Star Wars - Shadows Of The Empire (by Steve Perry)

Star Wars - Shadows of the Empire

"Face it, if crime did not pay, there would be very few criminals." laughton lewis burdock.

Prologue

He looks like a walking corpse, Xizor thought. Like a mummified body dead a thousand years. Amazing

he is still alive, much less the most powerful man in the galaxy.

He isn't even that old; it is more as if something is slowly eating him.

Xizor stood four meters away from the Emperor, watching as the man who had long ago been Senator

Palpatine moved to stand in the holocam field. He imagined he could smell the decay in the Emperor's

worn body. Likely that was just some trick of the re- cycled air, run through dozens of filters to ensure

that there was no chance of any poison gas being intro- duced into it. Filtered the life out of it, perhaps,

giving it that dead smell.

The viewer on the other end of the holo-link would see a close-up of the Emperor's head and shoulders,

of an age-ravaged face shrouded in the cowl of his dark zeyd-cloth robe. The man on the other end of

the trans- mission, light-years away, would not see Xizor, though Xizor would be able to see him. It was

a measure of the Emperor's trust that Xizor was allowed to be here while the conversation took place.

The man on the other end of the transmission-if he could still be called that- The air swirled inside the

Imperial chamber in front of the Emperor, coalesced, and blossomed into the im- age of a figure down on

one knee. A caped humanoid biped dressed in jet black, face hidden under a full hel- met and breathing

mask: Darth Vader.

Vader spoke: "What is thy bidding, my master?" If Xizor could have hurled a power bolt through time

and space to strike Vader dead, he would have done it without blinking. Wishful thinking: Vader was too

powerful to attack directly.

"There is a great disturbance in the Force," the Em- peror said.

"I have felt it," Vader said.

"We have a new enemy. Luke Skywalker." Skywalker? That had been Vader's name, a long time ago.

Who was this person with the same name, someone so powerful as to be worth a conversation between

the Emperor and his most loathsome creation?

More importantly, why had Xizor's agents not uncov- ered this before now? Xizor's ire was instant-but

cold.

No sign of his surprise or anger would show on his imperturbable features. The Falleen did not allow

their emotions to burst forth as did many of the inferior spe- cies; no, the Falleen ancestry was not fur but

scales, not mammalian but reptilian. Not wild but coolly calculat- ing. Such was much better. Much safer.

"Yes, my master," Vader continued.

"He could destroy us," the Emperor said.

Xizor's attention was riveted upon the Emperor and the holographic image of Vader kneeling on the deck

of a ship far away. Here was interesting news indeed.

Something the Emperor perceived as a danger to him- self? Something the Emperor feared?

"He's just a boy," Vader said, "Obi-Wan can no longer help him." Obi-Wan. That name Xizor knew. He

was among the last of the Jedi Knights, a general. But he'd been dead for decades, hadn't he?

Apparently Xizor's information was wrong if Obi- Wan had been helping someone who was still a boy.

His agents were going to be sorry.

Even as Xizor took in the distant image of Vader and the nearness of the Emperor, even as he was aware

of the luxury of the Emperor's private and protected chamber at the core of the giant pyramidal palace,

he was also able to make a mental note to himself: Some- body's head would roll for the failure to make

him aware of all this. Knowledge was power; lack of knowledge was weakness. This was something he

could not permit.

The Emperor continued. "The Force is strong with him. The son of Skywalker must not become a Jedi."

Son of Skywalker?

Vader's son! Amazing!

"If he could be turned he would become a powerful ally," Vader said.

There was something in Vader's voice when he said this, something Xizor could not quite put his finger

on.

Longing? Worry?

Hope?

"Yes... yes. He would be a great asset," the Em- peror said. "Can it be done?" There was the briefest of

pauses. "He will join us or die, Master." Xizor felt the smile, though he did not allow it to show any more

than he had allowed his anger play. Ah.

Vader wanted Skywalker alive, that was what had been in his tone. Yes, he had said that the boy would

join them or die, but this latter part was obviously meant only to placate the Emperor. Vader had no

intention of killing Skywalker, his own son; that was obvious to one as skilled in reading voices as was

Xizor. He had not gotten to be the Dark Prince, Underlord of Black Sun, the largest criminal organization

in the galaxy, merely on his formidable good looks. Xizor didn't truly understand the Force that sustained

the Emperor and made him and Vader so powerful, save to know that it certainly worked somehow. But

he did know that it was something the extinct Jedi had supposedly mas- tered. And now, apparently, this

new player had tapped into it. Vader wanted Skywalker alive, had practically promised the Emperor that

he would deliver him alive-and converted.

This was most interesting.

Most interesting indeed.

The Emperor finished his communication and turned back to face him. "Now, where were we, Prince

Xizor?" The Dark Prince smiled. He would attend to the business at hand, but he would not forget the

name of Luke Skywalker.

1 Chewbacca roared his rage. A stormtrooper grabbed at him and he knocked the man flying, armor

clattering as he fell into the pit. Two more guards came in, and the Wookiee battered them both aside as

if they were noth- ing, a child tossing dolls around.

In another second one of Vader's troops would shoot Chewie. He was big and strong, but he couldn't

win; they'd cut him down- Han started yelling at the Wookiee, calming him.

Leia stared, unable to move, unable to believe this was happening.

Han kept talking: "Chewie, there'll be another time!

The princess, you have to take care of her. D'you hear me? Huh?" They were in a dank chamber in the

bowels of Cloud City on Bespin, where Han's so-called friend Lando Calrissian had betrayed them to

Darth Vader.

The scene was bathed in a buttery golden light that made it seem even more surreal. Chewbacca blinked

at Han, the half-assembled droid Threepio jutting from a sack on the Wookiee's back. The traitor

Calrissian stood off to one side like some feral creature. There were more guards, techs, bounty hunters.

Vader and the stink of liquid carbonite permeated the air around them all, a smell of morgues and graves

combined.

More guards moved in, to put cuffs on Chewie. The Wookiee nodded, calmer. Yes, he understood Han.

He didn't like it, but he understood. He allowed the guards to cuff him- Han and Leia looked at each

other. This can't be happening, she thought. Not now.

The emotion took them; neither could resist it. They came together like magnets, held each other. They

em- braced, kissed, full of fire and hope-full of ashes and despair- Two stormtroopers jerked Han away,

backed him onto the liftplate over the makeshift freezing chamber.

The words erupted from Leia unbidden, uncontrol- lable, lava blasted from a volcanic explosion: "I love

you!" And Han, brave, strong Han, nodded at her. "I know." The Ugnaught techs, not much more than

half Han's height, moved in, unbound his hands, stepped away.

Han looked at the techs, then at Leia again. The lift- plate sank, lowered him into the pit. He locked his

gaze with Leia's, held it, held it... until the cloud of freezing vapor boiled up and blocked their view-

Chewie yelled; Leia didn't understand his speech, but she understood his rage, his grief, his feeling of

helplessness.

Han!

Stinking, acrid gas spewed up and rolled over them, an icy fog, a roiling soul-chilling smoke through

which Leia saw Vader watching it all under his inscrutable mask. She heard Threepio sputter,

"What-What's go- ing on? Turn 'round! Chewbacca, I can't see!" Han!

Oh, Han!

Leia sat up abruptly, her pulse racing. The sheets were sweaty and wadded around her, her night gar-

ment damp. She sighed, swung her legs over the side of the bed, and sat staring at the wall. The

chronometer inset showed her it was three hours past midnight. The air in the room smelled stale.

Outside, she knew, the Tatooine night would be chilly, and she considered opening a vent to allow some

of that coolness inside.

At the moment, it seemed too much effort to bother.

A bad dream, she thought. That's all it was.

But-no. She couldn't pretend it had been only a nightmare. It had been more than that. It was a mem-

ory. It had happened. The man she loved was embed- ded in a block of carbonite, had been hauled

away like a crate of cargo by a bounty hunter. Lost to her, some- where in the vastness of the galaxy.

She felt the emotions well, felt them threaten to spill out in tears, but she fought it. She was Leia Organa,

Princess of the Royal Family of Alderaan, elected to the Imperial Senate, a worker in the Alliance to

Restore the Republic. Alderaan was gone, destroyed by Vader and the Death Star; the Imperial Senate

was disbanded; the Alliance was outmanned and outgunned ten thousand to one, but she was who she

was. She would not cry.

She would not cry.

She would get even, Three hours past midnight, and half the planet slept.

Luke Skywalker stood barefoot on the steelcrete platform sixty meters above the sand, looking at the

taut wire. He wore plain black pants and shirt and a black leather belt. He no longer had a lightsaber,

though he'd started constructing another one, using the plans he'd found in an old leather-bound book at

Ben Kenobi's. It was a traditional exercise for a Jedi, so he'd been told. It had given him something to do

while his new hand had finished final bonding to his arm. It had kept him from thinking too much.

The lights under the canopy were dim; he could barely see the stranded-steel line. The carnival was done

for the night, the acrobats and dewbacks and jest- ers long asleep. The crowds had gone home, and he

was alone; alone here with the tightrope. It was quiet, the only sound the creak of the syn tent fabric as it

cooled in the arms of the Tatooine summer night. The hot desert day gave up its heat quickly, and it was

cold enough outside the tent to need a jacket. The smell of the dewbacks drifted up to where he

perched, and min- gled with that of his own sweat.

A guard whose mind had accepted Luke's mental command to allow him inside the giant tent stood

watch at the entrance, blind now to his presence. A Jedi skill, that kind of control, but another one he had

only begun to learn.

Luke took a deep breath, let it out slowly. There was no net below, and a fall from this height would

surely be fatal. He didn't have to do this. Nobody was going to make him take the walk.

Nobody but himself.

He calmed his breathing, his heartbeat, and, as much as possible, his mind, using the method he had

learned. First Ben, then Master Yoda had taught him the ancient arts. Yoda's exercises had been the

more rigorous and exhausting, but unfortunately, Luke had not finished his schooling. There really hadn't

been any choice at the time. Han and Leia had been in deadly danger, and he'd had to go to them.

Because he had gone, they were alive, but...

That hadn't turned out well.

No. Not at all.

And there had been the meeting with Vader...

He felt his face tighten, his jaw muscles dance, and he fought the anger that surged up in him like a hor-

monal tide as black as the clothes he wore. His wrist ached suddenly where Vader's lightsaber had sliced

through it. The new hand was as good as the old, bet- ter, maybe, but sometimes when he thought about

Va- der, it throbbed. Phantom limb pain, the medics had said. Not real.

"I'm your father." No! That couldn't be real, either! His father had been Anakin Skywalker, a Jedi.

If only he could talk to Ben. Or to Yoda. They would confirm it. They would tell him the truth. Vader had

tried to manipulate him, had tried to throw him off balance, that was all.

But-what if it was true... ?

No. Leave it. It wouldn't help to dwell on that now.

He wasn't going to be able to do anybody any good unless he mastered his Jedi skills. He had to trust in

the Force and move on. No matter what lies Vader had spewed. There was a war on, much to do, and

while he was a good pilot, he was supposed to have more to offer to the Alliance.

It wasn't easy, and it didn't seem to be getting any easier. He wished he felt sure of himself, but the fact

was, he didn't. He felt as if a weight were riding on him, more than he'd ever thought possible. A few

years ago, he'd been a farm boy, working with Uncle Owen, going nowhere. Now there was Han, the

Empire, the Alliance, Vader- No. Not now. That's in the past and in the future, this wire is the now.

Concentrate or you're going to fall off it.

He reached for the energy, felt the flux begin to flow. It was bright and warm and life-giving, and he

called it to himself, sought to wrap it around his form like a suit of armor.

The Force: Once again, it was there for him.

Yes.

But there was something else there, too. In a place that was removed but somehow right next to him, he

felt that pull he had been told about. A hard, powerful coldness, the opposite of what his teachers had

pre- sented to him. The antithesis of light. That which Va- der embraced.

The dark side.

No! He pushed it away. Refused to look at it. Took another deep breath. Felt the Force permeate him,

felt it attune itself to him. Or maybe it was the other way around. It didn't matter.

When they were one, he started to walk.

The high wire suddenly seemed as wide as a public sidewalk. It was natural, the Force, but this part

always felt like magic, as if he could do miracles using it. He'd seen Yoda raise the X-wing from the

swamp using his mind. It was possible to do things that might look like miracles.

As he lifted his foot to take another step, he remem- bered other things about his time on Dagobah.

Under the soft, damp ground, in the cave...

Darth Vader came toward him.

Vader! Here! How could that be?

Luke pulled his lightsaber, lit it, brought it up. The gleaming blue white of his blade met Vader's reddish

beam as they crossed in on-guard salute. The power hum and energy crackle grew louder.

Suddenly Vader swung, a powerful cut at Luke's left side- Luke jerked his blade up and over, dropped

the point, blocked the slash; it hit so hard it vibrated him, nearly tore his lightsaber from his grip- He

smelled the mold around him, heard the power hum of the lightsabers, saw Vader with a crystal clarity.

All his senses came to life, as sharp as they'd ever been, sharp as a warehouse full of vibro-shivs.

Vader cut again, now at Luke's head, and Luke's panicked overhead block barely stopped it, barely-he

was so strong!

Again Vader chopped at him, a blow that would have cut Luke in half had he not jammed his own

weapon out, just in time!

Vader was too strong for him, Luke knew. Only his anger could save him from being killed. He remem-

bered Ben, remembered Vader hacking him down- Unthinking rage drove him. Luke whipped his blade

around backhanded, all of his arm and shoulder and wrists behind it, and- The cut took Vader's head off.

Time seemed to drag like some heavy anchor. He stared. Vader's body dropped, oh-so-slowly... and

the severed head fell to the ground and rolled.

Rolled. Then stopped. There was no blood- There came a bright flash, a sudden blast of light and purple

smoke, and the mask covering Vader's face shattered, shattered and vanished, revealing, re- vealing-

The face of Luke Skywalker.

No!

The insurgent memory had flashed by much faster than the events had actually taken. He had moved but

a single step in reality. Amazing what one's mind could do. Even so, he nearly fell from the wire as he lost

contact with the Force.

Stop this! he told himself.

He took a deep breath, balanced uneasily, reached for the Force again.

There, he had it. He steadied, started walking, one with the Force again, flowing.

Halfway across the wire, he started to run. He told himself it was part of the test. He told himself that the

Force was with him and he could live up to his name without fear, that anything was possible to one

trained as a Jedi Knight. It was what he had been taught. He wanted to believe it.

He didn't want to believe that he ran because he could feel the dark side walking the wire behind him,

catfooted and evil, following him. Following like the memory of his face on Vader's severed head,

following and.

...and gaining...

Xizor leaned back in his form-chair. The chair, which had a bad circuit he kept meaning to have repaired,

took this move as an inquiry. Its voxchip said, "What is your wish, Prince Sheeezor?" It slurred his name,

dragging out the first syllable. He shook his head.

"Nothing save that you be silent," he said.

The chair's vox shut up. The machineries within the cloned leather seat hummed and adjusted the support

to Xizor's new position. He sighed. He was rich be- yond the income of many entire planets, and he had

a malfunctioning form-chair that couldn't even pro- nounce his name correctly. He made a note to have it

replaced, now, today, immediately, as soon as he was finished with his business here this morning.

He looked at the one-sixth-scale holoproj frozen in front of him, then up at the woman standing across

the desk. She was as beautiful, if not as ethnic, as the two Epicanthix women fighters in the holograph

between them. But her beauty was of a different order. She had long and silky blond hair, pale and clear

blue eyes, an exquisite figure. Normal human males would find her attractive. There were no flaws in

Guri's face or form, but there was a coolness about her, and that was easily explained if you knew the

reason: Guri was an HRD, a human replica droid, and unique. She could visually pass for a woman

anywhere in the galaxy, could eat, drink, and perform all of the more personal functions of a woman

without anybody the wiser. And she was the only one of her kind programmed to be an assassin.

She could kill without raising her ersatz heartbeat, never a qualm of conscience.

She'd cost him nine million credits.

Xizor steepled his fingers and raised an eyebrow at Guri.

"The Pike sisters," Guri said, glancing at the holo.

"Genetic twins, not clones. The one on the right is Zan, the other is Zu. Zan has green eyes, Zu has one

green and one blue eye, the only noticeable difference. They are masters of teras kasi, the Bunduki art

called 'steel hands.' Twenty-six standard years old, no political af- filiations, no criminal records in any of

the major sys- tems, and, as far as we are able to determine, completely amoral. They are for hire to the

highest bid- der, and they have never worked for Black Sun. They have also never been defeated in

open combat. This"- she nodded at the unmoving holoproj image again-"is what they do for fun when

they aren't working." Guri's voice was, in contrast to her appearance, warm, inviting, a rich alto. She

activated the hologram.

Xizor smiled, revealing his own perfect teeth. The holo had shown the two women mopping the floor with

eight Imperial stormtroopers in some rat's nest of a spaceport bar. The soldiers had been big, strong, well

trained, and armed. The women weren't even breathing hard when they finished. "They'll do," he said.

"Make it happen." Guri nodded once, turned, and left. She looked as good from behind as she did from

the front.

Nine million and worth every decicred. He wished he had a dozen more like her. Unfortunately, her cre-

ator was no longer among the living. A pity.

So. Two more handpicked assassins now under his command. Assassins with no ties to Black Sun, not

be- fore and, with Guri's expert manipulation, not ever.

Xizor glanced up at the ceiling. He'd had the pattern of the galaxy installed into the glowtiles. When the

lights were dim-and they usually were-he had an edge-on view of the home galaxy floating holographi-

cally there, with more than a million individual glow- ing dust-small stars hand-drawn in it. It had taken

the artist three months and had cost a warlord's ransom, but the Dark Prince could not spend what he

already had even if he tried hard, and more than that kept flowing in all the time. Credits were nothing; he

had billions. A way of keeping score, that was all. Not im- portant.

He looked at the holograph again. Beautiful and deadly, these two, a combination he enjoyed. He him-

self was of the Falleen, a species whose distant ances- tors had been reptilian, and who had evolved into

what was generally considered the most beautiful of all hu- manoid species. He was over a hundred years

old, but he looked thirty. He was tall, had a topknot ponytail jutting up from his otherwise bald head and

a hard body crafted by stim units. He also exuded natural pheromones that made most of the

human-stock spe- cies feel instantly attracted to him, and his skin color, normally a dusky green, changed

with the rise of those pheromones, shading from the cool into the warm spectrum. His handsomeness and

appeal were tools, nothing more. He was the Dark Prince, Underlord of Black Sun, one of the three

most powerful men in the galaxy. He could also kick a sunfruit off the top of a tall humanoid's head

without a warm-up stretch, and he could lift twice his own weight over his head using only his own

muscles. He could claim a sound-if ad- mittedly devious-mind in a sound body.

His galactic influence was surpassed only by the Em- peror and the Dark Lord of the Sith, Darth Vader.

He smiled at the image before him again. Third- but about to become second, if his plans went as in-

tended. It had been months since he'd overheard the Emperor and Vader talking of a threat they'd

perceived, months, and now the preliminaries were done.

Xizor was ready to move in earnest.

"Time?" he said.

His room computer answered and gave it to him.

Ah. Only an hour remained before his meeting. It was but a short walk through the protected corridors to

Vader's, not much beyond where the Emperor's mas- sive gray-green stone and mirror-crystal palace

thrust itself up into the high atmosphere. A few kilometers, no more; a brisk stroll would put him there in

a few min- utes. No hurry. He did not want to arrive early.

A chime announced a visitor.

"Enter," Xizor said. His bodyguards were not here, but there was no need for them in his sanctum-no one

could penetrate its defenses. And only a few of his un- derlings had the right to visit him here, all of them

loyal. As loyal as fear could make them.

One of his sublieutenants, Mayth Duvel, came in and bowed low. "My prince Xizor." "Yes?" "I have a

petition from the Nezriti Organization.

They wish an alliance with Black Sun." Xizor gave Duvel a measured smile. "I'm sure they do." Duvel

produced a small package. "They offer a to- ken of their esteem." Xizor took the package, thumbed it

open. Inside was a gem. It was an oval-cut, bloodred Tumanian pres- sure-ruby, a very rare stone,

apparently flawless, and easily worth several million credits. The Dark Prince held it up, turned it in his

fingers, nodded. Then he tossed it onto his desktop. It bounced once, slid to a stop next to his drinking

cup. If it had fallen onto the floor, he would not have bent to retrieve it, and if the cleaning droid came in

later and sucked it up, well, so what? "Tell them we'll consider it." Duvel bowed and backed away.

When he was gone, Xizor stood, stretched his neck and back. The evolved reptilian ridge over his spine

elevated slightly, felt sharp against his fingertips as he rubbed it. There were other applicants waiting to

see him, and ordinarily he would sit and attend to their petitions, but not today. Now it was time to go

and see Vader. By going there instead of insisting that Vader come here, he was giving away an

advantage, appear- ing to be himself a supplicant. No matter. That was part of it; there must not seem to

be any contention between them. No one must suspect that he felt any- thing but the greatest respect for

the Dark Lord of the Sith, not if his plans were going to succeed. And suc- ceed they would, he did not

doubt it.

Because they always did.

2 Leia sat in a bad cantina in the bad part of Mos Eisley.

You really had to work at it to earn both of those low distinctions. Calling this place a dive would have

elevated it four notches. The table was expanded metal, aluminum plate turned into a cheap and

easy-to-clean mesh-probably they used a high-pressure solvent hose to wash everything into that drain in

the middle of a sunken spot over there in the floor. If they opened the door to the arid outside, it would

dry in a hurry. The cup of whatever vile brew it was she had in front of her was certainly losing more

liquid to evaporation than to her drinking from it. The air refreshing system must have had a bad

circuit-the place was hot, the desert air outside seeping in along with the gutter scum who came to hang

out here. It smelled like a bantha stable in the hot summer, and the only good thing about the place was

that the light was dim enough so she didn't have to look too closely at the patrons-from a dozen different

species and none of them particularly savory- looking examples at that.

Lando must have done it on purpose, picking this pit in which to meet, just to get a rise out of her. Well.

When he finally arrived, she wouldn't give him the sat- isfaction. For a time, she'd hated him, until she

under- stood his apparent betrayal of Han had only been a ruse to help save them from Vader. Lando

had given up a lot for that, and they all owed him for it.

Still, this wasn't a bar she would have gone into without a good reason-a very good reason-and not a

place she would have gone alone, despite her protests that she didn't need a bodyguard. But need one or

not, she had one-Chewbacca sat next to her, glowering at the assorted patrons. The only reason Chewie

had left her with Luke after the last encounter with Vader was to go with Lando to Tatooine to set up

Han's rescue.

Once Leia had arrived, Chewie had stayed as close to her as part of her wardrobe. It was irritating.

Lando had explained it: "Chewie owes Han a life debt. That's a big deal among Wookiees. Han told him

to take care of you. Until Han tells him otherwise, that's what he's going to do." Leia had tried to be firm.

She told Chewie, "I appre- ciate it, but you don't have to." It was no use, Lando told her. As long as he

was alive, Chewbacca was going to be with her, and that was that. She didn't even speak Wookiee, save

for a couple of swear words she thought she recognized, but Lando had smiled and told her she might as

well get used to it.

She almost had, after a fashion. Chewie could un- derstand a number of languages, and while he couldn't

speak them, he could usually make known what he wanted somebody to know.

Leia liked Chewie okay, but here was another rea- son to find and free Han-so he could call the

Wookiee off.

Then again, even though she would never admit it, there were times when having a two-meter-tall

Wookiee around was useful. Such as in this wonderful place.

During the last hour, she'd had to look a little closer at several of the patrons than she liked. Despite the

fact that she wore old and threadbare freight handler's cov- eralls spotted and stained with lube, had her

hair wound into a tight and unattractive bun, and did not meet anyone's gaze, there had been a steady

parade of various humans and aliens to her table, trying to pick her up-also despite the fact that a fully

grown and armed Wookiee sat at the same table.

Males. Didn't seem to matter what species they were when they wanted female company. And it didn't

seem to matter what species the female was, either.

Chewie made it clear they weren't welcome, and be- tween his size and bowcaster, nobody much

wanted to argue the point. But new ones kept coming.

Chewie growled at a bulbous-headed Bith who banged into the table. The alien, whose species was

normally well behaved and peaceful, had obviously had way too much to drink, if he would even think it

possi- ble that he and Leia could find anything in common.

The Bith looked at Chewie's bared teeth, hiccuped, then tottered off.

Leia said, "Look, I appreciate your help, but I can handle these guys." Chewie turned his head to one

side and regarded her, a gesture she was coming to realize meant skepti- cism and amusement mixed

about equally.

She took it as a challenge. "Hey, next time some- body comes over, just watch me. You can do it

without threats, you know." It didn't take long. The next pest in the rotation was a Devaronian, a horned

humanoid who-surprise- wanted to buy Leia a drink.

"Thank you, but I'm waiting for somebody." The Devaronian said, "Well, why don't I keep you company

until they get here? Perhaps they were de- layed? It might be a long wait." "Thank you, but I have

company." She nodded at Chewie.

The alien ignored the gesture and, since the Wookiee didn't speak or point his weapon, kept right on

talking.

"I'm really quite pleasant to have around, you know. Many fems have thought so. Many." He leered at

her, his pointed teeth looking particularly white against his red lips. Shot his tongue out and sucked it

back in; it was as long as her forearm.

Spare me, Leia thought. So much for the easy way.

"No. Go away." "You don't know what you are missing, little one." His leer grew wider, making him look

more demonic.

She glanced at Chewie, who was about to start laughing, she could tell. She glared at the Devaronian.

Star Wars - Shadows Of The Empire (by Steve Perry)

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