Darth Plagueis (5 page)

After an hour of searching he found one to his liking. A product of Core engineering, the freighter had to be half a century old, but it had been well maintained and retrofitted with modern sensor suites and subspace drives. That it bore no legend suggested that the ship’s captain wasn’t interested in having the ship make a name for itself. Longer than it was wide, LS-447-3 had a narrow fantail, an undermount cockpit, and broad cargo bay doors, which permitted it to take on large freight. With the registry number stored in his comlink, Plagueis angled his way to the spaceport authority building. At that time of night the dilapidated structure was all but deserted, save for two thick-necked Kon’me guards who were sleeping on duty. Loosening the robe’s sash to provide ready access to his lightsabers, Plagueis eased past them and disappeared through the main doors. Faint light from unoccupied offices spilled into the dark hallways. On the second floor he found the registrar’s office, which overlooked the largest of the landing zones and the silent bay beyond.

A comp that had been an antique twenty years earlier sat atop a desk in a smaller private office. Plagueis placed his comlink alongside the machine and an instant later had sliced into the spaceport control network. A search for the freighter revealed that it did indeed go by a name—the
Woebegone
—out of Ord Mantell. Scheduled to launch the following morning, the ship with her crew of eight, including one droid, was bound for several worlds in the Auril sector, carrying cargos of fresh sea life. According to the manifest, the cargo had already cleared customs and was housed in a refrigerated hangar awaiting transfer to the ship. The good news was that the
Woebegone
’s ultimate destination was
Ithor, on the far side of the Hydian Way. A side trip to Muunilinst, therefore, might not strike the crew as too great a detour.

Plagueis called up an image of the freighter’s captain, whose name was given as Ellin Lah. Opening himself fully to the Force, he studied the image for a long moment; then, exhaling slowly, he stood, erased all evidence of his technological intrusions, and returned the comlink to his robe’s inner pocket.

The
Woebegone
had been waiting for him.

3:
WOEBEGONE

Plagueis’s instincts about Bal’demnic were correct. The planet’s rugged beauty was of a sort that appealed to the hedonistic side of human nature and would one day draw the wealthiest of that species to bask in the warm light of its primary, toe its pristine sands, swim in its animated waters, and dine on the toothsome fish that filled its vast oceans. But in those days, humans were still relatively scarce in that part of the Outer Rim, and most visitors to Bal’demnic hailed from Hutt space or the far reaches of the Perlemian Trade Route. And so Captain Ellin Lah was Togruta, and her first mate, a Zabrak named Maa Kaap. The
Woebegone
’s pilot was a Balosar; her navigator, a Dresselian; and her three crew members Klatooinian, Kaleesh, and an Aqualish, of the Quara race. “Near-humans” all, to use the term favored at that time in the Core, where chauvinism had been raised to an art form. The only nonsentient was a bipedal, multi-appendaged droid called “OneOne-FourDee”, after its model number.

Bal’demnic was but one of their planetary haunts. As often as not they could be spotted on Vestral, Sikkem IV, or Carlix’s Folly. But all were similar in that Captain Lah and her shipmates rarely saw anything more of the planets than what lay within a radius of five kilometers from the principal spaceports, and their contact with indigenes was limited to spaceport functionaries, merchants, information brokers, and those in the pleasure professions.

Theirs was a precarious business, at a time when pirates plied the intersystem trade routes, hyperspace beacons were few and far between,
and a lapse in judgment could result in disaster. The cost of fuel was exorbitant, corrupt customs officials had to be bribed, and import–export taxes were subject to change without notice. Delays meant that cargoes of foodstuffs could lose the freshness that made them desirable, or worse yet spoil altogether. Dangers were manifold and the earnings were meager. You had to love the work, or perhaps be on the run—from the law, yourself, or whoever else.

As a consequence of having imbibed too much local grog and gambled away too many hard-earned credits—and perhaps as atonement for so much carousing—concerns about the coming trip had bobbed to the surface of Captain Lah’s mind like an inflated balloon held under water, then released.

“No oversights this run,” she was warning the crew in a gentle way, as they made their way across the landing zone to their waiting ship.

The fact that she had used the same euphemism Blir’ had to minimize the impact of the near catastrophe he had caused made all of them laugh—except the Balosar, who lowered his head in mock shame, his twin antenepalps deepening in color.

“We take your meaning, Captain,” Maa Kaap said. “No inopportune omissions—”

“Ineradicable errors,” the Kaleesh, PePe Rossh, interjected.

“Dumbass mistakes,” Doo Zuto completed, his close-set, inward-curving tusks in need of a thorough scaling.

The captain allowed them a moment of merriment.

“I’m serious,” she said as they approached the
Woebegone
’s lowered boarding ramp. “I’ll say it again: this ship operates as a democracy. I’m your captain because knowing who’s good at what is just something I have a talent for.” She looked at Blir’. “Do I ever tell you how to pilot?” Then at Semasalli. “Do I ever question your decision about jump points?”

“No, Captain,” the two said, as if by rote.

“So I’m simply speaking as a member of what should be a competent team, and not as a commander.” She blew out her breath in a way that shook her trio of striped head-tails. “Either we turn a profit on this run, or we think about going to the Hutts for another loan.”

Even Wandau, who had had more dealings with various Hutts than anyone else, bemoaned the mere prospect.

“That’s right,” Lah told the tall Klatooinian. “And don’t any of you fool yourself into thinking that we can float an honest loan. Because no bank worth its assets is going to accept the
Woebegone
as collateral.”

Maa Kaap and Blir’ traded quick glances before the Zabrak said, “Excuse me for saying so, Captain, but you didn’t seem particularly concerned about credits last night—”

“Watch what you say,” Lah told her first mate, barely restraining a smile.

“I thought you were ready to give that young thing the ship,” PePe said, joining the tease.

Lah waved a hand in dismissal. “I was just toying with him.”

“
Toy
being the operative word,” Maa Kaap said. “Since he was young enough to still play with them.”

The captain planted her hands on her hips. “I can be convincing when I want to be.”

“Oh, that you were,” Zuto said, reigniting a chorus of laughter that accompanied them into the
Woebegone
’s main cabin space, where 11-4D was waiting.

“Everything in order?” Lah asked the droid.

The droid raised three of its appendages in an approximation of a salute. “Shipshape, Captain.”

“All the cargo is aboard and accounted for?”

“Aboard and accounted for, Captain.”

“You checked the thermo readouts?”

“In each bay, Captain.”

She returned a satisfied nod. “Well, all right then.”

The shipmates split up, each with duties to perform. Blir’ and Semasalli to the cockpit; Zuto, Wandau, and PePe to check that the cargo had been properly stowed; Maa Kaap and 11-4D to seal the ship; and Captain Lah to get clearance from Bal’demnic spaceport control.

Without fanfare the ship left the warm world behind and jumped from cold ether into the netherworld of hyperspace. Lah was still seated at the communications console when Blir’ radioed her from the cockpit.

“We need your input on something.”

“Since when?” she said.

“Seriously.”

She headed forward, and had no sooner ducked into the cockpit than Semasalli indicated a flashing telltale on the ship’s status display suite. A small metal plate below the telltale read:
CARGO BAY 4 AMBIENT
.

“Too hot or too cold?” Lah asked the Dresselian.

“Too cold.”

Lah flicked her forefinger against the telltale, but it continued to flash. “Funny, that usually works.” She studied Semasalli’s frown. “What do you think?”

He sniffed and ran a hand over a hairless, deeply fissured head that mirrored the appearance of the convoluted brain it contained. “Well, it could be the bay thermostat.”

“Or?”

“Or one of the shipping containers could have opened?”

“By itself?”

“Maybe during the jump,” Blir’ said from the pilot’s chair.

“Okay, so we go check it out.” She glanced from Blir’ to Semasalli and shook her head in ignorance. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Blir’ answered for the two of them. “Remember the Zabrak that Maa was talking to in the cantina?”

“Which cantina?” Lah said; then added: “No, I remember him. He was looking for a lift.”

Semasalli nodded. “He’d been booted from his last freighter. He didn’t say why, but Maa thought he smelled trouble, and said we couldn’t take him aboard.”

Lah followed the clues they were giving her and nodded. “You’re thinking we have a stowaway.”

“Just a thought,” the Dresselian said.

“Which is why you wanted to check with me before going aft.”

“Exactly.”

Lah’s face grew almost as wrinkled as Semasalli’s. “The ship would have told us if anyone had tampered with the anti-intrusion sys.”

“Unless he came in with the cargo?” Blir’ said.

“You mean inside one of the containers?”

Blir’ nodded.

“Then he’d be stiff as an icicle by now.” Lah turned to Semasalli. “Does bay four have a vid feed?”

“On screen,” Semasalli said, swiveling his chair to face the status displays.

Lah put her palms flat on the console and leaned toward the screen while the Dresselian brought up grainy views of the cargo bay. Finally the remote cam found what they were looking for: an opened shipping container, wreathed by clouds of coolant, with its cargo of costly meat-fins already defrosting.

“Spawn of a—” Lah started when the next view of the cargo bay stunned her into slack-jawed silence.

Blir’ blinked repeatedly before asking, “Is that what I think it is?”

Lah swallowed hard and found her voice. “Well, it sure isn’t the Zabrak.”

Plagueis was seated atop one of the smaller shipping containers when the hatch began to cycle. Fully awake since the
Woebegone
’s jump to hyperspace, he had sat still for the various scans the crew had run, and now lowered the hood of the lightweight and bloodied robe. When the hatch slid to, he found himself confronted by the ship’s Togruta female captain, along with a muscular male Zabrak; a mottled Klatooinian as tall as a normal Muun; an Aqualish of the two-eyed variety; and a scarlet-hued, scaly-skinned Kaleesh, whose face resembled those of the bats Plagueis had consumed on Bal’demnic, and who was emitting an olio of potent pheromones. All five carried blasters, but only the Klatooinian’s was primed for fire and leveled at Plagueis.

“You’re not listed on the shipping manifest, stranger,” Captain Lah said as she stepped into the bay, breath clouds emerging with the words.

Plagueis spread his hands in an innocent gesture. “I confess to being a stowaway, Captain.”

Lah approached guardedly, motioning to the open container a few meters away. “How did you survive in there?”

Plagueis mimicked the wave of her hand. “Those sea creatures make a comfortable bed.”

The Zabrak surged forward, his stippled cranium furrowed in anger. “Those creatures are how we make our living, Muun. And right now they’re not worth a karking credit.”

Plagueis locked eyes with him. “I apologize for spoiling some of your cargo.”

“The coolant,” Lah said more harshly. “How did you survive that?”

“We Muuns have three hearts,” Plagueis said, crossing one leg over the other. “Two of them are under voluntary control, so I was able to keep my blood circulating and my body temperature close to normal.”

Standing by the open container, the Quara said, “Speaking of blood, you’re leaking some.”

Plagueis saw that some of the sea creatures were coated with congealed blood. “The result of an unfortunate accident. But thank you for noticing.”

Lah shifted her gaze from the container to Plagueis. “We have a medical droid. I’ll have it take a look at your injury.”

“That’s very kind of you, Captain.”

“You’re a long way from the Braxant Run,” the Kaleesh said. “And probably the last species we’d expect to find stowing away in a cargo container.”

Plagueis nodded in agreement. “I can well imagine.”

“Kon’meas Spaceport has passenger flights to Bimmisaari,” the Zabrak added. “You couldn’t wait, or you’re out of credits?”

“To be honest, I wished to avoid the common spaceways.”

Lah and the Zabrak traded dubious looks. “Are you a fugitive?” she asked. “Wanted?”

Plagueis shook his head. “I do, however, value my privacy.”

“Well you might,” the Quara said. “But you have to admit—” He motioned to the bloody sea creatures. “—this undermines your credibility some.”

“What brought you to Bal’demnic, Muun?” the Klatooinian asked before Plagueis could speak.

“I’m not at liberty to divulge the nature of my activities.”

“Banking Clan investments,” the Klatooinian said with a sneer. “Or lawyering. That’s all the Muuns do, Captain.”

Lah appraised Plagueis. “Is he right?”

Plagueis shrugged. “Not all of us are bankers or lawyers. No more than all Togrutas are pacifists.”

“Be better for you if you
were
a financial wizard,” the Zabrak said, “to avoid being jettisoned from our ship.”

Plagueis kept his eyes on Lah. “Captain, I appreciate that you and your crew have many questions about me. But perhaps for the sake of simplicity, the two of us could speak privately for a moment.” When she hesitated, he added: “Strictly in the interest of facilitating an agreement.”