“Where are your troopers, Sergeant?” Vader all but snarled.
Again the reply was long in arriving. “Lord Vader, we have a visual on four bodies — two stormtroopers, the captain, and the comm officer.” Crest paused, then added, “Shot through and through, Lord Vader.”
Vader clenched his right hand. “You’ve failed me for the last time, Sergeant.”
“I get that, sir,” Crest said in a somber voice.
Vader turned to Tarkin. “We sidestepped the smaller trap only to fall into the larger one, Governor. If nothing else, we now know the reason we were lured here.” Bringing his left hand to the brow of his helmet, he paced away from Tarkin and the ambassador, then swung back to them. “The ship is still in the Murkhana system.”
Tarkin didn’t waste time asking how Vader knew that to be the case. Instead, he glanced at one of the stormtroopers. “The Judicial cruiser at the landing field.”
The stormtrooper shook his head in a mournful way. “Not spaceworthy, sir. We’ve been waiting on replacement parts for the hyperdrive motivator for three months, local.”
“I know where to procure a ship,” Vader said abruptly. He swept his arm in a gesture aimed at the stormtroopers. “All of you — come with me.” Then he turned and pointed to Bracchia. “And you.”
Tarkin fell in among them as they hastened from the ambassador’s residence.
Tarkin had his doubts.
At Lola Sayu, when Skywalker, Kenobi, and Ahsoka Tano had participated in rescuing him from the Citadel, Tarkin had taken issue with the Jedi strategy of splitting into two teams. Surrendering group integrity for twice the number of potential problems made little sense, and that was precisely the way the mission had unfolded. Tarkin’s general, Even Piell, had been killed, and the rest of them had nearly fallen back into the clutches of the Citadel’s sadistic Separatist prison warden. Now, all these years later, Vader had split their forces, and here they were allowing themselves to be herded at blasterpoint into the den of a Sugi crime lord while the stormtroopers were elsewhere in Murkhana City carrying out their part of Vader’s plan.
So Tarkin had his doubts.
But with the Carrion Spike apparently in the hands of shipjackers, and his captain, comm officer, and two stormtroopers dead, he had little choice but to go along with the subterfuge, in the hope that it would succeed.
“I still don’t like splitting up the team,” he said to Vader as one of the Sugi was shoving him from behind.
Vader glanced over at him, but as ever it was impossible to tell what was going on behind the black orbs and muzzle of his mask.
The headquarters building was in better condition than most in Murkhana City, its graceful swirls of coral and undersea colors having either survived the war or been restored since. Initially Tarkin had taken the Sugi for an insectile species, but in fact they were short bipeds who affected armored powersuits. The suits provided them with a second set of legs and a segmented, barb-tipped abdomen, which gave them the appearance of mythological creatures. The soldiers, at any rate. Others in the dank hall Vader and Tarkin were escorted into stood on their own two feet and wore cowl-like helmets, with power packs of some sort on their backs. The outsized helmets made their large-eyed skeletal faces seem even smaller than they were.
Twenty soldiers complemented the half dozen who were holding weapons on Vader and Tarkin, with several repurposed Separatist battle droids augmenting the hall group. Their apparent leader lounged on a gaudy throne of coral, clicking orders to his minions.
Vader came to a halt five meters from the throne and spent a moment taking in the overstated surroundings. “You have done well for yourself since the demise of your former competitor, crime lord,” he said at last.
“And for that I owe you a debt of gratitude, Lord Vader,” the Sugi answered in heavily accented Basic. “That is the sole reason I have allowed you entry to my abode — to thank you personally for killing my predecessor and persuading Black Sun to abandon Murkhana for safer realms.”
“You are as insolent as he was, crime lord.”
“Given that I enjoy the upper hand here, Lord Vader, I can well afford to be.”
Vader folded his arms across his massive chest. “Don’t be too sure of yourself.”
The Sugi dismissed the warning. “I have been apprised by my associates of your prowess, Lord Vader. But I doubt that even you could triumph over so many.” When Vader said nothing, he continued: “Now, what is this drivel about commandeering my starship?”
Tarkin stepped forward to speak. “We take your meaning about being outnumbered. But perhaps there’s a healthier way to persuade you to do as Lord Vader asks.”
The Sugi’s large eyes expanded. “I have not had the pleasure …”
“Meet Moff Tarkin, crime lord,” Vader said. “Sector governor of Greater Seswenna and more.”
The Sugi sat back in his chair. “Now I am impressed. That Murkhana should play host to two such luminary Imperials … Though many might say I would be doing the galaxy a favor by eliminating you here and now.” He fixed his gaze on Tarkin. “But you were saying, Governor Tarkin …”
“That in meetings of this nature there are always alternatives to using brute force.”
“I can’t imagine any alternatives that will convince me to surrender my fanged beauty of a starship, Governor Tarkin.”
Cautiously, Tarkin drew a portable holoprojector disk from the pocket of his tunic. “If I may?”
The Sugi waved permission.
“Sergeant Crest,” Vader said toward the device. “Are you in the crime lord’s warehouse?”
“Yes, Lord Vader. Ready to bring the entire place down on your command.”
“Then you have redeemed yourself, Sergeant.”
“Thank you, Lord Vader.”
The crime lord’s expression approximated entertainment. “You can’t be serious. Or do you actually believe that I would surrender my ship for a warehouse full of weapons?”
“Your Crymorah associates on Coruscant might encourage you to do just that.”
“I’ll take my chances, Lord Vader.”
“You’re right of course,” Tarkin said quickly. “But just now your warehouse contains more than weapons. We’ve arranged for your wives and brood to be present as well.” He called up an image of the Sugi’s family members huddled in a circle on the warehouse floor and surrounded by stormtroopers with raised weapons. “We understand that you are very attached to them. A product of your genetics, I suspect.”
“You wouldn’t!” the Sugi said.
His earlier doubts about Vader’s plan beginning to fade, Tarkin lifted an arrogant eyebrow. “Wouldn’t we?”
The Sugi fidgeted in apprehension. “I can have both of you killed where you stand!”
“We’ll take our chances,” Tarkin said, grinning slightly. “Your ship for their lives.”
After a long moment of rapid clicking and nervous hand wringing, the Sugi broke the tense silence. “All right, take the ship! I will purchase a replacement. I will purchase twenty replacements. Just let them live — let them live!”
Tarkin’s face grew deadly serious. “You’ll need to furnish us with all the necessary launch codes and order all of your underlings to leave the landing field at once.”
“Then I will do it,” the crime lord said. “Whatever you ask!”
Vader leaned slightly in the direction of the comlink. “Sergeant Crest, transport the crime lord’s family to the landing field and let me know when your troops are in possession of his ship.”
“Let them live,” the Sugi repeated, rising halfway out of his throne in supplication.
“Take heart,” Tarkin said. “They most certainly will survive you.”