Chapter Seventeen
The Lefler's Rose lacked a full communications suite, so Vorru had converted one of its unused passenger cabins into one on a temporary basis. He wasn't excessively concerned about security—there were no people on the ship, except maybe the pilot, who were theoretically dangers to him, and they'd already passed through the customs hurdle—but there were certain habits it was best to rigorously maintain, and communications security was one of them.
Leonia Tavira's face wore a smug expression that he found rather distasteful. "I have Moff Disra under control for now, but his anxiety is growing," she said. "It would be best not to leave him hanging, or the rope might snap. I believe Admiral Rogriss has learned that Invidious is occupying the repair yards and is quite irritated about it."
Vorru leaned back in his chair, steepling his hands together. "Disra is an irritant, but also an asset," he said. "We're better off having him as a tool we can use than allowing him to expire. He knows that as well... but he always had a tendency to panic when things got threatening," Vorru mused thoughtfully. "I suppose it's best to give him some salve. What do you have in mind?"
Tavira's smile was her familiar, predatory one. "Disra believes that you have the ability to hunt down information with the HoloNet," she said, arching an eyebrow. Her tone was coy, and he could see her enjoying the surprise he couldn't quite keep from his face.
"Does he," Vorru replied, keeping his own tone cool. It wasn't really surprising, but there was no reason not to let Tavira enjoy her momentary advantage. "Well, I suppose that Disra always had a certain cleverness, otherwise he wouldn't have made it as far as he has. Do you think we ought to give him what he wants?"
"I do," Tavira replied, crossing her legs as she pushed her hair back, adjusting her bandada. "I have access to Rogriss' last combat report, and I noticed a certain Corellian corvette and squadron of X-wings making mayhem for Rogriss' logistics. I have a small grudge against them myself, and I thought that perhaps they would make an ideal candidate for testing your pet Drall's abilities."
Vorru considered that, not letting himself react to the derogatory reference to Eliezer. "I will see what we can do. Send me that combat report, and I'll forward it on. Perhaps we can give Rogriss a badly needed victory. How long before Invidious' repairs are complete?"
"Another four or five days," she replied. "Maybe longer. I've put the facility's labor force to work resupplying my lost TIEs. It took them a little while to get a handle on how to assemble a clutch, but they have or can acquire all the necessary components to make good on the losses I accrued helping you rescue your pet."
No doubt that process would also deprive both Linuri and Rogriss of all their reinforcement TIE interceptors, but that was hardly Tavira's concern, Vorru thought sourly. Though it wasn't as if he was particularly invested in Rogriss' long-term success holding Ukio. The Empire was dying, and he wasn't about to hitch his futures to a half-drowned shadow of past glories. He'd already made that mistake once.
His communications station beeped as the combat report finished downloading, and he transferred it onto a datapad. "I'll have something for you before your repairs are complete," he said.
Tavira's eyes gleamed. "When do you go after the real prize?"
Vorru smiled thinly at her. "Soon. Good day, Moff Tavira."
She chuckled. "Of course. Good day, Moff Vorru."
Vorru exited the makeshift comm station back into the primary lounge, where Eliezer's workstation was assembled. Behind his primary screen the Drall coughed heavily, wiping his snout with the back of a furred arm. He looked up from his screen as he heard Vorru approach, the steady clacking of his claws on the keyboard ceasing as his attention shifted. "What did Tavira want?"
"Disra is growing restless," he replied as he drew a chair to sit across from the Drall, placing his elbows on the table and leaning forward. "We're going to need to give him something to make his position a bit more secure." He pursed his lips as he considered possibilities. "Can you identify the New Republic's ships in Albrion sector?"
Eliezer's claws scraped over the arm of his chair. "Tracking ships is a lot of time and effort," he said, "especially without a full computer and droid suite to help me sort through all the information. But I can still use pings against the HoloNet nodes as an effective tracker, yes."
It was impossible to track a ship through hyperspace. Even a tracking device only operated between hyperspace jumps, sending information through the HoloNet before a ship began its jump, and after a ship completed its jump. Eliezer had once explained to him, years before, that a holocomm was essentially a tracking device. Every time a ship used one to connect to the HoloNet, it provided the connecting node with an incredible amount of information, including its location. This 'metadata' didn't go anywhere, and most of it wasn't publicly accessible; it was buried deeply into the HoloNet, saved to seemingly forgotten files.
Unless you knew how to access them. Vorru did not… but Eliezer did.
The HoloNet was ancient, and Vorru suspected that at some point during its design process, maybe six or seven thousand years ago, one of the original designers had seen the HoloNet as a potential espionage tool. Perhaps their heirs still used it for that purpose. Or perhaps it was an addition Palpatine had made to the system more recently, seeking to enhance his all-consuming control over the galaxy. Or it may have been there for a reason entirely unrelated to espionage, long since forgotten. Vorru didn't know, and for the moment it didn't matter how or why the information was collected and anonymously saved to files which Eliezer had years ago stumbled across. What mattered was that it was there.
"I just need you to find just one ship, for now. A modified Corellian corvette named Ession Strike. It's the ship that harassed us during your escape," he said. "We know its last location, also; it was just engaged in the Ukio system, fighting Admiral Rogriss. That should narrow it down, yes?"
Eliezer's claws scratched harder over the arm of his chair as his snout wrinkled, his beady black eyes narrowing in concentration. "Yes, that should help me find it," he agreed. "But it will still take some time. The files are enormous and can be unwieldy to sort through, and I'll have to set up a search function manually. And I can't get started right away—we have more pressing obligations that shouldn't wait."
"After we break into Isard's safehouse, then," Vorru said with a nod. "Are you ready?"
Eliezer nodded, looking fatigued. "I am ready," he said. "Not looking forward to it, but ready. Are you?"
Vorru nodded firmly. "I'll make one more call to Roeder, and then I am ready. We'll go tonight."
The airspeeder meandered through Coruscant's aerial traffic as if it were just another vehicle out for a late-evening drive. On either side of them, Argosy District's largest, most ornately decorated and lavishly furnished buildings gleamed with lights matched by the long lines of glowing airspeeders. The speeders hummed in and out of line, landing on the reinforced balcony landing platforms that all the buildings had on offer.
In addition to being one of Coruscant's primary business and financial districts, Argosy District also had a reputation for a busy, dramatic nightlife, as all those businesspeople ended their daily work routines and went in search of relaxation with credits to burn. Large transparisteel windows peered out into the urban canyon, and within the windows life was as busy as it was beyond them, with people mingling and socializing. But below them, forty or fifty stories down, those same structures possessed humans and aliens of a distinctly different character; less prosperous, more desperate, looking not for an enjoyable evening but for a quiet, safe one.
The emotional intermingling of the rapturous cacophony of luxury with the quiet desperation of poverty, all within his mental reach, was not new to the Tevas-kaar, but it had been a long time since he had experienced it in such density. Coruscant's sheer weight of population made the city pulse with emotion almost like a heartbeat. Susevfi had some of the same emotional flavors, but it was not nearly so overpowering, and of course life on Invidious was life living among wolves—rapacious, sometimes vicious, always hungry for the next good meal.
The trip with Vorru and Eliezer had been almost a relief. They weren't like Tavira or the people Tavira surrounded herself with. Vorru had a bit of the wolf, but restrained by refinement. The restraints were not binding—he'd seen that with the way Vorru had unceremoniously murdered Acib—but they were there, and while Vorru's politeness was perhaps a facade, his mind was ordered and diligent. Eliezer was harder to read; the Tevas-kaar had never been as skilled at comprehending alien minds as human ones, but in Eliezer he could feel the Drall's calm preparation, anticipation, and patience.
Speculating how Vorru and Eliezer had ended up being partners had entertained him through many a dull hour of waiting. Speculation about both of their ultimate objectives had passed many other dull hours of waiting. But he knew his role. He served.
The airspeeder dipped out of line with the rest of the traffic, dropping down until it reached what would be considered the lowest levels of prosperity. These were far quieter, darker, with fewer lights and no large gatherings of people behind large windows. There was still airspeeder traffic enough, but not in the volume that occurred above. They neared one of the newer towers, a simple, inauspicious building that blended seamlessly in with the ones on either side. Its highest levels saw plenty of airspeeder traffic, but more leaving than coming.
The settled onto a landing platform, dim lights automatically illuminating as the airspeeder's repulsorlifts went quiet. The Tevas-kaar opened the vehicle's door, swinging it up as Vorru did the same on the other side, Eliezer sliding out of the car slowly after them, looking miserable. "Are you sure this is safe," he muttered to Vorru.
"It's as safe as it can be," the Moff replied. "Roeder has support standing by if we need it, and you said there is no sign that this safehouse has been used in some time."
"True," Eliezer growled softly, his snout wrinkling with distaste. "Okay. Let's do this. Which way?"
Vorru nodded at the Tevas-kaar. "After you."
The Tevas-kaar frowned, wishing he were wearing his mask—but Vorru was right, it was too conspicuous for now. He took a moment to adjust his armor under his bulky clothes, fitting it securely back into place after the airspeeder ride. Once he was sure he was prepared, he gently tapped the entry door with the ID card that Eliezer had made him. The name Rasmus Damask appeared on the attached screen in blocky green font, then the door clicked open.
He pushed through it, ignoring the twinge in his danger sense.
At this level, the apartments belonged to employees of the major local businesses. It was well-enough maintained, but not ornate, with occasionally flickering lights on the hall. The floor was made of a material that had the appearance of wood, but not any of wood's maintenance requirements, and each door was labeled with only a number. Occasionally they would pass shoes or bags or other personal items against the walls or doors.
They reached the end of the first short hallway, after passing about six apartments on either side. The lift arrived after a brief wait and a couple stumbled out, gave the three of them (especially him and Eliezer; Vorru got barely a glance) and then moved down the hall at a more-brisk-than-normal pace and shut themselves behind one of the doors they'd passed.
The trio entered the lift, and Vorru pressed the button for their destination. They descended two levels and exited into an identical floor, with more of the same style of apartment, maintained almost exactly as well.
Walking back in the direction of the building's exterior, they reached Apartment 1788. Its door was like any of the others, though it had no items scattered about outside. The door was slightly more worn than some of its neighbors, as if it hadn't received a new coat of paint recently, and its keycard access terminal was just different enough from those of its neighbors for the difference to be notable.
The Tevas-kaar turned to watch the hallway, reaching out with the Force. He could feel the people above and below them, going about their daily lives; could feel the activity twenty stories above, with the congregations of people in the much larger, fancier skyward apartments. He did not feel anyone that seemed alert to their presence.
"We're clear, for now," he murmured to Vorru.
Eliezer was already working on the keycard terminal. He pulled out a datapad and plugged it in, then started clacking away on the datapad as he searched for a security vulnerability.
"How long will it take?" Vorru asked, his hand inside his jacket—clearly holding the blaster pistol he had hidden there.
"As I told you before we left, I don't know," Eliezer responded, sounding irritated. "It depends on how good Isard's security teams were." The Drall worked quickly, text scrolling across the datapad he was holding faster than the Tevas-kaar would've been able to read.
It seemed like a long time before anything happened, but the Tevas-kaar's wristcomm told him it had only been four and a half minutes. There was a beep, and the keycard terminal went green. Vorru didn't hesitate, pushing the door open and ushering all of them inside. The apartment within was dark, and the Tevas-kaar searched for the activator for the unit's lighting.
"Did you trip anything?" Vorru asked Eliezer.
"I don't think so," Eliezer responded, breathing heavily. "But that was a lot more complicated than I was expecting it to be. And older, too. Isard might've used this place, but I think it predated the Emperor's death by quite a while."
"Any idea who?"
The rustle of Eliezer's shoulders in the dark suggested he had just shrugged. "Someone who learned a lot of their computer skills during the days of the Old Republic. I'd guess this safehouse was set up when the building was first built."
The Tevas-kaar found the switch and flipped it, sending a flood of light through the apartment. Eliezer gasped, and Vorru stopped a step short.
The space was much larger than he had expected. It appeared, at first, to be a simple apartment—plain, heavily-built furnishings in the space near the door, stretching into a good sized kitchen against one of the walls. But on the wall opposite them, where normally windows would be, hung a large, three-story sized symbol of the Empire: The classic white and black symbol loomed over the entire lofted space.
The three of them just looked at it for a moment, then at each other. The Tevas-kaar felt a shiver of dread—a shiver the Empire had spent a great many years instilling into as much of the galaxy as possible—go down his spine. It was odd, he thought, that one could spend so many years being a tool of that dread, and yet never fully lose it themselves.
Eliezer's distasteful expression regarded the banner for only a moment. He started meandering through the room slowly, slightly hunched, searching for computer terminals. He found none, but the banner could stand three stories tall because the apartment interior stretched all the way up, with two levels of loft above them. Eliezer coughed, then shook his head with dismay and started climbing the narrow spiral staircase upwards. "The computers must be up here," he said.
Vorru stepped into the center of the room and looked up. From the floors above, there were flickers of light and the quiet whirring of machinery. "You're probably right. I'll come with you. Tevas-kaar, do a quick search of this floor and then join us."
The Tevas-kaar nodded. He stretched out in the Force as he meticulously searched all the places he was most likely to find recording equipment, knocking against the walls to make sure there were no hidden rooms. The apartment itself was remarkably unremarkable; the kitchen was extremely well-stocked with non-perishable food supplies which looked like they dated back to the Clone Wars. He pulled open a cabinet and found himself staring at dozens and dozens—perhaps hundreds—of boxes of Imperial ration bars, still in all the original packaging. Only a handful of them were missing. He checked the expiration date on one and found it would be good for another few centuries.
He closed the cabinet again and kept looking.
In the bedroom he found a hidden wall closet. Working his fingers along the edges of the not-quite-totally-hidden crease, he searched for the latch until he found it. It refused to budge, so he quickly ignited his lightsaber and swept it through the locking mechanism. The doors to the closet came free, and he was able to pull them open, an interior light triggering automatically as he did.
It was a weapons locker—no, not just a locker. A full, if somewhat small, armory. A collection of weapons: a longblaster, disassembled with a set of extra power packs; a blaster pistol of a particularly wicked make that looked vaguely familiar; a holdout blaster, which for him would be too small to easily wield but which an Imperial agent might be able to stash on their person. A collection of easily concealable vibroknives. And, he realized, his heartbeat quickening as he took his lightsaber and tested it against the empty hook, a spot for a lightsaber.
His danger sense, before that moment a low, unnerving feeling of concern, suddenly became one of menace.
The Tevas-kaar hastened his search. Next to the weapons was a set of armor. He examined it quickly—black, flexible and comfortable, to be worn under thicker, equally black blaster-resistant synthfabric, with a few pieces of heavier but still lightweight armor for additional protection.
His feeling of dread heightened. He'd seen this fabric before, and the blaster too. Years before, such things had been available for secret Imperial agents. Custom make only. He removed pieces of the armor, looking for anything identifying. He found nothing, but he did learn that the armor was much too small for him. Much too small period—it was sized for a particularly petite alien, or maybe a human adolescent?
While he had never had the dubious pleasure of meeting Ysanne Isard, he—like everyone else in the Empire—had been quite familiar with her. She hadn't been the tallest woman, but at 1.8 meters in height she would certainly not have fit into this armor. He couldn't imagine which Imperial agent would have.
The rest of the room was uninteresting. The bed was made, probably kept by service droids, though he hadn't seen any yet. It was otherwise empty, but for all the normal things an apartment would have.
His search had not revealed anything that could be considered an imminent threat. Regardless, his feeling of danger stubbornly refused to fade. "Trust your feelings," his master had taught him. Right then, his intuition was telling him that they were in far more jeopardy than appearances would indicate.
The second floor of the apartment, which was approximately level with the middle of the enormous Imperial symbol hanging against the wall, was nothing like the first. The loft swung out about one-third the distance over the living space below and was clearly not meant as a casual living space. Instead, Vorru and Eliezer found a large computer terminal, set with a comfortable chair. Eliezer was already sitting in it—conveniently, he didn't have to re-size it much to suit his small frame—inserting his datapad into the computer's available access ports.
"Isard's network access?" Vorru asked.
"I don't know," Eliezer coughed as he rolled the chair into place, adjusting it just a bit higher so his claws could move comfortably over the available keyboard. "Probably. Give me a minute to find out." The Drall went to work on his datapad, looking for security vulnerabilities and testing out the myriad of security codes that he'd procured to try to breach the computer.
Vorru knew he would succeed, but it was harder to guess how long it would take. "I'll check out the upstairs," he said, leaving Eliezer with the computers. He took the second spiral staircase up to the third floor loft. It was a small space compared to the lower two floors, and it took Vorru a second to realize what he was looking at.
A full holocomm suite. And a fancy one, too. A secure communications unit, sized for one person. It included a compact platform which would, when active, project a hologram that would be fully-human sized (or even larger, though space here was limited). The platform itself, the floor plating with the holo-projectors, had a ceremonial feel to it. Whoever was on this end of the communication was expected to kneel, he realized.
Palpatine.
Isard had served Palpatine directly, and would've been expected to kneel. This might have been where she expected to stay in contact with him—a way to be isolated in a safehouse and yet stay fully in command. With the holocomm she would be able to run Imperial Intelligence, do most of the Emperor's bidding, and be safely isolated in a nondescript safehouse all at the same time.
It would've suited both of them, he thought. Palpatine with his need for control and domination, for total subservience, and Isard with her need for praise and approval. This place would have suited her just fine. And when Palpatine had died, and Isard had quietly assumed his place, she would've been quite pleased to be the one being kneeled to, also.
Vorru traveled back down the stairs to rejoin Eliezer. "I found the holocomm," he said. "It's upstairs. A fancy one, one of the Emperor's personal appearance tools."
Eliezer seemed not to hear him. He was focused on the display in front of him, his claws clacking against the keyboard vigorously. It was a good ten seconds before he glanced at Vorru, belatedly processing the spoken information. "Good, that'll give me easy access to the Coruscant HoloNet node," he mumbled distractedly. He concentrated on the computer for a few minutes more, then hit a key with victorious finality. "I'm in," he announced, and the display before them, the large monitors arrayed conveniently, flickered to life. "Okay," Eliezer said as he started to sort through the myriad of data suddenly presented to them. "This next part might take a while."
On the screen before Eliezer and Vorru was Ysanne Isard's private secure network. As Eliezer searched, he and Vorru came across everything one might imagine in such a place: lists of covert operatives and their assignments, some of which appeared to still be active; thousands of dossiers on important politicians, corporations, and military officers; tens of thousands of intelligence reports, sortable by date, location, and reporting officer… all of the secret files of Ysanne Isard and, by the looks of some of the dates, of her father before her.
Ten years ago, while the Emperor had still lived, this information might have given Vorru the wherewithal to challenge him. Isard had been one of his most loyal and trusted advisors, loyal to his memory long after his death; loyal to his Empire because it had been His Empire. Now, ten years later, much of this information would be worthless, or outdated, or no longer relevant in a galaxy where the New Republic ruled Coruscant. But, New Republic or not, some people who had been powerful before remained powerful, and information always had value.
"Can you transfer these files off-site?" Vorru asked.
"Probably. Go back upstairs and get the holocomm up and running, and I'll start an upload. We can go through these once I have a computer system capable of sorting through it all," Eliezer coughed, his beady eyes locked raptly on the screen. "I don't see what we're looking for yet, though."
"Keep looking," Vorru instructed. He jogged back up the stairs, the old Kessel-inflicted aches and pains forgotten for the moment. The holocomm was a complicated piece of equipment, but essentially Imperial standard issue; he had the system up and connected to the HoloNet in only a few minutes. The steady buzz and hum of the equipment betrayed that it was in use, stealing all of Isard's secrets for future use.
He returned down the narrow spiral staircase. The Tevas-kaar was waiting for him at the bottom of the stairs, carrying his broad frame stiffly, his face covered once again by his white mask. The bronze of the tall man's armor was mostly concealed by the unremarkable brown of his long jacket.
"Did you find anything?" Vorru asked him.
"Not very much," the Tevas-kaar responded. "Some old equipment. It seems Isard had a child operative using this as a safehouse at some point."
"A child?" Vorru asked in surprise. "Why do you think a child?"
"No one else would fit into the armor I found," the Tevas-kaar said. For the first time Vorru thought he heard just a hint of sarcastic wit, although it was possible he was imagining it. Either way, it was gone. "But I don't think it has been used in quite some time. By now the child is certainly grown."
Vorru nodded slowly. A child? That was strange, to be certain, but not completely unknown. Still, it wasn't like Isard; she had preferred to train her operatives herself, and while she would have appreciated the malleability of a child so that she could impose herself upon them, it struck Vorru as unlikely that she would have employed a child for intelligence work. Not impossible, though. Merely unlikely.
The Tevas-kaar's attention was wandering, his head tilted slightly towards the sky, peering back in the general direction of the center of Argosy District. That was unusual enough that Vorru felt the need to comment on it. "Is there something else?"
The tall man's masked face turned back to him, and Vorru found himself staring into the brown eyes of a d'oemir bear. In the dim light of the computer center, the white of his mask faded to a dull, slightly ghostlike appearance. Vorru couldn't see the man's expression, but the slight hunching of his shoulders betrayed enough nervousness that Vorru started to feel it himself. "I'm not sure," the Tevas-kaar said after a moment. "But I think we ought not to linger here any longer than we must. Something… feels wrong."
A shiver went down Vorru's spine. He'd never worked with Force adepts, not before the Tevas-kaar, and he'd only had occasion to meet Darth Vader once. He didn't understand the Force—it was said that none outside the Jedi really did—but he was familiar enough with its power from his experiences with Palpatine not to doubt the man's sincerity. And there was enough weight behind his words to take him seriously. Suddenly waiting for Eliezer to finish uploading all of Isard's secrets no longer seemed like the most important order of the day.
But he would not leave until he knew Eliezer had exhausted every option to find the rest of what they had come for. "Let me know if you think we are in danger. Comm our pilot and tell him to take off and come back for us; I'll make sure our backup is in place."
The Tevas-kaar nodded, already reaching for his wristcomm.
Vorru took out his comlink. "Colonel Roeder?" he said.
"Roeder here," the comlink replied instantly.
"Are your men prepared in the event they are required?" Vorru asked, putting all the weight of Moffdom, not to mention the Underlord of Black Sun, into the words.
"I have three teams in Argosy District, awaiting your location and instructions."
"Very good. Stand by," Vorru said, switching the comlink back off.
"Fliry?" Eliezer's voice was rapt. Vorru had known the Drall for a long, long time, and never heard him so awed. "Fliry, I found it."
He was back at the Drall's side in an instant. The screen was a mess of account numbers and passwords, and it took Vorru a second to realize what he was seeing. Once he did, he felt like the breath had been sucked from his chest. It took him another second to regain it, his heart thudding in his chest, blood pounding in his ears. There it was.
It wasn't much to look at. Just one line, among others. An account number. A password. A sum.
A staggeringly large sum. A sum so large that he almost had trouble conceptualizing what it meant. Almost.
"H-have…" His voice was throaty and haggard, and he was forced to clear his throat. "Have you started transferring the funds?" he asked, the awe in his voice matching the awe in Eliezer's.
He felt the Tevas-kaar peering over both their shoulders, and heard even him gasp.
"I spent days working up a routing system," Eliezer reminded him. "It will take some time to transfer it all… HoloNet credit transactions have a cap, so I'm having to utilize a few hundred different banking institutions and thousands of individual accounts. But after it's into the HoloNet I can make sure it's impossible to trace." He smirked, the first to recover. "I'll route most of it through Muunilist, they won't participate in any New Republic investigations."
Vorru nodded. He'd known it had to be here. Ysanne Isard's personal slush fund. Funded by years of the Emperor's largess… and her seizure of the previous Underlord, Prince Xizor's, personal fortune.
It wasn't all there. Isard had taken a fair amount of it when she'd abandoned Coruscant, and squandered much more of it even before her flight. But there was enough. There was more than enough.
"How long?" he asked Eliezer, still barely hearing himself speak.
"Twenty, thirty minutes… there are a lot of credits here."
Vorru nodded, forcing himself to breathe. With the secrets, and the wealth, and Black Sun, and Eliezer's skills… he suddenly had more power at his fingertips than he'd had since Palpatine had stripped him of his Moffdom and sentenced him to life on Kessel. He was, in that instant, the most powerful person in the entire galaxy. And with that power, with the secrets and the money and the omniscience that Eliezer could offer, Fliry Vorru could finally show Palpatine that he was the man's equal, Force or no Force.
Visions of future glory danced in his head.
Eliezer's claws clacked frantically over the keys, setting transactions in motion, buying and selling assets; Isard's personal accounts were laid bare and the fortune within vanished slowly but steadily into the HoloNet.
Time stretched, moving glacially slow as Eliezer worked.
"Moff Vorru," the Tevas-kaar said for a second time, the words finally breaking through the haze of Vorru's ambition. He turned slightly to look at the Tevas-kaar. The masked figure stood very still, peering up towards the sky, and Vorru got the distinct impression that the man's eyes were closed under the mask.
"Tevas-kaar?" he prompted.
The mask came down and brown eyes bored into him. "We need to leave," the Tevas-kaar said firmly.
Vorru's head shook automatically. "We can't leave. Eliezer is still transferring the funds—"
The Tevas-kaar grabbed his arm, one powerful, armored hand squeezing almost painfully. "We need to leave now," he insisted. "Or we're not going to be leaving at all."
Vorru swallowed, and looked at Eliezer. "How much longer?"
"I've got much of it. Almost fifty percent. Give me another ten minutes and I can get the rest of it," the Drall said hastily, the clacking of his claws interrupted by a hacking, desperate cough. "I'm starting an automatic routing program, in case we're interrupted here…" the clacking resumed, with even more haste.
"We can't leave yet," Vorru said firmly. He flicked his comlink, adjusting it to also transmit their location. "Roeder, send reinforcements to me now. We're about to have trouble."
The Tevas-kaar shook his head, a hint of anger in the motion, but he didn't object. His hand pulled the lightsaber from his cloak, holding it in a ready position, peering especially back towards Argosy District.
It was all quiet except for Eliezer's hasty efforts. Vorru watched the Tevas-kaar's head slowly turn, as if he was looking at an invisible foe on the far side of the walls. He peered up the spiral staircase to the holocomm facility on the third floor of the apartment, the only lights from up there coming from the equipment; the Imperial banner on the opposite wall cast in light and shadow. The Tevas-kaar stared up towards the holocomm, his stance shifting slightly, as if suddenly anticipating a new threat. Vorru turned to look—
The tip of a blue lightsaber burst through the wall of the apartment and into the holocomm, sending a shower of sparks through the room and plunging the third floor into total darkness.