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“Hard to tell. The Empire’s official position is that the Jedi Order is broken, and that rounding up the last of them isn’t a high priority. It would depend on the caseload of the local law enforcement officials. It could be weeks. Or days. Or hours. Sooner or later, however, it will be investigated.”

“Then we’ve got to find him first. Do we know when and where these were recorded?”

“The last three were taken forty-six hours and twenty-seven minutes ago, on the Mongoh Mezzanine, about two kilometers west of here.”

“He could be anywhere by now. How can we—?”

“No problem,” the droid said. “The rovercams have been alerted to make imaging Jax a higher priority now. And, having hacked into the security grid once, I can do it again far more easily.”

“You sure?”

“Would this face lie?”

Kaird of the Nediji sat at one corner of the conference table in the Underlord’s chambers. He was both alert and relaxed, his posture in the formfit chair casual, but not so much so as to suggest insouciance. One did not want to be too comfortable in the presence of Underlord Dal Perhi.

Across the table, at the second point of the equilateral triangle, sat his nemesis: Prince Xizor of House Sizhran. Xizor projected the same attitude, that of calmness and resolution. There was, however, a touch more arrogance in his body language, a sense of pride that he no doubt felt befitted Falleen royalty. His long jet-black hair was pulled tightly back into the traditional topknot, and his handsome features appeared to be carved from jade.

Underlord Perhi sat at the third point of the table, beneath the Black Sun symbol on the wall. The table was designed to change shape depending on how many were meeting with the Underlord; it could be reconfigured as anything from a simple narrow rectangle for one-on-one talks to a decagon that accommodated all nine Vigos and the Underlord.

Underlord Perhi was human, fifty-eight standard years old, and one and a quarter meters in height, which was not terribly tall as humans went. He had close-cropped blond hair, and appeared to be somewhat stocky; Kaird estimated his mass at about seventy-five kilos in a one-gravity field. None of it was fat, however. Kaird could attest to that; he’d played shock-ball with the man. Perhi played hard, and he played to win.

He’d started in Black Sun as so many others, including Kaird, had—as an enforcer. In Perhi’s case, it had been for a Hutt named Yanth, who had run a gambling establishment called The Tusken Oasis down in the Crimson Corridor. A mysterious assassin, whose identity had never been learned, had cut down Perhi’s boss. Not even the Jedi, who had investigated because a couple of their own might have been involved, had been able to figure that one out.

It was said that one of the Jedi investigating the matter had tangled with Perhi, and had come out the worse for it. The Underlord had never confirmed this, but he’d never denied it, either. What gave it the status of a legend was that the Jedi in question had been Obi-Wan Kenobi, later to become one of the greatest heroes of the Clone Wars. Whether or not it was true that Perhi had bested Kenobi, the rumor’s circulation through the corridors of Midnight Hall had done nothing to impede the human’s rapid rise through the ranks. Two years after the Battle of Naboo he’d been a Vigo; a year after that he’d become Underlord.

And such was his power and personality that he had held the position for the better part of a decade. Kaird admired the man tremendously. Of course, that wouldn’t stop him from assassinating him in a Jawa’s heartbeat if it would benefit him to do so.

He wasn’t quite sure why he and Xizor had been summoned into the presence. Certainly Xizor wasn’t giving away any clues; he might as well be wearing a death mask cast from his own features. His skin pigmentation was a neutral lime hue, and he wasn’t shedding pheromones. This last Kaird was quite sure of, because he was wearing a miniaturized molecular sensor programmed to pick up any such airborne chemicals. If the Falleen tried to