[Boba Fett] - 3(27)

And now Boba was alone with Aurra Sing.

“Thought you could betray me? Think again!”

With a dull whine the hoverbike swept toward Boba’s airspeeder. He glanced around, hoping to find something he might use as a weapon.

Nothing. He kept his hands on the controls and stared defiantly across the empty darkness at Aurra.

“Everything is for sale on Aargau,” she said with a cruel laugh. “I bought myself citizenship. Too bad you won’t live long enough to do the same.”

Her laughter died, and she stared at Boba with hatred. “No one escapes from me, Boba. I’m the best at what I do.”

“My father was better,” said Boba in a low, calm voice. His gaze locked with hers as he continued to stare at her, unafraid. As he did, his hand moved slowly, silently, across the control panel. “My father didn’t kill for fun. Or out of fear.”

“Fear?” Aurra’s voice rose almost to a scream. Her eyes blazed, and two crimson spots bloomed on her dead-white face. “You think I’m afraid? I think it’s time I introduce you to the real thing!”

Her face twisted into a mask of rage. She raised her blaster before her face, the bike steady beneath her. “Good-bye, Boba,” she said.

Boba ducked. He jammed his hand onto the controls, hitting the REVERSE DIRECTION command. A flaming pulse from Aurra’s blaster zoomed a scant meter above his head. At the same moment, the speeder shot backward. He’d hoped it would slam directly into Aurra’s bike. Instead it sideswiped it. Aurra shouted furiously as her arms swung and her next blast went wide. Her bike rocked wildly, and she clung to it to keep from plummeting into the abyss.

“Yes!” cried Boba in triumph. The speeder veered back and forth through the passage, barely missing the walls. He finally got control of it, whipping it around so that it soared out from the tunnel and into the vast main shaft. Behind him he could hear Aurra’s angry yelling, and the dull thrum of her bike throttling down. He pointed the speeder in the direction he’d come. With a low roar it began to rush back toward the entrance to Level Two.





CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO


Boba knew better than to think he’d lost Aurra for good. She was like a mynock clinging to her prey, difficult to pry loose.

But not impossible. As his speeder drew closer to the entry to Level Two, Boba flicked on the comm unit. Immediately a voice came through the speaker.

“Sir, we’ve been unable to contact you for some time. Are you all right?”

Boba cleared his throat. “I’m fine,” he said, trying to make his voice sound as deep and muffled as possible. “But there’s renegade noncitizen loose on Level Two. She’s armed. There may be some casualties - “

And I don’t want one of them to be me!

Behind him came the abrupt high drone of Aurra’s bike and another explosive burst. The comm unit went dead. Boba leaned over the controls, not taking his eyes from what was ahead of him: the entry to Level Two.

Closer, closer… He could see the familiar sign, and the door behind it. Sparks of orange and scarlet flame whistled through the air around him as he drew the speeder alongside the landing platform. Keeping his head low he jumped out, turned, and bolted for the door. He shoved it open, and raced through, onto Level Two.

Immediately the world around him changed color. Instead of darkness, everything shone with a soft green glow. He was in yet another tunnel, but this one was well lit. At one end a sign blinked on and off.

EXIT

Boba whirled. At the other end of the tunnel was another blinking sign.

INTERGALACTICBANK OF KUAT

ENTRANCE ONLY

“That’s it!” Boba said aloud. He began to run. From behind the door he’d just left he heard the hoverbike’s drone suddenly shut off. He didn’t need to look back to know that Aurra Sing was at his heels.

Ahead of him a security droid stood beside the entrance to the bank. “May I see your card, please?” it asked in its mechanized voice.

Boba dug into his pocket. For a second his heart stopped: He’d lost the card!

But no, it was still there. He yanked it out and handed it to the droid. The droid raised the card before its infrared eyes and scanned it. Then it took Boba’s hand. There was a flicker of heat as it read his DNA. Then it nodded.

“Very good,” it said. “You may enter.”

“Stop him!” Aurra’s voice raged from the far end of the tunnel.

“You better check her citizen papers,” Boba said breathlessly to the security droid. “She’s armed and I think her papers are forged.”

He pushed open the door and hurried into the bank. Behind him he could hear Aurra’s boots racing up to the entrance. Then he heard the droid’s calm voice.