• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

Corran extinguished the lightsaber, then clipped it to his belt. He shifted the belt around so the weapon hung at his left hip and wouldn’t bang against the bruised one. Pocketing his holdout blaster, he crawled over to the body of the first man he’d killed, loosened the chinstrap on the helmet and pulled it off. Inside it he found a comlink in a clip. He pulled it out and listened for a moment to see if other troopers were on the way, but the comlink remained silent.

He retrieved the second man’s blaster carbine and turned on the glowrod. He played it over the dead men and frowned. Their black uniforms weren’t any sort of Imperial uniform he’d ever seen before, and the men themselves were mismatched enough that he knew they weren’t storm-troopers. I’ve never seen a stormtrooper without a helmet on, but I can’t see them looking quite this ordinary. Still, the uniforms were paramilitary, so he assumed the three dead men were members of a local constabulary force. Another time I’d have thought you were allies, but in CorSec we didn’t shoot someone just because he wasn’t the suspect we were looking for.

Corran played the glowrod over the bottom of the corn-link and adjusted the frequency. Now to find out where we are. While he had long detested the Empire, it did manage to do some things with a remarkable amount of efficiency. One of them was the establishment and maintenance of standard measures. On each world broadcast stations had been set up to provide the exact time, both local and in relation to Coruscant. By tuning into that signal he could find out where he was and what time it was. It occurs to me I’ve not seen outside for a long time.

He held the comlink near his ear and slowly limped over to the hole the trio had blown in the wall on the far side of the chamber. “Must be a real backwater planet if they only sent three guys to catch an escaped prisoner—even if they thought I was Derricote. I wonder if I can ever get off it?”

Over the comlink he heard a mechanical voice announce, “8 hours, 45 minutes, Coordinated Galactic Time.”

“Great, I’m on a world that’s set its clocks to Coruscant time, no matter what the local situation is.” He hefted the blaster carbine, glanced at the power level indicator, then played the light out through the hole into the next room. Unlike the one he had found himself in, the room beyond the hole was clean and orderly. Even better, there is an open doorway to the outside.

He was about to step through the wall when two irreconcilable ideas collided in his brain. It was rather clear that he was inside some sort of storehouse filled with Jedi memorabilia. The mansion from which he had escaped had obviously been an Imperial Moff’s retreat, but what Imperial Moff would risk his position by hoarding so much Jedi material? The only Moff who could do that would be a powerful one, and powerful Moffs weren’t found on backwater worlds.

Actually, there were no Moffs so powerful that they would have dared defy the Emperor and Vader by hoarding this stuff. Only the Emperor could have … Corran’s jaw dropped open. And the clock here is set to Coruscant time…

Corran slumped against the wall. It can’t be. I can’t be on Coruscant. It makes no sense. I remember traveling on a ship. Then again, I was so doped up … Maybe I am on Coruscant and Isard just wanted me to think I wasn’t on Coruscant. He chuckled. It would explain why no one ever found Lusankya—it was here all the time, which means she is, too.

He glanced back at the dead men. And she has enough pull with local authorities to have them out hunting Derricote. I may be out of her clutches, but I’m not free, yet. He glanced at the comlink and thought about tuning into the military frequencies Rogue Squadron used, but rejected that plan for two reasons. I’m not going to have the right scrambler codes to let me hear and speak with them, and even if I did, there’s the traitor to consider.

He shook his head. I need someone I can trust. It’s a long shot, but it’s the only one I have. He set the comlink and opened a channel. “This is