[Legacy Of The Force] - 02(68)

He checked the chrono readout in his helmet, shifting his focus and feeling the beginning of a headache. Three hours. Too slow. The longer he took, the more vulnerable he was to discovery.

You don’t quit now, Fett.

And then he heard it: just a couple of words. It wasn’t even anything from which he could derive meaning. But he knew that tone, that pitch, so very well that it was like hearing his own name whispered in a crowded, noisy room; everything else fell silent as his brain filtered out all irrelevance.

It was Taun We’s fluting, gentle voice. He forgot the raw ache in his sternum and felt the adrenaline course through his body, erasing every pain.

Gotcha …

He frame-grabbed the coordinates in his HUD, got to his knees, and scouted around for an air vent. There was a biohazard containment opening fifty meters across the roof, the kind of hatch that a hazmat team would use to enter the building if it was ever contaminated and sealed. And he knew it would yield to the lock overrides on his wristband. He hadn’t met a lock, seal, or panel that didn’t.

And it was designed to take someone wearing a full hazmat suit. For once, his jet pack wasn’t an encumbrance as he took a security blade from his shin pocket to bypass the breach alarm and opened the hatch.

He slid down the vent and found himself standing in a chamber with two doors leading off it. Both were locked. When he switched to his HUD’s normal vision, the glow around him was that dull amber emergency lighting, and a safety notice on the wall read: LAST INSPECTED 6/8/1/36.

He adjusted his helmet’s sound sensors and listened. The corridor outside was clear. A quick flick back to the terahertz radar scan confirmed it. He made his way down the corridor, checking as he went, following the occasional sound of Taun We’s voice until he found himself outside an office with two shapes visible inside on his helmet scanner: one dense human body and a Kaminoan one with its characteristic abdominal spaces.

Fett ducked into the nearest alcove-a fire control station-and waited for the human to leave. Eventually the doors opened and a woman left. The lock panel at the side of the doors flashed again, but Fett slid a blade from his override system into the slot and the doors parted with a whisper.

He took the precaution of locking them behind him. Leaning over the desk, a tall creature with a long graceful neck and small, round gray head was engrossed in work at a data screen.

Taun We didn’t turn around. “Please leave the file in the tray.”

“Nice place you got here.”

Kaminoans never showed emotion, but the speed with which Taun We whipped around and the way her head jerked back on seeing him told him she was surprised..

“Boba?”

“Oddly, there’s only one.”

“How … did you find me?”

“It’s my job, remember?” Fett walked slowly across the room and propped his backside on the edge of her desk. He lifted his helmet. “Let’s say I followed the money.”

“Koa Ne sent you to-“

“No. He wants the data back, but that’s not why I’m here.”

Taun We stared into his face, blinking slowly. She knew him about as well as anyone alive, and that wasn’t a long list. She looked … old, very old.

“Are you all right, Boba? Is your leg functioning properly?”

“No. In fact, my whole body is giving me a few problems.”

“Can I be of help?”

“I’m suffering from tissue degeneration. Liver problems. Autoimmune diseases. Tumors. My doctor says I have a year or so to live if I’m lucky.” He reached in his belt for a datachip. “Take a look at the tests.”

Taun We took the chip with long, thin fingers and slid it into her dataport. “Ah,” she said. “I see.”

She got up and went to a cabinet, and Fett’s natural mistrust of the galaxy kicked in. If she could run out on her own government, she could betray him. He clicked his blaster just as a warning.

Taun We turned slowly and glanced at the blaster. “Do you think I would wish to draw attention to the fact that you tracked me down and gained access to my secure office?”

“You stole data and defected. Never had you down for that kind, either.”

Did I ever care about Taun We? I think I did.

Fett thought that it was funny how you never truly recalled how you felt as a child, except for the defining moments: and he was defined by his love of his father, and he knew it, and he was proud of it. When the idea occurred to him that it was all he was, he shook it off.

I miss Dad, every single day, every single minute. I want to live up to him.

Fett motioned Taun We to sit down with the barrel of his blaster. She settled in the chair, hands clasped, and didn’t react at all: no fear, no surprise, no affection. She was ice, control, indifference.