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  Luke finally stood away, openly admiring the other’s uniform. “I didn’t know you were back. When did you get in?”

  The confidence in the other’s voice bordered the realm of smugness without quite entering it. “Just a little while ago. I wanted to surprise you, hotshot.” He indicated the room. “I thought you’d be here with these other two nightcrawlers.” Deak and Windy both smiled. “I certainly didn’t expect you to be out working.” He laughed easily, a laugh few people found resistible.

  “The academy didn’t change you much,” Luke commented. “But you’re back so soon.” His expression grew concerned. “Hey, what happened—didn’t you get your commission?”

  There was something evasive about Biggs as he replied, looking slightly away, “Of course I got it. Signed to serve aboard the freighter Rand Ecliptic just last week. First Mate Biggs Darklighter, at your service.” He performed a twisting salute, half serious and half humorous, then grinned that overbearing yet ingratiating grin again.

  “I just came back to say good-bye to all you unfortunate landlocked simpletons.” They all laughed, until Luke suddenly remembered what had brought him here in such a hurry.

  “I almost forgot,” he told them, his initial excitement returning, “there’s a battle going on right here in our system. Come and look.”

  Deak looked disappointed. “Not another one of your epic battles, Luke. Haven’t you dreamed up enough of them? Forget it.”

  “Forget it, hell—I’m serious. It’s a battle, all right.”

  With words and shoves he managed to cajole the occupants of the station out into the strong sunlight. Camie in particular looked disgusted.

  “This had better be worth it, Luke,” she warned him, shading her eyes against the glare.

  Luke already had his macrobinoculars out and was searching the heavens. It took only a moment for him to fix on a particular spot. “I told you,” he insisted. “There they are.”

  Biggs moved alongside him and reached for the binoculars as the others strained unaided eyes. A slight readjustment provided just enough magnification for Biggs to make out two silvery specks against the dark blue.

  “That’s no battle, hotshot,” he decided, lowering the binocs and regarding his friend gently. “They’re just sitting there. Two ships, all right—probably a barge loading a freighter, since Tatooine hasn’t got an orbital station.”

  “There was a lot of firing—earlier,” Luke added. His initial enthusiasm was beginning to falter under the withering assurance of his older friend.

  Camie grabbed the binoculars away from Biggs, banging them slightly against a support pillar in the process. Luke took them away from her quickly, inspecting the casing for damage. “Take it easy with those.”

  “Don’t worry so much, Wormie,” she sneered. Luke took a step toward her, then halted as the huskier mechanic easily interposed himself between them and favored Luke with a warning smile. Luke considered, shrugged the incident away.

  “I keep telling you, Luke,” the mechanic said, with the air of a man tired of repeating the same story to no avail, “the rebellion is a long way from here. I doubt if the Empire would fight to keep this system. Believe me, Tatooine is a big hunk of nothing.”

  His audience began to fade back into the station before Luke could mutter a reply. Fixer had his arm around Camie, and the two of them were chuckling over Luke’s ineptitude. Even Deak and Windy were murmuring among themselves—about him, Luke was certain.

  He followed them, but not without a last glance back and up to the distant specks. One thing he was sure of were the flashes of light he had seen between the two ships. They hadn’t been caused by the suns of Tatooine reflecting off metal.

  The binding that locked the girl’s hands behind her back was primitive and effective. The constant attention the squad of heavily armed troopers favored her with might have been out of place for one small female, except for the fact that their lives depended on her being delivered safely.

  When she deliberately slowed her pace, however, it became apparent that her captors did not mind mistreating her a little. One of the armored figures shoved her brutally in the small of the back, and she nearly fell. Turning, she gave the offending soldier a vicious look. But she could not tell if it had any effect, since the man’s face was completely hidden by his armored helmet.

  The hallway they eventually emerged into was still smoking around the edges of the smoldering cavity blasted through the hull of the fighter. A portable accessway had been sealed to it and a circlet of light showed at the far end of the tunnel, bridging space between the rebel craft and the cruiser. A shadow moved over her as she turned from inspecting the accessway, startling her despite her usually unshakable self-control.

  Above her towered the threatening bulk of Darth Vader, red eyes glaring behind the hideous breath mask. A muscle twitched in one smooth cheek, but other than that the girl didn’t react. Nor was there the slightest shake in her voice.

  “Darth Vader … I should have known. Only you would be so bold—and so stupid. Well, the Imperial Senate will not sit still for this. When they hear that you have attacked a diplomatic miss—”

  “Senator Leia Organa,” Vader rumbled softly, though strongly enough to override her protests. His pleasure at finding her was evident in the way he savored every syllable.

  “Don’t play games with me, Your Highness,” he continued ominously. “You aren’t on any mercy mission this time. You passed directly through a restricted system, ignoring numerous warnings and completely disregarding orders to turn about—until it no longer mattered.”

  The huge metal skull dipped close. “I know that several transmissions were beamed to this vessel by spies within that system. When we traced those transmissions back to the individuals with whom they originated, they had the poor grace to kill themselves before they could be questioned. I want to know what happened to the data they sent you.”

  Neither Vader’s words nor his inimical presence appeared to have any effect on the girl. “I don’t know what you’re blathering about,” she snapped, looking away from him. “I’m a member of the Senate on a diplomatic mission to—”

  “To your part of the rebel alliance,” Vader declared, cutting her off accusingly. “You’re also a traitor.” His gaze went to a nearby officer. “Take her away.”

  She succeeded in reaching him with her spit, which hissed against still-hot battle armor. He wiped the offensive matter away silently, watching her with interest as she was marched through the accessway into the cruiser.

  A tall, slim soldier wearing the sign of an Imperial Commander attracted Vader’s attention as he came up next to him. “Holding her is dangerous,” he ventured, likewise looking after her as she was escorted toward the cruiser. “If word of this does get out, there will be much unrest in the Senate. It will generate sympathy for the rebels.” The Commander looked up at the unreadable metal face, then added in an off-handed manner, “She should be destroyed immediately.”

  “No. My first duty is to locate that hidden fortress of theirs,” Vader replied easily. “All the rebel spies have been eliminated—by our hand or by their own. Therefore she is now my only key to discovering its location. I intend to make full use of her. If necessary, I will use her up—but I will learn the location of the rebel base.”

  The Commander pursed his lips, shook his head slightly, perhaps a bit sympathetically, as he considered the woman. “She’ll die before she gives you any information.” Vader’s reply was chilling in its indifference. “Leave that to me.” He considered a moment, then went on. “Send out a wide-band distress signal. Indicate that the Senator’s ship encountered an unexpected meteorite cluster it could not avoid. Readings indicate that the shift shields were overridden and the ship was hulled to the point of vacating ninety-five percent of its atmosphere. Inform her father and the Senate that all aboard were killed.”

  A cluster of tired-looking troops marched purposefully up to their Commander and the Dark Lor
d. Vader eyed them expectantly.

  “The data tapes in question are not aboard the ship. There is no valuable information in the ship’s storage banks and no evidence of bank erasure,” the officer in charge recited mechanically. “Nor were any transmissions directed outward from the ship from the time we made contact. A malfunctioning lifeboat pod was ejected during the fighting, but it was confirmed at the time that no life forms were on board.”

  Vader appeared thoughtful. “It could have been a malfunctioning pod,” he mused, “that might also have contained the tapes. Tapes are not life forms. In all probability any native finding them would be ignorant of their importance and would likely clear them for his own use. Still …

  “Send down a detachment to retrieve them, or to make certain they are not in the pod,” he finally ordered the Commander and attentive officer. “Be as subtle as possible; there is no need to attract attention, even on this miserable outpost world.”

  As the officer and troops departed, Vader turned his gaze back to the Commander. “Vaporize this fighter—we don’t want to leave anything. As for the pod, I cannot take the chance it was a simple malfunction. The data it might contain could prove too damaging. See to this personally, Commander. If those data tapes exist, they must be retrieved or destroyed at all costs.” Then he added with satisfaction, “With that accomplished and the Senator in our hands, we will see the end of this absurd rebellion.”

  “It shall be as you direct, Lord Vader,” the Commander acknowledged. Both men entered the accessway to the cruiser.

  “What a forsaken place this is!”

  Threepio turned cautiously to look back at where the pod lay half buried in sand. His internal gyros were still unsteady from the rough landing. Landing! Mere application of the term unduly flattered his dull associate.

  On the other hand, he supposed he ought to be grateful they had come down in one piece. Although, he mused as he studied the barren landscape, he still wasn’t sure they were better off here than they would have been had they remained on the captured cruiser. High sandstone mesas dominated the skyline to one side. Every other direction showed only endless series of marching dunes like long yellow teeth stretching for kilometer on kilometer into the distance. Sand ocean blended into sky-glare until it was impossible to distinguish where one ended and the other began.

  A faint cloud of minute dust particles rose in their wake as the two robots marched away from the pod. That vehicle, its intended function fully discharged, was now quite useless. Neither robot had been designed for pedal locomotion on this kind of terrain, so they had to fight their way across the unstable surface.

  “We seem to have been made to suffer,” Threepio moaned in self-pity. “It’s a rotten existence.” Something squeaked in his right leg and he winced. “I’ve got to rest before I fall apart. My internals still haven’t recovered from that headlong crash you called a landing.”

  He paused, but Artoo Detoo did not. The little automaton had performed a sharp turn and was now ambling slowly but steadily in the direction of the nearest outjut of mesa.

  “Hey,” Threepio yelled. Artoo ignored the call and continued striding. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  Now Artoo paused, emitting a stream of electronic explanation as Threepio exhaustedly walked over to join him.

  “Well, I’m not going that way,” Threepio declared when Artoo had concluded his explanation. “It’s too rocky.” He gestured in the direction they had been walking, at an angle away from the cliffs. “This way is much easier.” A metal hand waved disparagingly at the high mesas. “What makes you think there are any settlements that way, anyhow?”

  A long whistle issued from the depths of Artoo.

  “Don’t get technical with me,” Threepio warned. “I’ve had just about enough of your decisions.”

  Artoo beeped once.

  “All right, go your way,” Threepio announced grandly. “You’ll be sandlogged within a day, you nearsighted scrap pile.” He gave the Artoo unit a contemptuous shove, sending the smaller robot tumbling down a slight dune. As it struggled at the bottom to regain its feet, Threepio started off toward the blurred, glaring horizon, glancing back over his shoulder. “Don’t let me catch you following me, begging for help,” he warned, “because you won’t get it.”

  Below the crest of the dune, the Artoo unit righted itself. It paused briefly to clean its single electronic eye with an auxiliary arm. Then it produced an electronic squeal which was almost, though not quite, a human expression of rage. Humming quietly to itself then, it turned and trudged off toward the sandstone ridges as if nothing had happened.

  Several hours later a straining Threepio, his internal thermostat overloaded and edging dangerously toward overheat shutdown, struggled up the top of what he hoped was the last towering dune. Nearby, pillars and buttresses of bleached calcium, the bones of some enormous beast, formed an unpromising landmark. Reaching the crest of the dune, Threepio peered anxiously ahead. Instead of the hoped-for greenery of human civilization he saw only several dozen more dunes, identical in form and promise to the one he now stood upon. The farthest rose even higher than the one he presently surmounted.

  Threepio turned and looked back toward the now far-off rocky plateau, which was beginning to grow indistinct with distance and heat distortion. “You malfunctioning little twerp,” he muttered, unable even now to admit to himself that perhaps, just possibly, the Artoo unit might have been right. “This is all your fault. You tricked me into going this way, but you’ll do no better.”

  Nor would he if he didn’t continue on. So he took a step forward and heard something grind dully within a leg joint. Sitting down in an electronic funk, he began picking sand from his encrusted joints.

  He could continue on his present course, he told himself. Or he could confess to an error in judgment and try to catch up again with Artoo Detoo. Neither prospect held much appeal for him.

  But there was a third choice. He could sit here, shining in the sunlight, until his joints locked, his internals overheated, and the ultraviolet burned out his photoreceptors. He would become another monument to the destructive power of the binary, like the colossal organism whose picked corpse he had just encountered.

  Already his receptors were beginning to go, he reflected. It seemed he saw something moving in the distance. Heat distortion, probably. No—no—it was definitely light on metal, and it was moving toward him. His hopes soared. Ignoring the warnings from his damaged leg, he rose and began waving frantically.

  It was, he saw now, definitely a vehicle, though of a type unfamiliar to him. But a vehicle it was, and that implied intelligence and technology.

  He neglected in his excitement to consider the possibility that it might not be of human origin.

  “So I cut off my power, shut down the afterburners, and dropped in low on Deak’s tail,” Luke finished, waving his arms wildly. He and Biggs were walking in the shade outside the power station. Sounds of metal being worked came from somewhere within, where Fixer had finally joined his robot assistant in performing repairs.

  “I was so close to him,” Luke continued excitedly, “I thought I was going to fry my instrumentation. As it was, I busted up the skyhopper pretty bad.” That recollection inspired a frown.

  “Uncle Owen was pretty upset. He grounded me for the rest of the season.” Luke’s depression was brief. Memory of his feat overrode its immorality.

  “You should have been there, Biggs!”

  “You ought to take it a little easier,” his friend cautioned. “You may be the hottest bush pilot this side of Mos Eisley, Luke, but those little skyhoppers can be dangerous. They move awfully fast for tropospheric craft—faster than they need to. Keep playing engine jockey with one and someday, whammo!” He slammed one fist violently into his open palm. “You’re going to be nothing more than a dark spot on the damp side of a canyon wall.”

  “Look who’s talking,” Luke retorted. “Now that you’ve been on a few big, automatic stars
hips you’re beginning to sound like my uncle. You’ve gotten soft in the cities.” He swung spiritedly at Biggs, who blocked the movement easily, making a halfhearted gesture of counterattack.

  Biggs’s easygoing smugness dissolved into something warmer. “I’ve missed you, kid.”

  Luke looked away, embarrassed. “Things haven’t exactly been the same since you left, either, Biggs. It’s been so—” Luke hunted for the right word and finally finished helplessly, “—so quiet.” His gaze traveled across the sandy, deserted streets of Anchorhead. “It’s always been quiet, really.”

  Biggs grew silent, thinking. He glanced around. They were alone out here. Everyone else was back inside the comparative coolness of the power station. As he leaned close Luke sensed an unaccustomed solemnness in his friend’s tone.

  “Luke, I didn’t come back just to say good-bye, or to crow over everyone because I got through the Academy.” Again he seemed to hesitate, unsure of himself. Then he blurted out rapidly, not giving himself a chance to back down, “But I want somebody to know. I can’t tell my parents.”

  Gaping at Biggs, Luke could only gulp, “Know what? What are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about the talking that’s been going on at the Academy—and other places, Luke. Strong talking. I made some new friends, outsystem friends. We agreed about the way certain things are developing, and—” his voice dropped conspiratorially—“when we reach one of the peripheral systems, we’re going to jump ship and join the Alliance.”

  Luke stared back at his friend, tried to picture Biggs—fun-loving, happy-go-lucky, live-for-today Biggs—as a patriot afire with rebellious fervor.

  “You’re going to join the rebellion?” he started. “You’ve got to be kidding. How?”

  “Damp down, will you?” the bigger man cautioned, glancing furtively back toward the power station. “You’ve got a mouth like a crater.”

  “I’m sorry,” Luke whispered rapidly. “I’m quiet—listen how quiet I am. You can barely hear me—”