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Poste looked over his left shoulder at the SoroSuub. “You're going to have to increase our lead.”

“What are you talking about?”

“To get behind them. Cut around the TransBormea Building. If you can get them to follow us—”

Hitting the booster, the newcomer threw the speeder vertical, then into a loop perfectly timed to drop them almost directly behind the pursuit vehicle.

“Fire!”

Poste tried to swallow his stomach and force his eyes to focus.

“Fire!”

Taking unsteady aim, Poste triggered three bolts, the last of which connected, burning through the repulsorlift compartment and conjuring flames from within. Black smoke puffed from the blunt rear end and the SoroSuub began to veer wildly, then lose altitude. Poste leaned over the passenger's-side door to watch the speeder spiral down into Nar Shaddaa's lower depths.

“Nice move,” he said when he could. “Fripping brilliant.”

The newcomer pulled up to a crowded landing platform, shut down the speeder, and hopped out. Sliding behind the controls, Poste looked up to find a wad of credit bills centimeters from his face.

“Will this do?”

Poste thought about accepting it, then shook his head. “Keep it. You taught me a valuable lesson about picking up strangers.”

The newcomer almost grinned. “Suit yourself.” Shoving the wad into his jacket pocket, he stepped away from the speeder to regard it front to back. “Who's responsible for the paint job?”

Poste touched himself in the chest. “Me.”

The newcomer laughed through his nose. “Looks like a piece of candy.”

Poste exhaled wearily. “First you're a swoop pilot, now you're an art critic?”

“Expunge the flames.”

“Ex—”

“And it needs a tune-up.”

“I'm sure it does after your showboating.”

“Have the turbine overdrive relay replaced.”

Poste put his tongue in his cheek. “Okay, so maybe you're not a total psych case.” He hit the ignition button. “Still, I hope I don't see you around.”

“Hold on,” the newcomer said.

Poste turned slightly in the seat.

“I need some information.”

“Yeah, what a surprise.”

“I'll compensate you well.”

Poste laughed. “What world are you from where they use words like compensate and expunge?”

The newcomer ignored the question. “I'm looking for ship salvagers who would have been working Nar Shaddaa's envelope sixty or so standard years ago.”

“Sixty …” Poste gestured dismissively. “Go to the library.”

“I plan to. But I need someone to ask around in the depths while I'm doing that. Do you know of any starship mechanics or engineers who might have been working back then?”

“Old-timers.”

“They'd have to be.”

Poste considered it. “There are a couple of beings …” He tilted his head to the side. “In the event I'm sick enough to be interested, how do I find you?”

“You've got a comlink?”

Poste dug into the pouch pocket of his pants and set the comlink down on the bench seat. The newcomer set his comlink down alongside it.

“Mate them.”

Poste enabled his comlink's pairing function. “You want to tell me your name?” he said, handing back the newcomer's comlink.

“Not yet.”

The blond man turned and disappeared into the crowd.

Jadak showed up at the Slag Pit II half an hour before he was due to meet with the scammer his comlink had identified as Flitcher Poste. Nar Shaddaa's short night had just fallen, with Nal Hutta shielding the moon from the light of Y'Toub. He waited outside, across the street from the flashing front entrance, until he recognized Poste making his way through the mixed-species crowd. A thickset kid of twenty-five or so, Poste had a pleasant face with symmetrical features and bushy eyebrows. His hair was several shades of blond and brown and swept straight back from his forehead. If Poste had grown up on Nar Shaddaa and was still fleecing tourists at his age, then he must have had a pretty lousy low-level childhood. Jadak watched him approach the tapcaf, exchanging greetings with a few beings. He had come alone, as Jadak had instructed, and was taking all the right precautions. Jadak waited awhile longer