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Han and Chewbacca sat at their controls for a moment, too drained to do more. Outside the cockpit canopy, the jungle was an irregular darkness, tangles of indefatigable growth topped by a roof of fernlike plants that stretched up twenty meters and more. Gauzy ground fog rolled through the undergrowth and clearing.

The Wookiee gave a long, gusty, bass-register exhalation. “I couldn’t have said it better,” Han concurred. “Let’s get at it.” Both removed headsets and left their seats. Chewbacca picked up his crossbow weapon and a bandolier of metal ammo containers, which also supported a floppy carryall pouch at his hip. Han already wore his side arm, a custom-model blaster with rear-fitted macroscope, its front sight blade filed off to facilitate the speed draw. His holster was worn low, tied down at the thigh, cut so that it exposed the weapon’s trigger and trigger guard.

According to directories, Duroon’s atmosphere would support humanoid life without respirators. The two smugglers moved directly to the ship’s ramp. The hatch rolled up and the ramp lowered silently, letting in smells of plant growth, of rotting vegetation, of hot, humid night and animal danger. The jungle was filled with sounds, calls, clacks, and cries of prey and predator, and, over all, with the monumental spillage of the waterfall.

“Now it’s up to them to find us,” Han said. Checking the jungle, he saw no sign of life. Not surprising. The freighter’s landing had probably frightened most wildlife out of the area. He turned to his shaggy first mate/copilot/partner. “I’ll wait for them. Turn off sensors, shut down the engines, the works; kill all systems so the Authority can’t spot us. Then see how much structural damage she suffered topside when she got her back scratched.”

Chewbacca barked acknowledgement and shambled off. Han stripped off his flying gloves, tucked them in his belt, and stepped down the ramp, which stretched down and out from the ship’s starboard side, astern the cockpit. He thumbed his gun’s sights to set it for night shooting, then glanced around. A lean young man dressed in spaceman’s high boots, dark uniform trousers with red piping, and civilian shirt and vest, Han had cast aside his uniform tunic, stripped of its rank and insignia, years ago.

He ran a quick check of the Falcon’s underside, assuring himself that she had taken no damage there and that the landing gear had come to rest properly. He also made certain that the interrupter-templates had automatically slid into place along the servo-guides for the belly turret, so that the quad-mounted guns wouldn’t accidentally blow away the landing gear or ramp if he had to fire them while the ship was grounded.

Satisfied, he went back to the foot of the ramp. He gazed up at the empty sky and the stars beyond, thinking: Let the Authority look for me; this whole part of Duroon’s spotted with hot springs, thermal vents, heavy-metal magma seepages, and radiation anomalies. It’d take them a month to find me, and in an hour or three, I’ll be gone like a cool breeze.

He sat at the end of the ramp, wishing for a moment that he’d brought along something to drink; there was a flask of ancient, vacuum-distilled jet juice under the cockpit console. But he didn’t feel like going for it. Besides, he still had business to conduct.

Duroon’s nocturnal life forms began reappearing in the mossy clearing. Lacy white things swam through the air with ripples of their thin bodies, resembling flying doilies, while nearby fern-trees held creatures that looked like bundles of straw, making their slow way along the wide fronds. Han kept an eye on them but doubted they’d approach the alien mass of his starship.

As he watched, a smallish green sphere sailed out of the undergrowth in a high arc, landing with a boink. It appeared perfectly smooth at first, but then extruded an eyelike bump that studied the Falcon with jerky motions. But when it noticed the pilot, it flinched. The eye-bump disappeared,