Palpatine smiled. "He will become one of us."

The hologram of his Master faded. Darth Vader didn't move.

No. Not Ferns Olin.

It was time to get rid of him.

Olin was a reminder of his past. His past was dead. Olin must follow.

Chapter Sixteen.

Ferus appeared in Darth Vader's office. "At your service."

"I have a job for you," Vader said.

"I take orders from the Emperor."

"The Emperor has commanded me. You can check with him if you like." Vader a.s.sumed that Ferus would decide not to. And even if he did, his Master had told him to help Bog Divinian before the vote. He could always claim that this was his intent.

"What's the job?"

"Find the thief who stole Bog Divinian's personal droid." Vader enjoyed the look of surprise on Ferus Olin's face.

"But the droid has been returned -"

"The thief was involved in the a.s.sa.s.sination attempt."

"There was no a.s.sa.s.sination attempt," Ferus said impatiently. "Bog made it up to make himself look like a hero."

"All the more reason to find the thief. If someone appears who can denounce Divinian, it could influence the vote."

"I can't find him again - I didn't see much."

"I'm sure you will be able to. If you fail, I will inst.i.tute ma.s.s arrests. A battalion orbiting Lemurtoo is awaiting my order to invade."

There. At last. Ferus Olin looked uneasy.

"I think this is a bad idea -"

"I am not interested in your opinion, Ferus Olin," Vader said.

Ferus turned and walked out.

Vader had threatened him and gained his cooperation.

A small victory. But tasty enough to savor.

Ferus stood in the hallway outside the door. He couldn't turn in Trever, of course. But he had no doubt that Vader would follow through on his threat. In the meantime, there were only a few hours before the no-confidence vote in the ministers' hall. It was time for the resistance to mobilize and expose Bog.

At the very least, it would serve as a distraction.

As he stood, his heartbeat quickened. Something was different. He listened carefully. Usually the sounds at headquarters were m.u.f.fled and indistinct. But he could hear voices and footsteps. It wasn't as though the place was coming alive . . . it was just more activity than usual.

He saw a nervous-looking junior officer heading down the hall. Ferus pretended to walk by him, then doubled back. The officer was speaking into a comlink.

Ferus kept well behind him, but accessed the Force. He screened out all the other noise and concentrated on that one voice.

"The troops are mobilized and ready for his order. Yes, sir. Garrison has been shifted to Order Thirty-Seven. Delegation is making plans to depart, but they are still quartered in the tower."

Thirty-seven. Ferus knew that directive from his time on Bella.s.sa. It meant that ma.s.s arrests were planned.

Ferus reversed direction again and headed for the exit, his heart pounding. Vader had lied to him. He had already given an order to his battalion. They were standing by. But who was he targeting?

Ferus had little doubt the Roshan delegation would be first.

He found d.i.n.ko, Nek, and Firefolk talking to Trever and Flame at the cantina. Ferus took a seat at the table. He nodded at Flame. If the resistance had included her, he would have to as well.

"I've heard a lot about you," she told him.

"I've got news," he said. "The Imperial battalion is on alert."

"For what?" d.i.n.ko asked. "Invasion?"

"My guess is that they're in reserve in case Bog isn't elected. Anyone who protests will find themselves in an Imperial jail."

"It's happening," Nek said. "What we feared for so long."

"Is there anything we can do to stop this?" Flame asked.

Ferus frowned. "We're missing something. What does the Empire have against Rosha? Why do they want to stop the trade agreement? They're willing to invade a planet that isn't even hostile to them."

"We've had a rivalry with the Rosha, but lately we've realized that we can benefit each other," d.i.n.ko said. "Before Bog started spreading lies about Rosha, diplomacy was working."

Ferus took out the two Roshan droids and put them on the table. Firefolk leaned over with interest. "I've never actually seen these," he said. "It's illegal to import them." Firefolk began to tinker with one of the droids, snapping off its control panel. "I'm a systems designer. This is a whole new technology to learn."

Ferus leaned toward him. "Larker told me that the Roshans were experts in microtechnology."

Firefolk nodded, still examining the droid. "Part of our rivalry, of course, was based on fear. Fear that their droids could invade our systems." He let out a low whistle. "Would you look at this. A universal receiver microchip. And a remote sensory plug-in . . . with amazing range. I heard a rumor they'd developed this stuff, but . . ."

"What is it?"

"They can transfer information from any mainframe without a plug-in. This is an amazing delivery system. They can do it from distances, from the air." Firefolk took out his datapad and began to run tests on the droid. "It's got a direct system pathway to the photoreceptors and the movement sensors, so I'm guessing this is a way for the droid to read another droid's programming . . . so it can avoid collision, say, or duplication. All in less than a second. On a world with heavy droid use like Rosha, it would be a necessity. Their droids fly, ours just hover. So in less than a second, they can single out what they need to know - the other droid's path, for example, so they can make a countermove. I've seen versions of this, but this is way beyond. Technically, it's highly sophisticated."

"Wait a second," Ferus said. "You mean they read the other droid's programming and a.n.a.lyze it?"

Firefolk looked at his datapad, which was now interfaced with the droid. "They don't read it, they duplicate it, transfer it to their own system, a.n.a.lyze what they need, and then dump it."

"Couldn't they steal it, then?"

"I see where you're going with this," Firefolk said. "Not really. It has to be garbaged out. A droid this size doesn't have near the capacity to hold on to that much information. It can receive it, but it can only process a bit of it. If the droid kept all that information, it would overload and self-destruct."

Ferus felt an excitement rise up from his boots. "But here in Sath, you've pioneered the delivery of vast amounts of information from a BRT to a personal droid."

"Yes, it's loaded on from mainframes that we have at home, or at businesses we frequent. And we have what we call safeguard pa.s.sageways to avoid overloading the droid," d.i.n.ko explained.

"What if the technology of both droids were put together?" Ferus asked. He turned to the others excitedly. "The Roshan droid has the ability to pull information from another droid. The Samarian droid has the ability to hook up to a vast BRT system. What if you built a super-droid that could grab enormous amounts of information without a plug-in? What if the droid could scramble the information and then send it all into a second droid?"

Firefolk sat still for a minute, thinking. "You mean pa.s.s random information from a BRT to another droid? It would have to be super fast. It's possible in theory . . . but that means that a vast amount of information would be pa.s.sed back."

d.i.n.ko let out a breath. "If we married our BRT system software to their droid system software . . ."

Nek leaned forward. ". . but used the hardware of our PDs . . . we target any droid and pa.s.s a flood of information to it. . . ."

". . . and the targeted droid would overload," Firefolk said.

Flame let out a breath. "Like a commander battle droid?"

"Or any Imperial droid?" Trever asked. "This is . ."

"Unbelievable," Firefolk murmured. "But .. . possible."

"And that is why," Ferus said, "the Emperor doesn't want a trade agreement between Samaria and Rosha. Because together you are a real danger to the Empire. If you could really do this, you could knock out their surveillance droids. Maybe even the stormtrooper communications systems. Everything they depend on for keeping the galaxy under their control."

"Just with our personal droids," Nek breathed. "Just by being able to transfer too much information."

"How do you like that," Trever said. "Buy a cup of tea, annihilate an army. All in a droid's day's work!"

"And if you exported your system to other planets . ." Ferus said.

"It's the key to a galaxy-wide resistance," Flame said. Her cheeks were flushed. "Moonstrike could fund it."

"Wait a second," Ferus said. "Remember, we're not the first to put this together. That's why they want to control Samaria. So they can move on to Rosha, too. Control both your worlds and stop any information exchange before it starts. I don't know whether Divinian is in on it or not - I'd doubt it. He's not high up enough and they don't value him . . . but he's played right into their plan. Now they'll arrest the Roshan delegation and imprison them. They can't let them get back to Rosha. They've had meetings with technicians here. Sooner or later they might figure it out, too."

Firefolk's hands were careful as he placed the droid back on the table. "What do we do now'?"

"We bring this idea to the Roshan delegation," Ferus said. "And we've got to get them off-planet. The Empire is monitoring all departures, so getting them out will be tricky. They can't leave from Sath. And they can't use their own ship."

"The Crystal Forest. I can do it," Flame said. "I've got the ship. I'll get them home."

Ferus nodded. "In the meantime, the resistance has to influence the no-confidence vote. Bog must be exposed. Now is the time. The vote is scheduled to take place in less than an hour. I'll go with Flame and Trever and smuggle out the Roshans."

d.i.n.ko nodded. "Nek and Firefolk and I will head for the Hall of Ministers."

d.i.n.ko, Nek, and Firefolk hurried out of the cantina.

"I've only got one more problem," Ferus said.

"What?" Trever asked.

Ferus thought of Darth Vader and his ultimatum. He'd like to think that Vader would be too busy in a little while to care, but he knew in addition to being an evil mastermind, Vader was an awesome mult.i.tasker.

He looked at Trever. Affection washed over him, and he smiled at the boy's earnest expression underneath that thatch of blue hair. "You."

Chapter Seventeen.

Ferus didn't know what to expect when he, Flame, and Trever arrived at the Residence Tower. The landing platform on level two hundred was empty of stormtroopers. He parked the airspeeder and was able to enter the tower without a problem. Obviously the Empire's forces were not expecting a rescue attempt. Why should they? The Samarians were now convinced that the Roshans were their enemies.

Ferus walked out into the small lobby. There was a datascreen set into the wall by the central reception area. He keyed in the Roshan delegation and the screen flashed a room number ten stories above.

Ferus accessed the turbolift and they jumped on. They exited on the two hundred and tenth floor. Ferus silently moved toward the corner that would give him a vantage point into the hall. He quickly ducked back. The door to the Roshan suite was being patrolled by six Prowler 1000 droids and several dwarf spider droids.

He quickly explained the situation to Flame and Trever. "It won't be a problem," he said. "I can take them down. But they'll send a signal back, and reinforcements will be sent."

Flame patted her blaster. "We'll be ready."

Ferus turned to Trever. "Do you have any of your smoke grenades?"

"I happen to have a couple right here," Trever said, reaching into his utility belt.

"Save them for now. We'll need a way out of here. Okay, as soon as I take care of the droids, follow me."

Ferus activated his lightsaber. Flame's eyes grew wide.

"Did I mention he once trained to be a Jedi?" Trever asked.

Ferus charged into the hallway. The prowler droids immediately darted toward him like a flock of angry birds. He leaped up, slashing the first one into smoking bits, then reversed and took out two more. Meanwhile the spider droids sent blaster fire his way. He deflected, it back to one, which burst into flame. He took out the other spider droid and casually sliced the last prowler in two with a backward swipe as he strode to the door.

He heard Flame's soft voice from down the hall. "No, Trever. You didn't mention it."

Ferus opened the door.

Robbyn Sark and the rest of the delegation stood in the middle of the room, blasters in their hands. All of them were pointed at him. Obviously they had heard the commotion in the hallway.

"We do not recognize your authority," Robbyn Sark said. "We will not subject ourselves to arrest."

"I'm not here to arrest you," Ferus said, deactivating his lightsaber and clipping it back to his belt. "I'm here to take you home."