by James Luceno
“Very good, sir.”
Through the window of the taxi, Zeerid saw Karson’s Park below. Benches surrounded a large pond in which greenbeaks swam. Walking paths zagged through a small wood. Picnic tables dotted the grass here and there. Public athletic courts, most of them cracked but still usable, formed the geometric meeting grounds where the neighborhood’s youth met and played.
Zeerid checked his chrono as the aircar set down. Right on time.
He paid the driver, threw on a billed hat, unloaded the hoverchair, and pushed it before him as he entered the park. The chair felt light in his hands, though he thought he might just have been excited. He headed straight for the walkway and benches around the pond.
Ahead, he saw Nat pushing Arra in her wheelchair. Arra was tossing to the greenbeaks the processed feed sold by the utility droids that cleaned the park. She laughed as the greenbeaks quacked and squabbled over the feed nuggets. To Zeerid, the sound of her joy was like music.
He spared a quick glance around, seeing many pedestrians and a few droids but nothing that gave him concern.
“Nat!” he called, and waved to them. “Arra!”
He thought his voice sounded different planetside than it did on Fatman, and he approved of the change. It wasn’t the voice of a spicerunner, not even the voice of a soldier. Instead, it was the gentle voice of a father who loved his daughter. Arra made him better. He knew that. And he needed to make sure he saw her more often.
Nat turned Arra’s chair and both of their eyes widened at the sight.
“Daddy!” Arra said.
Of all the words in the galaxy, that was the one he liked to hear most. She wheeled toward him, leaving Nat and the still-squabbling greenbeaks behind.
“What is that?” she asked as she came closer. Her eyes were wide, her smile bright.
He knelt down and scooped her out of her chair in a hug. She felt tiny.
“It is my surprise for you,” he said.
Arra’s face pinched in a question. “And what is that?” she asked, tapping the armor vest he wore under his clothes.
He felt his cheeks warm. “Something for work. That’s all.”
She seemed to accept that. “Look, Aunt Nat. A hoverchair!”
“So I see,” said Nat, walking up behind her.
“Is it for me?” Arra asked.
“Of course it is!” Zeerid answered.
Arra squealed and gave Zeerid another hug, dislodging his hat. “You are the best, Daddy. Can I try it out right now?”
“Sure,” Zeerid said, and set her down in it. “The controls are right here. They’re intuitive, so—”
She manipulated the controls and was off and flying before he could say another word. He just watched her go, smiling.
“Hello, Nat,” he said.
His sister-in-law looked worn, too young for the lines on her face, the circles under her eyes. She wore her brown hair in a style even Zeerid knew was five years out of date. Zeerid wondered how he must look to her. Probably just as worn.
“Zeerid. That was very nice. The chair, I mean.”
“Yeah,” Zeerid said. “She seems to be enjoying it.”
Arra flew the hoverchair after some greenbeaks and they fled into the water.
“Careful, Arra!” he called.
“I’m fine, Daddy,” she said.
He and Nat stood there, next to each other but with an abyss between them.
“Been a while,” Nat said. “She needs to see you more often.”
“I know. I’m trying.”
She seemed to want to say something but held off.
“How’s work?”
“I am a waitress in a casino, Zeerid,” she scoffed. “An old waitress. Work is hard. My feet hurt. My back hurts. I’m tired. And our apartment is the size of an aircar.”
He could not help but take all of it personally. “I will try to send more.”
“No, no.” She waved to punctuate the words. “If it wasn’t for the credits you do send, we’d go hungry. It’s not that. I just … feel like I’m on a treadmill, you know? Can’t stop running but I’m going nowhere.”
He nodded. “I hear you.”
Arra called to him. “Look, Daddy!”
She flew the hoverchair in a tight circle, laughing the whole way.
“Careful, Arra,” he said, but smiled.
“Wait until you’ve got the hang of that, Peashooter,” Nat said.
They stood together in silence for a time. Then Nat’s voice turned serious. “How did you afford the chair, Zeerid?”
He did not look at her, fearful that she’d see the ambivalence in his face.
“Work. What else?”
“What kind of work?”
He did not like the tone of the question. “Same as always.”
She turned on him, and the stern expression on her face channeled Val so well he almost crumbled.
“You’ve been sending us one hundred, two hundred credits a month for almost a year now. Today you show up with a hoverchair that I know costs more than the aircar I drive.”
“Nat—”
“What are you into, Zeerid? You have this ridiculous hat on, armor.”
“The same—”
“Do you think I’m blind? Stupid?”
“No, of course not.”
“I can guess at what you do, Zeerid. Arra has already lost her mother. She can’t lose her father, too. It will crush her.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” he said.
“You’re not hearing me. You think she’d rather have legs than have her father? That hoverchair more than you? She glows when she knows you are coming to see us. Listen to me, Zeerid. Whatever you’re doing, give it up. Sell that ship of yours, take a job planetside, and just be a father to your daughter.”
He wished he could. “I can’t, Nat. Not yet.” He turned to face her. “One more run and everything changes. One more.”
She stared back at him, her skin pale from too little sun and inadequate nutrition. “I told her not to marry a soldier, much less a pilot.”
“Val?”
“Yes, Val.”
“Nat—”
“You don’t know when to stop, Zeerid. You never have. All of you, you put on that armor, get in that cockpit, and you think you’re invulnerable, that a blaster can’t kill you, that your ship can’t get shot out of the sky. It can, Zeerid. And if yours does, it’ll hurt Arra more than the accident that took her legs.”
He could think of nothing to say because he knew she was right. “I’m going to buy her a sweet ice. You want one?”
She shook her head and he walked toward the concession stand. He felt Nat’s eyes on his back the whole way.
Vrath watched Zeerid walk away from the woman, his sister-in-law, and head to the vendor stands to get a sweet ice for his daughter.
His daughter.
Small wonder that Zeerid operated with such concern for being followed. Vrath knew what an organization like The Exchange, or one like the Hutts, could do to a man with a family. A young child was a lever waiting to be pulled, the marionette strings to make a man dance.
A man living the life Zeerid and Vrath lived had to have either enough power—or a patron with enough power—to protect his family, or his family was at risk. Zeerid had neither power nor patron. Vrath respected the fact that Zeerid had managed to keep his daughter out of the game for so long. No mean feat.
But now she was in it, a piece on the board.
Vrath would not use her, of course. As a matter of professional pride, Vrath never resorted to threats or harm to a man’s family, much less a child. It lacked precision, something a bomber pilot would do, not a sniper.
And Vrath was still a sniper in his soul. One shot, one kill, no collaterals.
He turned away from Nat and Arra to locate Zeerid and found him standing directly behind him, a red sweet ice in one hand, a green in the other, and eyes like spears.
“Do I know you, friend?” Zeerid said. His eyes too
k in Vrath’s clothes, his bearing.
Vrath slouched some, adopted as harmless a look as he could. “I don’t think so. You from around here?”
Zeerid took a step closer, angling his body for a strike.
Vrath had to fight down the instinct to shift his own stance to eliminate the off-angle of Zeerid’s approach. Zeerid would recognize it. And Vrath could not afford to kill Zeerid now, not until he used Zeerid to locate the engspice.
“What were you looking at, friend?” Zeerid asked.
“Daddy!” Arra called, but Zeerid’s eyes never left Vrath’s face.
“I was just watching the greenbeaks. I like to feed ’em.” He reached into his pocket and grabbed a handful of the feed pellets he’d purchased from one of the park’s droids.
“Daddy, I want the green ’ice!” Arra said.
Seeing the feeding pellets, Zeerid visibly relaxed, though not entirely. “Of course,” he said. “Sorry, pal.”
“Is that your daughter?” Vrath asked, nodding at Arra.
“Yes,” Zeerid answered, and the hint of a smile curled his lips.
“She seems very happy,” Vrath said. “Have a great day, sir.”
Vrath walked past Zeerid and fell in with the runners, bikers, and other sentients using the park. As he did, he chided himself for taking his eyes off Zeerid. The man clearly had a nose for trouble.
Zeerid turned to watch the man walk away. Something about him felt off, but Zeerid could not quite put his finger on it. He’d seemed overly interested in Arra and Nat, and he’d had a coldness to his eyes, despite the stupid grin.
“Daddy! It’s melting!”
Arra steered the chair over to him and he handed over the sweet ice, wiping his hands clean on his jacket.
“Thank you,” she said and took a bite. “Mmm. Deeeeeeelicious!”
He smiled at her, and when he looked back, he could not spot the man anywhere.
“Who was that?” Nat asked when she walked over.
Zeerid absently offered Nat the other sweet ice, still looking in the direction the man had walked. “I don’t know. Nobody.”
Nat must have picked up on Zeerid’s concerns. “Are you sure?”
“Yes,” he said, and forced a smile. “I’m sure.”
Only he wasn’t.
“I think I’ll walk you both home, okay?”
“Hooray!” Arra said.
“What is it?” Nat asked. She still had not taken the sweet ice.
“Nothing,” he said, not wanting to alarm her. “Can’t I walk my girls to their door?”
“I’m not walking,” Arra said, grinning. “I’m flying.”
Aryn’s Raven came out of hyperspace. She’d left her robes and her regrets back on Alderaan.
“Straight on to Vulta, Tee-six.”
The astromech took over the flying and the Raven knifed through space. Vulta appeared through the canopy, a lone planet circling its star. The sun’s light glinted off the many artificial satellites in orbit and the space traffic moving to and from the planet.
“Ping planetary control with our official Republic credentials,” she said to T6. “Request a pad at the Yinta Lake spaceport.”
The droid whistled an affirmative.
Aryn would soon know if her absence had been noted. If so, her credentials would probably be no good.
T6 gave a satisfied series of beeps as landing instructions scrolled across Aryn’s HUD.
“Take us down, Tee-six. And also link into the planetary directory and find me an address for Zeerid Korr.”
She had not seen Zeerid in years. He could be dead. Or he might be unwilling to help her. They’d been good friends: Aryn had been the only person Zeerid had told about his wife’s death before he’d mustered out. Aryn had helped him come through the initial shock. And she could still feel the intense grief, the despair he’d endured upon hearing the news. It was similar to what she’d felt when Master Zallow had died. Zeerid had been grateful for her sympathetic ear, she knew. But she was going to be asking him for a lot.
T6 beeped a negative. No Zeerid Korr in the directory.
Aryn clenched a fist as the planet grew larger.
“His wife had a sister. Natala … something. Natala … Yooms. Try her, Tee-six.”
In moments T6 had an address. She lived near the lakeshore in Yinta Lake and had legal guardianship over a nine-year-old girl named Arra Yooms.
“Arra?”
Aryn knew Arra was the name of Zeerid’s daughter. If Natala had custody of the girl, then Zeerid could very well be dead. Her plan began to crumble. She had no one else to whom she could turn. If Zeerid was dead, then so, too, was her opportunity to avenge Master Zallow.
She had no choice but to try. She did not know how she could get through the Imperial blockade at Coruscant without help.
The Raven descended through the atmosphere in a shroud of heat and flame. When she emerged into the blue sky of Vulta’s stratosphere, she could see below them the large blue oval of Lake Yinta and the ring of urbanism that surrounded it.
T6 put them into the flow of the sky traffic, and they headed for their landing pad in Yinta Lake. From there, she’d find Natala.
Zeerid felt like a father as he walked Nat and Arra back to their apartment near the lake. He felt like a failure when he saw what a hole it was. They lived in one of the mansions converted to subsidized housing by the planetary authority. Rust, broken glass, chipped stone, addicts, and drunks seemed omnipresent.
“It looks worse than it is,” Nat said to him, softly enough that Arra could not hear.
Zeerid nodded.
“Did you hear what happened on Coruscant?” Nat said, apparently wanting to change the subject. “It’s all over the ’Net.”
“I heard.”
“How do you think it will turn out?”
He shrugged.
As they walked, he kept his eyes open for anyone suspicious but saw no one. Still, he could not shed the feeling that something had gone awry. The man in the park just smelled wrong.
They took a rickety lift up several floors. Zeerid did not enter the apartment and Nat did not invite him in. Arra turned her hoverchair, maneuvering in the small space like a pro.
“You are a pilot’s daughter,” he said.
She beamed. “I love you, Daddy.”
“And I love you.”
He lifted her out of the chair and squeezed her so hard she squealed. He felt the absence of her legs like a hole in his heart. He didn’t want to let her go but knew he must.
He could see a bit of the tiny two-room flat over Nat’s shoulder. One window, a galley kitchen.
“Will you come back soon, Daddy?” Arra asked as he lowered her back into the chair.
“Yes,” he said, as unequivocal as a blaster shot. “Soon.” He stole her nose and she giggled. “I’ll give this back to you when I return.”
Nat, standing beside her, stroked her hair. “Time for homework, Arra. Then bedtime.”
“All right, Aunt Nat. Bye, Daddy,” she said, her eyes watering. She was trying to be strong.
Zeerid knelt. “I will be back soon. Within days. All right?”
She nodded and he mussed her hair. She turned the hoverchair and headed for her room.
He filed the image of her face in the file cabinet of his memory.
“She loves that chair,” Nat said. “You did good, Zeerid.”
“I’m going to get you both out of here,” he said, determined to make it so. “After this next job—”
Nat held up a hand and shook her head. “I don’t want to hear about the job. I just want you to promise that you won’t take unnecessary chances.”
“I promise,” he said.
“We’ll see you when you come back. We’re fine here, Zeerid. It doesn’t look like much, but we’re fine.”
He reached into his jacket and took out the bearer card. “There are over thirteen thousand credits on this. Take it. Buy something nice for you and Arra.”
She eyed the card as if it might bite her. “Thirteen thousand …” She looked him in the face. “How’d you come by this amount of money?”
He ignored the question and held up the card until she took it.
“Thank you, Nat. For everything.” He hugged her, the gesture as awkward as always. She felt too thin, as threadbare as an old sweater. He vowed to himself then and there that he was getting both of them out of the slum. He’d do whatever he had to do.
“Take care of yourself, Z-man,” Nat said.
“I will. And I’ll be back soon.”
To that, she said nothing.
The moment the door closed and the locks clicked into place, he flipped the switch in his brain. Zeerid the father fled before Z-man the soldier and smuggler.
The man at the park had been all wrong, from his hair, to his clothes, to the coldness in his eyes. He could have been nobody. Or he could have been somebody.
Zeerid decided that he would linger in the apartment building for a while, out of sight, just to be sure Nat and Arra were safe.
He took station on their floor and settled in. He hadn’t done sentry duty since he was a new recruit. Felt good, though.
Vrath sat in the aircar taxi on the street outside the decrepit apartment building. The smell of rotten fish and dirty lake filled the air. He watched for a long time, monitoring Zeerid’s movements with the tracker. Zeerid had stopped moving. Perhaps he shared an apartment there with Nat and Arra.
He gave it a while longer, then decided to take a look. He paid the droid driver, hopped out of the aircar, dodged the few ramshackle speeders and the public speeder bus that flew low through the street, and headed across to the apartment building.
Zeerid’s eyes adjusted to the dim lights that flickered intermittently in the hallway. The door to Nat and Arra’s flat was about halfway down the corridor. There was no other way in or out of the apartment. All he needed to do was take a boresighting down the hall.
The far end of the hallway ended in a cracked glass window. The near side ended in the lift and a door to the stairs. Other than scaling the building from the outside, the lift and the stairs were the only way onto the fourth floor. He could cover both.
He thought about just lingering in the hallway and putting the muzzle of his blaster into the belly of anyone who looked at him sideways. But that wouldn’t do. He did not want to draw too much attention to himself and he did not want to cause a scene unnecessarily. He finally decided to take station on the emergency stairwell to the side of the lift. He propped the door open so he could see the lift, the hall, and the stairs.