[Legacy Of The Force] - 02(19)

Fett had managed to shrug off the news at the time. It was more than twenty years ago. But it felt different now. He wanted to know where she had been, what she had done. But it was stupid and irrelevant-and far too late. He put the impulse aside.

“I hope she’s careful, then,” he said.

Beviin was waiting for more reaction, eyebrows raised, but he wasn’t going to get it. “Is that all?”

“Yes. I’m more interested in Kaminoans. What do you know about Ko Sai?”

“Apart from the rumors?”

“I’ll take rumors right now.”

“They said she was killed during the Battle of Kamino, but the general view was that she defected to the Separatists. Then there’s a big black hole, and the next rumor is that someone sent her back to Kamino.”

“I’d have known if-“

“A piece at a time.”

“What?”

“Body parts. Well, some of them.”

Only kidnappers did that kind of thing. They did it for credits-and that didn’t fit a wartime defection at all. So that was how Koa Ne knew someone had located Ko Sai.

“Fingers?” That was the usual removable body part of choice if a kidnapper wanted to focus someone’s mind. “Kaminoans don’t have external ears.”

“Not exactly. Parts she really needed, or so I hear.”

Fett tried to imagine what the scientist could have done to end up dead and dissected. Maybe she’d tried to withhold her data. But why send the parts back to Kamino unless whoever held her wanted to pressure her government, or teach them a lesson?

And the data had never been sold. It would have been in use by now if it had. And as far as he could tell, the Kaminoans had never been asked to surrender anything-credits or data-in exchange.

That sounded like revenge. And that didn’t help him find what he was looking for.

“Why are you interested in a disappearance that long ago?” Beviin asked. “If anyone wants you to find the rest of her, it’s a bit late.”

This was where things became uncertain for Fett. He had trusted only his father, who had put every scrap of his energy into making his son totally self-reliant. Boba Fett hunted alone. But from time to time he was reminded that he was also the Mandalore; he had a responsibility to a hundred warriors, and-this was the aspect that gave him the problem-a nation that wasn’t only geographic but a nomadic culture, too, except that it had a homeworld, and a sector, and … no, it wasn’t clear at all. He wasn’t sure what being Mandalore meant anymore.

And he wondered if he thought of himself as Mandalorian first and bounty hunter second.

He didn’t.

“Verd ori’shya beskar’gam.” Beviin took a pull at his ale. “A warrior is more than one’s armor.”

Fett rounded on him. “What?”

“Ailyn. Wearing your armor, flying your ship. No substitute for a fighting spirit.” Beviin never appeared to fear him and never called him sir. A traditional Mandalorian never would, of course. “You still don’t speak Mando’a, do you?”

“Basic and Huttese. That’s what I do business in.”

“Maybe we need a little less business and a little more Mandalore, Bob’ika.”

Bob’ika. Some of his father’s associates had called him that as a kid. His father never had. But he ignored the over-familiar form of his name. “I’m busy right now.”

“Nothing else you want done?”

“No.”

“I’d better be going. Just call if you have orders for me.” Beviin drained the last of his ale and scooped the uneaten coin-crabs into a napkin to fold them up and pocket them. “You’re my Mand’alor, after all.”

It might have been sarcasm. “You sound very tribal these days.”

“Spirit of the times. Seems to be catching on.”

Fett hadn’t visited Mandalore or the surrounding sector for a couple of years. There was no reason why it should feel like home in the same way Kamino did.

We don’t even know how many Mandalorians there are in the galaxy. You don’t need an ID or a birth certificate to be one … of us.

Beviin replaced his helmet and walked out without a backward glance. Without a drink in front of him, Fett had no reason to sit there any longer, either. He slid off the stool, to the visible relief of the bar staff, and wandered back to Slave I, taking in the sights along the way.

There was a share-dealing shop on the walkway. Upper City was full of them, open all hours to catch trading on the thousands of trading floors throughout the galaxy that made up the Interstellar Stock Exchange. Share dealing had become an entertainment for the wealthy on this forgotten world. Fett paused and walked into the vividly lit lobby to stand in the constantly shifting interactive holodisplay of the various markets.