He was hanging upside down under the Falcon"s power core. The scarred metal looked as if it hadn"t been touched, but he wanted to be certain.
On the way back to Skip 1, he had run a scan of the Falcon to make sure Seluss, the Glottalphib, or Davis hadn"t tampered with it. He could see no obvious sabotage, but that didn"t mean it wasn"t there.
He hated being on the Run. It made him even more paranoid than usual.
He needed to get some information about Davis and about the Jawas, but he would do that after Chewie came back. Han wasn"t about to leave the Falcon again. He suspected he would need to make a quick getaway.
Nandreeson wasn"t the type to give up.
The hatch hissed. Han grabbed his blaster, and pulled himself out of the well near the power core. Then he heard Chewie bark his name.
"Back here, Chewie!" Chewie roared and Han sighed. Once, just once, he"d like to do what he wanted, when he wanted.
"I"ll go into the Skip when I"m done here," he said.
Chewie roared again.
"Impatient sack of bones," Han muttered. He climbed across the well and onto the floor grid. "I"m coming!" He rounded the corner to find that Chewie had already left the Falcon. The hatch was still open. Han ducked out.
Chewie stood at the bottom of the ramp.
"You could have waited," Han said.
Chewie put a long, hairy finger to his mouth and then pointed. Han followed the direction. On the far side of the bay, smugglers were working, much as they had on Skip 5. Han frowned at Chewie, then got off the ramp and edged past a few other vehicles parked on the bay.
Han hid under the wing of a modified Gizer freighter. The metal was rusted and pockmarked and provided perfect viewing without allowing him to be seen.
Zeen Afit was carrying computer parts. Blue followed, gingerly carrying screens. Wynni was a few yards behind, her furry arms wrapped around four chairs that had bolts in their bases. Two more smugglers, both Sull.u.s.tan, were carrying the cushions on top of their heads.
They were stripping a ship. In Han"s day, smugglers never did that unless they had been betrayed by the ship"s owner or unless the owner was dead.
Something about this stripping had bothered Chewie, though, and Han couldn"t see the ship from his hiding place. After the procession pa.s.sed, he slipped out from under the wing, and moved closer.
The ship looked familiar. She was a s.p.a.ce yacht that had seen better days. Her sides were battered and her hull damaged from what appeared to be a difficult landing. Her name had been scratched off the side, but Han could still read it.
The Lady Luck.
Lando had been here.
On the Run.
And there was only one reason he would have come Han.
Only Han was free.
Lando would never betray his smuggling friends, at least not intentionally. And for all their bl.u.s.ter, the smugglers on the Run were Lando"s friends, as much as smugglers like that could be friends.
Which only left one option.
Lando had arrived alone--and Nandreeson had been waiting for him.
TWENTY-EIGHT.
Femon would have laughed at him, and told him he was afraid of his own imaginings. Sometimes Kueller missed her. She had been with him a very long time. He could still hear her voice in his head, admonishing him.
He missed her, but he didn"t regret killing her. Some things just had to be done.
He was standing on the very spot where she had died, in the control center on Almania. He had replaced the death masks she loved on the walls, and added a few of his own. His guards stood behind him, silently watching. His employees believed in him, but a few fanatics were all it took. He didn"t want to be vigilant all the time. So he had his guards.
They would protect him, and they would make no mistakes.
He frightened them.
But he didn"t frighten Luke Skywalker.
Kueller pulled his chair out and sat down, extending his long legs under the console. The screen before him showed the wreckage of Skywalker"s X-wing. It had landed near some of the most valuable houses on Pydyr, houses whose wealth had not yet been plucked. For a few moments, Kueller had been afraid that he would lose that wealth, but he thought it a small price to pay for Skywalker.
Skywalker, injured, on Pydyr.
Perfect.
He punched a b.u.t.ton and said to one of his undersecretaries in communications, "I want an interstellar link to Coruscant. I want you to get President Leia Organa Solo. Tell her it"s about her brother, and then have her hold for me."
"Yes, sir," the undersecretary said. The image winked away.
Kueller returned his gaze to the house that Skywalker had crawled into.
Femon would have chided him: What are you so afraid of, Kueller? not realizing that the limping man with the burned back had survived the crash.
A lesser man would not have.
Kueller had expected Skywalker to come to Almania. His decision to land on Pydyr had been a surprise, as had the explosion. Kueller had watched it all on the monitor. He had felt it in his gut.
At least he knew the detonators worked. He just hadn"t expected Skywalker to execute the destruct command by accident.
Kueller had blocked the Force repercussions as best he could. He wanted President Organa Solo to sense that something was wrong, but not to know what that something was. Kueller would never have been able to achieve this with Skywalker himself, but Organa Solo had neglected her Jedi training. She was deficient in many important areas, areas Kueller meant to use to his own advantage.
And after he reached her, he would go to Skywalker. Even though the man was injured, even though he had lost everything, he would still be a formidable opponent.
But the injury made other things possible. The injury did weaken Skywalker, and it would weaken his resolve. He might need some fast, easy strength. Kueller might succeed where the Emperor had not.
Kueller might be able to turn Luke Skywalker to the dark side.
And then they would rule together: Kueller as Emperor, and Luke as his Darth Vader.
How very appropriate.
Leia felt as if she were back on Hoth, working on the Rebel base. She and Wedge were seated side by side, the computers before them humming with activity. Admiral Ackbar sat at another terminal and so did the other high-ranking military officials. They were tracking down the remaining X-wings, the ones that had left Coruscant after the reconditioning. Admiral Ackbar had suggested having some of the lower-grade officers doing this, but Leia wouldn"t hear of it. She knew she could trust the people in the room. She didn"t know many of the other officers, and she didn"t know if she could trust them.
Too many lives were at stake. She had to know this was done right.
Besides, it gave her something else to concentrate on besides her anger at Meido. The no-confidence vote would be held the next day, and Senator Gno wanted her to campaign. She would: a single rousing speech just before the vote was held. She remembered no-confidence votes from her days in the Old Republic. They were often based on gut feeling. If she could make the remaining senators feel good about her, she would win the vote.
For now, though, she had to stay busy, even though it didn"t seem to be helping as it normally did. Beneath her anger at Meido, she felt a deep unease. The skeletal face she had seen in the hallway kept resurfacing in her vision, and each time it did, she felt a low-grade fear, as if Han or one of the children were in grave danger. But she had contacted Anoth, and Winter had a.s.sured her that the children were fine. And she would know if something serious had happened to Han.
At least that was what she told herself.
"President Organa Solo." A lieutenant bent over her station. He looked impossibly young, and his voice had a tremor when he spoke to her. She still wasn"t used to making people nervous just by being who she was.
"There is a message for you. Would you like to take it privately?" She glanced around the room. These people were her most-trusted friends. She had no secrets from them. "I"ll take it here."
"I"ll have it relayed. It"s holo-coded." He left.
Wedge looked up from his station, a frown on his face. "Holo-coding. I haven"t seen much of that since the Empire." Leia nodded. She pushed her chair back. There was an open s.p.a.ce on the floor between the terminals.
The holo would show there.
Suddenly the air rippled. Then it smoothed into a see-through wall.
"It"s coming from a long distance away," Admiral Ackbar said.
Leia stared at it intently. The feeling of unease that had followed her since the meeting was growing.
Finally the ripples coalesced into a face.
Leia gasped. It was the skeletal face of her visions. Its eyes were dark, endless, and its mouth was a thin black line. Its cheeks were concave and its forehead gleamed like bone. The face filled the center of the room.
"Leia Organa Solo." The mouth moved in time to the words. This was no mask like the one Vader had worn. This seemed real.
"I"m President Organa Solo," she said, rising to her full height.
There was a brief silence before his reply. "My name is Kueller. I"m sure you have not heard of me, but you have felt my presence." A shudder ran down her back. How had he known that?
"You felt it when I destroyed the people of Pydyr in a single moment, without using anything as crude as a Death Star or a Star Destroyer. I prefer elegant, simple weapons, don"t you?" Leia jutted out her chin. She had to look regal and unafraid before this madman. "What do you want?"
She used the same cold voice she had used on Meido.
Again, there was the pause. Then the death mask smiled at her. "Your attention, madam." She had the sense that the mask was part of Kueller and not part of Kueller. It chilled her.
"You have that. For the moment."
"Good." Kueller"s face winked out. A ripple replaced it.
"Did we lose the transmission?" Wedge asked.
Admiral Ackbar shook his head. "No. He"s doing something else. It"s a function of the distance. Just like the moments of silence before his replies. It is taking time for this transmission to carry."
"We have instant communication all over this galaxy," the lieutenant said.
"Not all over," Wedge said softly.
An image waved, then coalesced into a small form collapsed on the floor.
A small building burned beside it, and in the distance some metal burned.
Leia squatted. The figure was Luke. His flight suit was off and in rags.
His back looked like a ma.s.s of raw flesh. He wasn"t moving.
A wave of pain and anger hit her. She reeled backward, felt a bit of terror mixed with it, and through it all, she felt Luke.
Luke! she sent.
Leeee-Luke"s mental voice was cut off, replaced by a deep, throaty laughter Leia had never heard before.
His image winked away. The ripply see-through wall reappeared. And then the skeletal face was back, the laughter dying on its lips.
"No mental games, President Organa Solo. Your brother lives. For now."
"What have you done to him?" she asked.
The death"s head smiled. The image was so large she felt as if she could fall into the mouth and never come out. "I did nothing. His ship conveniently destroyed itself."
"The X-wing," Wedge whispered. Admiral Ackbar shushed him.
"I would have preferred that he land a bit closer to home, but he did not. Still, he"s on my property now, and on my property he will stay.
Unless you do two things. First, you must disband your inefficient government. And second, you must turn power over to me."
"Why would we do that?"
"Because I will kill your brother if you do not." Leia felt cold. Ice-cold. "You think I will trade millions of lives for one, no matter how much it means to me?"
"I know your heart, President. Your brother means as much to you as your husband. As your children. I could kill them now, if you like. Would that help you decide?" Leia forced herself to swallow. She would not allow him to intimidate her with idle threats. But she had to be careful in case his threats weren"t idle. "You"re very far away to be making such threats, Kueller." The smile grew wider. "Are you testing me, President?
Because I warn you, I do not bluff."
"What do you really want?"
"I believe your government lost its effectiveness years ago. I want to return efficient rule to this galaxy."
"And you"re the man to do so?" she asked.