[Dark Nest] - 1(21)

“When you tossed the workers off, they marked you,” the Aqualish explained. He tossed Han the rag. “Now you have to start over, or they’ll call their soldiers and tear your ship apart to see what you’re hiding.”

“Start over?” Leia asked.

“Transacting,” the Aqualish explained. “Isn’t that why you’re here?”

“Uh, maybe,” Han said. “You mean like trading, right?”

“More like taking,” the Aqualish said. “They take what they want. You take what you want. Everybody’s happy.”

The insects started up the ramp again.

“Boarding imminent,” BD-8 reported. “Permission to-“

“No!” Leia said. “Stand down.”

Han finished wiping the foam away, then stood up to find the six insects lined up on the ramp below.

“They’re not going to lay eggs or anything?” he asked.

“No, they only do that in the heartcomb,” the Aqualish assured him. “Just let them bring out whatever they want, then take back whatever you want to keep. It’s a lot easier-and safer.”

“If you say so.” Han stepped aside to let the bugs pass. “Okay?”

The lead worker responded with a single mandible clack, which was simultaneously echoed by the rest of the squad.

“That would be an affirmative,” C-3PO offered helpfully.

The bugs started up the ramp.

Han jumped down beside the Aqualish and returned the spray canister and rag. “Sorry about that Fangface stuff.” He reached for his money. “What do I owe you for the help?”

“Nothing, friend.” The Aqualish waved a dismissing hand. “It happens to everyone the first time.”

“Really?” Han’s mind began searching for angles, trying to figure out what kind of swindle the Aqualish was trying to pull. “Hope you don’t mind me saying so, but you’re a pretty helpful guy for your kind.”

The Aqualish watched the last bug disappear into the Falcon, then nodded. “Yeah. I don’t get it, either.” He turned and started back toward his own vessel. “This place just makes me feel good.”

Han, Leia, and the others spent the next hour returning to the Falcon most of what the bugs carried off. At first, the work was confusing and frustrating-especially after they had carried the same crate of protein packages aboard for the seventh or eighth time. But eventually order emerged, with the ship’s crew leaving anything they could bear to part with at the foot of the ramp and stacking whatever they wanted to keep in the forward hold. Toward the end, the bugs even started to add balls of wax and jugs of some amber, sweet-smelling spirit to the Falcon’s stack.

Finally, the only item under contention was Killik Twilight, a small moss-painting that had once hung outside Leia’s bedroom in House Organa on Alderaan. Designed by the late Ob Khaddor-one of Alderaan’s foremost artists-the piece depicted a line of enigmatic insectoid figures departing their pinnacle-city home, with a fierce storm sweeping in behind them. Han had no idea why the bugs were so taken with it-apart from the subject matter-but every time he put it on the keep stack, an insect would deposit a jug of spirits or a shine-ball in its place and carry it back down the ramp again. Han was about ready to start exterminating. The painting was Leia’s most prized possession, and he’d almost died trying to recover it for her on Tatooine.

A bug emerged from the Falcon carrying Killik Twilight in its four arms and stopped about halfway down the ramp, peering over the top of the frame. Han, waiting at the bottom, folded his arms and sighed.

“Come on,” he said. “Let’s get it over with.”

Instead of continuing down the ramp, the worker jumped to the floor and disappeared behind the disordered heap of crates and spare tools stacked next to the Falcon.

“Hey!”

Han rushed to the other side to cut off the bug’s escape, but it was nowhere to be seen. He glanced back at its buddies - waiting for this last bit of “transacting” to be completed-but they only turned their oblong eyes away and pretended not to notice. Han sneered, then knelt down to peer behind the Falcon’s landing struts.

Nothing.

“Blast!” Han slowly turned, his pulse pounding as he searched for the bug. Halfway up the hangar wall, he saw the Skywalkers emerging from a passage with Saba Sebatyne and a black-furred Ewok, but no sign of the thief. “Huttslime!”

“Han?” Leia appeared at the top of the boarding ramp, her arms loaded with provisions that she and the others were stowing again. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Han answered. “The bugs are getting sneaky.”