Star Wars_ The Adventures of Lando Calrissia - L. Neil Smith [74]
The little droid knew the man he was seeking would be in one of the small, comfortably furnished gaming salons just off the Grand Lobby, here on the first, or bottom, floor. Finding the room wouldn’t be any problem, but getting in might be. Gamblers tended to be jealous of their privacy. He “shouldered” his way through the richly dressed crowd, thinking about the news he had for his master—and how very reluctant he was to deliver it.
A human being can only stand so much bad news.
It had begun with an adventure. His master had won a starship—a small converted freighter, actually, called the Millennium Falcon—in yet another card game, and had whimsically decided to add “captain” to his other professional titles: gambler, rogue, and scoundrel. He was proud of every one of them, though he preferred “con artiste” to what the authorities usually had upon the tips of their sharp and unforgiving tongues.
He’d been a perfectly terrible pilot in the beginning. Vuffi Raa, an accomplished ship-handler by virtue of inbuilt programming, was gradually taking care of that in two ways: piloting the Falcon when the need arose; teaching his master to do it for himself whenever they had time.
He’d won Vuffi Raa in a card game, as well. That had triggered a series of events that culminated with their leaving the Rafa System with the very last full cargo of the fabulous life-crystals ever harvested there. The only load ever removed from the system legally by a private cargo vessel.
And they were rich.
Temporarily.
Yet his master hadn’t seemed very happy, filling out landing-permit forms, going over bills of lading, figuring overhead and profit margin. Even with Vuffi Raa along to make the workload lighter … It was too much like going straight. The gambler yearned to practice his original profession once again.
Thus, when the invitation had suddenly arrived out of nowhere to come and play sabacc in the Oseon, where the pickings were the richest in the galaxy, the pair’s free-lance cargo days had come to an abrupt and highly welcome end. They’d blazed across a hundred parsecs to be here on time. The Falcon’s speed, in competent tentacles, was legendary. And here they were.
Trouble was, someone had attempted to assure that they be not only here, but also back in the Rafa, out on the Edge, down at the Core, and everyplace else tiny little pieces of their respectively organic and mechanical existences could be scattered.
That someone, it would appear, didn’t like them very much.
Vuffi Raa approached the heavy antiqued wooden double doors. Standing before these was an enormous humanoid in an elegantly tailored groundsuit at least four sizes too large for any other two men in the hotel. Beneath the hulking fellow’s stylish armpits the robot could make out the twin bulges of a pair of Imperial-issue blasters.
“Excuse me, gentlebeing,” offered the little droid, “I have a message for one of the players inside.” He produced a card his master had given him for use in just such a circumstance.
To Vuffi Raa’s overwhelming relief, the bouncer/bodyguard looked at the holocard as the letters of instruction danced across its surface, nodded politely, and stepped aside. The doors parted slightly; Vuffi Raa squeezed past them.
The air inside the small, luxurious chamber was full of smoke, at least a dozen different, mingling odors, despite the best efforts of its starship-class life-support systems. In the center, seated at a table ringed with players and kibitzers, lounged his master, resplendent in tasteful and expensive velvoid semiformal shipclothes.
The robot approached, waiting until the hand was finished—his master raked in a substantial pile of credit tokens—then tugged gently at the hem of his short cloak.
“Master?”
The figure turned, looked down. White teeth in a dark face,