Star Wars_ Death Star - Michael Reaves [28]
“Milking mopak,” Ratua said softly.
“Indeed, indeed. I see you comprehend at last. Not so dull and boring after all, eh?”
Ratua shook his head. That was for sure. If the Empire could make something like that work, there wouldn’t be any place a Rebel force could hide—the superweapon could, with a single blast, destroy whole continents. Maybe even whole planets. Just knowing such a thing existed, it seemed, would be enough to keep the peace. You certainly wouldn’t want to see it coming into your system with malign intent …
Ratua was not the political type. He’d never cared much who was in charge, since he lived on the fringes anyhow, and now that he was condemned to spend the rest of his life on this dreadful planet, it mattered even less. If the Rebels somehow won out against the Empire—a thing that seemed beyond possibility, especially given this latest news—they wouldn’t be likely to offer him amnesty for his crimes any more than the Empire had. Sure, there were some political prisoners here who might be freed, but thieves and smugglers and murderers wouldn’t be going anywhere no matter who won the war. Even those who had truly been unjustly convicted, as he and Balahteez had been, couldn’t expect commutation. No, he was doomed, it seemed, to rot here on Despayre for the remainder of his days.
But …
If he could somehow manage to secure a spot on that station, he could be reasonably certain of two things: one, it wouldn’t be hanging around the Horuz system very long after it was operational, and two, it would be one of the safest places in all the galaxy. All things considered, there would be a much better place to be than here.
Unfortunately, Ratua had no particular talents that would make an Imperial recruiter want to choose him for station-side duty. Probably the Empire had little need of a scrounger on such a vessel. Still, when you considered it, on a station the size of a planetoid, a single being could easily escape official notice. Once there, he could fade into the shadows and, with a bit of luck, become effectively invisible. There had to be literally millions of places to hide up there.
The problem was, up there might as well mean the other side of the galaxy, as long as he was down here. Still, it might not be an insurmountable problem …
“Let me get you a mug of tea,” Ratua said, “and we can continue our talk.”
11
IMPERIAL-CLASS STAR DESTROYER DEVASTATOR
Refreshed from his time in the hyperbaric chamber, Darth Vader once more contemplated his unique fate. He had become accustomed to what he was, for the most part. It was hard, after all these years, to even visualize the face of Anakin Skywalker, Jedi Knight. But that was as it should be. Skywalker was dead. He’d been killed on the bank of one of the lava rivers of Mustafar, and the Sith Lord Darth Vader had risen from his ashes.
He became once again aware of his breathing, and the demand-respirator sped up as he let the dark side take him, let it envelop him in anger and hatred. The power of the Force flowed into him, filling him, fueling his rage. It was, as always, his choice: he could absorb the dark energy, keep it pent within him, a no-longer-quite-human capacitor that could discharge it anytime, directing it toward anyone or anything. Or he could let it flow through him now, be not the vessel but the conduit, and thereby find momentary surcease from the fury that was always so much a part of him.
He decided on the latter.
He left his lightsaber clipped to his belt. Ordinarily he would have used it to practice on the dueling droids that had been specially designed and constructed to test his mettle. Programmed with the knowledge and skills of a dozen different martial