Every residence of an Imperial governor, Moff, or simply an influential aristocrat hides many secrets. Including an underground passage necessary to clear out if things get too hot.
"Target is escaping!"
The call was broadcast directly into Captain Inek's ear from the comlink built into his helmet. Heavy stomping pounded on the floor above the agent's head to the accompaniment of the easily recognizable brap-brap of a blaster. Torin swore quietly. They had hoped to catch the target for subsequent interrogation, not kill him in the process of the operation.
The agent slowed his pace, descending further down the spiral staircase carved into the rock, straining to see anything in the darkness of the smell-filled underground. Behind him lay a breach in the wall, a maze of corridors, and a short passage with a locked door that had clearly not been opened until now. Apparently, that was where the criminals were headed. But there was nowhere to hide in the corridors, so Torin moved toward the enemy to have at least a hope of reliable cover in case of a shootout in the tunnels.
Now that the situation had turned into a fierce firefight, he regretted not appearing above to participate in the Shadow Guard's assault. But he had made the decision—to split up and set an ambush. This tactic had been drilled into him at the Academy thanks to an old instructor—a clone commando whom he still remembered with respect. Under the circumstances, he hated to think that such a tactic might be wrong.
The enemy not only had additional forces—certainly not just a couple of companies of local thugs as had been assumed—but also threw them into battle against Dominion agents without hesitation. The boys, while outnumbered, were superior to the enemy in the quality of the assault and the conduct of the operation. They had destroyed around two hundred enemy fighters—and that was not counting the throne room where the Shadow Guards were working. In half an hour of assault, the Dominion had only lost a couple of Molo Himron's clones—and even then, only due to the enemy's use of heavy weaponry.
But it was precisely the enemy's use of a grenade launcher that had revealed the secret of the new tunnels' existence to the agents. Otherwise, the agents continued to press the enemy on all fronts. Fifty agents, acting with maximum efficiency. No, he believed and hoped the tactic would work.
"If it fails, it will only be because I applied it incorrectly," the man decided, continuing to break through the tunnels.
They turned out to be more branched than he had expected. That was why he moved into the part that, judging by the rock and construction equipment, had been cut quite recently. Some of the agents were guarding the official part of the underground, in case the criminals decided to use it after all. But as soon as Torin saw the fresh catacombs, he made another decision—to move through the new tunnels. Most likely the criminals were making this part of the palace for themselves. Perhaps they realized that since the construction of the governor's residence, many Imperial secrets had ceased to be such. And the official underground was left to distract attention while they used the new tunnels for escape.
Torin and the other agents did not know the exits from them. But the presence of three entry points to them in the residence at once indicated that he was thinking in the right direction.
"Lieutenant Mac's" boots softly touched the steps of an ascending staircase. The higher he climbed, the more ominous the silence became. He occasionally thought about contacting the agents guarding the official secret passage, but he didn't want to break the advantages silence could give him. The underground was cleverly planned—in places it approached the official secret tunnels and residence rooms, allowing one to listen to what was happening in that part of the structure. A perfect way to secretly monitor what was going on. And with enough desire, one could always blow up the necessary wall of a room and escape into the new tunnels.
It was becoming clear that the enemy intended to settle here comfortably and for a long time. Residences were already designed to provide shelters and firing lines for defenders. And here the enemy had decided to further fortify and strengthen the buildings and rooms. They were clearly preparing to turn this place into a hardened command post.
He was halfway to the top of the flight when he was attacked. He had just passed a niche roughly carved into the mountain massif on which the residence was located when a hand with a blaster poked out from a doorway at the top of the stairs. Torin felt a hit to his armor, but the pain did not come—even after a second, during which he pressed himself into the niche. He shouldn't take such risks in the future—judging by the power of the weapon, these guys had powerful blasters. The armor might not save him a second time.
"Boss! Boss! There are Imps here!" the blaster's owner yelled, continuing to fire blindly and thus trying to force Torin to stay in cover. "I saw one!"
"So kill him, you idiots!" another voice roared.
The agent was being suppressed by fire to…
As soon as part of a criminal's bulk appeared before the niche (well, who else could care about the presence of an armed man in tunnels unknown to most sentients), Torin did not wait to be shot. Pushing off the rock with his feet, he jumped forward, flew across the half-meter width of the stairs, and knocked down the criminal who had approached to finish him with his body. Inek managed to hit him in the chin with his fist, snapping the latter and knocking the bandit unconscious. The night vision mode in his helmet gave him a clear picture that this was not the one he needed. And thus there was no point in sparing this bandit's life.
When the bandit's body hit the staircase steps with a crunch and slid down, Torin broke the enemy fighter's neck with one precise strike against the edge of the steps and let him slide freely to the base of the spiral attraction. Yes, the enemy was already on the stairs. And they really wanted to go down. They were heading for that very door in the new part of the underground that no one had opened until now. Behind that armored door was their salvation. But in their path stood Torin Inek. A Dominion agent. And despite the disadvantage of his position, he would not budge.
A pair of custom-made blasters easily switched to rapid-fire mode, taking the place of a light blaster rifle. But it would be enough for his enemies. Torin Inek slowly began to move up the stairs. Simultaneously beginning to kill.
***
Darth Maul was on the trail. Like a predator pursuing wounded prey. Using the Force, he developed the maximum possible running speed for his cybernetic body. However, it was more like giant leaps—each of his steps moved him several meters forward. The Zabrak tore through the darkness. But in it, he saw as brightly as if a local star were positioned above him. The Dark Side of the Force allowed its adepts much. And the deeper you know it, the more secrets it opens to you, allowing you to serve it with even greater efficiency.
In a matter of minutes, Darth Maul raced through the secret passage, traversed several floors, flying over staircases like a hurricane, searching one underground shelter after another. Cells, apartments, something looking like a ransacked bank vault, a torture chamber with several fresh corpses… But no trace of the escaped criminals. He felt life near him, literally around the next corners of the wide tunnel, but each time he turned there—he found no one.
The sounds of shootouts and explosions where he could not reach only incensed him and drove him deeper into rage. The prey was playing with him. The target had turned out to be craftier than he had expected. Finally, ahead, he felt the sparks of life. Fewer opponents than expected. And they were all somehow uniformly dull…
With a furious roar, Maul burst from the last turn of the tunnel, feeling that the end of the underground path was before him. And he braked, his prosthetic metal feet grinding against the rough stone, seeing blasters aimed at him. Held in the hands of figures in black armor. Familiar black armor.
"Can we help you, Shadow Guard?" one of the agents asked, at whose signal the others stopped aiming at the Zabrak.
"Where are they?" the Zabrak growled.
"No one has been here, sir."
The clone said something else, but Maul did not hear him. Drums beat in his temples, calling for killings. The Dark Side burned him from within, demanding bloodshed. But even if he finished these agents, he would experience no pleasure from their suffering and death. But worst of all, they were not even lying. Maul saw it in their thoughts. The clones were performing their assigned task—sitting in ambush. If they had captured the target and decided to deceive him, he would have realized it. But they were honest. There really was no one here on whom he could vent his rage and enjoy the ritual of inflicting death.
Killing clones was a routine anyway. No bright emotions from the sense of death, no horror of the onset of the end… Meat-droids fear nothing. They know perfectly well they will die. And they don't give a damn when or where. Maul spat on the floor in disgust and turned his back on the clones. He immediately picked up speed, heading back. There was only one tunnel. There could be nothing here that somehow led in another direction, because he, when running, had felt them, had been ready to catch them, overtake them, tear them to pieces… But they were neither ahead nor behind him. They were…
Maul braked, plowing a small furrow in the stone floor with his metal feet. He slowly turned his head toward the impenetrable wall. Behind which, in the distance, he felt the panic of those retreating.
"Attention!" This was the voice of one of the agents. "Enemy located in a new network of tunnels. Running parallel to the known ones…"
So that was what the clone at the exit wanted to tell him… There were more tunnels. Now everything fell into place. Maul touched the rough stone of the wall, significantly behind which he felt the struggle that had begun. He looked at his double-bladed lightsaber. He hung the weapon on his belt and concentrated the Force in his hands. Throwing it out with a telekinetic pulse, he broke through the wall and the one behind it.
Stepping into the new tunnel, he inhaled the air noisily. The smell of fear, battle, and death… It came from the second tunnel into which he had broken a path. Maul moved there, determined his direction, and rushed toward the target. It was time to kill.
***
Inek pressed his back to the wall, limiting the enemy's field of fire. Reloading took seconds, but in that time one of the mercenaries managed to descend even further. And now nothing prevented him from killing the agent. Except for one fact. Torin never reloaded both blasters at once. Therefore, he put another hole in the Nautolan's face. And immediately rushed to his place, jumping over the corpse sliding down the wall and fired at two other mercenaries. Both Rodians shrieked no better than Gamorreans, but Inek didn't give a damn about the circumstances of the killed ones' last breaths. He was winning back one landing after another, moving back up the stairs so as not to lose the criminals.
And the target of the entire operation—Mi-Ha the Hutt's assistant. This Weequay was necessary to unravel the thread of conspiracy and crimes reigning in Allied Tion. Torin had to take cover again when one of the opponents opened fire from a high-powered blaster carbine. Such rounds burned through a small layer of rock, let alone armor. Torin managed to shoot the opponent before he heard a bestial roar in the upper part of the spiral staircase.
The criminals, of whom only six remained, also froze for a moment, trying to understand what was happening. This allowed the Dominion agent to finish off two more. And in the same second their bodies began to tumble down the stairs, a red concentrated flame appeared in an energy blade above. Clad in all black, the Shadow Guard fell upon the opponents, killing them with the meticulousness of a sadist exterminating parasites or a discovered nest of rodents. The double-bladed lightsaber tore bodies apart, severing arms and legs that showered the agent from above in a terrible rain. It hacked torsos and sliced legs as if trying to perform decorative carving like in the galaxy's finest restaurants.
Torin clearly realized that for the first time in his life, he was terrified to the point of a chill down his spine. Terrified of something clad in the perfectly familiar form of a Zabrak humanoid who was clearly enjoying the killings. Several criminals rushed down the stairs, hoping for salvation from the terrible fate of their comrades. Inek realized he would gladly join them, but his legs felt like lead.
With one leap, the monster in humanoid guise jumped from the site of the last slaughter. And ended up directly in the path of the fleeing criminals. Leaving Torin behind his back. With one filigree stroke of his blade, the Shadow Guard finished off the remaining criminals. Except for one. He cowardly threw his weapon from the stairs, babbling something in Basic about surrendering. The Shadow Guard approached him closely. The Nautolan fell to his knees, folding his hands in a prayer gesture, looking up at the executioner from below.
"Mercy… mercy…"
The plea bit into Torin's brain like drills tormenting dense material. With a hiss, the lightsaber blades retracted into the long hilt, which the Shadow Guard hung on his belt. Then he placed a hand on the head of the surrendering alien trembling with fear.
"Mercy?" the Zabrak's voice echoed with ice and hatred. "What mercy can there be for those who are cowardly, weak, and useless?"
"Stop, he's…" Torin only had time to shout.
Seizing the Nautolan by a head-tail, the Shadow Guard smashed the criminal's skull against the stone wall with superhuman strength. The head burst like overripe fruit, spraying physiological fluids in all directions in a fountain. Blood and the contents of the skull doused Torin's face.
"Black bones of the Emperor!" the agent yelled. "What are you doing?! One of them is the ringleader!"
The Shadow Guard slowly turned his face to the agent. Torin felt a wave of nausea, seeing the Zabrak examine the remains of the criminal's head in his palm with interest. Then he clenched his fingers tightly. Blood and brains sprayed in small fountains.
"Know your place, Agent," the Zabrak said hollowly. "The leader was not here. None of these is the Weequay you seek."
Inek's gaze darted over the bodies of the killed…
"Bantha poodoo!" he cursed. "Where is that bastard?"
"The upper level has several corridors," the Zabrak said. "I think he sent the fighters on a false trail to escape pursuit through the residence himself."
It sounded reasonable.
"Then why in the Hutt's name did you turn these into salad?!" Torin asked, pointing at the finely chopped bodies of the criminals.
"Because it is fun," the Zabrak shrugged with a perfectly indifferent face. And slowly walked up the steps.
***
Vex walked in the footsteps of the task force, easily, uninhibitedly, and even with filigree stepping over the corpses of enemies littering the residence corridors. It wasn't that she was particularly disappointed that the enemy didn't have a single survivor left. On the contrary—it was an indicator of the storm commandos' excellent work.
Yes, yes, yes—Aurra Sing had already explained to her (with a haughty chuckle) that these were actually Dominion Intelligence field agents using storm commando armor as cover. So that according to all canons, accidental witnesses would indicate that it was the Empire working on exterminating the criminals. Though it was a mystery, of course, why storm commandos themselves couldn't be sent here… Most likely, there was some reason for it. In which she, traditionally, was not included.
Passing another corridor, the girl noticed movement out of the corner of her eye in a room she hadn't even thought to inspect. Taking a step back and pointing her blaster into the doorway, she crossed the threshold with a firm intention to sort out what was happening. A powerful blow to her forearms stripped her of her blaster. The girl, seized by her breastplate, was forcibly pulled inside and slammed against the wall so that pain from her lekku being crushed by her back and armor spread through her body.
The face of a Weequay, contorted with rage, stared into hers. And behind him, a hole in the wall was visible. Which, generally speaking, shouldn't be here according to the residence floor plan. The native of the planet Sriluur in the Outer Rim hissed something in his own language, pinning her throat with his left forearm. Simultaneously reaching with his free right hand behind his back with the clear intention of getting a backup weapon.
Vex did not hesitate. She launched her right hand between herself and the opponent to grab him by the back of the head. Turning her torso to the left, the girl stepped behind the opponent's legs with her right foot and put all the body mass she could into her frame, leaning forward. The Weequay flew to the floor with a squeak and a curse, simultaneously throwing out his right hand with a vibroknife. Aimed at her belly.
Vex intercepted the weapon with her palms, twisted the wrist to disarm the opponent and move the arm into a pain lock, flipping him face down. The vibroknife fell from his hand, the metal handle clattering on the room's floor.
"I don't train this tummy for you to defile it with your iron!" she shouted at the Weequay.
The opponent tried everything to break free from the hold. And this persistence gave Vex confirmation of the opponent's identity. Managing to press the activation key of the comlink built into her armor forearm, she said:
"Leader captured! Third floor, room with a hole in the wa…"
The scoundrel took advantage of her distraction and knocked the girl to the floor with a kick. With a crash, the Twi'lek fell onto her back, crushing her lekku once more, causing circles to dance before her eyes.
"I'll finish you!"
The opponent pounced on her. Vex tried to tuck her legs to kick him in the chest and throw him off, but realized that this move might have worked correctly anytime but under current circumstances. The armor—reliable and massive—did not allow her to do it with filigree agility, and the opponent landed on her tucked shins. He had already managed to pick up his knife and tried to strike her in the face from the side, but Vex put her left forearm under the knife. With stunning ease and pain, the weapon entered her arm so deeply she saw the tip of the blade. Protruding from the internal surface of the left forearm of the beauty from Ryloth.
The arm began to treacherously weaken, and the opponent pressed her even more, twisting the weapon in her arm. Causing excruciating pain and threatening her resistance to him. Vex realized she was weakening and the inevitable would soon follow—the blade would hit her breastplate, pierce it, and…
The Twi'lek looked again at the tip of the vibroknife protruding from her forearm. A couple of centimeters, no more. She looked into the opponent's eyes and smirked defiantly.
"And I know someone who will beat all the crap out of you for ruining my chest," she said in a mysterious tone. And defiantly stuck out her tongue. Stopping the struggle with her left hand. And tilting her head forward, offering her forehead.
The opponent, pressing her with his weight, leaned forward, imagining with sadistic pleasure how the blade would enter her body and openly enjoying her cry of pain… And then his face met her forehead. The opponent reflexively recoiled, grabbing his broken nose with both hands and stopping the pressure on her legs with his weight.
Vex, feeling something warm and hot (well, what could that be, eh?) spreading over her body under the armor and suit, freed her right leg and with all her heart introduced her boot heel to the Weequay's face. Now he was thrown back properly. He flew several meters back, allowing Vex to rise using only one healthy arm. She held her left arm where the blade had entered her body, feeling that she was getting worse. And breathing was painful. As if there wasn't enough air.
The girl kicked the opponent in the face with all her heart, making him whimper like a beaten guard dog that hadn't expected such treatment from a caring master. Grimacing in pain and not removing the blade from the wound, she bent over, overcoming the pain, and picked up her blaster, aiming it at the opponent. He stopped rolling on the floor, froze on his stomach, spreading his arms to rise.
"Move—and I'll make another hole in your rear," the Twi'lek promised.
The opponent did not believe her. But she did not keep her word either, firing the blaster. Но not with a lethal charge, but with the whitish rings of a stunner.
"I'll do it later," Vex promised, looking at her forearm. "Wonderful!" she commented on the fact that the vibroknife had sliced through her forearm comlink. And she didn't want to search for a spare, leaving her weapon without the ability to react quickly. At least—for now. Because she noticed movement in the hole out of the corner of her eye. And she fired there. But with live ammunition this time, fortunately nothing prevented her right thumb from moving the firing selector to the necessary position.
The crimson blade of a lightsaber that flared a fraction of a second before that reflected the charge into the ceiling.
"Have you completely lost it?" Reynar asked, appearing fully from the breach in the wall.
"Me?!" Vex was indignant, placing her healthy hand on her hip. "I captured the leader here while you're crawling through some dark and creepy holes! For shame, Reynar! I thought better of you! Hope you didn't bring any infections back from there into the family?"
Obscuro, who was removing his helmet at that moment, couldn't keep it in his fingers. The bucket fell to the floor with a crash.
"I was racing through the underground as if Darth Vader himself on spice were chasing me when I heard your signal!" he declared.
"I know those male excuses of yours," Vex grimaced feignedly, nodding toward the prisoner. "It is definitely him, right?"
Reynar lifted the unconscious Weequay into the air with the Force, looked at his face…
"Aside from the smashed face and broken nose bones—yes, this is the local gang leader," he concluded. After which he allowed the criminal to fall onto the room's floor like a sack.
"You're wounded," he stated, approaching the girl and sizing up the vibroknife to remove it from her forearm.
"You're the height of observation!" Vex quipped. "Don't touch it! The end of the knife is sticking in my chest. You pull it—I'll flood everything with blood."
"You do love flooding everything…" Obscuro muttered, looking unkindly at the prisoner. "He did this?"
"Technically—it's his fault," Vex nodded. "But it entered somewhere above the chest, I chose the safest… way."
"Since when has safety ever interested you?" the former Inquisitor wondered.
"Are we specifically talking about the knife sticking in my chest right now?" Vex asked.
"Of course," Reynar agreed.
"I could actually die, you know," the girl reminded him. "Standing here, I'm all flowing…"
"…"
"I'm bleeding out, you idiot!" the girl exploded. "Can you do something about this already?"
"Does a wound in your chest not even stop you from making double entendres?" Obscuro clarified, activating his comlink and requesting medical assistance.
"The strongest couples are those where one is hit over the head and the other is a gloomy and sullen slow-thinker," Vex shared her observations, grimacing as her beloved pricked her with a pneumo-syringe from his medkit.
"Bacta," he explained. "It will slow the blood loss. Но it's better not to pull the knife until I take the armor off you."
"Reynar Obscuro, you are a finished man!" the Twi'lek said with feigned disgust. "I'm standing here, dying, bleeding out, and he's only thinking about undressing me? Do you even have a conscience?!"
The Shadow Guard sighed resignedly. He understood perfectly that the girl was using this flow of words not out of whim. Just a psychological defense mechanism.
"Let me help," he said, approaching the girl and relieving her of the cloak, unfastening the breastplate fastenings. "I'll take the armor off and see what's going on with your chest…"
"Ahem-ahem," a businesslike clearing of a throat came from the doorway. "You could at least be ashamed, eh?! This is a combat mission, after all!"
"Get out, Sing!" the man and the Twi'lek said in unison. "It's not at all what you think!"
"Of course," Aurra said in a poisonously mocking tone, retreating from the room with deliberate slowness. "Of course…" She turned her head toward the corridor and a mocking smile appeared on her face. "Hey, Maul! Come here! Obscuro is groping his girl here! Right by the body of the leader we were hunting?!"
Reynar swore. Both because the blood from Vex's wound flowed more strongly. And because the Zabrak appeared in the room. Though the latter did not react at all to Obscuro treating his partner's wound. He simply approached the indifferent body, hoisted it onto his shoulder, and headed for the exit. Half a meter from the threshold, he stopped. Without looking back, Darth Maul said:
"Streen was evacuated to the Marut. The Imperials saved his life."
"Oland and the others kept their promise," Reynar said with relief, packing the wound after pouring hemostatic gel into it. "I'm glad he's all right."
"Did the leader cut your woman?" the Zabrak asked, continuing to stand with his back to them.
"Technically—it's his fault," Vex said quickly.
"Understood," Maul answered.
He sprang with his legs, taking a step forward. And this action coincided with the Weequay's upper part jumping on his shoulder, his head-back hitting the door frame.
"Maul's a gentleman," Vex said. "Avenged a woman's offense. Didn't think he was like that…"
Reynar shook his head, finishing the disinfection. He could have said the Zabrak simply enjoyed inflicting a bit more pain on an opponent. Но he kept silent, occupied with other, more important things. A shallow cut, it hadn't damaged much, so that would be enough.
"A scar will remain," he said, looking into Vex's eyes.
"A big one?"
"A centimeter and a half by a couple of millimeters," he named the wound's dimensions.
"Don't even think I'll be wearing a closed swimsuit," the girl warned in a loud whisper. "And since you're to blame for my beautiful body being ruined by some criminal, you'll have to make amends!"
"Such insolence even has me in a stupor," Sing admitted from the corridor. "Good for you, girl! That's it, drive the brute under your heel!"
"I will make amends," Reynar promised, looking into Vex's eyes. "Consider it already made."
"How so?" she blinked her eyelashes.
"I didn't strangle you," Obscuro explained, giving the girl a light kick in the direction of the door. "You shouldn't have been in the residence at all, you cheeky pest!"
Vex vanished from view faster than Aurra Sing could come up with a new quip.
***
"I don't like any of this," Booster grumbled crankily, watching the lights of Imperial fleet engines through the transparisteel.
"You never like anything," Mirax parried, clearing away simple food from the navigator's seat. It had been turned into an improvised snack table for her grumbling father on watch.
It was implied that Corran would also find time to join the family lunch. But no miracle occurred. Just as it hadn't occurred weeks earlier. Horn was distancing himself from them more and more, spending more time in his cabin, studying… something. Occasionally the hum of a lightsaber was heard, occasionally the sounds of falling objects or something else unlike a civilian's pastime.
"After one red-eyed blue-face took a Star Destroyer from me?" Booster snapped. "No, I don't like anything after that. And don't you dare reproach me!"
"Maybe I should remind you that you took the Adventure from the Imperials yourself, eh?" Mirax inquired.
"You say that as if it were a bad thing," Booster grunted, glancing at the colossal warship hanging over Kessel. "Has Corbez not come out of his hole?"
"No," Mirax replied. "You know he's busy…"
"…studying his Jedi heritage," Booster grimaced, repeating what he had heard more than once. "We need to clear out of here, not study textbooks while sitting on the refresher."
"Don't start…" Booster looked at his daughter, then shifted his gaze toward the corridor leading to the shuttle's cockpit, where they were.
"Something is wrong," he said.
"Everything is fine," Mirax said quickly.
"Not a Hutt's bit fine!" Booster hissed in her face. "The Hutt with it that Horn isn't himself. Jedi—they're all a bit touched, especially when it's Corbez's family…"
"Don't even think about starting that conversation again!" Mirax flared up. "He went through a lot to save us and…"
"Is that what he told you?" Lowering his voice, Terrik Senior addressed his daughter, looking her straight in the eye.
"Yes." The young woman looked away. "We talked a lot when we had to hide…"
"It's so good you started this conversation." A malicious smirk appeared on Terrik's face. "Maybe then your precious husband will tell us exactly how he got such an advanced little ship, eh?"
Mirax looked at her father with the same gaze he had given her. Searching, unkind, portending nothing good.
"You can't do without a fight, can you?" she asked.
"I can."
"Then why are you starting again…?"
"Because it's a joke for Jedi!" Booster exploded. "Do you know how many TZ-15s are in free sale in the galaxy? In fully working order, with all spare parts, with a functioning Stygium-based cloaking system? With equipment to hide ion engine emissions? Do you know who this toy used to belong to, eh?!"
"Right, that's enough." Mirax demonstratively rose from the co-pilot's seat. "I'm not going to be your lightning rod! Corran said friends gave him the shuttle, and I believe my husband…"
"I turned half the galaxy upside down just to find a battered ship like that!" Booster switched to a bass. "They cost fifty million each! I got the Adventure cheaper! The Empire spent a lot of time trying to get even one of those after it broke the Zann Consortium. And they didn't get that many, you know! And the black markets were swept clean within six months of Tyber Zann being finished off! Do you even know what Zann's people used such ships for?!"
"No," Mirax answered, turning to face her father. "And I don't want to know! Corran said friends helped him and…"
"With friends like that—by a Hutt's tail and into a museum!" Booster thundered. "I respected Corbez like his father for the principles they had! And he could only have gotten a ship like that from the remnants of the Zann Consortium! The most vile and most bastardly bastards of the galaxy! Whom even the Hutts didn't deal with, considering them total scum without concepts of honor or conscience!"
"Loud words," a calm voice came from the corridor.
Booster's nose twitched unpleasantly. "Smells like Corbez."
"Corran, I…" Mirax rushed to her husband, but he stopped her and cast a glance at the Guardian hanging over Kessel. His cold gaze peered at the ships circling the colossus as if he wanted to spot something…
"Trying to hypnotize them?" Booster inquired.
"No," Corran answered, looking at his father-in-law. "Vacate the pilot's seat, Booster."
"Like Hutt's fire," Terrik stubborned. "I'm comfortable here."
"Dad!"
"I don't have time for games," Corran stated coldly, further demonstrating the striking change that had occurred during the time his family members were kidnapped. "We have trouble."
"Yes," Terrik Senior nodded. "We're in the middle of Imperial territory on a ship with a crazed Corbez with a lightsaber and rotten connections…"
Horn stared intently at his father-in-law. It made the unbreakable Booster Terrik cower.
"I did what I did for your safety," he declared. "And I would do even more if required. You should be thankful that I have acquaintances who helped free you."
"Great help," Booster snapped weakly. "Sitting here like decoy targets waiting to be found…"
"We aren't waiting for anything," Corran stated, pointing to one of the points rapidly approaching them. "We have been found. And it's better that I am at the controls than you, dear father-in-law."
"Why's that?" the smuggler was offended. "Well, they fly around here often, so what?"
"Because they haven't just set pilots on us," Horn stated categorically.
"Who then?" Mirax asked.
"A Jedi," Horn answered, dropping into the seat his father-in-law had vacated. "Buckle up. And take over the guns. We have a serious fight ahead of us."
***
Captain Pellaeon thought his vision had failed him. Because the Headhunter had just vanished from the bridge's tactical monitor.
"Sir, the Hand has crossed the light barrier."
"Thank you, Captain," Grand Admiral Thrawn said. "I have already noticed. Exquisite, isn't it?"
"I beg your pardon, sir?" the commander of the Guardian looked questioningly at the Supreme Commander.
"The Hand has solved the problem of the sudden attack on Horn," Thrawn explained, stroking the ysalamiri.
"Yes, it performed a hyper-jump to him…"
"Not to him," Thrawn clarified. "Behind him."
At that same moment, the Onyx Star's previously vanished marker appeared near the suspected location of Horn's ship. The onboard computer recorded laser fire into the void of space… in which, a moment later, the marker of an enemy starship appeared that had not been there before.
"It used the Interdictor's gravity well and Horn's position near the artificial gravity border to exit into realspace from a vector from which Horn did not expect an attack," Pellaeon said with a note of admiration. Watching as a dozen TIE Avengers repeated the maneuver, dousing the Corellian's little ship with fire from their cannons and forcing it to move toward the Guardian and the entire Dominion fleet.
"A Zann Consortium shuttle," Captain Pellaeon identified the type of runaway Jedi's starship.
"A TZ-15," Thrawn specified. "Designed for transporting particularly important members of the organization. Hence the cloaking device."
"So the former CorSec operative has teamed up with Tyber Zann?" the commander of the Guardian hypothesized.
"No," Thrawn replied, smiling and rising from the command chair. "It is far more interesting than that, Captain. Use ion cannons for the capture and a droid boarding party. But I need the ship intact and suitable for further operation."
"It will be done, Grand Admiral."
"Inform me when the ship is delivered to the flight deck," Thrawn said. "I will be in my quarters."
"Yes, sir."