Urai Fen, silently enduring the pain of his wounds and burns, burst into the tiny hangar bay intended for the crew's ships.
He had no interest in the damaged Lambdas from the battle for the escort frigate.
He dragged the resisting, kicking Baroness toward that very precious Lambda, which sat regally in the center of the bay.
He had known about Sol Mon's personal ship since the moment the pirate acquired it — intelligence in all divisions of the Zann Consortium worked thoroughly.
"Don't resist, Baroness," he demanded, painfully grabbing the girl's wrists. "It'll only get worse."
"Screw you!" the unruly woman cursed him in a most un-aristocratic manner.
"So be it," Urai stopped, struck her on the back of the head, knocking the prisoner unconscious.
Paying no attention to the blood beginning to flow from her head, the Talortai ran toward the ship at the maximum speed he could manage.
But, ten meters short, he realized something was wrong.
The communication antennas were damaged, and the hatch covering access to the main hyperdrive was so crudely opened that there was no doubt about mechanical interference.
Almost immediately, he noticed a hefty semi-transparent box covered in a network of cracks, lying by one of the supports, surrounded by small parts and broken glass.
Someone had deliberately disabled the hyperdrive generator.
Urai frowned and looked around.
No one was visible who could have committed such blatant vandalism.
But as a wearer of a cloaking system, he knew that meant nothing.
Just as his terrible wounds had almost healed thanks to his innate regeneration.
The Talortai carefully placed the woman's body on the deck plating, knowing he would have to fight an unknown enemy.
Whoever had done this to the ship was here.
Because if it had been one of the pirates, they would have flown off long ago.
But the enemy — the Dominion — could be hiding.
And that enemy was few in number — hence the damage to the shuttle's key systems, understanding that the engines would allow Urai to break through any fighter blockade and escape.
A first-class hyperdrive could have given him an edge over Dominion ships — even with a damaged antenna, he could reach Etti IV far earlier than the Destroyers reached their bases.
That's why it was disabled.
And could have informed Tyber Zann of what happened — that's why the communication antennas were destroyed.
All that remained was to hope that the backup hyperdrive on this ship was still functional…
And the next moment, he heard something fragile fall onto the deck and shatter into pieces.
Flying out through the opening of the loading ramp.
The Talortai tilted his head, seeing a man in black-and-blue armor descending the ramp, a vibroblade in hand.
A Dominion guard.
"You won't escape," he said in an artificial voice from the vocoder, taking a combat stance.
Urai moved one of his blades aside, inwardly lamenting that his cloaking system had been damaged by the flamethrower.
The tip of the massive blade hovered a couple of centimeters from the Baroness lying on the deck.
"I need the ship," Fen said. "Or she dies."
"I don't care," the guard replied. "I'm not here to save her from death."
"Then why are you standing in my way?" the Talortai asked in surprise.
"You killed my brothers in blood and arms," the guard explained, advancing slowly.
"I've killed many," Urai shrugged, feeling the skin on the right side of his face tighten. "I'll kill you too."
It seemed that one of the Lambdas on this ship wasn't as badly damaged during the boarding through this hangar.
Perhaps if he dealt with this stranger quickly, he could escape, relying on his wits and the Force.
Oddly, the guard didn't respond to his remark, silently moving to attack with his vibroblade.
Urai parried the first blade strike.
He slashed back, but only left a superficial scratch on the guard's chest.
His second blade missed entirely, but that was enough for the more agile opponent to counterattack.
Urai felt a cut appear on his right shoulder and sharply moved aside to avoid muscle damage.
And thus he had to step back from the prisoner.
But he did so toward the shuttle he considered the least damaged of all in the bay.
Fine, he hadn't managed to capture the faster ship, but a standard Lambda would do.
The guard continued attacking, but his thrusts and "treacherous" techniques didn't reach their target.
Urai had seen all this before.
When he killed the Baroness's bodyguards.
Exactly the same.
And he had only one explanation.
And he knew how to use it.
"You're a clone," he spat in the enemy's face, catching his vibrating weapon between his crossed blades. "I've killed your kind before!"
Now it was clear that this wasn't just training based on uniform military tactics.
It was knowledge transferred from one source to other bodies.
Exactly what the Zann Consortium uses.
This information needed to be relayed to Tyber immediately!
He had to know the Dominion had cloning cylinders!
This significantly altered the entire operation against the holdings of the late Grand Admiral Thrawn!
They could create copies of experienced and dangerous fighters, just like the Consortium!
He needed to strike now, before they made even more soldiers.
Because against common criminals, these clones were too good.
If Urai hadn't led the capture of the Baroness's ship, Sol Mon would have lost all his soldiers right in the airlock.
"You're wrong, sharp-beak," the man in blue-black armor declared. "I am the original."
So the news that he was a clone wouldn't break this man.
Interesting — after death, would his body be cremated with the armor, like those Urai had killed on the Baroness's ship?
"Not much for skill either," if there was anything new Urai had learned about fighting humans, it was that they were easily provoked and driven into a rage that clouded their minds and led to defeat.
But the original of the clones, for some reason, didn't respond.
Instead, he unexpectedly raised his sword hilt upward, changing the attack angle of the blocked blade.
And deprived Urai of an eye, along with the left part of his face.
The Talortai roared in pain and stepped back.
But immediately blocked the strike he expected the enemy to make to disable him.
Protecting his standing leg with his weapon, Urai began to turn to deliver a side strike with his left blade, but the enemy proved more agile than he thought.
Ducking under the blow, he thrust his blade into Urai's right foot, caught the left leg raised for a knee strike, and straightened up, throwing the Talortai off balance.
The vibroblade, like a hot knife through butter, severed the right foot, and the lieutenant of the Zann Consortium crashed onto his back.
He rolled to the side, dodging a sword strike aimed at his lower torso, shifted his weight to his left leg, and looked at his opponent.
"If you're so good, then why were your clones so terrible?" he asked, still trying to get under his opponent's skin.
Instead of answering, the Dominion guardsman swung his vibroblade at Urai's legs, forcing him to defend.
Dragging his wounded leg, the Talortai parried the vibroblade thrusts that rained down on him.
He had already stopped paying attention to the numerous cuts his opponent was inflicting on him, leaving them to his regenerative ability.
But he knew he was starting to tire.
The fight in the cockpit, the damage he'd had to regenerate after the traitor Sol Mon threw that weapon, the burns from the flamethrower, the fresh wounds — all of it was draining his body's internal reserves, steadily weakening him.
He needed to attack his opponent, destroy him, and escape before reinforcements arrived.
Obviously, since there were no soldiers or droidekas here, the guardsman had come to fight alone.
That was his trademark mistake.
Urai waited for the moment when he could strike an exposed spot on his opponent's chassis and thrust his right blade into it, directing his left to hit the enemy's head.
But to his surprise, the guardsman paid no attention at all to the deep wound in his side or the damage to his helmet.
Instead, he jerked to the side, freeing the edge of his abdomen from Urai's blade, and delivered a vertical strike to the Talortai's outstretched arm.
The vibroblade sliced through flesh effortlessly, severing Urai's right arm cleanly at the elbow.
Before Urai could process what had happened, while his lieutenant's brain, screaming in pain, was still realizing he'd lost a limb, the same fate befell his left hand, which was cut off near the wrist.
Both mighty blades clattered to the deck.
The guardsman kicked them aside, then spun and drove his foot into Urai's head, sending the stunned Talortai crashing to the deck.
Unable to soften his fall, Urai slammed face-first onto the deck, then felt a tourniquet tightening around his left stump.
Next came the rolling of his mutilated body onto its back.
Before Urai could figure out what was happening, a metal cylinder was shoved into his mouth, prying his beak open so that its walls and teeth couldn't touch each other.
A moment later, his beak was sealed shut with aerosol spray-synthflesh.
"He intends to take me prisoner!"
The thought flashed through the Zann Consortium lieutenant's mind in terror.
He understood perfectly why the enemy was bandaging the stumps of his severed limbs and blocking his teeth — to keep him from bleeding out and to prevent him from using the poison capsule implanted in the molar of every high-ranking member of the organization and the Vultures.
That meant they were going to interrogate him.
And quite possibly try to clone him, to extract whatever data they could.
He couldn't allow that.
Years of work — down the drain.
If the Dominion learned even a fraction of what Urai knew, the life's work of the being most dear to him — Tyber, who over the years had become practically a brother to the Talortai — would be destroyed.
Urai tried to bite down on the poison capsule — it didn't work.
His opponent had already bandaged his wounds and was now tearing off his own cuirass to flood the wound in his abdomen with bacta.
Unfortunately, it was nothing more than a through-and-through flesh wound that would heal.
A few severed blood vessels, maybe a vein — nothing that would keep him from surviving until help arrived.
Especially with a medkit on hand.
So the guardsman's armor was a bit thicker than it looked — and because of that, the blow hadn't reached any vital organs.
Watching the guardsman tend to his own wounds, Urai strained with all his might to clamp his beak shut.
The metal cylinder bent, cracked, but didn't break.
He felt bacta flowing into his mouth, and it was humiliating — his regenerative abilities were about to kick into overdrive.
Urai coughed, and the guardsman rolled him onto his stomach, preventing him from drowning in the bacta.
Yeah, that wouldn't have been enough to finish him.
For a moment, the Talortai's eyes met the guardsman's visor.
The tip of the Talortai's tongue poked out from behind the beak spreader.
"No!" the guardsman realized what Urai intended, striking him in the face to disorient him.
But the deed was already done.
The razor-sharp side edges of Urai's beak had already nearly severed the end of his long, flexible tongue.
Blood gushed into his throat as the guardsman futilely tried to peel off the sticky, hardened synthflesh to get at his airway.
Urai knew the guardsman would manage it before the Talortai choked.
So he did the only thing left to him to protect Tyber Zann's secrets.
He used the nearly severed tip and his snake-like, agile tongue to suffocate himself.
By the time the guardsman finally managed to pry his beak open, the severed tip of the long tongue was lodged so deep in his throat that removing it without surgery was impossible.
And the guardsman's attempts to crack open the Talortai's solid ribcage yielded no results.
When the medics arrived, the Zann Consortium lieutenant was already dead, suffocated by his own tongue.
* * *
The door to the compartment hissed open, admitting a familiar figure in black-and-blue armor into the dimly lit room, then the bulkhead slid back into place with another hiss.
"Grand Admiral," Tierce, who had entered the small briefing room, saluted. "The prisoner has been brought."
"Bring him in," I ordered.
Tierce didn't even move, obviously using the comlink in his helmet.
The bulkhead hissed again...
The guardsman stepped aside, and through the open door flew a half-naked dark-skinned man with an elaborate hairstyle, as if he'd just received a hefty kick in the rear.
Something like dreadlocks, but woven through with various colorful beads, rings, and coins.
The man glared venomously at the two more guardsmen who followed him in and took up positions on either side of the entrance, making it clear to the prisoner that the only way out of the compartment was through them.
Which, unarmed and clearly beaten, he couldn't do.
After looking around, he spotted in the gloom the dome of a gray-blue astromech, on top of which sat an ysalamiri that I was stroking.
Only then did his gaze shift upward...
"Well, I'll be damned!" the pirate's eyes widened so much they looked like they might pop out of his skull. "Thrawn!"
"Good day, Captain Mon," I greeted my interlocutor. "I believe it's time we had a talk."
I don't think I managed to keep my tone even; the notes of disgust I felt looking at this butcher were probably still discernible.
"Y-you're supposed to be dead!" the pirate blurted out. "That Jedi cut you to pieces."
"I'll keep that in mind," I nodded, pointing to the chair at the far end of the rectangular table separating us. "Have a seat."
The pirate awkwardly shook his hands, which were bound in massive cuffs.
"Could take these things off," he muttered. "Can't get comfortable with them on, and I don't really feel like talking..."
He pointedly blew the bloody contents of his thoroughly crooked nose onto the floor.
He recovered from the shock pretty quickly.
"Are you aware that it's rude to spread filth and unsanitary conditions in someone else's home?" I inquired.
"Yeah," the pirate grinned, revealing several gaps in his row of pearl-white teeth. "But my nose is clogged."
"And you also lack basic respect," I added, glancing at my adjutant's helmet. "Lieutenant Colonel Tierce, if you please: teach our guest some manners."
The guardsman moved forward silently and soundlessly, at the same time handing his vibroblade to a nearby soldier.
As soon as his hands were free, the faceless warrior shot out an arm, driving a punch into the solar plexus of the pirate who tried to recoil.
Sol Mon gasped for air, doubling over at the waist.
Grabbing him by the hair, Tierce drove his knee into his face without a wind-up, sending him reeling backward.
The guardsman shifted to stand parallel and to the right of the pirate, then struck him on the front of the neck with an open palm inside an armored gauntlet.
Almost instantly, Tierce placed his left knee against the back of the pirate's right knee, forcing him down onto both knees.
"R7," I addressed the astromech. "Be a good droid and help our ill-mannered guest clean up."
The astromech, which before its upgrades, full memory scan, and subsequent memory wipe (including all backups) had been called R2-D2 and had served the Skywalker family for several decades, rolled forward.
The ysalamiri on its dome yawned sleepily as the droid approached Sol Mon.
Once in front of the pirate, it extended a small hose from its chassis and sprayed cleaning solution onto the deck plating.
Immediately afterward, a panel in its dome opened, and a small white towel, rolled into a tube, emerged.
Sol Mon glared at the droid in front of him, his look full of disgust and indignation.
But his gaze was shifted slightly upward, filled with surprise.
He seemed to have recognized the droid and couldn't understand how it had ended up in my hands.
Well, I certainly wasn't going to enlighten him.
"Either you clean up after yourself, or you'll be sent out to breathe vacuum right now," I explained.
"As if you won't just kill me after you've asked all your questions," the pirate nasally grumbled.
"The longer you defy logic, the greater my desire to do exactly that," I admitted.
The pirate fixed me with a look full of murderous intent, then realized that his actions were having precisely zero effect on me.
He grabbed the towel and started cleaning up his mess.
R7, meanwhile, returned to its original position.
Five minutes later, after the pirate — surprisingly — had cleaned everything to a mirror shine, though he'd ruined the towel with blood and chemicals, Grodin yanked him up by the hair and forcefully sat him down in the chair.
The pirate looked suspiciously at the guardsman as he carefully laid a cloth on the edge of the table in front of him.
But the guardsman's hate-filled gaze had exactly the same effect on him as the earlier one had on me.
In other words — a complete waste of time and facial muscle elasticity.
"So, let's begin," I said. "You attacked a Dominion vessel..."
"Yeah, like I knew whose ship it was! Do I look like some kinda Gungan? Why the hell would I pick a fight with the Dominion..."
Tierce, who still hadn't let go of the pirate's hair, slammed his face against the table in one sharp motion.
"Interrupting is also rude," I explained. "Let's continue. I want to know who gave you the coordinates of our ship and when."
"I did it myself, I..."
This time, understanding that another face-first smash into the metal could drive the cartilage and bones of his nose into his skull, the guardsman slammed the pirate's forehead into the tabletop.
"I was given the time," Mon said, straightening up and wiping blood with his hand. "And the place."
"By whom?" I asked.
"The one you let get away," the pirate smirked.
"Urai Fen," I nodded knowingly. "Tyber Zann's right hand."
"Until he died trying to hold onto power in a crumbling Zann Consortium," the pirate added.
Noted.
"Continue."
"When we arrived at the rendezvous point, the fighting on the ship was already over. Urai Fen apparently got onto the frigate somehow, staged a massacre on board, and then gave us the coordinates. My boys just mopped up the droids, though we lost a lot of our boarding party in the process," the emboldened prisoner rattled off quickly.
"Go on," I demanded.
"Urai gave us the coordinates, and we headed there in the captured escort ship," the pirate said. "We intercepted the Baroness's ship and took it by storm. Lost a lot of men again. Then we set a course for the Corporate Sector. And then you intercepted us."
"So you were not aware of the objectives of the operation and were simply following the direct orders of your commanding officer, Urai Fen?" I asked after hearing him out.
It sounded so logical that I didn't believe it for a second.
"Ah, there's that Imperial smarts," the pirate grumbled. "I told you everything straight."
"Except why you agreed to this mission in the first place," I had to remind the prisoner that we weren't "quite that smart." "Why are you working with Black Sun? Why didn't you refuse to attack a Dominion vessel in territory adjacent to ours? Why are you following Urai Fen's orders?"
The questions were simple, and I even knew the answers.
But this was a classic case of "he doesn't know that I know," which gave the pirate a chance to be honest.
His future directly depended on that honesty — whether he realized it or not.
So these questions had to be asked.
To plant a seed of hope in the pirate sitting across from me that he might be able to fool us.
Because we supposedly knew nothing about him or his past.
I was almost curious what story he'd come up with to save his life.
Let's see how inventive he was.
"Well, who's gonna go against Black Sun?" Sol Mon shrugged with feigned nonchalance. "Those guys don't mess around. They say jump, you jump. Otherwise, you've got no future in this life. Disobeying Black Sun is signing your own death warrant. I may be a free pirate with no ties to them, but I'm not stupid."
"That's enough," I said, realizing that no constructive conversation with this creature was going to happen.
"I understand that since I got caught, Kessel is what's waiting for me," Sol Mon sighed with feigned resignation. "Nothing to be done about it. Believe it or not, but I felt bad about killing your people on the ship, and the Baroness's bodyguards too. I don't get any pleasure out of robbing people and demanding ransoms from their families for their relatives or valuables. But the galaxy is a harsh place since the Empire fell; everyone's just trying to get by. I was actually thinking of joining those mercenaries you were recruiting about six months ago, but when I heard those rumors, I tried my hand at farming in another part of the galaxy. And when I resurfaced in known space about a month ago, everyone was already talking about your death. I decided to head back to the Outer Rim again, because I'd seen from the Empire how quickly something built by a great man can fall apart. But then Urai contacted me and started demanding I work for him. We'd crossed paths before when I was running contraband, so he knew me. That's probably why he decided to strong-arm me..."
The story was so tear-jerking it was only disgusting.
And it showed just how deeply involved Sol Mon was in the Black Sun operation.
"The name of the planet," I inquired.
"What?" the pirate was taken aback. "What planet?"
"The one where you were farming," I explained. "As it happens, I'm new to the galaxy and unfamiliar with many worlds."
"Oh," the pirate broke into a grin. "Zonju V, of course. The Luminii Pirates run things there. That's how we met them. A lush little world, very suitable for agriculture."
I see.
Another lie.
Zonju V was a desert world where only the crime rate could grow.
But that wasn't the main thing — the pirate said he knew the Luminii.
And he used the present tense, saying they "run things" there.
Which meant, at the very least, he didn't know what had happened to his "friends" on that planet.
Well, now I just needed to find out how deep his connection was to that particular pirate group.
"Why did you specifically mention Kessel?" I asked.
Sol hesitated for a moment.
"Well, that's where the Empire sends all its pirates," he muttered, confused, looking away.
"Indeed," I nodded. "But I suspect you're angling for it for a completely different reason."
"I wouldn't have even mentioned it if I'd known I could become one of your mercenaries, like Tyberos, or Vane, or Irv..."
Noted.
"I doubt that," I said. "But thank you for confirming my suspicions."
"Suspicions?" the pirate's nasal tone and battered face were getting somewhat irritating.
"Hypotheses about how quickly and widely information would spread among pirates that they were working for the Dominion," I explained. "It seems the Zann Consortium found out about it quite quickly, since it trickled down the chain of command to the low-level operatives."
The pirate's eyelid twitched.
"But the Consortium was destroyed," he said uncertainly.
"I think you, as a former supplier of stygium crystals from the Karthakk system for the Zann Consortium's military-industrial complex, would have found out about that faster than anyone," I said. My words were reflected in the horror in the pirate's eyes.
"Whether you know that Black Sun is nothing more than a middleman between the operatives and the Zann Consortium... let the Dominion counterintelligence find that out," I continued. "Of course, you've already figured out that you're not going to any Kessel. That Black Sun and Zann Consortium base is already compromised and under our control."
Sol Mon processed that long sentence for about a minute, then nodded with the air of a mortally offended professional whose best feelings had been trampled.
"Of course, I figured it out. But about the Zann Consortium, meaning they survived, that's the first I've heard. You're probably mistaken," he added venomously, looking me defiantly in the eye. "You're not so infallible, Grand Admiral. It's easy to deal with Republic soldiers. The criminal underworld is a lot more complicated."
"Truly so," I smiled coldly. "Grappa the Hutt has already told us just how deep the sarlacc pit goes."
The pirate froze with his mouth open.
Several seconds passed before he found his voice again, but his thoughts were still lagging behind.
"You're saying... I mean... Grappa the Hutt is working with you?!"
"Is there a problem understanding my speech?" I inquired coldly.
"No, no... uh..." Sol Mon swallowed nervously; his Adam's apple bobbed under his clean-shaven jaw, smeared with bloodstains. "Admiral, this is... all due respect..."
"Spare me the big words, Mr. Mon," I interrupted, not wanting to hear the pirate's bleating. "Pirates don't respect anyone except those stronger than them and those they depend on at any given moment. Your attempt to portray yourself as a victim of circumstance will fail. The Dominion is well aware of your activities. Both your work with the Zann Consortium smuggling stygium crystals from Maramere in the Karthakk sector, as I mentioned, and your role as an observer for Grappa the Hutt. It's no secret to us that you kidnapped prominent figures in the interests of your masters and delivered them to the leadership. Maybe they value you so little that they didn't tell you the truth about the Zann Consortium's resurgence. Maybe you're lying — our interrogators will find out. The only question is whether you'll tell us everything you know voluntarily and go to a labor colony, or whether we'll extract that information from you ourselves. And then you really will be sent to Kessel."
"But... what would I do there if the planet is under your control?" Sol Mon blinked.
"Take a direct part in mining the spice that we and the entire galaxy need," I explained courteously. "In any case — for capturing a Dominion vessel, killing its crew, capturing the leader of a neighboring state, and killing the Dominion citizens we provided as bodyguards for her and her father — a bright future does not await you. You will remain in the mines until you die there. As will the surviving members of your crew. Of course, after they've given full testimony."
"But... how... this..." the pirate stammered. "You guys don't use slave labor, you even handed over all the prisoners of war to the New Republic. You can't just send people to the mines. Without a trial..."
The pirate shut up, without any prompting realizing the absurdity of his statement.
"That's true," I agreed. "But you misunderstand me. No one is going to drive you into the mines — the Dominion is revising its spice extraction process. However, the energy spiders that live there and actually produce the spice are always hungry. Or, with your connections in the criminal underworld, didn't you know that spice isn't ore, but a byproduct of the spiders living in the Kessel mines? They feed on living organisms, and then spin their webs of pure spice that the galaxy needs so much."
I paused for dramatic effect, letting the criminal fully appreciate the "beauty" of his situation.
"What do you want?" Sol Mon asked hoarsely, not meeting my eyes, but wiping his bloody nose with the towel, now completely soaked through with his own fluids.
"I've been frank with you," I had to remind him. "And I demand frankness in return."
"About what, specifically?" the pirate asked quickly. "And what's in it for me?"
In doing so, he revealed his fear.
Excellent.
Now I could mold him into whatever I wanted.
Not giving him even a moment's pause to think over everything I'd said and realize the trap.
"I'm interested in the names of everyone your group captured," I explained the obvious. "Place, time. Where and how were they delivered? Who was involved in the transport? Who provided the targeting intel? What happened to the captured beings? What exactly did you do in Grappa the Hutt's gang? Your contacts in Black Sun are equally important information."
"The targets were designated by Urai Fen," the pirate replied. "My group would show up at the appointed time and place. Mostly we caught targets coming out of hyperspace or just before a jump. We often worked with the Luminii Pirates," oh, how interesting... "They helped us capture the toughest targets by intercepting them en route."
The Luminii Pirates were one of many pirate and mercenary groups the Dominion had already encountered.
They were the ones who owned the interdiction cruiser that had been hired by the late Prince-Admiral Krennel to repel the New Republic's attack on the Ciutric Hegemony.
They were also known for having a base on the planet where Grand Admiral Octavian Grant was spending his Republic pension in retirement, until Grodin Tierce kidnapped him.
They were the ones our auxiliary forces had destroyed at Zonju V.
They hadn't surrendered, so there was no one to interrogate.
"Are the Luminii Pirates also part of Black Sun?" I asked.
"Well, yeah. Most of the underworld answers to them. You rooted them all out and wiped them out, as far as I know. All the Black Sun operatives who took part in the operation in the Ciutric Hegemony. And your war on Black Sun's logistics and forces, destroying their ships and bases, won't destroy the organization, no matter how much you announce on the HoloNet that you'll exterminate all pirates and secure your Dominion. What really pisses off Black Sun's leadership is that you're destroying their fighters and cutting off their income. So why are you surprised they're sending their people into your territories to stir up rebellions? If I were in charge, I'd want you dead too. Maybe mass killings of low- and mid-tier bounty hunters scared the Bounty Hunters Guild, but it didn't scare Black Sun. Or, if you prefer," the pirate grinned, "the Zann Consortium. So your 'dead man' act won't throw off the people who want your head on a platter for long."
Now it's becoming clear that my crusade against crime has exposed a significant problem.
No wonder Tyber Zann has a grudge against me.
Without knowing it, I've been wiping out his operatives.
Except I was doing it to secure the Dominion and win popularity with the locals, not to spite the Zann Consortium.
Awkward.
But now there's no doubt that even if we met face to face, there's no negotiating with Zann.
Explaining my reasons to him would be stupid and dangerous.
It would be twice as stupid to tell him that I'm not Mitth'raw'nuruodo and didn't "identify" Black Sun fighters — I was just destroying pirate gangs I thought were independent, to show the Dominion's people that attacking our worlds means death.
Now my reputation is working against me.
Tyber Zann clearly took advantage of Krennel's search for mercenaries and slipped his own fighters in under the guise of scattered gangs.
I suspect the ultimate goal of this whole operation was to destroy military forces, capture, or secretly subordinate the Ciutric Hegemony to the Zann Consortium.
Then Zann would have a pretty powerful industrial cluster, since the Hegemony in its previous borders was fully self-sufficient in everything it needed.
And through trade in Imperial starfighters, Zann could have wormed his way into nearly every Imperial Remnant.
Damn!
If it weren't for my "destroying pirates is the right thing to do," Zann could have subjugated all the Imperial Remnants in a few years!
Now I understand why he operates with such multi-layered conspiracy!
In the past, the Consortium had to use less powerful shipyards, and their fleet was significantly inferior to both the Imperial and Rebel Alliance armed forces.
By absorbing the Empire, Zann wouldn't just capture nearly a third of the galaxy — he'd gain advanced technology, military factories, and a huge mobilization resource!
No wonder they were kidnapping and cloning Imperial and Republic officials, aristocrats, and military personnel!
If, overnight, even a dozen or a hundred sectors across the galaxy declared themselves supporters of the Zann Consortium, handed over their resources, and let their soldiers and officers be "zombified," like they do with the Vulture droids, that would be a force that couldn't be easily destroyed!
If in the past Zann was focused on controlling the galaxy's planets secretly, one way or another, limiting himself to rare battles, now his priorities have changed.
And I, without realizing it, have found myself at the center of opposing his organization, which turns out to be far more extensive than I initially thought.
A miscalculation that could have been fatal for me!
Because I assumed Zann wouldn't go to war with the Dominion over a couple of attacks on his territory and the capture of one droid factory.
Destroying the Rossum factory's production capacity and attacking nearby "resource" sectors should have weakened Zann and prevented him from gaining strength.
But the problem is that he already has that strength!
You don't need a fleet of Keldabe IIs or Crusaders if you can send hordes of mercenaries and thugs from across the galaxy ahead of you — people you don't feel sorry for and don't need to spend time training, preparing, or equipping.
I came to roughly the same conclusion, but with a caveat about the qualitative approach to auxiliary troops using Kavil's Corsairs.
And in the end, it turns out that my "small strikes" and military superiority aren't just the iceberg — they're its tip.
And I've been trampling on Zann's corns for a long time without knowing it.
Naturally, he thinks I'm waging war against him.
After all, he doesn't even know that I'm not Mitth'raw'nuruodo, and he hasn't made the connection.
A very delicate situation.
"For what purpose did the Zann Consortium kidnap Fina D'Asta?" I asked the pirate.
"They didn't tell me," he replied.
His darting eyes didn't escape my notice.
One nod of my head, and Mon's face was slammed into the table again.
There's practically a dent in it now.
"Nice try," I said. "Try again, and this time I need the truth."
"Urai only mentioned that she doesn't act the way she's ordered. And that she's fighting Black Sun troops instead of letting them take control of the sector," Mon wiped the blood. "The girl had already been kidnapped and recruited before, but it seems she decided she could play a solo act."
It's debatable whether she was actually fighting for her father's inheritance, or if it was all about the woman intending to seize power in the sector and hand it over to her masters while remaining the nominal ruler.
Having bodyguards with her, controlling her every move, ensured "loyal actions" from her side.
Effectively, we were doing the same thing Zann was — using her as a symbol, but for our own interests, fully controlling the activities of "loyal forces" in the D'Astan sector.
This gives us an advantage — while the woman is officially listed as kidnapped, we have the opportunity to examine her memory and identify hidden "implants."
I don't think Zann simply replaces people of interest with ordinary clones — they're probably processed the same way as our cloned fighters under the GeNod program.
Or according to Isard's "playbook."
Either way, that doesn't change the riskiness of the situation.
Most likely, the Zann Consortium didn't "surface" in the events I know about because Palpatine and his paranoid inner circle completely or partially destroyed the "sleeping agents" and scattered the army.
But not because it was an "extra force in the galaxy," but because their activities threatened the Empire's existence.
Actually, just as I suspected, that's where all of Palpatine's and his Dark Empire's excess forces "went" to fight the Zann Consortium.
And it's possible that the subsequent fragmentation of the Empire into petty fiefdoms after Palpatine's defeat was driven by Zann's "sleeping agents," who, according to their programmed instructions, declared their regions independent.
But they received no further orders from leadership and suffered defeat after defeat at the hands of the New Republic military.
Hutt, even the fragmentation of the Empire after Endor might be dictated by this, not by the banal "every warlord was stupid enough to declare themselves independent."
It's a fantastic hypothesis, of course, but it has a clear underlying basis.
The Zann Consortium, operating from the shadows, hidden behind numerous "fronts," kidnaps influential beings for subsequent cardianal "processing."
One of them was Fina D'Asta, who was a member of the Imperial Ruling Council.
And that council isn't just a "front."
It's the body that controlled one of the most battle-ready Imperial Remnants.
One so fanatically devoted to the New Order that the locals might even ask, "Why are we fighting alongside pirates against the New Republic?"
They'd say, "It must be done," and everyone would believe it.
The problem is much deeper than it seems.
Because the blossoming hotbeds of separatism within the Dominion's sectors could very well be nothing more than the delayed activation of the Zann Consortium's "sleeping agents"!
And that's no joke — that's a direct threat to the security of the state I've created.
And that, in turn, brings me to the question of prioritizing work on expanding cloning capabilities and relevant specialists.
If my Isard's words are to be believed, all integrated implants are "zeroed out" during cloning.
Therefore, even if there are "sleeping agents" of the Zann Consortium among the military, they no longer become as dangerous after cloning.
Actually, that's why clones now work specifically as clone-specialists of those who were originally there.
Well, I have an opportunity to test my suspenseful hunch in practice.
"Who is Makus Kaynif?" I asked.
The pirate's face went white as chalk.
"You know about him too," Sol Mon muttered.
"Just as I know that the Zann Consortium is carrying out subversive activities in the Dominion," I explained. "And that Makus Kaynif is somehow connected to the cloning cylinders used to create a copy of Baroness D'Asta. I want to know where this is happening, who is doing the cloning, and on what equipment."
"Even if that's true, no one keeps me informed about such things," the pirate drawled doubtfully. "Kamino has been inaccessible to everyone for several years now. Your assumptions about cloning are unfounded, Admiral. As far as I know, cloning a person takes several years. And between the delivery of prisoners and their return, no more than three weeks passed. Well, some were held much longer, about four or five months. But they came back looking like they'd been to a spa — younger than they were before..."
The pirate stopped short, obviously realizing that such procedures aren't done to hostages for no reason.
Despite what he just said (if he wasn't lying) about not knowing anything about cloning, he'd just confirmed my assumptions about what happens to captured beings.
Three weeks is fifteen days.
The time it takes to create clones using equipment from the Spaarti program.
But with the use of ysalamiri to block the Force.
And that's a far more alarming wake-up call than I'd have liked.
So Myrkr isn't as secret a planet as I'd like to think.
I don't recall these lizards living anywhere else except on the planet where Talon Karrde once established himself.
But I shouldn't forget that Karrde, even though he spent years on the planet, didn't know everything about the local fauna.
Yes, he knew that vornskrs hunted those who possess the Force and used it for that purpose.
He knew that ysalamiri grow their bones into trees at a certain point in time.
But he didn't know exactly how they would affect cloning.
Because he didn't experiment with it.
And since the Jedi in the past avoided Myrkr, the question arises — how did Thrawn himself find out that the planet has such lizards and what effect they have on cloning?
The books didn't mention it; it was left "off-screen."
I, to my shame, never asked that question either.
And I think anyone involved in what's happening between the ysalamiri and the clones also never asked where the Grand Admiral got such information; they just took it for granted.
So, three weeks...
Now it's clear why there was no alarm about Fina D'Asta's disappearance.
She wasn't gone for years.
And that confirms that either she was cloned using Spaarti technology, or Zann has more advanced cloning cylinders that don't require ysalamiri.
If that's the case, then I'm jumping to conclusions.
And then it hit me.
Mon was involved in delivering important cargo for the Zann Consortium.
"You've already seen ysalamiri, Mr. Mon, haven't you?" I asked, pointing to the lizard dozing on the astromech's dome.
"That crap?" He looked at the animal. "Never seen it."
"When you first noticed the droid approaching you, there was a look of recognition on your face," I explained. "It seemed directed at the droid, but you didn't recognize it. You recognized the lizard on it."
"No, no, no," the pirate protested, but shut up when a guardsman cuffed him.
"Let's just connect that with the fact that the Zann Consortium trusted you to deliver the rarest material in the galaxy — stygium," I reminded him. "And only you, despite the fact that the Karthakk system was a pirate haven in the past. So you were entrusted with the leadership's confidence. So I think you were far from a low-ranking person in the Zann Consortium. And I suspect you're also familiar with ysalamiri. So, answer the questions, mister. If you've forgotten them, Lieutenant Colonel Tierce, standing behind you with your hair in his fist, will remind you."
"Don't," the pirate whined. "I remember, I remember. Yes, I delivered lizards like that for Urai."
"When?" I asked.
"About a few years ago, when the Zann Consortium was just being organized," the pirate furrowed his brow.
"So after Tyber Zann escaped from Kessel?" I clarified.
"Yeah..."
"To whom and where did you deliver them?"
"To Makus, that's who," the pirate twitched his broken nose. "To one of Black Sun's planets."
"The name of the planet," I demanded.
The pirate became noticeably nervous.
"Stop, stop, Grand Admiral," he said. "You've already learned a lot, so let's talk about what guarantees I have of surviving betraying my employers."
So, just as I assumed, the pirate had "grown bold," seeing that I wasn't about to throw him to the energy spiders right this second.
My mistake — I underestimated how fast this bastard thinks.
"There can be no talk of guarantees," I said. "Not until our conversation is finished and I have all the necessary answers."
"Well, then I won't say another word," Sol Mon snorted. "I know your type. First you milk me dry, then you throw me in a cell. I've been through this before... Argh!! That hurts!!"
Lieutenant Colonel Tierce didn't wait.
He simply shoved the pirate's battered face into the table again, then bent his arms back behind his head.
And now he was just pressing down on the handcuffs, forcing his wrists toward his lower back.
Simultaneously holding the pirate's face to the table.
Not the most pleasant procedure for tendons and muscles.
"Whether you like it or not, you will tell me everything you know," I warned. "The only question is how painful it will be for you."
"Smarck!" the pirate almost whimpered as Tierce dragged his face across the towel on the table, adding to the pain. "I was hauling those Sith-spawned beasts to Makus on Smarck!"
"Where exactly?" I asked.
"There's a base on the planet," the pirate rasped. "Some kind of warehouse inside a huge mountain."
"How do I find it? What are its defense systems?"
"I don't know what guns it has! I never saw them!" the pirate whined as his elbows were forced practically parallel to his lower jaw. "The mountain is distinctive. Huge!"
A mountain that apparently contains Spaarti cloning cylinders inside.
Doesn't that ring a bell?
I have my suspicions that I might end up seeing a "Wayland 2.0," but this time executed by Black Sun.
"Release him, Lieutenant Colonel," I ordered.
The pirate returned with relief to a more familiar state.
"Some questions still remain unanswered," I said. "But the interrogators will handle that."
"I knew you wouldn't let me go," Sol Mon sneered.
"We will certainly let you go," I countered. "But first, you'll undergo a memory copying procedure. Our specialists will work with those files to find out what you've decided to hide. And immediately after that, you'll be released, if there are no further questions."
"What, just like that, you'll let me go?" the pirate asked incredulously, looking at me sideways.
"Of course," I replied. "Kessel's Administrator, Morut Dul, went through the same procedure. When all the questions were resolved, he was released. Why should we spend, even if small, but still money, on keeping criminals who betrayed their own and will certainly betray us if they get the chance after leaving counterintelligence offices? No, you'll be released, and your life will depend solely on you."
"Heh," the pirate grinned, touching his nose. "So you were just scaring us with stories about energy spiders. You're a master at pulling the wool over people's eyes, Grand Admiral."
"I'll take that as a compliment," I said. "Lieutenant Colonel."
Grodin turned his faceless helmet toward me.
"Take this man to a cell and arrange for his transport to the memory study lab. Then arrange his delivery to Kessel."
"Kessel?!" Sol Mon screamed. "You said you'd let me go!"
"And I'm keeping my word," I noted. "As I said, the fate of scum like you is to become food for energy spiders."
"But you promised to let me go!"
"And you will be released," I repeated firmly. "Into the Kessel mines. As I said: 'your life will depend solely on you.' Whether they eat you, or you manage to survive in the mines, I don't really care. The spiders need to be fed. And the spice needs to go to medical facilities."
"You bastard!" The pirate tried to lunge at me, but Tierce was much faster.
Reaching out, he habitually grabbed the pirate by the hair and yanked him back, then broke his right knee with a side kick.
Like a sack of rags, he dragged the cursing, whimpering criminal away from the table that his stubbornness had ruined.
When the door closed behind them, I looked at the blinking optical sensor of the R7.
"Check your databases for everything you know about the planet Smarck," I ordered, getting up from the table. "Report immediately."
The response was a pee-oo-fwee in binary, a language I didn't understand.
And I never seem to have the time to learn it.
Seeing the droid rocking from side to side, startling the ysalamir, I finally turned my attention to the computer on the desk.
I booted it up and asked the droid to repeat.
"Well, well," I said, receiving the answer to my question. "Too close to be a coincidence. Good work, R7."
The droid blinked with every color indicator it had, expressing its joy at the praise.
Yeah, this isn't that lazy hero R2-D2.
"Captain Tschel," I said into my comlink, already in the corridor, nodding to Rukh, who had taken up position behind and to the right of me.
"Yes, sir?"
"What's the status of our escort frigate?" I asked.
"Completely cleared. Confirmed deaths of three Fourth Special Squad fighters, including the commander. Only the 'scorcher' survived."
Sad.
I liked TNX-0297.
No matter how many clones of Colonel Selid we make, none can compare to that brave sergeant.
And we're running out of genetic material.
"Ship status?"
"Forty percent of the main engines are operational. The primary hyperdrive is damaged, the backup is active."
"Form a crew and send it to the nearest Dominion base in the Corvo sector," I ordered. "Contact them — have them send an escort. The Chimaera, Eternal Wrath, Krueger, Death's Head, Point of No Return, Twilight, and their escort groups are rendezvousing. Inform the commanders of those ships about the rendezvous in the Axxila system in three days. All other search teams are to stand down and return to base. We've found what we were looking for. Also, connect me with Captain Pryl in an hour."
Thunder is closest to the space point I need.
Of all the regular fleet ships, I least wanted to use that one, filled with cadets and conscripts on training exercises.
But if we delay, the Zann Consortium will clearly understand that their plan to kidnap the Baroness has failed.
And we won't be able to interrogate Urai Fen anymore.
"Yes, sir."
"And one last thing," I said. "Relieve the commander of the Motivator of his post upon return to base and turn him over to the DSB. I want to know why that officer delayed his ship's departure, and why that led to a stolen ship of ours nearly reaching its destination."
Tschel was silent for a moment, understanding that if the Chimaera and Eternal Wrath hadn't moved into position in secret from the other search teams (which was only possible because we were conducting a secret inspection across the Dominion's metropolitan sectors), Captain Sol Mon and Baroness Fina D'Asta would already be in the hands of the Zann Consortium.
And my paranoia tells me this didn't happen for no reason.