Star Wars: The Old Republic: Fatal Alliance (24 page)

Larin
knew what it was now. It was a compact droid factory, and it had been
busy ever since the Hutts placed it here, sending out tiny threads in
search of metals and power, infiltrating security systems and taking
everything it needed. Hence the threads she and Shigar had stumbled
across under the vaults. Hence the lack of alarms.

She
bet herself that if she took a knife to the metal walls of the safe,
she would find them barely flimsi-thin-enough to fool a casual
glance, but otherwise utterly plundered, dissolved, and removed, ion
by ion, for use in the factory's secret work.

Building
vicious, determined, reticent droids that wouldn't take orders.

Why?

That
was a whole other mystery. But the thing was still moving, still
functioning. Given enough time, she bet it would repair itself and
start all over again. No wonder Stryver wanted it destroyed.

She
picked up the comlink.

"Shigar,
I'm in the vault, " she told him. "You need to see this. "

"What
is it?"

"I
don't know. It..."

Something
red flashed in front of her eyes. A searing pain struck the hand
holding her comlink. She stared down in horror at the terrible
cauterized wound where her fingers had once been.

Over
the humming of her crimson lightsaber, the Sith said, "Give me
the navicomp or it'll be your head you lose next. "

*
* *

Ula
craned to see what was going on inside the vault. He and Jet stood in
the antechamber and had been just about to venture in after Larin
when the sound of blasterfire brought them up short. Bright flashes
of light lit up the cramped space. Larin and her two companions were
shooting at something. But what? Not another droid, surely!

Ula
and Jet dived for cover just in case, and kept their heads down until
the rattle of weapons-fire died away.

Ula
looked up. He could just see Larin's silhouette leaning over the
object Yeama had shown him. Its top was open, and she fired twice
into it.

He
was about to clamber to his feet when his eyes caught something out
of place among the bits of stone and other rubble on the floor.

It
was the navicomp.

One
of the hexes must have knocked it out when they emerged to do battle.
He scrambled for it before someone else saw and took it. Its
transparisteel container was intact, and the device itself looked no
worse than it had before.

A
feeling of triumph filled him. If he could open the case and get the
thing itself free, he could smuggle it under his cloak without anyone
else seeing. But first he had to distract Jet. If the smuggler saw
it, there was bound to be another fight over it. The whole extended
disaster could start all over again.

Footsteps
crunched behind him, and he turned, fearing that his find had already
been discovered.

It
was the red-haired Sith. She was heading for the vault, not him.

His
relief was short-lived. The Sith's lightsaber flashed and Larin
gasped with pain.

"Give
me the navicomp or it'll be your head you lose next. "

Ula
froze in horror.

"I
don't have it, " Larin said, voice tight.

"I
don't believe you. "

One
of Larin's companions fired at the Sith. She easily deflected the
bolt back into his throat. He went down kicking then fell still.

"I'm
telling the truth. "

"I'll
count to five. Then I'll start hacking up your friend here. And then
it'll be your head, I promise. "

The
Sith approached the last surviving member of Ula's security detail.
He backed nervously away.

"One.
"

The
box containing the navicomp was in Ula's possession. All he had to do
was surrender it to the Sith and Larin would be saved. And he would
safely deliver the information to the Empire. It was a simple
solution to all his problems.

"Two.
"

But
Ula couldn't move. The Sith and the Empire weren't the same thing.
Oh, to trillions they were inseparable-the Emperor himself was the
Sith to whom all others deferred!-but to him they were very
different. On the one hand, the Empire offered a society of rules and
clearly defined justice that could, if allowed to do so, bring peace
and prosperity to every planet in the galaxy. On the other,
oppression and constant conflict. Could he in good conscience give
any advantage to the followers of the latter? Would Larin want him
to?

"Three.
"

If
only he could deliver the navicomp to the Minister of Logistics. With
it in her hand, she could surely find a way to turn it to their
advantage. The Empire was so huge it wouldn't miss this world's
resources, for all the squabbling over them now. All Ula wanted was
the chance to prove the rightness of his principles. He didn't mind
the existence of the Sith, but they shouldn't be allowed to run
roughshod over everyone else.

"Four.
"

Yet
there was no point dreaming. The Minister of Logistics might have
been in another universe entirely. He could no more give her this
vital piece in the puzzle than he could stand up to the Sith himself
and survive. He was just a pawn in a game much larger than he could
imagine. He was insignificant and disposable. How foolish to think
that he could ever have changed the way this would turn out! The
navicomp had been earmarked for the Sith the very moment she arrived.

"Five.
" The Sith moved in to start slashing.

"Wait!"
he called out.

All
eyes turned to him. The Sith glared at him with hateful eyes. Jet
looked as shocked as though Ula had sprouted wings and flown up to
the ceiling. Larin's expression was hidden by her helmet, and that
was the one he most wanted to see.

"Here,
" he told the Sith, holding up the navicomp. "Take it. Just
leave her alone. "

The
girl's expression became hungry, triumphant. Ula didn't want to get
any closer to that blade than he had to. He hefted the box and tossed
it to her.

At
the height of its arc, a gleaming web reached in and snatched the box
clean out of the air

"What-?"
Ula spun around.

The
Mandalorian caught the box neatly in one hand and tossed something
back to Ula in return. He caught it automatically. It was a heavy
metal sphere with a blinking red light.

"No!"
screamed the Sith, robbed of her prize.

Stryver
was already moving, rising up on his jetpack and heading for the
exit.

"Chuck
it!" yelled Jet to Ula. "That's a thermal detonator!"

Ula
hurled the sphere away from him as hard as he could. It went up, and
kept going up as Shigar, the Jedi, used the Force to sweep it away.
The tactic wasn't entirely defensive. The detonator exploded high in
the creaking scaffolding that had once been the security air lock's
roof, directly above Stryver's escape route. The statue of Tassaa
Bareesh toppled and fell. Yet another avalanche came crashing down
after it, burying the Mandalorian and a herd of palace guards that
had come to quell the disturbance.

The
floor gave way, and kept giving way as Stryver fired downward, riding
the tide of collapse into the palace's deeper levels.

Snarling,
the Sith girl went after him, determined not to lose her prize. She
vanished into the roil of stone and ferrocrete, and didn't reappear.

Ula
took one step toward Larin, but Shigar beat him to it.

"Are
you all right?" the Jedi asked her.

She
was leaning against the outside of the vault with her crippled left
hand compressed under her armpit. With her right hand, she tugged off
her helmet. Her face was white and pinched.

"I'll
live, " she said. "Meanwhile, it's not over. Stryver will
head for his ship first chance he gets. You have to cut him off and
get the navicomp back, any way you can. Do you think you can do that
without me?"

Shigar
nodded, tight-lipped, and loped off across the shattered floor to the
hole in the wall, leaping gracefully from girder to girder.

Larin
held her grin until Shigar was out of sight. Then she slumped in
pain.

Ula's
pain was different but no less real. It was clear that Larin had a
close connection with Shigar. The Jedi even had tattoos similar to
hers. It was some kind of cultural thing, surely. Perhaps they were
married. The thought made his chest ache.

He
knew it was ridiculous to feel this way. He knew it was based on
nothing at all. He knew he had built it all up in his own head, and
that made him an idiot of the highest order. He had more important
things to worry about than this.

The
battle for the navicomp was over. Tassaa Bareesh's palace security
forces would be converging on the site to clean up and make
accusations. He didn't want to be there when that happened. His
loyalties were so compromised, he wasn't sure he could convince
anyone that he wasn't guilty of everything.

"Stryver
will be going for his ship, like she said, " he told Jet, "but
he's going the wrong way around. I'll head him off and see if I can
salvage something. Tell her-tell the others I'll meet them at the
shuttle. "

The
smuggler studied him closely, and then simply said, "All right,
mate. I might need a lift myself. "

"Isn't
your ship-?"

"Impounded
and crewless. " He shrugged. "And what's a freight captain
without his ship? Guess I'd better start thinking about a normal job.
"

Ula
patted him on the shoulder with what he hoped was appropriate
bonhomie, because it was utterly genuine. A normal job. Those three
words had struck him with the force of one of Stryver's thermal
detonators.

He
hurried off, following with infinitely greater clumsiness Shigar's
route across the shattered floor. He ignored the shouts and screams
coming from the levels below. He ignored the shaking of his hands. He
kept his mind firmly on its goal.

There
was an Imperial ship in the palace's dock. That was where he was
headed. If he could get there before it left, he could reveal his
true identity and claim amnesty. He could escape with the Sith and
the navicomp when she returned from hunting Stryver, and he could
finally report to his superior.

He
could relax the disguise, and speak freely, without lies or
deceptions.

He
could be himself. And then...

A
normal job?

Nothing
at that moment appealed to him more.

PART
THREE

THE
CHASE

CHAPTER
19

Ax
felt like she was being swallowed whole by a space slug. Even through
the Force barrier she threw around herself as protection from the
tumbling surf of rock, every sharp edge and crushing pressure
squeezed the breath utterly from her. Almost instantly she gave up
trying to guide her descent.

She
consoled herself with the knowledge that Stryver had to be faring
just as badly. Escaping this way was the height of desperation. She
admired his guts even while she despised him for capturing the
navicomp out from everyone else.

It
wasn't over yet, though. She would find him, no matter what it took.
There was absolutely no way she was going to report to her Master
empty-handed.

The
rough-and-tumble finally eased off, and she was able to make her way
through the debris, using the Force to help shove aside rocks and
gravel, cutting through larger obstacles with her lightsaber if she
had to. At every pocket of air she stopped to breathe, grateful for
every single lungful of oxygen. It was almost completely dark, but
very noisy. When the debris itself wasn't groaning and grinding
around her, she could hear voices crying for help.

Finally
one arm emerged into free air, then her head. A trio of dusty

Evocii
grabbed her armpits and began to pull. She shrugged them off and got
herself out. At the sight of her lightsaber, they squealed and ran.