Star Wars_ Episode VI_ Return of the Jedi - James Kahn [5]
“Bo shuda,” wheezed the Hutt, and lapsed into a fit of coughing. Although he understood several languages, as a point of honor he only spoke Huttese. His only such point.
The quaking robots scooted forward to stand before the repulsive ruler, though he grossly violated their most deeply programmed sensibilities. “The message, Artoo, the message,” Threepio urged.
Artoo whistled once, and a beam of light projected from his domed head, creating a hologram of Luke Skywalker that stood before them on the floor. Quickly the image grew to over ten feet tall, until the young Jedi warrior towered over the assembled throng. All at once the room grew quiet, as Luke’s giant presence made itself felt
“Greetings, Exalted One,” the hologram said to Jabba. “Allow me to introduce myself. I am Luke Skywalker, Jedi Knight and friend of Captain Solo. I seek an audience with Your Greatness, to bargain for his life.” At this, the entire room burst into laughter which Jabba instantly stopped with a hand motion. Luke didn’t pause long. “I know that you are powerful, mighty Jabba, and that your anger with Solo must be equally powerful. But I’m sure we can work out an arrangement which will be mutually beneficial. As a token of my good will, I present to you a gift—these two droids.”
Threepio jumped back as if stung. “What! What did he say?”
Luke continued. “… Both are hardworking and will serve you well.” With that, the hologram disappeared.
Threepio wagged his head in despair. “Oh no, this can’t be. Artoo, you must have played the wrong message.”
Jabba laughed and drooled.
Bib spoke in Huttese. “Bargain rather than fight? He is no Jedi.”
Jabba nodded in agreement. Still grinning, he rasped at Threepio, “There will be no bargain. I have no intention of giving up my favorite decoration.” With a hideous chuckle he looked toward the dimly lit alcove beside the throne; there, hanging flat against the wall, was the carbonized form of Han Solo, his face and hands emerging out of the cold hard slab, like a statue reaching from a sea of stone.
Artoo and Threepio marched dismally through the dank passageway at the prodding of a Gamorrean guard. Dungeon cells lined both walls. The unspeakable cries of anguish that emanated from within as the droids passed echoed off the stone and down the endless catacombs. Periodically a hand or claw or tentacle would reach through the bars of a door to grab at the hapless robots.
Artoo beeped pitifully. Threepio only shook his head. “What could have possibly come over Master Luke? Was it something I did? He never expressed any unhappiness with my work …”
They approached a door at the end of the corridor. It slid open automatically, and the Gamorrean shoved them foward. Inside, their ears were assaulted by deafening machine sounds—wheels creaking, piston-heads slamming, water-hammers, engine hums—and a continuously shifting haze of steam made visibility short. This was either the boiler room, or programmed hell.
An agonized electronic scream, like the sound of stripping gears, drew their attention to the corner of the room. From out of the mist walked EV-9D9, a thin humanlike robot with some disturbingly human appetites. In the dimness behind Ninedenine, Threepio could see the legs being pulled off a droid on a torture rack, while a second droid, hanging upside down, was having red-hot irons applied to its feet; it had emitted the electronic scream Threepio heard a few moments earlier, as the sensor circuits in its metal skin melted in agony. Threepio cringed at the sound, his own wiring sympathetically crackling with static electricity.
Ninedenine stopped in front of Threepio, raising her pincer hands expansively. “Ah, new acquisitions,” she said with great satisfaction. “I am Eve-Ninedenine, Chief of Cyborg Operations. You’re a protocol droid, aren’t you?”
“I am See-Threepio, human-cyborg re—”
“Yes or no will do,” Ninedenine said icily.
“Well, yes,” Threepio replied. This robot