Daemen Irath could not shake the images of the Imperial flags flying above the Wanderhome Starport from his mind. Shredded and in flames, the silken material fought for breath as Imperial personnel raced to escape the incoming armies of the Rebel Alliance. What remained of the Empire was in tatters. Despite a brief moment of rejoicing for its demise, he did not desire the power vacuum left in it death throes, which left nothing to claim or conquer for himself and an old, even more powerful nemesis standing in the ashes.

The Imperial Guilds of Wanderhome were defeated, scattered, and on the run. The Emperor was dead. Darth Vader was dead. Weak vision. Weak execution. And we are fallen as a result of it, he thought in a rage. Shirtless, the Zabrak Sith was dressed in nothing more than the black ankle-length rijani skirt that he wore and the sandals on his feet. Crippled in their escape from the port, the Rambling Rover's air units blew hot air over him, and he felt the sweat rising on his skin.

"Stop dwelling on it, brother," Keets whispered. "There is no merit in it." His tenor voice carried in the YT-1300's cargo bay, which had been turned into a makeshift triage and morgue. Sitting on a munitions crate by one of his dying guildmates, he sighed and rubbed his forehead. His left arm was bound in a sling from a blaster hit in the shoulder.

"It shouldn't have gone like this!"

"But it did. And what has changed? Nothing." Keets pulled the blanket over his dead companion's face. "We are still wanted men. Our executions are assured. But how we die," he said, running his fingers over the hilt of his lightsaber, "is yet to be determined, and I fully intend to be my own author when that moment comes. We who chase the shadows relish chaos, and yet here we are as much a victim to it as any. No way to know what guilds escaped the aftermath. No way to know who is lost, captured, or dead." His eyes lingered on the corpse before him. "The others will come to rely on you, Daemen, to get us through this."

"<ELITE> had no leaders, Keets. We were all equals."

"And we will hang as equals, not matter what guild we served, if you don't find a way out of this." He ran his hand through his curly locks. "I am so tired. Ah," he said, turning to the short soldier in Scout Trooper armor as she approached him with an offered flask. "Socorran raava?"

"Yes, Master Keets," Soelle replied with a slight bowing of her head. After Keets had taken a sip, she offered the flask to Daemen with imploring eyes. "Master Daemen?"

"Don't call me that," he said, turning his back to her. "I'm no one's master. Not anymore."

"Avari reports the others have finished scouting the docking area. They're waiting for you—"

"Go away, Soelle!"

"It's been decided and put to a vote, Master Daemen," she replied, not backing down from him. "We're waiting for your orders."

With the dark side riding high within him, the Sith turned on her. "Without my inclusion? Who's brought this to the table?" He snatched the double-bladed lightsaber from his belt.

"Your vote wouldn't have mattered. It's unanimous, and it was my idea to call for a vote of leadership." The notorious basebuster stared at him, unflinching in her defiance.

Forced to smile, Daemen asked, "Whatever happened to that little Imperial soldier who bowed to me with such deference in the starport in Wanderhome?"

"She's standing right here in front of you, as always, waiting for you to acknowledge her presence."

Had she been anyone else, Daemen would have ignited his lightsaber and killed her—slowly. But there was something disarming about the little basebuster from Socorro, her eyes, the admiring way she looked up to him, even in his worst moments. He had betrayed her once at a cost of her tears and nearly her life. She had forgiven him, her loyalty unbroken, and he had sworn never to allow it to happen again.

Daemen leaned his bare shoulder against the bulkhead wall and opened his comm. "Gomi, what's our situation? It's been over an hour. Why aren't we back on course for Omman?"

The return feedback nearly deafened him. It was a persistent, high-pitched hissing, mechanical in nature, accompanied by an erratic staccato of metal on metal that sounded like someone pounding furiously on pipes with a hyrdospanner. A steady slew of Old Corellian curses could be heard above the racket. "We're dead in the water," Gomi replied, the exasperation evident in his voice. "No guns. No shields. No hyperdrive. Soon to be no engines. That last hit leaving the starport was mortal. Unless we find some salvage, and I mean fast, Cloud City, or what's left of it, will be our last stop."

"It's been deserted for 50 years or more. Scavengers in and out must have stripped it clean," Daemen protested.

"Not if you know what you're looking for," Gomi said. "The components that keep this rig in the air are the same ones needed to keep a ship flying. If we can scavenge enough materials, I can get this boat operational, at least long enough to make Omman. The docking area is clear. I'll be out with the grocery list."

Daemen tilted his head to the side in acquiescence and punched the soft pad of his fist against the cargo ramp control. Shielding his eyes as the glaring sunlight pierced through the dark bay, momentarily obscuring his vision, he stepped down among a ragtag gallery of survivors who met him as the ramp touched down on the dock. "Report," he said to Nuru, a Master Bounty Hunter from his guild.

"Nothing here, and I mean nothing. Place has been stripped clean to the bone, at least this level, but there are 300 more to go. Grinder thinks he can bring the power grid back online, at least partially." He balanced the red Marbari armor helmet on his head and glanced at Soelle. "You slice terminals so well, kid, maybe you should give him a hand."

"Right." Soelle put her helmet on and ran over to assist the bounty hunter from her guild, <VIPER>.

"Only other thing we found was some dead smugglers," Nuru said, leading Daemen toward the other side of the dock. "Must have had a little disagreement among themselves and the shooting started. Been here a while—they're a little ripe."

Daemen stared down at the badly decomposed body slumped against a corner wall under a caution sign to watch for engine backdrafts. The man died pointing to a foreign word that he had scrawled on the wall in blood. "What's that mean?"

"Haven't got a clue. Figured Gomi or Soelle might know. Looks like Old Corellian." He turned and whistled. "Hey, kid!"

Working furiously at a power terminal, she didn't even look up to acknowledge him. Impatient, Daemen barked at her. "Soelle, leave the terminal. This isn't a base bust."

Quickly completing her task, she ran over to him. "What's wrong?" she asked, cautiously approaching the incensed Sith.

"What's that say?" Daemen asked, menace in his voice.

"Nharquis'I. It's Socorran."

"What's it mean?"

"Death place. It's a warning."

Dressed in dark blue combat armor, Grinder joined them, shaking sensation back into his fingers, which were blackened from suffering a series of short circuits. "Someone did a nice job jury rigging this deathtrap. There's partial power, median floors only. Mynocks ate through most of the circuitry. Little bastards. I suspect these smugglers did the fixing, powered up, and then cut the juice when the backstabbing started."

"If they saw fit to cut the power off, why would we turn it back on?" Nuru asked.

"My engines are too damaged to recharge the ship systems," Gomi said, coming down the main gangplank of his crippled ship. "Turn it on. I'll take whatever juice I can get." As he spoke, Grinder threw the switches, and the lights in the docking arena winked on, shedding light over the flight deck.

"Your Master Doctor?" Daemen said, pacing nervously back toward the ramp of the ship. He snapped his fingers at Soelle. "What's his name again?"

"Weolo."

"Get him out here with his med kit."

"Alright, listen up," Gomi said. "Here's what I need. About 50 meters of transfer cable. Make sure it's clean. It'll be a brassy color. If it's white, it's shot and no use to me. I need power converters. About a dozen of them."

"How do you expect to find power converters on this wreck?" Dysire complained, lightsaber in her hand. "It's been picked clean."

"Power converters are universal. That's they're called converters," he mocked her. "Can usually find them in control terminals. Soelle will know where to dig for them."

"Copy that," the basebuster said with a salute.

"And I'll need a dozen or so core couplings. You can find them on anything powered by repulsorlifts: elevators, vehicles, doesn't matter. I can sand them down and make them fit."

"Is that it?" Daemen asked. With confirmation, he turned to the assembly. "Three-man teams. Grinder, take Asli and Dysire for the transfer cable. Nuru, take Bink and Crimson and collect the core couplings. Since Soelle knows about the power converters, Avari and I will escort her." He turned to them, awaiting any protests, but there were none. "Avari, what's the rule."

Turning cartwheels, the high-energy Sith recited, "Line of sight, stay in the fight. Out of bounds, you're going down."

"That's right. Everyone stay within eyesight of your team," Daemen ordered. "Is that clear? Jedi out front. Guns in the back."

Nuru checked his datapad. "My crew will sweep the west quadrant. Should find what we need in the control rooms."

"My team will take the east quadrant," Grinder say, checking the muzzle of his flamethrower. "Should be plenty of lifts on this level."

"Someone call for a doctor?" Weolo asked. The ruddy Mon Calamari stood at the top of the ramp clasping his medical kit.

"Buffs for everyone." When the Mon Cal hesitated, Daemen felt the rage rise, but bit his lip. "Did you not hear me?"

"These medicines would best be kept for the wounded," Weolo replied in a high-pitched voice that reminded Daemen of the ocean.

"We don't know what killed these smugglers. Until we do, we need to be prepared. Now buff them." From passing conversations on the ship, the Master Doctor was notoriously stubborn when it came to moral boundaries. He was difficult to move, but a lightsaber had a very motivating effect. Before Daemen could ignite the blades, Soelle showed why she was one of the most trusted soldiers in the Empire.

"Weolo, all the medicine in the galaxy won't matter, if we can't get to Oman. Please buff them," she said.

Reluctantly, Weolo complied, opening his bag and staring perplexed at Avari when the Sith extended his arm for the injection and demanded a lollipop.

"I understand you're a crack shot," Nuru said, handing a rifle to Soelle. "If there is something dangerous here, you won't have any chance of getting close to it with those two rancor bulls out front. Better if you kept your distance."

"An A280? Nice."

"Old Reek made it for me. Custom modified it the way the Tuskans like to rig their rifles. It's yours."

Soelle shook her head in protest. "This is a one of kind. I can't take this."

"You're one of kind, kid." Nuru winked at Daemen as she admired the weapon in awe. "If it weren't for your quick thinking and those safe houses, I wouldn't be standing here at all." He tossed a small tracking droid into the air. It hovered above his head, awaiting orders. "Mount up, people. The sooner we find this junk, the quicker we're off this ghost rig."

                              * * *

Daemen stood sentinel at the top of a long, sloping ramp that led down to the only functional lift on the level that descended into the underbelly of the docking port. Standing in the nexus of the corridor, he kept his eye on the three-way channel. The two corpses they had found on the docking floor had grown to a total of six dead men, all killed by multiple wounds sustained from blaster fire.

Avari stood at the opposite end of the hallway, swaying back and forth to a music that existed only be in his head. His peculiar dance took the form of a kata with punches and kicks from his former life as a Teras Kasi. Daemen wondered if the Sith ever stood still, if only for a moment. His attention deficiency might have been a concern except that Avari was a Master of Lightsabers, one of the best duelists he knew.

Two hours into their scavenger hunt, Grinder's team had found the needed measure of cable in a maintenance shaft and were already back at the ship. Nuru's group were on their way after searching multiple levels for the core couplings to repair the Rambling Rover's damaged engine housing. The bounty hunter was waiting for them at the bottom of the lift.

"Soelle," Daemen said in frustration. "You're stripping the power converters from the terminal, not rigging it to blow. What's taking so long?"

"Sorry, Master Daemen, that was the last one."

"About time! Avari!" He stared at the Sith, who was standing stock still in the middle the intersection, pointing incredulously down the passage. "Avari?"

"Look, it's a droid."

"Avari!" Daemen shouted, as the Sith impulsively stepped out of sight into the corridor. Daemen sprinted after him with Soelle on his heels. He slid to a stop on the dust-covered floors and watched as Avari approached a tittering, gangly droid. Carrying a blaster rifle, it walked with halting, doddering steps as if experiencing a power surge or suffering from a servomotor malfunction.

"A Trade Federation battle droid?" Soelle whispered. "What a relic? I've only ever seen them in holo-games about the Clone Wars."

"Oh, look he has friends, and they want to play." Avari continued toward the six armed droids, unruffled even when they opened fired on him. Igniting his lightsaber, he twirled the red blade's hilt over the back of his hand in an intricate show of prowess that deflected every blaster bolt and sent them ricocheting back into the droids, decimating their numbers. "If I tame one, can I keep it?"

"Daemen," Nuru's voice came across on the comlink. "We're hearing blaster fire."

"It's nothing. Get back to the ship. Avari, stop playing with them," Daemen said. "We don't have the time..." His voice trailed off as something more sinister rolled into position behind the heap of droid parts on the floor.

With a pounding of metal feet, the droideka unwound itself from its wheel configuration and sat up. Without hesitation, it fired on Avari with two powerful twin blasters. Assuming a defensive stance, Avari deflected three of the bolts back at the droid. These were absorbed harmlessly by its shields. However, the fourth bolt caught the Sith in the shoulder. The impact launched him five meters into the air, where he collided with the ceiling, and another twenty meters back into the passage.

There were few things that gave Daemen pause. The sight of an accomplished Sith so aptly nullified was one of them.

"Master Daemen," Soelle whispered, "that's a Destroyer."

"Daemen, listen carefully," Keets said into the comm. "My master was but a padawan when his own master was killed by one of those things. While you may be the best among us, don't risk it. Get back to the ship. Now."

"There's only one," Daemen said, igniting his double-bladed lightsaber. "Avari?"

"I'm good," he said, wincing as he held his injured shoulder.

"Cover me and block the incoming fire. When I get in close, I'll put it down."

A second droideka rolled in from the opposite side passage, the corridor echoing as its metal feet clamped down on the floor. It sat up, twin blasters clicking as it primed its gun and commenced firing.

Daemen spun his ligthsaber, the crimson double blades becoming a blur that deflected the fired bolts back at the droids. Blast scoring from the ricochets scarred the peeling walls and ceilings of the luxury level, but not one bolt penetrated the droids' potent shields.

"Soelle, am I reading the cam feed from your helmet right? There's two of them?" Gomi asked.

"Two confirmed."

"Whatever you do, don't lead those damn things back to the dock. The Rover's shields are still down. They'll tear us apart."

"Soelle, blow the lift," Daemen ordered. "Avari, cover her!"

While the Sith covered her, Soelle sprinted to the lift and stared down into the shaft as Nuru and his team rushed off the freight elevator. She threw the bag of power converters to the bounty hunter, who caught it in one hand. "Good luck, kid," he said and vanished into the corridor.

Firing her blaster at the access panel, she yanked an Imperial detonator from her belt, activated it, and dropped the grenade into the ruined controls. "Fire in the hole!"

The resulting discharge was deafening. Daemen felt the scorching heat from the explosion and remnant debris raining down on him as he leaped up to the next level tier to escape the blast. One of the droideka pursued him into the passage. Covering his head to shield himself from the fiery detritus, he ran back to the railing and peered down into the rubble. The elevator bulkhead was gone, buried beneath tons of debris, and the first droideka was gone, buried beneath it.

"Soelle!" Daemen shouted. A barrage of blaster fire from farther down the corridor forced him to take cover.

Straining to see over the edge without getting shot, Avari whispered, "I don't see her."

"Same plan. You deflect the blaster bolts. I'll get in close and cut it down."

Confused by the abrupt demise of its companion, the remaining droideka moved from side to side, as if shifting position might bring its missing partner into view. When Daemen and Avari dropped back down into the corridor, it reared up and began firing its blasters again.

A loud muzzle report erupted from the end of the corridor behind the droid. The droideka's head exploded into ribboned shards of metal. The subsequent explosion of the droid's internal systems forced it to lurch forward before falling to the floor, narrowly missing Daemen as it collapsed at his feet.

In disbelief he stared at the droid and then at a familiar form dressed in Scout Trooper armor lying prone on the ground with a rifle in her hands. "What sort of stunt was that, Master Sergeant?" Daemen reprimanded her.

"The kind worthy of a Sith," Avari said, following the basebuster up a set of stairs and into a recessed alcove on the upper landing. "Soelly, you ganked them!" He sucked in his breath as she applied a medical stimpak.

Holding the medkit in place, she chuckled. "Couldn't let you have all the fun, Master Avari."

"How did you know to do that?" Daemen asked, pacing the floor.

"It's how my team beat them in the game." Soelle took off her helmet, depressurizing the seals to get a better look at Avari's injury. "As long as someone kept the aggro out front, I could drop in behind and get a head shot with a big enough gun." She kissed the muzzle of the A280 rifle. "Thank you, Nuru."

"Looks like I put that rifle in the right hands," the bounty hunter said via the comm.

"Nuru, report."

"We're all safely back at the ship, Daemen, but I can't say the same for you. That lift was the only way down to our level."

"We'll find another one. There have to be hundreds of elevators on this wreck."

"Most of them filled with Tibanna gas."

"Avari and I can hold our breath long enough to get from level to level," Daemen countered. "Soelle has environmental features in her armor."

"Soelle would be the only one to survive—until the gas penetrated her suit and killed her, too," Nuru said. "The gas is unrefined, highly corrosive and flammable. Over the last seven decades, it's leaked into almost every maintenance shaft on Cloud City and flooded every level from the administration offices on down."

"And now we know what killed those smugglers," Keets said. "The fools found their way into an area of the city where administration stored restricted contraband, opened a shipping container, and accidentally activated one of those destroyers. It then activated others."

Daemen closed his eyes and leaned against a neighboring wall. "How many other containers are there?"

"Fifty. All marked with the Trade Federation's signature. At least that's what I counted before one of those droidekas blasted Nuru's probe bot."

"Droids need to charge," Avari said. "Turn the power back off."

"We did," Nuru said. "They were ready for that trick and rerouted power to the top ten levels of the city."

"Which is where you're going to have to go to rendezvous with us," Keets said. "Gomi can fly up to the observation deck on top of Cloud City."

"Don't we risk further damaging the Rover ?" Soelle asked anxiously.

"We have what we need," Gomi replied. "Besides, can't afford to stay docked with those droids on the loose. Tibanna gas has no effect on them. You three need to get topside through the main casino and in a hurry. Long-range sensors have detected an Alliance Corvette coming this way."

"Massacred by droids or executed by Rebels," Avari grumbled. "I'm not having a very good day."

"Khiss, I sent you a schematic: sections to avoid, enemy checkpoints," Gomi said. "We'll keep updating the data until every tracer's tracking bots are used up. Now get moving."

"Soelle, you're going to have to keep up," Daemen said, pushing himself from the wall. "Get your helmet on and stay behind me."

                              * * *

It was fight and flight for the next seven hours as Daemen led a bloody scrimmage through the top 50 levels of the ruin that was Cloud City. Signs of fatigue were manifesting, when at last, out of breath and patience, he and the others found themselves on the casino's top tier of gambling suites, a level reserved for only the wealthiest patrons with the credit accounts deep enough to match the stakes. And the stakes had never been higher for him as he took point, careless in his near exhaustion, and was struck dead center of his chest by a blaster bolt.

He fell backward in slow motion, his arms and legs flailing in the air as his body was violently thrown backwards. Landing in a discarded pile of credit chits, he hit the floor, shoulders first, his head slamming into the leg of a Sabacc table. Daemen heard Soelle cry out, screaming his name, and saw Avari shoving her to the floor beneath the casino tables. Distantly, he watched the crimson blur of a lightsaber blade artfully deflecting the next incoming bolt that would have ended him as well as a dozen others. Thirty battle droids descended on them in an ambush.

There was a powerful muzzle blast from beside him, which was followed by a second more powerful explosion as Soelle took aim for the sniper droideka positioned in the upper tier of the room and blasted it. She continued to fire, but Daemen could no longer hear the sound of the battle as the darkness encroached on him with a pleasant, numbing sensation that drained his senses and left him unconscious.

When he awoke, he was on his feet again, standing in warm water. Staring at his feet, Daemen could see the tops of them, even in the shallow, sandy bottom of the ocean inlet. Looking up, he stared into the bay as the clear waters of the Casja Sea gently rolled in from the greater depths. He could feel the powerful current pulling at his legs. The ringed moons of Nirkova we're visible in the skyline above the pristine cove of white beaches. For the first time in many years, he felt strangely at peace.

"Daemen!"

"Ilanthe?"

In Zabrak, her name meant serenity, which is what his beloved fiancée brought to him, even in the most troubled moments of his life. With a smile, Daemen followed the sound of her voice to the beach, his grin fading when he saw her kneeling in the sand at the feet of a Rebel soldier. Dressed in black Ubese armor, he shook her roughly by her hair, which was knotted in his gloved hand, and pointed a blaster at her head as she desperately reached out in terror for Daemen to save her.

Enraged, Daemen grasped for his lightsaber, his hand coming up empty. This memory was from a time before, when the weapon did not even exist and the stories of the Sith were just that: myths. "Ilanthe!" he screamed, running through the water as the blaster went off.

Her head jerked to the side in the soldier's hand, and she went limp, falling face first into the sand. To add further insult, the Rebel dropped a frag grenade on top of her body and calmly walked away.

The obvious peril did not matter to him. Daemen ran headlong into the danger in hopes to save her. When the blast went off, he was lifted into the air and thrown backwards, gasping for breath, drowning in the clear, shallow ocean waters. In the smoke and ash on the beach, he saw her pale arm extending out from what remained of her body, still reaching out to him.

"Daemen!"

A familiar voice touched his mind and brought him back to consciousness with a realization that much time had passed since that fateful day, marking his first steps onto a dark path from which there was no return. Still prone on the floor beneath the Sabacc table, Soelle reached for his arm, careful to check for any other sniper droideka that might have been drawing a bead on them.

Summoning all the unadulterated rage and malice that he could from the pit of his soul, Daemen extended his hand, not for her, but for the lightsaber that had fallen from his grasp. It promptly came at his bidding, and he ignited it as he leaped up, jumping to his feet in one powerful move.

A malevolent, black miasma manifested around him and absorbed any incoming blaster bolts, nullifying them in a tangible cloak of the dark side. Extending his left hand, fingers splayed, a score of battle droids were sent flying backwards through the chamber at velocity, sheering heads and arms off their companions as they became helpless projectiles of his will. With the right hand, he threw the lightsaber into the remaining horde of droids. The double-bladed weapon cut through their ranks, severing heads and arms and reducing the droid army to scrap metal piled haphazardly on the floor.

The heavier, more resistant droideka hid behind their shields, still firing in earnest. As Daemen caught the returning lightsaber in his fists, he tightened his grip on the hilt, knuckles cracking, and watched with a malevolent grin as the droids were smashed beneath the terrifying weight of the Force.

Eyes rolling into the back of his head, Avari collapsed to the floor. Scrambling to his side, Soelle grabbed him by the arm and pulled him beneath the table where she was hiding. He groaned in agony, curling up into a fetal ball in her lap. "Are you hit?"

"No," he managed to whisper, trembling. "It's Daemen. He's draining me."

"Soelle!" Gomi's voice crackled over the comm. "What the hell is going on in there? Every Sith on board just dropped like a thermal detonator went off. Damn getting to the observation deck, they're all over it. Get to that anterior balcony. I'm coming for you!"

Soelle crawled from beneath the table. "Master Daemen?"

"No, Soelle," Avari gasped, holding on to her wrist. "He'll kill you."

She shook free of his hold and stood up. There was no need to cower or take shelter, every droid in the room was in pieces. The only remaining danger was the man standing in front of her. "Master Daemen?"

"Soelle, get away from him. He won't know you. Not like this." He tried to get up, sliding across the floor, but collapsed where he laid.

She bowed to him, reverently, averting her eyes. Such an insignificant thing, Daemen thought. And yet, he could not dismiss her. Her presence was an annoyance, interfering with his connection to the darkness rising from his soul. He would eliminate her and then eliminate every threat on Cloud City until there was nothing and no one left.

Raising his hand, Daemen squeezed his fingers together and imagined them burying into the fragile folds of her neck. Startled, she drew in a frightened breath and took a step back from him, but resisted the full effects of the choke, confounding him. He attempted to push her away with a blast from the Force, but found himself countered by a darker, more powerful energy. Enraged, the Sith imaged crushing her, splintering every bone in her body when she laid her hand on his forearm.

"Daemen, please."

The sound of her heartbeat was deafening in his ears, only it not just one heartbeat but two. Disarmed, Daemen felt his connection to the darkness weaken and heard the voices of his brothers and sisters on the Rambling Rover crying out for release. Unshackling them from his will, he shook the dense fog from his thoughts. He saw Avari struggling beneath the table and reached beneath it, clasped his hand, and pulled him up to his feet. "You good?"

"I am now," Avari replied.

Subsequent blaster fire once more erupted from the back of the room as three droidekas crashed through the ruined battle droids; however, the shots were not aimed at them. The roar of the Rambling Rover's crippled engines reverberated through the ruined viewports of Cloud City, blowing out any remaining glass on the balcony overlook.

"Run!" Daemen shouted.

While the Rover remained the target of the droidekas and their minions, Daemen led the chase to the outer patios to rendezvous with the ship. The side cargo ramp was opened and waiting for them with Grinder, Weolo, and Nuru strapped in for safety, ready to catch them when they made the leap from the platform.

Glancing over his shoulder, Daemen noticed that Soelle had fallen behind, on hands and knees anxiously looking through the debris on the floor. "Soelle!" he shouted. Throwing his saber at a trio of battle droids as they sprinted towards her, the Sith stood his ground with Avari and used the Force to push the other droids back into the incoming lines as the basebuster snatched something from the floor, got to her feet, and ran towards them.

Avari took her by the right hand, and Daemen took her by the other. Together, they leaped across the yawning chasm between the facility and the YT-1300, landing on the lip of the ramp where they rolled into the waiting arms of their companions. Blaster fire ricocheted off the interior bulkhead of the ship.

"Gomi!" Nuru shouted. "Get us the hell out of here."

"What were you thinking!" Daemen thundered, shoving Soelle against the bulkhead wall. "Our lives are in danger and you take the time for sightseeing? Souvenir shopping!" He gave her no room to offer excuses. "I'm not done discussing this or the other little secret you've been keeping. Go hide, Soelle. It's what you do best, isn't it? I don't want to see your face."

Cowed by his words, Soelle removed her helmet and retreated into the corridor. "Soelle?" Avari called after her, but she shrugged free of his hand and disappeared into the interior darkness.

"Little harsh on the girl?" Keets said. "Considering you nearly killed all of us."

"And would have if Soelle hadn't stopped you," Avari said, glaring at Daemen. He turned his back on him and followed Keets to the cockpit.

"Gomi, you said yourself we don't have any shields," Nuru said. He watched as hundreds of battle droids assembled on the balcony to continue firing at them.

"They've got power, but no range," Gomi countered. He stared hard through the viewport. "What I wouldn't give for my main cannons right now. We can't leave those things out there. The next ship that lands might leave with those droids onboard."

"Even if you could fire on them," Keets said, shaking his head, "I doubt you'd have enough power to take the whole rig down."

Risking Daemen's ire, Soelle slipped by the Sith, avoided his scathing glare, and crowded into the cockpit among them. With a heavy sigh, she stared through the screen at the floating skeleton of the once beautiful Cloud City.

"Soelle?" Gomi whispered. "What you got there, kid?"

"Remote detonator," she whispered, never taking her eyes from the rig. "It will activate the squad leader terminal and finish the chain reaction command. You all know what happens next." Soelle clicked the button and watched on as the first explosions violently blew out the supporting terminal hub and collapsed a hundred levels in the middle of the facility. Enormous black gouts of smoke erupted from the crumbling structure as subsequent explosions destroyed the adjoining levels and blasted flares of fire into the clouds. Internal eruptions signaled catastrophic failures as pockets of Tibanna gas were exposed to the air and ignited in an inferno that slowly engulfed the entire facility.

"Boom! This base is busted, people. Sealed with a kiss. Move out." Soelle looked away as Cloud City vanished into the dense gas giant of the planet Bespin below. "I just wanted to say that one last time."

"Well, I'll be a one-armed Wampa with a case of the shingles! You rigged the city terminals to blow while you were stripping the power converters?" Gomi grinned, slapping his thigh. "And they me a dirty smuggler."

"They call you that because you're a dirty drunk, Gomi. Here," she said, handing him a credit chit. "Hope I made a good gamble. The stakes were certainly high enough." Head bowed in shame, she retreated into the corridor.

Every eye turned to Daemen, who was leaning against the bulkhead, and he felt the weight of their accusations, especially from Bink. "There are no leaders in <ELITE>. We are all equal," she whispered, menace in her voice. "That is our code, which you just broke by cutting the heart out of one of us."

"I'll talk to her," Avari said.

"No," Daemen said, "I can clean up my own messes."

Choking on his pride, he went in search of the crestfallen basebuster and found her in the crew's quarters. She was sitting on the floor of the shower with her knees drawn up as the water ran over her head, soaking her to the scalp. Still dressed in her Scout Trooper armor, she never looked up, even as Daemen cut off the water.

"Was it that night in Bestine?" he asked, sliding down to the floor along the corner wall beside her.

"Yes," she whispered.

"Soelle, that was over a month ago. You never said anything—"

"I have no expectations of you. You got what you wanted—a few moments of sweet bliss. And I got more than I ever expected. A little piece of you that I can truly claim as my own."

She fully intended to have the child with or without his permission and to raise it with or without his protection. "You've got a price on your head. Last time I checked it was a few thousand more than the one on mine. Where will you go?"

"Home. Socorro. It's the only place I can be safe."

Daemen sighed, running his hands across the crown of horns on his bald head. "Reek's never going to let me live this down."

She looked around the corner at him, but only briefly. "Do you think he survived the Rebel assault on Tatooine?"

"If he made it out to the Jundland Wastes, which I know he did, they'll never find him, and I doubt they'll pick a fight with the Tuskans." He put a hand on her knee. "Guess I'll need to get a job. Does being a pirate pay well these days?"

"I don't think you'll make a very good pirate."

"He won't have to," Gomi said from the doorway. The smuggler entered the crews' quarters followed by Avari, Nuru, and their other compatriots."Do you know what this is, little girl?" he asked Soelle, holding up the crimson credit marker. "Of course you do because you risked your life to go back for it."

"A casino credit chit, so what?" Daemen said.

"Not just any chit, Irarth. This is the Suicidal Queen—so named for the legendary Sabacc move that put Cloud City into the hands of the man who made the hand famous: Lando Calrissian. Every casino has to keep a credit marker with enough money to cover every chip open on the floor, every game, every slot." He held it up. "This is that marker."

"How much is on it?" Daemen asked.

"Enough to tend our wounded, even the worst of them, putting them up in the best medical facilities on Omman. Enough to buy passage anywhere we want to go, first class, or enough for each of us to buy our own ships and hire a crew to take us. That is, if Soelle cares to share it with us."

"It's worth 8,000,000 credits!" Avari said.

Gomi rapped him in the ribs with an elbow. "Add another zero to that, idiot." He held out the chit to her. "It's worth 80,000,000 credits, Soelle. And it's legitimate. I checked it."

Soelle took the marker from his hand and stared at it, turning it over in her gloved fingers. "Is it enough to fund an Empire? A new one?"

"It's a start," Gomi said with a grin.

"Oh, hell yeah," Nuru said, "count me in for that."

"I want in! Wherever you go, I go, Soelley!" Avari crossed his bare arms across his chest.

"We all do," Keets said, nodding to the unanimous consensus behind him.

Soelle got to her feet, standing in front of Daemen, eyes downcast as she stared at the chit. "If there are bases to be busted ..." she paused, meeting his intense gaze. "Can I count on you?"

"The Code is unbroken, little one," Daemen said, igniting his lightsaber. He bowed to her as she had bowed to him so many times. "My lightsaber is yours to command. Lead and I will follow."