Star Wars: Scourge (20 page)

“Popara will not have his family threatened. He has crushed his foes and left clan homes empty among those who have challenged him. For this reason, he wants to find out who is responsible for this new addiction on the worlds, so he may destroy them.” Popara patted his belly, let out a belch, and motioned for more worms. After downing another handful, he took a long drink from a crystal ewer, and continued.

“You are of similar mind, Mighty Popara thinks, as he is. The Jedi do not care for shackles, either on the body or on the mind.”

“Mighty Popara is correct in his assumption,” said Mander, in the best Huttese he could manage. Popara chuckled, and for a moment a pained look crossed his
face. He motioned for the ewer, downed a healthy portion, then burbled another long speech.

The Twi’lek followed her master’s words and translated. “Fatherly Popara does not wish his youngest son, so recently returned, to put himself at risk. Similarly, Vago is most competent, but Vago is like a daughter to him and should not be endangered, either. Zonnos is the eldest and one does not imperil the family heir. You will investigate this matter on our behalf.” The Twi’lek with the datapad stepped forward and handed it to Mander. “This is a list of local tapcafs at which Vago determined that this Tempest was sold,” the second Twi’lek said. “Perhaps you will be able to trace the source, or find our would-be assassin.”

Mander slipped the datapad inside his robes and said simply, “It would be our honor to be of service.” Reen started to say something, but Eddey nudged her with an elbow and she thought better of it.

Popara started to say something, then stopped, repeated himself, and let out an indecorous belch that took the Twi’leks aback. He started to say something else, but stopped again, even as he seemed to sway for a moment on his repulsorlift. Then his eyes widened in pain and horror.

Eddey said, “What’s going on?”

Mander didn’t know, and crossed toward the great Hutt. It would normally be a transgression to approach him, but Popara was clearly in pain now. Popara’s belly started to swell, and the great Hutt patron started to croak like an injured frog. The Twi’leks were clearly frightened, and one of them pushed Mander back, away from their master. Still the Hutt’s massive form expanded, his eyes wide with panic. His skin was stretched taut, like a balloon about to pop.

Reen shouted, “I’ll get help,” and turned back to the doors. They slid easily apart, and Mander realized what
it would look like to the assembled party—Popara in obvious pain, the Twi’lek shouting in fear, and the rest of them standing right in front of the Hutt’s distended form.

“Reen, don’t!” Mander said, but Eddey grabbed him and pulled him to one side. Popara was almost ovoid in shape now, and screaming in a low, throaty roar.

And then the flesh gave way in half a dozen places and Popara exploded, his organs rupturing in all directions around the room. The Twi’leks screamed, diving for cover, and Reen was flung forward by the power of the explosion and bounced off the force field, along with the former Hutt patriarch’s interior organs. Both the Pantoran and the Hutt’s digestive system were moving too fast to allow the screen to let them pass.

There was silence for a moment, and Mander looked out at the assembled guests—Hutt and Quarren, Bimm and Rodian, Wookiee and Cerean. All of them looked at the gory tableau beyond the open doors in shock. It was only for a moment, but Mander felt his heart hammer from the certain knowledge of what was to come.

Then Zonnos shouted in a drunken bellow, “They killed my father! Death to the
Jeedai
and his allies!”

Mander, Reen, and Eddey were fortunate, in that the first impulse of the guests and bodyguards was to pull whatever weapons they had, concealed or otherwise, and unleash a volley at the three accused killers. Fortunate in that the energy screen held and their initial high-caliber energy shots splayed helplessly against the invisible barrier.

Mander scanned the room. There was no obvious way out, other than the lift at the far side of the chamber—and on the wrong side of the now-howling mob. Popara probably had a hidden turbolift somewhere in his office, but locating and activating it would take time. Time they did not have.

“You have a plan?” asked Eddey. His small blaster had manifested from beneath his voluminous tunic.

“Get Reen and follow me,” said Mander.

Reen, her back splattered with blood, was already up. Two of the green-skinned Twi’leks were in shock, moaning over the remains of their Hutt master. The third descended on Reen in an enraged fury, head-tails lashing and sharpened nails curled to rend the Pantoran. Reen ducked inside the blow and brought her elbow up hard against the Twi’lek’s chin. The handmaiden went down with a whimper.

Mander ignored the battle and ran to the back of the audience room, to the grand window that displayed the
expanse of Nar Shaddaa beyond. It seemed like he was looking out at an inverted sky, Nal Hutta solid, dark, and gravid above them, the lights of the city-moon cluttered constellations below. Aircars and signblimps moved like comets in these overturned heavens. Mander pulled his lightsaber and thumbed the switch. The blade erupted with a satisfying hiss. The Jedi drove the blade against the transparent wall.

The window did not break, and only grudgingly melted, which gave Mander hope. He strained and forced the blade through like an oarsman struggling against a flowing river. In a matter of moments he had carved a humanoid-sized circle in the back wall.

Mander looked over his shoulder as the first blaster bolts fell among them. The Niktos, Wookiees, and Cereans were using the doorway for cover, their carbine barrels jutting into the room beyond the screen. Apparently Eddey had hidden Reen’s blaster under his tunic as well, and the pair of them were returning covering fire over the cooling remains of Popara and the now-shrieking Twi’leks.

Mander kicked the molten oval outward, and it disappeared into the darkness, glittering in the reflected light of the surrounding buildings. “Onto the ledge!” he shouted, and stepped out into the void himself.

The ledge was ornamental, but ornamental in a Hutt style, which meant that it was narrow but not impossible for a normal-sized humanoid to navigate. He slipped out to the right, and Reen and Eddey followed him. The winds at this altitude curled around the buildings and threatened to pluck them from the ledge and send all three of them screaming to their deaths below. He flattened against the wall behind him and moved toward the corner.

Behind him, the window shuddered with blasterfire. Eddey flinched at the impacts.

“It is made of transparisteel,” said the Jedi. “They’ll be able to break through it, but it will take time. We have to get off this side of the building.”

The shots tracked them as they reached the corner, and now a pair of Niktos had made it to the egress the Jedi had cut and were firing along the side of the building behind them. Reen, pulling up the rear, used the corner for cover and returned fire. This wall was also made of transparisteel, and the Wookiees were concentrating their fire ahead of their path, hoping to break the window before the escapees got to that point. They were trapped.

“Good plan,” Reen shouted over the gusts. “Now how do we get off this crazy thing?”

“Shush,” said Eddey. “He’s working on it.”

Mander leaned back against the shuddering transparisteel and cleared his mind. Ahead of him one of the signblimps was sagging its way slowly across the sky. He reached out, mentally, and pulled it toward them. The lighter-than-air vehicle bobbled in their direction, but the droid driver revved its engines to let it clear the building.

“Size matters not,” Mander muttered. “Inertia, however, is a pain in the butt.”

He shifted his attention away from the signblimp and to the air between him and the vehicle. The air gusted away effortlessly, and pulled the blimp, with its surprised and cursing droid pilot, right up against the side of the building. There was a crinkling impact as the thin heglum gas envelope crumpled slightly.

“Jump on!” shouted Mander, but Eddey was already scrambling over the airship’s diode-laced sides, his boots knocking light emitters loose and scrambling the sign-blimp’s message. Reen took a pair of final shots and joined him.

Mander leapt and the transparisteel wall behind him
shattered. Bolts laced among them, and a couple struck the signblimp, leaving jagged tears in the outer skin and puncturing some of the flotation cells as well.

The signblimp fell away from the building, losing altitude steadily.

“We’re falling!” shouted Reen. Beneath them, the droid sputtered a mixture of orders and obscenities in Huttese. Behind them, the blasterfire was already dropping off.

Mander pointed to one of the gallery bridges between skyscrapers and bellowed in Huttese, “Aim for the bridge!” He threw in a few Huttese curses as well. Whether the instructions, the curses, or the winds were the cause, the signblimp lunged to port and mated in an ungainly fashion with the span. The impact burst the bulk of the flotation cells and the bridge groaned as the entire weight settled upon it. The three escapees clambered onto the bridge and into the wide atriums of an adjoining skybridge.

“What happened back there?” said Reen.

“Our patron, Popara the Hutt, blew up,” said Mander.

“I caught that part,” said the Pantoran. “How?”

“Binary bioexplosive, most likely,” said Eddey. “One component administered by one vector, the other administered by another. Neither traceable as dangerous by itself.”

“Something in the smoke, something in the worms,” said Mander, “and maybe a trigger as well to go off at a certain time or in a particular place. We’d have to search the penthouse.”

“Unlikely they would let us do that. Zonnos has already determined we’re responsible,” Eddey said.

“He was quick with the accusation,” said Reen. “And he was giving you the hard eyes the entire meal. Think he was expecting it?” Her implication was clear:
Do you think he did it?

“Perhaps,” said Mander. “Or maybe Lungru or Parella or someone we don’t know about.”

“Or perhaps the Bomu clan is not as incompetent as we thought,” Reen added. “The Hutts do not lack for enemies and schemes.”

Mander thought about it. “Adding the attempt on Mika’s life this morning, it is most likely an effort to thin the ranks of Hutts interested in where the Tempest comes from.” He looked around. “Either of you know where we are?”

“No,” said Eddey. “We could probably find our way back to the
New Ambition
, but it is likely that Zonnos and his Wookiees will get there first. No, make that definitely.”

“We just got that ship!” said Reen. “We can’t abandon it!”

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” Eddey said. Reen scowled at the Bothan.

“We have the datapad of tapcafs selling Tempest,” said Mander, producing the pad from beneath his robes. “If Popara’s death is connected with the spice, we can track our suspects through it.”

“And maybe find a ship to get us offplanet,” added Eddey. “There should be a surplus of shady spacers on the Smugglers’ Moon.”

“Regardless, I’m going to need a new outfit,” said Reen. “I reek of dead Hutt lord.”

The vendor-droid they came across was supremely disinterested in Reen’s bloodstained gear, and suitable replacements were gathered, along with hooded robes for both Eddey and Mander. The vendor-droid wasn’t the only one incurious about the trio. The bulk of Nar Shaddaa’s population seemed singularly unaware of Popara’s sudden and explosive passing, or that there was any pursuit of his accused assassins.

“It is the nature of the Hutts,” Eddey said. “They try to solve things inside the family. Let’s hope it stays that way. What is our first opportunity?”

Kuzbar’s Cantina was an upscale tapcaf on level 42, not far from Popara’s skytower. A Rodian chanteuse warbled in the corner in Huttese, accompanied by a Bimm on a Kloo horn. The barkeep, a member of a humanoid species that Mander could not immediately place, took a few credits from them and directed them to a particularly corpulent Sullustan named Min Gost, who had occupied a corner booth like his own personal fiefdom.

“I understand you’re looking for information,” said the Sullustan, lacing his fingers before him on the table in an expectant pose.

“We need travel offplanet,” said Mander. “Can you arrange it?”

“Easy for me, expensive for you,” said Min, his lips curling up in an amused expression.

“Set it up,” said Mander. “Payment on delivery.” The Sullustan shrugged.

“What do you know about Tempest?” Reen asked suddenly. Mander frowned. In his desire to get everyone away, he had forgotten why he had the list of tapcafs in the first place.

The Sullustan’s eyebrows twitched. “Others have been asking about Tempest. Those others smell of military, and I have told them nothing.”

“Do we smell of military?” asked Reen, and the Sullustan laughed. Mander put several Huttese truguts and a few of his remaining credits on the table. Reen smiled back and pressed, “So what do you know about Tempest?”

“I know many things about this Tempest,” said Min. “It is new. It is profitable. It is very, very hard. Tends to
kill your customers. Bad for repeat business. You want some, I can find some for you.”

“Do you know where it comes from?” asked Reen.

Min shrugged again. “No one knows. We had a dealer here, Rinnix. Nice Trandoshan male. Did good business. No one has seen him for a while.”

“You know where he got his supply?” asked Reen, and Mander moved to put a few more coins from his depleted supply on the table, but the Sullustan waved him back. “If I knew, I would not be selling information. I would be selling Tempest.”

“Who did this Rinnix sell it to?” asked Eddey, and the fat Sullustan blinked, as if noticing the Bothan for the first time.

The Sullustan paused, rolling the flavor of his information on his tongue before letting it loose. “A select few. Mostly upscale. Popara’s boy, Zonnos, was a buyer.”