Grendahl's face was menacing. "We're scheduled to rendezvous with the Interrogator within the hour. Inquisitor Tremayne is eager to see you again, Lord Brandl... very eager." Pointing to Ross, Grendahl demanded, "Take him to the isolation area for questioning." Changing his demeanor with obvious fraudulence, Grendahl tipped his hat with mocking respect, "Please, Lord Brandl, your quarters have been prepared."

Massaging the bruises swelling on his chest and arms, Ross leaned his head against the antiseptically clean wall of the holding cell.

Several hours had slowly passed, marked with isolated sessions of routine questioning.

Abruptly, the door opened, admitting two stormtroopers and Captain Grendahl, who he recognized from the hangar bay. Pleasantly, the Imperial officer sat down across from him, setting a large datapad on the table between them. "Do you recognize this gentleman?" he asked, keying up a picture on the small screen.

Ross laughed softly, recognizing the distinguished curves of his own face. "Would it help if I said I didn't?"

Grendahl smiled generously. "No." Folding his hands against the table top, he sneered, "Interfering with an Imperial investigation is a crime punishable with imprisonment."

"An Imperial investigation?" Ross jeered. "It was a fight, and not a fair one," he argued. "Two storm-troopers against a Jawa, come on!"

"Never mind the odds," Grendahl replied evenly. "You still interfered; however..."

"However?" the Corellian scoffed, mocking the insipid officer.

"However, I am authorized to extend a generous amnesty if you will cooperate and answer a few questions."

"Amnesty?" Ross chuckled. He scratched his head, agitated.

"Imperial amnesty is about as valuable as a Wookiee dwarf with no hair."

Grendahl frowned, covering his dismay with shrewd professionalism.

"You have the Emperor's guarantee, Captain Ross. Help us with one short investigation and you will be cleared of all charges."

Stalling, Ross demanded, "He owes me money!"

"I can't promise you will get it," Grendahl countered, "but you are entitled to 10,000 credits." Grinning malevolently, he watched the smuggler's startled reaction.

"That's 10 percent of the bounty offered for Brandl's safe return."

Intrigued, Ross leaned over the edge of the table. "You mean to say Brandl's worth 100,000 credits?"

Anxious to keep the smuggler's attention, Grendahl silently acknowledged the query. "You're lucky to even be alive, Captain Ross.

Adalric Brandl is highly unstable, capable of inconceivable atrocities.

However, his value to the Emperor makes him an essential resource.

Where did you find him?"

"Najiba."

Grendahl's face darkened, perplexed. "Najiba has stringent ordinances restricting traffic through the asteroid belt."

"By the time I got there," Ross explained, "no one cared about port control penalties. They just wanted him off the planet."

"Was there trouble? Was anyone harmed?"

The Corellian shrugged casually. "I never left my ship," he lied, "so I can't really say."

"And where were you going?"

"Mos Eisley, but," Ross laughed, "considering my last visit, I only planned to take him as far as Anchorhead.

After that, he was on his own."

"Did he ever mention his connection with the Emperor?"

"Not until you had us in the tractor beam."

"The damage to your ship?"

"We were attacked by pirates," Ross replied rhythmically.

"My hyperdrive failed and we just barely managed to arrive here."

Grendahl hesitated. "You keep accurate ship records, Captain Ross.

Your flight log and manifests substantiate your story."

"Call it a throwback to my bounty hunting days," Ross offered.

"If you wanted your expenses, exact documentation was a necessity."

Tentatively peering into the room, a junior-grade lieutenant saluted Grendahl, ignoring the prisoner with him.

"Captain Grendahl, sir, Admiral Etnam requests your presence on the bridge immediately, sir. Lord Brandl has been given the task of escorting the civilian to his ship."

"What!"

Ross concealed a sly grin behind the collar of his duster.

Feigning surprise, he rose from the chair and leaned against the glossy table, pondering how Brandl managed to arrange this escort.

"Captain Grendahl," the lieutenant whispered, appalled by the outburst.

"Admiral Etnam's instructions were quite specific. He is anxious to rendezvous with High Inquisitor Tremayne." Being Etnam's personal aide and fearing no reprisals from Grendahl, he nodded to the nearest stormtrooper and whispered, "Retrieve the prisoner."

Grendahl struggled to retain his composure, chafed by Brandl's influence, which despite his moment of dishonor to the Emperor, still held weight, even with the intrepid character of Admiral Etnam.

Nostrils flared, he hissed between gritted teeth, "Very well." Then to eestablish his ego in the company of those under his command, he straightened his hunched shoulders, erasing the sour scowl from his face. "You're free to go, Captain Ross," he growled. "The Emperor's clemency can be bountiful and far-reaching; but the next time you meddle with an Imperial investigation," he paused, "you may find yourself at the wrong end of Imperial justice." Folding his hands behind his back, Grendahl started up the corridor. "Remember that the next time you consider beating the odds."

Over the polished shoulders of several stormtroopers, Brandl watched Grendahl's retreating back. Sneering behind the Imperial officer, the Jedi sniffed disdainfully as he led the smuggler into the corridor.

"Are you a superstitious man, Captain Ross?"

Preoccupied by the armed escort behind them, Ross whispered, "My grandfather used to say that superstition was the foundation of a weak mind."

"Then we are surely doomed, for the basis of our civilization lays in the hands of high priests, shamans, and monks." Brandl laughed with genuine good nature.

There was a spark of emotion betrayed by the brilliance of his eyes and Ross noted the deepening of the laugh lines framing his mouth.

Adalric Brandl was in good spirit.

"Your grandfather was a wise man."

Ross shrugged off the compliment. "Just another smuggler who found himself on the wrong end of Imperial justice." He sniffed, recalling Grendahl's threat. "That's why I became a bounty hunter, hoping to avoid what happened to him."

"And then?"

"And then I got bored. Guess it wasn't meant to be."

"We spend nearly the whole of our lives searching for the appropriate role that will mark the end of our existence with some moment of glory, ignoring the fact that fame and reputation are but mere perfumes of virtue.

They never last."

"Is that another line?" Ross teased.

"Acting is a profound education in human nature and that is why I became so obsessed; but as my intellect improved, my morals failed and I became the very thing I most despised."

"And what was that?"

"Human. I was not a king, not a hero, not a god. Just a man trapped in the passion of the play."

"So what happens now?" Ross probed.

"My life has been one continuous drama," Brandl whispered, "a tragic one, I'm afraid. And I have stumbled through it, scene by scene, act by act, like some terrified neophyte. Tonight, Fortune calls for the final exit. I can no longer live the lie."

"You're going back to the Emperor, aren't you? After what he's done to you?"

"He did nothing but point in a general direction. I chose to go and do his bidding."

"What about your family? Your boy? What if the Emperor ever found out?"

"I assure you; no harm will befall them." Euphorically, he sighed, "They will be safe."

Ross believed him. There was a certainty about the Jedi that went beyond the sinister shadows that had once kept the two men at odds with each other. But the smuggler's conscience demanded a bit more for security. "How can you be sure?"

"I've never been more certain in my life." Placing a credit chit in the smuggler's hand, he closed Ross's fingers over it. Ross noticed another object in Brandl's hand, one which the Jedi tried to conceal when he folded his hands together over it. "The chit is the remainder of what I owe you and the Emperor's compulsory fee for capturing a dangerous renegade." He grinned malevolently, amused by his own sarcasm.

Slipping the chit in his duster pocket, Ross noticed the spherical, metallic shape beneath Brandl's hands, and noted the raspy acid erase etched into the explosive where the serial trace markers had been removed. Eyes wild with the revelation, he stared into Brandl's tranquil face.

"Consider all debts paid," the Jedi whispered. Turning curtly on his heels, he retreated in the hangar corridor with the escort in tow.

Ross hurried up the ramp, rush sealing the corridor hatch.

"Kierra!" he hissed, sprinting through the access tunnel into the flight cabin. "Kierra, wake up!"

"What do you mean wake up!" she snapped. "The engines have been on line and waiting for the last hour. I even managed to knock one of the ion coils in place by popping the shield housing." She snorted, causing an er ratic hiccup over the comm. "What's the rush? The main databanks were clean and according to this little as-tromech they had on board-"

"Never mind!" Ross shouted, strapping himself into the acceleration chair. "Brandl has one of my thermal detonators and I think he plans to-" A muffled explosion reverberated through the docking corridors, blowing smoke and debris into the auxiliary bay.

Piercing, high-pitched alarms began to blare, alerting medics and technicians to the area. Amid the chaos of shouting voices, the klaxons, and the sound of armored feet rushing to secure the area, the Kierra momentarily hovered above the flight pad. Several smaller explosions echoed from the passage, rattling TIE fighters and shuttle craft in the nearby racks.

Bewildered, Kierra gasped, "What would ever possess him to pull such a stunt?"

"He had to protect his family," the smuggler replied wearily.

"But with him dead, there's no guarantee the Empire won't find them.

Then again," she mused aloud, "there's no guarantee the Empire will even look for them." Flustered by the infinite innuendoes, she quipped, "I'm just glad it's over."

"But it's not," he whispered. Banking sharply over an array of TIE fighters and ejector racks, Ross guided the Kierra out of the launch bay, repeatedly throttling the labored engines. "Brandl might have made his final exit; but the play is far from over... for us.

.. or his family."

The Corellian grinned nostalgically. Mesmerized by the verdant face of Trulalis, he watched the planet rotate before him, physically unmarred, innocently unaware, momentarily unchanged. He sighed, his smuggler's sense oddly at peace. There were no more shadows.

Casually resetting the astrogation system for Najiba, he braced himself as the Kierra stuttered across the open void and then vanished into the translucent brilliance of hyperspace.

Missed Chance

by Michael A. Stackpole

Corran Horn smiled broadly as the R2 droid's muted warble came to him from back in the darkened interior of the temporary hangar. "Yes, Whistler, you have done a good job of disguising this place." In his absence the droid had busied himself by strewing all manner of debris inside the abandoned vehicle shed.

Between that and the growth of the purple djorra vine across the front of the shed, no one would guess that the structure hid the only X-wing fighter on Garqi.

Corran swung under the ship's sleek nose and squat-walked back to where the little green and white droid stood. Things had been moved around since he'd last visited Whistler and Gorran suspected he was only seeing the latest in a long line of decorating schemes. "I'm sorry I haven't visited sooner, but the whole city is going quite insane about Rebel activity. The way everyone is being watchful, you'd think some slicers grafting New Republic slogans and graphics onto computer screens and public data displays was the same as murder."

The droid extended his I/O jack and plugged it into the port on a small datapad resting atop a can oozing an oily gray substance. The screen flicked to life and displayed the blade assembly for an X-wing's centrifugal debris extractor. A chirp ran from low to high as the droid's head swung from the image around to Gorran.

The pilot blushed, then shook his head. "No, I haven't figured out how to get the part out of the Imperial Guards' possession. With the Rebel activity around here they've not slackened their security the way they normally would. Finding the spare parts and those proton torpedoes on the Star's Delight was the biggest thing to happen to Imps on this backwater, and it got Prefect Barris all hot to root out the Rebels here. I don't know who he thinks that will impress-the Emperor is dead and there's enough infighting on coruscant that we even get word of it out here."

The droid's whistle scolded corran as the image of the debris extractor faded into the crest of the New Republic.

"No, it's not a question of joining the Republic or not-and we've gone over this before. There is no Rebel activity here. The 'Rebels' they think they have are kids-students at Garqi Ag University, They couldn't help me get those parts away from Imps if I gave them months of instruction. Moreover, they'd get killed in the attempt." corran shook his head adamantly: "Look, this is my problem.

Gaptain Nootka brought those torpedoes because he thought he could sell them to me, or move them to his Rebel contacts elsewhere. They got him caught, got his crew arrested and his ship impounded. I might owe it to him to try to spring him, but doing that without having this ship up and flying is not going to work."