by K. W. Jeter
whole galaxy out there that's heard you're dead; most
creatures would figure you'd be just about digested
inside the Sarlacc by now. Some creatures-I don't know
who-might be happy to hear you made it out. There's a
whole bunch of others who would probably be a lot less
than happy when they find that you're walking around
again."
"That's their problem." Fett gave a slight shrug.
"And it might be a while before they find out, anyway.
Especially since you won't be telling them."
"Hold it right there." With one quick motion, Hamame
pushed Neelah aside as his other hand swung the blaster
rifle up into firing position. The shove was hard enough
to send her sprawling onto her knees, the sand and gravel
scraping her palms raw. "Get your hands up." He gestured
with the rifle's muzzle. "Step away from that box."
"This?" Boba Fett's gloved hands were already level
with his helmet. With the toe of his boot, he gave the
comm unit a kick. "It's not even operational."
"I don't care if it's as dead as you're supposed to
be." A few lights had blinked on the control panel of the
comm unit. Hamame raised the muzzle of the blaster rifle
higher, aiming from his hip straight toward Boba Fett's
helmet. "Just get away from it. You know what kind of
reputation you've got, being a tricky barve and all. I
don't want any surprises."
Fett moved toward where Dengar was standing with his
hands raised. "Careful," said Fett. "Trust me-you won't
get nearly as much for a corpse as you will for living
merchandise."
"I'll take what I can get," said Hamame. "Especially
since you don't have any choice about talking right now."
He smiled as he kept the blaster rifle trained toward
Dengar and Boba Fett. "Amazing how persuasive something
as simple as this can be when you're looking down its
barrel. There's a bunch of questions I'd like some
answers to. Profitable answers."
"Don't be an idiot." Dengar spoke up. "If you want
credits, there are easier ways of getting them than this.
And less dangerous. Just let us go, and we'll make it
worth your while."
"Oh, sure; I'll trust you to send the credits. You
can send it care of the Mos Eisley cantina." Hamame shook
his head with a grimace of disgust. "Get real. Whatever
you two could pay for your hides isn't anything compared
to what some others would be willing to." He looked
straight toward the other bounty hunter. "There are some
big players interested in Boba Fett's welfare, and I mean
to make sure that they're gonna have to make me happy
before they get to do whatever it is they want with you."
Neelah lay on the ground where she had landed,
keeping still as she listened to the exchange going on
above. The man's choice of words tipped her off. Whatever
you two could pay for your hides. He was exactly the sort
who'd forget all about a female's presence, whenever he
didn't have any specific use for her. Just as if she
didn't exist ... or couldn't do something about the
situation.
"You forgot something."
Her voice actually surprised him, as though it had
suddenly come from nowhere. The man's startled gaze swung
around and then down to her; that 1 slight movement was
echoed in his torso, turning it f toward her. That opened
up just enough of an angle for Neelah to dig the points
of her elbows into the ground, plant one boot sole flat
with her leg bent, and straighten the other leg into a
kick straight to the man's crotch. The look in his eyes
showed that he was fully aware of her now.
The man went down, falling heavily on his side, but
managing to keep some semblance of control. He jammed the
butt of the blaster rifle hard against his ribs as his
knees drew up in an instinctive fetal position. His fist
squeezed tight on the trigger, getting off a line of fire
that coursed within inches of Neelah's head as she
scrambled to her feet and ran toward the others. She had
to take another dive to get out of the way as Boba Fett
snatched up his own blaster from the pile of equipment he
had stacked up while working on the comm unit. Without
taking time to aim, Fett laid down a quick series of
shots that stitched the ground close to the other figure,
now rolling shoulder-first into a sandy hollow. His
return fire, desperate and inaccurate, was still enough
to drive Fett back toward the rocky hillside.
"In here!" Dengar grabbed Neelah's forearm and pulled
her into the safety of the shallow cave. He pushed her
behind himself, then grabbed the blaster rifle that had
been propped against the side of the opening. He braced
the weapon against himself and started firing. The
covering barrage lit up the night, sending hard-edged
shadows jittering across the rocks and sand dunes. The
shots forced the other man's head below the lip of his
shelter, giving Boba Fett enough time to break off his
own fire and sprint, back hunched low, to his companions.
From inside the cave, Neelah and the two bounty
hunters heard the raised voice of the man outside.
"Phedroi!" He wasn't shouting to them, but to some other
figure, unseen in the surrounding darkness. "Get in on
this! Now!"
The command was hardly necessary; his partner, who
must have been watching everything all along, now
directed a hot fusillade their way from an angle that
gave him a clear shot into the cave's mouth. Boba Fett
fired back as all three of them retreated farther inside.
"Now what?" Neelah looked around the rough-hewn rock
as the barrage of blaster fire lit up the space. All the
other weapons in Boba Fett's carefully hidden stash had
already been dragged outside with the other gear. Both
Fett and Dengar had their spines planted against opposite
walls of the cave, leaning forward just enough to get off
a few quick shots before snapping their heads back from
the bolts that sizzled past them. "We're stuck here-this
hole doesn't go anywhere!"
"It wasn't meant to." Boba Fett didn't look back
around at her. "You don't get anywhere by running away
from creatures like these."
"Good theory." Across the cave, Dengar held his
blaster rifle close against his chest, watching the
shifting shadows in the darkness outside, waiting for
another chance at a well-aimed shot. "Gets a little tight
when you try to put it into practice."
Boba Fett gave a small shrug, his shoulders scraping
against the rock behind him. "Don't worry about it." His
voice remained as calm and drained of apparent emotion as
before. "Everything's under control."
"What are you talking about?" From the back of the
cave, Neelah stared at the bounty hunter in dismay. She
had already come to the limit of the space, no more than
a few meters from the ope
ning in the hillside's rocky
slope. "There's no way out of here! They've got us pinned
down-they can either wait us out, till your blasters are
exhausted, or they can call in more of their friends." A
couple more shots blazed through the middle of the cave,
striking the roof above her and showering down a rain of
scorched rock shards. "Either way, they've got us!"
"As I said, don't worry."
The bounty hunter's calm response infuriated Neelah.
The thought of dying in this hole-or worse, being dragged
out of it after the pair outside had finished off Boba
Fett and Dengar-infuriated her. I didn't escape from
Jabba's palace to wind up like this. There were still too
many things she didn't know, too many questions without
answers-her real name, where she had come from, how she
had gotten here-to let bleed away into the sand. If there
had been any chance of pulling it off, she would have
grabbed one of the blasters out of the others' hands and
made a break, firing and charging headlong at the two-man
siege force outside. Anything would be better than
waiting here for the inevitable.
Dengar turned his face away from the cave opening.
"If you've got some kind of plan-" The blaster rifle's
muzzle touched his chin as he held the weapon in a
diagonal line across his chest. "I'd appreciate being let
in on it, too."
"If there was anything you could do about it, one way
or the other, I might tell you." Boba Fett fired a quick
couple of bursts outside, before glancing over at Dengar.
"But there isn't. All you have to do is wait. And you'll
see."
"That's great," said Neelah sourly. She had to raise
her voice over the noise of another fusillade streaking
through the dark and carving the back of the cave out in
sparks. Her disgust had reached the point where nothing,
not even laser bolts, could make her flinch. "All this
time I thought you were recovering from what happened to
you-only it turns out that your brains are still fried."
Boba Fett made no reply. "Hold your fire," he
instructed Dengar.
"But they've come in closer." Dengar used the rifle
muzzle to point outside. "The one that was out in the
dunes-he's moved up. He's got an even better angle now."
"That's all right. I want the two of them together.
Or close enough."
"Why?" Dengar looked puzzled. "You think you can take
both of them out? I can cover you if you want to take a
shot at it."
"That won't be necessary."
The flashes from the weapons outside were enough for
Neelah to tell that Dengar was correct; the two besiegers
were now within a couple of meters of each other,
crouching down behind a shallow lip of rock. From there,
they would be able to fire straight into the cave.
"Don't bother trying to talk to him." Neelah nodded
toward Boba Fett. "He's so far gone he can't tell when
there's no way-"
A sudden noise interrupted her. From above, as though
the night itself had split open; the sound grew from a
distant shriek to a roar that spanned the audible
frequencies. The cave itself-vibrated, as had the one
containing the Sarlacc's still-living segment; dust
sifted from cracks spidering overhead, then pebbles and
finally broken rocks large enough to cut Nee-lah's arm as
she shielded her brow. From underneath her forearm, she
could see Dengar leaning forward, blaster rifle lowered,
gazing outside in wonderment.
His shadow leaped toward her, as did that of Boba
Fett; both bounty hunters were silhouetted by the fiery
glare that had banished what was left of the night. The
encircled sand dunes were lit up as though by the fall of
Tatooine's twin suns. Beyond the cave's mouth, the two
other figures were visible, turning onto their sides and
raising their outspread hands, trying to ward off the
weight rushing down toward them.
All that happened in a few seconds, from the first
whisper and bare glow, to the half-rounded shape that
appeared just above the desert floor, balanced on the
fiery column of its landing engines. One of the two men
was able to scramble to his feet and run, making a final
dive headlong that took him beyond the quickly braked
impact of the ship. The other managed only to get to his
knees, blaster rifle pressed into the sand beneath his
palm; then the tail of the craft, nozzles blackened and
still hot, crushed him flat.
"Oh." Dengar's voice broke the sil ence, the thrusting
roar replaced by the glassy crackle of the molten sand
cooling. "It's your ship. It's the Slave I."
Neelah realized what had happened. He got through,
she thought. On the comm unit. The link between the gear
inside his helmet, the small transceiver antenna mounted
at the side, and the equipment that Dengar had fetched
back from the Mos Eisley spaceport-Boba Fett must have
gotten that up and running just before the other two men
had shown up. And all the time that the one named Hamame
had been talking, and then when he had swung the blaster
rifle up onto his hip, Fett had been sending a signal
straight to his ship, outside Tatooine's atmosphere.
Giving Slave I, as Dengar had called the craft, the exact
coordinates of this location-exact enough to bring it
right down on the heads of the two men. One of them was
still partly visible underneath the ship, a leg and an
arm showing, his weapon lying on the sand just a few
inches away from his fingers. He wouldn't be making any
deals anytime soon.
"Come on." Boba Fett moved toward the cave's opening.
"Let's get going. There's no reason to hang around here."
She didn't know whether he had been speaking to both
of them or just to Dengar. But she wasn't taking any
chances. Neelah let the two men go before, at a quick
sprint toward the Slave I ship. From the darkness of the
surrounding dunes, a volley of laser bolts scorched the
sand at their feet; the other besieger hadn't given up
yet. Neelah didn't let that stop her from following after
Boba Fett and Dengar, and quickly scooping up the dead
man's blaster rifle as she ran.
"Hold it." At the hatchway of the ship, Neelah raised
the weapon, her thumb at its firing stud. "Stop right
there."
Dengar was already inside; with one gloved hand
grasping the side of the hatch, Boba Fett turned and
looked over his shoulder, his visored gaze meeting that
of the blaster rifle's muzzle.
"You're not going anywhere without me," said Neelah
coldly.
Boba Fett's hand shot out before she could react, the
motion faster than her eye could perceive. His fist
locked onto the rifle barrel; with a quick twist of his
arm,. he had wrenched it out of her grasp. The weapon
went spinning through the air as he flung it away,
l
anding within inches of the corpse's unmov-ing arm.
They stood looking at each other for a moment. Then
Boba Fett reached down and grabbed Neelah's wrist, and
pulled her up toward the hatchway.
"Don't be stupid." Fett's grasp lightened, squeezing
the bones together. "I'm the one who decides who goes and
who stays. And right now you're too valuable a piece of
merchandise to leave behind."
A second later she was inside the ship, with the
hatchway door sliding shut behind herself. "Brace
yourself," said Fett as he headed for a metal ladder at
the side of the space. "We're leaving now."
Neelah rubbed her aching wrist. As she looked about
herself, at the bleak metal bars of the cages, she
realized-though she didn't know when, in what part of her
shrouded past-that she had been here before.
"That is just so entirely typical." SHS1-B tilted his
head unit back, watching the ship ascend swiftly into the
night sky. "You go to all that trouble fixing them up,
putting them back together, and they don't even bother to
thank you."
"Ingratitude." le-XE stood next to the taller medical
droid. They had both come creeping out of their hiding
places when the shooting had finally stopped. By now,
even the human out in the dunes had presumably left,
heading back to whatever den of iniquity he had come
from; at least, there was no longer any indication of his
presence. That was a further disappointment to both
droids; after an encounter with Boba Fett, the man might
have had some interesting wounds to take care of.
"Thoughtlessness."
"But of course, what else can you expect?" The ship's
glowing trail had already dwindled to a speck of light
among the stars. The hope had formed inside SHSl-B's
circuits-to the degree that a droid could hope-that it
and le-XE would have been taken along with the humans,
particularly the one they had nursed back to health, the
one named Boba Fett. They would have certainly been able
to earn their energy sources, what with the considerable
amount of tissue damage he had the knack for creating.
"It's their nature, I suppose. All flesh thinks it's
immortal." SHSl-B brought its gaze down from the sky to
the surrounding empty desert. "Now what?"
"Unemployment," squeaked le-XE's voice.
"Needlessness."
SHSl-B looked at its companion for a moment. Then it
extruded one of its scalpel-tipped arms and scraped a
