Why you would bother to inspect clones was beyond him. Seen one, seen them all.

Admiral Bleyd stood before them. He was an impres-sive figure, surely enough-tall and lean, his dress grays showing nary a wrinkle, and somehow Den knew that he wasn't using an antistatic field generator. No wrinkle that knew what was good for it would come anywhere close to the admiral's uniform.

The bald, burnished head gleamed in the sun, its dark bronze shining like an insect's carapace. Den couldn't see any sign of the admiral sweating. Maybe Sakiyans didn't sweat.

Or maybe it was just Admiral Bleyd who didn't.

The reporter came to a stop not far from the officers' line. He could see Filba-Not exactly hard to miss, he looks like something a s.p.a.ce slug sneezed out. The Hutt's yellowish skin was even more mottled than usual, and he looked particularly slimy today. You don't know what suffering is yet, Den silently promised the gigantic mollusk.

At least this planet has an atmosphere, foul though it may be. Not like a prison on an asteroid, where all you'll have to look at is rock...

The best time to drop his bombsh.e.l.l would be during the inspection tour-out of Filba's earshot, obviously. Den tried to visualize the look of dismay on the Hutt's face when security came to collect him.

Somewhat to his surprise, now that this elaborate re-venge scheme he had worked on for the past several weeks was about to pay off, he felt remarkably unen-thused about the whole thing. Blowing the whistle on the Hutt suddenly seemed like more of an obligation, a duty, than savory retribution. He didn't feel the joy he thought he would.

It wasn't just payback for the Hutt's recent treatment of him. He'd nearly gotten Den killed on Jabiim, as well. No, Filba had had this coming for a long time. But now-and this struck him with something very close to real horror-Den realized might actually be feeling re-luctant to do it.

You're getting soft, Den told himself. Losing your edge. Must be the heat. You gotta get off this planet.

Then he noticed the admiral pause slightly as he pa.s.sed the Hutt. There was eye contact between the two-a very quick glance, something that, unless you'd been an investigative reporter with your sensors attuned by years in the field, was virtually unnoticeable.

But Den noticed it.

Most interesting.

Although he was aware that he might be reading a ter-abyte or two into that look that wasn't necessarily there, still, the implications were... unsettling. He would bet his droptacs that there was something going on between the Hutt and the Sakiyan, and that it would be, at the very least, highly unorthodox. What would an admiral of the fleet and a supply sergeant have to talk about?

It was a lot to read into a single, almost subliminal glance. It might be nothing more than distaste for Hutts in general that had caused Bleyd's look, but Den Dhur was adept at what he did, and he had learned to trust his reporter's instincts-maker knew they had been hard enough to come by. And the more he thought about it, the more sense it made. The deeper his investigations into Filba's malfeasance had gone, the more obvious it had become that the Hutt couldn't be handling a black-market operation like this by himself.

He had to be get-ting help from higher up. Den just hadn't realized how high up the help was.

Of a moment, he did a fast revision of his plans.

Looks like I won't be acquainting the admiral with your iniquities after all, you sack of slime. Certainly not until he was more knowledgeable about Bleyd's in-volvement. The rot had spread higher than he'd thought. If he went tripping into the admiral's presence and began blathering about Filba's crimes to his partner in those crimes, who just happened to be somebody who could have him shot with a wave of his hand - well, that could be a fatal error.

Don't tell me you're surprised, his mind whispered mockingly.

The admiral dismissed the troops and personnel. Col-onel Vaetes, accompanied by Captains Vondar and Yant, joined Bleyd to walk him through the operating theater.

Sooner or later, Bleyd would find time to speak to Filba alone. And Den was determined that they wouldn't be as alone as they thought they were...

23.

Back in his cubicle Den pulled a small box from under the bed, thumbed the recognizer lock, and opened it. It was time to bring out the big guns-or, rather, the small ones. The smallest one, in fact, and it wasn't a gun, though it did "shoot."

Den held the tiny device close to his eyes and admired it. It was a tiny spycam disguised as a flying insect, known as a moon moth. The entire thing barely cov-ered his thumbnail, but its biomimetic design allowed it to fly about undetected, letting its operator hear and see everything its sensors could pick up, from up to ten thousand meters away. He'd used it a few times before. It had a built-in state-of-the-art confounder that would nullify tangle fields, sensor screens, or other electro-magnetic obstructions either Bleyd or Filba might be wearing. And, with all the winged pests buzzing around the base anyway, one more would hardly be noticed. It had cost him three months' pay, but the first time he'd used it, back when he'd done the story on the Wild s.p.a.ce smugglers, it had paid for itself.

"Off you go," he murmured as he activated the de-vice. The moon moth flew through the open entrance and vanished as Den slipped on the virtual headset that would allow him to control it.

He let himself enjoy the feeling of flying for a few mo-ments, climbing high over the base for a panoramic view of the swamp, then swooping down low to buzz one of the many clones in sight. Then he leveled out and headed for Filba's domain.

The door was shut, but there were plenty of tiny openings where the heat-warped plasteel was joined with the duralloy framework. He squeezed the moon moth through one. Not a moment too soon-Bleyd was already there, facing the Hutt, and from the looks on both their faces Den didn't expect either one to whip out holos of the kids anytime soon. He steered the bug-cam to a landing on a nearby shelf.

What was that old Kubaz saying about wishing one were a buzz-beetle on a wall...?

Filba had evidently prepared for this confrontation by finishing most of a keg of what looked like Alder-aanian ale. His skin folds had that rubbery look that Hutts got when drunk.

Bleyd, on the other hand, was not at all intoxicated, unless anger could be considered an intoxicant. He was speaking in a low, level tone, and seemed-to Den, at least-ready to slice and dice Filba.

Den turned the gain up on the sound enhancers.

"-things are too hot right now," Bleyd said through his fangs. "I don't want Black Sun coming back anytime soon. Until this affair with their missing emissary is set-tled, we have to lie low."

"Easy for you to say," the Hutt rumbled. "Your profit margin's far higher than mine." He took another mighty swig of the ale; despite his distended gut, he was evidently nowhere near capacity. "I'm taking all the risks, and you're getting all-"

"There'll be no profits for either of us if Black Sun moves in, you bloated imbecile! If you've a brain buried anywhere in all that blubber you'd understand that."

"Insults," Filba sneered, waving his jug about. "All I ever get. I deserve more for my part in this. I deserve-"

Bleyd was suddenly across the room and at the Hutt's throat. He'd moved so fast that the moon moth had only registered a blur. "You deserve," the Sakiyan hissed, "to have your innards rearranged, you swamp-sucking-"

He stopped abruptly. Filba's eyes were even more bul-bous and distended than usual. His wide gash of a mouth opened and closed, either questing for air or try-ing to speak, and apparently not succeeding at either. The small arms were waving about in panic. The jug slipped from his hand and shattered on the floor.

Filba lurched forward, drawing more and more of his bulk upright until it seemed impossible that he could maintain his balance. He swayed, a mottled tower of flab and slime-then toppled, crashing down to the floor. Bleyd had to leap out of the way to avoid being crushed as the Hutt's considerable ma.s.s struck hard enough to shake the building. It nearly vibrated the moon moth off its perch.

Maker's eyes! He's fainted! Or worse...

Den, watching, could not believe his eyes-or, rather, the moon moth's photoreceptors. What was going on? Had the admiral actually scared Filba into having heart failure-or whatever the Hutt equivalent was; hard to believe Filba even had a heart-by appearing to attack him?

Bleyd bent over the motionless form. He touched the Hutt's back, perhaps feeling for some kind of pulse.

Then he turned to the broken ale jug, lifted a shard, and sniffed it.

A peculiar expression spread over his face-equal parts understanding, anger, and bafflement. He stood frozen for a moment, then hurled the fragment to break against the wall.

The entrance chime activated. A m.u.f.fled pounding was heard, as were concerned shouts.

Filba's collapse had probably been noticed by everyone in the area - Den would have been surprised if the Separatists hadn't felt it as well.

Bleyd turned to the door. He smoothed his uniform, made sure no medal hung even slightly askew, and then opened it.

Den knew it was time to go. The moon moth was im-mune to most detection devices, but shortly techs would likely be going over this chamber with gadgets that could hear an electron shifting sh.e.l.ls. He made the moon moth fly off the shelf, toward the entrance, which was already filled with confused and shocked faces-A hand came out of nowhere, moving so fast it just seemed to appear. Den gasped as his point of view shifted violently. And then, suddenly, the moon moth was being held close to Bleyd's face. The admiral was staring, it seemed, right into Den's eyes.

A second later the hand closed into a fist. There was a flash as the piezoelectrics shorted out-and then blackness.

Uh-oh...

24.

Barriss Offee was just finishing her meditation when she heard the commotion, and felt a simultaneous ripple in the Force. She settled to the floor, unlocked her legs, and stood.

Outside, several people were running back and forth. This in itself wasn't unusual for the base, but the rever-berations she had felt were not the familiar ones of in-coming wounded. She followed these new feelings, and the excited crowd, and saw a knot of people animatedly talking outside Filba's office in the large central admin-and-requisition center. Zan Yant was among them. She stepped up alongside him.

"Doctor Yant."

He smiled at her. "Healer Offee. Looks like we all felt Filba's pa.s.sing, one way or another."

"The Hutt is dead? How?"

"Hard to say for sure. Apparently it was very sudden. I had a word with one of the techs, who sometimes sits in on our card game, and the indication from him was poison."

A tech emerged from the large cubicle with an anti-grav gurney, upon which was a large body sack, sealed shut and obviously filled to capacity. The lifter's gyros and condenser whined under the load as the tech guided it outside.

"That would be the late, and fairly heavy, Filba, un-less I miss my guess. I wonder who's on medical exam-iner duty today? Whoever it is has got quite a job ahead of him."

Jos Vondar arrived just then, and the three of them watched the gurney head for the OT.

"Bad luck," Jos said. He didn't look happy.

"Filba was a friend of yours?" Barriss asked.

He looked at her, obviously surprised at the question. "Filba was an obnoxious, officious, tightfisted father-less squat who would make his own pouch mother sign a requisition for water if she was dying of thirst."

"You've got to learn to be more open with your feel-ings," Zan said.

"Why the grief, then?" Barriss asked.

"Because I'm on ME duty," Jos said dolefully. "Lucky me, I get to do the autopsy. This war'll be over by the time I've cut him up. I'll dull just about all the vi-broscalpels we have in stock. I'm saving the last one for my throat," he said to Zan in a mock-aside whisper.

"Word is, he was poisoned," Zan said.

"Won't help, and you know it. I still have to dice him and weigh each organ, even if he just had a simple car-diac arrest. I'll need a wrecker droid to help."

"Oh, well, look on the bright side," Zan said. "Maybe we can recycle him into lube-it'd be enough to keep all our surgical droids working smoothly for, oh, the next couple hundred years."

"It's good to see you two can maintain a sense of hu-mor at the death of a fellow being,"

Barriss said, sound-ing slightly stiffer than she had intended. After all these weeks at Rimsoo Seven she was certainly not unfamiliar with the black humor; even so, it occasionally took her somewhat by surprise.

Jos looked at her and shrugged. "Laugh, cry, get tanked, or go mad-those are the options around here. I'll leave you to your own choice-me, I have a moun-tain to carve." He headed toward the OT, following the gurney.

After he was gone, Zan said, "It gets to you, after a while. You have to develop defenses.

I have my music - Jos uses sarcasm. Whatever gets you through the hot nights."

Barriss didn't say anything. She knew he was right, but still...

Zan sighed. "You know what I regret?"

"What?"

"I just heard a brand-new Hutt joke, and now I can't use it to steam Filba."

She looked at him in surprise, and he grinned at her. After a moment, she smiled back and shook her head.

It was, other than Filba's demise, a quiet day. There was a lull in the fighting, and no medlifters arrived bear-ing wounded, a welcome rarity.

The activity around Filba's death was exciting enough. The plithvine carried rumors everywhere. As Barriss made her medical rounds in the ward, even the patients knew about it. She overheard the Ugnaughts gossiping: Yar, the Hutt drank poison. Suicide, f'sure. He beed a spy-it war Filba who blowed up the bota transport, no lie, blood. They were closin'

in on 'im, 'e sar it comin'...

Hadn't Admiral Bleyd himself gone to see the Hutt just before Filba had croaked? No doubt it had been to question him about his activities. He was also stealing bota, didn't you know? That little reporter, Dhur? - he was on the Hutt like sleaks on swamp sc.u.m, nosing around, building a case, and Filba was on the verge of being arrested, and he had taken the poison to avoid be-ing court-martialed and executed... and so on.

Barriss didn't add to the gossip; she just listened as she went about her duties. If the suicide rumor was true, then it might mean she would be leaving Drongar soon. Her mission to find out who had been stealing bota would be over, if it truly had been the Hutt. And from the talk, it seemed it had. How many thieves, after all, were likely to be operating at the same time in a small outfit like this? Filba had been a supply noncom-he would have had the access. And, while Barriss didn't like to make sweeping speciesist generalizations, it was true that Hutts in general were not known for their honesty and virtue. Filba was a good fit for the crime.

Perhaps too good a fit. She could not be sure, because the Force was not quiescent.

Something was still roiling in its invisible folds, and she did not have the skill to de-termine exactly what the subtle vibrations portended. She only knew that the matter was not yet settled.

She had mixed emotions about it all. This war was in-deed a situation that called for heavy emotional re-sponse, and she had been on a lot more pleasant worlds, that was for certain. But it was all part of her test, her path to Jedi Knighthood-and if she was called away, then what? What would her own future bring? She was not afraid-her training did not admit many fears-but it was... unsettling.

What would be, would be. It was not up to her.

The day faded into evening, and eventually Barriss was finished with her medical ch.o.r.es.

She decided to skip dinner and go to her cubicle. Perhaps another ses-sion of quiet meditation and deep breathing would shed some light on whatever it was causing those small, but continuing, disturbances in the Force...

The camp was quiet as night crept over it. Few people were about; shift change was long past, and most were either eating supper, or resting, or doing whatever it was they did when they weren't working. For the most part, that didn't include taking in the fetid, hot night air.

As Barriss neared the mouth of the alley that led to her quarters, she felt a presence in the shadows. She saw no one, but the Force's prompt was clear and unmistak-able-almost the psychic equivalent of a hand on her shoulder.

She stopped. Her hand moved slowly toward her lightsaber.

"You won't need that," a voice said. "I'm not going to do you any real harm. Just teach you a little lesson in humility. You Jedi are big on that, aren't you?"

Phow Ji.