Star Wars - Coruscant Nights 02 - Street of Shadows

by Michael Reaves

  Eventually he ran out of things to say to her—except, of course, for the one thing he'd been dread-

  Michael Reaves 191

  ing saying since she walked in the door. Despite having reached an agreement with his companions, now that the time had come to propound it, his Jedi training continued to resist.

  She stared at him. "Was there something else, Jax? "

  "No—yes." Girding himself in every respect, he sat down beside her. "Dejah, I don't want to do this. I've been trying to think of the best way to ask it of you, the least offensive way to make this request."

  Her eyelids fluttered, and her crimson skin was positively aflame. "I'm Zeltron, Jax. Whatever request you want to make, I'm sure I've heard it before."

  "Good. That makes it easier—" He broke off in shock at what the Force showed him behind those eyes. She'd chosen to reveal her thoughts, of that he was sure; no one with her psychic sensibilities could be read so easily.

  He stood hastily. "That's, uh, that's not what I mean—at all."

  Her expression turned uncertain. "I don't understand. Then what kind of request are you having trouble making?"

  "What I'm trying to say, Dejah, is that we're about out of funds, and if we're going to continue to help you, I'm going to have to ask for—a retainer."

  There—he'd managed to get it out, though the request still sounded obscene to him. He looked away.

  I should have let Den do this, he told himself unhappily. Or Rhinann. Or even I-Five. Asking for money wouldn't have bothered any of them in the least.

  He felt ashamed to look at her, reluctant to use the 192 Star Wars: Coruscant Nights II: Street of Shadows Force to sense her feelings. How would she react?

  Would she be hurt? Insulted? Angry?

  He forced himself to turn and face her—and saw that her right hand was unsealing her jeweled carry-bag. "How much do you need? Do you want cash, or a credit transfer?"

  Relief left him momentarily weak in the knees. She was watching him with a coy smile that seemed to say, There now—that was easy enough, wasn't it?

  Less than an hour after he'd brought her up to date and she'd left, his colleagues rejoined him.

  "How'd it go?" Den inquired anxiously. "Did she balk at the request?"

  "Yes," Rhinann wanted to know. "Do we eat well tohight?"

  I-Five made a snorting sound with his vocabulator.

  "It's always about food with you organics."

  Jax, affecting an air of complete and utter confidence, said, "I am happy to say that, thanks to the gracious and understanding Dejah Duare, we now have an open line of credit through the planetary banking system under two new assumed identities, either of which any of you can now freely access."

  Rhinann's tusks quivered in gustatory anticipation.

  "I thank you, Jax. There is nothing worse than being a gourmet in a world of indiscriminate eaters."

  "Except having to listen to one," Den said. "But seriously, Jax—good work."

  "Yes," I-Five agreed. "It would have been enough to have secured a promise of token payment. But an unlimited line of credit—your efforts exceed my expectations.

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  I may go so far as to indulge in a logic board tune-up."

  Basking in their praise, Jax noticed that compliments were lacking from one of the group. Having once again taken her seat at the work center, Laranth had resumed her equipment upgrading without a word.

  He shrugged. He thought briefly about probing her feelings with the Force, but decided to respect her privacy. If the Paladin had a problem with him, his past experience with her guaranteed that she wouldn't be reticent to let people know when she was ready.

  Still, it did somewhat dampen the celebratory mood...

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  "I'm looking for the Cragmoloid Boulad. I was told you might know where I could find him."

  The Green Nikto sitting in the ticket kiosk of the sleazy holobooth looked Typho deliberately up and down.

  "Who teld ye thet?"

  "Does it matter?" Courteous and diplomatic most of the time, Typho could be tough when the occasion demanded. Here in the bowels of Coruscant, occasion did more than demand: it positively screamed.

  "Can you help me or not?"

  "Depends." The Nikto groomed his facial scales with his long claws. "C'n ye pay?"

  "I didn't take you for a philanthropist." Typho unsealed a pocket and brought out a fistful of credit chits. Avarice replaced some of the disinterest in the Nikto's large obsidian eyes. He licked his narrow lips.

  "How d' I know ye're net thee police?"

  "Get serious. Do you really think a dreg like you is worth the sector's time?"

  The Nikto cackled, halting only when his laughter degenerated into a hacking cough. Typho made sure Michael Reaves 195

  to stay well out of respiratory range while waiting for the attack to finish.

  A clawed right hand swept the credits from the captain's grasp. "Twenty-third level," the Nikto said.

  "Quadrant D-three, Sector Two-Twelve. Ye didn't hear eet from me."

  "Hear what?" Typho turned and walked away.

  Nighttime downlevel on Coruscant wasn't all that different from daytime. In the abyssal ferrocrete depths the sunlight hardly ever penetrated to any perceptible degree; the light came from fluorescents, elec-troluminescence, and other sources. Even so, the combination rarely amounted to more than a perpet-ual twilight. Down here life surged and pulsed to rhythms unsettling to the average citizen. It was best, Typho had found, to move at a brisk clip, to project a don't-mess-with-me attitude. Uncertainty, more than anything else, drew the attention of predators and scavengers.

  The entrance to the address Typho had been given was on the bottom row of what appeared to be a run-down resiplex. Even though he couldn't see them, he knew his body was being scanned by a plethora of security devices. If he could see them, he reflected, they wouldn't be very secure.

  "You're armed," a voice accused from a hidden speaker.

  "Of course I'm armed. What kind of idiot would come to a place like this without being armed?" He hoped the scan had only registered his blaster. The lightsaber was secured in the inside lining of his jacket, along with a small confounder that was supposed to render it invisible to detection.

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  "The exact extent of your idiocy is yet to be determined." There was a click, and double doors parted.

  They were much higher and wider, Typho noted as he entered, than was necessary to accommodate the passage of the largest humanoids on Coruscant.

  The female Cragmoloid who met him displayed no weapons. Given her impressive size and bulk, none were needed. "Check your lethal devices, please."

  "Certainly." Typho had no compunction about handing over his blaster and vibroknife. Not in light of the fact that the female asking for them stood more than three meters tall, massed over two hundred kilos, and could kill him with a blow of one massive fist. It was strange, however, to be frisked by a trunk as well as by hands. Despite their immense size, they traveled over his person with surprising delicacy.

  Satisfied that she had relieved the visitor of every instrument of destruction, regardless of size, she stepped back. "Follow me."

  The chamber where she left him was occupied by one other. It spoke to Boulad's confidence that he would meet alone with a complete stranger. Of course, help was likely only a trumpet away, and while it was one thing to talk oneself into the fixer's presence, it would be rather more difficult to get out in the event that things did not proceed as intended.

  The fact that the average adult Cragmoloid had the strength of half a dozen large humanoids was threat enough.

  Boulad's kind were known for their directness. Typho's host did not disappoint in that regard.

  "The fact that you found your way here means that you seek something you cannot find anyplace else."

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  Typho could feel the deep, sonorous voice vibrate the floor beneath him, heard it echo off the cavernous walls. The entire block of resicubes, he realized, had to be a facade, a hollowed-out shell that formed the Cragmoloids' lair. This chamber was dimly lit, sparsely furnished, and big enough to house a sky lorry. It also smelled faintly like hay.

  He responded to Boulad's statement. "Your perception flatters you."

  This produced a deep grunt that might have indicated satisfaction, recognition, or perhaps indigestion. Unfamiliar as he was with Cragii punctuation, Typho chose to accept it as encouraging. He gestured behind him.

  "Your mate? A niece, perhaps? Attractive as well as competent."

  The Cragmoloid's tiny eyes opened wider. Typho had chosen his opening well. He knew that the pachy-dermoids would rather discuss clan or relationships than just about anything else, so they spent the next twenty minutes talking family, with the captain letting his host carry most of the conversation. By the time Boulad had finished waxing rhapsodic about his current wife, Typho had been accepted as an honest broker, if not quite a member of the family.

  "For one of the feeble trunkless, you are a pleasant exception," Boulad told him. "Still, it is time that you stated your business."

  "Just so," Typho agreed. "I seek the disposition of any Sith on a certain world at a specific time."

  Even for the representative of a species that valued honesty and directness above all, Boulad was taken aback. His trunk elevated in surprise. "Why not ask 198 Star Wars: Coruscant Nights II: Street of Shadows me something easy to obtain, like the Emperor's personal taste in beverages, or the home of the current mistress of the Senate vice president?"

  Typho proceeded to fill in his host on the necessary details. When Boulad had recorded them all on an appliance designed to accommodate his massive digits, he grunted anew.

  "All this is a simple matter to research, except for all of it."

  "You understand," Typho said, "why I couldn't walk into Imperial Records and ask for a hard copy."

  Boulad's trunk waved affirmation. "By now there would be little of you left to question. The Emperor does not like anyone prying into such interdicted material, even for something as simple and innocent as travel itineraries. How resourceful of you to find it all by yourself, without any assistance from anyone. Especially anyone like me."

  The captain smiled. "I amaze myself sometimes."

  "And now to the matter of money, which cannot be avoided. For such a dangerous service, at risk of inviting potentially lethal attention, I must charge five thousand credits. If you cannot pay such an amount, then you may utilize the exit, for our business here is done. I respect your manner, but I will not take such a risk for anything less. And if you know the people of Ankus, you know that we do not bargain in such things. Our word is our bond."

  Typho was not a man of unlimited means, by any stretch of the imagination, but he had determined from the beginning of his quest that money could and would be no object. "Very well," he said, pulling out his coinpurse. "I assume cash is acceptable?"

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  "Mandatory." Boulad leaned forward, towering over his guest. "My people have already secured the information you want. At least, as much as was avail-Typho blinked in surprise as he paid his host.

  "That was fast."

  "I was curious to know the why and wherefore of what you sought. If you were able to pay for it, so much the better. If not, it was worth researching to see if it might prove valuable to someone else."

  A flicker of fear shot through the captain. If the Sith or any of their minions learned that someone was delving into their travel records ... without thinking, he said as much to Boulad.

  His host was no Jenet, for whom Typho's uncertainty would have been a compliment. "You wound me, visitor! I am an honest broker, as are all in my family." He gestured to his left from where another, somewhat smaller Cragmoloid was joining them.

  "Including my third son Arlumek, whom I believe has brought the information you requested—and have now paid for, in full."

  While the elder Cragmoloid counted and pocketed his payment, Arlumek placed a small emitter in front of the expectant Typho. Heavy hands manipulated instrumentation, and words appeared in the air between them. They obviously meant nothing to the younger Cragmoloid, who turned away in disinterest.

  To Typho, however, they meant a great deal. The strictly prohibited records that the slicer's family had somehow managed to access indicated that one Darth Sidious had journeyed to Mustafar, was there at the same time as Padmé and Anakin Skywalker, and had returned shortly thereafter.

  200 Star Wars: Coruscant Nights II: Street of Shadows His mind whirling, Typho excused himself. Now that their mutual business had been concluded, however, Boulad was reluctant to see the human go.

  "Stay!" he entreated his visitor. "I would hear more of your excellent family."

  "Sorry." Typho headed toward the door. "I have pressing business to attend to."

  "A pity," the jovial Cragmoloid called after him.

  "If you ever have something similar to trade, you know where to find me."

  Typho spent the rest of the night wandering the underlevels, his thoughts churning. Twice he was approached by footpads, but a glance at his face was enough to convince them that easier pickings lay elsewhere than on the corpus of the half-crazed human.

  Padmé, Padmé, he whispered to himself. Retribution is at hand. Retribution and justice. I know now who killed you.

  Like any puzzle, it was simple to solve once you had all the pieces. Who could have penetrated her security on Mustafar? Who could have slain the Senator's resourceful, determined bodyguard and suffered dearly in the fight that would surely have followed any attempt to harm her? Anakin Skywalker would not have gone down easily. Yes, the answer was clear now.

  Darth Vader had killed them both.

  Therefore, Vader must die.

  He wasn't worried about getting close enough to the Dark Lord to finish him, even though he knew that one as adept in the Force as Vader surely would detect any threat. Typho knew from his own work as Michael Reaves 201

  a specialist in security that, given sufficient knowledge, determination, and ability, coupled with a disregard for his own life, an assassin could get to any public figure. A soldier such as himself had both of those assets. Early in his quest he had realized that to avenge Padmé, it was reasonable to assume he would have to sacrifice his own life, and he was fully prepared to do so.

  The problem lay in getting physically close enough to Vader to strike. What would draw Vader away from the security that undoubtedly surrounded him?

  What might induce the Dark Lord to forgo his usual caution and meet alone with an unfamiliar intermediary? As aide to the Emperor, Vader needed nothing.

  That didn't mean he was devoid of desire, of course.

  But what could such an incarnation of evil want?

  Abruptly, he remembered what the bounty hunter Aurra Sing had said during their confrontation in the ruins of the Jedi Temple: "On behalf of Lord Vader I was hoping to find evidence here of a Jedi named Jax Pavan."

  Vader was looking for a surviving Jedi named Pavan. And Typho recalled seeing the name Jax Pavan listed on the Imperial administration complex readout as being possibly still alive.

  So the Dark Lord wanted this particular surviving Jedi badly enough to send a bounty hunter as celebrated as the relentless Aurra Sing after him. She had been searching for him locally, in the ruins of the Jedi Temple. Which meant that, unless the bounty hunter was way off the mark — not likely, given her 202 Star Wars: Coruscant Nights II: Street of Shadows reputation—Jax Pavan was somewhere on Coruscant. Not only on Coruscant, but somewhere nearby.

  That was it. That was the solution. Jax Pavan would serve as the bait to bring Darth Vader within killing range. How precisely Typho was going to carry out the assassination was something he still had to plan, but he had no doubt a means could be
managed. Having spent his entire professional life learning how to keep people from being killed had taught him how best they could be slain.

  No question about it: Darth Vader was going to die. Padmé Amidala would be avenged and so would Anakin Skywalker. But before he could begin to put the final plan in motion, there was one more thing he had to do.

  He had to find Jax Pavan.

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  seventeen

  It seemed to Jax that no matter how hard they worked, they couldn't get a break.

  It wasn't as if no one on the streets had heard of Ves Volette. Ever since the devastation that had been wrought on his homeworld, every prominent Caamasi on Imperial Center had been fodder for media interviews, commentary, and a good deal of tsk-tsk gossip. The violent death of one as famous as Volette made his name even more widespread.

  But this was Imperial Center, the world-city, home to billions upon billions and workplace to billions more. Here, the murder of an artist, no matter how well known, was minor news at best. If not for the Caamasi connection, it would have required a dedicated search by those with a particular interest in such matters to determine that it had even occurred.