The New Jedi Order: Force Heretic II: Refugee

American

Foreign

Publisher's summary

Swift and deadly, the Yuuzhan Vong have blasted their way across the galaxy—and now stand on the threshold of total victory. Yet a courageous few still dare to oppose them…

Rife with hostile cultures and outright enemies, the Unknown Regions hold many perils for Luke Skywalker and the Jedi searching for Zonama Sekot, the living planet that may hold the key to dealing with the Yuuzhan Vong once and for all.

Meanwhile, on the edge of the galaxy and in the heart of a trusted ally, old enemies are stirring. The Yuuzhan Vong have inflamed long-forgotten vendettas that are even now building up to crisis point. And as Han and Leia journey on their quest to knit the unraveling galaxy back together, betrayal and deception await them…

Plot summary

Nom Anor is disguised as Yu'shaa the Prophet on Yuuzhan'tar, perfecting the Shamed Ones' heresy against Supreme Overlord Shimrra during each of his appearances. Meanwhile, he is trying to find a suitable spy to enter Shimrra's courtroom, but all attempts have failed, and these failures have eroded the faith in the heresy. However, Nom Anor finally meets Ngaaluh, a priestess of Yun-Harla who has entered into Nom Anor's sanctuary to team up with him and bring Shimrra down. She does not believe that the Yuuzhan Vong War is worth serving Shimrra, and agrees to spy for Nom Anor in entering Shimrra's throne, since the Supreme Overlord still trusts her.

In the Unknown Regions, Luke Skywalker, Mara Jade Skywalker, Jacen Solo, Danni Quee, Saba Sebatyne and Tekli, along with some help from the Imperial Remnant, have been searching for the living planet Zonama Sekot. Now traveling with the Imperial xenobiologist Soron Hegerty, the group arrive at the planet Munlali Mafir. Luke, Jacen, and a squad of stormtroopers land on the planet in an Imperial shuttle and are met by a tribe of native Krizlaw. Upon Luke's request, the Krizlaw tell the travelers that Zonama Sekot visited their star system years ago and stayed for months, during which great environmental disasters befell them. When Luke attempts to explain how the environmental issues befell them, the Krizlaw grow enraged and attack the Jedi and Imperials. Unable to affect the two minds of the Krizlaw with mind tricks, the group flees with the Krizlaw in pursuit. During the retreat, Hegerty is severely wounded, requiring medical attention, all but one of the stormtroppers are killed and the remaining one was eaten by a Jostran, and the other members of the envoy mission escape in their shuttle. En route back to the Jade Shadow, a patrol of the Chiss Expansionary Defense Force arrives to meet them. The patrol is led by the female Chiss Commander Irolia, who demands to quickly meet with Luke. After a heated discussion in which Irolia questions the motives of the Imperial/Jedi expedition, she gives them a disk with instructions to the planet Csilla, where they need to be approved of being allowed within Chiss territory. They then travel to Csilla to find library records of where Zonama Sekot might be hiding now. But Luke and his company are permitted only two days to search the whole library for systems in the Unknown Regions that have gained any planets in the last fifty years. And along the way, Jacen meets and befriends Wynssa "Wyn" Fel, daughter of Soontir Fel and Syal Antilles Fel, and sister of Jagged Fel, all of whom are trusted allies of the Chiss. But when rogue Chiss decide that Soontir is more of a danger to the Chiss because of allowing Luke and his company access to Chiss records, they try to kidnap Wyn. However, Jacen saves Wyn, and Luke and the rest of his party unveil the rogue Chiss to the Chiss High Council. Because of this, Luke and his company are granted an extended access into Chiss records for their search for Zonama Sekot. But Jacen begins to lose hope in finding Sekot until he guesses that the living planet might actually be hiding as a moon. The search party for the living planet takes note of this and looks for systems that have quickly gained moons in the past fifty years, and they estimate that Zonama Sekot must now be orbiting the gas giant Mobus. So Luke and his party depart Csilla and go to Mobus.

Han Solo, Leia Organa Solo, Jaina Solo, Jagged Fel and Tahiri Veila all arrive at Bakura to try to bring the planet into the Galactic Alliance in the Yuuzhan Vong War. But Bakura is going through a revolutionary stage right now—the Ssi-ruuvi Imperium's former slaves, the P'w'eck, have decided to consecrate the planet with the permission of the Bakuran government, led by Prime Minister Molierre Cundertol. But Cundertol has recently been kidnapped, and the blame is being directed to Malinza Thanas (the influential daughter of the late Pter Thanas and Gaeriel Captison, who were friends with Luke, Han, and Leia) and her group of rebels who don't believe the P'w'eck should consecrate Bakura. Soon, though, Cundertol returns in an escape pod from a ship that explodes once it reaches the Bakura system and explains how he overpowered his kidnappers and returned just as Malinza has been arrested for having the Prime Minister kidnapped.

However, it turns out that Cundertol had actually betrayed the planet to the actual Ssi-ruuvi Imperium to be put into a Human replica droid. Meanwhile, one of Cundertol's assistants, Blaine Harris, had also secretly been working with Malinza but would betray her by killing all of the important figures before the Keeramak completely consecrates the planet. Harris would do this by bombing certain areas of the arena where the consecration will take place, including Cundertol's area. Elsewhere on Bakura, Jaina unwittingly breaks Malinza out of prison after hearing her side of the story concerning Cundertol's kidnapping. Jaina is brought by Malinza to her rebel group, but they are all betrayed and brought to Harris by Malinza's Rodian member, Salkeli. Meanwhile, Tahiri meets the next Ryn contact, Goure Conor, to help investigate Cundertol. Tahiri, thanks to Han and Leia, learns that the inner conflict that had been bothering her since before she left with Jaina and everyone else from Mon Calamari came from Riina Kwaad. Riina was the Yuuzhan Vong persona implanted by the late Master Shaper Mezhan Kwaad, which had been suppressed thanks to help from the late Anakin Solo, who had been Tahiri's one true love and had died on the Mission to Myrkr to destroy the voxyn. Ever since Tahiri had moved on from grieving from Anakin's loss, her guilt over Anakin's death, and the guilt of moving on from it, dragged Riina back into her life. So Tahiri separates herself from Han and Leia and buries herself in tracking down Cundertol's betrayal with Goure. This leads to Tahiri and Goure saving Jaina, Malinza and her rebel group and defeating Harris and Salkeli. But the bomb which will kill many in the arena will go off soon, so Tahiri heads off to stop it. It explodes before she can deactivate it, and Harris's plan succeeds: Cundertol appears to be among the dead. Nevertheless, the Keeramak still consecrates the planet despite the bombing, and the second Ssi-ruuvi invasion on Bakura begins. As it turns out, the P'w'eck were still the Ssi-ruuk's slaves. However, just as the Galactic Alliance are about to lose, the P'w'eck turn on the Ssi-ruuk and bring victory to the Alliance in the end. The Keeramak is shot dead by his P'w'eck aide, Lwothin. Cundertol also reveals he is alive and executes Harris by shooting him, but his betrayal to Bakura with the Ssi-ruuvi is figured out, so he tries to flee. After a brief fight with Jaina, who unsuccessfully tries to stop him, he goes off and Jaina figures out that Cundertol was a human replica droid, since she had cut off his arm with her lightsaber during the fight.

But Cundertol's failure does not go unpunished when the Ssi-ruuvi Imperium general he meets with reveals that he is actually a Yuuzhan Vong and uses a remote on Cundertol to pause his body long enough for the Yuuzhan Vong to kill him. Meanwhile, back on Bakura, it is revealed that when the bomb in the arena went off, Tahiri did survive by putting a Force bubble around herself, but she went into a coma immediately afterwards. Goure tells Jaina and her party the next location they should go to, which is Onadax, in order to reestablish contact with the rest of the galaxy for the Galactic Alliance.

Development

While Tahiri and the Ryn are in the Bakuran subsystems, they disguise themselves as Yon, Gaitzi and Scod, a cleaning group known as the Tripod. This is a reference to an Australian musical comedy group and its members Scott "Scod" Edgar, Simon "Yon" Hall and Steven "Gatesy" Gates. The band references Star Wars in a number of its songs.

Continuity

This is the only novel in this series where the protagonists don't directly fight the Yuuzhan Vong.

In Part Four of the book, one of Cundertol's arms is severed. The Epilogue reminds the reader this happened by having Cundertol muse about being able to afford a replacement arm. Nevertheless, a few paragraphs later, the narration says that he "clenched and unclenched his fists."

Appearances

Unknown

Unknown

None