Chapter Ten

The Happy Contriver entered the atmosphere of Junduk at a steep angle, trying to apply more speed to reach the surface faster. Brey didn’t like having the unmarked box on his ship and he was terrified at what might be inside it. Even if the Imperial hadn’t have told him to look inside he still wouldn’t have. What he didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him and the last thing he wanted was to get caught in between the dealings of a Hutt and the Empire.

The last thing, he thought with a wry smile. That’s exactly what I’m in!

The vessel levelled out as they reached the surface and as they started the short journey back to Raca City, Brey looked at Skeet with concerned eyes.

   “Skeet, what is it? What’s happened?”

   “Nothing,” Skeet answered, his gaze now fixed on a point on the cockpit floor as his mind tried to put into order what he had just seen. “I’m alright.’

   “Like stang you are,” Brey snapped. He wasn’t one who took kindly to being lied to. “What is it?”

   “That old man, in the uniform.”

   “Yes, I saw him. An Imperial butcher in a Grand Moff uniform. What of it?”

Skeet interlocked his fingers and started to massage the backs of his hands. He held them close to his mouth and took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. The thoughts were bad enough. Saying it out loud was threatening to make him weep.

   “That butcher was my father.”

The starship banked slightly, setting off several warning lights as the vessel threatened to veer off its approach vector. Brey regained control, the momentary loss of concentration down to the fact that he was staring at Skeet with an expression beyond shock.

   “When I was young my father was a member of the Emperor’s New Order,” Skeet said. He suddenly felt the need to explain, as if he had been holding back this information and seeing his father for the first time in years was the aid he needed to finally reveal it. Brey kept his eyes on the route indicator but listened intently.

   “He was well-respected and was destined for great things, but he neglected me and my mother. When the slaughters by the Empire started she begged him to stop but he wouldn’t. He agreed with every doctrine spelled out by Palpatine, every opinion. So,” he cleared his throat and adjusted his position in the seat, trying to convey the appearance that he was just making normal conversation, “my mother took me and we fled. We ended up on Tatooine, but even way out there in the Outer Rim Territories he still managed to get to us. He’d hired this ugly bounty hunter to find us, to bring us back alive, but when my mother decided to fight for our freedom...” Skeet stopped. His gaze went back to the view outside as Raca City approached rapidly.

   “He killed her. The bounty hunter shot her.”

Brey was uncomfortable with the sudden silence and felt compelled to ask,

   “What happened to you?”

   “I thought I was dead. The hunter just stood over her body and stared. Then he looked at me and said, ‘I’m sorry’. And he just left. I was found days later by a swoop gang who helped me out. That’s how I got into racing.”

Skeet went silent again and Brey was loath to ask any more questions. The one thought which was screaming in his mind was, but did your father recognise you?

   “I was a boy at the time, not even ten,” Skeet said aloud suddenly. “I doubt whether he recognised me.”

Brey looked at his friend and smiled. He also tried to let out the breath he had been holding quietly so as not to make Skeet think his fears were for himself.

After docking the Happy Contriver and hiring a speedervan to take the cargo to Komag, Skeet and Brey finally pulled up outside the Betting Syndicate. Brey had kept silent during the trip, not wanting to push Skeet any further about his father. They had talked amiably about fleeing the system together, especially since the thing Skeet needed now was to be as far away from Junduk as possible.

They disembarked and straight away were greeted by the scarf-headed human and the Barabel. They appeared from the side door and quickly approached the two men.

   “Do you have it?” the human asked.

   “Yes,” Brey said, carefully pulling the cargosled from the back of the speedervan. “Here, take it and we’ll be off.”

   “Bring it,” the human said.

   “But...”

   “Bring it!” he snapped, his hand going into his robes. Skeet took the handle of the sled and pulled it towards the entrance.

   “Bay, let’s drop this off and go. Come on, you’ll have to help me guide this thing down those steps.”

Together they slowly managed the cargosled down the steps and through the blast door into the basement. There were several other beings there, now, obviously hearing about the Hutt’s payment and wanting to view it with their own organs. They crowded around the sled as the racers pulled it up to Komag.

The Hutt rumbled with pleasure, his voice rising as the sled was raised so that his thick arms could manipulate the crate. His long slavering tongue licked his lips in anticipation. He noticed that Brey and Skeet still stood in front of him and said something with quick, hurried words. The polyhedral ‘droid swooped down to face them.

   “His Excellency thanks you for the delivery and will be in touch if he requires any other jobs doing.”

Brey was aghast.

   “But he said that this one job was enough to wipe the debt!”

Several of the beings gathered laughed at Brey’s words but most were watching the box intently. The ‘droid squealed with impatience.

   “This simple job is not enough to bring you out of his Excellency’s charges, now begone!”

   “But...” Brey started forward but Skeet grabbed his arm.

   “Let’s go.”

   “Skeet, he can’t...”

   “Bay, let’s go! He’s a Hutt and he most assuredly can! Don’t make it worse!”

Guards and other beings assembled moved threateningly in their direction and Brey looked about hopelessly. He was unarmed, after all, but it was not as if having any form of weapon would help him against the aliens gathered who outnumbered them both. Reluctantly, and not able to get any attention from the Hutt who was now unclasping the crate, he turned with Skeet and headed to the door.

They pushed through the rapidly thickening crowd and stepped through the door to the stairs just as the Hutt opened the crate.

It was as if a giant hand had slapped them both down. Skeet and Brey fell to the ground as a horrendous explosion tore through the crowd and the basement, it’s devastating effect increased by the closeness of the room. The concussion blew beings off their feet, throwing bodies to the walls and ceiling and debris to all corners of the room. Fire billowed across the amassed, with thick smoke following the flash and the flames.

Both men’s ears rang from the explosion, their eyes stinging from the pain in their heads and the smoke that was, even now, being sucked through ventilation ducts that had detected the overly-thick atmosphere and were working to vent the toxic air.

   “What... what the...” Brey rolled over, rubble falling from his back as he tried to get to his feet.

Skeet was already up and he staggered back to the door. The room was a scene of carnage, with bodies lying across the area in blackened heaps. The ceiling had partially collapsed where the Hutt had been lying, the room above which had contained some kind of canteen had collapsed down from the power of the explosive. The black crate was nowhere to be seen, so the cause of the devastation was only too clear.

As the vents cleared the smoke, Skeet could see a single chubby arm sticking out from the rubble. Komag, if he hadn’t been killed outright by the incredible blast, was now under tons of rubble, most definitely dead. The cans and pots of the empty canteen above clattered down, several cooking pots spilling their slimy contents over the dead bodies by the blast centre.

Several survivors, groggy and staggering, started to appear from the smoke. They walked in a daze, not fully realising what had happened.

From nowhere, the polyhedral ‘droid appeared, one side of it torn away to reveal wires and circuits which sparked with internal damage. It dipped every now and then as its repulsorfield threatened to short out.

As Skeet helped Brey to his feet, the ‘droid turned it’s photoreceptors onto them.

   “Stop them!” it screamed, impossibly high-pitched. “They just killed Komag the Hutt!”

As Skeet finally got Brey up he became acutely aware of the amount of survivors. Even those who were obviously badly hurt were pulling weapons and he had a sudden urge to depart.

Brey had also had that same feeling and renewed strength entered his weak legs. “Let’s go!”

Blaster bolts ripped into the walls as they ran up the stairs. The smoke ruined the aim of many of the beings but the amount of energy released threatened to collapse the stairwell. Red, green and blue slivers of energy chased the men up the entranceway as they tried to beat a hasty retreat, explosions tearing out chunks of the walls by their heads and the steps at their feet. As they approached the outer door it slid open, and the scarf-headed human appeared.

    “What the...?”

Brey wasn’t in the mood for explanations and he threw a blind punch at the human, which connected squarely with his jaw. The blow was enough to send the man sprawling unconscious, surprising even Brey, who checked his shock as more blaster shots screamed out of the door. Skeet leaped over the body and headed for the speedervan.

Alarms were sounding in the Gambling Syndicate as the explosion had been detected in the basement and swarms of gamblers were streaming from the building. Skeet and Brey fell into the fray, the speedervan close but almost unattainable as they were threatened to be swept away by the panic-stricken crowds. The Hutt’s cohorts appeared at the door and started firing wildly into the crowd, felling beings trying to escape as they tried desperately to get to the two men they believed had murdered their employer. Brey was caught by a falling victim and he fell under the weight of the hammer-headed Ithorian’s body.

   “Skeet!”

The crowds had separated to avoid this new threat, and Skeet, trying to haul the wounded Ithorian off his friend, looked up to see the first four of Komag’s employees taking aim. He screwed his eyes shut and threw himself in front of Brey.

The lead shooter’s chest erupted in sparks as a blaster bolt screamed over Skeet’s head. The others turned their attention away from their quarry as a new threat appeared.

Officer Eilen leaped the bodies on the ground as she fired again; her shot throwing another criminal back against a wall. At first the employees took aim, thinking that a well-placed barrage of fire would take out this single constable, but then several other officers appeared, blaster firing with deadly effectiveness. The cohorts, now under threat themselves, returned a smattering of fire and beat a hasty retreat back to the open door. Bolts exploded into bodies and the walls as weaponsfire criss-crossed the air, the constables going far beyond the need for stun and making their point well made; they were not going to tolerate this kind of violence.

Eilen helped the groaning Ithorian off Brey carefully so as not to aggravate her wound any further and pulled her headset mike to her mouth.

   “Control, backup and medspeeders required, central peak, Komag’s Betting Syndicate. Now!”

She fired another shot at the retreating gangsters but then allowed her fellow officers to run past her and continue the fight. She picked up Brey and escorted them behind the holed speedervan and into cover.

   “Thank you, thank you,” Brey said. “You don’t know how pleased we are to see you!”

   “I can imagine. Don’t thank me just yet; you guys are in serious trouble. I’m to take you to see Governor Retsam right now.”

Skeet groaned. He had so desperately wanted to meet the governor but this was hardly the way he wanted it to be. Things had become so convoluted in his life these past two days his head hurt.

Eilen quickly glanced back at the diminishing firefight and saw that her officers had almost got the situation under control.

   “So,” she said, stern-faced and narrow-eyed, “what did you do wrong this time?”