Star Wars_ Darth Maul 02_ Shadow Hunter - Michael Reaves [31]
Lorn felt an excitement he hadn’t known in years as he contemplated it. It would work, and they would use the money to build a new life out on the Rim. There were plenty of worlds where, with enough money, one could disappear into a new identity and live a life of ease with no questions asked.
A new life—a real life this time. Maybe not the one he had before, but certainly a better one than this hardscrabble existence he was suffering through now.
Of course, it would mean leaving behind any possibility of ever seeing Jax again.
So what? a savage voice in the back of his head asked. Like there’s any chance at all of that now? That’s in the past. It’s time you started living again.
Yes. Far past time, in fact.
He looked at I-Five, and though there was no expression on the droid’s metallic countenance, he felt certain that I-Five knew exactly what he was thinking.
“What are we waiting for?” he asked the droid. “The Hutt’s still expecting us to bring him a holocron; why disappoint him? Let’s find a dataport and make it happen.”
The gods of fortune smiled upon Mahwi Lihnn. Just as she arrived at the Dewback Inn she saw the Neimoidian depart in the company of a hulking brute of a Trandoshan. The big reptiloid with Monchar sported a pair of blasters, one on each hip, and moved like a bodyguard, which undoubtedly he was.
Lihnn reviewed her options. This was too public a place to take out the guard and collect Monchar, so she’d just have to follow them until circumstances were more viable. She stepped into a narrow aperture between two buildings and let them pass. She was about to fall in behind at a safe distance when someone else emerged from the inn—a robed and cowled figure, bipedal and human-sized, who slipped into the shadow of a doorway across the alley. Lihnn didn’t get a look at the face, but whoever he was, he was obviously interested in Monchar.
Lihnn quickly moved behind a stanchion and out of sight.
A footpad bent on robbery? she wondered as she watched. Whoever he was, he had to be pretty sure of himself if he was willing to take on an armed bodyguard.
Sure enough, the robed figure followed the Neimoidian and the Trandoshan, keeping to the dimly lit areas and moving with a stealth that Lihnn had to admire. If this fellow could shoot half as well as he could tail, he could drill the Trandoshan and be on the Neimoidian in a hurry.
Lihnn frowned and loosened her own DL-44s in their holsters. This job was threatening to become complicated. She decided the best course was to take out the bodyguard and the mysterious robed tracker as quickly as possible. If she had to, she could use a glop grenade on Monchar, seal him up in a gel bubble, and haul him back to Gunray like that, though she didn’t think it would be necessary. She’d never met a brave Neimoidian, never even heard of one, and she didn’t think Hath Monchar would prove the exception to the rule.
Darth Maul melded with the darkness, becoming a shade among shadows, a ghost in the fetid gloom. It was always night this deep in the ferrocrete canyons. Artificial lights were few and far between at best, and there were many places where lights were burned out, stolen, or shattered by vandals. He had plenty of cover, and the lumbering pair in front of him had no idea they were being followed. Now and again the bodyguard would glance around to assure himself that no threat drew close, but it was obvious that he was an oaf, without skill or much training. Maul did not need to use the dark side to hide from such a being.
As he surveilled the Neimoidian and his guard, however, Maul felt a small prickling of something—not real danger, but a kind of disquiet—touch his awareness. He looked about and listened carefully, but did not see any cause for this. He expanded his consciousness, let the dark currents of the Force extend outward from him—and became aware of another presence behind him,