Tales from the New Republic (20 page)

Since Leb’Reen, Fen could but marvel at how Ghitsa managed to sneak the word “mercenary” or “Imperial” into every exchange with Dunc lasting more than two sentences. It kept the conversation entertaining and far more dangerous than Fen normally preferred.

She and Ghitsa were now waiting in the cabin. Dunc and Shada were forward for their first course correction. The itch to be in the cockpit became an ache as Fen felt the ship drop into normal space. Just when she thought the whole process was taking a bit too long, Shada’s voice called over the comm. “Fen, get up here.”

She was out of her seat and halfway up the passage before Ghitsa caught up.

As they ducked into the cockpit, Shada swiveled around in the pilot’s chair. “I want your opinion on something the sensor sweep turned up.”

A few degrees off the bow a metal cylinder turned lazily on a spindle. An antenna protruded from its top.
Stang
, Fen swore silently. The trip had just gotten a whole lot more interesting.

Shada was watching them closely. “It looks like a relay buoy,” she said. “Apparently, it’s picking up ship signatures as they drop in here.”

“Blast it,” Fen uttered curtly.

Shada was already bringing
The Fury
’s laser battery to bear on the buoy. “Yes. I intend to.”

“It’s probably too late, though,” Ghitsa opined as she eased into the cockpit’s rear seat. “Whoever put it there will know soon enough we were here and where we’re headed.”

“Who would care?” Dunc challenged.

For once, Ghitsa favored her with a straight answer. “Anyone interested in what travels on the smugglers’ hyperspace lanes between Ryloth and Nal Hutta.”

“Ryll pirates,” Shada said, making the name a curse.

“Or worse,” Fen said.

Shada deftly moved the targeter on her board. A sure punch and the buoy exploded, for an instant a brilliant orange glowing flower on the canvas of space. “Any particular ‘worse’ you had in mind, Fen?” Shada asked.

“The Karazak Slavers Cooperative springs to mind,” Ghitsa put in grimly. “The KSC used to ambush ships along this line looking for Twi’leks to sell.”

“Anyone who does this run will know that a ship from Ryloth will normally change course here,” Fen added. “Usually for a jump to the Naps Fral cluster—”

“—And then a set-up there for the final jump to Nal Hutta,” Shada finished for her. “Which means that a relay buoy here implies a trap waiting at Naps Fral.”

Ghitsa nodded. “The KSC was once very active on this route. Jabba stopped it because he thought too many valuable slaves were dying in the ambushes.”

Shada gazed at both of them, her dark eyes thoughtful. Dunc could learn much from that knowing, quiet surety, Fen thought. It was probably why the younger Mistryl had been paired with Shada in the first place.

“Jabba died four years ago,” Shada pointed out. “Were you expecting the KSC to have moved back in here since then?

“There were reasons we wanted Mistryl,” Fen responded truthfully. “The possibility of the KSC returning was one of them.”

Turning back to her board, Shada nosed
The Fury
in the direction of the Naps Fral cluster. “Well, there’s no going back now,” she said simply. “Looks like you may get your money’s worth after all.”

“No!” Ghitsa protested with a stamp of her shiny boot. “I am going to ride up front. I’m a perfectly capable copilot—”

“Forgot to take your antidelusional medication today?” Fen cooed, pushing past her and into a cockpit seat.

Since the last course change, Ghitsa had harped endlessly on about wanting to be in the cockpit when they dropped into the Naps Fral cluster. She now curled her hands into tiny fists, reminding Fen of an extremely petulant toddler.

“She can stay,” Shada said calmly as she slid into the pilot’s chair. Ghitsa smiled like a child just presented with a space pop. “However,” Shada added in the same tone, “if she says or does anything to annoy me or distract us, I’ll cripple her.”

“Unless I beat her to it,” Dunc added, her eyes on the monitor readouts.

“Give you a cool thousand if you let me do it,” Fen offered.

“I can
too
fly,” Ghitsa stated for the official record, dropping into her hard-earned seat.

“Sure you can, Ghits,” Fen mocked. “Just like the time your nav coordinates would have put us into Corellia’s sun?”

“We would have just grazed the corona,” Ghitsa said defensively.

“How about the time you were shooting at dust because you thought it was draining the shields?”

“It
was
draining the shields.”

“It was
dust!
Blasting dust will just make
more dust.
”

“Put a cleaning rag in it, both of you,” Shada cut off the growing argument. “We’ve got work to do.”

Ghitsa bridled, but fell silent. “Sorry,” Fen said.

“As I see it, our worst-case scenario is that we’ll find an armada waiting for us when we drop in,” Shada went on. “They may try to hit the engines with surgical turbolaser blasts; more likely, they’ll have a heavy ion cannon ready for a saturation disabling.”

“After which they’ll board us, take the Twi’leks, and kill us,” Fen nodded. “Which means they’ll try to be right in front of us or else aligned on our probable exit vector.”

“That was my reading, too,” Shada answered. “So our obvious countermove is to simply come in two or three seconds early.”

Fen swallowed as she pulled up a chart of the Naps Fral system. Most hyperspace entry coordinates had a built-in “safety zone” of a second or two. In-system pilots knew to stay out of the zones to keep from having a ship pop into real space on top of them. Studying the chart, Fen realized Shada had, once again, done her homework. Three seconds would put the ship just outside the zone, probably not too close to anything lethal.
Probably. Hopefully
.

Ghitsa was clearly thinking along the same lines. “Isn’t altering your hyperspace entry point… dangerous?” she asked in a small voice.

“Very,” Dunc said absently.

“It’s definitely a maneuver with a warning on the box that says, ‘Don’t try this at home,’” Fen forced a quip.

“Stay sharp, everyone,” Shada said. “At my mark. Fifteen, fourteen…” At five seconds, she squeezed her hand over the levers, and star lines melted to the milky cluster of Naps Fral.

A flash of blue ion fire cut across their bow, the proximity alarm pealed, and Shada pulled
The Fury
around in the direction of the threat. In the span it took for the sensors to tell her what had just tried to paste them, Fen reached over and switched off the alarms, wondering why anyone even bothered with the prijgin things. If you needed them, you were already dead in space anyway. “Kuat
Firespray
–class ship,” she announced through clenched teeth.

“Switching over,” Dunc said, her voice unreasonably calm.
The Fury
shook as a pair of concussion missiles blazed off in the direction of their welcoming committee.

“Fen, find out what the computer knows about Fire-sprays,” Shada ordered.

“Right.”

The Fury
jerked to port, then rolled starboard as Shada bounced between bursts of ion energy.

At Fen’s elbow, the computer display began spewing technical information. “ ’Puter says this model’s got a ticklish spot in the port shield,” Fen called. “Right below the stabilizer fin.”

“Stang,” Dunc muttered. “Wouldn’t you know we’d come in on their starboard.”

Shada pushed on the throttle. Still dodging between bursts of ion fire, she lunged straight for the attacking ship. At the last moment, she hauled on the rudder, bringing
The Fury
under the belly of the Firespray. There was a sickening crackle of ion discharge and a lurch—

“What does that red light mean?” Ghitsa asked, pointing over Fen’s shoulder.

Fen shoved the other’s rigid arm out of her face. “It means bad,” she spat. “We took a hit to that weak aft shield,” she added for the benefit of the others. “Another hit and we’re in trouble.”

“They won’t get the chance,” Shada gritted as they burst clear of the Firespray. Yanking on the throttle, she reversed the forward thrust hard, and flipped
The Fury
back over. The Firespray’s left fin magically appeared before them, jutting out from the ship, small and vulnerable. “Dunc?”

“Got it,” Dunc said, fingers flying across the console as she tracked the quivering Firespray and, from the sound of it, emptied an entire magazine into the left fin. The Firespray’s shield rippled with the force of the blasts, plasma ebbing and flowing across the ship’s hull like a flooded river. Dunc let fly another barrage, and this time the missiles pierced the other vessel’s weakening shield. Fire exploded on the ship, scorching its armor. Plates began peeling off the hull like a reptile shedding its skin.

Dunc switched over to the heavy turbolasers. The hot lasers carved through the Firespray’s collapsing shield, strafing the ship along its diagonal. Two explosions, one at the cannon and the other near the reactor, and the Firespray, true to her class, erupted in a brief and blazing shower of white, yellow, and red.

For a moment they all sat in silence. “Well,” Shada said at last, her voice calm as ever. “That seems to be that. Well done, both of you.”

“Not a bad piece of flying, Shada,” Fen conceded, trying to get her breath back and wondering why she was so winded. “Though of course I would have done it without losing that aft shield.”

To Fen’s surprise, Shada laughed. “Fen, you have to be the most arrogant pilot in the galaxy. You want to see if the computer was able to pull an ID before we blew it into the next sector?”

“Let me check,” Fen said, keying the computer. A name came up. “Surprise, surprise,” she muttered in disgust. “It was the
Indenture
.”

“Well, well.” Ghitsa murmured.

Shada and Dunc exchanged glances. “Explain,” Shada said.

“You need to get out more,” Fen said bitterly, “if you haven’t heard about the
Indenture
.”

“Mistryl don’t move in the same exalted circles we do, Fen,” Ghitsa scolded, her customary tinge of superiority returning.

“And you can’t imagine how pleased we are about that,” Shada countered. “Fen?”

“That ship’s had more names and ID codes than a Gamorrean has morts,” Fen said. “Last I heard, it was traveling as
Salvation
, doing hit and runs for the Karazaks out on the rim.”

“Firesprays are mostly used in law enforcement,” Ghitsa added. “I understand Krassis Trelix really appreciates the irony of using that kind of ship for slaving.”

“And Krassis Trelix is?” Shada waved out at the still glowing dust cloud. “I’m sorry: Krassis Trelix was?”

“Karazak logistics coordinator,” Ghitsa amplified. “A very nasty person, even for a smuggler.”

“Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy,” Fen added. Shada nodded with comprehension, and maybe satisfaction, too, Fen thought.

“Dunc, let’s get those coordinates,” Shada said. “Next stop, Nal Hutta.”

Fen rinsed the anxiety of the battle from her body. The water was flat and recycled, washing over her like a ritual cleansing that was really nothing more than a tepid sponge bath. She let her head fall forward and rest against the wall, taking a deep breath.

The KSC encounter had not been entirely unexpected. It had been a lucky break in some respects, and disastrous in others. She had done her part. Now it was up to Ghitsa to get them out of this developing jam.

Stepping into another battered flight suit, she ran a comb through her wet hair, slicking it back in what Jett had called her drowned womp rat look. Having already been to Mos Eisley numerous times by age fifteen, she had long ago ascertained how rare a commodity water was there. Her adoptive father had laughed until tears ran down his red face when she had explained that, in the Tatooine desert, water was too precious to be wasted on drowning rodents. Only belatedly had she understood that that had been his point. She quickly checked the small grin threatening to pull at her lips.

At the cabin entrance, she paused, taking in the sight. Dunc was straddling a chair, watching Ghitsa seated near the back primly apply a new coat of nail polish. The omnipresent holo viewer hummed lightly in the background.

Fen eased back over to the computer terminal. With Dunc distracted and Shada tending to the shields, now was a good time to complete a certain task still on her checklist.

The first eighteen times Shada had caught her, Fen had appeared to be doing nothing more than playing battle simulations. Shada had her suspicions, but, as every female on that ship knew, there was a galaxy’s difference between doing something and actually getting caught doing it.

Ghitsa delicately applied a streak of vibrant red to replace the pink adorning her fingertips. Dunc watched with suspicious fascination. “Why are you using such an obvious color?” she asked.

“
Ohta su marvalic plesodoro
,” Ghitsa responded.

“Which means?” Dunc countered.

“Huttese,” Fen said. “Let them marvel at our splendor.”

“It was a favorite phrase of Jabba’s.” Holding out her hand, Ghitsa admired the gaudy red shade. “Jabba understood the importance of flaunting prosperity to demonstrate power. Since Mistryl have nothing, this is something you cannot understand.”

Ghitsa sure wasn’t wasting any time. Fen subtly shifted for easier access to her blaster, wondering if a stun setting would stop a truly enraged Mistryl.

But Dunc merely cocked an eyebrow, the same gesture Fen had noticed Shada using on occasion. “You seem to know a lot about Hutts,” she said. “One might wonder how that happened.”

“Oh, I don’t think you’re wondering at all,” Ghitsa said with a smug, evil smile. “Surely you’ve read the Mistryl backgrounder on me.”

“What backgrounder?” Dunc asked.
Score one for Ghitsa
, Fen thought. Although Dunc’s light skin would probably always betray the slightest stress, the young Mistryl was going to have to learn to lie better. She would have to remember to mention that to Shada… from a couple of light-years away.

Ghitsa had obviously noticed the reaction, too. “Oh, come now, Dunc. Fen’s dear-departed, noble partner dealt with the Mistryl for years. As has Fen.” Her forefinger joined her thumbnail, both colored red. “So what does it say?”

“Why don’t you tell me?” Dunc suggested, her voice dark.

“If you insist,” Ghitsa sighed irritably. “Among other things, it says that I am a Hutt counselor. Do you understand what that means?”

Dunc’s mouth twisted in contempt. “It means you’re authorized by one or more Hutts to conduct business on their behalf,” she said. “Like this dancers’ contract between Durga and Brin’shak.”

“A nicely standard textdoc answer, shadow guard,” Ghitsa said approvingly. “But it doesn’t even scratch the surface. Shall I tell you what it really means to be a Hutt counselor?”

Dunc nodded her head slightly to the side. “I’m all ears.”

“Hutt clans appoint counselors to conduct their business,” Ghitsa said. “The skill and loyalty required to manage their complex schemes, plus a Hutt’s own longevity, dictate that counselors remain within a single unit, preferably a family. Dogders have orchestrated Hutt infiltration of Core World businesses for over one hundred and fifty years.”

Fen lifted an eye from the screen. This was news to her, too, if it were true.

“I see,” Dunc said in a cold voice. “What a splendid and honorable family history you have.”

“I don’t need to justify myself to you,” Ghitsa said loftily. “My motivations, and those of my clan masters, should be perfectly comprehensible to you.” Her left hand now completely painted, she switched the brush from right to left, and began reddening her right nails. “Money, profit, security—things even Mistryl ought to understand.”

Dunc snorted. “Except that our principles aren’t for sale to the highest bidder.”

“But that’s the irony of it. They are for sale. They have been sold, you have been sold, like any cheap trinket.” Ghitsa laughed with merry scorn. “Do you really think Mistryl are immune because they don’t deal with former Imperials, refuse to assist in patently illegal ventures, and charge more for the questionable ones?”

Under the terminal, Fen slowly and silently slid her hand down and released the safety on the blaster at her hip. She had no idea how much of this was show and how much the twisted truth. What she did know was that Ghitsa was trying to push the young Mistryl to the snapping point. And that she might succeed.

“For all your exalted justifications of saving your desperate people,” Ghitsa went on, “you’re delivering the Twi’leks to servitude and death as certainly as any Karazak slaver.”

Slowly, deliberately, Dunc uncoiled from her chair and stalked over to the table, her face calm and deadly. Fen got a grip on her blaster butt, but Dunc made no move against her partner except to stand and tower over her like a storm cloud.

“The contract said they were being paid, Hutt,” Dunc bit out, making the word a curse. “You said they weren’t slaves. You’ve lied to the Mistryl.”

Ghitsa raised her eyes to Dunc. “I didn’t lie. They will be paid. And then they’ll be charged; for costumes, board, room, and expenses. At one time, they might have saved enough to buy out their contracts. However, because Twi’lek mortality hovers near seventy percent, Durga now withholds an additional sum to cover the cost of a burial shroud.”

“Shada questioned Brin’shak,” Dunc hissed. “She asked each of the Twi’leks if they wanted to go.”

Ghitsa held her hands out, admiring her work. “In a uniquely Twi’lek way, these dancers do indeed go willingly. They know some Twi’leks must end up in Hutt throne rooms. This is the price they all pay for a lack of power. A Hutt commercial agent will see that the clan is compensated. The alternative is indiscriminate Karazak slaving raids on their enclaves.”

Dunc’s lip twisted. “I’d heard that Twileks sell a few of their own to buy a greater peace for them all,” she conceded reluctantly. “But you make it sound as if your altruism keeps Karazaks from plundering Ryloth.”

“
Our
altruism, Dunc—we’re all in this together, you know.” Ghitsa blew lightly on her perfectly marked claws. “I advised Durga it was more cost-effective to go this route, rather than contract with the Karazaks. The KSC is expensive and their slaves tend to be poor quality.” She began capping the little bottle. “As I see it, the Hutts purchased Mistryl morality for thirty-two thousand. Karazaks would have demanded at least forty-five. But then, they aren’t as desperate as the Mistryl.”

Fen cringed at Ghitsa’s attack. Perfectly crafted in the words of commerce, she was a humanoid vision of repugnant Hutt excess.

And it had worked, all too well. Dunc stood above her, color rising, the slow boil of a jump’s worth of taunts and insults bubbling over, threatening to ignite the fire beneath. She stirred, perhaps about to go for a weapon, perhaps to simply pick Ghitsa up and hurl her bodily across the cabin—

“Dunc,
in aiente,
” came a quiet order from the door.

Fen jumped. Ghitsa didn’t even twitch. “Hello, Shada,” the con chirped innocently. “How long have you been standing there?”

“Long enough,” Shada said, her eyes on Dunc. “
In aiente
.”

Dunc took a careful breath. Then, wordlessly, she pivoted away from Ghitsa and strode from the cabin.

For a moment Shada studied Fen and Ghitsa, her face stiff and unreadable. “We drop out of hyperspace at oh-one-hundred hours tomorrow,” she said and followed Dunc out into the passageway.

Ghitsa finally broke the long silence that followed. With uncharacteristic, doubting hesitation, she asked, “Do you think I went too far?”

“Hard to say,” Fen said, working moisture back into her mouth. “If we get out of this alive, I’d say no. If they slash our throats in our sleep, then, yeah, probably so.” She hesitated, weighing her words carefully. “You said some pretty reprehensible things. How much of it was true?”

She grimaced. “Enough. Too much.”

Seeing the little grifter shift uncomfortably in her seat, Fen asked, “Ghitsa, could that be your conscience bothering you?”

Ghitsa made a show of examining her nails. “Of course not, Fen. Merely indigestion. Ship’s rations, you know.”