The spiky orange woman said, “And we’re willing to pay handsomely for the service. Money is no object.”
Those last four words went a long way toward clearing the fumes. Maybe money was no object to them, but right now it was Dash’s only object. He slid into the booth and studied his prospective employers. Both wore poly-prismatic lenses that cycled a rainbow of colors over the irises of their eyes. There was no telling what color they actually were; nor could he read their expressions clearly. Camouflage, instinct told him. These fems were in disguise. Why?
Maybe the answer was in why they felt the need of a bodyguard.
“I’m listening. Let’s hear your pitch.”
Again the exchange of glances. The spiky one leaned forward, elbows on the table. “Here’s the deal. My boss, here, has picked up a stalker. Probably nothing. Just an overzealous fan. But we’re not willing to take any chances. We need someone to keep an eye on her.” She jerked her head toward the turbaned girl, drawing Dash’s attention to her.
“Overzealous fan? Are you somebody I should know?”
“Only if you’re breathing,” Spike muttered.
“My friend exaggerates,” said the other woman, with a smile that managed somehow to be both coquettish and self-deprecating.
“Are you going to tell me who you are?”
“If you take the job, I’ll have to, I guess.”
Dash couldn’t tell if she was being serious or sarcastic. Fine. “So what’s the situation? Where would this guarding take place?”
“Aboard my yacht, mostly. At our ports of call. Wherever I go. This … person … has let it be known that he can get pretty close to me and so you’d have to stay pretty close to me, too.”
“Darlin’, that would not be a hardship.” He smiled at her.
“Pretty close, she said,” interrupted Spike. “Not skin-close.”
That can change, Dash thought, his smile never wavering. “Normally,” he said aloud, “I wouldn’t take a job like this—I’m a merchant pilot by trade—but my ship is under repair right now, so I’m at loose ends. Until I can get repairs completed. That’s gonna take a while.”
“How long?”
“I’m flexible.”
“I’ll just bet you are,” said Spike drily.
“So you can start right away?” asked the other.
“Well, actually, it’s not just me. I have a partner. A Nautolan. Who happens to be a teräs käsi master.” He watched for the reaction from the two women and was gratified by the response. They apparently knew something of the sort of threat the masters of the “steel hand” discipline represented.
“We can definitely use someone with those talents,” said the turbaned woman. “And it doesn’t hurt that he’s Nautolan. There are rumors that a high percentage of them are a little Force-sensitive.”
“Well, Eaden claims to be able to read emotions even out of the water, but I think he’s just showing off. I also have a droid.”
“Of course you do,” said Spike. “Every pilot I’ve ever known has a droid. You’d all be dirt-fliers without ’em.”
Matching her aggressive, elbows-on-the-table stance, Dash leaned into her across the table. “I beg your pardon, but I’ll have you know that I’ve successfully completed any number of missions without a droid’s assistance. And I’ve gotta say that Leebo’s not much of a space-monkey, but he’s good company, so I keep him around.”
“Really.”
“Yeah. He tells jokes. Not very good ones,” Dash admitted, “but still—the amazing thing is not that he tells them badly, but that he tells them at all.”
The spiky woman snorted. Very unbecoming in a female, Dash decided. At least in a human female. A Zabrak might think it was sexy, though.
“What do you think, JC?” she asked her boss.
“What’s your name?” her boss asked him.
“What’s yours … JC?” he asked in return.
Turban Girl blinked her lenses off and looked out at him through eyes of pale, luminous silver. He almost swallowed his tongue. With an expression that was suddenly deadly serious, she lowered her voice and said, “Javul Charn.”
He sat back in his seat, feeling as if a bantha had just sat on his chest. That name he knew, just as he knew those silver eyes. They’d gazed out at him from so many holoposters and performance vids, he’d lost count. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, suddenly in complete sympathy with the overzealous fan.
“I’m, uh, I’m Dash. Dash Rendar. I’m a pilot.”
“Yeah,” said Spike. “So you said.”
Eaden Vrill was not entirely pleased with their new job. At least Dash didn’t think he was. It was hard to tell with teräs käsi adepts—they were so disciplined. And a Nautolan’s huge, dark eyes were hard to read anyway. Standing in the docking bay, he and Leebo listened to Dash’s glowing description of the job in complete silence.
Eaden was stone-still for a full ten seconds, then said, “What will it pay?”
He nodded when Dash named the figure, then turned on his heel and went up into the ship to pack his kit.
Dash turned to Leebo and said, “Well? You gonna say something? Crack a joke? Take a shot at me?”
“Defensive, aren’t we? We needed credits. You got us credits. So you get the credit for getting us the credits.” The droid added an uncannily accurate reproduction of a percussive three-note trap skin riff. Dash rolled his eyes. It wasn’t the first time he’d heard Leebo accentuate jokes in such a manner, nor the hundredth. But add a few more zeros and we’ll be getting close, he thought.
Leebo then raised one metal arm, servos whining delicately. “Question.”
“What?”
“We’re going to be working on this woman’s yacht?”
“Yeah.”
“What’s her name?”
“Her name? I told you her name. Javul Charn. You know—Javul Charn, the holostar?”
Leebo made a sound somewhere between a snort and a clatter. “Not the fem. What would I care about a girl? The ship, protein-brains. What’s the ship’s name?”
Dash laughed. “I keep forgetting your taste in females is toward the hard and ion-powered. She’s the Nova’s Heart—a SoroSuub PLY-3500.”
“Ooh,” said Leebo, managing to sound rhapsodic, “I’m in love.” He turned and tilted his head toward the Outrider, sitting forlornly in the center of the bay. “Don’t worry, old girl. I’m sure they’ll never let me near the engine room.” He returned to the ship himself, then, muttering PLY-3500 specs in a mechanical undertone. “Twin ion/hyperdrive nacelles … programmable transponders … state-of-the-art gyrostabilizers … be still, my recirculation pump …”
Dash sighed. He’d still rather be piloting the Outrider than be a paid passenger on some personal luxury yacht, no matter what the specs. And he somehow suspected that, as bodyguards for the rich and famous, he and Eaden would be more passengers than crew. They would, after all, have to go where the big holostar went, eat where she ate, be quartered close to her. He had no experience in the field to base that on, but he intended to be as professional about this as possible. It might be a nothing job, but he was going to take it seriously.
He’d arranged with his new boss (damn, but it was hard to even think that word—he doubted he could say it aloud) to transfer an advance payment to his account, had dispersed some to Eaden, and used most of the remaining credits to pay several weeks of rent on the docking bay with just a little left for Kerlew as a good-faith gesture. When all was arranged, Dash, Eaden, and Leebo reported to the spaceport, where a shuttle waited to take them up to the orbiting yacht. Dash thought it a little odd that the Nova’s Heart didn’t dock dirtside, but he supposed that had something to do with Javul Charn’s celebrity status. Maybe she was afraid of calling too much attention to herself—or giving her “overzealous fan” a heads-up that she was on Tatooine. That made sense. Dash Rendar understood well the need to keep a low profile. Over the years he had, perforce, become a master of disguis
e, subterfuge, and just plain hiding. He had every confidence that between Eaden’s abilities and his own innate wariness, they’d be as good a set of bodyguards as the lovely fem could wish for.
The PLY-3500 was everything the SoroSuub press campaign said and more. As they were greeted by the ship’s steward—an E-3PO protocol droid—and shown to their quarters just forward of the observation deck, Dash noticed quite a few “enhancements” that weren’t in the manufacturer’s literature. He made a mental note to get the ship’s schematics and acquaint himself with the vessel, paying close attention to any nook or cranny in which a stowaway might hide. When he’d brought up the idea that someone might sneak aboard her ship unobserved, the celebrity had denied that such a thing was possible—but she had blanched at the suggestion, her skin becoming, if possible, paler than it already was. He’d scared her, but the fact that she hadn’t considered the possibility that Fanboy might be able to get real close only showed that she deserved to be scared.
Dash and Eaden were quartered in a suite of rooms at the head of the aft quarterdeck immediately abaft a set of emergency doors. Kendara Farlion’s suite was next door to theirs, while Javul Charn’s chambers took up the opposite side of the aft quarterdeck, her door cattycorner to Dash and Eaden’s.
“Rarefied water,” said Eaden philosophically as he surveyed the surface of Tatooine from the expanse of transparisteel that ran the entire outer wall of their quarters. Softly lit by clever indirect lighting, the stunning main chamber featured adjustable coloration and lighting schemes, original work from a dozen well-known artists, and sleek, designer furniture, which included state-of-the-art antigrav form couches upholstered in the finest Corellian leather.
“Yeah, there’re definite perks to the position of royal bodyguard—having to room near the royal mark being one of them.”
“You’d be wise not to let her hear you call her that,” observed Eaden.
“Not to worry, I’ll be a good boy.”
The Nautolan smiled—a peculiar curling of his wide mouth. “Highly unlikely. Perhaps you should practice saying, Yes, boss.”
A strange, metallic sigh issued from just inside the door to the opulent quarters, making both men turn. Leebo stood behind them, looking somehow bereft; an attitude communicated almost entirely by posture, as of course the droid’s facial features were immobile.
“What’s wrong with you?” Dash asked him.
“Like you care. So engrossed in your silly sentient squabbles while I stand here doing everything. I mean, really, you two may have jobs, but me? I might as well be turned off and used as a clothes rack.”
“There’s a thought,” said Dash. “What do you want me to do?”
Leebo’s head came up with a faint squeak. “Introduce me to the ship’s engineer. Tell him what a genius I am. That you’d never be able to keep the Outrider in trim without me, that—”
“Excuse me,” Dash said, interrupting the droid’s recitation. “Okay, point one: I’d never be able to keep the Outrider in trim without you? I hate to spoil this droid fever-dream you’re having, boyo, but I kept the Outrider shipshape long before you came on the scene. And point two: may I remind you where the Outrider is at this moment? Hardly great advertising for your genius.”
“That,” said Leebo, drawing himself to his full height, “was not my fault.”
“Are you saying it was mine?”
“I wasn’t the one who piloted the ship into an ambush then tried to get out of it by sideswiping a singularity … or three.”
“Now, that just hurts. Look, you whiny bucket of bolts—”
“Do you realize that you’re arguing with a mechanism?” Eaden said.
Eaden’s question, mildly asked, brought swift embarrassment. “Yeah, yeah, you’re right. I oughta just turn him off.”
“Hey!”
“When he might actually be useful?” Eaden asked. “Unwise. At the very least, he’s another pair of eyes—metaphorically speaking. And he doesn’t need to sleep.”
Dash grinned. “Night watch, huh? Good idea.” He turned back to Leebo. “Looks like you’ll earn your keep after all.”
“I’m ecstatic with relief.”
The door chimed just then and, to Dash’s affirmative, slid open to reveal Kendara Farlion. She’d removed her pinwheel lenses to reveal deep violet eyes that exactly matched her sequined eyebrows. “You know, I can hear you arguing all the way out in the hall. And this ship is pretty well insulated. You sure you can all work together?”
“We’re fine,” said Dash. “Just fine.”
“Glad to hear it. Ready for a tour of the ship?”
“More than ready,” Dash said, and followed her from the cabin.
SIX
DASH WAS PREPARED TO BE DISAPPOINTED IN, EVEN DISPARAGING of, the Nova’s Heart. It was, after all, not a working vessel. It was a yacht, which in Dash’s mind translated to toy. But five minutes after the tour began, he was grudgingly willing to admit that the ship was pretty well put together, and ten minutes in he’d decided that Nova’s Heart was a stunning piece of craftswork. He kept that assessment to himself, however.
Every angle was precise and smooth, every curve delighted the eye, every joint was flush. The interior was a tasteful combination of brushed durasteel and fabrics that emulated the metal’s satiny sheen. He’d been aboard Lando Calrissian’s Lady Luck—a PLY-3000—and had been amused at the way the gambler had hidden the secret muscles of the craft beneath layer upon layer of opulent, even gaudy, luxury appointments. Nova’s Heart was a different sort of creature. Her trim, muscular, graceful frame was draped only lightly with opulence. She was, in a word, a lady: sleek, feline, and—though not afraid of showing off her strength—unmistakably feminine. Definitely not the transportation equivalent of an odalisque.
Dash gave the quarters and living areas of the ship only the most cursory examination. It was the working decks, engineering, and the bridge that fascinated him. He assumed these also interested Eaden, but really, who knew?
In engineering, Dash slowed the tour to a crawl by checking out every nuance of the ship’s drives and systems. This caused Spike to roll her eyes roughly every twenty seconds, but the captain, an imperturbable Zabrak named Serdor Marrak, seemed … well, imperturbable. Having the captain and Eaden Vrill standing on each side of him made Dash feel as if he were getting serenity in stereo—an eerie feeling. Spike’s prickly impatience was almost a relief.
“Your shield generators are Chempat-6s, I see,” Dash observed as he crawled around the gleaming deflector system. “But that resonator coil up there doesn’t look stock to me.” He pointed upward to where a meter-long, half-meter-wide coil of flat optical-quality transparisteel wound its way around the power conduit to the deflector array.
“It’s not,” said Marrak placidly. “It’s a modified Chem-6. I’d almost call it a 6.5.”
“Why do you have to call it anything?” asked Spike, glancing at her chrono. “It’s a machine.”
“Yeah?” said Dash, ignoring her. “May I ask about the nature of the modifications?”
The captain said, “Javul Charn has sufficient reason to want to run silent and to be … difficult to track or trace. We modified the unit along those lines.”
Dash looked over sharply from the resonator coil. “A cloaking device? You modified this to be a cloaking device?”
The captain shrugged. “More of a smudging device. It kicks in once we’re in open space. We’ve installed maximal confounders; the coils have been torqued and the harmonics realigned so that they distort and blur our communications signature … among other things.”
“What other things?” asked Eaden, betraying his own interest in the ship’s construction.
“We beefed up the ablative capacity of the shields while we were at it. They’re virtually impenetrable to communications signals when we want them to be. They’ll also fling off pretty big space debris and, if we ever should find ourselves under attack for some reason, they’ll do a fine
job of repelling energy weapons fire as well.”
Dash frowned, puzzled. “They block communications. Why, exactly?”
“Keeps people from eavesdropping on us,” said Spike. “We don’t want everybody to know Javul’s plans, do we? I can’t begin to tell you what a pain it is to get into a port of call and find a literal fleet of overeager fans waiting in orbit. Javul likes to keep a low profile. I think you can appreciate that.”
Dash moved to peer out through a long, narrow viewport at the port engine nacelle. “Combined ion/hyperdrive, huh?”
The captain nodded while, behind him, Leebo gave an ecstatic sigh. Dash stifled a grin. “Those modified, too?” he asked.
“A bit. They were rated to just lightspeed. We managed to push them a bit farther than that. My engineer is quite an innovator.”
Dash nodded. “I’d like to meet him.”
“Her.”
“Oh. Droid brain?”
The captain blinked. “Excuse me?”
Dash laughed. “Not your engineer—although I guess she might have a droid brain. Mine does.” He jerked a thumb back toward Leebo, who was gazing around like a lovesick Wookiee. “I meant the ship. I have a … an acquaintance who installed a full-faculty droid autopilot and system controller in his ship.”
“Ah, I see. As it happens my engineer is a Twi’lek named Arruna Var. Our steward has a droid brain, though. So does the ship’s doctor.”
“It’s too bad you don’t have a droid brain,” Spike told Dash, “we could download all this information right to your cortex. Save a lot of time.” She checked her chrono again.
Dash grinned at her. “That is a fantastic idea. In fact, if you could take Leebo, here, and get those schematics downloaded into his neural net, that’d be stellar. Eaden and I can go over them with him later.”
She stared at him a moment. “All right, but do you think you could hurry this tour up just a bit? We need to make sure we’re secure before we leave Tatooine.”
Star Wars: Shadow Games Page 4
