Crosscurrent

by Paul S. Kemp

  He wound through the crowd, almost invisible to those in The Hole. Perhaps someone saw him for a moment, but he flickered in and out of perception with such smoothness that they probably registered him only out of the corner of an eye, as a fleeting shadow.

  Or a ghost.

  A table erupted in shouts as someone scored in the grav-ball game blaring on one of the vidscreens. Korr stood in place, arms crossed, staring after Khedryn Faal, motionless and placid amid the frenetic activity of dancing girls, servers, and patrons in The Hole.

  Kell fell in with the activity. His feeders roiled in his cheeks as he closed on Korr. He could not take his eyes from the back of Korr's head, could not pry his thoughts from the imagined taste of the Jedi's soup, the sharp, creamy flavor implied by the power that flashed when the Jedi had used his mind trick.

  Kell's appetites were driving him, he realized, making him incautious. He recognized this, but he recognized, too, that if revelation were ever to be his, it would come through the soup of a Force-user.

  Perhaps this Force-user, he thought.

  He glided behind Korr, near enough to touch him, and stopped there. His feeders twitched. The effort to keep himself shielded-even from a passive Force-user-strained him. His daen nosi tangled themselves with Korr's, squirming, silver, green, and red serpents wrestling for dominance.

  The sounds and smells of the cantina fell away, leaving him and Korr alone in the swirling potentiality of Fate, the roiling mix of their daen nosi. Kell leaned forward, inhaled the air around Korr.

  Korr cocked his head, turned. Unready for the sudden spotlight of the Jedi's Force-enhanced awareness, Kell's perception screens failed him.

  Thinking quickly, he clutched at the Jedi's coat and stumbled into him as if drunk, the collision of their flesh echoing the collision of their fates.

  "Pardon," Kell said in Basic, and tried to stagger past. He bumped a waitress carrying a wooden tray laden with glasses of pulkay, but she did not even break stride.

  The Jedi took Kell by the bicep, held him in place. Kell's left hand fell to the hilt of one of his vibroblades.

  "Are you all right?" Korr asked.

  Kell looked up and met the Jedi's deep-set gray eyes, underlined by dark circles, and saw the stress and longing written in the broken capillaries of his conjunctiva. For a moment he could not speak. He knew he had met a kindred spirit, that he and Jaden Korr sought the same thing-revelation. And Kell knew that he would find it when he fed on the Jedi's soup.

  "I am fine," Kell said with an affected slur. "Thank you."

  The Jedi let him go. Kell weaved to an unoccupied table with a view of the sabacc table and slid into a seat.

  He felt the weight of the Jedi's regard on the back of his head. It diminished only when Korr walked past him and into the back room to watch Faal play sabacc.

  Kell waited a few moments, then followed him in.

  ***

  Clutching him by the arm, Marr steered Khedryn toward the sabacc table the same way he might a balky speeder.

  "You are nineteen minutes and nine standard seconds tardy," Marr said.

  "You cannot just say late? You have to say tardy?"

  "Nineteen minutes and fourteen standard seconds… tardy."

  "Why are you worried? You do not approve of my gambling anyway."

  The Cerean shrugged. "I would disapprove less if you did not lose so often."

  Khedryn smiled half-heartedly. He still felt discomfited from his encounter with Jaden Korr. He looked over his shoulder and saw that Jaden was staring at him, his deep-set eyes in shadow.

  "You remember that time we carried those Sacred Way pilgrims to Hoogon Two so they could see the monument built there by their founder?" Khedryn said to Marr. "You remember how they looked when they got there and there was no monument?"

  Marr nodded. "Haunted."

  "Right. Haunted." He indicated Jaden with his chin. "He reminds me of them. He's got that look. Like he learned something he wished he hadn't and it called into question what he believes."

  "I can steer him off, if you'd like. He doesn't look like much."

  Khedryn shook his head. "That's bad business. He said lucrative, so let's hear what he has to say."

  Reegas's nasal voice pulled Khedryn's head around to the sabacc table.

  "Put your arse in a seat, Faal! And get your bug eyes on some cards!"

  "Did he say bug eyes?"

  Khedryn preferred to think that his lazy eye allowed him to see the world askew, from a different angle than most.

  "I believe he did."

  "Huh," Khedryn said. He fixed false mirth to his face and turned to the table.

  Reegas's bald head, already dampened with sweat, glistened in the overhead lights. He smiled through his paunchy jowls, and his overweight body slouched in his seat. A glass of straight keela sat before him on the table, as clear as water. His two Weequay bodyguards, their faces as dry and cracked as the leather of their blaster holsters, leaned against the back wall of the room. Both eyed Khedryn with the dead eyes of those who harmed others for a living.

  "Sit! Sit!" Reegas called.

  Khedryn thumped Marr on the shoulder. "Duty calls."

  "But that Cerean comes nowhere near this table," said Reegas. "His brain is built for counting cards."

  Khedryn lost even the false mirth. "You spent too much time in Hutt space. Gotten yourself paranoid. I don't cheat, Reegas."

  "No wonder you never win," said Earsh, also seated at the sabacc table. The human's long nose and his bushy sideburns, groomed to a point, made him look like he was sniffing the wind for easy marks. He had the twitchy nature of a rodent, and Khedryn knew he was into Reegas for at least three thousand credits.

  "Oh, I am not here to win. I am here to make the game respectable. Otherwise it's just a table full of thugs and scoundrels. Save you, Flaygin."

  The old man smiled a mouthful of rotted teeth. An old-timer in Farpoint, Flaygin had been a salvager himself before he'd retired. Khedryn saw his own future in Flaygin's thin gray hair, sun-wrinkled skin, and serial gambling. Flaygin missed the life because he'd never had anything else. Khedryn could see that.

  Earsh grunted, tapped a credit on the table, spun it under his finger. "A junk jockey don't make a game respectable. You pull any rubbish out of the sky recently, junk jockey?"

  "Why?" Khedryn said to Earsh. "You lose your ship somewhere?"

  Earsh's expression hardened. His sideburns pointed accusations at Khedryn, though he could rarely hold Khedryn's eyes. Khedryn figured his eyes made Earsh uncomfortable. "You calling my ship trash, Faal?"

  Khedryn stood behind his chair, the comforting weight of his blaster on his thigh, his eyes all innocence. "Calling your ship trash would be an insult to trash."

  Earsh stood, a callused hand on his DL-21 blaster pistol.

  Khedryn lost his smile. "A man skins his weapon at this table, he best be ready to use it. You think hard, Earsh." He let his hand hover over his own IR-5.

  "Sit down, Earsh," ordered Reegas, tapping the table with a finger as if summoning his pet. "We need four to play."

  Earsh looked as if he had eaten something foul as he sat back down. "One day, Faal. One day."

  "Any day that takes your fancy, Earsh. Any day."

  "Please sit, Khedryn Faal," said the dealer droid, Himher, and one of its dexterous, metallic hands gestured at his chair. Himher's voice changed from male to female in mid-sentence, a manufacturing defect that had either slipped past quality control or reflected the odd sense of humor of a worker at the plant. How it had ended up in Farpoint, owned by Milsin, Khedryn had no idea. Himher was a fixture at The Hole and always had been.

  Khedryn accepted the droid's invitation while Flaygin threw back a long drink of pulkay, slammed his empty glass down on the table, and said, "Now that the preliminary posturing is out of the way, maybe we can see some cards, eh?"

  Everyone chuckled, but none sincerely.

  "Corellian Gambit rules, players?" asked
Himher.

  All four nodded and Himher's mechanical appendages turned to blurs. Khedryn sank into the game as cards floated across the table: flasks, sabers, staves, and coins. Credits slid across the tabletop, one hand after another. A steady stream of dancing girls took shifts either standing at Reegas's side or sitting on his lap and sinking into the folds of his obese body. He gave a few credits to those he favored. Other spectators and hangers-on trickled in as the stakes grew larger, the game more intense. Khedryn did not need to turn around to know that Marr's eyes were boring holes into his back. He could feel their weight.

  Lengthy discussion and dueling insults went by the wayside as the game turned earnest. The room became quiet but for the hum of Himher's servos and the occasional gasp or exclamation from one of those in the audience. Reegas sipped his keela with affected casualness, studying the other players over the rim of his glass. Earsh's face reddened as the game went on. He slammed back pulkay about as fast as the servers could fill his cup. Khedryn barely touched his own drink.

  His sobriety was not rewarded. Over the next four standard hours, Khedryn's cards fell about as well as they usually did. He watched as bad luck and bad play eroded his pile of credits while growing Reegas's into a mountain. He kept his rising irritation from his face, but the clench of his jaw made it hard to separate his upper teeth from his lower. A headache nested in his left temple and he could not shake it. He played to push things, not to win, but it annoyed him to lose to Reegas.

  "Refill me, will you, dear?" Reegas said to the haggard-looking blond dancing girl perched on his lap. He jingled his ice and wore a smug smile that Khedryn would have preferred to wipe off with a power sander.

  "Me, too," said Earsh, and the dancer snorted with contempt. "Hey!"

  While the dancing girl bounced off Reegas's lap and ignored Earsh, Reegas grinned at Khedryn.

  "Credits are looking a little thin, Faal."

  "You, however, look not at all thin," Faal returned. "Nor hirsute."

  Snickers and a couple of guffaws made the rounds among the spectators who formed a ring around the table. Reegas's false smile hung on his face as if painted there, but his eyes turned hard.

  As if summoned forward by his anger, Reegas's pair of Weequay bodyguards left their perch along the back of the wall and slunk through the crowd until they stood at its edge.

  "You play about as usual," Reegas said.

  Khedryn shrugged. "Some beings are born lucky. Some are born pretty. Never both. I suppose that makes you lucky."

  Even Earsh snorted, though he tried to hide it in a cough.

  "The bet is to Reegas," Himher said, its voice changing to female when it said Reegas.

  "All in, Himher," Reegas said, pushing his sea of credits into the center of the table and staring at Faal the while.

  "Reegas Vance is all in," the droid said, and an excited susurration went through the spectators.

  Earsh grunted, folded his cards in disgust. "Out."

  Flaygin looked first at his cards, then at Reegas, then at Khedryn. "It seems this is between you two. Good enough. Out."

  "You are short, Khedryn Faal," said Himher, studying Khedryn's remaining credits. "Please produce six hundred forty-two credits, obtain credit in that amount, or cede the hand."

  The crowd murmured. Khedryn stared at his credits as if he could cause them to breed and multiply through force of will, all the while seething over ceding anything to Reegas.

  "Marr," he called over his shoulder. He stared at Reegas, daring the fat clown to object to Marr's presence at the table.

  Reegas made a dismissive gesture-a king granting an indulgence-and eased back in his chair.

  The Cerean appeared beside Khedryn, his face composed.

  "Don't say a kriffing word about losing," he said, and Marr's mouth stayed closed. "What do we have?"

  "What we have is sitting in front of you," Marr answered.

  Khedryn nodded. He had figured as much. He looked up, thinking to save face by making light of the situation, and spotted Jaden Korr in the crowd. The man's gaze pinioned him, and concern carved grooves into his brow. Khedryn looked past him, smiled at some random spectator, and tried to laugh, though anger and embarrassment made his voice too tight.

  "Anyone out there have six hundred and forty-two credits to loan?"

  Laughter moved through the crowd. Khedryn downed his pulkay and when he looked up, he'd lost Jaden. He scanned the crowd, picked him up again, sliding around the perimeter of the room. The man was smooth. He was not sure Marr had correctly evaluated him as not looking like much.

  "No one?" Khedryn asked.

  The laughter died.

  Khedryn faced Reegas and held up empty hands. "It appears I'm short."

  Reegas grinned through his jowls. "So it appears. Perhaps you'd consider putting something other than credits at risk?"

  Khedryn knew what was coming but played along. "Such as?"

  Reegas took a sip of his drink, smacked his lips, both of them glistening wet in the overhead lights. "The coordinates of the signal you picked up. Word is there might be some value in the site. If that word is legit, we can throw those in and call it even."

  "You in the junk business now? Selling narco not earning you enough?"

  The crowd let out a collective ooh at that. Reegas lost his grin; his upper lip twitched.

  "I am trying to do you a favor, Khedryn Faal."

  "You don't even know what's there. I don't know what's there. It could be valueless. A crashed survey droid."

  Khedryn did not think so. He thought he had stumbled upon an unoccupied base of some kind. There was bound to be lots of value there, in electronics if nothing else. And he had probably told the three Zeltron dancing girls exactly that. And they had told everyone, including Reegas. He cursed himself for a mouth that ran like a bad power manifold, always opening at the wrong time.

  Reegas leaned forward, his fat folding over itself a few times. "There's always something of value floating in the black, correct? Isn't that what you salvagers say?"

  Khedryn said nothing, thinking that Reegas's mouthing the salvager's motto somehow soiled it.

  Reegas made a show of sighing before he stood and started reeling in the credit pool. "If you'd rather just cede the hand, then… "

  "Fine," Khedryn said, and had to unclench jaw and fist. He would not cede the hand to Reegas Vance. "Done."

  Reegas held his pose over the table for a moment, a bloated, half-drunk, smug dragon hovering over his hoard. He sat down and fixed Khedryn with a hard stare.

  "Let's get them on the table then."

  "My word is not good enough?"

  "The table," Reegas said.

  "The coordinates," Khedryn said to Marr, who still stood at his shoulder.

  Marr hesitated a beat before he pulled a small datapad from the dozen or so pockets in his trousers and started punching keys.

  "You all right with this?" Khedryn asked him.

  "You need his permission?" Reegas asked.

  "Shut your mouth, fat man," Khedryn spat.

  Earsh lurched from his chair, but Reegas stayed him with an upraised hand.

  "You need his permission?" Khedryn said to Earsh. "Do it. Do it."

  The slits of Earsh's eyes moved from Khedryn, to Reegas, then back to Khedryn, and he retook his chair. His chest rose and fell like that of a man who'd run five klicks.

  "You are pushing it," Marr said to Khedryn.

  "I always push it," Khedryn said.

  "The coordinates if you please, Master Marr," Reegas said to Marr.

  "Marr," Khedryn said, his tone soft. "Sorry."

  Marr made eye contact with no one as he punched the coordinates into the 'pad. "You are the captain," he said, his tone equally soft.

  Khedryn almost reconsidered-Marr's disapproval was as tangible as the heat in the room, and Khedryn valued Marr's opinion above all others'-but the smugness in Reegas's expression beat wisdom off with a stick.

  "You keep all t
hose numbers in your brains, Cerean?" Reegas asked.

  Marr stared at him from under the cliff of his brow, but said nothing. The Cerean removed the storage crystal from the datapad and placed it in the center of the table. It caught the light, flickered like a diamond.

  "Good luck," Marr said to Khedryn, and withdrew into the crowd. Khedryn felt his absence. Marr's presence offered Khedryn something he could not quite articulate, something solid, something… certain.

  Word of the wager and brewing confrontation must have spread through The Hole. A few dozen spectators crowded the room, elbowing out space and craning necks.

  "Give me fake coordinates," Reegas said, "and, well… you know."

  Khedryn looked past Reegas to his Weequay bodyguards. Jaden Korr, now standing behind Reegas's bodyguards, stared back at him and slowly shook his head. Khedryn ignored him.

  "Like I said, I don't cheat, Reegas. Not ever. I take my losses when that's how the cards fall."

  "So you do." Reegas sipped his keela. "Deal, Himher."

  "An accord over the wager has been reached," said the droid, and dealt.

  Khedryn studied his hand, his heart racing. He was not so much concerned about losing the coordinates to Reegas as about simply losing to Reegas in front of a roomful of people.

  His first four cards included the Master and brought him to nineteen. A mediocre hand. He stared across the table at Reegas, trying to read his cards in the set of his lips. Nothing. He dared not call at nineteen.

  "Khedryn Faal?" asked Himher.

  He discarded his two high cards and decided to shoot low. Himher skimmed two cards across the table. Khedryn eyed them-Balance and the Evil One-and it took a few moments for their value to register. He did the math in his head again and again.

  Negative twenty-three.

  "Reegas," Himher said.

  "Call it," Reegas said, and sat back in his seat.

  Khedryn tried to answer Reegas's smugness with his own. He savored the moment, flipped his cards. "Negative twenty-three."

  Gasps and applause broke out in the crowd. Only a positive twenty-three could beat him.