A Trip With Jacen Solo : Part 6

[soloing]

Source - Canon Review with Trip & Havac!

Part XLI: Balance Point
In which our hero administrates, pontificates, and aggravates

• Jacen is on Duro. He is helping refugees. He feels like something bad is about to happen. Something bad does not happen right away. Instead, Ryn bicker for a bit. Apparently Han is running a refugee camp. Lando would be so proud. Jacen is helping him. This seems to involve primarily adjudicating minor disputes between people about their stupid kids, and whining about how their supplies either suck, or are not even here to suck, but are instead sucking elsewhere. So, yeah, the alien gypsies are arguing. Hah, one's named Romany. That's so clever. Oh, wait. Bad things now. Jacen gets hit with the feeling of Jaina getting all blown up and stuff. He just about passes out, but somehow manages to pass out into a Force vision. Sweet.

• An Extra-Deep Luke Voice speaks to him. Apparently, the Force talks like a Tatooine hick, but deeper. Because that's manly. This is silly; everyone knows all cosmic powers must be played by either James Earl Jones or Morgan Freeman. Since Jones is already taken . . . Freeman's obviously the Force. Anyway, Luke's hanging out all in white. Hanging out on the galactic disc. He fights some Vong. The galaxy starts tipping toward darkness. Luke throws Jacen his lightsaber. Jacen tries to catch the torch. He fails due to his anger. Terrified, overthinking, desperate to support his uncle and do what's right, Jacen clumsily plunges to help. He slips and falls into the darkness. The Force warns him over and over to stand firm. Why? "Plainly, the strength of a hundred-odd Jedi couldn't keep the galaxy from falling to this menace. One misstep -- at one critical moment, by one pivotal person -- could doom everyone they'd sworn to protect. No military force could stop this invasion, because it was a spiritual battle. And if one pivotal person fell to the dark side -- or even used the ravishing, terrifying power of light in a wrong way -- then this time, everything they knew might slide into stifling darkness."

• I'll let you think about that.

• Jacen wakes up and is all, "Oh, yeah, Jaina was in trouble or something a while ago. Let's check on that." So they do. We waste a tremendous amount of time watching them not get a link in the communications hut and getting massive infodumps about Settlement 32's situation. Then they go to the Falcon to try their luck there. While they listen to the hold Muzak, Jacen and Han talk about why Jacen decided not to use the Force. Wait, Jacen decided not to use the Force? Well, I guess he did. Apparently, Centerpoint scared him, because he finally realized Anakin could have taken the shot, and maybe he was wrong. Somehow, this makes everything murkier and forces him to go even farther into abandoning the Force and fighting altogether. Not sure where the line is? Give up and go home. Possibly hide in a basement shelter. Because, see, fighting evil only makes it worse. Seriously. Because you can't fight darkness with darkness, so it totally makes sense that you can't fight darkness with fighting, right? Because the one's got violence, and the other one's got violence, so you totally get nowhere. Do you hear that, police? Go home. You're only making the situation worse. Go home, NR soldiers. Let the Vong invade. YOU'RE ONLY MAKING IT WORSE! So Jacen stopped using the Force and completely dropped off the face of the galaxy to go work with Dad managing refugees. Oh, yeah, so Jaina got all shot up, but she's OK. Because no major character ever dies in a fighter explosion. Main characters are awesome at ejecting.

• Randa the Hutt shows up later and complains he's not getting enough food. Jacen tells him to shut up. Randa tries to get Jacen to run off and form some kind of Vong-hunting irregular privateer squadron. Totally wrong guy for you, dude. Jacen blows him off. Poor Randa. No one loves him. So then they finally get their call back about Jaina. Her eyes got nuked, and they have to just leave her alone and let her heal for a while. So they're sending the blind girl to live with her family. I smell hilarious hijinks as Jacen pranks his temporarily disabled sister! Oh, that's not really the tone for this series? OK.

• Mara Jade contemplation of the day: "Sometimes she imagined Jacen forty years in the future, either teaching at the academy or ensconced on his own little world, like Yoda. If he survived."

• Here comes Jaina. She is grumpy. She wants to fight. Jacen takes her to live with a smelly old Ryn woman who is tired of sleeping alone. She bugs him to put her in a healing trance, because apparently he's all good at healing and stuff. But he's not using the Force. But he does it anyway, because Jaina is good at guilt-trips or something. The next morning they get breakfast, and people applaud Jaina for kicking ass. Awwww.

• Cut to a couple days later. This book is doing that a lot. Jacen is waiting for supplies. Supplies do not come. See, CorDuro Shipping sucks at shipping. "Shipping" being in their name, you would think they would be good at it. Randa randomly shows up and talks about how Kyp's Dozen apparently dozenhandedly held off a Vong invasion force at Kubaz until they got every single spaceworthy ship evacuated, which is pretty fricking awesome and probably deserving of a plaque and a really killer rock song. And a lifetime supply of Nilla Wafers. Jacen's all like, "Yeah, but he fights people and wants to punch Vong in the kidneys." Also, Randa uses a spittoon, which is pretty sweet. Jacen goes and asks where the hell his supplies are. The shipping clerk is like, "Yeah, CorDuro stole it." Jacen's all, "Let's talk to them about it," and Han's like, "Haha, no. They're thieves. They will lie to you and laugh and do nothing. Let's just snag some of the nearby settlement's stuff." Scoundrelly!

• So now Jacen's scraping worms off eaves. Except dangit Tyers, they're not worms. They have legs. They are insects. Get it right. Anyway, they eat synthplas, which is what most of the place is made of. So he has people round up the space plastic-eating mislabeled creatures and kill them. Then Jacen's randomly like, "Hey, Jaina. Let's try to figure out where Mom disappeared to." They talk to Viqi "Big Glaring Traitor" Shesh. She gives them the runaround, then hangs up on them at the first opportunity (Randa running in and trying to shout something about OMG SAVE THE WHALES AND/OR HUTTS!). Jacen's like, "Gee, there's something vaguely fishy about her. In fact, she randomly reminds me of Palpatine. Let's not pursue that any further."

• Jacen wakes up. Something is wrong. He does not know what. He looks around. Things seem OK. He wakes up Jaina. Things still seem OK. They turn on the lights. OMG SPACE PLASTIC-EATING NOT-REALLY-WORMS ARE NOW SPACE PLASTIC-EATING MOTHS AND THEY ARE EATING OUR SPACE PLASTIC ESPECIALLY THE SPACE PLASTIC THAT IS OUR DOME KEEPING OUT THE BAD AIRS OF THE OUTDOORS BECAUSE DURO IS POLLUTED AND THAT IS BAD KIDS (Thanks, Mission from Mount Yoda). They attempt to battle this infestation. They are not successful. They must evacuate. Jacen calls Gateway for evac. He helps them get loaded on the crawlers. Randa starts getting on and being a total jackass, knocking people around because Han didn't let him be a total jackass before. Jacen shoots him. It's just a stun blast, but it's still pretty sweet. Jaina uses the opportunity to point out that he's an idiot: "What was that about not being aggressive?" "He was hurting people. And I wasn't using the Force." "And the Yuuzhan Vong aren't hurting people? So they shouldn't be stopped with everything we've got?"

• No comeback.

• Gateway calls. They want a quarantine, since there might be more dome-killing purple plastic eaters. Rather than be responsible, Jacen's like, "No, that would involve making people uncomfortable. Don't worry, we're totally not carrying any eggs, though I have absolutely no way of knowing that." Gateway is like "Shut up, you idiot. You're all going to get shaved and irradiated." So they show up at Gateway, and hey, look, you know those "Mom could be on Duro all along and we'd never even know!" jokes? Yeah. What a coincidence. Happy reunion, Han and Leia's marital issues begin to be resolved, and so on.

• Gotta go back to grab the people's stuff that they left behind. Jacen leads the expedition. Because pretty much nothing has happened in terms of action so far, some people randomly get attacked by Fefze beetles. What, you ask, do Fefze beetles look like?

• You know, as long as we're showing GODV pictures:

• Yeah, baby. Yeah. Feel the awesome.

• So, anyway, Jacen stops them. Without the Force. Being just beetles, he can get away with that. He does not kill them, because it would be morally wrong to kill threatening wildlife when you don't have to. Plus, Fefze don't make very good rugs. Then some other people get attacked by Fefze. This time, there are more beetles and they are angrier, so it's OK to kill them. Jacen starts chopping, and the other people get away, but there are many beetles. Droma has to run up and start hacking. The beetles are attracted to Jacen's lightsaber, because they've only seen Force FX replicas before, and they're just not the same. So Jacen has to throw his lightsaber away, and run, and then pull it back. Even though it means breaking his vow. Because that's not as important as actually getting stuff done when it's really important, but Jacen seems unwilling to acknowledge the questions this raises. So Jacen takes off in the Falcon and brings it to Gateway. Yay.

• When he shows back up, yet more cargo has gone missing. Since we've undergone the boring events we needed to go through now, Leia's like, "Yeah, you can totally go up and talk to them about this now." Jacen goes through decontamination and gets his head shaved, so now he's the most neo-Nazi-looking hippie ever. (Meanwhile, Luke, Pregnant Mara, and His Aunt Really Thinks He's Handsome Anakin are at the same orbital city of Bburru, and they hear about the infestation, and Anakin makes a YJK-based crack about Jacen collecting animals. So far, we've also had mentions of how Jacen hid his sensitivity under labored jokes, and last book a bunch of references to Lightsabers. I love how tightly tied this is to YJK.) Anyway, Jacen goes and talks to Durgard Brarun, which sounds pretty hilarious when you say it out loud. He's Vice-Director of Stealing Stuff From Refugees And Obvious Collaborationism for CorDuro. Jacen's not nearly as surprised as he should be when he realizes the two Kubaz in the corner are Luke and Anakin in absolutely ridiculous disguises. Brarun is all "OMG YOU ARE REALLY SCARY AND I AM REALLY EDGY AND HOSTILE. Also, your problems are not my problems please go away I need to get back to being an ass." Jacen's like, "Well, let's negotiate. Also, let me explain how evil the Vong are, and what an idiot you must be if you think they'll leave your orbital mechanical cities which are incredibly badly photoshopped back ends of SSDs stuck in front of generic domes alone." Brarun's like, "Yeah, negotiations are good. Let's do them later. Go, uh, hang out in a back room, will you?"

• Since Jacen doesn't find anything suspicious in being held in a bedroom by an obvious collaborationist. Luke shows up in the guest room and is all, "Hey, dude." Jacen explains about his vision, and his desire to not use the Force so he can't screw up, and to make an example for all the Jedi out there running around misusing it." And Luke's like, "You gonna die for that, boy?" And Jacen's like, "Yeah! That'd make a great warning!" And Luke's like, "You're an idiot. Also, cut the halfway crap. Either totally use the Force, or totally don't. Because with you being this little ball of fear and insecurity and self-doubt, you can't use the Force at all in that state. Jacen's like, "Aha! Now it makes sense!" Actual quote: Luke: "Does that follow from all you've been telling me?" Jacen: "It has to. Somehow, it all has to fit together." License to Contradict. Then Luke's like, "Beware your pride," for the second hardcover in a row. See, by thinking he's the only one who's got it figured out, who realizes everyone else is doing it wrong, who's too humble to use the Force . . . yeah, pride. Then Luke's like, "No one's even paying attention to you anyway. But I am. I will pay more attention to training people with ethics in the future. Now, can we move on? What are you actually going to do?" And Jacen's like, "I'll convince the Duros to follow through on shipping supplies! It shall be a great victory!" And Luke's like, "Hi, collaborator. Also, make your Force choice." Jacen goes, "OK, no Force for me." Luke's like, "Dammit, you weren't supposed to pick that one. Don't get killed, dumbass. Also, if you stick to this, it's going to get people besides you killed, you ignorant twit."

• Yes, the conversation really was that long and meandering.

• So a Sunesi shows up with Jacen's dinner, and is like, "Hi, you're in danger. For the fifty-eighth damn time, COLLABORATIONISM. Here, you can get out of here in my car. Bye." Jacen does not actually feel the need to follow through on this warning and leave, though. Then Jacen watches Luke and Anakin have a great big practice duel outside his window for random reasons, and doesn't think, "Gee, this might be some form of distraction. Perhaps I ought to get ready to leave." Then Jaina shows up at his door, and he's like, "Dammit, I wanted to talk to Brarun." Jaina's like "YOU ARE THE BIGGEST DAMN IDIOT IN HISTORY. ALSO, WE HAVE LINKED BRARUN TO THE PEACE BRIGADE DUMBASS." Jacen's like, "Oh, that is shocking and disappointing." And Jaina finally decides screw it, and pulls a blaster and is just like "I AM GOING TO MAKE YOU COME." So Jacen's like, "Whatever, lah-dee-dah. Let's go." And they go, but there are guards beneath them in the stairway. Jacen's like, "Better get ready," but by then Jaina's already pulled some wild Matrix **** and jumped down the center of the stairwell and shot them on her way down. So they take the Sunesi's hoverpod, and for no justifiable reason Jacen lets the blind girl drive. They are chased by people who are not blind. They elect to steal somebody else's ship to get back down to Gateway. Yeah, this is going to cause problems down the road.

• Oh, well, never mind. Before they screwed around up there, Jaina and Mara found Nom Anor hanging out at Gateway. So they figure they probably should leave now. Then a Vong fleet shows up, and that'll be a problem. Oh, look, the shields over Gateway are sabotaged. Yeah, they're screwed. Jacen goes and finds Han, and Han's digging an escape tunnel into the mines. So Jacen runs back and tells Mom, and they take people there, and oh crap the Vong are landing. Leia feels the need to go back to the admin building, for reasons that are not entirely clear. I think she wants the transmitter, but what does she have to say? Coruscant already knows they're attacked. Is there a sale ending on Space QVC or something? Jaina and Jacen volunteer to go along. Then, wait, Leia's telling other people to go to transmitters and grab refugees, and Jaina suggests they just grab the mining laser and make a distraction . . . what the hell? This is even more incoherent than Jacen's philosophical views last book. Jacen thinks for about ten seconds about negotiating with the Vong, and Leia's like, "Even I know better than that."

• They go by the admin building, and find a pit with tech getting thrown in it, and prisoners around it. Leia wants to free them. Jacen refuses to help, since it would require use of the Force and he can tell the Big Crisis Moment is coming and he has to keep from using the Force. So Jaina goes ahead and picks a droid up out of the pit and drops it on a bunch of Vong guards, which lets people run away. Interesting that everyone seems to go to Jacen first, to treat him as much more powerful than Jaina. They get in the admin building, and Leia's like, "I intend to be a colossal idiot and make some stupid distraction that won't accomplish anything at the cost of my life. But you have to run away." But obviously, this won't work, since Olmahk is along and he'll knock her out and have the kids carry her away before he'll let her get killed. So Leia shows them the run-away-to-the-mines tunnel, then some Vong show up in the hallway or something, and Leia's like "OMG CRISIS!" and rather than let the four of them easily take out a two-man Vong patrol, locks this kids inside and shouts "RUN!" and gets Olmahk killed and herself captured.

• The twins run. Then Jacen's like, "I'm getting punched in the back of the head by the Force. How about we do what we should have done were we well-characterized, and go back there and kick some ass and get Mom out?" And Jaina, who before was all, "I'm going up with you, I'm not running away," is now all, "She sent us away, wah, wah, screw her let's go." Jacen's like, "Screw you, go tell Dad what happened. I'm gonna go pull off some badass hero ****. With no Force. Gotta make up for the YJK." And he goes back. Meanwhile, Luke gets a distress message from Leia, but the Force is like, "No, Jacen's gotta handle this. Either he succeeds, or it's all over."

• So, badass hero Jacen is cowering inside a tiny closet. He made it back into the building, but now he's all like, "I have to wait for my moment." Jacen struggles, trying to figure out just what the hell he's supposed to do with his life while the Force, which he's supposed to be ignoring, tells him to wait. Then he's like, "I can't do nothing. I gotta fight. Doing nothing saves no one. But I still don't have to use the Force." So Jacen comes out of the closet, and fights some Vong. He kicks one over the stair railing, which is pretty cool, and then follows the other one into a room. In that room, Mom's getting the crap tortured out of her legs. Maybe you should have been listening to the Force, kid. Coulda gotten here before you had that problem. Also present: Warmaster Tsavong Lah and a bunch of flunkies. Lah's like, "Haha, you're the cowardly Jedi. I've heard about you, coward. Coward." And in a vaguely anticlimactic scene, Jacen's like, "Gee, I guess I can't beat these guys without the Force. So my whole bunch of nonsense this whole book was a bad idea. Oh, well." So he gives himself over the Force and fights Tsavong. Then he's like, "Screw this amateur crap," and just lets rip with a Vadertastic "Throw everything in the room at the bad guys" dealie. If this was a Karpyshyn book, it would read, "Jacen cast Force Whirlwind." He knocks all the bad guys out, and he belts Tsavong in the face with a fricking desk and knocks him out the window.

• So then Jaina shows back up, and Jacen grabs Leia and uses the Force to control her bleeding while he runs back through the tunnels with Jaina. They run through some water that's just randomly hanging out in the tunnels for extra drama, and then they're out and Han picks them up in the Falcon. They med Leia up, then blast off while Jacen goes to lay on some pwnage in the quads. They get a super refugee convoy going out (unfortunately, no chartreuse microbus), and Luke and Mara and Anakin show up in super-butt-kicking mode. They jump to hyperspace, and that is the end. Well, except the part where Tsavong Lah calls on the galaxy to start handing over its Jedi, especially that Jacen Solo fellow.

• Also, at some point in the book, Jacen apparently did that. Yeah. Your guess is as good as mine. I have no idea what the heck is supposed to be going on there.

• Stay tuned for our next episode, when Jacen does nothing much.
• Part XLII: Recovery
  In which our hero helps him mom some, which is a good thing to do
  
  
  • So, yeah, Han and Leia dropped off the kids, because they were too recognizable, then went to Corellia to get some medicine done, since Leia was kinda in danger of bleeding to death. Jacen goes back to Coruscnt and spends his time writing book reports on CorDuro corruption. Unfortunately, since most CorDuro people got killed for being idiots, and their cities got all blown up and stuff, he does not have much evidence. When they are not busy repairing their SHATTERED MARRIAGE, trash-talking Thrackan who somehow managed to become Governor-General what the hell that's not even an elected position dammit, and doing things with hilarious sissing Barabel Jedi, dig up some evidence that CorDuro is collaborating and bad. And that Viqi Shesh is tied to them. There is some kind of assassination attempt. I don't really know what, because this is a ridiculously long short story and I'm just looking for Jacen stuff.
  
  
  • Anyway, Leia and Han and some Barabels and crap return triumphantly to Coruscant, except not that triumphantly since Leia's still crippled. They have evidence that Viqi is corrupt and evil. Like all good evidence, this results in a senatorial hearing. Jacen is there to support his mom. Literally, she can't walk. For some random reason, though, Jaina puppeteers her body through the Force so she walks that way. They hope not only to nail Viqi, but to distract her from organizing support for the Peace Vote, better known as the Appeasement Vote, which would outlaw the Jedi and have the New Republic basically roll over and die because they have such colossal dumbassery that they actually believe Vong promises of peace. This does not work, as Viqi doesn't even bother to show up. Leia presents her evidence. This is very strong evidence, and it has the senate panel very concerned. Then her chief of staff shows up dead and takes the blame for it all. Convenient.
  
  
  • Jacen sits in Leia's hospital room with everyone else and watches the Peace Vote fail like one of his old jokes. The Senate clobbers that bill good. It is anti-peace. Yay, good guys winning! Aren't those politicians so heroic? Jacen is happy. Also, now Leia's legs work, because why spread good news out over two instances when you can concentrate it into one big gooey ball of wrap-up shmoop?
  
  Part XLIII: Conquest
  In which our hero pulls a Horsey
  
  
  • Because people are idiots, they believe Yuuzhan Vong lies. So jackasses start selling out Jedi like Toys R Us May 1999. Luke is upset. Can you guess what he does? That's right. JEDI MEETING, BABY!
  
  
  • Kyp is angry that Jedi are getting sold out. He wants to do something. Luke's like, "No, don't be aggressive. Let's just keep our heads here, and do undefined nice moderate things." Jacen argues with Kyp, and gets in a pretty good shot about how what Kyp does isn't actually all that great. Kyp's like, "Screw you guys, I'm going out there to actually do stuff." He leaves, and Jaina and Anakin go to try to get him to come back, but he argues some more and leaves. He gets in a pretty good shot at Jacen -- he only broke his Force embargo to save his mom, and everyone knows he wouldn't have done it for somebody he didn't know. Hypocrite! Even Jaina and Anakin wind up admitting that Kyp's not all that wrong, and Luke's kinda screwing this one up with the whole doormat passivity thing. Then Jacen comes out, and is like, "Hey dudes, wassssssap?" And then he starts fighting with Anakin, because that's what they do. And then they're like, "Hey, let's actually figure out something to do. Uh, let's predict danger. Uh-oh, the Academy's in danger!"
  
  
  • And they go to talk to Lukie, but he already knows. Except he hasn't done anything about it, except get denied by Fey'lya and fail at finding Booster. So Mara's like, "Duh, try Karrde." So they do that.
  
  
  • But then Anakin runs off, and gets in trouble, and Karrde punches the Peace Brigade in the groin and saves everyone except Anakin and some random kids. And Shada comes back with the kids, and is like, "Hey, help? Vong are there." And Luke's like, "Dude, let's track down Booster." Because Borsk is still being a politician. And the politicians are back to being bad now. And Jacen's like, "I can do that." So he and Jaina are going to do that. Except wait, they can't leave the kids around on Coruscant, because that's dangerous. So they'll take them with. On the Jade Shadow. Except Mara and Luke can't come. And whoops, Mara's pregnant. Jacen figured that out already, but now it's out in the open. That's nice. Let's go.
  
  
  • So they go. And Jaina figures Booster's gunrunning for the Hutts. And Jacen goes all meditationy and tracks down Corran Horn, who's on the ship. Then Corran and Booster are presumably like, "VALIN'S THREATENED BY VONG OH CRAP LET'S GO KICK SOME ASS."
  
  
  • So they show up, and oh, it's right in the middle of Anakin's escape attempt. How coincidental. So Jacen and Jaina get in X-wings and shoot up some skips and save Anakin's life.
  
  
  • Tidbit for Horsey of the day: "Corran Horn's out here, too. I almost pity the Vong."
  
  
  • Then Booster's all like "I'M BOOSTER ****ING TERRIK AND YOU STUPID ****ERS ARE TRYING TO KILL MY GRANDSON YOU ARE SO ****ING ****ED." And there's something about a Darksaber superweapon or something, but I choose to believe he just gets out, lifts the Star Destroyer over his head, and physically beats the Vong to a bloody pulp.
  
  
  • Then there's like a battle for a whole day or something, which presumably involves much badassery from Booster, and Karrde, and Corran, and Jaina and Anakin and Jacen, and therefore is not shown. And the Vong go away, and everyone is saved, and Jacen talks with Anakin about how Anakin figured out some stuff about how the Vong are actually people, and he can understand them. But he's still going to fight them. And this dismays Jacen, who remains in "Fight evil? That's so . . . violent. It must be wrong" mode. Despite the fact that he fights evil all the time. Apparently, the key thing is to talk about how devoted you are to peace. Free pass.
  
  
  • Stay tuned for our next adventure, when Jacen becomes a freaking pirate. AWESOME.
  • Part XLIV: Rebirth
    In which our hero nearly makes his dad pull this ship over right now
    
    
    • We open with Jacen drifting in zero gravity, a gash in his head and something ominous outside. Then we go away for a couple chapters. Then we come back, and oh, it's some kind of Vong ambush of the Falcon. Everyone got magically knocked out. It is never explained how this might be possible, and this doesn't really play any role ever again. Pretend it didn't happen. Because the plot demands it, the interdictor which pulled them out of hyperspace is exceptionally lazy, and everyone takes about twenty minutes to do anything. Jacen goes to one spot where a grutchin is cutting in, and he kills the grutchin, and takes off down the cofferdam to a boarding coralskipper and kills a pair of Vong in an awesome zero-G John Woo duel which involves Jacen and the Vong literally launching themselves through the air at each other like missiles and battling in midair. Then he accidentally cuts the cofferdam and the Vong gets sucked out to space and he nearly dies, but because he's a main character and this is a paperback, he's invincible and the cofferdam heals itself just in time. So he goes back into the ship, and the Noghri are dismembering the other Vong boarding party. Do not mess with Noghri.
    
    
    • Because the interdictor is still lazy as hell, they don't care. It's probably noon and everyone's on break. So they have plenty of time to fix up their ship, have Threepio lob a few concussion missiles out the trash hatch (Jacen came up with the plan, and it's not clear why he couldn't just do it a lot quicker with the Force). Then lunch break is over, and the interdictor finally starts doing stuff, so Han powers back up and takes off, and the missiles make some cover or something, and Jacen gets on the guns and they shoot some stuff until they get away.
    
    
    • Hilariously, it is left up to Jaina in the C-plot to offhandedly mention what the hell the Solos are actually doing, which is establishing the Great River for Jedi to run away. This seems to involve a lot of random wandering in the Falcon.
    
    
    • They go to Shelter, which is a brand new exciting secret Jedi base inside the Maw. No one is using it, and it's not explained why the Jedi kids are still on the Venture. But Lando's there, and boy is he smooth. They have some grownup talk, and reminisce about the good old days when they were shot at by Star Destroyers rather than big coral things, and then it is Meeting Time. Not a Jedi Meeting, unfortunately. A random meeting with a handful of people running resistance schemes. Leia is upset that one of them charges money, since this is exploitative. The other is the Hutt resistance, who actually funded Shelter. Then there's Numa Rar hanging out and being pissed-off. And they argue some, and Jacen tries to play the nice mediator, and everyone wants something out of the Jedi but don't want it to cost them anything, and Jacen's all like, "No we can't fight, that would be bad, but we will smuggle some crap and give you supplies and free candy." And it goes on, and no one agrees, and they're angry, and so they take a break, and Leia and Han are fed up stressed with all this negotiating business, and finally even Keyes says, "Screw it, that's enough of that."
    
    
    • So the meeting just gets dropped entirely, and all of a sudden they're in the Falcon seeing a suspicious freighter. Jacen's meditating and still being all worried about how to tell what the Force wants, or does it even have a will now? Gah, I thought we were over this. Anyway, he snaps out of it. And oh, here comes a Vong escort for the suspicious dudes. Yep, Peace Brigade is carrying supplies inside Vong space. Han's like, "Ah, hell. I'm bored. Let's pirate the hell out of that thing." And Jacen's like, "That would be violent. I signed up for this because I thought there would be no violence. We don't need to actually shoot anybody right now. This is unnecessarily aggressive." And Han's like, "They're the enemy. We shoot them. That's what we do. Also, shut the hell up and take orders. I'm wearing the captain hat."
    
    
    
    
    • And Jacen's like, "Humph!" But he goes and mans the guns anyway. And so they blow up the Vong escort, because Han Solo is fricking awesome. And they're like, "Arr, matey! Heave to!" and other kinds of pirate stuff. And so Han and Jacen board the ship, and they're calling themselves the crew of the Princess of Blood, which is an awesome cheesy pirate name that probably came from Han Solo and the Princess of Blood or some other holodrama.
    
    
    • Conversation I cannot resist reproducing:
    "This is piracy."
    
    "That's good. I thought I was going to have to write it down for you, so you'd know what happened. Though for the record, it's actually privateering. See, pirates steal from anyone. They're greedy, and they just don't care who they hijack. Privateers, on the other hand, only attack ships allied with a certain fleet. In this case, I'm choosing for my targets any lowlife gutless and stupid enough to supply the Yuuzhan Vong or the Peace Brigade, or any other collaborationist scum, with anything whatever."
    
    "I told you--"
    
    "Look. In about five minutes, I'm going to see your cargo. If it's just a bunch of food that the Yuuzhan Vong are buying for their captives out of the goodness of their sweet, tattooed hearts, I'll let you go, with apologies. But if I find you're carrying weapons and ordnance, or any other sort of war materiel, I'm going to smack you around. And if you have captives . . . Well, you have an imagination. Use it."
    
    
    • Unfortunately, Han does not actually smack anyone around. But they take possession of the ship. And Jacen argues some more, and finally Han's like, "Screw it. We're going back to Shelter. If you don't like it, you can get the hell off the boat."
    
    
    • And they go back the Shelter. And Han and Jacen work on repairing some E-wings for a while. And Leia is all worried about the tension, and comes to talk to him, and tells him to cut the rebellious teenager crap and stop thinking the whole world revolves around his abstract hippie moral dilemma of the day. And she's like, "Han is just upset he doesn't understand you and you're pulling away, and he's maybe a little afraid you look down on him." And then there is crying, and hugging, and Jacen going off to make up. But he'd already made up his mind to keep pirating, so that he can keep things as safe as possible. Massive progress, right? Until the next book.
    
    
    • So they go out and privateer some bad guys. Jacen presumably starts wearing the standard pirate uniform.
    
    
    
    
    • No parrot, though. Or peg leg. Maybe a bicorn.
    
    
    • Anyway, now they're hanging out on Tatooine. Because what would a Star Wars novel be without a wholly gratuitous movie-planet appearance. They are in a cantina in Mos Eisley. Oh god. Wait, wait. It's actually not Chalmun's. Hallelujah. So Jacen and Han meet some shady dude named Shalo, and Han wants some information. But now Shalo thinks he's going to collect the enormous bounty on Jacen. Think again, sleazy dude! Talon Karrde and Shada D'ukal are in ur base, killin ur doodz. Also, Jacen has a lightsaber at your throat, which was going to be a problem even if you had the doodz. Shoulda tried that from a little farther away, idiot. So now Han gets some information. But them some more of Shalo's doodz show up. Karrde and his leet doodz pwn Shalo's doodz, and Jacen and Han manage to not get killed by a Gamorrean who knocks away Jacen's lightsaber and turns the whole thing into an Indiana Jones scene.
    
    
    • So Shalo cracks and admits there's a big convoy coming. The Solos decide to pirate it with Karrde. Then it shows up, and some more Vong show up, and uh-oh, Tsavong Lah just ambushed you! Good thing it wasn't Nas Choka. So with the interdictor showing up, they can't get away. Basically, Jacen just kinda sits in the turret while Han flies around, and then Tsavaong calls a cease-fire to demand Jacen, and Han's like, "Sure, I'll just send him over." And Tsavong sucks at sarcasm, so he waits. This makes Han laugh, and throw a bunch of liquid hydrogen at his ship that overwhelms the dovin basals with THE POWER OF SCIENCE. Valedictorian at Carida, baby. So they get away, and this is a happy end.
    
    
    • Except Jacen's in the OMG MARA! montage. Then Mara gives birth to Ben, and everyone's happy, so the Solos figure they'll go hang out with the family. Yay.
    
    
    • Tune in next week for Jacen's next adventure -- getting kidnapped! Man, it's been way too long since that happened.
    • Part XLV: Star by Star
      In which our hero gets kidnapped. Dammit, not again.
      
      
      • So, some Jedi are hanging out, getting ready for a Jedi Meeting about how Nom Anor relayed a Yuuzhan Vong threat to kill a bunch of refugees over Talfaglio unless the Jedi surrender. Jerks. They argue about breaking the Talfaglio blockade. Jacen doesn't like letting Talfaglio die, but he doesn't like rushing in to fight, either, because that could get the refugees killed too. Both choices are bad. Welcome to life. He doesn't get quite as far as suggesting the Jedi should surrender.
      
      
      • Uh-oh, Leia had a rough time on Coruscant killing some voxyn and saving a freighter full of refugees with the help of epic badass Gavin Darklighter. Han's going to take the voxyn bodies back to Eclipse, so Jacen comes out to Coruscant to hang out with mom. They go to talk to NRMOC. Jacen, perhaps the last person you would expect it from, proposes a genius military strategy to sneak a couple Star Destroyers in the back door and pound the Vong blockade. Viqi Shesh is all traitorish and jackasses the plan into the ground. Rather than kill the proposal, Borsk puts it in military study under Garm Bel Iblis. This upsets Leia, because Borsk didn't use his special war powers to "declare" a majority and put the plan in action. Oh, that Leia. She loves her democracy so. So she decides she's done with politics because the chief of state won't do her favors, and storms out and makes Jacen sad.
      
      
      • Back to Eclipse. Lyric died. They're sad. We're not, because we're still trying to remember who that is. Also, the other kids have been doing exciting fighting stuff without Jacen. And Lusa died without even having to good grace to let Jacen be in the reaction scene. She was frolicking a meadow or something, which I guess was supposed to make it sad, but just raises the question of why the hell wasn't she out kicking Vong to death or something? Anyway, Cilghal announces the voxyn are eating ysalamiri. From Myrkr. They know where the queen must be. Anakin proposes they get captured, then break themselves out when they're across the magically impenetrable frontier of deep space. Han points out that this is a stupid plan. And they cannot do it. Luke says he'll do it, and no one worries, because he's Luke Freaking Skywalker. Tenel says they won't buy that. Jacen says maybe no one should go, because the Vong will retaliate. You fricking idiot. Like the Vong aren't out there killing all the people they can get their hands on already? Oh noes, Tsavong might get mad! Choka might waggle his pelvic area at innocent bystanders! However could we live with this on our consciences? People argue. Luke makes them all speak in turn. Leia basically guilt-trips Han into supporting the plan because overprotective blah blah blah Anakin growing up blah blah blah. So Luke decides to do it. Jacen volunteers first, so he can use critter-fu against the voxyn.
      
      
      
      
      • Lando's going to take them. He's all smooth and stuff, and YVH 1-1A starts drilling them for the mission, and it is all very serious. Lando provokes an ends-and-means argument, because they need to be able to deal with this stuff. Guess which side Jacen comes down on? Finally, Anakin comes down on Jacen and says he just has to shut his face, get on board, and let Anakin worry about the hard decisions. Anakin's about ready to can him for being all dissent-forming with his hippie ways or something, so Jaina throws out the idea of a battle meld to save the day. Anakin might have anchored the VP one, but now Jacen and his uber-empathy mean he has to coordinate it. They can meld up to resist any torture/breaking effort, which was kinda the HUGE GLARING WEAKNESS in their plan before. So now they're ready to go, right? No problem?
      
      
      • So, it's capture time. The Jedi are nervous. Voxyn aboard. Jacen savors the tangy taste explosion of thakitillo curds. So, Jacen starts melding it up, and he's basically coordinating the whole thing, which sometimes means he forgets about himself. This seems extraordinarily inconvenient. They act out the whole thing, but it's earlier than they expected to be grabbed, which means their weapons are going down the garbage disposal rather than to a weapons locker. Gotta play for time while the two Ridiculously Uber Healing Armor Make Vong Explode By Looking At Them Droids recover their weapons. Tenel Ka basically carries Jacen around while he runs the meld. The Jedi beat the crap out of the Vong, since this makes their plan better somehow, or plays for time, or something. Duman Yaght, the guy in charge of this little capture thing, refuses to surrender and says he'll have his ship blow them up. They find out their blasters are rigged to be no good, which is good because they were supposed to be no good, and they get themselves recaptured like they wanted to. Confused yet? Well, Ulaha gets herself stabbed in the back. Bad move.
      
      
      • They're getting all tortured and stuff now. Wonderful. Jacen's still using the meld to strengthen whoever's being tortured at the moment. Boomin' Duman wants to know where Eclipse is. They are not saying, so they keep getting tortured. Ulaha especially. Man, the Vong really are jerks. The stupid weak Jedi kids want Ulaha to just admit that there is a base, so the torture will stop. Mistake, idiot kids. Ulaha caves. Idiot kids. You're supposed to be heroes. Tell Duman to kiss your ass. Come on.
      
      
      
      
      • So, yeah, Duman's breaking the will of the team. And he's good at it. He makes Jaina choose Anakin or Jacen to be tortured. Because they're both back to being good action heroes, each wants to be the one. She picks Anakin, who has more need of being a badass at the moment. Then it's Ulaha's turn. Pissed off that she's being used to break the team, she decides she's had it with these clowns and has Jacen lend her some strength -- then she tries to off herself. When that doesn't work, she takes what was probably the better course and kills a guard and stabs the voxyn in the face. Duman just got punked.
      
      
      • Well, that's it for the torture. They're just going to have to sit quietly now. Jacen's all offended, though, since he thinks Anakin ordered Ulaha to take herself out. Oh, well. Escape time. The Special Super Uber Droids Of Death pretty much take care of all that for them. Then the thoroughly brutalized Jedi suit up, and dammit, it's Action Hero Time. I don't know what it is, but my mental image of the Solo brothers always changes in SbS from skinny kids to fricking Bruce Willis.
      
      
      
      
      • So the Jedi go to clean out the rest of the ship and grab Ganner. Jacen complains that Anakin tried to sacrifice Ulaha. Anakin's like, "No, actually, I was a wuss and told her to name the base." And Jacen's like, "Oh, sorry," and Anakin's like, "You doubted my character and I am very offended. Very very offended." Tenel Ka keeps up her whole taking-care-of-Jacen thing and tells him shhh, wait and deal with it later. Let's go kick some ass. So they do. Ganner back, ship theirs. Go Jedi.
      
      
      • Awwww, Jacen and Tenel are snuggling on a bunk. Jacen is being all mopey because he doubted his brother, but dude, what else was he supposed to think? Tenel makes a joke, and Jacen says, "Ah. Aha." Hilarious role reversal!
      
      
      • They're at Myrkr now. I guess they cut that one close. So they want to go to the Death Star-sized worldship and blow up the cloning place. Oops, Anakin senses Forcey people by it. No good. Gotta go down and land, then. Anakin acts all pissy at Jacen. Jerk. Oh, wait, the Vong are anticipating them! Uh-oh. So they use their big missile on the big ship, and bail out in escape pods onto the surface of the worldship. Ulaha stays with the ship, and makes beautiful Force Flute Music and dies.
      
      
      • They go to the nearby surface spaceport thing. Anakin has started wondering if maybe, just maybe, they're not totally prepared for this. Yeah . . . anyway, they draw the ysalamiri out with mating pheromones and walk in using their special holoshrouds to look all Vongy. Jacen and Ganner watch the landing field while Anakin and everyone else go in and find out . . . oh, crap, those people we nixed the efficient option for . . . yeah, darksiders. You'd think Anakin would have kinda sensed their evilness when he sensed them in the Force. Anyway, uh-oh, Jacen just spotted Nom and a hundred or so soldiers arriving! Ominous cutaway!
      
      
      • I can't not mention the Battle of Talfaglio. This may be the most badass battle ever. Luke, Han, Leia, Mara, Lando, Corran, Gavin, Garm, Tycho, and Wedge take a freaking tire iron to the Yuuzhan Vong. It's like a festival of badassery. And they told me this book would be depressing.
      
      
      • And back to the team. So, Nom's coming. And oh, what's that with him? It's a little feathery thing and holy crap is it Force-sensitive? Jaina shows up and recognizes Vergere. Lomi Fullname Plo and Welk say they have to retreat though the voxyn training course, since Nom's got like a hundred Vong. THsi seems like it could lead to trouble. Jacen is worried because Zekk's all mopey about having Dark Jedi in the group, and the meld spreads his mopeyness to everyone. On the training course, some coralskippers show up. The Uber Ultra Super Duper Regenerating Armor Mega Invincible Haha Lando's So Vain And Always Doing Wacky Business Stuff Droid sacrifices himself to kill the skips. Well, at least we won't have them magically handling everything for the team from now on.
      
      
      • They go to a lake. There are voxyn in the lake. They kill the voxyn like they do it for a living. Maybe this mission won't be so bad, right guys? Then they ambush the hundred Vong, and Jacen and all the other Jedi pop up out of the water like a slow-motion action movie scene. Jacen avoids killing Nom, though, because he thinks maybe it would be kinda darksideish to single that one guy out because he dislikes him. He has no idea how his mom does things, does he? So, Nom and Vergere get away, but Jacen lures some voxyn down to eat some Vong, and they kill all the Vong and the voxyn without taking any losses. Man, this is going to go great. Remind me again why they need to still go through the voxyn training course still?
      
      
      • Meanwhile, Borsk is totally awesome and fakes out the entire Senate with file holos in order to support the Jedi. This is too awesome not to mention. Man, everything's going right. This book is going to be awesome.
      
      
      • So they keep going on for over a day, and there's too much discord in the group to keep the battle meld up. Awww. Anyway, they keep getting close to the cloning lab, and Nom keeps heading them off at the pass or something. They just took out a hundred Vong. What the hell is stopping them? So there's some random interlude with an AT-AT and killer gnats. It doesn't involve Jacen, so I don't care.
      
      
      • They decide they're going to head through a slave city and then the feral voxyn warrens to get at the cloning lab. Does this sound like a bad idea to anyone else? In the city, they surprisingly get ambushed. They fight. It is chaotic and bad. Eryl and Jovan get killed. Gee, that seems a little severe, taking out two redshirts in just one battle. You'd think you'd want to spread that out. So, Jaina gets trapped, and Anakin rushes in to save her, and he gets stabbed in the side with an amphistaff. That's alright, though, since heroes suffer injuries like that all the time just to show how tough they are and stuff. It never actually significantly impacts them.
      
      
      • So they're going through the warrens, and it's almost like Anakin's in bad shape. And then he collapses or something. I . . . I don't understand. This seems kinda severe. I . . . but . . . he's a hero. I don't get it. Heroes don't sustain debilitating injuries. Like a limp or something, just to show how tough he is and how bad the situation is, but . . . internal injuries? Collapsing? Isn't he supposed to just be grimly bearing some vaguely described pain? Why is he fading out? Man, Denning's really pushing the drama here. It's not like he'll die or anything, but man, I almost believe he might. This is severe. This isn't how it's supposed to be. I'm not supposed to feel that the hero is in danger. I don't know how to deal with this. But Jacen's standing by while Tekli's elbow-deep in Anakin, and he gets in his nice apology. The brothers are OK again. Wait, Tekli's done. So Anakin needs a healing trance or something. OK, I get it. It's just a delaying move for the plot. OK.
      
      
      • They have to go now. Uh-oh, Bela's dead. People have just started dropping like flies. I guess we're clearing the redshirts out of the huge Jedi cast so we can focus down on the real heroes, right? Alema decides they have to hide inside the really voxyn-warreny part of the voxyn warren. Jacen's been using Heart to keep the voxyn down in there, but now they want to hide down there so Anakin can have time to heal. Anakin's not sure about the risk. He's cracking under pressure, man. He's cracking. What kind of hero is he? Anakin goes to Jacen for advice, and Jacen says they're going down the rabbit hole.
      
      
      • So they go down, and holy crap, there are a bunch of voxyn here. Jacen comes up with some vague kind of plan, where they use Bela's body to lure out some voxyn and blow them up. They keep going. Jacen and Jaina and Tenel talk about how worried they are about Anakin, but they promise they won't let anything happen to him. This seems vaguely ominous. Then they get jumped by a bunch more voxyn, and Krasov dies, and they run away. The voxyn in the next chamber all have nests, and so Jacen keeps them calm as the strike team works through the room and stays away from their nests. And Anakin gets all inspired by Vong warrior religious culture or something, and then they come to some place where they've got a ton of equipment stacked up, including a freighter, so hey, maybe they could actually escape the worldship.
      
      
      • Oh, good, Lowie has the ship ready to go while the rest of them are out scouting the cloning grashal. Oh, wait, it's flying away now. Who's on it? Oh, crap, Lomi and Welk were here, weren't they? Yeah . . . and now they stole our ship. Jerks. Oh, crap, Raynar's aboard. And Em Teedee. Well, that sucks. Actual characters we know and have some kind of attachment to being lost on this mission. Now that's just depressing. Jacen and Jaina agree. They are crying. This seems odd, since they never liked spending time with that rich jackass anyway. Rich people are bad.
      
      
      • Anakin decides this is a good time to kick some ass. So they attack the grashal. Jedi charge!
      
      
      Oh, wait.
      
      
      Oh, hold on. They're shooting. Crap.
      
      
      Yeah. Yeah, let's go with that. I like that.
      
      
      • Jacen and Ganner take the grashal. They seem to have a little bit of a team thing going. I wonder if that'll lead anywhere? Then everything goes kinda confusing, but basically Anakin is fighting, and everyone else is off somewhere after the queen, and it doesn't quite work, and Anakin's cut off and . . . it's like some kind of last stand thing. Sweet, he's going to save the team and then they'll finally have a chance to let him heal up. This is going to be badass. He puts Jacen in charge and orders him to go after the voxyn queen. Wait, what the hell? Denning's really pushing this idea that he's not going to make it. Come on. He's a hero. We know better. Jaina and Jacen are crying and Jacen has to pull her away . . . man, this is dramatic. Then . . . wait, WHAT THE HELL? He's . . . wait, what? I DON'T UNDERSTAND! A young person dying in a bloody war? What? Since when? What the hell? That's not supposed to happen! He's the PROTAGONIST! He can't be dead! Heroes don't die! Hasn't this Denning guy read any FICTION? How can I escape into a fantasy world when the heroes suffer consequences for their risky behavior? THIS MAKES NO SENSE!
      
      
      • "When Anakin went away, the hearts of my people fell to the ground and they could not lift them up again. After this, nothing happened." Right? Right? It's all broken now! It's all ruined! Why go on? (Apologies to Chief Plenty Coups)
      
      
      • Yet, somehow, the narrative persists. Jacen led the team to the Vong servant quarters, where they commandeer a room and lay low while Tesar looks for the queen, because they lost it somehow since we need to drag out the story a while longer. Jaina is very angry. She complains Jacen left Anakin. Returning to YJK dynamics, Tenel Ka steps in and defends Jacen, since Jacen can't do anything for himself. Jaina snaps that Tenel Ka has no emotional depth. Which isn't quite fair, but . . . hey. Anyway, Lowie, who I guess they all kinda left for dead, gives them a ring and says he found Anakin's body. Jaina, Tahiri, and Alema decide screw the mission, they want the body back. Zekk decides screw Jaina, so he should go with her. Jacen is upset, because they kinda ought to spend their time doing what Anakin died for, and kill the queen.
      
      
      
      
      • So Jacen leads Team Still Cares About The Mission after the queen, and they keep trying, but every time they use the Force, she runs off. Sounds like maybe they should stop trying to use the Force. Then the Frigate of Anor lands, and is it a trap or something? Too bad they don't have a Mon Cal. Tekli, what do you think? So, they watch, and hey, here comes Nom with some people and some shapers. But he doesn't have warriors, since the Jedi have taken out pretty much all his 300 Vong warriors. Looks like Nom's trying to get the queen back. Vergere lets them listen in on Anakin's comm, but they don't speak Vong so the effort is kinda wasted. Then Jaina buzzes the frigate in a stolen shuttle, and gets all shot down and stuff. And she gets pissed, and finally gets really angry at the same time as she crashes, so the bond cuts off and this is vaguely unnerving. Nom goes back off toward the frigate, which I guess is a ways off but Denning doesn't really make that clear, and the shaper goes after the queen. Then Vergere pops out and is just like, "oh hai guyz! u wantin 2 chase vxn? i go w/u. letz go!"
      
      
      • And Jacen's like, "Aw, what the hell. She doesn't seem hostile." So they go, and the shaper has the queen now, and Jacen just keeps pushing the voxyn to attack the handlers, which makes for a thoroughly amusing way of whittling down the resistance. Jacen, of course, has mild moral problems with this, but he has progressed very far and does it anyway. Then they come to a comb of dovin basals. Why? Well, every climactic action sequence needs to be in some kind of impressive, dangerous, and semi-exotic setting, that's why! Nom's crawling to Jaina's crashed ship, and then there's voxyn. Vergere is all like, "Ooh, a choice!" and Jacen is like, "I'm an action hero now, featherduster. We're doing both, and we're doing it with style." So he sends everyone else to steal Nom's ship and use it to pick up Team Wants Vengeance And/Or Likes The Look Of Jaina's Hiney while he goes off one-man against the voxyn queen and her remaining escort. Vergere cuts off Jacen kissing Tenel. Man, that bird has no romance in her. Must be a sign she's evil. So Jacen fights the voxyn, and like all good climax battles, it takes forever, and then the shaper comes screaming out of nowhere like Karl and gets chopped up, though unfortunately not by Carl Winslow. Then Vergere shows up and hands him the thermal detonator he lost, which is kinda useful. Unaccountably hilarious prose of the day: "All spheres of shiny silver were spheres to be feared." Jacen takes a bunch of heroic wounds, and then knocks the queen onto a dovin basal, because in all good action climaxes, the exotic setting must be made use of when disposing of the villain creatively. Then he just kinda lays back helpless, because he got a voxyn tail sting, and Vergere's like, "Clear out, team. Nothing you can do." And there is nothing they can do, so they have to leave. But Vergere captures Jacen. Uh-oh, he's her prisoner now.
      
      "Vergere, were you--"
      
      "Yes, Jacen. I was crying for you."
      
      
      • Jaina loses her sense of Jacen in the Force, and oh, by the way, Coruscant also fell to the Vong. Crap. That's no good. Cue ominous ending of Han and Leia talking about the twins being in terrible trouble . . . and having to get themselves out of it. Duh duh duh!
      
      
      • We'll return next week, when Vergere makes Jacen evil by teaching him the exact opposite of everything she wants him to learn.