by Troy Denning
Raatu rotated his dish-shaped sensory antennae toward her. “Would I be able to speak with Chief Omas personally?”
“No!” Tozr said. He turned to Luke. “Look, someone assassinated the Bothan ambassador last night, and the chief of detectives wants as many of us on it as he can get. So if you want to handle this matter yourself, just say—”
“We’re the law on Coruscant,” Raatu objected. “Not the Jedi.”
The Bith whirled on his partner. “Someone killed a Jedi Master, you laserbrain!” He was so irritated that his voice warbled. “Even if we solve the case, are we going to make the arrest?”
Raatu’s snout widened in excitement. “You’re afraid of a challenge?”
“Maybe we should all work together for now,” Luke suggested. He waved at the forensics droids swarming over the near hedge. “You’ve already started collecting evidence, and the Jedi can bring some unique resources to bear.”
Raatu cast a resentful glance in Tozr’s direction, then let out a disgusted snort. “We call the shots,” he said. “Technically, you’re just observers.”
“I guess that’s better than suspects,” Mara retorted. She turned to Tozr. “Why don’t you show us the scene?”
“You’re standing on it.” Tozr nodded at the walkway, then waved at the blartree hedges lining either side. “It looks like they were waiting in ambush—”
“They?” Luke asked.
“You think that’s wrong, Skywalker?” Raatu kept his bulging eyes fixed on Luke. “Something maybe you need to share?”
“No, go on,” Luke said. The interruption had been a mistake, and not only because it had aroused Raatu’s suspicions. He could feel Mara studying him, too, wondering what he knew that she didn’t. “I was leaping to conclusions—no one has anything to gain by that.”
“Right,” Tozr said. He pointed down the walkway to a blartree on the far side, where a forensics droid appeared to be making resin casts of a set of footprints. “One ambusher was waiting there, and another over here.”
He pointed to a bush on their side of the walkway, a little closer, where another droid was casting footprints.
“What species?” Mara asked.
“Human or near-human,” Raatu answered. “The shoes made it hard to tell, but both ambushers were probably female and fairly light—the prints were small and shallow.”
“And one had a deformed foot—she didn’t put any weight on the front part of her shoe,” Tozr added. Motioning the Skywalkers to follow, he stepped through the hedge. “We think your Jedi realized something was wrong and tried to come up on them from behind.”
“Too bad they saw her coming,” Raatu said from the back of the group. “But it doesn’t look like she suffered long.”
They emerged from the hedge into a bed of knee-high chrysanthus shrubs. A pair of medical droids were waiting on the far side with a stretcher and a hoversled, while yet more forensics droids were swarming over the area, making casts of footprints and holorecording every detail of the crime scene.
In the center of the bed, still dressed in Jedi robes, lay the torso of a large Chev woman. Both lower legs and her head lay a couple of meters away. The lifeless eyes in the head were still open wide in surprise. There was no sign of her lightsaber or other equipment.
Luke’s stomach grew hollow. “This is a message.” He started to move closer to the body, but a forensics droid quickly cut him off. “She’s toying with me.”
“Toying with you?” Raatu repeated. “Who would that be?”
“In a minute.” Mara touched Luke through the Force, making sure that he felt her suspicion—and growing irritation. “How is this a message, Luke? From Lumiya?”
“I’m afraid so,” Luke said. “I think she’s telling us she can take Ben anytime she wants.”
“What does this have to do with Ben?” Mara demanded. “You’d better not be telling me you were using our son as bait.”
“Not bait, exactly,” Luke said. He had not told Mara about asking Tresina Lobi to follow Ben, in large part because of their disagreement over whether Jacen was good for him. “But I did ask Tresina to keep an eye on him, because I thought Lumiya might try to use him against me.” It looks like I was right.”
“And that’s why you told me to bring my shoto?” Mara asked, referring to the halflength lightsaber she had built as a defense against Lumiya’s lightwhip. “Because you knew Lumiya had something to do with Tresina’s death?”
Luke shrugged. “It looks like I was right.”
“Being right is no excuse,” Mara said. “You should have told me.”
Luke sighed. “I said it would be a good idea to keep an eye on him. You accused me of looking for an excuse to spy on Jacen.” He paused to collect himself and sensed the keenness of Raatu’s interest in their conversation. He gave Mara a Force-nudge, reminding her of their audience, then said, “Besides, that’s not what you’re really angry about.”
Mara flashed him a look that said this conversation wasn’t over, but took the hint. “No, I suppose it’s not.”
“I take it this Lumiya is our prime suspect?” Tozr asked. “Who is she?”
“One of Luke’s old girlfriends,” Mara said sharply.
Raatu’s antennae snapped upright. “Ah—that explains it.” He lifted his hand and dictated a note into the datamike clipped to his cuff, then gestured at Lobi’s body. “And Master Lobi is the new girlfriend?”
Instead of answering, Mara merely lifted her brow and looked to Luke.
“Not at all!” Luke answered. “Mara is—er, Mara is my wife. I don’t have a girlfriend.”
Raatu shrugged. “What do I know about you Jedi?” he asked. “With most humans, it’s usually sex or love.”
Tozr nodded sagely. “Eighty-seven percent of the time,” he said. “Spice is a distant second.”
“Not this time,” Luke insisted. “This time, it’s revenge.”
“Revenge for what?” Tozr asked. “And how is your son involved?”
“Lumiya was a Sith apprentice,” Luke explained. “She wants revenge because I shot her down and helped overthrow the Emperor. Ben is just a means to an end.”
“Sure, Master Skywalker,” Raatu said. “Whatever you say—but for now, we’ll keep all motives on the table.”
“Any idea who the accomplice might be?” Tozr asked.
Mara’s voice suddenly rose behind Luke, sharp and angry. He turned to see that she had stepped away from the group and was not quite shouting into her comlink.
“I’m a lot more than Ben’s mother, Corporal Lekauf,” she was saying. “I’m Master Mara Jade Skywalker of the Jedi order.”
The corporal’s reply was not quite audible to Luke.
“If you know who I am, then you also know that you’d better tell me why my son’s comlink is being jammed—or spend the next six weeks in a bacta tank trying to regrow all the parts I’m going to cut off.” Mara looked across the plaza toward the giant silver cylinder of the Galactic Justice Center. “I can be there in three minutes.”
There was a short pause.
“Of course this comlink is scrambled,” Mara said.
The corporal spoke again.
“He’s what?”
The corporal repeated whatever he had told her, then Mara’s anger began to fade from the Force.
“I see. Well, have him get in touch with me the moment he returns.” Mara paused, then added, “The moment, Corporal Lekauf. Do I make myself clear?”
Mara closed her comlink, then seemed surprised to find Luke and the others watching her. She frowned. “I just want to be sure that Lumiya isn’t delivering the rest of her message.”
“And you’re sure she isn’t?” Luke asked.
“Corporal Lekauf was very convincing,” she said. “Apparently, Jacen took Ben up to Crix Base.”
“Crix Base?” Raatu echoed. “What for?”
Mara shot the Rodian a don’t-be-stupid look. “He wouldn’t say.”
More properly k
nown as the General Crix Madine Military Reserve, Crix Base had been constructed during the first wave of fleet reorganizations undertaken in the wake of the war with the Yuuzhan Vong. It was a huge complex of orbital hangars currently serving as home port to the Third, Eighth, and the mysterious Ninth Fleets. It also housed the headquarters of two elite fighting units, the Space Rangers and Gamma Corps, and—as Chief Omas had revealed during their meeting last night—a brand-new Imperial-class Star Destroyer secretly assigned to GAG, the Anakin Solo.
“Maybe that’s a good thing,” Luke said, guessing that Jacen had taken Ben to the base to go on the Anakin’s shakedown cruise. “At least we know Lumiya won’t get him there.”
“Do we?” Mara asked. “Base security wouldn’t stop me.”
“No, but it would take time for you to defeat it,” Luke pointed out. He didn’t mention the possibility of a shakedown cruise because Raatu and Tozr lacked the necessary security clearance to even hear of a vessel named the Anakin Solo. “And it would entail risks you wouldn’t need to run elsewhere.”
Mara thought about this a moment, then nodded. “Okay. Your point?”
“That now is our chance,” Luke said. “Until Ben gets back, it’s just her and us.”
“And us,” Raatu reminded Luke. “This Lumiya woman is our suspect.”
“Do you think you can identify your old girlfriend?” Tozr produced a large datapad from a pocket of his wrinkled tabard and began to enter codes. “There was a lot of fog last night, but the security cams have pretty good imaging filters. We’re in a blind spot here, but we might be able to catch her on the way in.”
“I’d recognize her if I saw her.” Luke went to the Bith’s side and saw that he was calling up last night’s video feed from the anti-terrorist cams that had been installed to protect Fellowship Plaza. “But she won’t be visible.”
“She won’t?”
“No. She’s too skilled for that.” Mara joined them and held her hand out for the datapad. “May I?”
Tozr ruffled his cheek flaps, then reluctantly passed over the datapad. Mara began to punch keys, bringing up the feed from the entrance closest to the Jedi Temple. It didn’t take long to spot Ben entering the park and Master Lobi trailing him, following a discreet distance behind and taking care to remain in the shadows. But they spotted no hint of Lumiya—or of the second killer—even when Mara brought up the feeds from the next two cams.
Luke checked the time stamp at the bottom of the screen, then said, “It’s too early. Tresina’s message didn’t come in until nineteen twenty-two.”
“What message?” Raatu asked.
“She clicked in with a partial message saying she had spotted Lumiya,” Luke replied.
“What else?” Raatu demanded.
“That’s it,” Luke said. “Just that I was right, Lumiya was watching Ben. Then she cut it short.”
“But it doesn’t look like this Lumiya was following your son when he left the Temple,” Tozr said. He reached over to tap the screen of the datapad. “So she was waiting for him inside the plaza.”
“It would seem so.” The edge in Mara’s voice was as cold as the knot in Luke’s stomach. “I don’t like it. She knew where he was going to be.”
“We said this was an ambush,” Raatu reminded them. “Both killers were waiting for Master Lobi in the hedges.”
“That’s the way it looks, all right,” Luke said. He turned back to Mara. “Lumiya had to enter the plaza somewhere.”
Mara began to bring up feeds from the other entrances and run through them at high speed. Finally, a line of static flashed across the screen, and she froze the picture and checked the time code.
“Nineteen fourteen,” she reported.
“Eight minutes before Tresina’s message,” Luke said. “That fits.”
“But that’s just a power glitch,” Tozr said, still looking at the datapad.
“It’s a Force-flash,” Luke corrected. “And it can be used to prevent a security cam from recording your image as you pass through its field of view.”
Mara checked the cam code at the bottom of the screen, then asked Tozr, “Is that the Galactic City entrance?”
Tozr nodded. “That’s right.”
“Then we’re in luck,” Raatu said. Without asking, the Rodian took the datapad from Mara and called up a schematic of the cam net. “Galactic City is dignitary central. There are security cams all over.”
He scrolled through the feeds from each of the adjacent cams until he came to a line of static similar to the last one.
“Nineteen oh six.” Raatu led the way back through the hedge, then started up the walkway toward the Galactic City entrance. “Looks like we’re on the scent.”
chapter ten
Within a few hours of discovering Lumiya’s trail in Fellowship Plaza, Luke, Mara, and their two detective companions were following a Neimoidian building manager down a larmalstone hall on the three hundredth floor of the opulent Zorp House apartment tower. Luke had talked Raatu out of calling an enter-and-capture team—but just barely—by pointing out that SWAT-droids were hardly inconspicuous. Lumiya would have sensed the agitation of any bystanders who happened to see them moving into position and fled before they could capture her. But Saba Sebatyne and two other Jedi were stationed outside as backup, posing as maintenance workers on a hoversled just around the corner.
The building manager stopped next to an expensive homogoni side table, then pointed down the hall to a double sliding door of polished brass.
“That’s three hundred seven twelve,” he whispered.
“You’re sure it’s theirs?” Tozr asked. Like Raatu, the Bith was convinced that Lumiya had an accomplice. Luke and Mara were not arguing the point, especially since there had been two sets of footprints in the hedges.
The Neimoidian spread his leathery hands. “There are twenty-five thousand apartments in Zorp House,” he said. “I can’t know who lives in them all.”
“But this is where the security cam keeps malfunctioning?” Luke asked.
The Neimoidian nodded his flat-faced head. “And that is the only apartment whose door never opens when the cam is working.”
Mara commed Saba, telling her they were about to go in. Raatu drew his blaster and started down the hall, pulling the Neimoidian along beside him.
“Buzz them,” Raatu ordered. “Say you’ve been getting a smoke alert for their apartment, and you want to be sure they’re okay.”
“Me?” The Neimoidian glanced warily at Raatu’s blaster, then at Luke and Mara. “Isn’t the tenant dangerous?”
“Are you refusing to cooperate with a criminal investigation?” Raatu demanded.
“You won’t have to go inside,” Tozr said, speaking to the manager over his partner’s shoulder. “We’re just trying to find out if they’re home.”
The Neimoidian’s pace remained unenthusiastic, but he did go to the door and do as he was asked. As they waited for a response, Luke extended his Force-awareness into the apartment, searching for any glimmer of a presence that would suggest someone hiding inside. He felt nothing, but that meant little. Lumiya would certainly be capable of hiding her Force presence.
When no answer came after the second buzz, the Neimoidian said, “It seems they’re not home.” He turned to leave. “If you need me, I’ll be down in my—”
“Not yet.” Raatu caught his arm and pointed at the security panel. “The universal code.”
The Neimoidian’s relief flooded the Force. “Of course.” He extended a finger and reached for the keypad. “If you’d be kind enough to avert your eyes.”
A prickle of danger sense raced down Luke’s spine, and he and Mara cried out in unison, “Don’t!”
Luke used the Force to pull the Neimoidian’s hand away from the panel, then stepped forward. “I think it’s been altered.”
“Altered?” the Neimoidian asked. “That’s impossible. No one but our maintenance personnel can …” He let his explanation trail off when Luke ign
ited his shoto’s short blade and carefully began to cut the security panel out of the wall.
“Have you gone spacesick?” the Neimoidian cried. “Who’s going to pay for that?”
“I hope you’re not trying to deny us access to the apartment,” Raatu said. “Harboring terrorists results in a total property forfeiture.”
“Who’s harboring terrorists?” The Neimoidian threw up his hands. “Fine. I’ll write it off as tenant damages.”
Luke finished cutting, then deactivated his weapon and carefully pulled the unit out of the wall. Attached to one side was a small thermal detonator, with a thin signaling wire running from the security pad to its trigger.
“Well, at least we know we’re at the right apartment,” Mara said.
She reached over and depressed the detonator’s safety, then broke the signaling wires, detached the casing from the security panel, and slipped it into her pocket for safekeeping.
Luke held the security panel out toward the Neimoidian. “Now you can enter the code.”
The Neimoidian stared at the keypad for a moment, then began to shake and looked toward Luke. “Red seven, blue twelve, green zero zero.”
Luke entered the code, and the doors slid open. Without waiting to be dismissed, the Neimoidian spun around and tried to leave again.
Luke caught his arm. “Wait here,” he ordered. “You’ll be safe in the hall—and I’ll know if you try to leave.”
The Neimoidian’s face paled to ivory. “Of course. I’m happy to assist the Alliance any way I can.”
Raatu patted the fellow’s cheek. “That’s a good citizen. Coruscant needs more like you.”
Luke led the way into the apartment. It was smaller than he had expected and surprisingly cozy, with a sunken seating area in front of the entertainment wall. The rest of the walls were decorated with reproductions of famous artwork from across the galaxy—including a holographic copy of Leia’s own Killik Twilight. But the thing that most surprised Luke were the mirrors. There was at least one on every wall, all carefully arranged so that it was possible to see any corner of the room by looking into the appropriate combination of mirrors.