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A long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...

STAR WARS:A LIFE OF THEIR OWN
Chapter One

With the support of an elderly Obi-Wan
Kenobi, Jedi Master Yoda and the eleventh
hour redemption of their father, Anakin Skywalker,
the Skywalker twins overthrew the evil Emperor and
ushered in a new era of peace. Luke Skywalker is now
a Jedi Master. As the last remaining Jedi, he is collecting
potential students to carry on the Jedi legacy. His sister Leia
is a Minister in the Senate of the New Republic. While she lives
on the planet of Corrusant with her husband and three children,
she is often sent on diplomatic missions to convince isolated planets to
join forces with the New Republic...

* * * * *

Princess Leia Organa stretched. Under her formal gown, the muscles in her neck and arms ached and protested at the sudden movement. Several long weeks of fruitless negotiations with the Ekash people had taken their toll on the New Republic's Minister of State. It was testimony to the strategic importance of the planet that the New Republic had sent such a high-ranking representative but the Ekash remained stubbornly unimpressed. In fact, Leia was beginning to suspect that the Ekash government didn't have any intention of joining the New Republic at all. Unfortunately, they were equally reluctant to offend the New Republic by calling a total end to negotiations. Leia had alternatively praised, threatened, cajoled and listened for hours on end but made no progress at all.

She flopped ungracefully into a chair in the temporary quarters that the government had loaned her and sighed. Her head was beginning to throb with a headache born of sleepless nights. Leia's body needed to rest but her mind was far too active to allow it. Her aides for this mission, S'moa and Prem, had all retired for the night and Leia was alone in her rooms.

The furniture was sparse but that was normal for the Ekash. They were a people who loved to move about, to be active. An old Ekash proverb warned that too much furniture simply led to accidents. A lazy, slovenly Ekash was almost unheard of. In an attempt to distract herself from what was fast becoming a political nightmare, Leia began to think about her twin brother Luke. Luke had always been a source of comfort and calm.

"Not quite always," Leia corrected herself.
When she had first met Luke, he had been young and rash but she had liked him. He had come a long way since the eager young man who had stumbled into Leia's prison cell to rescue her. It was only through time that he had begun to project an atmosphere of calm wherever he went. Lately, however, his eyes had begun to look haunted, his face showing the strain of being the only Jedi Knight left in the New Republic.

At this very moment, Luke was at the other end of the galaxy, searching out others with the potential to become Jedi Knights. Leia herself had the potential, had inherited it just as strongly as Luke had from their father - Anakin Skywalker. She reflected ruefully that even if work and family stopped her from completing the full training of a Jedi Knight, the potential was quite possibly the only decent thing her father had ever done for her.

"Her biological father," she corrected herself again.
Raised as the daughter of Bail Organa, she had come face to face with her biological father many times as his enemy. He had pursued her as a leader of the Rebellion, threatened and even tortured her. He had been present when Leia's adopted homeworld and adopted family was blown to so much dust and rubble. He had not been present when Luke broke the news that he was really her brother and that Bail Organa was not her real father.

Anakin Skywalker had died less than twenty-four hours after Leia had been told that he was her father. Although Luke was with him when he died, Leia did not see him once in that twenty-four hours. She was told that less than two hours before his death, Anakin Skywalker had learned of both the existence and identity of his only daughter. She never had the chance to find out what he thought about it.

Leia shifted herself out of her chair, discarded her boots and knelt on the ground. She knew that Prem, a bothan with an excess of maternal energy, would berate her for the creases that were appearing in her gown. The chance of relief from her headache, however, made Leia decide that it was worth the inevitable scorn.

Leia carefully relaxed her muscles and tried to calm her agitated thoughts. Thinking about a past she could no longer change would not point the way to solving her current problems. Instead, she went through the motions of a simple meditation Luke had once shown her. Sometimes she was too tense and agitated up for the meditation to work but this time she succeeded. Leia could feel the Force, sense it remotely like a warm blanket cocooning her. Her muscles relaxed and a sense of peace filled her. Perhaps it was the heavy perfume from the native flower entwined in her hair but the meditation gradually began to take on a different tone.

Leia could still feel the sense of warm calm and the Force but her senses sharpened. The flower in her hair smelled so strong she could taste it, a rich meady flavour that had Leia swallowing hungrily. Leia’s senses stretched out and she could smell a vase of the same species of flower out in the hallway. Her sense of hearing was also sharpened, her mind filled with the calls and cries of insects and small mammals in the vast gardens beneath her window. Even with her eyes closed, Leia felt like she could see further too. The entire room was fresh in her mind without any effort to remember how it looked. It seemed to Leia as if she could see that the flowers in the hallway vase were gently trembling by the breeze from an open window. There was movement by the hallway window and Leia’s heartbeat quickened.

Leia’s senses snapped back to their usual limits, the sudden rush leaving Leia reeling. Any sense of calm was swept away, displaced by a gnawing sense of dread. A coldness wrapped itself around Leia’s racing heart and she opened her eyes. When Leia exhaled, she half expected to see frost on her breath. At the same time, the other half of her knew that this was a coldness that came from the Force and not from the air temperature.

As the coldness settled at the base of her throat, her throat burned as if icicles had begun to form in her airways. Her throat constricted painfully and Leia surged to her feet. Her personal blaster was out of its holster and in her hand. She looked around the room, eyes straining against the dimmed lights but her senses were back to normal. She could see nothing beyond the sparse furniture of her own room. She was pointing a blaster at nothing more threatening than curtains and armchairs.

Leia stood still, her heart thumping in her chest as she listened. When she’d heard nothing for a full minute, Leia reholstered her blaster. She sighed in relief and smiled at her own foolishness. When you spent most of your adolescence and adult life fighting as a member of a military cause, a little paranoia was to be expected. Leia settled herself back into the chair and tried to remember where the heating controls were.

Footsteps approached her door and Leia quickly smoothed down her gown. The last thing she needed was to be found swinging around a weapon in the dead of the night. It would not help negotiations. Then again, negotiations weren't currently going anywhere so perhaps shock tactics were called for.

The footsteps stopped at some point in the hallway. Leia would have guessed they had stopped at Prem's door but it was difficult to tell from just the sound alone. If she could get the meditation working again she might be able to actually see who it was. She tried to relax but she was still chilled.

Something smashed in the next room and Leia was up on her feet again. The coldness stabbed at her chest, an unmistakable warning. Something was very, very wrong and the footsteps had returned to the hallway. More than one pair of footsteps, walking down the hallway again.

“What was that?” called the sleepy voice of S’moa.
A door opened out in the corridor.
“Hey...” gasped S’moa.
Leia had opened her mouth to shout a warning but heard the distinctive thud of a body colliding with something solid. S’moa said nothing further.

Leia turned away from the door and pulled a scarf from her luggage. She wound the scarf tightly around the doorknob and then tied the other end to the coat hook that was set into the wall. There were no other doors out of her room. The only other option was a large window that ran the length of the room. Without hesitating, she pulled the heavy curtains aside.

Perched on the window sill and about to reach for the curtains was an Ekash dressed from head to toe in black. Startled at being discovered, he just stared at Leia. Then he reached for his belt.

Leia grabbed a fistful of his black shirt and pulled him forward, into the room. He flung out both his hands to break his fall. While his hands were busy, Leia drew her blaster and smashed the handle down on the back of his head. He slumped to the ground and she dragged him into the next room and rolled him underneath the bed.

A knock at her door made her freeze halfway to the window. She bit her lip, forcing herself to keep moving. She climbed out the same window that the intruder had used to sneak in and pulled the curtains shut behind her. She balanced on the window ledge outside and swung the window shut behind her. The window moved so smoothly and so well oiled that it was virtually a silent escape.
"Perfect for a midnight assasination," Leia thought to herself.

Leia shivered, her mind filled with images of being attacked in her sleep. Images of the bedding drenched in blood and S’moa and Prem. Images of faceless men in black that slithered in through the windows. Feeling sick, Leia was glad for once that Han and the children hadn't accompanied her.

She looked down from the ledge at the ground. It was a jump of at least three stories to the well-manicured flower beds below. Leia pressed herself back into the window, knowing that only two inches of ledge separated her from the long drop. Leia raised her eyes to look out to the horizon, both to plan an escape route and to avoid looking down.

Purple grass stretched out from the flower beds beneath her towards a scenic lake. Leia had been taken on a tour of the impressive gardens when she'd first arrived at these facilities. As she remembered it, the lake was fed by a fast-moving river that wound its way through the centre of the small city of Siash and then out into the heritage-listed forests of Ekara.

Even better, Leia could remember a dock at the mouth of the river where a small collection of water-craft had been moored. Her guide had said that the dock was not often used and was there for mostly tradition’s sake rather than a real need.

Fists thumped on her door. After a few frustrated moments, shoulders were applied and both scarf and door gave way. At least five pairs of footsteps entered the room.
"Minister?"

Leia recognized the voice as belonging to the Commander of the Ekash Guard, Natheb Braylul. The Ekash Guard was the government's security force so Natheb had been present for most of the negotiations. Leia had never been at all concerned by Natheb and he had said little at the meetings. His expressions, however, had often been a good indicator for how well her words were being received. What face would he make when he learned that New Republic Ministers hid on window ledges?

“Come out, come out...,“ drawled a second voice.
That voice belonged to a young Ekash woman Leia did not know well but she might have worked in the kitchens. Leia had seen her hanging around in Natheb's shadow sometimes as if she were a lover. The general distaste with which she seemed to regard Natheb, however, eliminated that possibilty.

With sandy hair and green eyes, the woman’s physical appearance was not unusual for an Ekash. What made her easy to recognize was the long, green coat that she wore and the constant, hard, cynical edge to her voice.

"Think she knows?" drawled the Ekash woman.
"Sssh, Emalda,” interrupted a third voice. “I'm sure she's around here somewhere."

Leia recognised the new voice as Natheb's brother, Georeb Braylul. Georeb was the liaison between the Ekash government and the Ekash Guard. Georeb had also been at the negotiations, proving himself to be a talented negotiator that Leia respected. He bore an obvious affection for the woman, Emalda. While Emalda seemed to be fond of Georeb, Leia very much doubted that it went any further than that. Georeb was too nice and diplomatic to have a sharp, cynical woman like Emalda.

"She probably sensed something..." continued Emalda, beginning to sound petulant.
There was silence for a moment and Leia desperately wished she could see past the curtains and into the room. She could almost see the frown crossing Natheb’s fair face.

The similarity between Humans and Ekash was such that the Empire had virtually ignored the planet. Ekash looked like humans, used the same facial expressions, ate similar food and their language was an old archaic version of the language now spoken around the galaxy, Basic. Ekara had been absorbed into the Empire just as the war with the rebellion was gaining momentum and the Imperial Scouting Party had spent less than four days on the planet before reporting that Ekara’s population welcomed an Imperial presence. They had then left to rejoin the fleet.

Leia had been on the Ekash homeworld of Ekara for two weeks before she realised that the similarity was only skin deep. The average Ekash was about the same height as Leia, which made them slightly shorter than most humans. Ekash hair was always a shade of golden sand while their eyes were always a haunting shade of green and their pupils were like black diamonds. The fact that their pupils were diamond shaped and not circular, meant that it could be difficult to know what an Ekash was focusing on. It also gave them extraordinary peripheral vision. Most surprisingly, Leia had managed to catch sight of a furry tail that had slipped out of concealing clothing on two occasions.

Ekash clothing and fashions followed a pattern that Leia had never seen before. Every diplomat, official or guard she had seen so far was wearing clothing that was an obvious imitation of something from another planet. The uniform of the Ekash guard was essentially a bright red imitation of an Imperial Officer's uniform with the addition of a long flowing cape. The copy was not exact enough to pass for an Imperial uniform but too close to be a coincidence. Even the fashions worn by the civillians were similar to those worn on Coruscant, if a few seasons old.

The only culturally unique feature that Leia had noted in her time here was the Ekash language but most of them spoke modern Basic as well. Not only had the Ekash agreed to Imperial demands before the Empire could even threaten to use force but the Ekash seemed to have successfully erased their true culture. Given the Empire's anti-alien policies, it was truly a sensible strategy. Commendable as their intentions might have been, however, it made it almost impossible for Leia to understand how the Ekash truly thought. For a politician and a negotiator, there was nothing worse.

"Emalda," Natheb scolded (Leia thought he would probably be screwing up his nose as he said that). "There is no way she could have known."
"If she's as Force sensitive as I think she is..." continued Emalda, ignoring the warning tone in Natheb’s voice. "She might have known when we dealt with the aides. They were only in the next room, after all. With the aid of the Force, she could have known what the plan was before we did..."
"Don't start this, again," said Natheb, irritably.
"If you don't believe in the Force, why are we doing what we're doing?" asked Emalda.

A note of challenge had crept into Emalda's voice but all Leia could hear were the words 'dealt with the aides'. What had they done to S'moa and Prem?
When Natheb answered, his anger was barely restrained, "I suppose its just a coincidence that if we use her, we don't have to use you anymore."

Leia found herself swallowing again. The further this conversation went, the more she didn't like it. She forced herself to look down again, hoping for some way to reach the ground. There were low bushes near the lake that offered cover but between the building and the lake there was nothing. Leia would need all the headstart she could manage. None of the trees were within reach and for the most part, the walls were made of a smooth alloy that offered no purchase except for the ledge she was already on. Leia kept looking.

The Ekash assasin had managed to reach the window sill somehow. If somebody had gone to the trouble to make the window open silently, they would probably also have left something to aid in the assasin’s scramble up the wall. It stood to reason that if Leia could find it, she could use it to get down.

The only likely possibility was a drainpipe. The pipe ran down the wall half a metre to her right, a distance most Ekash would not have a problem with. It might be a bit of a stretch for Leia and the joints were full of rust. It didn’t inspire confidence that it was capable of holding together long enough to get Leia to the ground. Leia slipped a hand beneath her gown to feel the reassuring presence of her blaster. Emalda finally spoke again.

"I might be able to sense her," suggested Emalda. "I'm the most Force sensitive person we've got... for the moment."
The bitterness in Emalda's tone made Leia shudder. She definitely did not want to be the ‘Force sensitive’ that took Emalda's place. Leia choked down her fear and braced herself for a jump to the pipe. She leaped, both feet sliding off into open air and both hands wrapping around the pipe. Gravity caught up with her and her entire bodyweight jerked on her arms.

With a creak, the pipe’s weight shifted and slid away from the wall. Leia thought that the slide wouldn’t end until she hit the ground but the pipe clicked into place after moving only a couple of inches. There was nothing accidental about that click, that was a sound of machinery doing the job it was designed to do. With the few inches now separating the pipe from the wall, Leia could wrap her arms completely about the pipe. The pipe was designed to be clung to by people that climbed walls in the middle of the night. Leia shuddered again.

"Did you hear that?" came Georeb’s voice, genuinely puzzled.
"She's outside!" Emalda cried harshly. "She knows! I warned you. She knows!"
"Sound the alarm!" shouted Natheb.

Leia scrambled down the pipe as fast as she could, bare feet slipping. The metal dug into her fingers and toes, her knees scraping against the wall. She was only couple of metres from the ground when the window above was thrown wide. Natheb's head appeared above the ledge, silhouetted by the light in the room behind him.

Unable to see his expression, Leia wasn’t sure when exactly he spotted her. She did see him raise a blaster and aim it in her direction. Leia abruptly let go of the pipe and threw herself bodily backwards. A stun bolt from Natheb’s blaster hit the pipe she'd been clinging to seconds later. Leia landed flat on her back on the soft purple grass, having just missed the flower beds. Wincing in pain, she rolled to her feet and was running, stumbling before she was even upright.

Behind her she could hear Natheb shouting angrily while Emalda was wailing in frustration. The wail was so full of despair that Leia looked back. Natheb had started scrambling down the pipe while Georeb watched from the window with a commlink to his mouth. With the curtains blocking Leia's view of the rest of the room, Emalda couldn't be seen but she could definitely be heard.

Leia sprinted across the gardens, ignoring the thorny plants that caught at her gown. She reached the lake and dashed into the protection of the surrounding bushes, following the edge of the lake down to where it drained into the river. The Ekash were probably regretting that they had been so helpful and had pointed out so many useful landmarks, now that it could provide her with an escape route.

The dock and its three small watercraft were visible through the bushes when Leia heard the sounds of pursuit. Someone blundered through the undergrowth practically on her heels. Leia dived and rolled across the ground. Blaster stun bolts slammed into the ground where she had been standing. Rolling behind the cover of a fern, she returned fire from her own blaster.

Despite good training and a far superior peripheral vision, the Ekash Guards had never been in a real war. They were simply no match for a battle-hardened rebel such as Leia. As the last went down, Leia wondered briefly why they were using stun bolts. The next second, the answer occurred to her and she shivered. They wanted Leia, and her Force ability, intact.

She ran towards the docks. Hoisting up the hem of her gown, she scrambled onto a small waterbike. She then released the tether holding it to the dock and turned her blaster on the two remaining waterbikes, blasting the control columns into scrap metal. The craft was like a waterborne version of the speeder bikes she'd ridden on Endor and it wasn't long before she was speeding away.

The spray whipped at the exposed soles of her bare feet as she shot over the water. She leaned around the corners, the waterbike rolling with her. If she threw her weight too far on a corner, there was a risk that the bike might go into a full roll, pitching her into the chilly water. Too little roll and she lost speed and precious time. She picked what she thought was a happy medium and prayed that it remained happy.

The river twisted and turned as it flowed through the city Siash but at this hour there were no other craft on the waterway. Few people were even awake enough to spot the fleeing waterbike that sped past their buildings. For Leia’s part, the buildings were a blur and within minutes she was out of the city and into the true forest.

Now huge trees, their bark black and their leaves rich purple, hid what was coming up just around each bend. With no sound of pursuit, Leia was starting to worry again, her grip on the controls turning her knuckles white. What had really happened to Prem and S’moa and the rest of her companions? None of them were Force sensitive but Leia wasn’t sure whether that was in their favour or not.

Would the Ekash arrest them or dispose of them? She had no way of knowing and no way of doing anything about it. It wasn’t the first time in her life that she found herself longing for Luke‘s calm composure, or even the scandalous comments of her husband, Han Solo. However, these were wishes that would not be granted. Luke was busy and Han was with their twin children, Jacen and Jaina. The former Princess of Alderaan could rely only on herself.

She swept a bend in the river and a stone structure swung into view further down the hill. The building was old and crumbling. Beyond it, in a clearing bare of trees, Leia could just make out the dull shine of a painted cross. A few seconds later it was obscured from view but it was long enough to recognize the markings of a landing pad.

A landing pad usually meant a hangar and that meant a spacecraft. In such a disused place, a working spacecraft was distinctly unlikely. However, a few missions aboard Han Solo's beloved Millennium Falcon, and Leia had learnt more about emergency repairs than she had ever wished to know. The odds were that there would be something she could patch together just enough to get her off the planet, at the very least.

Making her decision, Leia accelerated towards the building. Pulling up to the bank, Leia beached the waterbike and slid out of the seat. The ground was less stable than she'd expected and the pebbles beneath her feet shifted, pitching Leia backwards into the water. The chill water surrounded her, leaching precious heat from her body. With a gasp, Leia broke the surface.

Swearing in four diplomatic languages, she hauled herself back onto the bank. More cautious of her footing, this time she took more notice of her surroundings. Up this close, the landing pad was hidden from sight behind the old building. The building itself leant precariously to one side and was surrounded by a thick belt of trees. The waterbike would not fit through the forest if she tried to go around but the bike was not well suited to travelling overland anyway.

At that moment, the whine of approaching watercraft drove her into immediate action. There was no time to remount the bike and no time to hide it so she abandoned it. Ignoring the pain as her bare feet ground against the pebbles on the bank, she fled into the nearest hiding place she could find - the old building itself.

"She went into the mine!" yelled one guard, beaching his water-bike.
"After her!" called a second voice as a second bike was beached.
"Are you mad?" asked the first voice. "You know what they say about that place? Tell Natheb that she drowned, 'cause I'm certainly not going in there after her."
"Superstitious fool! There's no such thing as ghosts."
"After you, then."

Leia did not wait to hear who won the argument before she ran deeper into the building. Enough moonlight filtered in the doorway for her to see that the only way out was either the way she'd come in or down an antiquated old lift, which was rusting quietly in a corner. Hurrying into the lift, Leia's cold stiff fingers levered open the control panel. She randomly pressed a button in the dark. The lift groaned and shuddered alarmingly before finally relenting to programmed movement. Beneath flickering lights, Leia found herself shivering again and reached a hand out for the comforting presence of her blaster. It was gone. It must have been lost in the river, leaving Leia defenseless.

As if to deliberately interrupt her momentary panic, the metal lift shrieked in protest as it ground to a halt. The doors powered open to reveal an impenetrable darkness. Raising a hand to steady herself on the lift wall, Leia's fingertips brushed against plastic. In the sketchy light, she could see a row of miners helmets latched onto the lift wall.

Lights were mounted on the top but most of the glass had been shattered long ago. She was forced to examine four helmets before she found one with a working light. She tucked the flower from her hair into her pocket and strapped the helmet tightly to her head. Her delicately arranged hairstyle was crushed.

Taking a deep breath, Leia moved out into the darkness of the old mine. Even with the light the helmet provided, Leia could only see a couple of feet in front of her. She had been stumbling along for five minutes before she paused to nurse her bleeding feet. As she leant over to examine them, she began to feel an unnatural chill returning.

Remembering the prophetic nature of her earlier feelings, she straightened up and backed up against the wall. She strained her eyes, trying to see into the darkness while the coldness intensified and wrapped itself around her chest. Leia remembered Han's stories about the creatures he had seen in the mines of Kessel. She had no wish to run into anything living, no matter how harmless it might be.

Leia's eyes began to ache, her heartbeat unnaturally loud in the silence. She slowly walked deeper into the mine. She almost felt as if the ancient rocks themselves were watching her. She could imagine their ancient hands reaching out to touch her back. Leia’s nerve snapped and she ran. She scrambled about the rocks, arms flailing, stirring clouds of dust into the air.

As the cold began to fade, Leia slowed to a jog. She looked over her shoulder, peering into the darkness, straining to see if there were any pursuers at all. At that moment, Leia's foot collided with a rock and she fell forwards onto the ground. She raised a shaking hand to her forehead. The helmet had protected her head from the rough ground but the strap was starting to dig into her neck. Gagging, Leia tugged at the catch until the strap loosened.

Leia remained lying on the ground, exhausted and waiting for her breath to return to normal. She listened hard but still couldn't hear a thing. She considered trying the meditation exercise to see if she could extend her senses again but she knew she was nowhere near calm enough. Leia shut her eyes as her breathing finally cooperated and slowed down. A reassuring warmth spread out across her frozen limbs and eased the pressure on her chest.

Leia opened her eyes again and the first thing that her eyes focused on was a long gash down her forearm. As she stared at it, slightly bemused, her arm began to tingle. Then, gently, the edges of the tattered skin began to twitch and move. The long edges of the wound stretched and met and then melded together, leaving a faint pink scar. More warmth flooded into her arm and the scar itself faded completely.

She sat up sharply and looked around her. She touched her arm gingerly, wondering if she was seeing things. With the strange sense of warmth still spreading, Leia was surprised to find she wasn't alarmed or at least, not as much as she ought to be. She could only describe it as a sense of there being nothing malicious about the warmth. It almost seemed familiar to her.

As she reached down to pick up the miner's helmet, she realised the warmth she was feeling was not coming from within her but was flowing through the tunnel like a river. She staggered to her feet and tottered forward a few steps before she realized that her feet were no longer bleeding but fully healed. Wiping her hair out of her eyes and slipping the helmet back on, she set out to follow the flow of warmth.

She didn’t have to go far to find it. Set into the tunnel wall, level with Leia's eyes, was a row of huge glowing jewels. The closest glittered blue, then purple and then flushed green. Streaks of gold were laced through it like sparks. Each was about a metre wide and far too smooth to be naturally occurring. Leia reached out towards it. As if in anticipation of her touch, the jewel flashed purple repeatedly.

Leia paused and the jewel reverted to a tame blue-green glow. The warmth radiating from the jewel was pleasant and comforting. It was like coming home to an old friend or being hugged by her husband.

Chiding herself for being so sentimental, Leia placed her palm firmly against the jewel to prove to herself that it was nothing more than a pretty crystal. The instant she touched it, the jewel burst to life. The pulsing colours sweeping across its surface made Leia's breath catch in her throat. The streaks of gold became a current, flowing into Leia's hand. With them came the dreamy warmth, the maddeningly strong sense of calm and the Force. It overwhelmed Leia's senses, her eyelids fluttering closed.

As the warmth grew, it became uncomfortable. Leia wrestled back enough self-possession to rip her hand away from the jewel. As the amazing effect of the jewel faded, Leia was once again aware of her surroundings - the damp dress, the rough rocks beneath her feet, the burning cold air in her nostrils and the all-encompassing silence. Her helmet light began to flicker. Although the glow of the jewel illuminated this corridor, without the helmet light Leia would not be able to see her way back.

Leia slid the helmet from her head and began to examine it in the light from the jewels. The glow from the jewels started to dim. Irritated, Leia looked up. The nearest jewel was angrily flashing red and the warmth had began to fade. Leia hurriedly pulled the helmet back onto her head.

There came a sound from down the tunnel. A soft, slithering whisper that sent shivers down Leia's spine. It raised memories of rasping breath and a feared black shape. A scraping sound echoed down the corridor from the opposite direction. As Leia whirled to face it, her helmet light flickered again and went out.

Total darkness blanketed her. As her eyes adjusted to the faint glow of the jewels, Leia wrestled her breathing back under control and forced herself to be silent. The temperature seemed to have dropped a few degrees. The jewels continued to pulse red but more faintly, as if they were hiding. Leia's feeling of unease increased.

At the far end of the corridor, a grey mist materialized out of the blackness. Emitting a bleached grey light of its own, it began to coast down the corridor towards her. As it approached, the air became colder, Leia's breath coming out in clouds of vapour. The New Republic's Minister of State kept her eyes locked on the mist, as if she could stare it into submission.

It seemed to work as the mist hesitated but then started towards her again. Taking her eyes off the mist, Leia glanced behind her. A second mist had formed at the other end of the corridor.

Leia had nowhere to run and no idea how to fight such a nebulous enemy. Leia ruthlessly forced herself to calm down. It was not long before she presented the stoical face of the former Rebel she had been before she was a New Republic politician. An impenetrable facade that not even Darth Vader had managed to crack completely. Inside, however, Leia wished fiercely that she had committed herself to learning the Jedi arts from Luke. Even though Leia would not be overcome without a fight, she instinctively knew that this was an evil that only a Jedi Knight could defeat.

The mists advanced patiently, inevitably, their low speed almost painful. Leia backed up against the wall of the tunnel. Her fingers brushed against one of the jewels. She could feel the power coursing beneath her fingers but she did not know how to use it.

Leia realized with a chilling clarity that she was going to die and closed her eyes. She thought of the twins, bright little faces that would loose their mother before they really knew her. She thought of her sweet little baby and his young laugh, Luke and his deep affection for her but most of all, Leia thought of her husband. That scoundrel of a smuggler who had rescued her, body and soul.

"Han?" Leia whimpered.
Even if Han had been there, there was nothing he would be able to do. He was no Jedi.
"Luke?" called Leia, her voice stronger now. "Luke, please."

She prayed he would hear her like she had heard him at Cloud City. She waited but there was no reply, no familiar voice answering her across the void of space. Luke was on the other side of the galaxy, dealing with his own problems. He would not come.

Leia opened her eyes again. One of the mists had almost reached her, shadowy tendrils snaking out to touch her skin. In desperation, Leia called out to another Jedi - one she knew was dead but she called anyway.
"Obi-Wan Kenobi!"

The mist touched her, ice cold, passing straight through her skin and into her body. Whispers and murmurs filled her mind, the warmth leaching from her limbs. One hand still clinging to a jewel provided warm respite from the cruel onslaught but Leia knew the cold would soon overtake her. Her tormented mind latched onto the only other Jedi she knew of, also long dead.

"Father?" she gasped weakly.
The jewel surged beneath her. It seemed to Leia as if it was trying to help, trying to answer her desperate cries.

THE END OF PART ONE

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