cantina lobby. "Quick."
Karoly followed her gaze, and Shada felt her stiffen. Striding
down the steps toward the bar, heavy weapons held at the ready,
were a pair of stormtroopers. Who clearly weren't here for a
drink.
"I wonder if there's a back door out of here," Karoly murmured.
"I don't know," Shada said, running a finger along her slender
wineglass as the Imperials summoned the bartender over. Thrown
against the face of a storm-trooper helmet, it ought to slow him
down long enough for her to slide her knife blade into a critical
junction ...
The bartender pointed somewhere behind them. Shada frowned,
then understood. "They must be asking about the Jedi Knight," she
said, turning to look at the booth. A knot of aliens brushed past,
momentarily blocking her view. They continued on -
The old Jedi was gone. So was the kid. The storm-troopers
stepped up to the booth, eyed Solo and the Wookiee a moment, then
moved on. For a moment, as they looked around, their armored masks
seemed to pause on Shada and Karoly. But they said nothing, and
continued on their way toward the rear of the cantina.
Karoly nudged her. "Now's our chance," she said. "Let's go talk
to him."
Shada turned back. Solo and the Wookiee had left the booth now,
Solo heading for the lobby while the Wookiee went in the direction
the stormtroopers had gone. Probably where the back door was,
which would explain how the Jedi and the kid had disappeared.
"Right," Shada agreed, taking one last sip from her glass and
putting it back on the bar. She turned again -
To find that Solo was no longer walking toward the lobby. He
was, instead, backing into a booth at the wrong end of a blaster
held by a dirty-looking Rodian. "Uh-oh," Shada said. "Friend of
his?"
"Doubt it," Karoly said, palming the scanner. "Hang on ... his
name's Greedo. He's a bounty hunter."
For a long moment Shada stared at the quietly tense discussion
in the booth, trying to decide what to do. Taking action would
jeopardize her cover as Brea Tonnika, and certainly there was no
shortage of smugglers in the cantina. But there was something
about the way Solo carried himself that she liked. Or maybe the
fact that he'd been talking widi the Jedi Knight . . .
"I'm going to take him," she told Karoly. "G et ready to back me
up."
She reached for her knife; but before she could draw it, Solo
solved the problem on his own. From the booth came a flash of
muffled blaster fire, and the Rodian slumped over onto the table.
Warily, Solo slid out of the booth, bolstered his blaster, and
continued on toward the lobby, flipping a coin to the bartender as
he passed.
Karoly let out a'breath. "Good thing we weren't interested in
Greedo. This isn't a very healthy place to hang around."
"No kidding," Shada said. "Let's go catch Solo before he gets
away."
And then, from behind her, a sweaty hand closed on her wrist.
"Well, well, well," a voice said. "What have we here?"
Shada turned. The sweaty hand belonged to a sweaty Imperial
colonel, his uniform streaked with sandy dust, a maliciously
pleased look on his face. Behind him were the two stormtroopers
who'd come through earlier. "Brea and Senni Tonnika, I do
believe," the colonel went on. "How nice of you to drop back into
sight again. You can't imagine how brokenhearted Grand Mqff Argon
has been since your departure. I'm sure he'll be pleased to see
you again." He lifted an eyebrow. "As well as the twenty-five
thousand you stole from him."
Smiling sardonically, he gestured to the storm-troopers. "Take
them away."
The police station cell was cooler than the cantina had been,
but that was about all it had going for it. Small, sparsely
furnished, streaked with Tatooine's ubiquitous sand, it had all
the charm of a used transport crate.
"Did you catch when they'd be moving us out?" Karoly asked,
leaning against a wall and gazing dolefully at the door.
"Didn't sound as if it would be anytime soon," Shada said. "The
colonel said something about finishing up the search before
getting us transferred to his ship."
irony here The Imperials' search had already ended, only
they.didn't know it.
Or maybe they did know it. Maybe the colonel was just playing
along with the masquerade while he sent out for the proper
interrogation equipment.
Shada looked around the room. A single bunk, a reading lamp
fastened to the wall over one end, primitive refresher facilities,
a barred door, and a one-way observation window opposite it.
Limited resources, and no privacy to use them.
Which left only their combat training. And the possibility that
the Imperials still didn't know they were dealing with Mistryl. "I
just hope they feed us before then," she commented to Karoly. "I'm
starving."
Karoly's eyebrow twitched. "So am I," she said, looking around.
"Maybe I should beat on the bars and see if I can get someone's
attention."
"Go ahead," Shada said, stretching out on the bunk and letting
her hand rest idly on the reading lamp above her head, examining
it with her fingertips. It was fastened to the wall over the bunk,
but a little work with her belt buckle ought to get it off. Behind
it would be power cables . , . "On second thought, you might want
to try that mirror instead," she said to Karoly, nodding back at
the spy window. "Someone's probably watching it."
"Okay," Karoly said. She stepped over to the window and pressed
her face against it, blocking the view into the cell. "Hey! Anyone
there?"
Quickly, Shada pulled off her buckle and got to work as Karoly
kept up the noise. She got one of the three fasteners loosened;
did the second; started on the third-
"Shut up the noise!" someone snapped.
Shada paused, palming the buckle, as a man in a faded uniform
appeared at the door. "We're hungry," she complained.
"Too bad," he growled. "The meals come in two hours. Now shut
up or I'll have you strapped down and muzzled."
"Two hours'?" Shada repeated. "We'll never make it that long.
Can't you get us something to tide us over?"
"Please?" Karoly added, smiling encouragingly.
The guard's lip twisted; and he was just opening his mouth for
what would probably have been a memorable comeback when a young
man in civilian clothing stepped into view. "Problems, Happer?''
"Always," the other growled. "I thought you were off till
tonight."
"I am," the younger man said, peering thoughtfully at Shada and
Karoly. "Heard you were drowning in prisoners; figured I'd come in
and take a look. Who do we have here?"
"Brea and Senni Tonnika." Happer threw a glower at the two
women. "Very special prisoners of Colonel Parq. And none of our
business, if you ask me. If the Imperials want t
o lock up half of
Mos Eisley, the least they could do is provide their own holding
tanks."
"And do their own ID checks?"
"Don't remind me." Happer grunted. "I've got fifteen of them
running right now, with about thirty more in the hopper." He
glared again at the prisoners. "Look, Riij, do me a favor, will
you? Go down to Stores and pull a couple of ration bars for these
two. I've got to go down to the check room - the sifter's been
needing a lot of babysitting today, and those stormtroopers are
starting to get snotty."
"I'll handle it," Riij assured him. "Have fun."
Happer grunted again and disappeared down the corridor. "So,"
Riij said, gazing at them again. "Brea and Senni. Which is which?"
"I'm Brea," Shada said carefully. There was something about the
way he was looking at her that she didn't at all care for.
"Ah," he said. "I'm Riij - Riij Winward. You know, I could have
sworn I heard you two had gotten on a transport heading out toward
Jabba the Hurt's three hours ago."
Shada's heart seemed to seize up inside her. The Tonnika
sisters were here? On Tatooine? "We came back," she said through
suddenly dry lips. "I guess we shouldn't have."
"I guess not." Riij paused. "I heard something else interesting
too, just after this big Imperial droid search came down all over
Mos Eisley a couple of days ago. It seems the Empire's also put
out an urgent search-and-detain order for a stolen Strike
Cruiser."
"A Strike Cruiser?" Shada repeated, putting as much scorn as
she could into her voice. "Oh, I'm sure. People steal Strike
Cruisers all the time."
"Yeah, I thought that sounded pretty strange myself," Riij
agreed. "So I went over and talked to a pal of mine at the control
tower to see if that was even possible. You know what he told me?"
"I'm dying to hear."
"He said he'd picked up something sneaking in toward the Dune
Sea an hour or so before that Star Destroyer showed up and all
these Imperials dropped in on us. Something just about the size of
a Strike Cruiser." Riij lifted his eyebrows. "Interesting,
wouldn't you agree?"
"Tremendously," Shada said, fighting to keep her sudden dread
out of her voice. So they had spotted the Strike Cruiser, after
all. And Cai was in big trouble. "Were the Imperials pleased to
hear this?"
"Actually, he hasn't told them yet," Riij said, eyeing her
closely. "He was going off duty at the time and didn't feel like
holding a question session with a bunch of stormtroopers. 'Course,
once they came down in force and took over the tower, he was even
less inclined to remember stuff like that. That happens on
Tatooine."
"I see," Shada murmured. They were still in trouble, but at
least they still had a little breathing space. "You'll forgive me
if lost Imperial property isn't high on my list at the moment. We
have more pressing problems of our own."
"I'm sure you do," Riij said solemnly. "Number one being how to
get out of here before Happer finds out you aren't Brea and Senni
Tonnika."
Shada felt herself tense up again. She'd suspected he knew, but
had been hoping fervently that she was wrong. "That's ridiculous."
"It's all right," Riij said. "The microphones in this cell
haven't worked in three months. I popped out the circuit fuse a
few minutes ago too, just to make sure."
Shada glanced at Karoly. She looked as puzzled as Shada felt.
"All right," she said, looking back at Riij. "Fine. Let's cut
through the smoke here and tell us what you want."
Riij seemed to brace himself. "I'll let you out," he said. "In
exchange for some of whatever's in that Strike Cruiser,"
Shada frowned at him. "What are you doing, running a smuggling
service on the side?"
"Not smuggling." He shook his head. "Information. To certain
interested parties."
"What parties?"
"It's not important." Riij smiled faintly. "On Tatooine, one
normally doesn't ask that question."
"Yes, well, we're new here," Shada countered, thinking hard.
This could be an Imperial trick, she knew a way to get her and
Karoly to tell them where they'd hidden the Hammertong. But
somehow that seemed a little too subtle for people who owned
interrogator droids and normally had no compunction about using
them. "All right," she said. "But only if you can find us a
freighter that can handle something three by five meters."
Riij frowned. "Three by-?"
"Hey, Riij!" Happer's voice called from down the corridor.
"Gotta go-something big brewing over at Docking Bay 97. The
Imperials have called the whole duty force in to run backup. Can
you watch things here a while?"
"Sure, no problem," Riij assured him.
"Thanks."
Happer ran off, his footsteps cut off by the boom of a closing
security door. "Well?" Shada prompted.
"I can get a freighter," Riij said, forehead wrinkled in
thought. "The problem's going to be getting it fast enough.
There's a sandstorm sweeping in across that part of the Dune Sea-a
big one. It'll hit in a couple of hours, and there's a good chance
it'll bury you r ship for good."
"Then we haven't got much time, have we?" Shada said. "Get us
out of here, and let's go."
The wind was already picking up across the sand dunes as Riij
set the transport ship awkwardly down at the edge of the makeshift
tunnel leading to the Strike Cruiser. "How long have we got?"
Shada asked, shouting to be heard over the wind as the three of
them half walked, half slid their way down the sand to the hatch
way.
"Not long," Riij called back. "Half an hour. Maybe less."
Shada nodded back, keying the panel open and stepping inside.
On the deck just inside the hatchway lay the segment of the
Hammertong they'd removed, its loadlifters still attached. Across
the huge empty room Deefour was warbling to himself as he poked
around the rest of the huge cylinder, searching for any last-
minute bits of data he could add to his extensive technical
readout of the device. There was no sign of Cai. "Cai?" Shada
called. "Da mala ci tri sor kehai."
"Sha ma ti," Cai replied, emerging from hiding behind one of
the support struts and bolstering her blaster. "I was starting to
think you weren't going to make it back in time."
"We may not have," Shada said grimly. "We've got another
sandstorm breathing down our necks. There's a transport
outside-you and Karoly get that Hammertong segment aboard."
"Right," Cai said. "Karoly? Grab the lifts on that end."
Together they got the Hammertong segment off the floor and out
the hatchway as Shada went forward to the Strike Cruiser's
cockpit. As it had before, the flying sand was interfering with
the sensors, and she had to adjust the fine-tuning several times
before she was able to get a good view. As far as she could tell,
there were no longer any Star Destroyers over Tatooine. They
must
have assumed their escaped prisoners had already made it
offplanet. Keying off, she headed back to where Riij was crouched
beside the end of the Hammertong cylinder, his face pressed close
to one of the openings. "So there it is," she said. "What do you
think?"
He looked up at her, his face pasty-white. "Do you know what
you have here?" he whispered. "Do you have any idea?"
"Not really," she said warily. "Do you?"
"Look here," he said, pointing to a plate. "See? 'D.S. Mark
Two. Module Seven, Prototype B. Eloy/ Lemelisk.' "
"I see it," Shada said. "What does it mean?"
Riij straightened up. "It means this is part of the prototype
superlaser for the Death Star."
Shada stared at him, a shiver running up her back. "What's a
Death Star?"
"The Emperor's latest grab for power. Like nothing you've ever
seen." Riij looked back along the Ham-mertong's length. "And we've
got a piece here of its main weapon."
"A piece?" Shada frowned, following his gaze. A solid two
hundred meters of laser- "You mean this isn't all of it?"
"I don't think so," Riij said. "Module Seven, remember?" He
looked at Shada sharply. "I've got to have that piece you cut off.
It's absolutely vital."
"Forget it," Shada said. "If this really is a weapon, my people
can find a better use for it than you can."
"We'll pay you anything you want."
"I said forget it," Shada said again, brushing past him. Cai
was going to need help-
And abruptly, she was spun back around by a hand on her arm.
Reflexively, she reached up to break his
grip-
She froze, staring at the blaster that had appeared from
nowhere in Riij's hand. "Is this how you keep your bargains?" she
demanded.
"You have to let us have it," he said, his voice low. "Please.
We need to know everything we can about the Death Star."
"Why?"
He swallowed hard. "Because we're likely to be its first
target."
Shada stared at him. Tatooine was going to be the first target?
Ridiculous.
And then, suddenly, it fell into place. "You're with the Rebel
Alliance, aren't you?"
He nodded. "Yes."
Shada focused on the blaster in his hand. "And this thing is
important enough to you to kill me in cold blood?"
He took a deep breath, let it out in a hissing sigh. "No," he
conceded. "Not really."