Stupid, I thought as I shouldered into my office and hit the floor, rolling. Other offices branched off of the hallway leading to my rental space, and nobody would have been around at that hour. Nobody respectable, that is. My fall into the office jarred a potted tree which tipped over, the plant taking the incoming blaster shot against it's soft bark. My own weapon slipped from my grasp and skidded somewhere across the floor. Now prone on my side, I rolled in the direction of my pistol and two more blasts blew holes in the stained carpeting. As I struggled to my feet I could hear heavy boots running down the hallway. There was only one attacker. That was somewhat of a relief.

My blaster was lodged somehow under the leather two-seater in my outer office. Tugging on it, I found it had gotten caught on one of the gun's many bumpy modifications. As the footsteps grew closer, I pulled more violently on the blaster. It came free but left a large portion of the emitter underneath the seat; the weapon wouldn't fire. I was still staring in disbelief at the blaster's stunted barrel when my assailant stormed through the door.

He was big. I couldn't tell what species he was as his features were concealed in a hooded cloak, but I could make out heavily wrinkled skin on his arms and hands. He said something to me I couldn't understand and brought his DL-44 to bear on me. There was a sudden whine of high-powered servos and the clatter of metal as the stranger went down. Getting to my feet, I watched as Teryn Aeries' droid pummeled my assailant. A swift kick to the ribs, and the droid sent my attacker into a wall, leaving a large depression. As he tried to get up, his hood fell back revealing himself as a weequay. Spitting blood, the weequay rushed at the protocol droid, but was met with the cyborg's metal-clad fist. The assassin was rocketed back into the wall, deepening the depression and receiving a deep gash across his scalp. Bent over on one knee, the weequay gasped for air, but I could see his left hand reaching toward his boot for something – the glint of a vibroblade was there. Before the weequay could react, however, the droid grabbed the alien's thick braid of hair and lifted him clear off the floor, then buried his free hand into the weequay's abdomen with a thunderous punch. A gout of blood sprayed out of my attacker's mouth and the droid dropped him to the floor where he lay motionless.

The droid turned to face me. "Are you unharmed, sir?" it asked in a calm voice.

I nodded shakily. "Yeah, fine…" I replied. "What are you doing here?"

The droid looked down at the unconscious weequay. "I believe that is obvious, sir."

I ran a hand over my sweaty face. "No… why are you here? And what's your designation?"

"I am AVR-8P0, human-cyborg relations and protocol," came the proud reply. "My human compatriots designate me Aveear, which you are more than welcome to do, sir. I came to be here at the request of Mistress Aeries to… keep an eye on you, sir."

"Well, you're doing one hell of a job, Aveear," I remarked, looking down at my assailant. "Did Mistress Aeries give you any instructions on cleaning up after yourself?"

Aveear straightened. "I am fully programmed for domestic duties, sir."

I turned to head for my inner office. "Then clean this mess up."

"But, sir!" Aveear started. My answer was the slam of the inner office door.

I woke up with Aefeeh's ID card stuck to my cheek. The rodian's belongings were spread out across my desk, and a couple of the smaller parts were adhered to my face from my sleeping on them. Glancing at the chrono on my wrist, I found it was only a few hours before sunrise. Cursing, I rubbed my eyes with balled fists – I hadn't wanted to fall asleep. Chances were it was too late to follow up on what I had found in Aefeeh's pockets.

Jumping out of my chair, I peeled some more creds from my cheeks and reached out for the blaster I had fixed a few hours earlier. It was gone.

"I took the liberty of adding some upgrade modules to your Blastech DL-35, sir."

Aveear's even tones nearly made me jump out of my skin. The droid stood in the shadows just inside the door to my inner office. His dark metal plating made him difficult to see, and it was only when his optical sensors flared to life that I was able to pick out his cranial unit. "Don't ever do that again," I told the droid.

Aveear stepped forward into the dim circle of light thrown by the glowing orb hovering over the corner of my desk. In his hands he gingerly held what used to be a Blastech DL-35. "I apologize, sir," Aveear said. "But I assumed you would appreciate a more powerful…"

"I meant the hiding in the shadows trick," I replied, stepping forward and snapping the blaster out of the droid's grip. "Thanks for the… uh… upgrades. Listen, I gotta take a trip into Spacer Town. Why don't you go on home to Mistress Aeries?"

Aveear took a long stride, putting him between the door and me. "Mistress Aeries has requested I keep an eye on you. I will join you in Spacer Town."

I stared into the droid's passively featured faceplate, remembering what he did to the weequay. "You're not going to let me go until I say okay, are you?"

"Correct, sir."

"I'm going to regret allowing you to tag along, aren't I?"

"No, you won't, sir."

Aveear stepped out of the way and I swung the door open into the outer office. The weequay was gone, as was the worn carpet. What remained was the dusty wooden sub flooring. I could clearly see two burn marks from the attacker's blaster shots by the main door. The potted tree was upright again, sitting in the corner where Nanse kept it.

"Nice job," I remarked. "Was he carrying any ID?"

"No, he wasn't, sir," Aveear told me. The droid passed by me and repositioned the blasted hrkyu tree by about a quarter centimeter. "But I believe he worked for Jyergo Huthis."

"What? Why?" I asked, surprised by the droid's insight.

"Because he has been seen in the company of Aefeeh Neil and Qort Teeno on regular occasions."

I set the office's security system and stepped into the dark hall. "What kind of protocol droid are you, Aveear?"

"The kind that watches the news, sir," was the droid's reply.

I kept my speeder in the secured garage beneath the office building. Several card-access locks blocked the way for unauthorized access, and in three years of renting my office, I had never had a problem with vandalism. However, after what happened upstairs, I wasn't taking any chances. I sent the 'droid in, first.

"I am not scanning any threats, sir," Aveear remarked from the garage. I stepped through the door, blaster in hand, and looked around quickly. The place was deserted. It was still hours before the work-day started, and the dance instructers wouldn't be showing up until well after dawn. All that was in the small garage space was my own speeder and the aircar belonging to the club manager.

"That's mine," I said to Aveear, and led him to my ride. The LXS-22 had served me faithfully since my arrival on Iotra, despite the scratches, bumps, holes and mechanical problems. The closed cockpit had a sunroof, and the sound system was the best I could afford. I wasn't planning on getting rid of it any time soon. We climbed in, and within a few moments I was navigating down the cracked streets to Spacer Town.

With the hour as late as it was, there was next to nobody on the streets except for a few questionable individuals and some police IPF patrols. The apartment complex where Aefeeh lived was on the opposite end of Town, and I cruised past the Nook to see if the IPF was still nosing around. Qort, and the speeder he had jacked, had been cleaned up. An IPF forcefield had been erected at the entrance to the alley where I had blanked poor Aefeeh, but there was no police presence at all.

"You are travelling several kilometers over the posted speed limit, sir," Aveear remarked after several quiet minutes.

"Thanks for the update, Av'," I replied, and opened the throttle up a little more. Buildings flashed past on either side of the speeder, multicoloured neon lights flashing against the windscreen at increasing speed.

"You have increased your speed by thirty seven and a half kilometers per hour, sir!"

I didn't reply. For some reason, I really enjoyed razzing this 'droid.

It was only a short time longer that we arrived at the aparment complex marked on Aefeeh's ID. The building was one in a long line of decrepit buildings running down both sides of the narrow street. The building across from it was so close I felt as though you could reach out one of the windows and touch it. I parked my speeder half a block away, and we walked along the quiet street to Aefeeh's building.

Most of the front doors to the complexes were open, and cool stale air wafted out onto the streets from them. I could see peeling paint, dripping water, and bare cables coming down from the ceilings. Windows were broken, and garbage was strewn across the walkways and street. Two iotran children, dressed in tattered clothing, stared out of an allyway at us as we walked by. With stifled giggles, they ran off into the darkness.

"They should be slumbering," Aveear remarked vaguely.

"I guess a lot of the normal rules don't apply here," I replied.

Aefeeh's building was like all the others, but worse. Aside from the dangling power cables and leaking water, there were gaping holes in the walls of the lobby, and all the lifts were marked as 'Out of Service'. I checked the ID card for the unit number Aefeeh had been renting, and sighed when I realized it was on the eighteenth floor.

"I could carry you, sir," Aveear said when I relayed the information. I gave him a wry grin and headed for the stairs.

Seventeen agonizing floors later, I looked upon the door marked '18' with victorious glee. I shoved it open and stepped into the hallway. The carpeting was worn right through to the duracrete floors in many places, and I could easily tell that some of the unit doors had been forced open some time ago. A card-access panel sparked intermittantly with flickering blue light. More cables hung from the ceiling, left over from residents trying to bypass the meters which kept track of their power usage, and there was still the neverending sound of dripping water.

Aefeeh's unit was four doors down on my right, and I used the access card I had found on him to gain access. Aveear and I stepped in quickly, and I locked the door behind us. The place was dark, the only light coming through a surprisingly whole window in a small enclosed balcony. I pulled a small luma from my pocket and flipped it on. Aveear's cranial unit made a short buzzing noise as he switched his optical sensors over to another mode – perhaps infrared.

"What are we looking for, sir?" the 'droid asked.

"Anything that connects Aefeeh to Jyergo," I replied. "As well as any datacards, comlinks, anything."

Aveear went off to the left past a small kitchenette while I stepped into a short hallway to the right. A horrible smell came out of the refresher, so I avoided that room and turned a corner to my left, finding myself in the bedroom. A stained mattress was laid out on the duracrete floor, with some clothes scattered about. The window was boarded up, though some light filtered through the cracks. I kicked through the clothing and pornography publications on the floor, finding only a spice pipe and a broken vibroknife. Aveear appeared at the door to the bedroom to let me know he hadn't found anything of importance.

I dreaded what I had to do next. Stepping past Aveear, I moved into the refresher and swung my luma across the room. It looked as though it had never been cleaned, and at least a centimeter of dust and grime covered nearly every flat surface. I focused the light beam into some cupboards, but found only the personal effects of a rodian with hygiene problems. There was only one place left to check, and I was not looking forward to it.

Reaching up behind the toilet, I felt along the space between the tank and the wall for anything. Almost immediately my hand found a loose packet, so grasped on to it and pulled down. It came away freely from the tank, and I stood up, focusing the luma's beam onto it. Inside a thin flimsiplast bag was a datacard.

"Bingo," I said, tossing the bag into the air and catching it. I stuffed it into an inner pocket of my jacket and led Aveear back to the door. "Easy as shooting mynocks in a cargo crate!"

I hit the door release and it slid open, revealing two individuals. The smaller one was bent over slightly, fiddling with the card-access port for Aefeeh's apartment. The other was a big, dumb-looking herglic. They looked up, eyes wide, and went for their blasters. Before I could draw, a blaster shot whined over my shoulder and exploded into the wall between the two of them. They dove out of the way and I slapped the door release again, slamming it shut. I hit the lock and spun to look at Aveear, just in time to see a wrist-mounted blaster disappear into his forearm.

"What-?" I stammered, but the 'droid took my arm and moved me away from the door.

"Sorry, sir," Aveear said in his calm voice. "I should have scanned the entrance before you opened the door. They are heavily armed, we cannot go that way."

I gestured to the door. "That's the only way out, Aveear."

Before the 'droid could answer, a blaster bolt punched through the doorway and exploded on the wall only half a meter from where I stood.

"I don't believe it is, sir," Aveear replied, as he slowly turned to look at the large balcony window.

The voices of the two men floated through the door toward me, and I knew I heard one of them say 'detonator'. "Please tell me you've got a jet-pack hidden in your torso, somewhere."

"No, sir, I do not," Aveear replied. "But I do have very powerful leg servos, and fifth generation mylar musculatuer."

I heard a quiet beep from the hallway, and turned to look at the window. "You're sure about this?" I asked, my voice raising an octave as I began to panic.

"No."

"Good enough, let's go."

With one hand, Aveear picked up a steel-framed chair and pitched it through the window, smashing a fair-sized hole. His other arm wrapped around my waist and suddenly I was lifted off the floor and moving towards the newly-opened window. As we lurched upwards and outwards, there was another, louder beep behind us and the door to the hallway blew into the apartment with tremendous force.

We were already airborn. The wind whistled past me as though I were riding a swoop bike, and I felt as though Aveear's metal body was pulling me down toward the street with tremendous speed. I could see the building on the other side of the street approaching, but it also seemed to be rocketing skyward. I tried to count the number of floors we were descending past, but lost track at six. I saw a broad section of crumbling duracrete wall skim past, and then a crash, and then darkness.

I tumbled end over end, my shoulder cracking against something hard before I came to rest on my back. I stumbled to my feet as quickly as I could, my left shoulder screaming out in pain – I had nearly dislocated it. There was a trail of ruin leading from the broken window of the apartment unit we had landed in, past me, into another room. Part way there, I could see one of Aveear's arms, seperated at the shoulder, lying in the grime. In the darkness of the room beyond, two photoreceptors flared to life.

"Are you unharmed?" came the 'droid's voice.

"Relatively," I replied. "You?"

"I seem to have misplaced my right arm," said Aveear as he stepped out of the darkness into the light of the broken window. "We seemed to have escaped those burglers. Would you have a repair kit somewhere?"

Holding my shoulder I looked out from the broken window. We had fallen thirteen stories, and were now on the fourth floor of the building opposite from Aefeeh's unit. I couldn't see anyone at the window we had just jumped from. "Back at my place," I replied. "Let's get going before those thugs track us down."

Aveear picked up his right arm, inspecting it closely. "Perhaps these quick-release appendages could be strengthened."