Stunned and doubled over from the blow to his gut, Boba Fett lay on the cargo area's grated metal floor, one shoulder rolled beneath him. His own sudden flurry of motion revealed to his dazed and swimming vision what had previously been concealed by the thick smoke gath-ered at the base of the cage: the laser-cannon bolts from the hidden enemy ship had buckled the hold's floor enough to spring loose a section of cage bars. The one with which Voss'on't had struck him had come com-pletely free, and had been held in place only by the stormtrooper's fist, giving the visual impression that he was still trapped inside the cage. In fact, and as Boba Fett had just painfully learned, he had been merely waiting for Fett to unlock the door and come within striking distance.
"You should have ... listened ..." Voss'on't's words came from somewhere in the blurred, red-tinged distance above Boba Fett. "When you had... the opportunity..."
As Fett tried to push himself up from the floor, an-other blow from the metal cage bar to the base of his battle armor's helmet sent him sprawling again. The hel-met's visor scraped across the cargo hold's grating. His mouth filled with the taste of smoke as he gulped for breath.
"But you . . . didn't. . ." Voss'on't had planted his boots on either side of Boba Fett, the better to raise the cage bar high and aim a killing blow at the top of the bounty hunter's vertebrae. "You don't get... a second chance..."
Boba Fett heard the bar come whistling down through the oxygen-thinned air. But the broken weld of its tip struck the hold's floor instead of his spine as his own arm grabbed hold of one of Voss'on't's legs and jerked him off balance. Voss'on't lost his grip on the metal bar as he fell backward, and it clattered across the floor and against the farthest bulkhead.
The butt of the holstered blaster pistol was already clamped in Boba Fett's fist. Before he could draw it and fire, Voss'on't's close-combat training asserted itself: with his elbows braced against the floor, he brought the heel of his boot hard under Boba Fett's chin, snapping his helmeted head back. The blaster went flying from Fett's loosened grasp. Before Boba Fett could recover, the renegade stormtrooper dived for the weapon. Voss'on't landed with his chest scraping across the edges of the grate, outstretched hands clawing desperately for the blaster.
Fett didn't wait to see if Voss'on't came up with it. He scrambled onto his knees and snatched up the cage bar that had fallen from the stormtrooper's grasp before. In one fluid motion, Fett twisted about, the bar poised javelinlike in one gloved hand; he saw Voss'on't also kneeling a couple of meters away, turning with the blaster pistol gripped in his doubled fists. Behind the weapon, and through the eye-stinging haze filling the cargo hold, the harsh angles of Voss'on't's triumphantly grinning face could be seen as he took aim and squeezed his finger upon the weapon's trigger.
The cage bar flew from Boba Fett's hand as he whipped his arm straight before him. A bolt from the blaster pistol scorched an inch away from Fett's helmet as he dived to one side. Across the hold, a screeching intake of breath sounded from Voss'on't' as the jagged tip of the cage bar ripped through his sleeve and tore a red wound through the flesh underneath. The force of the thrown bar was enough to pull one hand away from the blaster—but the other hand tightened its grip.
"Good . . . shot . . ." With his heart and lungs laboring in his chest, Voss'on't stood up, his wounded arm pressed tight against his side in a vain attempt to stanch the flow of blood. Dark red ribbons wound past the hip of his grease-stained uniform trousers and down his thigh. "But not... good enough..."
Boba Fett made no reply, but watched as the blaster pistol in Voss'on't's shaking hand drew down upon an invisible line to the center of his helmet.
"I might've ... put you in the cage ..." Voss'on't gri-maced with the effort of pulling in enough breath to re-main conscious. Beneath the smoke and ash streaking his narrow face, the scarred and chiseled flesh was as pallid white as a sheet of flimsiplast. "And kept you... alive..." He held the blaster, unwavering now, straight out in front of him. "But I've changed my mind."
Fire and a blinding glare erupted through Slave I's cargo hold, overwhelming the single bolt that shot out from the muzzle of the blaster. Boba Fett felt himself be-ing thrown backward as the hold's grated flooring ripped into pieces from the explosion that pushed apart the ship's bulkheads as though they were mere fluttering sheets of metallic cloth. He knew what had happened, even as he fell again, with one forearm protectively shield-ing his helmet's visor. From somewhere in the airless dis-tance outside, the other ship, his unidentified enemy, had taken aim and fired its laser cannon, scoring a direct hit on his own ship's hull.
Another explosion rumbled from deep in the bowels of Slave I, in the main engine compartments. Fire, laced with electrical sparks, white-hot wasps swirling in dense clouds of oily smoke, leapt up through the chasms that had been driven through the flooring and bulkheads. The blood that had already been spilled now hissed into red steam as the remaining atmospheric content shim-mered with the fierce heat from below.
There he is —
Boba Fett spotted the renegade stormtrooper behind a wall of flame and black, coiling smoke. Stunned by the impact of the laser-cannon bolt and the catastrophic sys-tems failure it had triggered, Voss'on't had fallen to his knees and now-empty hands, his head lowered as though to preserve the last flickerings of consciousness inside his oxygen-starved brain.
At the same time, the ship's alarm systems overrode the muting command that Boba Fett had given them. A chorded electronic wail sounded both inside his helmet and through the diminished air, as though the damage suffered by Slave I had given it a shrill, ululating voice, one with which it could keen its own death.
Tendrils of smoke streamed past Boba Fett like elon-gated ghosts as he strode through the flames; the ship's hull had been breached in enough places that the vacuum outside had begun sucking out the remaining oxygen in the cargo hold. The fire from the main engine compart-ments had begun to diminish, but still remained high enough that its bright tongues lapped past Fett's knees.
"Let's go." Boba Fett reached down through a wash of smoke and grabbed Voss'on't underneath one arm. He lifted the stormtrooper up onto his wobbling legs.
Voss'on't's head lolled back, as though the bones had been surgically extracted from his neck. The fire's heat had cauterized his wounded arm, stopping the flow of blood, but a thinner red line trickled from the corner of his mouth. The close impact of the laser-cannon bolt had taken him closer to death than any of Boba Fett's weap-ons could have.
"Go ahead ..." Voss'on't's eyelids were barely able to drag back above his unfocused sight. There was barely enough breath left in his lungs for his voice to be emitted as a dry, forceless whisper. "Finish ... me off..."
"I told you before." The other man was taller than Fett; he had to lift Voss'on't higher and brace him against his chest, then step backward to pull him away from the flames and smoke. "You're too valuable to let die." Boba Fett took one hand away from where he had clutched the torn front of the stormtrooper's insignia-less uniform, and prodded his gloved fingertips up underneath the edge of his own armor's helmet. He took one last, lung-filling inhalation from the helmet's air supply, then tugged and ripped the breathing tube out beneath the helmet's lower edge. The tube extended only a few inches from the helmet; Boba Fett had to bring the stormtrooper's face up close to his own, foreheads separated only by the dark visor, in order the thrust the end of the tube into Voss'on't's mouth.