His eyes narrowed in sudden thought. Was he coming at this from the wrong angle? He was assuming that he had been the target of whoever had done the espionage. But what if he was wrong? What if Filba had been the subject?
Bleyd activated the flatscreen desk display, quickly constructing a new search algorithm. In a moment he had the data he needed.
On several separate occasions there had been public complaints made by the Sullustan reporter, Den Dhur, concerning Filba. While Dhur was hardly the only one in the Rimsoo to have some kind of grievance against the Hutt, the fact that he was a reporter meant he most likely had access to surveillance equipment.
Yes. Yes, it made sense. Dhur must have been recording the Hutt's actions at the time of the latter's death—and had, by unhappy coincidence, gotten the incriminating interchange between Filba and Bleyd.
Unhappy indeed, for the reporter ...
Bleyd stepped out from behind the desk, wearing a grim smile. He would order Den Dhur arrested and
brought up from planetside immediately. With any luck, there was still time to rectify this mess before—
The door to his office opened.
Bleyd blinked in surprise. It was the robed figure of a Silent who entered, but Bleyd knew immediately who was hidden beneath the vestments.
Kaird, the Nediji. The Black Sun agent.
Bleyd stepped away from his desk. Almost automatically his hand slipped around to the back of his uniform, releasing the knife from its hidden belt sheath. It slipped comfortably into the folds of his hand. It was a ryyk blade, much smaller than the traditional weapons fashioned and used by the Wookiee warriors of Kashyyyk, but no less deadly. It had proven the difference between victory and defeat, between life and death, for him before, and he intended that it do no less now.
The bird-being folded back his hood, revealing his sardonic face and blazing violet eyes. He cocked his head in greeting.
"Admiral," he said. When he lowered his hands from the hood, the right one held a gleaming blade in it.
Bleyd did not reply to the greeting. He circled to his left, his knife held low by his right hip, the point extended downward from the little finger side of his fist, edge forward, in a reverse grip.
Three meters away, Kaird kept the circle complete, moving to his left, and the short and stubby blade he held jutted upward from the thumb side of his grip, the edge also facing his opponent.
Bleyd seemed outwardly calm, although he was thinking furiously. His office was fairly large, but it was still on board a starship, where every cubic centimeter of space was at a premium. With any luck, the enclosed area would negate the Nediji's speed. He couldn't dodge
if he didn't have room, and once he was backed into a corner, Bleyd, who was larger and stronger, would have him. He would take some damage—no way around that—but damage could be repaired, wounds could be healed.
"Let me guess," the Black Sun agent said. "Mathal didn't 'accidentally' fly his ship into the wrong orbit."
"Mathal was greedy. He wanted to fill a freighter with bota, to make a killing, and Samvil take the stragglers. Doing that would have made me a fugitive from the authorities for life. He didn't care about that. He got what he deserved."
"You should have contacted us. Black Sun would have dealt with him. We take a longer view of our business, and we frown on rogues."
Bleyd shrugged. "As far as I was concerned, he was Black Sun. I could not allow him to ruin what I had set up here."
Kaird shifted his stance, turning so that his right side faced Bleyd. The Admiral noticed that the dark blue swatch of feathers around his opponent's neck had grown darker still, and had risen in a stiff ruff—no doubt an atavistic warning for predators. The Nediji was in full combat mode. He spun his knife, twirling it around his fingers. A showy move, the more so because it indicated he was not tight with fear.
"It's not too late," he said. "As you said, Mathal got what he had coming. We can overlook that. No need to ruin a business that's making everybody profit."
Bleyd shook his head. Just to show that he wasn't nervous, he also shifted his knife, turning it with a little move that switched from a mountain climber's pick to a sword fighter's hold. "Too much of the profit lines Black Sun's vaults. I can store the bota far away from
here, move it myself, and make much more—if I cut out the middle beings."
The Nediji laughed. "Starting with me, eh?"
"Nothing personal."
Kaird laughed again. "Pardon me, but I take my death very personally." And with that he lunged, impossibly fast, and the short knife flicked out in a blur.
Bleyd saw it coming, but even so, he barely had time to get his own knife in position for the block. Durasteel clashed with durasteel, and Kaird hopped back, grinning, before Bleyd could counterattack.
"Just checking to see if you're awake, Admiral."
"Awake enough to cut you down, Nediji."
"And what if you manage that? There are many more where I came from. Do you think Black Sun will just shrug and forget to send another agent? Perhaps next time it will be a team of shockboots, real shoot-first-and-ask-no-questions types. Most unpleasant folk."
"Teams need a ship," Bleyd said. "Enemy ships tend to be shot down in wars. By the time the next agent or agents get here, I can be far, far away—far enough to make it financially unfeasible for the Republic to pursue me."
"You think having the authorities looking for you is a problem? You can't imagine how that pales compared to having us after you." Kaird flipped the knife from hand to hand. "And Black Sun never gives up the chase."
"I'll worry about that later. Right now, I'll deal with you."
"I don't think so. You're larger and much stronger, true, but I'm far faster. You are obviously adept with these"—he waved the knife—"but I still have the advantage."
It was Bleyd's turn to laugh. "You really think so? I'm a hunter and a warrior, bird-man, and I've killed half a dozen opponents with this very blade. You are fast, yes, but your bones are hollow and your feathers no protection against cold durasteel. No matter how fast you are, you can't get to me before I gut you."
"You're forgetting something," Kaird replied. "I'm an assassin."
Bleyd raised an eyebrow. "Which means . . . ?"
"It means that getting the job done is more important than how I do it."
Bleyd frowned. What—?
Kaird whipped his hand back suddenly, snapped it forward, and threw the knife—!
It came too fast to dodge. Bleyd instinctively swatted at the incoming weapon, and, with reflexes honed by centuries of natural selection, managed to deflect it— barely. It nicked him on the hand, but that was all. A mere scratch.
He grinned as the Nediji's knife fell to the floor, clattered, and bounced to his feet. He crouched swiftly and scooped it up, then stood, a knife in each hand.
"Now you have no weapon," he said. "You don't stand a chance, barehanded against two blades. Fool!" He brandished the knives mockingly.
The Black Sun agent backed up a couple of steps, until his back was against the transparisteel port. He rose slowly from his fighting crouch. What was he up to? Bleyd wondered. Did he have another knife hidden on him? Or a small blaster, maybe?
The Sakiyan paused, considering his next move. Then, to his surprise, the Nediji slowly shook his head.
"You could have taken me just then," he said. "If
you'd come in fast enough, you might have backed me into the corner before I could have maneuvered around you. But you hesitated. And now you've lost."
"Lost? Nothing has changed. I still have you cornered." Bleyd smiled, a feral gleam of teeth. "Frankly, I was hoping for more of a fight, Nediji. I expected better of a Black Sun killer. Now we finish this."
"I don't think so," Kaird said. His posture was quite casual now; he could have been carrying on a conversation on a Coruscant street
corner. Despite himself, Bleyd felt a slight sting of uneasiness. "So
mething has changed," the bird-being continued. "Time has passed. And all of a sudden, you feel... tired, don't you, Admiral? As if you can hardly hold your weapons. As if all your strength has been used up."
Bleyd snarled. "Are you a Jedi, to try infantile mind tricks? Trust me, I'm immune to such claptrap."
"But you're not immune to dendriton toxin."
Bleyd blinked. Then, suddenly, the pulse of uneasiness bloomed into full-blown shock.
The Nediji's knife! The cut on his hand!
Bleyd gathered himself to charge, but his legs abruptly would no longer obey him. He tried to leap, and instead staggered to one side. Tried to take another step, and his left leg, now completely numb, gave way. He fell to one knee. He kept his grip on the knives, but he was so weak! And now a sudden fire raged within him, roasting his muscles, torching each individual nerve . ..
Kaird moved toward him, reached out, and took one of the knives from Bleyd's burning fingers. The other one fell from the Sakiyan's nerveless grasp.
"Dendriton toxin is a bad way to go," Kaird said. "Painful, slow—you're literally immolated from inside
out. But you were a brave adversary, Admiral, and I admire bravery. So, even though my superiors wish you to suffer, I'll spare you the toxin's effects."
He stepped to the side, caught Bleyd's head in one hand, and tilted it back.
Bleyd felt the touch of the knife against his throat, but it wasn't painful, just cold. An almost pleasant momentary respite from the fiery agony.
His consciousness started to fade, then, the colors of his office leaching into grayness. He realized numbly that he wouldn't be able to cleanse his family's honor. That knowledge hurt even more than the molten venom in his veins.
He managed to shift his eyes, to look at the Nediji before he faded out completely. Kaird gave him a small and slow bow, a final salute that held no mockery.
"Nothing personal," he said.
And the darkness claimed Tarnese Bleyd, forever.
36
The medlifters came at dawn.
Barriss Offee was asleep in her quarters, in the middle of a Force dream. They had not been coming to her as often of late, these subconscious connections with the galactic life-energy field. When she had first felt the Force awaken within her, the dreams had been frequent and powerful, never to be remembered in their entirety upon awakening, but always leaving her with a sense of increased strength and control.
As always, she was momentarily confused upon awakening—then she recognized the sound of the approaching lifters. Hastily donning her jumpsuit, she started for the OT.
She caught a glimpse, through the spore clouds, of the lifters hanging low in the eastern sky, just above the bloated oblate sphere that was Drongar Prime. Other Rimsoo personnel were already running from their cubicles and quarters, some still pulling on clothing. She saw Zan Yant and Jos Vondar heading toward the landing area.
Then, suddenly, she stopped.
Something—someone—had called to her.
It had been a cry for help, nonverbal, but no less strong. She had heard it echo in her mind as if its author
had been standing right behind her. A cry of rage and despair.
A death cry.
She knew where it had come from—the edge of the Kondrus Sea—and, though she didn't know who was dying, she knew why. For one unmistakable and mercifully brief moment, she could see, as clearly as with her own eyes, the killer's face as he loomed over his victim.
Phow Ji.
Without a moment's hesitation Barriss turned and ran away from the lifters, away from the Rimsoo, and into the lowlands that sloped toward the sea.
It did not even occur to her to wonder until she was deep in the fetid marshes why she had made the decision to abandon her duty—to turn her back on dozens of Republic soldiers wounded in battle and go seeking out one unknown casualty instead. There could only be one reason, and she was loath to admit it, because it flew in the face of everything Master Unduli had taught her about working for the greater good, not to mention the Jedi Code. She had let her emotions take over, had let herself be swayed by anger and, yes, a desire to punish.
But even knowing this, even fearing that she was running toward the dark side, she did not stop.
She emerged from the swamp vegetation, pushing through a last clinging cluster of snarlvines, and saw Ji—the only one still standing amid the carnage. Seven men, all wearing Separatist uniforms, lay dead about him. He had a shallow vibroblade wound on his right forearm, and a blistered left cheekbone where a laser beam had narrowly missed. Other than that, he was unmarked.
He was waiting for her, that sardonic smile she had
come to despise on his lips. "A drunken t'landa Til makes less noise than you do," he said. "Nevertheless, it's always a pleasure to see you, Padawan Offee. To what do I owe the honor of this visit? Have you come to congratulate me on my latest victory for the Republic?" He gestured mockingly at the bodies strewn about his feet.
Her rage threatened to overwhelm her. She felt the desire and the will to destroy him. In that moment, Barriss Offee knew exactly what Master Unduli had meant when she had spoken of the dark side's seductive power. She wanted nothing more than to turn him into a pile of ashes, and, worse yet, she knew that she could. The dark power lived and shouted within her. It wouldn't even require an effort—all she had to do was release it.
Phow Ji must have seen the truth of this in her face, because his eyes widened in slight surprise. "Do you seriously think you can stand against me? I am a master of teras kasi, of Hapan, echani, tae-jitsu, and a dozen other deadly styles. I am—"
"You are a murderer," she interrupted him, her voice quiet but with an edge that stopped his tirade. "And I will see that you murder no more."
Ji smiled and shrugged slightly, recovering his aplomb. He shifted his feet, settling into a stance. "Come ahead, then—Jedi."
After it was all over, Barriss spent many a sleepless night wondering what she would have done. Would she have given in, accepted his challenge, and used the Force to destroy him? Or risen above her baser impulses and used only enough power to render him helpless? In short, would she have succumbed to the dark side or not?
She never got the chance to find out.
Phow Ji suddenly staggered, his eyes snapping wide in astonishment. Barriss realized he'd been hit from behind by something. He turned, and she saw the vanes and stubby tail of a hypo dart protruding from between his shoulder blades. Another Separatist soldier, shooting from the cover of the nearby swamp, had nailed him. For all his vaunted strength, skill, and speed, there was no way Ji could have dodged something he hadn't seen coming.
Barriss expanded a bubble of awareness outward, with herself at the center, realizing even as she did so that, had she not been blinded with rage at Ji, she might have sensed the intended attack in time to warn the martial artist. But now it was too late. He had fallen to his knees, and, as she watched, he toppled heavily into the wet sand. He lay quite still, save for slight, rhythmic twitches of his fingers.
She could detect no further danger—evidently the shooter had not stayed to see the results of his ambush. Which meant she was safe for the moment as well, although that could change at any time. She kept her expanded awareness in operation while she knelt beside Ji, examining him.
His hands and fingers were cold, and the twitching had not abated. Paresthesia, most likely, she decided. She pinched back an eyelid, saw that the pupil was contracted. His breathing was rapid and shallow—it seemed obvious that Phow Ji had been hit with a potent neurotoxin of some sort—Paraleptin, perhaps, or Titroxinate. The Separatists had been known to use such biochems, and worse. If something was not done quickly, he would die.
There was no time to call for an evac, even if there was an available medlifter, which was problematic. But there was another way to treat him.
The Force.
Without even stopping to reflect on the irony of it
, Barriss knelt beside Ji. She pulled the dart out, then rolled him over and put her hands on his chest. It occurred to her that it would be quite easy to just let the paralysis of his central nervous system do the job that, only a few minutes before, she had been all too willing to take on herself. But that temptation had passed. She was a Jedi healer. Here before her was a life in need of healing.
There was no need to make it any more complicated than that.
Barriss Offee closed her eyes and opened her heart and mind to the power of the Force.
The droid approached Den Dhur as the latter headed toward his quarters. It was one of the standard harvesting units, a little weather-worn and dented, but moving well enough.
"You are Den Dhur, sir?" the droid said.
"Who wants to know?"
If it was possible for a droid to look confused, then this one surely did. "I have a delivery for you, sir."
"And who caused this delivery to be sent to me?"
"Lieutenant Phow Ji."
Uh-oh. Den looked at the package, then at the droid. "It isn't going to blow up, is it?"
"Unlikely, sir. The item in question is a holoproj recording. There are no explosives contained in it."
Den nodded. "All right." The droid extruded a carry
drawer from its chest and removed the device, which, Den noticed with relief, did look like a standard holocron cube and not a bomb.
As he took it, Den said, "Ji gave this to you?"
"No, sir, he did not give it to me. He did, however, ask that I witness his activity and record it. This is the result, which I was to deliver to you."
Den was still trying to wrap his mind around the concept of a gift from Phow Ji. "He specified me by name?"
"Not by name, sir. His exact words were, 'Give it to that pop-eyed little womp rat who thinks he's the galaxy's gift to news media.'" The droid added, "This required some extrapolation on my part."
"Now I believe you. All right. Thank him for me."
"I am afraid that will be quite impossible, sir. Phow Ji is no longer among the living."
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