[Boba Fett] - 3(14)

Nuri climbed into the front. Boba slipped in behind him. The top closed again. Boba looked around and saw that the capsule was inside yet another tunnel - like a sort of tube, or slide, that curved and swirled and twisted ever downward.

“Is this how you get to the Undercity?” he asked.

Nuri nodded. “It is one of the ways. There are thousands. Many are only known to a handful of people. Many have been hidden for so long that they’ve been forgotten. Of course, there are official routes to the Undercity - turbolifts and such - but one needs special clearances for those. And money.”

With no warning Nuri flicked a switch on the control board and the capsule plummeted downward with a sudden whoosh.

“Whoa!” Boba shouted. It was as though the entire floor had dropped away beneath them. The capsule shot almost straight down, then curved abruptly to the right. It corkscrewed around and around - like going down a gigantic, kilometers-long slide. Boba braced himself with his hands and looked out.

Everywhere he saw lights. Shimmering, blazing flashes of red and orange and blue and violet.

“Those are the other levels,” Nuri explained. He had to shout to be heard over the rush and roar of their descent. “We are traveling at a rate of kilometers per minute - but in realtime, not in hyper-space.”

“Cool!” said Boba. He wished this thing had controls!

He stared out again. He had glimpses of huge leaping flames, of tunnels that seemed to be filled with molten gold. One level was like a giant aquarium, where huge dianogas floated, their tentacles waving.

Boba wrinkled his nose. “Smells bad here,” he said

“Sanitation level,” said Nuri. “We’re almost there.”

Suddenly everything went black. Not the kind of black you see at night when you go to sleep. Not the kind of black inside a closet, or a darkened ship. Not like the darkness of space, which was not darkness at all, but spangled with stars and planets and distant galaxies.

This was darkness like Boba had never seen. Like he had never imagined. It was like a huge, smothering hand pressed upon his face. Boba couldn’t see Nuri in front of him. He couldn’t see his own hand. For a heart-sickening second Boba imagined that he himself had disappeared. That he had somehow been transformed into antimatter. That he was

“Here!” exclaimed Nuri.

An explosion of light surrounded them. Purple, green, deep blue. Boba blinked. The light flickered. It was not an explosion now, but flashes of color. Shapes. Buildings. Moving waves that were people. The familiar figures of droids, creatures, men, and women. Above them all was that terrible, strange darkness. It was like a cloud or a huge black curtain.

The capsule began to slow down. Boba let his breath out in relief. “That was great,” he said. “Kind of creepy at the end, though.”

Nuri nodded. “That was the emptiness between the Undercity and the upper levels. Sunlight never comes here. Only artificial light. And darkness.”

Boba shivered. The capsule came to a halt. He gazed out at a teeming city. It was more crowded than anyplace he had ever seen. A disorderly mass of living things, more like a hive than anything else.

The capsule lid popped open. Nuri jumped out. He bowed to Boba.

“Welcome to the Undercity,” he said.

Boba had thought that Level Two was crowded. He had thought that Coruscant was crowded, and the Candaserri, too.

None of these compared to the Undercity. There were so many people, so many beings, so many droids, so many everything, that his head whirled.

“Stay with me!” said Nuri. “If you get lost, you’ll never find your way out.”

Boba scowled. “Don’t bet on that,” he said. “I’ve got a good sense of direction.”

“That might not be enough to help you here,” replied Nuri.

Boba hated to admit it, but he had to agree with the Bimm. High above them, the sky that was not a sky was crisscrossed with thousands of shining objects. They looked like ribbons, or rainbows. But they were actually other chutes, or slides, like the one Boba had taken down here. He could see capsules speeding through them, up and down. The air was filled with bright airspeeders, swoop bikes, robo-hacks, even Podracers. On the ground, streets and sidewalks wound around tall, crumbling buildings. The streets were filled with rubbish, broken stones, mangled airspeeders.

And everywhere he looked, he saw people - nonhumans, mostly, but a lot of humans, too. None of them looked friendly. A lot of them looked dangerous.

“Hey, watch it!” someone snapped at Boba. A tall, angry-looking Caridian glared down at him.

“Sorry,” said Boba. The Caridian jostled past him. Boba looked around: Nuri was gone!