Vision of the future

Shada had stripped off her jumpsuit and had just gotten into her robe when the cabin door call chimed. 'Who is it?' she called.

'It's Karrde,' the other's voice came distantly through the panel. 'May I come in?' Shada sighed, wrapping her robe securely around her and knotting the waist sash. She had no particular desire to see him, especially right now. But she had committed herself to this trip, and she couldn't very well avoid the captain and still fulfill that commitment.

Besides, the pain of his casual betrayal of her trust had mostly subsided. Enough, anyway. 'Come in,' she called, tapping the release.

The door slid open, and Karrde stepped inside. 'We've just made the jump to lightspeed,' he told her, taking in her state of dress and dismissing it in a single glance. 'Odonnl estimates seven days to Exocron.'

'Good,' Shada said briskly. 'I should be back to full combat capability by then. Speaking of which, if you'll excuse me, I'm on my way to the bacta tank.'

'The bacta can wait,' Karrde said politely but firmly, gesturing her to a chair. 'I'd like to talk to you.'

She thought about refusing. But she was still committed to him and to this trip. 'About what?' she said, sitting down, wondering if he was really insensitive enough to try concocting some feeble excuse about that tapcafe thing at this late date.

But he surprised her. 'Jorj Car'das, of course,' he said, pulling another chair over to face her and sitting down. 'It's time you heard the whole story.'

'Really,' she said, keeping her voice neutral. He'd only promised to tell her this story on the way into the Exocron system; which, according to him, was still a week away. Was this his way of trying to make amends for his earlier thoughtlessness?

Not that it mattered. Too little, too late; but at least she'd get some useful information out of it.

'Go on,' she said.

His gaze drifted outward, as if to a time or place far away. 'The story of Jorj Car'das goes back about sixty years,' he said. 'To the Clone Wars era and the chaos that it brought on the galaxy. There was a great need for smuggling during the conflict and afterward, of necessities as well as contraband, and a large number of organizations were hastily and rather haphazardly thrown together.'

'That was when the Hutts really hit their stride, wasn't it?' Shada asked, interest stirring in spite of herself. There was very little she knew about that period, and she'd always wanted to know more.

'Many of them did, yes,' Karrde said. 'Car'das was one of those who jumped into the business, and whether through skill or simple blind luck wound up with one of the better organizations. Not one of the larger ones, but definitely one of the better ones.

'They'd been operating for about fifteen years when he was accidentally caught up in the middle of a big battle between some Bpfasshi Dark Jedi and—well, basically everyone else in that sector. According to Car'das's later story, one of the Dark Jedi commandeered his private ship and forced them to take off.'

Shada shivered. That one she did know something about; a group of Mistryl had been involved on the defensive side of that conflict. Some of the stories she'd heard as a child from the survivors had given her nightmares. 'I'm surprised he came back able to tell any stories at all,' she said.

'So was everyone else,' Karrde said. 'The other four members of his crew never did return, in fact. But Car'das did. He suddenly reappeared two months later, settled back into control of his organization, and to all appearances life went back to normal.'

'But the appearances were wrong?'

'Very wrong,' Karrde agreed soberly. 'It was quickly apparent to his inner circle that something serious had happened to him during those two months. He still had one of the best smuggling groups around, but suddenly he began pushing to make it one of the biggest, as well. He would move systematically into the territories of smaller groups and either buy them, absorb them, or destroy them, taking over their routes and clientele. Unlike the Hutts and other groups, he went for overall coverage rather than concentrated brute-force control, spreading himself thinly out all over rather than trying to dominate any specific systems or sectors. In a few years, he was already on his way to having something that could someday rival even Jabba's organization.'

'Didn't anyone try to stop him?' Shada asked. 'I can't see the Hutts sitting by and letting him outflank them that way.'

'My dear Shada, everyone tried to stop him,' Karrde said darkly. 'But he was almost literally unstoppable. Somewhere, somehow, he had developed a knack for guessing precisely what his opponents were planning against him, and he was often able to counter their attacks almost literally before they were launched.'

Shada thought back to the dozens of missions she'd gone on for the Mistryl, and the hours of painstaking research she'd had to put into learning her opponents' strengths and weaknesses, weapons and strategies, allies and