Fully upright, it would probably be four meters tall, but it sat hunched forward, like a lazy student kneeling with bad posture. Its head turned to bring two oversized holocam lenses to bear on him, and it spoke from somewhere in that head unit, its synthesized tones strikingly reminiscent of Jacen Solo’s voice: “Who are you?”
“I’m Ben Skywalker,” the boy said. He didn’t add, I’m here to destroy this whole installation.
“Wonderful,” the droid said. “I’m so happy to meet you. I’m Anakin Solo.”
Chapter Fourteen
CORONET, CORELLIA
THE BEHAREH SPACEPORT, THOUGH A MINOR ONE BY THE STANDARDS of Coronet or any decent-sized city, still sprawled for many acres, even though it was located only a couple of kilometers from the urban heart. Unfortunately for Jaina and team members, it differed from the city’s main spaceport in a significant way: there was no central parking or hangar area for visitors’ groundspeeders, no large common-arrival point where it would be comparatively easy to remain inconspicuous. Instead, Behareh was divided into dozens of smaller commercial properties, usually with the offices and hangars of three or four firms clustered around common launching and parking areas.
Kolir directed Thann to a cluster of businesses whose parking area was surrounded by tall trees. He landed. Here, the city’s space raid sirens were not as loud as in the government districts, but continued to blare into the skies.
As the groundspeeder slowed to a stop, Zekk’s eyes came open, alert, untroubled, unclouded by pain. “Are we on Corellia yet?” he asked.
“Quiet, you,” Jaina said, but brushed a lock of his hair from his forehead, a gentle gesture robbing any sting from her words. “Thann, Kolir, status?”
“Skywalker’s squadron is making a run over the government center,” Thann said. “To disguise the real purpose of their arrival and to give us some time to get airborne. As soon as we are, he’ll disengage and come over to escort us into space. Tahiri’s speeder will be here in a couple of minutes.” He frowned. “I think there’s something she’s not telling us.”
“Like what?”
“I’m not sure. She wouldn’t tell me.”
“I have a likely proshpect,” Kolir said, and held up her datapad; on its diminutive screen was a red-and-yellow company logo that read: DONOSLANE EXCURSIONS. “Female human manager on duty. The offishes should be over-” She looked around and spotted a curve-topped yellow duracrete building straight behind the groundspeeder. “Over there.”
The others looked in that direction but were diverted-another groundspeeder, this one an inconspicuous blue, settled down on the parking pad adjacent to theirs. At the controls was Tahiri Veila, blond-haired and green-eyed, a few standard years younger than Jaina; she was dressed in a utility worker’s gray jumpsuit. Beside her was Doran Tamer-tall, fair-haired, brown-eyed, square-jawed, and blandly handsome as any holodrama leading man, but incongruously dressed in brown grass-stained field-worker’s garments. Both were Jedi. At the moment, neither looked like it.
In the speeder’s backseat was something roughly the size of a grown human woman, wrapped in a brown cloak from its calves to the crown of its head. Only feet protruded, clad in brown leather boots.
Heart suddenly pounding, Jaina slid out from under Zekk and leapt over to that backseat even as Doran said, “It’s not what you think.”
Jaina whipped the cloak away from the head and shoulders of the body-and revealed the features of a brightly polished silver protocol droid, its photoreceptors dim. “What’s this?” she asked. “Where’s Tiu?”
Doran offered her a pained smile. “She’s in Thrackan Sal-Solo’s mansion.”
“Captured?”
“No,” Tahiri said. “Hiding.”
“Hiding?”
“We ran into a trap,” Doran said. “It sounds like you did, too. Lots of guards. Several combat probots. A couple of YVH droids. Not a tenable situation. So we decided to run away.”
Tahiri gave him a reproving look. “There was nothing we could accomplish there. So I ordered a nice, clean withdrawal. Which would have been fine if Brilliant Notions here hadn’t had his great idea.”
Now Jaina fixed Doran with a hard stare. “Which was what?”
Doran shrugged. “We ran into this deactivated protocol droid in the room from which we decided to stage our retreat. And it occurred to me-I could dress it in my clothes, Tahiri and Tiu could carry it out, and it would look like they were taking the body of a fallen comrade to safety. They knew three of us had gone in, they’d watch three of us escape … and I’d hide there, see what I could find out in the wake of this disaster.”