Vision of the future

They made it across the traffic in one piece and went into the tapcafe. Inside, it was just as Han had hoped: large, well lit, and crowded to the gills with sabacc players hunched over tables and kibitzers standing behind them gazing over their shoulders. Breaking to the right just inside the door, he sidled around behind a wall of observers as Lando and Lobot worked their way in toward the curved bar bulging out into the room from the center of the left-hand wall. By the time they reached it Han had managed to work his way out of his scholar's robe. Kicking it back out of the way against the wall, he rubbed the sweat off his palms and waited for Lando to make his move. He didn't have to wait very long. 'All right, that's it!' Lando abruptly bellowed, his voice cutting through the low murmur of background conversation like a lightsaber through a block of ice. All heads turned toward the bar—

And jerked back in shock and fright as the slugthrower blew a gaping hole in the ceiling.

'We'll settle this right here and now, you mangy kowk brain,' Lando shouted over the echoing thundercrack and a handful of gasping shrieks. 'Everybody else— out!' It was as unclear to Han as it was to everyone else just who the mangy kowk brain was that Lando was referring to. But if the sudden panicked exodus from the room was any indication, no one seemed eager to accept the title. Drinks, cards, and dignity completely forgotten, the whole crowd made a concerted dash for the door.

Han let about half of them get past him. Then, shoving his way into the stream, he squeezed through the door and out into the street.

He'd been right about the two security men. Their quiet surveillance totally abandoned, they were pushing their way upstream against the crowd toward the sound of the slugthrower shots, their blasters drawn and ready. Elbowing his way crosswise against the flow, Han angled toward them. Concentrating on the tapcafe, the first one shoved past Han without a single glance. Han waited until the second was just passing him; then, grabbing the kid's gun hand, he swiveled on one heel and drove his elbow hard into the other's stomach. The air went out of him in a loud, agonized whoosh that clearly announced he was out of the fight.

Unfortunately, the sound also clearly announced trouble to his partner. Even as Han wrenched the blaster from his victim's limp hand the other security man, still enmeshed by the crowd, turned to see what had happened.

The kid was certainly young and agile enough. But he had turned around to his left, which left his blaster out of line for a quick shot behind him. Han, on the other hand, already had his appropriated weapon aimed. With a silent plea for the complete trappings of civilization to be in place here in the Imperial capital, he fired.

His plea was answered. Instead of the killing flash of full-power blaster fire, the weapon in his hand spat the brilliant blue rings of a stun jolt.

The security man dropped like a rock beneath the flow of the crowd, already scattering away from this new threat to their peace and quiet. Brandishing the blaster high, Han leaped over the prone body and dashed back to the tapcafe.

Inside, the place was deserted. Even the bartender had found somewhere to disappear to. 'Not like the old days in the Outer Rim,' Lando commented almost wistfully, stripping off his own scholar's robe with one hand as he kept his slugthrower ready.

'Lucky for you it isn't,' Han reminded him. 'On Tatooine or Bengely there'd have been fifteen blasters on you before you got your second shot off. Come on—back door's that way.' Nevertheless, he felt a twinge of regret of his own as the three of them headed for the back of the tapcafe. Those had indeed been fine days...

* * *

Bracing himself, Disra lifted his eyes from the datapad. 'I don't know what to say, Admiral,' he said, careful not to overdo the hurt indignation in his voice and expression. 'I categorically deny all of this, of course.'

'Of course,' Pellaeon echoed, his eyes cool and measuring. 'I'm sure it's nothing more than a carefully orchestrated smear campaign against you by your political enemies.' Disra bit down on his tongue in annoyance. That had indeed been the line he'd been planning to run with. Vader take the man, anyway. 'I wouldn't go quite that far,' he said instead. 'I have no doubt that at least some of your sources have been sincere. Whatever their motivations or sincerity, though, their information is wrong.'

Pellaeon exchanged glances with Commander Dreyf, seated beside him. Patient, knowing glances on both sides. 'Really,' Pellaeon said, looking back at Disra. 'And what do you suggest is the motivation an sincerity of the official trading data Commander Dreyf uncovered on Muunilinst?'

'That's section fifteen on the file,' Dreyf offered helpfully. 'In case you missed it.' Disra ground his teeth, looking back at the datapad. Vader take Pellaeon and Dreyf. 'All I can suggest is that someone deliberately planted those numbers,' he said. It was an unbelievably weak defense, and everyone in the office undoubtedly knew it. But even as Pellaeon opened his mouth to most likely point that out, there was a diffident tap from across the room and one of the double doors swung ponderously open. Disra looked up, ready to scorch the person who'd had the temerity to intrude on a private conversation—

'Your Excellency?' Tierce said, blinking with nicely underplayed surprise at the sight of the two armed troopers flanking the doorway, guards Pellaeon had had the effrontery to bring in here with him. 'Oh, I'm sorry, sir—'

'No, that's all right, Major,' Disra said. 'What is it?'

'I have an urgent message for you, Your Excellency,' Tierce said, hesitantly crossing toward the desk, his eyes on Pellaeon. 'From the palace situation room.'

'Well, let me see it,' Disra growled, waving the other impatiently forward and trying to cover his sudden misgivings.