Star Wars_ The Dark Lord Trilogy - James Luceno [15]
Regardless, Gunray had resisted offers to throw his full support to the Separatists—not when there were still profits to be made in countless Republic star systems. Playing a game of his own, teasing Dooku along, he had informed Dooku that a precondition to their entering into any exclusive arrangement was the death of former Naboo Queen Padmé Amidala, who had foiled Gunray on two occasions, and had been the loudest opposition voice at his trials.
Dooku had hired a bounty hunter to oversee the business, but two attempts at assassinating Senator Amidala had failed.
Then came Geonosis.
But just when Gunray finally had Amidala in his grasp—on trial, no less, for espionage—Dooku had equivocated, refusing to have Amidala killed outright, and not lifting a hand against the Jedi until some two hundred of them had showed up with a clone army the Republic had grown in secret!
That day had provided Gunray with the first in what would be a series of narrow escapes. Hurrying to the catacombs with Dooku at their side, Gunray and Haako had barely managed to flee the embattled surface and recall what core ships and droid carriers remained.
By then, though, it was too late for anyone to resign from Dooku’s Confederacy.
The war was begun, and it was Dooku’s turn for revelations: he, too, was Sith, and his Master was none other than Sidious! Whether a replacement for the fearsome Darth Maul, or a Sith even during his years in the Jedi Order, Gunray didn’t care to know. What mattered was simply that Nute Gunray was right back where he had been so many years earlier: in service to forces over which he had no control whatsoever.
When the war had been going well, the issue of whom he served had been scarcely a problem. Trade had continued, and the Trade Federation had continued in the black. For a time it appeared that Sidious and Dooku’s dreams of toppling the Republic might succeed after all. But they found themselves facing a worthy opponent in the person of Supreme Chancellor Palpatine—also from Naboo—who had never much impressed Gunray, but who had managed through a combination of charm and artfulness not only to remain in power long past his term of office, but also, in conjunction with the Jedi, to conduct the war. Slowly, the wheel began to turn, as one Separatist world after another was retaken by the Republic, and now Viceroy Nute Gunray himself had been driven from the Core.
A tragedy for the Trade Federation; a tragedy, he feared, for the entire Neimoidian species.
He gazed at the few possessions he had been able to gather: his costly robes and miters, resplendent jewelry, priceless works of art—
A sudden chill laddered up his spine. His bulging forehead and lower jaw tingled in dread. Eyes protruding from his mottled gray face, he swung to Rune Haako.
“The chair! Where is the chair?”
Haako stared at him.
“The mechno-chair!” Gunray said. “It’s not here anywhere!”
Now Haako’s eyes widened in apprehension. “Surely we couldn’t have overlooked it.”
Gunray paced worriedly, trying to recall when and where he had last seen the device. “I’m certain that I had it moved to the launching bay. Yes, yes, I remember seeing it there! But in the rush to launch—”
“But you armed it to self-destruct,” Haako said. “Tell me you armed it!”
Gunray stared at him. “I thought you had armed it.”
Haako gestured to himself. “I don’t even know the sequence codes!”
Gunray fell silent for a moment. “Haako, what if they should decide to tamper with it?”
Haako’s broad slash of mouth twitched with worry. “Without the codes, what could they possibly gain from it?”
“You’re right. Of course, you’re right.”
Gunray tried to convince himself. It was just a mechno-chair, after all; finely wrought, but just a walking chair. A walking chair equipped with a hyperwave transceiver. A hyperwave transceiver given to him fourteen years ago by—
“What if he should learn that we left