The Lost Ones

3

As the five companions left the hawk-bat’s nest behind, Jaina stuck close to Zekk. She watched the dark-haired boy move instinctively, hurrying through the maze of upper and lower walkways and cross-connecting bridges as he made a beeline back to his living quarters. The green-eyed boy beamed with self-congratulatory pride at the precious egg he held, as if it were a trophy he had hoped to win for a long time.

“Peckhum is going to be so pleased!” Zekk crowed, looking from Jaina to Jacen. “He’ll know just what to do with it. He’s got a line on everyone who’s looking for anything.” He glanced sidelong at Jacen again. “Don’t worry about it. We’ll find a good home for this baby, just like you promised, Jacen. It shouldn’t be too hard for a professional zoologist to incubate this egg until it hatches.”

Tenel Ka cleared her throat and said ominously, “If we bring the egg back intact.”

Jaina suddenly noticed that they had returned to the abandoned levels emblazoned with gang graffiti. The Lost Ones.

The sharp corners of the cross in a triangle symbol seemed brighter now, as if freshly painted. Jaina wondered if the gang members could have marked their territory afresh in the short time since the young Jedi Knights had passed through. If the gang members kept such a careful eye out for everything, they might have spotted the five companions already.

Maybe they were watching from hidden, shadowy corners right now….

Tenel Ka tensed and pulled out a small throwing knife, looking from side to side. She seemed alert, ready to spring at the first sign of danger, but Jaina didn’t feel safe. With her Jedi senses, she felt a tingle down her spine.

“If the Lost Ones are so tough and powerful, how come we’ve never heard of them before?” Jacen looked around nervously in the creaking, musty buildings.

“Because you never come down here,” Zekk answered. “Whenever we get together, you either have me come to the Imperial Palace or we meet in the safe upper levels. I’ll bet your parents would blow their thrusters if they knew where we were right now.”

“We can take care of ourselves,” Tenel Ka said defensively, flashing her tiny dagger.

“Dear me, I shouldn’t be so certain about that, if I were you,” Em Teedee replied from Lowie’s waist. The young Wookiee groaned.

Zekk smiled thinly. “Down here you can see how I live every day. I don’t have anyone to wash my hands for me or cook my meals, you know. And I don’t have the luxury of worrying about how to amuse myself. Every day is a search—I’m just lucky I have a special knack for finding things.”

Jaina was surprised to hear a hint of resentment behind her friend’s words. “Zekk, if you needed anything, you should have just asked. We could have found you new quarters, given you credits to spend—”

“Who said I wanted that?” he responded through clenched teeth. “I don’t need charity. I’ve got my freedom here. I can do whatever I want. Besides, it’s more satisfying to live by my own wits than to be pampered and coddled all the time.”

Em Teedee piped up, “Well really, Master Zekk! It might interest you to learn that not everyone minds being pampered and coddled.” Jaina ignored the translating droid and wondered if Zekk really meant what he said.

“Nothing personal,” Zekk said with shrug. He looked up at the cross-in-triangle symbol. “Being a gang member doesn’t impress me either. Their leader Norys—who’s our age—is a big bully who likes to throw his weight around. I can run my way through the lower levels better than any of the Lost Ones, so he’s been after me to join for a long time. He’d love to have me as his right-hand man, but I’m too independent for that. I work for myself.”

They stood at the entrance to a sheer-walled building, near one end of a dilapidated covered walkway that extended to an adjacent skyscraper. More threatening gang symbols marked the inside walls. Half of the windows were broken, and confined breezes whispered through the walkway like voices warning them to go back.

Zekk looked behind him. “This building we’re in is the headquarters of the Lost Ones. We’re taking a pretty big risk being here.” His emerald eyes sparkled. “Kind of exciting, isn’t it?”

The building was large and dark, filled with cavernous spaces of empty meeting chambers, offices, and abandoned supply rooms. Jaina wondered if any record or blueprint of this ancient building still existed in the vast computer archives of the Imperial Information Center.

“I don’t think you have to worry about Norys, though,” Zekk said, raising his voice. “He talks big, but his ambitions are definitely low. He has no interest in becoming anything more than the biggest bully in a run-down section of a single building on an average planet in a big galaxy.” Zekk’s voice sounded taunting. “He’ll never go anywhere, because his dreams are small.”

Just then ceiling panels smashed down from above them, and a dozen wiry young men and women dropped to the floor. They looked scuffed and dirty, with hard, lean faces; each held an interesting cobbled-together weapon scavenged from sharp pieces of scrap.

“You trying to annoy me, trash collector?” the biggest burly young man said. His face was broad and dark, his eyes close-set, his teeth crooked as he ground his jaws together and spread his lips in a sneer.

“It’s not polite to eavesdrop, Norys,” Zekk said.

Then the gang leaders eyes fixed on the precious hawk-bat egg that Zekk cradled close to his chest. “What has the little trash collector found?” Norys said. “Hey, everybody! Looks like we’re gonna have fresh eggs for morning meal.”

Lowbacca growled loudly enough to startle the Lost Ones, baring his long Wookiee fangs. Zekk looked suddenly nervous, as if the valuable hawk-bat egg made him vulnerable in new ways.

“What do you want the egg for?” Jacen said.

“He only wants it because I want it,” Zekk said. “He’ll probably smash it, not knowing what it’s worth.”

Tenel Ka now held a throwing dagger at the ready in each hand. The Lost Ones looked at her and Lowie, then at the three seemingly easier targets of Zekk and the twins.

“In a case like this,” Zekk said, moving slowly, extending the mottled egg gradually, as if reluctant to surrender it to the brawny gang member, “the most sensible idea is to … ran!”

He whirled and dashed onto the rickety walkway. The vibration of his running knocked loose a broken wall plate, which dropped silently into the murky depths below. The young Jedi Knights reacted quickly and scrambled after their friend onto the covered bridge.

The gang members howled and gave pursuit, clattering their crude weapons against the walls.

Out in the middle of the dilapidated walkway Zekk suddenly pulled to a stop as a gang member—an angry young woman who looked even tougher than Tenel Ka—appeared from the opposite building and stood ominously at the far entrance.

“We’re trapped,” Jaina said with a hard gulp. This did not seem like a good place for a standoff.

Zekk looked back and forth, as if seeking inspiration in the middle of the swaying bridge. The cold wind sighed through the broken windows and gaps in the flooring. “Just to be fair,” he said, crossing his arms with feigned good humor, “I’ll let you guys solve this one. Got any ideas?”

Jaina tried to think of something she could do with what Uncle Luke had taught them at the Jedi academy. With uninterrupted concentration she could manipulate objects with the Force, but she couldn’t think of any way her fledgling powers could help them escape.

Norys strode forward, his chest puffed with confidence. “Now give me that egg, trash collector, and maybe we won’t throw you over the edge!”

Just then a screeching sound came from above, a blood-curdling animal shriek. A predator’s heavy shadow swept like a dark blanket over the cracked windows of the walkway.

With another loud scream, the mother hawk-bat struck the side windows, smashing against the wire mesh that barely held the frames in place. She spat and hissed, her sharp beak ripping at the wires, her forked tongue thrashing as she dug her claws in, trying to get at Norys. The gang leader staggered backward with a surprised yelp.

Zekk protected the egg again, holding it to his chest. At the same time, Lowie—focusing on the lone woman guarding the opposite end of the walkway—let out a ferocious roar and charged forward.

“Oh, my!” Em Teedee squeaked. “Would anyone object if I switched off my optical sensors again so I don’t have to watch?”

Distracted by the attacking hawk-bat and startled by the snarling battering ram of Wookiee fur, the gang member backed off and leaped aside.

“Well, what are we waiting for?” Jaina cried. Zekk ducked low to protect the hawk-bat egg as he ran after her. Jacen followed them, while Tenel Ka turned once to threaten the Lost Ones with her throwing daggers before bringing up the rear, sprinting along on her muscular legs.

Seeing them escape, the mother hawk-bat shrieked one more time, then flew off, as if satisfied.

Zekk kept running while Norys yelled after them. “We’ll catch you next time, trash collector. Do you hear me?” he shouted. “You’ll join our gang—one way or another.”

Zekk didn’t respond as he led the young Jedi Knights through a maze of stairwells, slides, and lifts in the lower levels, climbing up to rickety catwalks, then higher to lighted levels. He was panting, but his flushed face wore a grin of exhilaration. Triumphant, Zekk cradled the hawk-bat egg close to his body.

“I thought you said hawk-bats had short-term memories,” he gasped.

Jacen shrugged and looked sheepish. “Aren’t you glad I was wrong?”

“Yes,” Jaina said. “We all are.”

“Come on,” Zekk said. “Let’s get this egg back home.”