"I bought a few. Someone had to make sure the majority shareholding stayed in Mandalorian hands."

"Just as well we don't have a law against insider dealing."

"I don't intend to sell. Might sign them over to someone on the condition they never sell on to . . . aruetiise."

"Is that a go-ahead for production?"

"Full spec for us, de-enriched for them." Fett walked away briskly, feeling his unconnected acts of prudence falling together into a policy of sorts. "Make sure the export hyperdrive spec is a fraction better than an X-wing, no more."

Yomaget trailed after him. This was defense policy on the fly, and the clans didn't get consulted. And they wouldn't care, Fett knew.

"We're going to arm the Confederation, then," said Yomaget.

"We'll arm anybody, including the GA, if they can pay." Fett hadn't even thought about the next move: it just happened. "Provided Colonel Jacen Solo comes here in person to negotiate the deal."

"You're a subtle man, Fett."

"I've never been called that before."

"Fifty percent of production for our own defense?"

Defense. That was one word for it. "Agreed."

Mandalorians liked a sensible compromise. The best deals were where both sides were happy, or where one was happy and the other dead. Fett stopped short of asking to fly the first beskar fighter off the production line. He wanted that privilege to go to Beviin, the nearest he would ever have to a friend.

He looked forward to seeing the reaction when MandalMotors opened their order book. Jacen Solo would have the choice between letting the GA's enemy buy better fighters than his, and showing up here. Fett had no doubt which he'd choose, but it would be fun seeing him have to handle the messy presentational issues in public. That could be arranged.

"It'll be called the Bes'uliik,'" Yomaget called after him. "The Basilisk. I always had a soft spot for the ancient battle droids. Good old Mando name and old-fashioned Mando iron in a state-of-the-art package."

Fett nodded to himself. Bes'uliik. It had a nice ring to it. A name from the past, a name that wouldn't go away, however hard the rest of the galaxy tried to make it-ever.

Bes'uliik.

It was the kind of news that made other men walk away whistling.

CHARBI s.p.a.cEPORT, VULPTER, DEEP CORE.

Ben pressed as close to the viewport as he could to peer at the permacrete below. It was hazy daylight outside, but his body said it was still last night and he needed more sleep.

As far as the rest of the s.p.a.ceport was concerned, the well-maintained but very old Incom tourer was not a Galactic Alliance Guard ship carefully contaminated with Corellian dust, Corellian food waste, Corellian fabric, and any number of other touches designed to show a forensics team that the vessel definitely came from Corellia. And the battered intersystem delivery cutter tailing Cal Omas's shuttle wasn't a spy vessel with top-of-the-line comms, spoofing devices, and an overpowered hyperdrive.

Jori Lekauf wasn't a GAG a.s.sa.s.sin, either. He was just a nice ordinary young Corellian on an adventure with his younger cousin in an elderly ship he'd saved every spare credit for a couple of years to buy.

The trouble was that Ben could believe that all too easily, even though he'd seen the range of weapons Lekauf carried under his jacket.

"If I'd kept my hair red, the family resemblance would have looked more convincing," Ben said. He wanted another caf to keep him alert, but he had a vision of being desperate to visit the refreshers at a critical point in the operation if he drank any more. "Your hair's reddish, really."

"More sandy blond," Lekauf said. "One redheaded human is noticeable, but two is asking to be remembered by witnesses. If we have any, that is."

"Could have dressed as Ubese . . . with masks."

"I think that's been done before."

"I'm just worrying."

"I know."

It was a long wait. Shevu would make contact with them when he landed. His last transmission said he was a few minutes behind Omas's shuttle, which wouldn't attract suspicion; Charbi was a busy port freighting cheap and shoddy goods, and ships landed almost too close together for safety and comfort. n.o.body cared who you were as long as port fees and taxes were paid.

They said Vulpter had once been a lovely planet. It didn't look lovely now: the skies had that polluted smoky haze that meant there were wonderful red sunsets here, and not much else to be grateful for. And this was after they'd tried to clean up the environment. The vast landing strip-landing field, more like-was scattered with dozens upon dozens of craft in varying stages of disrepair, some taking on board supplies and fuel, some berthing next to freight warehouses where conveyor belts disgorged crates into their holds. Their outlines shimmered in the heat haze from idling drives. And there were all kinds of species wandering around on foot between the vessels, stretching their legs-anywhere between one pair and four of them, it seemed. The only concession to landing field safety was a tracery of red and white painted lines across the permacrete bearing the warnings pedestrians DO NOT CROSS THIS LINE and BEWARE GROUND TRAFFIC.

But everyone was crossing the lines as they pleased, and battered speeders with Charbi Port Authority livery swerved around them, honking in annoyance.

Ben decided it was the last place anyone would expect two heads of state to conduct a top-level meeting.

"Stand by," Lekauf said quietly, pressing his fingertip to his ear.

"It's the captain . . . yes, sir . . . copy that." He looked up. "About twelve minutes before Omas lands. Shevu's right behind him in the landing queue."

Ben perked up. The Karpaki was folded in two inside his jacket, right on the limit of what he could hide, and the vibroblade was tucked in his hip pocket. He'd rehea.r.s.ed it all in his mind on a continuous loop of what-ifs and if-onlys: rifle to drop Gejjen, preferably at very long range, and vibroblade to escape if seized.

It would have been better to get Gejjen as the man disembarked, while he was exposed on the landing field for a few moments without bystanders milling around. But Jacen wanted the meeting recorded. It was a case of following Gejjen-or Omas-to the room they'd hired by the hour, then slipping a strip-cam through a gap under the doors. The building blueprints showed plenty of places to insert the flimsi-thin device. Each room's doors were set in a recess, so-for once-it was a simple matter of squatting down as if picking up a piece of litter and shoving the strip-cam into the gap.

"Should have put a hidden bug in Omas's coat or folio or something," Lekauf muttered. "Then we sit here, pinpoint Gejjen's ship, and slot him on the ramp as he leaves."

Ben fidgeted with the vibroblade, wondering how his mother would have tackled a job like this. "You can't stick bugs on people without them finding out sooner or later."

"Yeah, with our luck he'd have changed his jacket. They used to have this stuff called tracking dust, you know. Just like powder. If the target inhaled it, you could pick up signals from it for ages afterward."

"Makes you wonder how much all this stuff costs," said Ben. "I mean, we're dirt-cheap, but we have to abandon this ship."

"It's an old crate. Saves the Defense Department the cost of disposal."

And leaving it behind would add weight to the setup that Corellian dissidents had killed their own Prime Minister for giving in to the GA.

That was the plan, anyway.

Ben switched seats in the cramped interior to look out from the starboard side. Gejjen's ship should have landed by now, according to its flight plan: one pilot, three pa.s.sengers, maximum five-hour stopover.

That was what it said on the CPA information database that his datapad- scrubbed of all ident.i.ty, in case of capture-showed him.

Ben avoided looking at the chrono on the bulkhead. He just waited for the word from Lekauf.

"So how do you feel being an officer now?" Ben asked.

"Weird. But my granddad would have been so proud. I wish he'd been alive to see it."

Lekauf never mentioned his parents. It was always his grandfather.

It struck Ben that almost everyone he'd grown up with or worked with either had no family or had key members missing or totally absent. It wasn't normal. He thought about how routine killing was for his whole family, and knew that most of the beings in the galaxy got through their entire lives without ever killing anyone, deliberately or accidentally.

It was strange that families like his got to make the really big decisions for worlds of normal, ordinary, nonlethal people.

Ben concentrated on centering himself, edging a little toward that state where he vanished from the Force. He pulled himself back just as he felt a drifting sensation that could have been disappearance, or nodding off.

"Plug yourself in," Lekauf whispered. "It's a go."

Ben activated his comlink and earpiece, and shut down the environmental controls to leave the tourer.

When Lekauf opened the hatch, the air and noise hit Ben like a solid wall. It smelled of factories and sulfur. They ambled down the ramp, working hard at looking ordinary, and made their way toward the terminal buildings as if they were killing time, not politicians.

Lekauf scratched his ear, repositioning the earpiece. "Got you, sir. Position?"

Ben picked up Shevu's voice clearly. "He'll pa.s.s thirty meters to the left of you unless he deviates. Heading for Building G. You pick him up and I'll follow you in."

"No visual on the target yet."

"He must be inside already."

Oh, this is real. This is happening.

It was a throwback of a thought, back to the time when Ben first started taking crazy risks, but this mission had an extra dose of risk: Omas knew him by sight, and had even met Shevu, too. They couldn't afford to be spotted. Ben slouched and meandered as fourteen-year-old boys were p.r.o.ne to do, turning around from time to time to chat to Lekauf about safe and meaningless trivia-baka rock, speeders, anything-while he took a cautious look across the permacrete in Omas's direction. And there he was: flanked by two men in working clothes, a carefully scruffy figure himself. His confident bearing gave him away as a man used to being obeyed, but only to someone who knew what he was looking for. And Ben did.

"Going okay," Lekauf whispered, not looking toward the three men.

One of the GA Intelligence agents walked through the doors of Building G in front of Omas. The other followed close enough to tread on his heels. They almost vanished in the crowds inside the terminal building, but Ben kept them in sight even though he lost Lekauf for a few moments. One of them appeared to be checking the numbers on various doors and exits as he walked, and eventually he stopped at one marked 53-L and inserted a credit chip in the slot to one side. The doors parted and Ben got a glimpse of a small, brightly lit room almost filled by a white duraplast table ringed by chairs. There was already someone in there.

The doors closed again. A steady two-way river of pa.s.sengers, port workers, flight crew, and the general temporary population of a s.p.a.ceport stood between Ben and the doors.

"You can do this," Lekauf said. "How many in there? I can't place the strip-cam under the doors if someone else is going to come along and open them again. "

Ben closed his eyes and concentrated on the ebb and flow of the Force, the patterns of density that he could both feel at the roof of his mouth and see as speckled color behind his eyelids.

"Six," he said. That made sense: two close protection agents each, even numbers, two statesmen who didn't trust each other. "Yes, six.

They're all inside now."

"Can you see lottery numbers, too?" Lekauf made his way casually through the shoals of people and squatted down to adjust his boot. Ben saw him take out what looked like a small flimsi strip, then slide the thing under the hairline gap with quick ease.

Strip-cams were very small these days, the size of a coat-check stub. They really were flimsi, and just as disposable once they'd finished transmitting.

"Lovely," said Shevu's voice in Ben's ear. "I can see right up Gejjen's nose. Good clear sound. Nice job, Jori."

Eventually, Ben glanced around and spotted Shevu leaning against a drinks dispenser on the other side of the concourse. He was recording the output from the strip-cam and transmitting it back to GAG HQ. As soon as he had confirmation that it had been received and stored, he'd erase his datapad and send a code to the strip-cam to shred its data. It'd be just a sc.r.a.p of garbage the cleaners would sweep up, if they ever came this way. It looked as if they wouldn't.

Ben and Lekauf could hear the conversation in their earpieces, both of diem monitoring it so they knew when to vanish, wait for Gejjen to emerge, and follow him.

It was a fascinating conversation. Ben had started to get the hang of the code and insinuation that beings in power used to say unpleasant things, a different language that let them deny later that they'd meant any harm. Jacen was good at it. Ben hoped he never would be, because it got to be a habit and Jacen seemed to enjoy playing that game for its own sake.

He recognized Omas's voice. Gejjen sounded softer than he did on the HNE bulletins.

It was very weird to listen to a man you were about to kill. Ben was hearing the last words Dur Gejjen would ever speak.

"So . . . can we agree as gentlebeings to cease hostilities while we sort out a compromise?"

"Before or after I take this to the Senate?" Omas asked.

"I'm not referring this to my a.s.sembly-yet. You might not need to refer it to yours," Gejjen replied. "We'll stand down if you agree to that form of revised wording in the commitment of planetary defense a.s.sets to the GA."

"You might be able to deliver that with Corellian forces, but can you pull back the Bothans?"

"Are you sure Niathal will do as you tell her?"

"She's a career officer. She will."

"The Bothans are pragmatists. They will."

"As a show of goodwill, you'll commit forces to helping us restore order in places like the Sepan system."

"Of course. And you need us to come back into the GA fold to stop the membership hemorrhaging away."

"I won't ask for any statement that causes loss of face. I know how . . . proud Corellians are. Just something along the lines of differences being bridgeable."

"That's very gracious, Chief Omas. Now, those differences will only be bridged if Admiral Niathal and Colonel Solo no longer carry the military weight that they do now."

"You want me to fire them."

"I think you might need to do more than fire them now that they've become used to getting their own way."

"I think I know what you mean, and I don't care for that solution."

"Niathal-ambitious. Dangerous. Solo-ambitious, dangerous, and Jedi, too. We can solve the problem for you permanently."

"If you do, I don't need to know about it."

"If we do, I'd like your security services to look the other way.

Solo has ambitious minions who'd be temporarily blind and deaf in exchange for promotion, I think."

"I see you know of Captain Girdun, then . . ."

And they laughed. The two of them actually laughed. Ben heard a faint sound as if Shevu was clearing his throat. When Ben turned his head, Lekauf was looking at him, for once not the permanently cheerful man who looked so much younger than he was. He looked old and angry.

"That's how much we're worth," he said quietly. "I bet our Intel guys in there love the idea of having their man back in command."

Ben's gut turned suddenly heavy and cold. It was a dirty game all the way to the top. While he was preparing to a.s.sa.s.sinate Gejjen, Gejjen was doing a deal to strike at Jacen and Niathal, with Omas turning a blind eye.

Everyone could be bought if the price was high enough. Omas obviously put peace above individual lives. It might not have been any different in the long run from any general risking combat casualties, but it didn't feel anywhere near as clean.