous. There's no way to guarantee they wouldn't get a message off."
Ovkhevam drew himself up. "If the Lady Vader is in danger, the Noghri people are willing to take that risk."
Luke looked up at them, an odd sensation rippling through him. Those nightmare Noghri faces hadn't changed; but in the space of a heartbeat, Luke's perception of them had. No longer were they just another abstract set of alien features. Suddenly, they had become the faces of friends.
"The last time I had a vision like this, I rushed off without thinking to try and help," he told them quietly. "Not only didn't I help them any, but I also nearly cost them their own chance at escape." He looked down at his artificial right hand. Feeling again the ghostly memory of Vader's lightsaber slicing through his wrist . . . "And lost other things, too."
He looked back up at them. "I won't make that same mistake again. Not with the lives of the Noghri people at stake. I'll wait until the Imperial ship is gone."
Khabarakh reached out to gently touch his shoulder. "Do not be concerned for their safety, son of Vader," he said. "The Lady Vader will not easily be defeated. Not with the Wookiee Chewbacca at her side."
Luke looked up at the stars overhead. No, with Han and Chewie and the whole of Palace security beside her, Leia should be able to handle any normal intruders.
But there was that final unformed image. The person who he'd sensed drawing on the Force . . .
On Jomark, the Jedi Master C'baoth had made it abundantly clear that he wanted Leia and her children. Could he want them badly enough to personally go to Coruscant for them?
"They will prevail," Khabarakh repeated.
With an effort, Luke nodded. "I know," he said, trying to sound like he meant it. There was no sense in all of them worrying.
The last of the fires were out, the last of the microfractures sealed, the last of the injured taken to sick bay . . . and with an odd mixture of resignation and cold-blooded fury, Lando Calrissian gazed out his private command room window and knew that it was over. Cloud City on Bespin; and now Nomad City on Nkllon. For the second time, the Empire had taken something he'd worked to create—had worked and sweated and connived to build—and had turned it into ashes.
From his desk console came a beep. Stepping over to it, he leaned down and touched the comm switch. "Calrissian," he said, wiping his other hand across his forehead.
"Sir, this is Bagitt in Engine Central," a tired voice came. "The last drive motivator just went."
Lando grimaced; but after all the damage those TIE fighters had inflicted on his walking mining operation, it didn't exactly come as a surprise. "Any chance of fixing enough of them to get us moving again?" he asked.
"Not without a frigate's worth of spare parts," Bagitt said. "Sorry, sir, but there are just too many things broken or fused."
"Understood. In that case, you'd better have your people concentrate on keeping life support going."
"Yes, sir. Uh . . . sir, there's a rumor going around that we've lost all long-range communications."
"It's only temporary," Lando assured him; "We've got people working on it right now. And enough spare parts to build two new transmitters."
"Yes, sir," Bagitt said, sounding a shade less discouraged. "Well . . . I guess I'll get over to life support."
"Keep me informed," Lando told him.
Switching off the comm, he walked back to the window. Twenty days, they had; just twenty days before Nkllon's slow rotation took them from the center of the night side across into full sunlight. At which point it wouldn't much matter whether or not the drive motivators, communication gear, or even life support were working. When the sun began its slow crawl up the horizon over there, everyone still left in Nomad City would be on their way to a very fast and very warm death.
Twenty days.
Lando gazed out the viewport at the night sky, letting his eyes flick across the constellation patterns he'd dreamed up in his occasional idle moments. If they could get the long-range transmitter fixed in the next day or so, they should be able to call Coruscant for help. No matter what the Imperial attack force might have done to the shieldships at the outer system depot, the New Republic's spaceship techs ought to be able to get one of them flying again, at least well enough for one last trip into the inner system. It would be tight, but with any luck at all—
Abruptly, his train of thought broke off. There, just shy of directly overhead, the brilliant star of an approaching shieldship had appeared.
Reflexively, he took a step toward his desk to sound battle stations. If that was the Imperials again, come to finish the job . . .
He stopped. No. If it was the Imperials, then that was that. He had no more fighters left to send against them, and no defenses remaining on Nomad City itself. There was no point in stirring up the rest of his people for nothing.
And then, from the desk came the screeching static of a comm override signal. "Nomad City, this is General Bel Iblis," a well-remembered voice boomed out. "Can anyone hear me?"
Lando dived for the desk. "This is Lando Calrissian, General," he said, striving for as much nonchalance as he could muster. "Is that you out there?"
"That's us," Bel Iblis acknowledged. "We were out at Qat Chrystac when we picked up your distress signal. I'm sorry we couldn't get here in time."
"So am I," Lando said. "What's it look like at the shieldship depot?"
"Afraid it's something of a mess," Bel Iblis said. "These shieldships of yours are too big to easily destroy, but the Imperials took a crack at it just the same. At the moment this one seems to be the only one in any shape to fly."
"Well, it's all pretty academic, anyway," Lando said. "Nomad City is done for."
"No way to get it moving again?"
"Not in the twenty days we've got before the dawn line catches up with us," Lando told him. "We might be able to dig it underground deep enough to last out a trip around the day side, but we'd need heavy equipment that we haven't got."
"Maybe we can pull it off Nkllon entirely and take it to the outer system for repairs," Bel Iblis suggested. "An Assault Frigate and a couple of heavy lifters should do the trick if we can get another shieldship flying."
"And can convince Admiral Ackbar to divert an Assault Frigate from the battle planes," Lando reminded him.
"Point," Bel Iblis admitted. "I suppose I should hear the rest of the bad news. What all did the Empire get?"
Lando sighed. "Everything," he said. "All our stockpiles. Hfredium, kammris, dolovite—you name it. If we mined it, they got it."