Invincible (9 page)

What Ben
saw,
however, was a vast durasteel square teeming with bored tourists and loitering office workers, strewn with litter and badly in need of a cleansing rain. The smog-pearled sky was kept blissfully free of air traffic by a no-fly security zone, and the only possible location for an observation post was inside the monuments themselves, all of which were surrounded by softly rumbling rivers of sightseers that would render even the most sophisticated eavesdropping equipment useless. In short, what Ben saw was the perfect place to avoid being seen without being obvious about it, a seething mass of life so vast that even GAG could not identify every being it contained.

No wonder Lon Shevu liked to meet his informants here.

Ben found one of Shevu’s favorite statues—a gray monolith depicting a droid mechanic—and sat on one end of the empty viewing bench. A hologram of an attractive female Sullustan rose out of the plaza decking and began to explain that
Devoted Technician
was both the newest and largest monument in the plaza, a fitting tribute to the billions of dedicated beings who had worked so hard under the Reconstruction Authority to rebuild the galaxy after the war against the Yuuzhan Vong.

The hologram continued, spewing a self-congratulatory stream of propaganda about the remarkable job the RA had done with limited resources in a very difficult political climate. If Ben had not had more important things to think about—like why the hairs on his neck were standing erect when he
knew
he hadn’t been followed from the Mizobon Spaceport—he would have been bored to yawns.

Ben had experienced that same sensation a thousand times since he had left the
Sweet Time
—the much-modified KDY space yacht the strike team was using as its base of operations. He reached out in the Force, searching for anyone who might be watching him. Lon Shevu might be a GAG captain himself, but anyone who caught him talking to Ben would instantly realize that Shevu was also a spy, a traitor who wanted to bring Caedus down as much as Ben did—well,
almost
as much. Caedus hadn’t murdered Shevu’s mother, after all.

Ben
was
being watched, of course. Aunt Leia and his cousin Jaina were both in the crowd, serving as his backups but keeping their distance to avoid drawing attention to him or Shevu. And he could sense about a dozen young females keeping a furtive eye on him, overly interested but bearing no hint of harmful intentions—probably just admiring the Arkanian wardrobe that Aunt Leia had chosen as part of his nobleman’s disguise. There were also several presences that felt watchful but not focused, no doubt just plainclothes security agents looking for nervous demeanor, irrational conduct, or any of a thousand other behaviors that usually betrayed terrorist attacks in the making.

What Ben did
not
sense was any curiosity or suspicion directed his way, no hint that he would be bringing danger along when he made contact with Shevu. Reassured, he rose and made his way to the opposite corner of the monument.

Shevu was standing behind a viewing bench, posing as a tourist. He wore the now meaningless uniform of the Reconstruction Authority Space Patrol, and he was using a small vidcam to record another hologram, this one narrated by an attractive Falleen female. His hair was tinted gray, and he was wearing a false goatee beard in the same color. In fact, he looked so much like a retired RASP pilot that despite his familiar Force presence, Ben wasn’t quite sure he had the right man.

Or maybe it was the changes that
weren’t
part of Shevu’s disguise that were throwing Ben off—the sunken eyes and ashen complexion, and the worry lines that seemed to have appeared from nowhere. Ben stopped half a step in front of him and a little off to the side, pretending to be interested in the same hologram. It
was
a bit more interesting than the last one. The Falleen was explaining how the Reconstruction Authority had liberated the Maltorian mining belt from the notorious pirate captain Three-Eye.

Shevu surprised him by speaking first. “That’s not quite how it really happened, you know,” he said. “I could tell you about Three-Eye, if you’re interested.”

Ben casually turned and found Shevu smiling at him from behind his vidcam—but also holding his brow cocked in concern and curiosity.

“So you were there, sir?” Ben asked, still playing the role of the polite young noble.

Shevu shook his head. “I’m acquainted with some people who were. The way I heard it, the fighting was over by the time we arrived. Three-Eye was actually handed over to us by a pair of Jedi Knights.” He lowered his vidcam and looked directly at Ben. “Jedi have a funny way of doing that—just appearing when nobody expects them.”

“I’m sure they have their reasons,” Ben said. “Did you serve with RASP long, sir?”

“The whole ten years,” Shevu said. “Time of my life.”

When Shevu did not suggest a snack or lunch as a prelude to going somewhere they could talk more freely, Ben realized his friend was also worried about their security. He extended his Force awareness again, and this time he
did
feel a pair of focused presences—but they were focused on Shevu, not him. The watchers could have been a GAG backup team, of course—but Ben doubted it. Shevu came here to meet informants, and a careful spymaster did not risk his assets by allowing a backup team to see them. If someone had Shevu under surveillance, it was because they suspected him of treason.

Ben’s first instinct was to take his friend and flee, but that would be a stupid move. Even if they could fight their way out of the plaza, Shevu’s defection would be considered a security emergency. By the time they reached the
Sweet Time
at Mizobon, GAG would have a full-scale “recovery” effort under way, with every spaceport on the planet sealed tight and whole divisions of GAG troopers scouring every cranny within a hundred kilometers of the plaza.

Ben finally identified Shevu’s watchers, a narrow-snouted Rodian couple about thirty meters away. They were pressing suction-tipped fingers to each other’s green cheeks, running a vidcam, and generally trying too hard to look like a couple on holiday. Ben began to subtly flick his fingers in their direction, sending a steady stream of surveillance-negating Force flashes toward the vidcam.

Once Ben felt certain that the Rodians’ recording equipment was useless, he turned back to Shevu.

“Do you know what happened to him—Three-Eye, I mean?” Ben asked, continuing to speak obliquely but coming directly to the point. If he and Shevu were at risk, it was best to get done and get gone. “I have some friends who might like to meet him. I’m sure you would find it worthwhile to help us.”

Shevu’s brow shot up. “How worthwhile?”

“We could make you a very happy man in a very short time,” Ben replied. “As a matter of fact, we’re making preparations for a meeting with him now.”

The look that came to Shevu’s face was equal parts surprise and fear. For an instant, Ben thought that he had been misreading his friend all along—that either Shevu did not want to be involved in moving against Caedus so directly, or he had been Caedus’s double agent from the beginning.

Then Shevu smiled. “There’s no telling how long it would take to put you in touch face-to-face,” he said. “But I
can
tell you where to find him. Would that be worth something to you?”

Ben nodded. “Probably. How much depends on how hard it would be for us to arrange a meeting.”

“Should be easier than on Coruscant,” Shevu replied. “I hear that Three-Eye’s new gang has been causing problems on Nickel One. The last I heard, he was on his way to bring them into line.”

“Are you sure?” Ben asked. Two different intelligence services—Hapan and Wookiee—had confirmed that the
Anakin Solo
was in its hangar at Crix Base above Coruscant. “We’ve heard that his space yacht is still in its moorings.”

“Security precaution,” Shevu replied. “He crossed some Bothans awhile back, and it’s become advisable for him to travel in something a little less conspicuous. He’s definitely gone to Nickel One.”

“Nickel One?” Ben repeated. Suddenly, the Remnant’s easy conquest of the Roche system seemed more convenient than alarming. Asteroids were small places, and if the Jedi acted quickly, they would be able to slip a strike team into place before the Imperials had a chance to debug their security operation. He reached for a credit chip. “That should be worth something to us. How about…”

Ben let the sentence trail off as he felt Jaina reaching out to him in the Force, warning that trouble was on the way. He looked past Shevu and saw the Rodian couple coming, their hands slipping into the pockets of their outer tunics.

“Ten thousand?” Shevu asked, misinterpreting Ben’s sudden silence and still trying to maintain cover. “It’s not easy to come by that kind of information, and if Three-Eye ever finds out—”

“Seccer!” Ben yelled, using the galaxywide slang for a public security officer. He hit Shevu in both shoulders, but harder in the right so that he would be spun around and see the approaching Rodians. “
Dead
seccer!”

Hoping to make it appear that he was resisting arrest—and that Shevu was therefore not involved in anything disloyal to Caedus or GAG—Ben drew his hold-out blaster and fired past his friend’s head. The first bolt came close enough to raise a heat welt along Shevu’s jaw and make it appear the effort to kill had been sincere. The other three shots were not so close, scattering the crowd and sending the two Rodians diving for safety.

“Sorry!”
Ben hissed, leaning close to Shevu’s head. “I think they were watching
you.
Maybe you should come—”

Shevu elbowed him in the ribs, lifting him off his feet and drawing a real grunt of pain.

“No. You go!”
Shevu spun around, simultaneously reaching for his blaster and clutching at Ben’s cloak lapel. “
Make it look
—aaargh!”

The order ended in a surprised scream as Ben clamped a hand over Shevu’s wrist and pivoted away, sending his friend into a flying somersault that ended with him lying flat on his back.

“See ya!”
Ben whispered.
“Good luck!”

He put a couple of blaster bolts through the loose cloth of Shevu’s tunic for good measure, then turned to run.

He found himself staring down a hundred-meter aisle that seemed to be spontaneously opening in front of a woman sprinting through the crowd toward him. Dressed in a dark cloak and black GAG armor, she had blond hair, a lightsaber hilt in her hand, and a dozen GAG commandos following close on her heels.

“Oh,
kriff
!” Ben said. “That’s Tahiri!”

The rising whine of repulsorlift cooling fans began to howl over the plaza, and Ben looked up to see a flight of GAG-black troopsleds sweeping down from the milky sky.

“Go!”
Shevu ordered. “Make this count!”

Ben obeyed instantly, charging into a mass of beings slowly pressing away from the Reconstruction Authority monument in an effort to escape the fight about to erupt in their midst. Assuming Shevu would be close behind him, he began to use the Force to clear a path ahead, at the same time tearing away the wig and heavy robes of his Arkanian disguise.

Ben was traveling in the opposite direction from Jaina and Aunt Leia, trying to protect the mission by moving the action away from his backup team. When the odds got this bad, it was better to split up and avoid getting your partners captured or killed as well. That way, at least there would be someone left to file the report.

The crowd broke into screams as energy bolts began to zing back and forth across the square behind him, and that’s when Ben realized Shevu wasn’t with him. He stopped and spun around, but all he could see was the constant flash of blasterfire flickering through the wall of panicked tourists backing toward him.

Ben tore the finger socks—part of his disguise—from his hands and started to push back toward the fight, then remembered the last thing Shevu had said to him before sending him off.
Make this count.
If Ben rushed back there now, he would be doing just the opposite, robbing Shevu’s sacrifice of meaning—and in all likelihood
still
failing to save him.

Leaving his lightsaber to hang on the belt beneath his tunic, Ben pulled the comlink from his pocket. He allowed the press of the crowd to push him slowly backward, away from what now sounded more like a tapcaf fight than a shootout, determined to
make this count
and
then
go back for his friend.

He did not open a direct channel to the
Sweet Time.
That would give GAG eavesdropping droids the few precious seconds they needed to trace his signal and identify the rest of his team. Instead, he recorded a quick message describing what he had learned about Caedus’s location, ending with a report of Shevu’s capture and, most likely, his own. He formatted it for a five-millisecond burst transmission that would be too fast to track, then opened the channel to the
Sweet Time
…and felt a cold prickle of danger sense race down his spine.

A familiar female voice sounded a pace behind him. “Don’t transmit it, Ben. I won’t hesitate to kill you.”

“You just
did.
”

Ben depressed the
TRANSMIT
button, then tossed the comlink into the air and reached for his lightsaber—only to find Tahiri’s hand already there.

“Bad idea,” she said.

Ben spun toward the hand, bringing an arm up and smashing his elbow into the side of her head. He started to tell her she talked too much, then heard the
snap-hiss
of an igniting lightsaber and realized he had just made the same mistake.

A line of scalding pain erupted across his lower back, and he saw the bright glow of Tahiri’s blade tip shining beside and a little behind him. When his body did not fall to the plaza deck in two pieces, he guessed that he was still alive and continued his spin, bringing his hand around in a reverse knife-hand strike that
would
have caught her just below the ear and almost certainly knocked her unconscious—had she not blocked.