of the Empire, I didn't want to get into the same position with the New
Republic. Everybody knows that Jade and Karrde are just puppets."
Seeing Lando's skepticism, Doole waved his hands. "Oh, but we are
considering it, of course. In fact, I've already spoken with a minister from
the New Republic, opening up a line of communication that may eventually
lead to an alliance."
"Sounds like good news," Lando said in a noncommittal voice.
Doole led them back along the catwalk to the access doorway, where Artoo
waited. Shutting the heavy door behind them, Doole paused a moment for their
ears to adjust to the sudden silence. "As you can see, a great deal is
changing around here. You, my friend, have chosen a good time to join in."
"If I decide to invest," Lando said firmly.
"Yes, yes, if you decide to invest. The truth is, this could be even more
important, Mr. Tymmo. Since the death of Skynxnex, I'll be needing a new,
er, assistant for running the spice mines."
Lando fluffed the cape behind him in a self-important gesture. "If I'm
investing half a million credits, Doole, I'd expect to be more of a partner
than an assistant."
Doole practically kowtowed. "Of course. Trivial details can be worked out.
I'll also need a new shift boss. Maybe your companion here would be
interested in the work?" He looked at Luke, squinting with his egg-white
eye.
Luke met the Rybet's mechanical eye and stared into the focus-changing
lenses, trying to pry some secrets from Doole's brain. Luke said, "I'll have
to think about it."
Doole ignored him, focusing his attention back on Lando. "Now then, you've
seen practically everything. Is there anything else I can show you?"
Lando looked to Luke, who pondered a moment. Thoughts of the jagged moon and
its security base kept troubling him. If Han was not on Kessel itself,
perhaps he was imprisoned on the moonbase.
"Aren't you worried about attack from remnants of the Empire?" Luke asked.
"Or consolidation forces from the New Republic?"
Doole brushed aside the comment. "We have our own defenses. Don't worry."
But Luke persisted, trying to sound like a cautious business associate. "If
we're going to invest, we should see these alleged defenses. We know about
the energy shield left by the Imperial Correction Facility. But do you have
a fleet of any sort?"
Doole began to sputter, but Lando took charge. "Moruth, if there's something
you don't want us to see ..."
"No, no, it's no trouble at all. I'll just have to arrange a shuttle up to
the moonbase. I don't want you to think we have anything to hide!"
Doole bustled off to arrange for the shuttle, leaving Luke and Lando to
exchange skeptical glances.
Lando did not like the idea of leaving the Lady Luck behind on the landing
pad of the Imperial Correction Facility, but Doole continued to play the
gracious host. Luke silently tried to console him as they lifted off in the
short-range shuttle, but Lando kept looking out the small window as if he
would never see his ship again.
Kessel's moon approached, looking like a hollowed sphere with most of the
rock scooped out to house a large internal hangar and the enormous
generators and transmitters that created the protective energy shield
surrounding the planet.
After they landed, Moruth Doole strutted out of the shuttle, gesturing them
to follow with an impatience that made Luke curious. Doole stood waiting for
them as Artoo worked his way down the ramp and into the giant grotto. Behind
a transparent atmosphere-containment screen, Luke could see stars and the
trailing wisps of gas looping around the black hole cluster.
Doole seemed prouder of his defensive fleet than he was of any other aspect
of the Kessel operations. "Follow me."
He waddled across the rock floor of the hangar bay, leading them along rows
and rows of fighter craft arranged in seemingly random order. They passed
ships Luke found familiar and others so exotic he could not even identify
them. He called on his knowledge as a fighter pilot to assess the fleet:
X-wings, Y-wings, powerful Corellian Corvettes, a single B-wing, TIE
fighters, TIE interceptors, four TIE bombers, several Skipray blastboats,
gamma-class assault shuttles. In space, like prizes around the ragged
opening of the moon, hovered larger attack ships--three Carrack cruisers,
two big Lancer frigates, a single Loronar strike cruiser.
"After we drove out the Empire," Doole said, "I placed the highest priority
on a defensive fleet. I bought every fighter I could find, no matter what
its condition, and hired experienced mechanics from the Corellian sector of
Nar Shaddaa."
He grinned with his amphibian lips. "We just got the energy shield
operational again two days ago. I can heave a big sigh of relief now. With
the shields finally up and our new fleet as a backup, Kessel is safe and
independent. We can set glitterstim prices across the galaxy without
interference from anybody."
"Sure is a lot of ships," Lando agreed. "I'm impressed."
Luke recalled how much trouble the New Republic had obtaining sufficient
fighting ships during Admiral Thrawn's guerrilla campaigns. If Moruth Doole
had been pulling all the strings he could to obtain every functional ship in
the sector, no wonder supplies had been so limited.
"We should be able to defend against spice pirates, don't you think?" Doole
said.
They kept walking along the rows of parked ships. Suddenly Lando froze, and
Luke felt a surge of shocked emotion from him. Artoo began chittering
wildly. Luke looked around until he saw one modified light freighter of
Corellian manufacture--a ship that looked decidedly familiar.
"What is it?" Doole asked, looking down at the droid.
Lando took a moment to regain his composure. He rapped his knuckles on
Artoo's top dome. "Stray cosmic ray, I suppose. Occasionally these old
astromech units frazzle a circuit." He swallowed. "Could I speak with my
assistant for a moment in private, Moruth?"
"Oh, uh, of course." Doole discreetly backed away. "I'll go make sure the
mechanics are prepping the shuttle for our return to Kessel." He turned to
Luke and forced humor into his tone. "Now, don't go talking your boss out of
making an investment here!"
The moment Doole moved out of earshot, Lando nodded excitedly to the
freighter. "That's the Falcon, Luke! I know her like a krabbex knows its
shell!"
Luke looked at the ship, recognizing it himself but wanting more proof. "You
positive?"
"It's the Falcon, Luke. I owned her, remember, before Han stole her from me
in a sabacc game. If you look, you can see the streaking scar on top where I
knocked off the subspace antenna dish trying to zip away from the Death
Star."
Luke also noticed scorch marks from a recent space combat. "They could have
changed the markings, wiped the memory core. Is there any other way we can
prove it?"
"Just get me inside the cockpit. Han's made some modifications to the ship
nobody else would know a
bout."
When Doole returned, Lando said, "My assistant wants to be sure you've been
doing thorough maintenance on these ships. If you're not taking care of
them, they don't make much of a defensive fleet. Let's take a look inside
one at random ... say, that Corellian ship over there."
Doole seemed taken by surprise, glancing at the Falcon. "That one? Uh, we
have plenty of top-notch fighters you can check out. That one is something
of a ... piece of junk."
Lando waggled his finger. "If you choose the ship for us, Moruth, that
contradicts the whole point of a random inspection, doesn't it? Open this
one up. Go on."
Reluctantly, Doole worked the external controls that dropped the Falcon's
ramp. Lando took the lead, followed by Luke, while Artoo puttered so closely
behind Doole that he nearly ran over the Rybet's heels.
Inside, Lando strode to the cockpit, ostensibly to check out the systems.
Running his fingers lovingly over the stained, worn surfaces, he flicked a
few switches. "Ion-flux stabilizer checks out as optimal, so does the
stasis-field generator. Should we go back and check out the power converter?
Those things are notorious for breaking down in Corellian freighters."
Lando backed down the narrow corridor leading from the cockpit to the
central living section of the ship. Turning left toward the entry ramp, he
stepped carefully on the main deck plates. From the control panels he had
unlatched the hidden locks, and when he stomped on the appropriate plates
with his boot heel, they popped up, revealing the seven secret compartments
Han had personally installed as spice-smuggling bins beneath the floor.
"Caught you, Doole, you bastard!" Lando grabbed him by the yellow cravat at
his throat. "What have you done with Han and Chewbacca?"
Doole seemed completely astonished, flailing his splayed hands in the air.
"What are you talking about?" he croaked. As Lando glared down into the
Rybet's huge eyes, Doole slipped one of his hands into his waistcoat and
yanked free a small "hold-out" blaster pistol. Luke saw it and reacted
instantly, shoving with his mind and using the Force to hurl Moruth Doole
away from Lando.
The blaster went off, sending a deadly beam ricocheting around the Falcon's
corridor. Doole fell backward, then scrambled to his feet. He fired at them
again, but his mechanical eye had no time to focus, and the beam went wide.
Doole dove down the ramp, bellowing for the guards. His mechanical eye fell
off, clanging and rolling across the floor. He scrambled after it in a
panic, feeling blindly with his hands.
Luke smacked the door controls, raising the ramp and sealing the hatch. "We
should have kept him as a hostage," he said. "Now it's going to be a lot
more difficult to get out of here."
Outside, Doole raised the alarm. Guards scrambled through the parked ships,
drawing blasters, fastening their armor.
"Artoo, get to the computer!" Luke said.
Lando jumped into the chair behind the controls. "I doubt we can do anything
for Han anymore. We need to get back and tell Leia. She can bring a
full-scale occupation force to Kessel. We'll go over this place with a
high-res scanner."
"If we get out of here alive," Luke said.
"Artoo," Lando called, "jack into the copilot's computer and tie into the
hangar controls." The astromech droid chittered his willingness to help and
rolled toward the navicomp console.
Outside in the hangar, security horns sounded. People ran around every which
direction, not knowing where to go. Luke saw immediately that these
mercenaries had far less experience working together than the sloppiest
Imperial regiment. But the moment Lando lifted the ship off the landing-pad
floor, everyone had an unmistakable target.
"Artoo, get that door field down!" Lando shouted. Using maneuvering
thrusters, he edged the ship forward, picking up speed as they rose over the
other parked fighters. Pilots scrambled into their ships, ready for a space
battle. In orbit around the moon, the capital ships did not yet seem aware
of the situation.
Lando accelerated toward the wide hangar opening to space. They could not
see the invisible shield. Artoo bleeped and whistled, but the sounds were
not positive. "Get the shield down!" Lando insisted.
Artoo's interface jack whirred as he worked with the hangar bay's computer,
trying to skirt the password controls.
"We need the shield down now, Artoo!" Luke said.
The Falcon's rear thrusters kicked in and they lurched forward, gaining
speed. "Come on," Lando said to the ship. "You can do it. Do it one last
time for Han."
Artoo bleeped in triumph a moment before they shot through the opening. Luke
flinched, but the shield dropped just in time. Alert lights began to wink on
in the big battleships riding in orbit. Weapons systems warmed up, targeting
modules locked on to aimpoints.
The Millennium Falcon soared into open space as, behind them, the Kessel
forces scrambled in pursuit.
Hunched in his dark robes, Tol Sivron came to visit Qwi Xux in her research
room. He drew in a long, hissing breath, and his head-tails twitched with
uneasiness as he stared at her setup. The Twi'lek administrator gave the
impression of never having set foot inside an actual laboratory
before--which seemed odd to Qwi, since he was in charge of the entire
installation.
Qwi stopped her musical calculation with an atonal squawk. "Director Sivron!
What can I do for you?"
Tol Sivron demanded regular written reports, feasibility studies, and
progress summaries; he hosted a weekly meeting among the scientists to share
their ideas and their work in a frank and stimulating exchange.
But Tol Sivron did not make a habit of visiting.
He shuffled around the room, poking at things, kneading his knuckles, and
looking at the standard equipment as if deeply interested. He brushed his
clawed fingertips over the calibration gauge of a weld-stress analyzer,
muttering, "Mmm hmmm, good work!" as if Qwi herself had invented the common
instrument.
"I just came to commend you for your consistently fine efforts, Dr. Xux."
Sivron stroked one of the vermiform head-tails draped around his neck; then
his voice grew stern. "But I hope you are about finished with your endless
iterations on the Sun Crusher project. We're past Grand Moff Tarkin's target
date, you know, and we must move soon. I insist you write your final report
and get all the documentation in order. Submit it to my office as soon as
possible."
Qwi blinked at him in annoyance. She had submitted five separate "final"
reports already, but each time Sivron had asked her to rerun a particular
simulation or to retest the structural welds in the Sun Crusher's quantum
armor. He never gave any reasons, and Qwi got the impression that he never
read the reports anyway. If it had been up to her, the Sun Crusher would
have been ready for deployment two years ago. She was getting bored with it,
wanting to move on to a new design she could start from scratch and get back
to the enjoyable, imaginative work again.
"You'll have the report by this evening, Director Sivron!" She would just
send a repeat of the last one.
"Good, good," Sivron said, stroking his head-tail again. "I just wanted to
make sure everything is in order."
For what? Qwi thought. We're not going anywhere. She hated it when the
administrators and the military types kept sticking their noses in her work.
Without another word Tol Sivron left.
Qwi stared after him, then activated the rarely used privacy lock on her
door. Returning to her imaging terminal, she continued trying to crack the
wall of passwords in front of her. She did like challenges, after all.
Qwi could not stop thinking about what Han Solo had told her. At first it
was a new puzzle to solve, but then she finally began paying attention. To
her all the prototypes she developed were abstract concepts turned into
reality through mathematical music and brilliant intuitions.
She kept telling herself that she did not know, or care, what her inventions
were used for. She could certainly guess, but she tried not to. She didn't
want to know! She blocked those thoughts before they could surface. But Qwi
Xux wasn't stupid.
The Death Star was supposed to be used to break apart depleted, dead planets
to provide access to raw materials deep in the core. Right! Had she thought
up that excuse afterward? The World Devastators were supposed to be immense
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