Star Wars - The Bounty Hunter Wars - The Mandalorian Armor

by K. W. Jeter

"Like I told you before. For your own good." Dengar

  indicated the subchamber with a tilt of his head. "That

  guy's one dangerous barve. If there's some kind of

  connection between you and him, it might not be one

  that's to your benefit. When he's got his strength back,

  he might kill you just as easily as look at you. And you

  won't be asking any more questions then, believe me."

  The message seemed to sink in. "All right," said

  Neelah. "Whatever you say."

  There was more that he hadn't said. His precautions

  weren't just for her sake. I don't want the two of them

  conspiring against me, thought Dengar. Even before Boba

  Fett got his full strength back, that razor-sharp mind of

  his would be working and scheming away. Fett would be

  fully capable of making his own deals with Neelah that

  she wouldn't be able to resist falling in with. A bounty

  hunter didn't get the drop on people just with weapons

  that someone could see and feel burning through one's

  gut; the history of what Boba Fett had pulled off with

  the old Bounty Hunters Guild indicated that he was a

  master at ensnaring sentient creatures in subtler traps.

  Though you wind up just as dead, thought Dengar, either

  way. And if Boba Fett had been lying and playing for

  time, back when Dengar had found him out there in the

  Dune Sea's wastes, the quickest way to dissolve any

  partnership would be to use Neelah as his cat's-paw.

  Now I've got two that I've got to watch out for. That

  was another reason Dengar had wanted the female down

  here, rather than wandering around on the surface. He had

  his hands full as it was; he didn't need anyone else

  hooking up with Neelah, for whatever agenda they might

  have.

  She might as well have read his thoughts. A thin

  smile appeared as Neelah regarded him. "You trust me?"

  "Of course not." On that point, Dengar could afford

  to be honest with her. "I don't trust anyone." That was

  almost true; there was always Manaroo. But that was

  something different. "Nobody survives in this business by

  going around trusting creatures. Let's just say that I've

  got an idea of what to expect from you now. And if you're

  smart enough to play along with me, maybe you'll get what

  you want."

  Neelah signaled her understanding with a quick nod.

  "I still want to see him."

  "That's easy enough," said Dengar. "But if you were

  planning on having any kind of talk with Fett, I don't

  think that's going to happen anytime real soon. He's

  still unconscious."

  "Just as well." The thin smile faded from Nee-lah's

  face. "I changed my mind about that part. For now. I've

  begun to see the wisdom of your cautious attitude. Maybe

  it's better if he doesn't know about me. That I found him

  out in the Dune Sea, and that I'm here, waiting. As you

  pointed out . . . whatever our connection is, it might

  not be exactly safe for me."

  "Suit yourself." Dengar's caution went up a notch.

  She's a fast learner, he thought. All the more reason to

  be careful. "Come on." He pushed himself away from the

  wall of the main chamber. "Let's go pay our guest of

  honor a visit."

  The tall medical droid's appendages raised in warning

  as Dengar and Neelah entered the sub-chamber. "Please

  observe the necessary hygienic protocols." The chart of

  vital signs scrolled down the display on SHSl-B's

  cylindrical torso. "The patient's condition remains very

  critical-"

  "Yeah, right." Dengar pushed the droid aside, away

  from the pallet in the center of the space. "This barve's

  survived worse things than your attentions. If you

  haven't managed to kill him, then nothing will."

  Neelah stepped close to the side of the pallet and

  looked down at the unconscious form. "That's him?" She

  sounded almost disappointed. "That's Boba Fett?"

  "No-" From the pile of gear in the sub-chamber's

  corner, Dengar picked up a battered helmet, etched with

  the digestive fluids of the Sarlacc's gullet. He turned

  the helmet's narrow-visored gaze toward Neelah. "This is

  Boba Fett."

  She shrank back from the empty helmet, a sudden fear

  showing in her widened eyes. One hand tentatively reached

  out to touch the pitted metal, then jerked back as though

  scorched. She slowly nodded. "That's what I saw." Her

  voice was a barely audible whisper. "And I knew ... I

  knew it was him. ..."

  "That's how everybody knows him." Dengar turned the

  helmet's blank visage toward himself. He could guess how

  the female felt; a little apprehensive chill ran down his

  own spine. "All through the galaxy." He nodded toward the

  figure on the pallet. "Not very many creatures have seen

  him like that. Or if they have, they didn't live to tell

  about it."

  For a moment the only sound in the subchamber was the

  clicking and sighing of the cardiopulmonary assists that

  the medical droids had set in place. Then Neelah turned a

  somber gaze toward Dengar. "I did," she said quietly.

  Dengar was unable to make a reply. The dark spaces in

  her eyes, and what might lie beyond them, unnerved him as

  much as the empty helmet. He turned away, to set it back

  down on the rest of Boba Fett's gear.

  "Remember," said Neelah. "Don't tell him. Don't tell

  him anything about me."

  By the time Dengar turned back around, the female had

  slipped out of the subchamber. He was alone with the

  other bounty hunter. The presence of the medical droids

  barely registered on Dengar's senses.

  He stood looking down at Boba Fett for a while

  longer. The little trace of fear hadn't gone away; it was

  still there, inching along his spine. Even unconscious,

  this man was enough to spook ordinary creatures.

  There's too much past, thought Dengar. Inside Boba

  Fett's skull; a whole galaxy full of it. Who could tell

  what was going on in there as he slept and dreamed his

  dark dreams?

  8

  THEN

  He couldn't believe his good luck.

  "I've got him this time," said Bossk. He had upgraded

  both the firepower and the tracking abilities of the

  Hound's Tooth since his last unfortunate encounter with

  Boba Fett. The other bounty hunter snatching the

  accountant Nil Posondum away from him had been the final

  irritant underneath his scales; he had sworn to himself

  that if he ever got the chance, he would put his rival

  out of commission for good. And nothing will do that,

  thought Bossk, savoring the words, like blowing Fett to

  atoms. "When I get done, there won't be enough of him

  left to find without an electron microscope."

  Beside him, Zuckuss leaned the hoses of his face mask

  toward the cockpit's target-acquisition screen. "I don't

  know. ..."

  "What, you can't tell that it's Boba Fett ap

  proaching? Are you blind?" Bossk rapped a claw against

&
nbsp; the screen, hard enough to leave a permanent mark amid

  the glowing vector lines. "Of course it's him! There's

  all the identification data on the Slave I." A tiny

  column of numbers scrolled down from the triangular icon

  swiftly moving across the screen. "That's his ship, so

  he's aboard it."

  "Oh, it's Boba Fett, all right." Zuckuss nodded

  slowly. "There's no doubt about that. I'm just not sure

  if you should-what's the phrase you always use?-'blow him

  away' right now."

  Bossk angrily glared at the shorter bounty hunter.

  "When's there going to be a better time?"

  "Well, maybe when he's not traveling under an

  assurance of safe passage from your father." Zuckuss

  sounded even more doubtful and nervous. The breath in his

  air tubes rasped quicker and louder. "Boba Fett already

  contacted the Guild council-you know that-and Cradossk

  and the others gave him their word that he could dock at

  the perimeter station without anyone taking a shot at

  him."

  "They gave him their word." The slits in Bossk's eyes

  narrowed. "They didn't give him mine."

  "Still . . ."

  You little insect, thought Bossk. When he inherited

  the leadership of the Bounty Hunters Guild-he had already

  killed, as was Trandoshan custom, all of his father

  Cradossk's younger spawn-he intended to review the

  requirements for membership. A certain amount of guts, he

  figured, should be a prerequisite. Which meant that this

  sniveling partner that had been foisted on him would be

  out the air lock like the gnawed bones of yesterday's

  lunch.

  "Maybe," whined Zuckuss, "you should think about-this

  a little more. . . ."

  "Thinking takes too long." Bossk's claws moved across

  the control of the Hound's weapons systems. "Action gets

  things done."

  "Your father isn't going to like this."

  "That remains to be seen." The same blood ran in his

  and the old reptilian's veins; he had the comfort of

  knowing that his spawn-father was just as mean and

  vicious as himself. "For all you know, this is exactly

  what he and the rest of the Guild council are expecting

  me to do."

  "Destroy another bounty hunter without warning?"

  Incredulity pitched Zuckuss's voice higher. "That's

  hardly in line with the Hunter's Creed!"

  Bossk always felt a simmering impatience when someone

  mentioned the Creed to him. "Boba Fett has violated the

  Creed enough times," he growled, "that he deserves no

  protection from it."

  "But he's never been bound by the Creed! He's never

  been a member of the Guild!"

  "Spare me your tedious legal analysis." Bossk had

  locked the concentric rings of the tracker sight onto the

  distant craft. "If Boba Fett wants to lodge a complaint

  against me, he'll have to do it from the other side of

  the grave. If enough of him can be scraped up to put into

  one."

  He ignored the rest of Zuckuss's tiresome fretting.

  His index claw hit the main fire button, and a quick

  rumble rolled through the Hound's frame. On the screen, a

  brilliant white tracer shot toward the icon representing

  Boba Fett's ship.

  "Got him!" The shot must have caught Fett completely

  by surprise; he'd taken no evasive action at all. What a

  fool, thought Bossk with contempt. That's what you get

  for trusting other bounty hunters. The advantage of being

  considered lowlife scum by most of the galaxy's

  inhabitants was that maintaining one's reputation was

  never an issue. "You know," said Bossk, "I'm almost

  disappointed. . . ."

  "Why?" Zuckuss turned his large-lensed gaze away from

  the screen. "Because he didn't put up more of a fight?"

  "No." Bossk peered at the red numbers that had

  flashed on. "Because there's anything left of him." He

  clawed in the command for a damage assessment on the

  laser cannon's most recent target, then studied the

  result. "That ship of Fett's had some serious armor on

  it. It's still holding together." The glowing triangle

  had stopped in the middle of the screen, but hadn't

  disappeared. To have taken that kind of a hit, enough to

  punch a hole through the main deck of an Imperial battle

  cruiser, and still be in one piece, however badly

  damaged, was amazing. It didn't correspond with the

  velocities that the Slave I's engines- high-thrust but

  low-mass-capable units from Mandal Motors-could attain.

  Like most bounty hunters, Boba Fett had always prized

  speed and maneuverability over protection. Right now,

  though, Bossk didn't have time to puzzle over the

  discrepancy. "Let's go finish him off."

  The distinctive half-rounded shape of the Slave I

  filled the viewports as Bossk piloted his own craft

  toward it. He kept his claws on the controls for the

  emergency reverse thrusters in case Boba Fett, like the

  devious scoundrel he was known to be, was lying low

  inside the other ship, waiting for his own chance to take

  a shot at his attacker.

  "Looks like a clean kill to me." Zuckuss pointed to

  the cockpit's forward viewport. "Right through the center

  and out the other side. There couldn't be anyone left

  alive on that ship."

  "I'll believe that," said Bossk, "when I see Boba

  Fett's .charred corpse." He started moving the Hound's

  Tooth in toward the drifting wreckage. "I'm going

  inside."

  "Well, if you need that kind of proof . . ." Zuckuss

  gave a shrug. "I suppose you'll have to."

  He didn't even glance over at Zuckuss. "You're going,

  too."

  "Oh."

  They managed to establish a transfer connection

  between the Hound's Tooth and what was left of the Slave

  I. No atmosphere support was needed; enough of the Slave

  I's systems were still operating to have sealed off the

  central interior sections.

  "Something's wrong," said Zuckuss as he looked about

  the Slave I's empty hold.

  "Something's always wrong, as far as you're con

  cerned." This time, though, Bossk wondered whether his

  partner might be right. A sense of unease crawled across

  his scales; he drew his blaster and slowly scanned across

  the open hatchways.

  Zuckuss reached over and poked a gloved finger at one

  of the bulkheads. The thin material wobbled back and

  forth; another poke, and Zuckuss's finger went right

  through it.

  "It's a decoy." Zuckuss gave a few more exploratory

  proddings to the hold's confines, with similar results.

  "That's why there's nothing here-it's just a shell!" He

  turned toward Bossk. "No wonder your shot went right

  through. There's no real mass to have taken the hit. It's

  like shooting through flimsiplast."

  Rage boiled up inside Bossk, nearly blinding him.

  "That slimy ..." Words failed him. He stomped toward the

  dummy ship's aft section, shoulders smashing apart the

&nb
sp; sides of the flimsy hatches.

  "This is why we got a positive identification."

  Zuckuss had followed behind, into what would have been

  the cockpit if they had been aboard a real ship. He

  pointed to a beacon transmitter mounted to one of the

  space's curved walls. "Look-you can see that it's been

  programmed with the Slave I's ID profile." Zuckuss nodded

  in admiration. "Setting up something like this takes a

  lot of work; you have to force through overrides almost

  down to the subatomic level. And then to build it back up

  with the false data . . ." He stepped back from the unit.

  "Fett must have had this decoy already prepared, just

  keeping it for sometime when he'd need it." Even behind

  Zuckuss's face mask, there was a hint of amusement as he

  glanced over at Bossk. "Like when he might be heading

  into some territory where creatures might have a grudge

  against him."

  "I'll kill him." The words seethed out through

  Bossk's clenched fangs. "I swear it. I'll find him and

  I'll kill him so hard . . ."

  "Chances are pretty good, I'd say, that Fett's al

  ready slipped by us. We're wasting our time here."

  Zuckuss peered at another device, a cylinder of black

  metal studded with biosensors. "Now, this is interesting.

  I wouldn't have expected something like this aboard a

  simple decoy vessel."

  Bossk knew his partner had more of an interest in

  technological matters; right now all that moved inside

  his own head were grim fantasies of cracking bone and

  spurting blood. He didn't even bother to look around, but

  kept on brooding at the mocking stars visible through the

  port. "What is it?"

  "Offhand ... I'd say it's a bomb. . . ."

  "You fool!" Bossk whirled on his clawed heel, in time

  to see a row of lights flash into fiery life along the

  cylinder's casing. The device emitted a faint hum,

  already gaining in pitch and volume. "We've triggered'it!

  The thing's going to blow!"

  He dived for the false cockpit's hatchway; a fraction

  of a second later Zuckuss landed on top of him. Both

  bounty hunters scrambled to their feet. Through the

  hatch, Bossk could see the bomb detach itself from its

  mountings on the flimsy bulkhead; with slow, ominous

  grace, the bomb's miniaturized antigrav repulsors

  swiveled it about, bringing the scrutiny of its blind

  gaze toward them.

  "Get out of my way!" Bossk shoved his partner aside

  and sprinted for the transfer port fastened to the decoy