Tags:
Fiction,
General,
Science-Fiction,
Fantasy,
Action & Adventure,
Juvenile Fiction,
Fantasy & Magic,
Space Opera,
Life on other planets,
Interstellar Travel,
Leia; Princess (Fictitious character),
Skywalker; Luke (Fictitious character),
Solo; Han (Fictitious character)
leaned forward and kissed the glove Trioculus wore. "You have my dark blessing," he said.
Trioculus smiled. It was one of the first real smiles of his life. However, it was cut short by a stabbing pain in the center of his head. Everything then became blurry and dim.
Emperor Trioculus could see only dull blobs of light, shadows, and streaks of gray-and nothing more.
CHAPTER 5
A Path of Fire
Trioculus remained still, blinking his three eyes. Within moments his vision came back to him and he could see clearly once again. Following on the heels of Grand Moff Hissa, he departed from the Chamber of Dark Visions. He acted as if nothing happened. It was a perfect act. He didn’t tell anyone-not even his trusted droid, Emdee.
A short while later, as Trioculus stood in the control room of his Imperial strike cruiser and looked out at the vastness of space, his thoughts were millions of miles away. He was thinking about Yavin Four and its vast rain forests. "How can I find the Lost City of the Jedi?" he wondered aloud.
"Someone on Yavin Four must know where the Lost City is," Grand Moff Hissa said. "The question is, who?"
"Perhaps Luke Skywalker or SPIN knows," replied Trioculus in an icy voice.
"Yes, SPIN, of course," said Grand Moff Hissa, referring to the Senate’s Planetary Intelligence Network. His eyebrows shot upward as he suddenly got an idea. "I think you should send those Rebels an ultimatum-a warning so terrible that they won’t be able to ignore it."
A few days later on Yavin Four, where the next meeting of SPIN was about to take place, Princess Leia and Han Solo were already seated in the conference room, waiting for Luke Skywalker. Han was so enjoying seeing Leia again that he’d put off his return to Bespin with Chewbacca.
"Han, I’m worried about Luke," Leia said. "He promised me he was going to show up on time for the SPIN meeting today."
"I’m worried too," Han said. "Have you noticed how strange he’s been acting lately?"
"Luke has been acting different," Leia agreed. "The way he went off on his airspeeder the other day."
"Yeah," Han agreed. "Since when does he take mysterious journeys over the jungle, without any idea of where he’s going?"
"He does things like that when he feels the pull of the Force," Princess Leia replied.
"And now he’s obsessed with finding a boy he says is from the Lost City of the Jedi."
"I think he’s gone off the deep end," Han said with concern. "Luke never used to believe in the Lost City of the Jedi. He told me that because Obi-Wan and Yoda never mentioned it, then it must be only a legend. But suddenly he’s convinced that it does exist-and he thinks the Force is going to lead him to it."
At that moment, Luke hurried in to join the other SPIN members in the Senate conference room. "Sorry I’m late," he said, out of breath.
"Same excuse as usual?" Leia asked.
"Afraid so," Luke admitted. "I was on my airspeeder again, searching for Ken. Still no luck."
The SPIN meeting started with a report by Rebel Alliance leader Mon Mothma on the problem of Imperial probe droids. "There’s a new danger to SPIN," she explained. "Several enemy probe droids have recently penetrated Yavin Four’s Air Defense Network. They’ve been spotted hovering over the jungle, as if searching for something. But their purpose is still unknown."
EEEE-AAAAA-EEEEE-AAAAA .. .
An alarm siren sounded in the Senate. Security had been violated.
KCHOOOOING! KCHOOOOING!
In the SPIN conference room the sound of laser blasts could be heard coming from the big defensive laser cannons on the domed roof of the building.
BRACHOOOOM!
The laser cannons must have missed their target, because something crashed right through the roof. Luke looked up to see a very small, perfectly round, black Imperial device flying under its own power. It zoomed around the SPIN conference room like a tossed ball.
Then it hovered in front of everyone.
Han Solo raised his blaster and fired once .. . twice . . .
But