THE PARADISE SNARE(80)

With Zavval vainly trying to control it, the big sled hurtled forward at top speed. Seconds later it slammed into the far wall and bounced off.

Mowing down everything in its path, the sled caromed around the collections room, with Zawal a helpless passenger.

A Rodian guard who was concentrating on trying to shoot Han didn’t see it coming and was struck down in a spray of blood. The sled hurtled through a display case, and Teroenza screamed as he saw his precious collection of antique vases reduced to powder.

The Hutt crashed into the opposite wall, and the entire room shook.

Dust and debris rained from the ceiling. Han and Bria threw themselves flat as the hurtling sled whanged into one of the jade nymphs and shattered her.

Zavval was yelling, and most of the guards by now had wisely made a quick exit.

Then the sled, with Zawal’s massive weight atop it, plowed directly into the room’s central pillar. The support column buckled and groaned, then bent in two and snapped off—and then the one Han had partially vaporized followed suit.

With a last, agonized groan, the repulsorlift sled settled to the floor and died.

Han stared in frozen horror as, seemingly in slow motion, half of the ceiling rumbled, bulged, cracked, then broke into huge chunks and plummeted down. He recovered himself just in time to grab Bria and yank her out of the way as a huge chunk of stone flooring hurtled at them from the upper level. Throwing her to the floor beneath the bowl of the stone fountain, Han fell on top of her, shielding her.

Zawal screamed shrilly as massive chunks rained down on him, pinning him to the shattered remains of his sled. Dust rose in a choking cloud.

Coughing and gagging, Han crawled off Bria as soon as he was sure the ceiling fall had ceased. He stared at the spot where Zavval had been, but all he could see of the buried Hutt overlord was his spasmodically jerking tail.

Teroenza had thrown himself flat beneath the protection of a massive antique table and remained relatively unscathed. When the debris stopped falling, he crawled out from under the dust and rubble of his now-cracked table. Staggering toward Han, Bria, and Muuurgh—the Togorian was sheltering in the doorway to the priest’s apartment—Teroenza howled, slavering with rage. Obviously still intent on revenge, the t’landa Til lowered his head, horn pointed, and charged.

Han aimed and fired a bolt into his right flank, sending him crashing to the floor with a scream. The sickening smell of burned meat filled the air. A blaster bolt from one of the guards struck the fountain again, and tiny shards of sizzling stone whipped by Han’s face. One buried itself in his neck, and when he yanked it free, his fingers came away slick with blood.

Han sighted along the barrel of his blaster, fired, and the last guard went down in a heap.

“Come on!” he yelled, grabbing Bria and the knapsack and gesturing to Muuurgh. “We’re gettin’ outta here!”

Slipping in the rubble and stumbling over bodies, the three thieves headed for the double doors. When they reached them, Han motioned his comrades back and cautiously slid his head around the edge of the door, only to be rewarded by a blaster bolt that nearly took his ear off.

“Muuurgh, take Bria out the other way!” he ordered. “Go through Teroenza’s door, and we’ll catch them in a cross fire. On the count of fifty!” The Togorian nodded, and he and Bria slithered and slipped back through the ruins of the treasure room, past the moaning Teroenza, through the door of the priest’s apartment.

Silently, Han counted. At fifteen, he stuck his hand around the edge of the door and snapped off four quick shots, and was rewarded with a howl of agony.

One more down …

He waited, breathing hard, trying not to cough on the dust that still filled the air.

Forty-five, forty-six, forty-seven, forty-eight, forty-nine …

fifty!

Han dived out the door, hit the corridor rolling, and fired. Red blaster bolts zinged past his legs and where his head would be, but he got another guard, a Whiphid. As they’d planned, Bria and Muuurgh were firing from behind the guards, and two more fell.

The remaining two guards, a Devaronian and a Gamorrean, took to their heels and pounded away from Muuurgh and Bria, leaping over Han’s still-recumbent body as they did so.

Han got shakily to his feet, just in time to hear Muuurgh let out a huge battle roar and grapple with—who? Han couldn’t see anyone!

Has he gone crazy? Han wondered, but then he glimpsed a reddish orange eye, a mouth full of teeth, and heard a loud hiss. He saw a blaster wave, seemingly in midair, then suddenly he could make out the pale skinned, warty, scaled being. A skinchanger!

Muuurgh growled and snarled as he savagely attacked the Aar’aa. The Togorian was so much taller than his opponent that Muuurgh was bent over nearly double. Han winced as the Togorian fell to his knees, grasping his foe. The reptilian creature was the exact color of the neutral walls and flooring in the dimly lit corridor. With a motion like a striking gral-viper, the Togorian buried his fangs in the being’s throat and ripped.