THE reach of the GALACTIC EMPIRE spanned the Galaxy, though some places did not feel its touch as often or as harshly as others. But when the IMPERIAL SECURITY BUREAU arrived to begin an audit, people took notice. When Agent Sluka arrived in the Sariffa System to search for clues that would lead him to the insurgent financiers, he landed on a world that had not felt such a harsh touch in nearly twenty years. ADELHOFFE was a world with a long history that predated the formation of the Galactic Empire and was in the process of celebrating that long history of Kings when the Imperial shuttle landed in Tor Alinde, carrying Agent Sluka and his comrades, Sergeant Conor and Doctor Asimka. Agent Sluka departed for the Hall of Records while Sergeant Conor and Doctor Asimka entered the festival searching for clues to the LAST KING of ADELHOFFE.
Thus begins THE FESTIVAL OF FIVE KINGS, EPISODE 4 of THE ADVENTURES OF AGENT MALGO SLUKA, ISB…
Outer Rim
Sariffa System
Adelhoffe
Tor Alinde, capital of Adelhoffe
The corridor was enormous, ten meters wide with a five-meter ceiling, a size magnified by its emptiness. The floor was white marble with thick swirls of blue and the corridor's vastness was magnified by the lone figure stepping along its surface, Agent Sluka. He marched down the corridor in his grey green Imperial uniform with matching cap on his head. A blaster pistol was on his hip and he carried an attaché case under his arm. On Sluka's left, the wall was a continuous pane allowing a view outside of an enormous overlook into a sunny sky with green wooded terrain bordering below. A view over the edge of the hill which was named Tor Alinde, long ago.
Except close inspection, or an awareness of one's surroundings, revealed the truth.
The continuous pane was merely a holo-display. Outside, the drop-off which had been the overlook remained, but the wooded terrain was not there. Instead, there were office buildings which had long ago replaced the overlook's beautiful scenery.
Agent Sluka passed a set of double sliding doors and then a second. I hope Asimka and Conor can find something out at the Festival of Five Kings, he thought. I can imagine how much info I'd get dressed like this out there, Sluka laughed to himself. He stopped at a third set of double sliding doors and turned toward them.
The doors opened and he passed through without breaking stride.
Inside was a large chamber, well-lit by hanging light fixtures. A single path opened down the middle with a dozen rows of tables on each side of it. Each row of tables had a half-dozen datapads coupled with display terminals and behind each sat a clerk, seventy-two clerks on each side for one hundred forty-four in total, all of them human.
And every clerk stopped entering data to stare at Agent Sluka.
"I'm sorry," Agent Sluka laughed. "I expected this facility to have more automation, more robotic recordkeeping." He looked them over again. "No wonder there are so many errors and omissions in your records."
Gasps filled the air and Agent Sluka felt the tension rise.
"If you'd been out here during the Separatist War, you'd hate droids too," said one of the clerks. "And all the non-humans that controlled them." The clerk had close cropped white hair and a white mustache. He was also old and very skinny, but appeared hale.
Agent Sluka nodded at the clerk. So many humans fled from the Separatist bastions of the Outer Rim into the Simbar cluster and its surrounding systems like Albin and Tarpau during the War, Sluka remembered. I guess Sariffa was one of those too. He pointed to the clerk who had spoken. "You, I need to look for some particular information. This is not a full audit, merely a partial examination. The sooner I find what I need, the sooner I leave."
"Yes, Master…," the clerk paused in his words. "I do not know your name."
"I did not give it," Agent Sluka snapped back as the man closed the distance between them. Careful, Sluka thought. He might be playing me. Afterall, I'm here looking into sympathizers with an insurgency. Agent Sluka calmed and smiled at him. "I am Agent Malgo Sluka." He reached out and shook the man's hand.
"Follow me," the clerk said and turned around without giving his name.
I got a feeling he is a sympathizer, Sluka laughed to himself as he followed the clerk. As they approached the clerk's aisle, the others who were seated there stood and moved away. The clerk sat in front of his datapad, then opened his program and immediately bypassed the first screen. But Agent Sluka was faster and instantly burned the image into his mind. Callorin J'Sita was his name.
"What do you need?" Callorin asked.
"I need all the info you have on the last King of Adelhoffe," Sluka said as he handed the man a memory stick he had pulled from his attaché case. "I don't even have his name. Most importantly though, I want information on his wife and his daughter."
"His daughter?" Callorin asked in surprise.
"Yes, she was mentioned on a file I recovered from…Albin 2," Agent Sluka quickly answered.
The man looked at Sluka for a moment, then said. "I'll see what I can find."
Just as I thought, Sluka laughed to himself. He was surprised I asked about her but not surprised she existed. This might even be the same guy who originally wiped the records here. He waited patiently as Callorin continued his work.
A few minutes passed and then Callorin looked up. "I've downloaded everything I could find," the clerk said as he removed the memory stick from his console and handed it to Agent Sluka.
"Excellent work," Agent Sluka told the clerk as he reached out and shook the man's hand. "Perhaps I can interest you in coming to work for me one day?"
The man stared at Agent Sluka in shock. "I'm old and think I'll stay here," he answered.
"Very well," Agent Sluka answered. "Good day then," he added as he turned and left. Now, what to do with this memory stick? Sluka asked himself. I'm certain there is nothing of use on here and I got a feeling there is a very nasty bit of malware on there too. He laughed to himself as he placed the memory stick into his case.
Sluka turned around and headed toward the exit.
On a whim, he stopped and turned back around. "Callorin," he said. The clerk looked up with fear and surprise at his name being known. "Tell Saleucami she owes me a dinner date for my gift." Sluka turned back around and immediately left the hall.
