The Approaching Storm

by Alan Dean Foster

  For a long moment, Shu Mai gazed into the face of her former associate. “Patience, my friend, is the one weapon we cannot afford to waste,” she whispered softly, even though the object of her admonition could not hear her. Turning away, she walked back to stand alongside Mousul, who had retreated slightly into the hallway behind them. The Senator looked on as Shu Mai touched several small controls in quick, practiced succession.

  A slight creaking noise filled the end of the hallway, quickly rising to a groaning. Uliss stopped pounding on the unyielding barrier. His rage turned to uncertainty, then to surprise. Metal failed, composite dissolved. Both palms pressed against the barrier, the industrialist was still looking at Shu Mai and the Senator as the entire skywalk broke away first from Bror Tower Three, then from Tower Four, and plunged toward the surface 166 floors below.

  Walking right to the edge of the opening that had been torn in the side of the building, Shu Mai leaned over and looked down. Even amid the noise of the great city and given the distance to the ground, the skywalk still made a very loud splintering, shattering sound when it struck. The president of the Commerce Guild gazed thoughtfully down at the wreckage for a long moment before turning and moving back into the hallway that was now exposed to the air outside. Across the intervening gap, an identical hole had been torn in the side of Bror Tower Three.

  “Structural fatigue,” she murmured to Mousul. “Uncommon in this day and age, but not unheard of.”

  “Indeed,” the Senator from Ansion replied noncommittally.

  “Such an important person. A terrible tragedy. Terrible. I will deliver the eulogy for Tam Uliss myself.” Long-fingered hands folded behind her back, she started down the hallway.

  “That’s thoughtful of you, Shu Mai.” The Senator took a deep breath. “When they learn what has happened to Tam Uliss, after what happened to Nemrileo of Tanjay, I don’t think any of the others will give us any more trouble.”

  “I agree. Our support should be more manageable once again.”

  The Senator gestured down the hallway. “If you don’t mind, I think I will leave you now, as I have work of my own to do this afternoon.”

  The president of the Commerce Guild gestured understandingly. “I understand. I have work of my own to do as well.”

  They parted amiably; Mousul to return to his Senatorial duties, Shu Mai to her private office. There she locked herself in so tightly that nothing short of a small nova could interrupt her. Only when she was sure that everything was secure did she activate the special code sequence that put her in contact with the remarkable individual to whom she was charged with reporting the progress of the conspiracy on Coruscant.

  When a familiar face appeared before her, she began speaking without hesitation. “There have been some—problems. The Jedi succeeded in making peace between the urban and nomad factions on Ansion. As a result, the Unity delegates on Ansion voted to keep their world in the Republic.”

  The voice on the other end was firm, confident. “That is too bad. It will force us to scale back our immediate plans.” The face smiled. “I wouldn’t have thought the Jedi could accomplish it. Not in so short a time.”

  “Something else. While Senator Mousul remains firmly committed to the cause, a number of our supporters were preparing to move forward despite Ansion’s decision. It was necessary to deliver an—object lesson,” She proceeded to explain.

  The individual on the other end of the secure communication listened quietly until Shu Mai had finished. “While I regret the loss of the industrialist Tam Uliss, I understand the reasoning behind your actions.” Without quite knowing why, the president of the Commerce Guild felt much relieved. “It doesn’t matter. Events advance, designs move forward. We can swallow the loss.”

  “The resolve of the Guild remains strong,” Shu Mai told him.

  Count Dooku smiled. “As does that of our other backers. I consider this nothing more than a temporary setback. The eventual outcome is inevitable, no matter what the irksome Jedi do. Great changes are at hand. Destiny awaits us, my friend. It comes, and soon. Those who are ready will be the ones to profit greatly.”

  It was a good thought to cling to, Shu Mai mused as the transmission was terminated. Deactivating the privacy shielding, she rose and left the room.

  There was much to be done.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ALAN DEAN FOSTER has written in a variety of genres, including hard science fiction, fantasy, horror, detective, Western, historical, and contemporary fiction. He is the author of the New York Times bestseller Star Wars: The Approaching Storm and the popular Pip & Flinx novels, as well as novelizations of several films including Transformers, Star Wars, the first three Alien films, and Alien Nation. His novel Cyber Way won the Southwest Book Award for Fiction in 1990, the first science fiction work ever to do so. Foster and his wife, JoAnn Oxley, live in Prescott, Arizona, in a house built of brick that was salvaged from an early-twentieth-century miners’ brothel. He is currently at work on several new novels and media projects.

  www.alandeanfoster.com

  BY ALAN DEAN FOSTER

  The Black Hole

  Cachalot

  Dark Star

  The Metrognome and Other

  Stories

  Midworld

  No Crystal Tears

  Sentenced to Prism

  Star Wars®: Splinter of the

  Mind’s Eye

  Star Trek® Logs One-Ten

  Voyage to the City of the Dead

  … Who Needs Enemies?

  With Friends Like These …

  Mad Amos

  The Howling Stones

  Parallelites

  Star Wars®: The Approaching

  Storm

  Impossible Places

  Exceptions to Reality

  THE ICERIGGER TRILOGY

  Icerigger

  Mission to Moulokin

  The Deluge Drivers

  THE ADVENTURES OF FLINX OF THE

  COMMONWEALTH

  For Love of Mother-Not

  The Tar-Aiyam Krang

  Orphan Star

  The End of Matter

  Bloodhype

  Flinx in Flux

  Mid-Flinx

  Reunion

  Flinx’s Folly

  Sliding Scales

  Running From the Deity

  Trouble Magnet

  Patrimony

  Flinx Transcendent

  Quofum

  THE DAMNED

  Book One: A Call to Arms

  Book Two: The False Mirror

  Book Three: The Spoils of War

  THE FOUNDING OF THE

  COMMONWEALTH

  Phylogenesis

  Dirge

  Diuturnity’s Dawn

  THE TAKEN TRILOGY

  Lost and Found

  The Light-Years Beneath My Feet

  The Candle of Distant Earth

  THE TIPPING POINT TRILOGY

  The Human Blend

  STAR WARS—The Expanded Universe

  You saw the movies. You watched the cartoon series, or maybe played some of the video games. But did you know …

  In The Empire Strikes Back, Princess Leia Organa said to Han Solo, “I love you.” Han said, “I know.” But did you know that they actually got married? And had three Jedi children: the twins, Jacen and Jaina, and a younger son, Anakin?

  Luke Skywalker was trained as a Jedi by Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda. But did you know that, years later, he went on to revive the Jedi Order and its commitment to defending the galaxy from evil and injustice?

  Obi-Wan said to Luke, “For over a thousand generations, the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Before the dark times. Before the Empire.” Did you know that over those millennia, legendary Jedi and infamous Sith Lords were adding their names to the annals of Republic history?

  Yoda explained that the dreaded Sith tend to come in twos: “Always two, there are. No more, no less. A Master, and an apprentice.” But d
id you know that the Sith didn’t always exist in pairs? That at one time in the ancient Republic there were as many Sith as Jedi, until a Sith Lord named Darth Bane was the lone survivor of a great Sith war and created the “Rule of Two”?

  All this and much, much more is brought to life in the many novels and comics of the Star Wars expanded universe. You’ve seen the movies and watched the cartoon. Now venture out into the wider worlds of Star Wars!

  Turn the page or jump to the timeline of Star Wars novels to learn more.

  ONE

  We have to get access to those hyperspace routes that the Separatist droids haven’t seized yet. Without that, we’ll never be able to take the Outer Rim worlds. Unfortunately, that means we need the cooperation of the Hutts.

  CHANCELLOR PALPATINE, on the logistics problems

  facing the Grand Army of the Republic

  ZIRO THE HUTT’S PALACE, USCRU DISTRICT, CORUSCANT

  “COULD YOU KILL A CHILD?”

  Count Dooku thought it was an odd question, coming as it did from Ziro. The Hutt had been perfectly happy to go along with the idea of kidnapping his nephew’s baby son. But if he’d thought through the reality of grabbing Jabba’s gangland power, then wiping out all rivals, even baby heirs, had to be high on his list of priorities.

  Maybe it wasn’t. And that would be a fatal mistake.

  “Could you?” Dooku responded casually. “Isn’t he almost your flesh and blood too?”

  Ziro blinked, passing the nictitating membranes across his eyes with slow deliberation. It was the Hutt equivalent of raising a sarcastic eyebrow. The private chamber was deserted, with not even a serving droid to overhear them.

  “You don’t understand us, even if you speak our language far better than most realize,” Ziro said at last. “He’s Jabba’s bloodline. Not mine. So I do whatever it takes, and my priority is my own offspring.”

  Ziro might have been playing the hard case, or he might have been serious. If he was serious, then Dooku hoped for his sake that he was ready to kill Jabba, too, because his nephew would send every assassin in Hutt space after him if he found out his uncle was responsible.

  “Try not to be too hasty,” Dooku said. Don’t blow this before I get what I need. The ploy was buying time. “Extract maximum leverage from this.”

  “You don’t have to explain long-term strategy to a Hutt,” Ziro rasped.

  Dooku tried to stop himself from falling into a chain of reasoning with Ziro. It would bring the delicate edifice of his own operation crashing down if he said anything that made Ziro wonder if this kidnapping was going to achieve anything for him. Dooku wasn’t convinced that taking Rotta would dislodge or even weaken Jabba’s grip on power, but Ziro thought it would reduce his nephew to mere clay in his hands—which was all Dooku needed.

  Dooku was certain of one thing, though: harming the Huttlet would unleash a tidal wave of incredible vengeance, and Jabba was going to be around a long, long time to make sure he found everyone involved in the kidnapping and punished them in his uniquely inventive way.

  Dooku was counting on it. He wanted the Hutt in the Separatist camp, and the way to do that was to frame the Jedi for Rotta’s disappearance.

  But if Ziro’s cover is blown—then he has to be silenced. We can’t have Jabba realizing he’s been maneuvered by us …

  It would be too bad if anything happened to Ziro. After Jabba was signed up, Ziro’s fate was inevitable; he would have to be silenced before he implicated Dooku.

  Either Hutt would do, though, in a pinch. It didn’t matter if it was Jabba or Ziro who denied hyperspace passage to Republic forces. Dooku wasn’t selling ideology, and he was sure neither Hutt was buying.

  “Of course not,” he said, smiling at a being he would kill without hesitation if he threatened his plans. He had no doubt that Ziro would do the same to him. “But you do have to consider what you’ll do with Rotta in the longer term.”

  Ziro eased his bulk across the marble floor onto a platform strewn with shimmersilk cushions that he swept out of the way. Hutts needed smooth surfaces to move properly; carpeting and upholstery didn’t go well with a lubricating layer of slime. But Ziro surrounded himself with the finest examples of furnishing anyway. It was as if he wanted to show the rest of the galaxy how powerful he was in terms that other species could understand. Dooku didn’t despise that. He felt the faintest pang of pity. It explained the Hutts’ need to flaunt Twi’lek dancers and other glamorous humanoids, so radically, physically different that no Hutt could possibly have found them attractive. They collected them because humanoids coveted them, and so it sent the message clearly: I possess everything you lust after, so I have power over you.

  It all came from fear. Hutts felt threatened at a subliminal level. Once Dooku worked that out, it had been far easier to deal with them by pressing gently on their paranoia.

  “Rotta should be on Teth soon,” Dooku said, taking a slow turn to look at the doors. He could hear raised voices in the chamber beyond. He sensed anxiety; no unusual thing in a Hutt’s palace with a capricious boss. Maybe the servants couldn’t find whatever overpriced delicacy he’d sent them to procure. “Plenty of time to consider your position at your leisure.”

  “I’m expecting confirmation any moment. Tell me, why do you hate your Jedi family so much?”

  “They’re not my family, and haven’t been for a very long time,” Dooku said. “Does it matter?”

  “Motivation is everything in business.”

  “Lord Ziro, I suspect you really have no need to ask. Would you put your future in their hands?”

  “I wouldn’t trust the Republic to do anything for Hutts except try to stop us from making a living.”

  Ziro saw Jedi and Republic as one entity. Dooku had reached a similar conclusion years before. “And anyone who doesn’t want to be part of their happy Republic family must be a tyrant or an anarchist. If a world wants to leave, it’s accused of being undemocratic, because the will of its inhabitants doesn’t suit Coruscant. Such a beautifully embroidered veil of irony.”

  “You don’t have to sell me on Separatism, Dooku. I don’t care about your politics, but I know in which sauce my gorog is marinated.” Ziro seemed the braggart in Jabba’s extended clan, but sometimes Dooku saw hints of a subtler intelligence underneath. He kept a cautious eye on that. “You help me get what I want, I help you get what you want.”

  “Welcome to politics,” said Dooku. “Don’t delude yourself that it has to have party labels.”

  Dooku steeled himself to relax. The doors suddenly snapped apart; two droids strode in at a brisk pace, and Dooku slid quietly into a shadowed alcove to watch unnoticed from the sidelines.

  “Exalted Lord,” one said in a flat monotone. “We have bad news. Your nephew’s son has been kidnapped by criminals.”

  Ziro reared up in feigned shock, then settled down again with a noise like slapping a wet stone. “It’s an outrage! Have they demanded a ransom? This is an insult to all Hutts! Organize a search team. We’ll find the scum who did this to poor Jabba.”

  Ziro wasn’t a bad actor, all things considered. But even if he’d rehearsed it, his choice of words was revealing. Dooku noted that it was more about loss of face than concern for the child’s safety. But Hutts didn’t think like humans, and the social rules of organized crime were not those of middle-class Coruscant. He tried not to judge when his own species had so little to boast about at times.

  Dooku listened, waiting for the droid to leave. Now to the next stage. Now to making sure that we lure the Jedi to Teth …

  “There has been no ransom demand yet, Lord,” the droid said. “Most unusual.”

  “I’ll see the scum fed to a rancor.” Ziro held out an imperious hand to the second droid. Dooku couldn’t quite see the other droid around the edge of the alcove. “Get me the comlink. Let me console my nephew. I expect all Hutts to rally around and help him.”

  He’s really getting into the role …

  “Lord Jabba is s
aid to be inconsolable. He has asked the Republic to help—to send Jedi to find the child.”

  Dooku was a hard man to surprise, but the thought of Jabba—Jabba—throwing himself on the sympathy of the Jedi hit him like a punch.

  Why would the head of one of the most powerful criminal organizations in the galaxy, who could buy any number of bounty hunters and an intelligence network that many governments might envy, beg the Jedi for help?

  It was an inexplicable move for a species—a gang lord—so concerned about loss of face, about looking weak, about being seen to be an easy target.

  Not Jabba. And it will be explicable, if I think about it …

  The Hutt was up to something appropriately slippery. Dooku wasn’t sure what that might be, so he was instantly on his guard. But it was the most perfect stroke of luck—unnaturally perfect—for Jabba to ask the Jedi to walk into his setup and implicate themselves in the kidnapping.

  Some would say it was meant to be.

  And while Dooku didn’t believe in luck half as much as he believed in the less random patterns of conspiracy, plot, and counterplot, he wasn’t about to pass up an opportunity.

  He hoped the Jedi Council would do the decent, upstanding, moral thing, and say yes.

  He was certain that they would.

  TWO

  Communications with General Kenobi, disrupted they are.

  So a messenger we are sending, with important orders for him.

  MASTER YODA to Admiral Yularen, ordered to deliver

  Padawan Ahsoka Tano to General Kenobi