Lu San's bulging, saurian eyes tracked him. "Protocol dictates that you keep your chins down."

Taunt, who had almost as many rolls of fat under his mandible as the pregnant females of his species had b.r.e.a.s.t.s, pressed his chin against his upper chest. "Like this?" he managed to say.

"That will do. What's important is that you refrain under any circ.u.mstance from showing your neck."

Taunt shifted his gaze to Lu San's spindly, ring-encased neck. "You're not worried?"

The Gossam indicated himself. "Not nearly enough meat on my bones."

"You'd better hope."

Staggering through the ring corridor while the Second Chance raced away from the Tion planetoid at full speed, Taunt tried in vain to get control of himself. In his years on Nar Shaddaa, he had witnessed the brutal executions of collaborators and betrayers; he had seen would-be defectors fed to rancors and traitors tortured at the hands of droids programmed for sadism. But he would be lucky to erase the Colicoids from his memory.

Emerging like a, sudden plague from the burrows that hollowed the planetoid, slavering while the rapid-thawed and microwaved eopie meat was being off-loaded from the ship, tearing into it with such abandon that blood misted in the thin air and collected like dew on Taunt and Lu San, Viss and Heet as they deboarded the ship . . .

The Colicoids were so stimulated by the feeding frenzy, Taunt was certain that he and his entire party would be ripped limb from limb and consumed live before Lu San could close the deal for the buzz droids.

Somehow, though, the Gossam had made it happen, and the spherical droids had been moved with due haste into the same holds that had held the meat. But then poor Viss, lost in the effort of loading the cargo, had stretched out his neck to work kinks from his shoulders and the feeding frenzy had recommenced. Half a dozen of the barbarous insectoids pounced on him and stripped his bones of meat and flesh faster than Taunt could comprehend . . . Taunt tucking his chins against his chest the whole while, and Lu San, poor Lu San, ineffective in preventing the tragedy and paying dearly for it when he tried to intervene. Smelling the sudden fear coming off him, the Colicoids had sliced and diced the Gossam like raw filleted fish, indifferent to whether he const.i.tuted a meal or a snack, and not a sc.r.a.p was left behind.

Taunt shuddered.

Two circuits through the ring corridor and he was still shaking uncontrollably. Two more and he finally began to calm down, the YT gaining speed and distance for the jump back to Nar Shaddaa.

That they had come away from the horror with their cargo intact was nothing short of a miracle. The sabotage droids were piled a meter high in the cargo holds - unsecured and rolling around like ball bearings in a duratin can - and a Colicoid Creation Nest computer sat in the number two hold, capable of tasking them for their eventual chop shop duty.

Lumbering into the main hold, Taunt lowered himself onto the acceleration couch, waiting for the pilot to announce that the ship was ready to make the jump to lightspeed. But when after too long there was no word, he called forward.

"What's the delay in going to hypers.p.a.ce?"

The response was a worrying moment in coming. "The navicomputer says that the hyperdrive isn't responding. I'm going aft to check it out."

Taunt cut his gaze to the c.o.c.kpit connector in time to see the copilot hurry into the ring corridor. Before he could lift himself out of the couch, a cry of surprise echoed forward.

"The buzz droids are activated! They're disabling the entire ship!"

Bammy Decree's face filled the engineering station's main display, his expression a mix of confusion and deep concern.

"Pistoeka sabotage droids? But how..."

"I bartered for them," Taunt cut him off. From all directions came the sound of the droids chattering to one another and the Second Chance being taken apart. "I'll explain later, but right now we need to know how to deactivate them before they undo every system on the ship!"

"Did the deal include a control computer?"

"Yes, yes!"

"Then can't you just shut it down?"

"It is shut down! We never activated it."

"Then how..."

"And the navigator's telling me that the droids are mainly reversing all the work you performed! Like they're trying to return the YT to factory specs. How can that be?"

"The work I did?" Decree fell silent for a moment, his jaw unhinging slightly. "Did anyone help you broker this deal?"

"The Koorivar-Masel. But what's that have to do with anything?" Taunt didn't bother to wait for a reply. "Is this because of some component you installed? Some aftermarket part? I warned you, Decree, no aftermarket parts!"

Decree squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them wide. "You've got to bring the Pistoeka control computer online. Instruct your engineer to have the computer task the droids with reverting to their standard programming."

"Did you get that?" Taunt yelled over his shoulder.

"I'm on it," the engineer told him.

Taunt returned his gaze to the display. "What else, Decree?"

"Then you've got to jettison them-every last one of them. Can you do that?"

"Can we do that?" Decree shouted to no one in particular.

"It'll take a while, but we can do it."

Taunt expelled his breath. "Decree, this had better work. If not, there won't be a planet remote enough for you to hide on."

Decree swallowed and nodded. "It'll work."

"What do we do about the damaged systems? The kriffing droids have torched their way into nearly everything!"

"Have your engineer inventory the damage. I'll get hold of the parts you need and find someone with a fast ship. I'll repair everything personally."

"Get started on gathering parts. I'll contact Nar Shaddaa and set you up with a ship."

Decree looked sheepish. "I, I..."

"Save it," Taunt said, and ended the communication.

Big hands shaking, he stood to his full height. He would have to come up with an explanation for the Vigo, as well as credits enough to pay for the eopie meat and the cost of the trip. The fiasco. He wasn't sure just how long he had been standing at the engineering station when Heet hurried into his peripheral view.

"The droids are shut down. Naath is below, getting ready to jettison them. But they did a lot of damage, boss. Comms up and running, but we've only got the sublight drive."

Taunt nodded absently. "Help is coming. Have a list prepared of everything needed to repair the hyperdrive."

"Will do."

Heet no sooner moved off than the voice of the pilot rang out from the c.o.c.kpit. "Boss! You'd better get in here. We've got a serious problem on our hands."

Taunt whirled from the engineering station and thundered through the connector into the c.o.c.kpit, nearly slamming his head on the hatch's low head jamb. The pilot indicated two glinting shapes in the center of the viewport.

"Imperial Navy. One of the older Acclamator-cla.s.s a.s.sault ships, with a Destroyer escort." The pilot looked at him. "Do you think they've had their eye on the Colicoids? Could they have observed the deal go down?"

Taunt worked his jaw. "Even if they did, they're not going to find any evidence of it."

The pilot touched the earphones of his headset. "They're comming us. They want us to power down and submit to an inspection." He glanced at the viewport. "The escort's vectoring for intercept."

Heet squeezed into the c.o.c.kpit behind Taunt. "The droids are jettisoned."

"Good," Taunt started to say, then stopped himself, all color draining from his face. "Decree had us retask the droids to their original programming."

Heet stared blankly.

"Their original programming is to disable Republic vessels!"

The three of them swung as one to the viewport.

A choice epithet flew from the pilot. "The escort's flying right into their midst!"

"Warn them away!" Taunt said. "Tell them we have a radiation leak!"

"Overseer, this is Second Chance,'" the pilot said into the mike. "It would be better if we came to you-But-But-No, that's not the... It's..." Turning to Taunt, he said: "They suspect a trick. They're threating to open fire."

For a moment, Taunt couldn't get his vocal cords to work. "How much time until the escort reaches the droids?"

The pilot brought a magnified view of the ship to one of the dis-plays. You didn't have to be a technical wiz to grasp that the spherical sabotage droids were already maneuvering toward the escort.

"They're penetrating the deflector shield. Attaching!"

Taunt stumbled backward into the copilot's chair, which nearly collapsed beneath him.

The c.o.c.kpit fell eerily silent, except for deliberate tones issuing from the communications suite. Then, without warning, an explosion blossomed in front of the YT and nova-bright light flooded through the viewport.

In the early days, there wasn't a sacrifice he wouldn't make for the Falcon-even if that meant flying halfway across the galaxy risking his and Chewbacca's lives to rescue a man from prison in exchange for equipping the YT with an upgraded guidance system, a new rectenna, and a hyperdrive that would allow the ship to make 0.5 past lightspeed.

The trip to the Corporate Sector was the first real voyage he and the Wookiee had made with the Falcon, shortly after he had won it from Lando at Cloud City. The first of their grand adventures. The idea had been to visit Klaus "Doc" Vandangante, an outlaw tech who knew better than just about anyone how to get the most out of a ship. The problem was that Doc had gone and gotten himself arrested and imprisoned in Stars' End on Orron III, and Doc's gorgeous blond daughter, Jessa, had made Doc's rescue part and parcel of the agreement to upgrade the Falcon.

Doing that had required having the Falcon masquerade as the brain of an ungainly barge, which had so slowed the jump to Orron III that he and Chewie were practically at each other's throats by the time the c.u.mbersome vessel emerged from hypers.p.a.ce. But the tedious journey had left him feeling proud of the fact that he was in some way responsible for having rescued the old freighter from a life of such duties. In the same way the Falcon had saved him from a life of having to pilot gaudy ships for the Hutts and other degenerates.

Over the years, as the sacrifices he made for the ship had mounted up, he came to think of himself as bound to the Falcon as surely as he was bound to Chewie and, later, to Leia. All the chances they had taken together, all the danger they had put themselves" through, all the sacrifices they had made for each other.

Chapter seven.

ZAMAEL ARCHIPELAGO, DEEP CORE.

43 YEARS AFTER THE BATTLE OF YAVIN.

Allana Solo sat on the rim of the main hold maintenance access, her thin legs dangling over the edge of the open hatch.

"Tell her to try it now," Han called from somewhere deep in the innards of the ship.

Allana cupped her hands to her mouth and turned toward the c.o.c.kpit. "Grandma, he says to try it now."

A moment later the Falcon's sublight engine loosed a whining groan but failed to come to life. In the compartment Han muttered a barely inaudible, truncated curse.

"One hundred and eighteen," C-3PO said from behind Allana, who shifted slightly to look at him. "This is the one hundred and eighteenth time since it has been my privilege to serve aboard the Millennium Falcon that this very same event has occurred. Or events of a similar nature, I should say."

Allana smiled. "That's a good thing."

The protocol droid c.o.c.ked his head to one side, as if he hadn't quite heard her. "I'm not certain I take your meaning, mistress."

" 'Cause Grandpa has always fixed it."

A pained yowl erupted from the compartment.

"Perhaps," C-3PO said. "Though not without requisite contributions of Captain Solo's flesh and blood."

Leia appeared from the c.o.c.kpit connector, smiling at Allana, then stroking the seven-year-old's long red hair as she settled down beside her on the rim of the hatch.

"Grandpa and his shortcuts."

"I heard that," Han said. "You're going to blame me for an uncharted gravity sink?"

"I can't very well blame the sink, Han."

"Yeah, well, it could be worse. We could have been drawn directly into it."

Leia had learned long ago that things could always be worse. Still, the sink had yanked the Falcon from hypers.p.a.ce with such force that the power core had shut down, leaving the ship in danger of being drawn ineluctably into the sink, and certain catastrophe.

"That seems to be exactly what's happening, darling."

Han's head and shoulders emerged from the hatch, a lopsided, mirthless smile on his face. "Always looking on the bright side. That's why I've kept you around all these years."

She returned the look in land. "I love you, too."

Han scowled and disappeared back into the compartment.

Sighing, Allana stood up and walked to the dejarik table's semicircular bench, humming to herself and gazing around. "Grandma, how long do you think we'll be here?" she said finally.

"Not long." Leia stood up and joined her at the hologame table. "What's a family outing without an unexpected twist or two?"