Part 21 (2/2)

”Oh, sister,” said another. ”I can't believe it!”

”What?” Luke said. ”What is it?”

Before anybody could say, the door exploded inward and somebody came in shooting.

Leia smiled at Guri, who was once again seated across from where she herself sat at the desk in their suite. But the smile was to cover her puzzlement.

According to the computer screen inset into the desk and the scanner that fed it, Guri was not human.

What she was, the scanner program could not say.

”Care for some refreshment?” Leia asked.

”Tea would be fine.”

”Threepio, fix two cups of the special tea blend, would you, please?”

Leia turned back from the droid and flashed her smile at Guri again. She caught the computer screen peripherally as she glanced at Black Sun's representative. According to the scanner, Guri's skin was around ten standard years old.

Wasn't that interesting?

”I trust your business went well?”

”It did.”

It would be no trouble to keep her talking for a few minutes, until the ”special blend” tea Threepio was preparing did its job. The sleeping potion he was instilling into Guri's cup would put her out harmlessly for a couple of hours, during which time Leia and the others could make a closer examination of Guri's person and effects. This was the plan they'd agreed upon if the scan didn't check out the way it should. After a couple of hours, Guri would awaken and-if the potion worked as it was supposed to work-not remember having fallen asleep. Maybe they could figure out who and what she was during that time. At least Leia's instincts had been right: There was something odd about Guri. Very odd.

Threepio brought the tea. Leia hoped the droid had gotten the stuff into the right cup. It would be embarra.s.sing if Lando or Chewie had to come in and take over while she took a nap.

Threepio had his back to Guri. Leia glanced at him. His left eye illuminator winked off, then back on.

Leia picked up her tea and smiled again.

When a man comes at you with a blaster spewing, you don't stand there asking stupid questions. Luke s.n.a.t.c.hed his lightsaber from his belt, lit it, and whipped it up in a right inward block as he slid to the side.

A blaster bolt splashed from the blade in a shower of red and orange sparks. The air stank suddenly of ozone.

The techs were unarmed, and Luke saw two of them take hits and go down.

The others scrambled for cover.

Koth Melan produced a small weapon and returned fire, hitting the lead attacker right between the eyes. The attacker fell backward.

There were more behind him, boiling through the shattered doorway.

Luke leaped forward, circled his lightsaber into a horizontal slash, and took down the next man through the door.

Melan fired. The bolt sizzled past Luke's left ear and hit the third man incoming. Beyond that, Luke saw, there were at least a dozen more shooters crowding toward the doorway. Maybe more. It wasn't as if he had time to do a precise count here-More energy beams cooked the air, scorching past Luke and spearing computer consoles and technicians alike.

”Too many of them!” Melan yelled. ”This way!”

Luke wove a curtain of hard light with his blade, deflecting blaster bolts and driving the attackers back temporarily. He leaped to the side, and Melan fired repeatedly into the opening, momentarily clearing it.

”Come on!”

Luke turned and ran. Discretion here was definitely the better part of valor. Who were these guys? They wore black, but didn't have any insignia he could see. Some kind of new Imperial strike team? Mercenaries?

Never mind that now. Worry about who they are later. This party is over, Luke, it is time to leave.' Luke hurried after Melan.

After twenty minutes of small talk, Leia realized the sleeping potion wasn't going to work. It was supposed to take five minutes, eight minutes at the outside, if you had the const.i.tution of a rock.

Guri continued their diplomatic back-and-forth without any apparent effects from the powerful potion. Maybe Threepio had fouled up somehow?

Not put the stuff into Guri's cup? The computer was still processing information and displaying it for Leia. The... person sitting across from her breathed air and her heart pumped blood, but the lungs weren't normal, and neither was the heart. The muscles under the supposedly ten-year-old skin weren't made of any tissue the scanner could recognize. Her body temperature was ten percent cooler than normal. A human that cold would be dead.

On visual inspection, Guri looked like a perfectly normal and attractive young woman in her early twenties. According to the scanner and computer, she was not human; nor was she any one of the eighty-six thousand alien species it was designed to recognize; nor was she any kind of standard droid. And she was, it seemed, immune to a sleeping potion that should work on anybody human.

What was going on here?

No doubt about it, this was a problem, and not one that Leia had antic.i.p.ated.

Now what were they going to do?

Guri helped her resolve the problem. She said, ”All right, Leia Organa, I think this has gone on long enough.”

”Excuse me?”

Guri held her empty container up. As Leia watched, she squeezed the heavy ceramic mug in one hand. Her hand shook a little, but the cup shattered into tiny bits. Guri smiled. ”I can do that to your head if I wish. You probably have a weapon hidden somewhere, but I warn you, I am much faster than you, and if you attempt to reach your weapon, I can get to you before you get to it.”

Leia played it out. ”Suppose I believe you. What do you want?”

”You are going to accompany me from this place. You will tell the Wookiee in the hall to stay here as we leave; convince him, otherwise he dies.”

”Where are we going?”

”Do not concern yourself with that. Just do as you are told and you will survive to get there.”

”I don't think so,” Leia said. ”Whoever-or whatever-you are, I bet you aren't faster than a blaster bolt. Lando? Dash?”

The door to the bedroom slid open. Lando and Dash stood there, blasters aimed at Guri. They stepped into the room.

”You might be wrong,” Guri said. The door to the hall also slid open, and Chewie stood there with his bowcaster leveled at Guri's back. ”Could be,”

Leia said. ”But you'd have to be real fast to avoid being hit by three bolts.”

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