Disclaimer: I do not own anything to do with Star Wars, other than Aurora. It all belongs to the bearded genius in flannel. As this is based on the book, some of the dialogue is taken verbatim from Shadows of the Empire. That belongs to Steve Perry and George Lucas. I do not intend any copyright violation and am not making any profit from this.
Once a plan was decided on, they moved swiftly, and had everyone outfitted with anything they could think of that they might need in the sewers. Chewie had even managed to find himself a bowcaster somewhere. Luke himself was sticking with his lightsaber. It just felt right. He considered trying to contact Aurora again; he was worried that she and Leia might get impatient and take matters into their own hands, but decided that the risk of alerting Vader to his presence was too great. Still, he wished he could talk to her just once before they undertook this crazy plan. He didn't like the way they had left things and he really regretted the way he had handled the whole situation. Most of all, he simply missed her. They hadn't been apart for this long since they had met, and he hadn't realized how much he'd come to rely on her presence.
But was that a good thing or a bad thing?
Dash interrupted the tangled cycle of his thoughts.
"Ready?"
Luke took a breath. "Let's do it."
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Vader had made up his mind. The Emperor had warned him once before about the overt antagonism between himself and the Falleen prince, so simply walking up and crushing the life out of Xizor was out of the question, despite his inclination. Therefore he would obey the Emperor, in his own fashion.
The link call went through with gratifying quickness.
"Lord Vader. What a pleasant surprise." Xizor said, his manner as pleasant as always.
Vader, for his part, despised such useless pleasantries and spoke simply and directly. "Perhaps not so pleasant. I have been made aware of your attempts to kill Luke Skywalker. You will cease all attempts to harm the boy immediately."
Xizor's face remained neutral. "Your information is in error, Lord Vader. And even if it were correct, I am given to understand that the boy is a Rebel officer, all of whom are traitors and wanted dead or alive. Is this sudden change of policy an official Imperial decree?"
Vader ignored the question. He had only one thing to say, and he intended to make it perfectly clear. "If Skywalker is harmed, I will hold you personally accountable."
"I see." Xizor replied, the pleasant smile long gone. "I assure you that if I should happen to come across Skywalker, I will extend to him the same courtesy I would to you, Lord Vader."
He might have said more, but Vader disconnected. He had made his point, and Xizor could not possibly pretend to have misunderstood. He had been warned; if he continued to pursue Luke, then he was fair game. Not even the Emperor would dispute that. Vader almost hoped the Falleen would try again, just so he'd have an excuse to eliminate him.
Page Break
Luke didn't think he'd ever find a worse smell than that of the Imperial garbage chute on the Death Star, but within seconds of entering the sewers, he'd discovered that he had been very, very wrong. The sludge flowing sluggishly down the center of the tunnel was a sort of greenish-black, and the smell defied description. It was a disgusting combination of liquid and solid, and they were walking ankle deep in it. Luke didn't even want to think about the contents. Smelling it was more than enough.
Ahead of them, there was a strange chirping noise, followed by two small plops, as if something had dropped into the slop.
Chewie, who was in the lead, muttered something and stopped.
Lando, right behind him, poked him in the back. "I heard it. It's not my fault you didn't want to wear boots. Go on, it's more afraid of you than you are of it."
From the rear, Dash snickered. "Yeah, better watch yourself, Chewbacca. I hear that sewer serpents love Wookiee toes!"
Chewie's reply was short, sharp, and decidedly profane.
"Fine," Lando said. "Forget the life debt you owe Han. Let the bad guys keep Leia and Aurora because you're afraid of a toothless little slitherette."
Chewie growled something else profane, but he started moving again.
"What's up with the Wook?" Vidkun asked from where he was walking in front of Luke.
"He doesn't like little swimming or running things." Luke answered. "He really doesn't like them."
Vidkun shrugged and continued forward, completely oblivious to the disgusting substance he was trudging through or whatever might be living in it.
Suddenly from behind them, Dash yelled. "Hey! Look out!"
Luke spun, drawing his lightsaber and flicking it on as he did. In the sudden bright light he caught sight of a large, bloodshot eye on a fleshy stalk rising out of the muck directly behind him. He also caught site of Dash's drawn blaster.
"Don't shoot!" He yelled, even as he crouched and swung. The blade of the lightsaber cut through the stalk effortlessly, and then as the coils of the dianoga began to thrash violently, he stepped up and swung down, cutting the body in half.
The death spasms ended abruptly.
Dash reholstered his blaster. "Nice move, kid."
"I've seen these things before." Luke told him. "Last time I ran into one was in a trash compactor. It nearly got me."
Chewie harned in agreement.
Dash raised an eyebrow. "That's the time you and Aurora were talking about back on Tatooine. You spend a lot of time in places like this?"
"More than I'd like."
Dash shook his head. "No wonder she won't look at you twice."
Lando snickered. "Oh, I wouldn't say that. Would you, Chewie?"
The Wookiee roared out a laugh and added a comment. Luke didn't quite catch all of it, something about Aurora and an overreaction to something, but it was enough to have him fighting a blush. Obviously Lando and Chewie had figured out that something was going on, but not exactly what; which was how Luke planned on keeping it. He was having enough problems figuring out what to do about the situation between himself and Aurora without having ribald commentary from everyone else.
Dash was looking back and forth between Luke and Lando. "Can't be too much going on. When I got there the kid was obviously sleeping on the couch."
Luke felt a sudden surge of gratification towards the swoop troop, whose sudden arrival had prevented him from putting away the blankets he'd been using.
Lando was eying Luke speculatively, but he thankfully dropped the subject. "Come on. We can continue this conversation in a far less fragrant environment."
They continued wading through the slop until Vidkun suddenly pointed, "Just ahead, there."
There were two large, round holes in the far wall, covered with thick metal mesh gates, each a finger's width thick. The lips of the holes were angled down slightly, so that runnels of thick sludge could ooze out of them.
"Okay, Vidkun," Lando said, wading towards them. "Let's see if those codes you have work."
The engineer moved forward and punched a keycode into the locking mechanism. It took a moment, but the gates swung forward slowly.
Vidkun turned around, smiling. "See? Just like I told you. We want the one on the right."
Chewie started to climb into the new tunnel. It was slightly smaller than the current one they were in, so it was a little short for him. Unfortunately, in the process of climbing in, he slipped, and almost went in. He managed to catch himself, but had to put one paw into the goop to do it. He pulled it out with a loud sucking sound and shook it violently, sending dank globs of muck everywhere as he cursed.
"Careful." Vidkun said mildly. "It's a little slippery in places."
The look that Chewie turned on him was decidedly murderous.
Lando was chuckling to himself. "Yeah, be careful, you big clumsy – yow!"
He skidded and sat down abruptly in the sludge. He came up almost instantly, but not fast enough to prevent the seat of his pants from being soaked through.
Chewie was laughing so hard he almost went into the muck again.
Luke had to fight to keep from bursting out laughing himself. It served Lando right. But he didn't want to tempt fate and find himself the next victim.
"You should have worn old clothes." Dash told Lando.
"Hey, Rendar, I don't have any old clothes." Lando replied.
"You do now. I don't think you'll ever get 'em clean enough to wear in public. They'd drum you right out of the Elite Stormtroopers smelling like that."
"Shut up." Lando told him.
They carefully climbed up the slight incline into the smaller tunnel and continued on.
"Coming up on the zap field." Vidkun said laconically.
"Lemme run the deactivator."
He fiddled for a few seconds with the black box he was carrying. The air in front of him shimmered a little, then popped abruptly with a purplish light.
"Should be okay now." He said with satisfaction.
"Fine, you go first." Lando told him.
The engineer glared at them, but moved forward cautiously a few meters. When nothing happened, the rest of them followed.
Luke tried to ignore the smell as they walked, but it was so overpowering that he couldn't ignore it. He'd thought that after a while, he'd get used to it, but so far that hadn't happened. It was all he could do not to retch.
The smell was all around them and even though he hadn't touched it directly, other than his boots, he knew the smell was clinging to him. It was going to take a long hot shower to get the stench off.
Nor was he the only one who seemed to feel that way. Lando was holding his sleeve over his nose, and Chewie kept letting out low moans of unhappiness.
Vidkun alone seemed oblivious to the odor, trudging along silently. "Not far now." He said blandly.
"Good." Lando, Luke, and Dash all said at the same time. Chewie yowled his own agreement. Even a firefight with Xizor's guards would be better than this.
"There." Vidkun whispered, pointing. "There's the entrance to the building. It leads into the recycler in the sub-subbasement. There won't be any guards inside the recycler itself, but there will probably be some in the adjoining flow chamber. Here's the key to the rat-grate." He held out a plastic card to Lando and turned to leave. "See ya."
Dash stepped in front of him, stopping him in his tracks. "Where do you think you're going?"
"Hey, I'm done." The little man protested. "I got you into the building; I got you the floor plans for the place; that was the deal."
"Well, I guess you have us there." Dash said. "That was the deal, all right. But you see, there's been a little change in our itinerary."
Vidkun looked suddenly worried.
"Easy, we aren't going to blast you or anything. We'd just like you come along until we get to a place where you can safely…wait for us."
The engineer looked stubborn. "No offense or anything, but what if you get killed? I might be waiting for a long time!"
"I guess you'll have to take that chance." Lando replied, moving up next to them. "It's not that we don't trust you. It's just that we don't trust you. Besides, it'll be a lot nicer inside." He gestured at the oozing blackish green sludge.
"I don't mind the runoff," Vidkun protested. "I'm in it all the time."
"Nevertheless, we insist." Lando smiled urbanely, but his hand had dropped to his blaster.
Vidkun shrugged. "Well, okay, since you put it that way…" And before anyone even had an inkling of his plan, he'd pulled a small blaster out from under his shirt and opened fire. The first shot missed entirely, but the second hit Dash; Luke heard him grunt out a breath.
It had all happened so fast that they hadn't even had a chance to react. Luke had his lightsaber out and ready for the next shot, but Dash had pulled his blaster and put a shot right between Vidkun's eyes before the small man could fire a third time. The engineer's body tumbled backward with a loud glopping noise, before sliding slightly down the slope.
Luke turned away to check on Dash. "You okay?"
"I'm good. Just scorched me a little." He turned to show them where the shot had burned a line across his hip, doing little more than raising a blister along the skin.
"Don't get any of this crud on you." Lando told him, waving his hand at the sludge. "Probably wouldn't do you any good."
"I hadn't planned to, regardless." Dash said dryly.
"Where'd he get the blaster?" Luke asked. They'd very deliberately not given any weapons to Vidkun when they'd armed themselves.
"Must have had it concealed all along." Lando said. "What I'm wondering is, why'd he do it? We weren't going to hurt him."
"Guy like that, he figures he sold out, why shouldn't we?" Dash replied, slapping the bacta patch that Luke had handed him onto the wound. He hissed out a breath as the topical painkillers in the gel started to work. He glanced over at the body and addressed it. "I stand corrected. I guess we were going to blast you. But it wasn't our idea."
"Let's hope the guards didn't hear the shooting." Lando said.
Chewie harned in agreement.
"Yeah." Luke replied, looking around. He took a deep breath. "Ready?"
Nearly as one, they climbed into the grate and continued on.
