Part 11 (1/2)

The hand was human, and had been ripped free by sheer force, the bones of the forearm cracked and severed by some blunt object. Two of the fingers were missing, plucked from the knuckle. Zahara looked at it with no particular emotion evident on her face.

”It belonged to a guard,” Zahara said.

”How do you know?”

She pointed out the signet ring. ”ICO academy.” She dropped it, and it landed with a soft thud.

Behind her, on the other side of that row, Han heard Chewbacca growl.

”Uh, Doc?” Han said. ”I think we found your droid.”

Zahara looked, and as soon as she did, she realized that some small, dismal part of her had been expecting exactly this outcome, from the moment she'd arrived in solitary and Waste had not been there.

The 2-1B lay in pieces across the floor behind the last of the beds. Its arms, legs, and head had all been systematically dismantled and crushed, its torso beaten so the instrumentation panel flickered listlessly, erratically, beneath the cowl. It was still trying to talk, making garbled noises through its vocabulator.

”Dr. Cody?” it said.

”Waste, what happened?”

”I'm sorry. That test pattern wrote on the owl wall. It was marvelous. Would you like to taste it again?”

”Waste, listen to me,” she said, crouching down next to it. ”The patients, the bodies, where did they go?”

”Look, Doc,” Han said behind her. ”Let's get out of here, huh? This whole place...”

”Shh,” Zahara said, not looking back, keeping her attention on the droid. ”The corpses, Waste,” she prompted. ”Did someone take them?”

”I'm sorry. There isn't any left. It doesn't walk without three and the two places. I'm sorry. Every reasonable attempt was made.” The 2-1B clicked and something sparked and clanked deep inside its lower processors. ”We must uphold the sacred oath of. . .” It stopped, hiccupped, and seemed to regain some sense of what she'd asked it. ”An amazing thing. They're miracles, really. Marvelous.” And then, with terrible brightness: ”They woke up!” There was one last small internal click, although this one sounded more jarring, broken, and when it spoke again its voice sounded thick and sluggish. ”They just. . . eat.”

”What?”

The components in the droid's torso flickered again, but it didn't say anything else. ”Hey,” Zahara said, turning around to Han and Chewbacca, ”do either one of you know anything about droids?”

But Han and Chewie were gone.

Chapter 22.

Bulkhead The graffiti scrawled on the inner bulkhead was written in Delphanian, but Trig could guess what it meant. Face Gang. Keep out. Blood toll.

”Will you relax?” Kale said. ”Myss is dead. They all are.”

It didn't make Trig feel any better. At first all the corpses had frightened him, but there was something worse about not seeing them. They hadn't seen any more dead people since Sartoris had chased them away from the escape pod. Now they were traveling crosswise through the admin level, in accordance with Kale's plan. Trig had initially thought that it was because of the hidden route they were using, down these tight pa.s.sageways, alongside conduits within the walls, but now he wondered why they hadn't seen a single body.

”Hold this for me.” Kale handed him the blaster rifles he'd been carrying. ”Here we go.” He removed a loose panel from the wall, reached inside, and slid out a pair of power packs. ”Right where Dad left them.” Sticking his hand deeper, he groped around for a moment and came up with another blaster, a pistol. ”Here, you take this one.”

”I don't want it.”

”Did I ask if you wanted it?”

Trig realized his brother was right. Whether or not there still was something following them, he was going to need a weapon. He inserted the power pack into the blaster, clicked it home, and tried to find a way to carry it that didn't feel awkward or self-conscious before realizing that there was no way of doing that. His father's voice spoke to him: When you're carrying a blaster, whatever else you're doing comes second.

Kale gestured forward, up the walkway. ”Let's go find that other escape pod.”

”How do you know there is a second escape pod?”

”It's here because we need it to be here.”

Trig just shook his head. Circular logic: their father would be proud. ”Seriously, though.”

”Seriously?” Kale said. ”The Imperials build everything symmetrically. They're not creative enough to do anything else. So where there's one, there's got to be another, same location, opposite side.” He shrugged. ”I don't know, what do you want me to say?”

Trig just nodded. He'd liked the first explanation better.

Fifteen minutes later, Kale let out a small but energetic whoop. They had reached the opposite side of the barge's admin level. ”What did I tell you?”

The pod looked exactly like the one that Sartoris had taken. Trig wondered how they were going to activate it without the launch codes, but he didn't want to puncture Kale's enthusiasm. It was nice to see his brother smiling again. He walked over to the pod's hatch and put his face against the viewport, peering into a darkly luminous chamber of softly glowing lights.

He felt a wave of coldness slip over him and turned around fast.

There was someone coming up the hall.

It wasn't his imagination this time, no chance; Kale heard it, too, Trig saw it in his brother's face, both of them registering the deep-chested growling noise getting louder as whoever it was rounded the corner.

”Stay behind me,” Kale murmured, raising both his blasters up to chest level. ”If anything happens, shoot first and then run, got it?”

”Wait,” Trig said, fumbling with the pistol, ”where's the stun switch?”

Kale said something in an even lower voice, but Trig could hardly hear him over the beating of his own heart. He realized he was about to fire a blaster for the first time and his life would depend on how well he used it. If it was another guard they might have to kill him. This was why he hadn't wanted to carry a blaster in the first place, but that didn't seem to make a difference now, because- A man in an orange inmate's uniform came around the corner with a Wookiee next to him.

”Hold it!” Kale shouted.

When the man and the Wookiee saw them they stopped walking, but neither of them appeared particularly surprised. The man raised his hands, but the Wookiee growled louder, shoulders hunching up, looking like it still hadn't ruled out attack as a possible response.

”Easy, kid, put the blasters down.”

”No way.” Kale shook his head. ”What are you doing here?”

Han's eyes flicked over to the escape pod. ”Looks like we both came looking for the same thing.”

”There's not enough room,” Kale said. ”So why don't you and your friend turn around and go back where you came from.”