The Crystal Star Read Online Free PDF

falling
    toward the black hole, on the inward curve of its eccentric elliptical orbit.
    "Will you look at that," Han said. "Quite a show." "Indeed it is, Master Han," Threepio said, "but it is
    merely a shadow of what will occur when the black hole captures the crystal star." Luke gazed silently
    into the maelstrom of the black hole.
    Han waited.
    "Hey, kid! Snap out of it." Luke started. "What?" "I don't know where you were, but you weren't here."
    "Just thinking about the Jedi Academy. I hate to leave my students, even for a few days. But if I do find
    other trained Jedi, it'll make a big difference. To the Academy. To the New Republic..." "I think we're
    getting along pretty well already," Han said, irked. He had spent years maintaining the peace with
    ordinary people. In his opinion, Jedi Knights could cause more trouble than they were worth. "And what
    if these are all using the dark side?" Luke did not reply.
    Han seldom admitted his nightmares, but he had nightmares about what could happen to his children if
    they were tempted to the dark side.
    Right now they were safe, with Leia on a planetary tour of remote and peaceful worlds of the New
    Republic. By this time they must have reached Munto Codru. They would be visiting the beautiful
    mountains of the world's temperate zone.
    Han smiled, imagining his princess and his children being welcomed to one of Munto Codru's mysterious,
    ancient, fairy-tale castles.
    Solar prominences flared from the white dwarf's surface. The Falcon passed it, heading toward the more
    perilous region of the black hole.
    Han set the shields as high as they would go, and sped through the dangerous radiation. The accretion
    disk blazed wildly, its light harsh and actinic.
    Neither white dwarf nor black hole possessed natural planets, only a few bits of distant debris and a halo
    of frozen comets. But the white dwarf did possess one artificial planetoid.
    Crseih Station had been a secret Empire research facility. During the rule of the Emperor, it had moved
    from covert place to hidden location to secret destination. Wherever it went, it carried with it a reputation
    of evil.
    Most of the records of its work had been destroyed when the Empire fell. Its researchers had fled, to
    surrender to the New Republic or to disappear. Han knew only one thing about Crseih for certain. It had
    been sent to this star system to adapt the destructive power of the black hole to the martial ambitions of
    the Emperor.
    Crseih had failed, but it still existed, hidden out here on the edge of civilization, isolated by the disruption
    of the exploding, dying stars. Some inhabitants remained, content to be free of the Empire. They also
    lived outside the New Republic, without the protection of its justice.
    Without the protection, or the restraints.
    Han plunged the Millennium Falcon into the shadow of Crseih Station. He breathed a sigh of relief. Light
    from the white dwarf still illuminated his ship, but the station blocked the intense X rays of the black hole.
    Like a patchwork umbrella, powerful shielding covered half the irregular artificial planetoid of Crseih
    Station. As the station had grown, the patches had spread. Shielding formed the residence domes, and
    the corridors of the airlinks. Transparent to the visual spectrum, it protected the equipment and the
    inhabitants from high-energy radiation. The shielding shimmered in patterns of shadow. Wherever a
    particularly intense burst of radiation assaulted the shielding, it darkened.
    Han set the Millennium Falcon down on a bare patch of blasted stone. Crseih had nothing much in the
    way of a spaceport. A few itinerant hyperdrive mechanics and refuelers.
    A rental company that specialized in shielding.
    Han made arrangements for an extra shield for the Falcon. A few minutes later, a crawler shuffled toward
    them, towing the big transparent sheet.
    "Efficient," Luke said.
    "Or bored. Sure isn't much traffic." He scowled. "Wouldn't you know? First vacation I ever