Vision of the future

In her earphone came the sound of Calrissian's door opening and closing; and with a sigh, Karoly D'ulin pulled the device out of her ear. 'Shassa,' she murmured into the empty air. The word seemed to hang in front of her, there in the tiny utility closet. An old Mistryl battle curse, but spoken now not with anger or combat rage but a deep sadness.

Her gamble had paid off... and now she was going to have to kill an old friend. With practiced fingers she began disassembling the audio tap she'd put into Calrissian's office when she'd arrived here forty hours ago, a flush of anger intruding on her dour mood. Anger at Talon Karrde for being so predictable; anger at herself for anticipating his moves so precisely; anger at Shada D'ukal for putting her in this position in the first place.

What in the ashes of Emberlene had possessed Shada to defy the Eleven that way? she wondered. Loyalty, Shada had said up on that windswept rooftop. But that was clearly ridiculous. Mazzic was a grubby little smuggler— nothing more—with no more claim on Shada's loyalty than any of the dozens of other employers she'd worked for over the years. True, this particular job had lasted longer than most; but no matter what Mazzic might have thought, Shada had still been a Mistryl shadow guard all that time, ultimately answerable only to the Eleven Elders of the People. So Shada had defied her orders, and as a result a Mistryl deal with a Hutt crimelord had gone sour, and the Eleven were demanding Shada's head. All Mistryl had been alerted to watch for her, and several teams had been sent specifically to hunt her down.

And out of all that flurry of activity it had been Karoly who had found her. Even now, eight days later, the irony of it was still a bitter taste in Karoly's mouth. She hadn't worked with Shada for twenty years, yet had still managed to anticipate that Shada's next move would be in the direction of the New Republic hierarchy, though whether to join up or sell out Karoly still didn't know. She'd arrived on Coruscant just in time to see Shada leaving the Imperial City, and had tracked her to an apartment owned by High Councilor Leia Organa Solo and her husband near the Manarai Mountains.

She might have taken Shada there—certainly surprise would have been on her side. But the Solos were rumored to have a cadre of Noghri warriors around them at all times, and even given that Noghri combat skills were probably overrated, it would still be risky for a single Mistryl to go up against them alone.

So she had called for backup. But before they could arrive Shada had left the building in the company of Talon Karrde. There again might have been her chance; but before she could do more than infiltrate into the inner landing bay Organa Solo and her protocol droid had arrived with a pair of Noghri in tow. She and the droid had gone inside, the Noghri taking up positions at the outer hatchway; and when Organa Solo had left a few minutes later it was without the droid. She'd collected her guards and left the landing bay.

And then, to Karoly's chagrin, the Wild Karrde had immediately sealed up and taken off, leaving her too far from her own ship to have any hope of giving chase.

The Eleven had been furious. So had the Mistryl hunter team who had dropped everything to rush to Coruscant at her call. Nothing had been said; but then, nothing had to be. Their expressions had been enough, and the sideways glances and muttered comments to each other as they'd headed back to their ships. They'd heard the story about Karoly letting Shada escape back at the Resinem Entertainment Complex, and it wasn't hard to guess that many of them were thinking she'd done the same thing here.

Which had made it that much more important that she prove them wrong. And so she'd played a long-shot hunch, keying back on a vague connection between Karrde and Calrissian that Mazzic had gotten whiff of a few years back.

A hunch that had now paid off. Solo had been careful in that transmission, but that single oblique reference to Karrde had been all she'd needed. Shada was off with Karrde, and Calrissian was being asked to join in.

And wherever he went, Karoly would be there, too. Calrissian had once been a smuggler, and every smuggler— former or otherwise—had a hidey-hole or two hidden aboard his personal ship. If Karoly could reach the Lady Luck even a couple of minutes ahead of Calrissian, odds were she could be snugged away out of sight by the time he started up the entry ramp. And if it turned out he was planning to use her hidey- hole for something else... well, she would mark that target when she came to it.

In the meantime, there was her carrypack to throw together and a place on the next surface shuttle to reserve. Preferably with a seat closer to the exit than Calrissian's. Waiting until the corridor outside was silent, she slipped out of the utility closet and headed at a fast walk back toward her room.

* * *

'Admiral?' Captain Dorja's voice came from the comm speaker in the secondary command room's inner circle of repeater displays. 'The Ruurian ambassador's shuttle has just cleared the ship and is heading back to the surface.'

Handing his drink to Tierce, Flim flashed Disra a smug smile and stepped over to the repeater displays. 'Thank you, Captain,' he said in that calmly measured Thrawn voice he did so well.

'Prepare a course for Bastion, and inform me when the ship is ready.'

'Yes, sir.'

The comm unit clicked off. 'About time,' Disra growled, throwing a glare at Tierce. 'If you ask me, we've pushed our luck too hard here already.'

'We're familiar with your opinions on the topic, thank you,' Tierce said, not quite insubordinately, as he handed