“And I suppose you understand them?” Jiliac snorted. “Where do these masterful insights of yours spring from, Nephew? From watching them cavort around scantily clothed?”
Jabba was really getting angry now. “I do understand them! And I understand that this offer is not one to toss aside!”
“So you would have us arrange to kill some thirty t’landa Til for the Corellian Resistance,” Jiliac said. “What if that was ever discovered here on Nal Hutta? The t’landa Til here would raise such an outcry!
They are our cousins, Nephew. Humans are nothing!”
Jabba hadn’t thought of that. He remained silent, mulling her objection over. “I still think it could be arranged,” he said. “We’ve gotten away with multiple assassinations before, after all.”
“Besides,” Jiliac said, sulkily, “I don’t want the Ylesian enterprise destroyed. I want to take it over. What good will it do us to best Besadii if the spice factories are destroyed?”
“We could build other factories,” Jabba said. “Anything would be better than having Besadii warehousing that spice and driving the prices up and up!”
Jiliac shook her head. “I am the clan leader, and my decision is no.
That is the end of it, Nephew.”
Jabba tried to expostulate further, but she waved him to silence, and, with a bellow, summoned K8LR and the Rebel Commander. The droid quickly shepherded the young woman back into the room, solicitously commenting on her bravery the whole time.
Jiliac shot an exasperated glance at Jabba, and harrumphed loudly.
“Girl, as I was saying before, when I was interrupted—” she glanced at Jabba meaningfully, “we appreciate your offer, but our answer is no.
Desilijic cannot risk allying with the Resistance in this matter.”
Bria Tharen’s features betrayed her disappointment, Jabba noted. She sighed, then squared her shoulders.
Very well, Your Excellency.” She reached into the pocket of her fatigues and took something out. “If you should ever change your mind, you can reach me—” Jiliac waved aside the proffered datacard, then glared at her nephew as he reached for it. Jabba gazed at Bria, holding the datacard. “I will keep this,” he said. “Farewell, Commander.”
“Thank you for the audience, Your Excellencies,” she said, and bowed deeply.
Jabba watched her as she walked away, and found himself thinking that she’d look magnificent in a dancing girl’s costume. All that reddish hair spilling down over her bare shoulders. Nicely muscled shoulders.
This human was fit, exquisitely so, and her height was impressive.
What a dancing girl she’d make!
Jabba sighed.
“Jabba,” his aunt said, “I did not appreciate the way you appeared to disrespect my decision just now. Never forget that we Desilijic must always present a united front when conducting business with inferior species.”
Jabba did not trust himself to speak. He was still bitterly angry over his aunt’s refusal to see what a great opportunity Bria Tharen had offered them.
If I were the leader of Desilijic, he thought, I wouldn’t have to listen to her paranoid conservatism. Sometimes you have to take chances to make large gains. Motherhood has made her stupid and weak….
It was only then that Jabba realized, for the first time, that if Jiliac were out of the picture, that he, Jabba Desilijic Tiure, would be Desilijic’s next leader. He would have to answer to no one.
Jabba lay there, his tail twitching thoughtfully, then glanced sideways at his aunt. Suddenly her belly rippled, and her baby slithered out.
“Mama’s precious!” she exclaimed. “Jabba, look! Getting bigger every day!”
She cooed at her baby. Jabba grimaced, belched, and then wriggled rapidly out of the room, unable to stand the sight of either of them for one second longer.
Bria Tharen picked up her glass of wine, sipped it slowly, appreciatively, then smiled at her escort. “That’s wonderful. Thank you so much, Lando.
You don’t know how long it’s been since I had an evening where I could just relax.”
Lando Calrissian nodded. Bria had returned to Nar Shaddaa aboard the shuttle from Nal Hutta today, following what she’d said was a “disappointing” interview with the Desilijic leader. To cheer her up, the gambler had promised to take her out for a nerf tenderloin dinner at one of the Smuggler’s Moon’s finest hotel-casinos, the Chance Castle. Bria was wearing a softly draped gown of turquoise that matched her eyes, and Lando was wearing his black and scarlet outfit, “for old time’s sake.”
“How long?” Lando asked, twirling his own wineglass slowly in his fingers.