Obi-Wan took the rear guard, letting his companion reach safety. The Jedi scrambled up the rock with barely a moment to spare. One of the worms tried to crawl up after them, but now Obi-Wan turned and fought. His lightsaber flashed, and the worm screamed. He couldn’t actuallyhear the sound, but he felt it clearly through the Force.

Jesson’s grip slipped. The spear rattled to the dirt, and Jesson slid down the rock toward the worm’s cilia-ringed mouth hole. Its razor teeth clamped down on the X’Ting’s right leg, sawing. Obi-Wan was there in an instant, and sliced the creature’s head off. Severed, the head flopped back to the sand . . . the remaining body still alive and writhing.

Jesson scrambled up, leg lacerated but still functional.

"Thank you, Master Jedi, " he said, shivering. Obi-Wan inspected the wound: the chitinous shell was splintered, exposing the tender pink muscle beneath. He bound it as best he could, and to his credit Jesson made not a single sound of pain, although it had to be brutal. When he was done, Obi-Wan looked down below them. Four worms crawled atop and beneath the soil now, and they showed no signs of abandoning pursuit.

So. This was what had happened to the "true" X’Ting, those who had remained behind. The soil they had built up over ages to grow their crops-burying their dead, fertilizing with their wastes-had finally become deep enough to conceal predators. The X’Ting in that first cavern had been caught unawares, driven into the hollow statues. And once there, they had been unable to open the sealed metal doors. There in the darkness, they had become desperate enough to resort to cannibalism. There they had been trapped.

As Obi-Wan and Jesson were trapped, here on one of the few rock spurs on the floor of this second cavern. Obi-Wan felt the first tiny whisper of despair and bared his teeth. He would not fail. Not die. Not here in the dark. He had a job to do; he would find a way to do it.

The worms hissed at them, their cilia wavering back and forth with a chilling, unnatural appetite.

Jesson grimaced and climbed a little higher as another worm tried to ascend the spur.

Obi-Wan seared it with the lightsaber, and it retreated without a sound. Again Obi-Wan could sense its shriek through the Force.

The soil humped up in furrows. From both far ends of the cave additional worms appeared, plowing up the ground and gnashing at them. There had to be ten or fifteen in all by now.

Some larger, some smaller, all deadly.

"Maybe they smell us. Or hear us. Or they’re calling each other to dinner. " He shone his light up above them. "What’s that? There’s something up there. "

Favoring his injured foot, Jesson climbed higher on the spur, shining his light as he did.