Star Wars_ Legacy of the Force 04_ Exile - Aaron Allston [65]
Leaning in close to the viewport, he could see the mechanical control that opened the viewport from within. It seemed, from this angle, to be a simple hand crank, but its handle was now folded against its shaft, and the control itself was snugly fitted within a small transparisteel cylinder with a mechanical lock holding the cylinder to the apparatus.
Ben studied it for a few moments and decided he understood its workings. With the handle up against the shaft and the smooth transparisteel cylinder in the way, an ordinary person’s grip strength could probably not develop the torque necessary to open the window.
He half closed his eyes and concentrated on the apparatus. He reached out to it through the Force, gripping it as he’d grip his lightsaber hilt to yank it to him, and twisted.
It didn’t budge.
He tried the other direction. Now it did move, a few degrees of arc. He frowned, concentrating harder, and the crank began to rotate, very slowly. It was hard work.
As it moved, a tiny gap appeared at the top of the viewport, and it widened—one centimeter, two—
Ben’s grip slipped and he fell.
Ben grabbed frantically, wrapped one arm around the cable, felt its knots bumping their way past his elbow hard enough to leave bruises. He tightened his grip, grabbed with his free hand and the Force, and arrested his fall, the impact of his stop yanking both arms to full, painful extension.
He gulped for a few moments, then looked down.
He’d fallen only two stories. There was still more cable beneath him—he hadn’t grabbed the very end. And two stories down was the next decorative ring. Had he missed the cable altogether, he would have hit that—possibly not even with enough force and noise to alert every security officer within a kilometer. Possibly.
Half dreading what he might see, he looked into the viewport where he now found himself, expecting to peer into the alarmed faces of office workers, but instead he saw an unoccupied chamber, a combination lounge and kitchen.
He gulped in a few breaths, then climbed back up, furious at himself. His concentration on the Force had been so great that he’d lost focus on his hands. He couldn’t afford to do that. He’d get himself killed.
When he reached the viewport again, he spent a few moments tying the cable around his waist, with a knot he could undo with just a pull, then got back to work.
In a couple of minutes, the viewport was open enough to admit him. He scrambled through, pulled the release length of cable, and dropped to the floor.
He was happy. He could relax for a moment, and all he had to do at this point was make a covert search of the offices, find the display case, swap the amulet, and make his way to the ground again. Easy.
Ben looked at the display case and his heart sank.
It hadn’t taken long to find. The Tendrando offices all seemed to have been emptied by the hour, so there were no people to dodge. The display case was not in any of the individual executives’ offices, but in the central chamber, dominated by a big desk and a receptionist/protocol droid whose optics were unlit, indicating that it was in sleep mode.
The chamber itself contained a dozen or so displays, chiefly statuettes and plaques commemorating unusually advantageous business deals made on Drewwa. Some of the items were unusual presents given to the local office, such as a set of tiny acrobat droids, each no taller than Ben’s hand was wide, even now doing tumbling routines on their shelf of the display case.
But the transparisteel top had been carefully removed from the display case and the Amulet of Kalara was gone.
The red velvet pillow it had rested on was still there, as was the silver-on-black sign next to it: AMULET OF KALARA. PRESENTED TO STONIAS LEEM BY THE GRATEFUL VICTORS OF THE INSURRECTION OF ILIABATH.
But there was no amulet on the pillow itself. Instead there was a hand-lettered