Fi tried not to wonder where he might be. It was bad enough thinking about Sicko.
“Okay, that one was routine. Garment delivery.” Sev made a low rumble in his throat, almost like an animal. “What do we look like from the outside now?”
“At the moment, one Rodian taxi driver reading a holozine while he’s parked and waiting.”
Fi could see out, but nobody could see in-or at least they could see something that wasn’t actually in the taxi, thanks to the thin film of photoactive micro-emitters coating the interior. “Clever stuff, this gauze.”
“Thank you,” Jusik said. “It took me a long time to work out how to program moving images into it.”
“Are you bored?” Sev said, looking around at Fi. He still seemed wary of directing any of his comments at Jedi, even if all rank had been swept aside. “‘Cos I’m not. And your constant yakking is getting to me somewhat, ner vod.”
Jusik cut in. “Sorry, Sev. My fault.”
Sev looked embarrassed for a moment. “If you’re interested, fifty-one of the seventy crates I’ve clocked on this watch show up on the CSF database tagged as criminal. Theft is a bigger industry than legit business here.”
Jusik raised an eyebrow. “Isn’t that the sort of thing Obrim’s people might like to know?”
“Isn’t it the sort of stuff that would bring the boys in blue crashing in here and blowing our op?”
“Point taken.”
“No offense … Bardan.”
Delta hadn’t worked with Jedi much, at least not the junior ones. Fi savored a moment of delight at seeing Sev’s stone-cold pretense reduced to embarrassed deference. All Jedi were supposed to be humble, but Jusik actually was. He seemed to see himself as nothing special, just a man with some accidental skills that didn’t make him any more important than the next person, only different.
So they waited.
And that was a lot harder than it looked.
“Whoa,” Sev said. “Look at this one . .” Fi and Jusik followed the angle of Sev’s scope. “CSF database has this tagged as RESTRICTED.”
“Could mean it’s of interest to us, or could mean organized crime.”
Jusik’s visor had slipped to the end of his nose. “Or both.”
It was a medium-sized delivery transport with dull green livery caked with dust. The identity transponder was evidently fake, because when the crate aligned itself with the platform at the doors to Warehouse 58, and the hatches sprang open, there were just a few boxes inside. The warehouse doors eased open far enough to let a repulsor cart edge out, and two droids began loading the small containers onto the repulsor’s flatbed.
“Small but heavy load by the look of it,” Fi said.
“And we’ve got company.” Sev realigned the scope, and the datapad hummed into recording mode. “Second transport backing up to it.”
Another delivery vehicle hovered, edging astern until it was level with the other side of the landing platform. The boxes were transferred to it. They didn’t go into the warehouse at all.
“That’s irregular,” Sev said. “And we don’t like irregular, do we? ID transponder says a legit rental vessel.”
A female human in coveralls-white skin, wavy ginger hair to the shoulders, medium build, short-stepped out of the green transport onto the platform to be met by a male Falleen who’d jumped out of the rental. He was young, as far as Fi could tell, with light green skin, and his mundane pilot’s rig was a little too long in the leg for him. All details were worth noting.
The two turned their backs to the skylane and appeared to be talking.
“Well, that’s a rare sight, and I bet he’s not on the CSF database,” Sev said, checking the ‘pad. Images flicked across the screen at a blinding speed while the system sought a match from the image the scope had grabbed. After a few moments the screen read: NO MATCH. “Falleen don’t venture offworld very often, and he certainly isn’t here to check out the tourist sights. Let’s try the woman.”
Fi watched. There was a match indeed, and one that came up rapidly.
“Fierfek,” Sev said. “Her name’s Vinna Jiss. And she’s a government employee.”
“I’m not going to like this, am I?”
“Not when you hear she works in GAR logistics, no.”
“Chakaar,” Fi said. “She could be on legit business, of course, but then I’m such a trusting soul.”
“Falleen male and GAR clerk? Hello? Do I have to draw you a picture?” Sev sighed to himself. “They certainly put those Falleen pheromones to good use. I bet she’d do him any favor he asked. Getting security information out of her would be even easier.”