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Iella watched him through half-closed eyes, then slowly smiled. “Well, the droids are going to take time for the analysis, and the computers will start chunking out lists, cross-indexing them, and probably come up with a couple thousand likely candidates. When they get that list pared down, then we go through it. We refine the parameters of our search, pull up auxiliary data, and narrow the field further.”

“So, nothing to do until the list is finished?”

“Oh my, you clearly haven’t done anything in the way of detective work, have you?”

Wedge reddened slightly. “Ah, you and Corran were the ones trained by CorSec, not me.”

“And Corran has clearly neglected your training.” Iella came around the table and slipped her arm through Wedge’s. “The start of any good investigation involves hunting up a reliable source of caf—the kind that can keep you awake through an Ithorian production of a Gamorrean opera.”

“Isn’t that kind of caf considered a controlled substance within the New Republic?”

She laughed. “I think someone tried to pass a regulation like that, but the Senate staffers live on that kind of caf, so the proposal vanished.”

“Data-card probably just fell into a pot of the stuff.” Wedge smiled. “Probably improved the taste, too.”

“Well, we’ll have to see if we can find a place that makes its caf hot, strong, and to your liking, then. And, once we do that, we buy several liters, come back here, and go to work.”

Wedge nodded and took one last look at the device that killed Urlor Sette. “You want to know what scares me the most about that device and this whole murder?”

“What?”

“The way it was done, so boldly and obviously, it means whoever did it wants us to come after them.”

Iella’s eyes narrowed. “Calling Rogue Squadron down upon yourself would be ruled ‘suicide’ by most coroners.”

“Right, which means whoever did this thinks they can handle us, is crazy enough to think they can handle us, or just has one colossal hate on for us.”

“Not a pretty holograph.” Iella tugged Wedge toward the door. “Let’s get that caf. We’ll save a little and when we learn who it is we’re after, we’ll use it to melt them clean away.”

6

Corran slipped into his darkened apartment and let the door close quietly behind him. A couple of lights blinked, then a softly rising tone greeted him.

“It’s me, Whistler. Keep it down.” Corran peeled off his jacket and dropped it beside the door. “Is Mirax asleep?”

The R2 unit tootled affirmatively, but a glow panel clicked on in the bedroom. “Corran, is that you?”

He kept back from the slender bar of light streaming through the narrow crack between doorjamb and door. “Yes, it’s me. Don’t get up, I’ll be with you in a moment.”

“Are you okay? Corran?”

And I’m supposed to be the one with latent Jedi skills. “I’ll be fine.” He pushed open the door to the bedroom with his right foot, then leaned against the jamb with his left shoulder. Looking at his wife as she lay there on her side, her black hair up, wearing a light blue nightgown, he smiled.

Smiled as much as his split lip would let him.

Mirax sat bolt upright in bed. “What happened to you?”

“It was nothing.”

“Nothing? Your lip is split, your right eye is almost swollen shut.” She threw back the covers and padded over to the refresher station. Corran heard water running, then Mirax returned bearing a wet washcloth. She raised it to dab at the blood on his chin, but he caught her hand.

“Mirax, I’ll be fine.” He took the washcloth from her and scrubbed away at the blood. “I decided I needed to get my head clear, so I walked from the morgue. I ran into a little trouble.”

Mirax planted balled fists on her hips. “A little trouble? You came out of the Lusankya looking better.”

He snorted a laugh and followed it with a smile that tugged at the split in his lip. “Well, these are more Lusankya-based injuries. I can’t get the image of Urlor dying like that out of my head. Wedge and Iella have already told me it’s not my fault that he died, but the fact