And as she looked off to her left a slight glint of metal caught her eye. Well back from the Grand Dukha, half hidden in the long early-morning shadows beside another building, was the boxy shape of a decon droid.
Leia stared at it, a shiver of sudden horror running through her. A decon droid with unusual curiosity-Threepio had mentioned that, but she’d been too preoccupied at the time to pay any attention to his concerns. But for a decon droid to be in Nystao, fifty kilometers or more from its designated work area, was far more than just over developed curiosity. It had to be-She squatted down, mentally berating herself for her carelessness. Of course the Grand Admiral wouldn’t have just flitted away on the spur of the moment. Not without leaving someone or something to keep an eye on things. “Chewie-over there to your right,” she hissed. “Looks like a decon droid, but I think it’s an espionage droid.”
The Wookiee growled something vicious and started pushing his way through the crowd. But even as the Noghri made way for him, Leia knew he would never make it. Espionage droids weren’t brilliant, but they were smart enough to know not to hang around after their cover had been blown. Long before Chewbacca could get over there it would be off and running. If it had a transmitter-and if there were any Imperial ships within range-
“People of Honoghr!” she shouted over the conversation. “I will prove to you right now the truth of what I say. One of the Empiror’s decon droids is there.” She pointed to it. “Bring it to me.
The crowd turned to look, and Leia could sense their uncertainty. But before anyone could move, the droid abruptly vanished around the corner of the building it had been skulking beside. A second later Leia caught a glimpse of it between two other buildings, scuttling away for all it was worth.
It was, tactically, the worst decision the droid could have made. Running away was as good as admitting guilt, particularly in front of a people who had grown up with the things and knew exactly what the normal behavioral range of a decon droid was. The crowd roared, and from the rear perhaps fifty of the older adolescents took off after it.
And as they did so, one of the guards on the terrace beside Leia cupped his hand around his mouth and sent a piercing half-scream into the air.
Leia jerked away, ears ringing with the sound. The guard screamed again, and this time there was an answer from somewhere in the near distance. The guard switched to a warble that sounded like a complicated medley of birdcalls; a short reply, and both fell silent. “He calls others to the hunt,” the maitrakh told Leia.
Leia nodded, squeezing her hands into fists as she watched the pursuers disappear around a corner after the droid. If the droid had a transmitter it would right now be frantically dumping its data :
And then, suddenly, the pursuers were back in sight, accompanied by a half dozen adult Noghri males. Held aloft like the prize from a hunt, still wiggling uselessly in their grip, was the droid.
Leia took a deep breath. “Bring it here to me,” she said as the party approached. They did so, six of the adolescents lugging it up the stairs and laying it on its back on the terrace. Leia ignited her lightsaber, her eyes searching the droid as she did so for signs of a concealed antenna port. She couldn’t see one, but that by itself didn’t prove anything. Steeling herself for the worst, she sliced a vertical cut through the droid’s outer shell. Two more crosswise cuts, and its internal workings were laid out for all to see.
Chewbacca was already kneeling beside the droid as Leia shut down her lightsaber, his huge fingers probing delicately among the maze of tubes and cables and fibers. Near the top of the cavity was a small gray box. He threw a significant look at Leia and pulled it free from its connections.
Leia swallowed as he laid it on the ground beside him. She recognized it, all right, from long and sometimes bitter experience: the motivator recorder unit from an Imperial probe droid. But the antenna connector jack was empty. Luck, or the Force, was still with them.
Chewbacca was poking around the lower part of the cavity now. Leia watched as he pulled several cylinders out of the tangle, examined their markings, and returned them to their places. The crowd was starting to murmur again when, with a satisfied murmur of his own, he pulled out a large cylinder and slender needle from near the intake hopper.
Gingerly, Leia took the cylinder from him. It shouldn’t be dangerous to her, but there was no point in taking chances. “I call on the dynasts to bear witness that this cylinder was indeed taken from the inside of this machine,” she called to the crowd.
“Is this your proof?” Ir’khaim asked, eyeing the cylinder doubtfully.