reluctantly. "Do you remember what happened the last time you heard that
chime and you kept going?" "A trapdoor opened," Anakin said, suddenly
finding reasons to look everywhere but at Q9. "Yes. A trapdoor opened. Under
me. And I fell into a waste disposal ehute. If I had not managed to jump my
repulsors to high power in time and bounce back up, what would I be right
now?" "Mashed down to a ten-centimeter cube. Unless the machine had melted
you down by now." "Quite right. But Chewbacea only found that out afterward,
didn't he?" "I helped him," Anakin protested. "Yes, you did. And we need you
around to help him more. So what would we do if the trapdoor was under you
this time?" Anakin's eyes grew wide with alarm. "Oh," he said. "Maybe I'd
better stop and let Chewie look." "Maybe you'd better," agreed Q9. "Come on,
let's go find the others." Anakin nodded. "Okay," he said, and turned back
the way they had come. Q9 followed after on his repulsors, relieved that
Anakin had decided to be cooperative-this time. Q9-X2 had been designed with
the capacity to learn new behaviors by trial and error, but he had never
expected to use that capacity to learn practical child psychology. The
skills required to handle Anakin with even marginal success were taking up
an inordinate portion of system resources. Q9 decided he was going to have
to perform a partial memory wipe on himself, and free up some capacity, when
this was over. If it ever was over. As they came out of the side passage and
into the central chamber, Q9 reflected that this situation was starting to
look rather permanent. They were a motley crew, all of them holed up in this
huge and alien place. Anakin and Q9 paused at the exit from the side passage
and looked around. Seen from this vantage point, the rcpulsor chamber seemed
too large and obvious for a hiding place, but, from the surface, Q9 knew
just how difficult it would be for outsiders to find this place. It was
shielded from every detection system that Q9 knew about-with the exception
of Anakin Solo. He had found this chamber-and Us identical twin on
Corellia-with no trouble whatsoever. And there were good reasons for hiding
the chamber. It contained the planetary repulsor that had propelled Drall
into its current orbit, unknown millennia ago. Likewise with Corellia and,
no doubt, with the other inhabited worlds of the Corellia system-Selonia and
the Double Worlds, Talus and Trains. Each of them had a hidden chamber like
this one. Each of them had a planetary repulsor like this one. And each of
them had been transported into the Corellian system long, long ago, by some
long-forgotten race for some long-forgotten reason. But now the hunt for the
repulsors was on. The party in the repulsor chamber had been cut off from
outside contact for some time, but the last information they had was that
the rebel forces on at least some and probably all of the inhabited worlds
were actively searching for the repulsors. The reason was not entirely
clear. While the repulsors would make powerful and effective weapons, they
were not war-winners, not by any means. According to Ehrihim, a planetary
repulsor could be used to knock out a ship in orbit- but it would be hard to
aim and unwieldy to use. There would be the element of surprise, but only
the first time the repulsor was used. There were other, simpler, cheaper,
more reliable ways of shooting down enemy spacecraft, and many of them were
available to the rebel groups. So why were they expending precious time and
effort in the middle of a war in order to find weapons of marginal utility?
Q9 gave it up. He had come to that point in the analysis two hundred
thirty-nine times before, and it didn't seem likely that an answer that did
not spring to mind any of those times would do so on the two hundred
fortieth attempt. Instead, he admired the strange and massive forms that
made up the main planetary repulsor chamber. The chamber itself was a huge
vertical cone, just under a kilometer from lop to bottom, the walls of which
appeared to be gleaming, perfect metallic silver. At the base of the conical
chamber were six smaller cones of the same silver material, each just over
one hundred meters tall. They were spaced evenly around a circle centered on
the axis of the pyramid. In the exact center of the chamber's base was a
seventh, larger cone, twice as tall as the others, but with the same slender
proportions. Passages to side chambers were spaced around the circumference
of the chamber, and vertical shafts in the floor of the chamber led to a
series of lower levels they hadn't even started to explore. It was a huge,
artificial, gleaming, impersonal alien place-and a ramshackle, improvised,
crude, homey-looking campsite was sitting right in the middle of it. right
by the base of the central cone. No doubt to human or Drallish-or even
Wookiee-eyes, the camp looked incongruous enough. To the droid's eyes, it
looked absurd. The Millennium Falcon was there-and it had been a very close
job flying it into trie concealed topside entrance. The Duchess's hoverear
was parked alongside it. A line with washing on it was strung between the
Falcon's topside parabolic antenna and a spike antenna on the roof of the
hovercar. Chewbacca was trying to use as little power as possible, to reduce
the chance of detection. Even the Falcon's clothes drier was off for the
duration. Folding chairs and tables were set up to one side of the two
vehicles, and the children, tired of the close confines of the Falcon, had
moved their sleeping pads outside and under the ship. As always, the
children had arranged their beds so they could all sleep together-the twins'
beds close together, with Anakin just a bit farther off. 09 could see all
the rest of the party from here- Jacen and Jaina carrying some sort of gear
out of the Millennium Falcon; Chewbacca the Wookiee, sitting at his camp
chair, fiddling with some recalcitrant bit of hardware or other; and the two
Drall, Ebrihim and his aunt, Mareha, the Duchess of Mastigophorous, at the
other end of the table, hunched over their own work. The two Drall, like all
of their species, were rather short by human standards, Ebrihim being just
about Jacen's'height. They were short-limbed and thick -bodied- downright
plump, in fact-and covered with thick brown fur. As Q9 had learned, to human
eyes they tended to look like stuffed toy animals. Some humans found them
hard to take seriously-but failing to take Drall seriously was always a huge
mistake. They were sober, serious, levelheaded beings in general. Even if
Ebrihim was found to be a bit Highly by Drallish standards, his aunt was one
of the most commonsensical beings Q9 had ever met. No doubt Anakin's latest
somewhat unnerving discovery would give them something else to work on, give
them another piece to the puzzle they were struggling to put together. They
intended to develop a useful understanding of the repulsor's control system.
All in all, Q9 felt, the two Drall had the hardest job of anyone in the
camp. The hardest job besides waiting, of course. And they were all doing
that. "Come on, Q9," said Anakin. "Quit dawdling." Another bit of child
psychology to note down-no matter how slow they might be when one was
waiting for them, no caregiver had ever moved fast enough when it was the
child doing the waiting. "Coming, Anakin." Jaccn set down the crate he was
lugging out of the Fa/con, looked up, and saw Q9 and Anakin heading back to
camp. "Finally," he said. "I thought they'd never get back. Now we can eat."
"Darn. We can? Maybe we can get them to stay away a little longer." Jaina
set down her own crate and waved to Anakin. Her little brother waved back.
"Come on, the survival rations aren't that bad." "They aren't that good,
either. Especially the nine millionth time in a row. I think they call them
survival rations because no one knows if you'll survive eating them." "Ha
ha. Very funny. I think you've told me that joke nine million times-and it
wasn't so good the first time." "Sorry," Jaina said, sitting down on her
crate. "Not much new inspiration here." "I know, I know," Jacen said.
"Things here don't change much." He could have gone and checked the
Millennium Falcon's chronometer, but without that and Chewbacca's rigid
insistence that they all eat and sleep at normal intervals, there was no
elue at all to how much time had passed. The light in the chamber was
unchangeably bright, coming from some diffuse and undefinable source in the
upper reaches of the cavern. There was no sound at all from the massive
cavern, except the sound of their own moving around and talking. But every
sound anyone made produced a series of faint, distant echoes, whispering
down from the top of the chamber for long seconds afterward. And the echoes
of every sound mingled with all the others, Anakin's laughter blending with
Chewbacca's growl or the whir of a machine, or the bang of a camp chair
bumping into a table merging with the low, serious voices of the two Drail
in conversation with each other. Whenever the camp was busy and active,
there was a constant whisper of background echoes reverberating down from
above, just enough to make the chamber seem less foreboding and empty. But
five or ten seconds after they stopped moving or talking, the chamber would
fall silent again, and the stillness would seem to shout louder than any
noise how strange this place was, how old its flawless gleaming silver
walls, how alien and powerful its capabilities. Night-or what they pretended
was night-was the hardest. With the silver walls still gleaming in the
unchanging light, they would go to bed-the children to their sleeping pads
in the shadow of the Falcon, Chewbacca to his usual shipboard bunk, the two
Drall to foldout beds in Aunt Marcha's hovercar, and Q9 plugged into a
charge stand. Then, all would be so quiet that the slightest noise seemed to
echo forever. A cough, a whisper, Ebrihini's muttering snore-or Anakin
crying in his sleep-seemed to carry up to heaven and come down again and
again. It was not the best way to live, Jacen reflected. But in a sense, it
was not a way of life at all. It was a way of waiting. All of them, even
Anakin, seemed to know things could not last this way forever-or even for
very long. There was a war being fought out there, and sooner or later, one
side or the other would find this place, and after that- After that, no one
even pretended to know what would happen. "Sit up properly, Anakin," said
the Duchess Marcha, "and stop banging your foot against the table leg. The
noise is bad enough, but the echoes will drive me to distraction." She shook
her head and looked toward her nephew, Ebrihim. "Honestly, nephew, I do not
understand these human children. What does Anakin gain by slouching over and
making such irritating noises?" "I have not dealt with them long enough to
obtain a clear answer, dearest aunt. However, I might add that it would seem
that even human parents do not understand the purpose behind much of what
human chil-dren do-and that in spite of having once been children
themselves." "Somehow, that docs not surprise me. I suppose our own young
ones can be some trouble, but I must say I have no recollection at all of
your misbehaving as badly as Anakin does." "Don't talk like I'm not here!"
Anakin shouted indignantly. These Drall grown-ups were worse than regular
human grown-ups for pushing kids around. "I was just thinking about stuff."
"What kind of stuff?" Jaina asked. All of them ganging up on him, even the
other kids. "Just stuff." Anakin said, frowning fiercely. "Well, Anakin,
there is certainly nothing wrong with thinking," said Aunt Marcha. "I'm sure
the universe would be a better place if we all indulged in the practice a
bit more. If you could do your thinking without the banging, that would be a
great help. All right?" "All right," Anakin said, still feeling kind of
grouchy. But he knew he was lucky they had stopped asking questions when
they had. Because of all that Jedi stuff, he would have had to tell the
truth if they asked more, or his brother and sister would catch him fibbing,
and then he'd be in even more trouble. Sometimes Jacen and Jaina acted just
like grown-ups. If he had told them he had been thinking about that control
panel Q9 had told him to stop fooling with, they all would have yelled at
him. He knew he could get it to do something. Something big, and important.
What, exactly, he wasn't sure. But something. He could feel that. It was
like the control panel was calling to him, asking him to hurry back and set
it didn't matter. They hadn't asked him about it. So he could think about it
all he liked. "Come, dearest aunt," said Ebrihim to the Duchess. "It is
late. Everyone else is asleep. We have made great progress, but we can do no
more with our researches tonight." The two Drall were sitting in the
hovercar. reviewing their notes for the day. And Ebrihim was right. They
could go no further for the moment. "Whatever progress we have made is only
the barest start toward understanding this place," the Duchess replied. "We
have some idea of how the alien keypads are laid out, and what- some of the
button markings and color coding seem to mean. But going from there to
operating this place, and shutting it down safely-a machine that has been
operating for at least tens of thousands of years and perhaps much longer?
We have no idea how the system draws its power. Suppose we do learn how to
turn it off. Where does the power go once it is not coming here? If it is
some sort of geologic energy tap, as I suspect, we might set off massive
seismic disturbances. I think it most probable that this chamber is but one
part of a much larger system. I suspect this is merely the nozzle, if you
will, for a propulsion system woven into the very being of this world. We
are dealing with a device that can move a planet. A device of that power
could also destroy a planet, if it was not used properly. I do not see any
way of learning all we need to know in any reasonable period of time."
Ebrihim smiled faintly and let out a short bark of a laugh. "Unless, of
course, we simply instruct Anakin to find the main control panel and then
set him loose on it." Marcha's eyes widen
ed in horror. "Do not say such a
thing, nephew. Not even in jest. Jokes like that have a way of coming true."
Anakin's eyes snapped open so suddenly it startled him. He was, quite
abruptly, wide awake and staring up at the under hull of the Millennium
Falcon. He sat up quietly and looked around. Jacen and Jaina were still
sound asleep. Chewbacca was a deep enough sleeper that Anakin didn't even
worry about him. Ebrihim and Aunt Marcha were in the hoverear. Anakin turned
and looked in that direction. All the car's lights were out. the windows
darkened, and the hatch was shut. That left Q9. The droid spent most nights
in standby mode, partially powered down, plugged into a portable charging
stand between trie hoverear and the Falcon, with his back to the larger
craft. Anakin also knew that the bulk of the Falcon would block nearly al!
of the droid's sensors. So long as he kept the ship between himself and Q9,
he ought to be able to sneak away without any problems. Moving as silently
as he could, he pushed back his blanket and rolled over so he was on his
hands and knees. He crawled out from under the Falcon, and.into the endless
bright light of the repulsor chamber. Anakin blinked once or twice as he got
to his feet. Strange to be sneaking around in light as bright as day. But
there was no time to worry about that kind of stuff. Someone might wake up
any second and notice he was gone. Padding along in his bare feet, clad only
in his underwear, Anakin moved straight out for the perimeter of the huge
chamber, glancing over his shoulder now and then to make sure that he was
keeping the Falcon between himself and Q9. He reached the perimeter and
trotted unhesitatingly into the closest tunnel entrance. The passage he
wanted was almost on the other side of the chamber from here, but that did
not worry him. The others might get lost in the side passages, but not
Anakin. He could feel which way was the right way. He moved unerringly
through the complicated maze of passages, taking every turning and passage
with absolute confidence. He eould feel the panel getting closer. Closer.
And there it was, just as he had left it, the initial keypad open and
waiting. He stared at it for a minute, then reached out his hand and held
it, palm down, over the pad. He closed his eyes, reached out, and fell the