There wasn’t time, as much as Fett might have wanted, to finish off Gheeta. From the other side of the great reception hall, beyond the erect, howling figure of D’harhan, a volley of blaster fire singed past Fett. With the container tucked under one arm, he grabbed the bolted seams of Gheeta’s floating cylinder, gloved fingertips digging a hold on to the metal. Gheeta’s dazed eyes rolled as Boba Fett shoved the cylinder ahead of himself as a shield. A frightened scream escaped from the Shell Hutt’s mouth as the mercenaries’ laser bolts stung and sparked against the cylinder’s curved flank.
When he reached D’harhan, he shoved Gheeta aside; with enough force to send him bobbing and twisting into the cross fire that filled the center of the reception hall. The immense form of D’harhan reared above Boba Fett, the inert laser cannon shrouded by hissing steam, the heavy arms crucified against the glare of the mercenaries’ rifle fire. Above the cannon’s barrel, the optics of D’harhan’s tracking systems focused upon the helmeted figure stepping within range of the tearing hands.
Boba Fett halted; with one quick motion, he unscrewed the end cap of the tube-shaped container. The seal hissed, higher-pitched than the steam escaping from the laser cannon’s black metal housing, as air rushed into the vacuum. Tilting the container, Fett slid out a fully charged reactor core. He lifted one end of the core in his hands as though he were aiming a rifle, then stepped forward and thrust it into the gaping hole of the receptor site in D’harhan’s chest.
When they had been aboard the Slave I, D’harhan had howled with the pain of an essence-deep violation as Boba Fett had drawn out a core just like this one. Now a sharp intake of breath sounded inside the throat hidden beneath the laser cannon’s barrel; D’harhan’s back arched, his segmented tail thrashing convulsively across the broken rubble around him. Every neuron and sinew of D’harhan’s frame tensed and surged in sync with his accelerating pulse as the bounty hunter’s fist turned inside the exposed chest, locking the reactor core into place.
The pulse of D’harhan’s blood seemed to shatter the barrier between flesh and machine as the indicator lights along the laser cannon’s housing flashed in a microsecond from yellow to a fiery red. As Boba Fett slammed the locking armature into its socket, then spun and dived for the floor, the cannon barrel swung down from nearly vertical to aiming level. The heat from D’harhan’s first shot scorched Fett’s spine and shoulder blades as he used the corpse of another dead mercenary to pull himself to a safe distance.
He found the mercenary’s blaster rifle and held it to his chest as he rolled onto his back. Pushing himself up with one hand, Fett saw another cannon bolt, a hundred times wider and more destructive than the other shots cutting across the great reception hall’s space, enough to rip a hole through the light armor of an Imperial cruiser. And more than enough to reduce one entire wing of the building to charred splinters. Through the rising dust of fractured stone, Boba Fett could hear the screams and shouts of the Shell Hutts and their hired thugs as one pillar and then another toppled into the center of the hall, bringing down a section of roof and exposing the dark sky of Circumtore.
D’harhan turned where he stood, segmented metal tail bracing himself against the recoil of the laser cannon borne by his shoulders and torso. The cannon’s barrel rocked back in its housing as another white-hot bolt coursed
across
the hall, scattering
a
knot
of mercenaries. The screams of the Shell Hutts actually diminished, their panic having increased to the point where
all
notion of escape had
been
abandoned. Tortoiselike, each one drew his head back into the safety of his floating cylinder; when the last throat wattle was past the circular metal collar at the front of the cylinder, a ring of crescent blades irised toward the opening’s center, sealing off the Shell Hutt inside. The blind cylinders bobbed and collided with each other, pushed and spun by the blaster fire striking their riveted plates.
A few meters away from Boba Fett, a blaster shot went straight toward the reception hall’s ceiling; a quick glance to the side showed him that a shot from one of the mercenaries had struck Bossk at one side of his chest, knocking the Trandoshan off his feet and sending him splayed out on the dais’s smoldering rubble.
Fett swiveled the rifle in his hands and blew away the mercenary, a broken corpse even before he hit the floor.
Another one of the mercenaries had taken command of the remaining dark-uniformed figures; Boba Fett could see the man at the hall’s perimeter, signaling to the others and directing their fire. The aim of their blaster rifles turned away from Fett, as well as IG-88 and Zuckuss. A concentrated volley singed the air past the three bounty hunters. Crouching down, Boba Fett turned and