Hard Merchandise

12

"We've found them."

Those words came from the comm unit speaker in Kuat of Kuat's private quarters. The felinx watched from its silken-lined basket beneath Kuat's lab bench as he turned toward the voice of the absent Kodir of Kuhlvult, security head for all of Kuat Drive Yards.

"I'm not so much concerned about 'them.' The person we need to locate is Boba Fett." Kuat regarded the view of stars and construction docks visible from the curv-ing bank of transparisteel panels near the bench. "If you haven't found him, I don't even want to hear your report."

"Don't worry," said Kodir. "I wouldn't have put the link through if I hadn't succeeded at the task given to me."

Kuat made no reply. Even though Kodir wasn't physi-cally present at the Kuat Drive Yards corporate head-quarters, he had as clear an image of her as if she were standing before him. She had all the haughty bearing of a member of one of Kuat's ruling families, combined with the intimidatingly honed athletic grace that had made her such a suitable candidate for the position she now held. That, plus a sharp-edged mental acuity equal to his own, evoked a small measure of unease in Kuat. In truth, he'd had a better personal relationship with Fenald, his previous security head; the only problem being that Fen-ald had been a traitor, to both Kuat and to Kuat Drive Yards, by being part of the scheme to wrest control of the corporation away from him and turn it over to the greed-iest and most ambitious factions among the ruling fami-lies. If it hadn't been for Kodir of Kuhlvult, Fenald and the conspirators he'd fallen in with would very likely have succeeded in their plans—and the corporation that Kuat of Kuat and his predecessors had treasured and protected for so many generations would now be on its way to utter ruin. No one from the planet Kuat's other ruling families had the experience and cunning to cir-cumvent all of Emperor Palpatine's schemes to break Kuat Drive Yards' independence and make it a mere component of the Empire. So Kodir had earned both Kuat's respect and his trust, no matter how much her tough, even brutal mannerisms grated against his own instincts. It's a brutal universe, Kuat had told himself more than once. And he had certainly played his own hard game of survival in it. Perhaps what disturbed him about Kodir was a certain essential resemblance to his own ruthlessness in service to the corporation.

"So now we know where Boba Fett is." Kuat spoke into the comm unit mike on top of the lab bench.

"Is he still aboard the ship called the Hound's Tooth}"

"That's how I found him." A tone of self-satisfaction was audible in Kodir's voice. "The Hound's Tooth was spotted by one of our paid spies, at the edge of one of the remoter border systems. Then it vanished again; obvi-ously, Boba Fett was piloting a course designed to throw off any trackers. But the sighting of the Hound's Tooth was close enough to a certain navigational sector that had figured prominently at one time in Boba Fett's activi-ties that I took a chance at keeping it under more inten-sive surveillance. And sure enough, the Hound's Tooth showed up there."

"Indeed." Kuat nodded to himself. That was the type of work, both methodical and insightful, that he had ex-pected from Kodir. "So where is it?"

"It's out by where the arachnoid assembler Kud'ar Mub'at used to have its web, before it was destroyed by Prince Xizor. And the fragments of the web had drifted a bit since then, so Boba Fett apparently had to do some searching of his own to find them. But he did; by the time my ship got close enough to do some surreptitious moni-toring of his activities, he and his companions had recon-structed most of the web."

"Interesting." Rubbing his chin, Kuat wondered what that piece of information meant. The death of the assem-bler Kud'ar Mub'at at the hands of Prince Xizor's Black Sun cleanup crew had previously been something of a re-lief to him. Kud'ar Mub'at had had too much knowledge of Kuat's own dealings with the assembler; those kinds of secrets were better kept by the dead than by any living creature, no matter how well paid for silence. If Xizor hadn't taken care of Kud'ar Mub'at, then the chances would have been good that Kuat of Kuat would have been forced to, eventually. "Were you able to discern ex-actly what they were up to?"

"Negative on that," came Kodir's reply. "I ordered our ship to pull back from the sector when another vessel was detected, approaching from directly opposite us. We did manage to ID that ship; it's the freighter that Kud'ar Mub'at's successor Balancesheet is now using as its base of operations."

"Do you think there was some kind of arranged ren-dezvous between Balancesheet and Boba Fett?"

"I'm pretty sure there wasn't." Kodir's voice sounded grimly amused. "Balancesheet has had that clunky old freighter of his outfitted with some decent armaments; it opened fire on both the reconstructed web and the Hound's Tooth alongside. Things got a little confused af-ter that, but right now it seems as if Balancesheet and Boba Fett have sorted it out; Fett and his associates are currently aboard Balancesheet's freighter."

"Any way of finding out what they're discussing?"

"Negative again," replied Kodir. "Balancesheet val-ues its privacy as much as Kud'ar Mub'at did. That freighter is shielded against every distance-operational spy apparatus we've got. Short of cracking open the hull with one of our own laser cannons, that meeting is com-pletely secured."

"Too bad." For both myself—and Boba Fett, thought Kuat. If there had been some way of determining exactly what the bounty hunter was discussing and scheming with the arachnoid assembler, Kuat would have been able to more accurately assess what kind of threat Boba Fett's continued existence represented to him and to Kuat Drive Yards. But as it was, he'd have to err on the side of caution...

And eliminate Fett.

"That's the situation at this point." Kodir's voice broke into his thoughts. "I await your decision about what to do next."

"Have you got this freighter of Balancesheet's in your weapon-sights?"

"Not yet," said Kodir. "We're out of range for that. But that problem can be corrected very shortly."

"Then do so." Kuat had already made his determina-tion about the bounty hunter's fate. "And when you've locked on to the target, proceed with its destruction. I want complete annihilation of the freighter and all living creatures aboard it."

"We could be a little more surgical in our approach. It wouldn't be too difficult to disable the freighter, then board it and extract Boba Fett without harming the oth-ers. We could eliminate him alone—that is, of course, if there were some value to be placed on the lives of the others with him." Kodir expanded on the option she had presented. "Balancesheet, for instance; the assembler has its uses for us."

"Not enough of them." Kuat shook his head, though there was no way that Kodir could see him. "Not enough to outweigh the disadvantages of having it remain as a witness to our actions against Boba Fett. I don't want any of this traced back to Kuat Drive Yards. So proceed as I indicated."

"Very well. I'll report back when the operation is con-cluded." From the faraway ship, Kodir broke off the comm unit connection.

In the resulting silence, Kuat of Kuat could hear the felinx asking for attention, its voice a mere guttural whine. He reached down and scratched behind its ears.

"Believe me," said Kuat. "It'll be for the best..."

"Not so fast," said Suhlak. "There's a couple of other things that have to be taken care of before we go any-where."

The hunt saboteur hadn't moved toward the transfer hatch that would have led both him and Boba Fett to his waiting Headhunter. Fett and the others aboard Balance-sheet's freighter gazed at him impatiently.

"Now what's the problem?" Neelah set her hands on her slim hips. "I thought we already figured out, we don't have time to waste."

"Look, I'm just trying to help you out here. So you'll be like a satisfied customer and all. I've got a reputation to maintain," Suhlak said testily. "If all you wanted was for me to get this bounty hunter here to Tatooine, quick and quiet, I can take care of that for you. But you want a roundtrip; you want me to bring Fett back here as well. Now that's going to be kind of hard for me to pull off if this whole freighter and everybody aboard it is gone by the time Fett and I return."

"Why would we be gone?" Puzzled, Dengar stared at the hunt saboteur. "Where would we go?"

"You wouldn't have gone anywhere, pal, except up in flames." Suhlak shook his head in disgust. "None of you even knows what's sitting out there, keeping a watch on your every move. But there's a light cruiser, top of the li ne, from the Kuat Drive Yards, keeping surveillance on this tub right now. Matter of fact, it's a KDY ship; I iden tified it when I snuck past it. It's the Kuat Drive Yards' main security enforcement vessel, and it's armed and very dangerous."

"It didn't spot you?" Boba Fett gestured toward the hull of the freighter and the empty expanses of space out-side it. "They don't know you're here?"

"Naw; I've got my ways of sliding past something like that—especially when their attention is fixed on some-thing else, like this freighter here."

Neelah looked over at Fett. "What do you think they want?"

"Given the fact that the last time any KDY ships got this close to me, they unloaded enough bombs to atom-ize a few square kilometers of the Dune Sea, I'd expect that this one isn't going to be any friendlier."

The arachnoid assembler Balancesheet had scurried over to its freighter home's detect and tracking screens. "It would appear," it announced, "that not only is our young friend correct about the presence of this other ship, but that we also have a limited time in which to de-termine what to do about it. It's come within range of my ship's scanners, and is continuing to head this way."

"All right," said Boba Fett with rapid authority, "here's the deal. I can get away with Suhlak, just like we planned, but this freighter won't be able to either outshoot or out-run that KDY ship. But the KDY security forces aboard it undoubtedly are bearing down this way, because they figure I'm aboard here." He pointed to Dengar and Nee-lah. "You two—get back aboard the Hound's Tooth and head out, full thrusters, to open space and prepare for a hyperspace jump to the Oranessan system. They'll as-sume that it's me aboard the Hound, and they'll follow after you."

"But then what?" Dengar pointed with his thumb toward the cruiser's image on the screen. "If we go into hyperspace, that KDY ship won't be able to follow us."

"They will, if they know your destination. Before you make the jump, fire off a comm transmission with a minimum encryption level, giving the details of the ren-dezvous point. Suhlak and I will already be out of range, but the KDY ship will be able to pick it up. When you come out of hyperspace, it'll be right behind you. Then all you'll have to do is stay out of its reach until I'm fin-ished with my business on Tatooine and can hook up with you again. Then we can lose them for good."

Dengar shook his head. "I won't be able to elude that KDY ship for very long, out there in the Oranessan sys-tem. Wouldn't it be simpler to jump there, and then as soon as the KDY ship shows up, make another quick jump to some other point that we can use for a ren-dezvous? That way, we'd already have lost them."

"Only for as long as it would take KDY security to tap their information sources and find out just where you were waiting for me. And if I were delayed getting back from Tatooine, you'd still have the same problem of eluding the KDY ship. In the Oranessan system, at least, there'd be a chance of pulling that off." Boba Fett made a quick sharp gesture with the flat of his hand. "Maybe not forever—but then, all you have to do is elude them for long enough. And that way, Suhlak and I would have an even better chance of making it to Tatooine without getting intercepted."

"Smart." Suhlak nodded in appreciation. "I always like improving my odds."

"Oh, I approve as well." Balancesheet had scuttled back onto the metal ledge alongside the larger figures. "You can just draw the Kuat Drive Yards ship away from here, and I won't have anyone firing laser cannons at me. Much better."

"Right—and you won't be tempted to find some way of turning me over to them." Boba Fett gestured toward the transfer hatchway. "Now it's really time to get going."

Moments later, Neelah and Dengar were back aboard the Hound's Tooth. In the forward viewport of its cockpit, the smaller shape of Suhlak's modified Z-95 Headhunter had already shot away, detection by the approaching KDY cruiser blocked by the imposing bulk of Balancesheet's freighter. The flare from the Headhunter's main thruster engines dwindled to a streak of light, then was gone.

"Hold on—" In the pilot's chair, Dengar grabbed the Hound's thruster controls. "I'm not waiting around, either."

Neelah braced herself in the corner formed by the cock-pit's two rear bulkheads. The sudden acceleration, as Den-gar slammed the controls, forced her spine and the back of her head against the metal behind her. Another burst, from the ship's side jets, threw her against the hatchway.

"What're you doing?" She had grabbed the back of the pilot's chair to keep from being knocked off her feet. Past Dengar, she could see out the forward viewport; a few remaining scraps of Kud'ar Mub'at's once-living web scattered to either side of the Hound as it gained speed, heading for a larger shape ahead. "You're going straight toward the KDY ship!"

"If I'm supposed to be chased by something with guns," said Dengar between gritted teeth, "I want to make sure I've got their attention!"

The combined acceleration of the two ships ate up the distance between them; at the last possible moment, and as the cruiser fired off a bolt from its prow-mounted can-non, Dengar banked the Hound's Tooth to one side and above the other ship's hull, clearing it by what seemed to Neelah to be less than a few meters.

Below the Hound, the cruiser's rear thruster exhausts shot past. Dengar kept the ship at full throttle, taking them out into empty space, with nothing but stars ahead of them. Reaching into one of the Trandoshan-sized grooves on the control panel, he toggled onto one of the display screens the image from the stern viewport. Far off in the distance was Balancesheet's untouched freighter; closer was the KDY cruiser, wheeling itself around to fol-low them.

"Good." Dengar backed off the thruster controls a fraction of a centimeter. "Now all we have to do is fire off our comm transmission—"

Neelah watched as he picked up the comm unit mike, then listened as he gave the rendezvous coordinates to the now-vanished Headhunter with Fett and Suhlak aboard. A moment later, the Hound's Tooth was in hyperspace as well.

"Now we're all set." Dengar leaned back, hands be-hind his head.

"You think so, huh?" Neelah had managed to stay on her feet through the Hound's violent maneuvers. Hands braced against the back of the pilot's chair, she leaned down closer to Dengar. "Did you ever stop to think about what happens when we reach the Oranessan sys-tem? And if Boba Fett doesn't show up? Then we're sup-posed to just hang around there and wait, I suppose. Seems to me, that's a perfect opportunity for this KDY cruiser to eventually catch up with us and sort us out into a lot of little pieces."

Dengar's face fell. "You're right ... I didn't think about that."

"Great." Neelah straightened up and shook her head. "Boba Fett's the one with a clear shot right now, and we've got the heavy artillery chasing us. That worked out, all right—for him. Too bad for us if anything hap-pens to him—or he decides to change his plans again."

"I guess ..." Dengar had been hit hard by Neelah's words; he spoke slowly, his thoughts obviously turned to the KDY ship, heading for the same destination. "I guess we'll just deal with it when we get there ..."