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Skynx flowed to the acceleration couch and on up into his nook. He began taking objects from his treelike storage rack. “If you have no further tasks for us, sir,” Bollux told Han, “Max and I would like to continue our study of Skynx’s tapes.”

“Whatever you want, old-timer.”

Bollux crossed to the tech station, where he and the computer resumed their perusal of the ancient records Skynx had brought along. The labor ’droid, who had worked his way across the galaxy and had already outlived one body, possessed an almost sentient streak of curiosity, and Blue Max was always ready to absorb new information. The two mechanicals were particularly interested in technical data and other references to the giant war-robots of long-dead Xim.

Skynx, sitting up on his rearmost two sets of limbs, took and held a miniature amplified hammer dulcimer in the next set and two hammers in each digital cluster of the next. He strapped a pair of tympanic pulsers around himself, tapping experimentally with the digits of his next-higher limbs. Above those he fastened a pair of small bellows to pump air to a horn held in his uppermost-but-one set of extremities. In the uppermost he took up a flute of sorts and tried a few runs. The sound was like the wind cones Han remembered from his own homeworld. He wondered what kind of brain could coordinate all that activity.

Skynx launched into a merry air, full of sudden runs, bright interplay and humorous progressions, and impudent catches made to sound as if the instruments or Skynx’s limbs were getting out of hand and taking their own course. The Ruurian made a great pretense of distress and bewilderment and a desperate effort to bring his extremities under control again. The others laughed, particularly Chewbacca, whose Wookiee chortles made the bulkheads ring. Badure rapped time on the gameboard and even Han was tapping a toe or two. He opened the flask, took a swig, and passed it to the Wookiee. “Here, this’ll put some curl in your pelt.” Chewbacca drank, then sent the flask along. Even Skynx accepted a drink.

They demanded another number after that, and a third. Badure eventually jumped up, both hands over his head, to demonstrate the Bynarrian jig. He capered around the compartment as if he were twenty kilos lighter and as many years younger.

At the height of the Bynarrian jig the ship’s hatch signaled. Badure and Chewbacca rushed off, eager to see what Hasti had brought back. Bollux and Blue Max looked up from the strobing rapid-readout screen, and Skynx began extricating himself from his instruments.

“Step one completed!” he said in his quick fashion. “Skynx, of the K’zagg Colony, off on a treasure hunt! If my clutch-siblings could see me now!”

But when the Wookiee reentered the compartment, he slumped dejectedly over to his partner and sank into the couch, head in hairy hands. Bad as that? thought Han. Badure followed, one arm clasped around a despairing Hasti. She took a sip from the flask, coughed, told her story quickly, then took another.

“Voice-coder?” Han exclaimed. “Nobody said anything about a voice-coder.”

“Maybe Lanni never realized her voice was being printed,” Badure replied.

“That steward,” Hasti muttered. “I should’ve jabbed my gun into his bellybutton and offered to glaze his gallstones for him.”

Han handed the half-empty flask to his copilot and rose. “Now we do it my way.” He headed for the cockpit, pulling on his flying gloves. Chewbacca fell in behind. “Want to know how to make a withdrawal? Stick around.”

Badure hurriedly interposed himself between the two partners and the main passageway. “Steady there, boys. Just what’ve you got in mind?”

Han grinned. “Swooping down on the vault, blowing the doors with the belly-turret guns, going in, and taking the disk. Don’t bother getting up, folks; it’ll all be over in a minute.”

Badure shook his head. “What if a Tion patrol cruiser shows up? Or an Imperial ship? Would you care to have a hunter-killer team on your neck?”

Han made a move to step around him. “I’ll chance it.”

Hasti jumped up. “Well, I won’t! Sit down,