Quinlan returned to the landing pad, whizzed past the rental booth, and braked gently to a halt beside his starfighter. His next task – and probably his easiest one for the foreseeable future – was to figure out where exactly the coordinates would lead him.

He tapped a hidden controller on his belt, and the cockpit of his starfighter opened silently. Putting a hand on the side, he vaulted in and connected his datapad to the consol.

"Okay. Let's see what we've got."

The map of Nar Shaddaa's surface on the screen zoomed in abruptly to a blinking white dot, and coordinates lit up. "Wow. Grakkus wasn't kidding when he said the other side of Nar Shaddaa. That's, what, seven thousand kilometers away?"

He glanced at the speeder. Top speed of that junkpile was probably one hundred kph, so that meant seventy hours of non-stop travel through dangerous air lanes. Alternately, he could take his starfighter and risk detection. Seventy hours, or five and a half. The choice was an easy one, really – but it was too bad he couldn't take the speeder. Especially since he'd paid the hundred and twenty credits.

Staring at the map, Quinlan rested his chin in one hand. He could feasibly strap the speeder to the top of his fighter and hope it didn't fall off, but that would really catch people's attention. Better to leave it here.

Still, he'd leave it somewhere handy . . . just in case something went wrong, which it inevitably would. Quinlan hopped out, moved to the edge of the platform, and peered over.

Many landing pads had ledges connecting their supports. These ledges were more than big enough to store a speeder bike on. Sure enough, this landing pad followed the pattern. Perfect.

He went back to his starfighter and pretended to be tinkering with it while the Gran locked up his rental booth for the day and stepped into a lift. The instant the doors closed, Quinlan moved the speeder bike to the edge, checked for oncoming traffic, and slammed the accelerator pedal down.

The bike shot off the edge and tilted on its side as he immediately hit the right thruster and the left brake, then cut speed abruptly. The bike's nose slipped neatly into the gap between platform and supports. Quinlan maneuvered it carefully to the exact center of the beam and dismounted, his boots on the very edge of the ledge. Darkness stretched out beneath him for hundreds of meters. If anyone but himself was insane enough to climb either up or down to reach the speeder . . . well, they'd be welcome to it. Unless, of course, said person decided to plant a bomb or some other equally unpleasant gimmick and leave it for him to find.

Getting blown up while starting a speeder would be an incredibly stupid way to enter the Force.

"Guess I'd better take some precautions," he murmured, flipping open the black wallet he carried on his belt. Taking out a data stick, he inserted it in a small slot just beneath the starter and allowed his current code to register. Several clicks sounded, and he nodded, withdrawing the data stick. No one could start it without that code now – and, should anyone try a little sabotage, they'd be unable to access the engine or fuel lines without forcibly breaking open the locks that protected them.

It would make it harder for them to set explosives up unnoticed, at the very least.

Satisfied with his work, Quinlan moved along the ledge to the most shadowed area of the landing pad, then jumped, catching the duracrete ten feet above.

A minute later, he was back in his starfighter and taking off.

Quinlan double-checked the destination coordinates, turned on autopilot and set an alert to go off when he was within one hundred kilometers of his destination. As the surface of the planet streaked past beneath him, he tilted his seat back and picked up his datapad. Time for some research on the Prince and his establishment, and then he would take a nap. It wasn't like there was anything else to do.

The platform Quinlan landed his fighter on was only a two-minute walk away from the huge building – a warehouse, it seemed – that was supposed to be the Prince's headquarters. Quinlan shut down and locked all the systems, then climbed stiffly out.

He stretched backwards, hands braced against his spine, and froze in that position, staring at the sky and at the shadowy yellow sphere that was Nal Hutta. ". . . Aw, great."

Having gotten that complaint out of the way, he slid a long-range commlink between his left bracer and forearm, checked his blaster, and hefted his lightsaber thoughtfully.

It was always good to have a lightsaber – except when the sight of one would mark him as prize bounty. And he couldn't risk blowing his cover this early in the mission, especially not when the Prince was likely to have men everywhere. A knife wouldn't draw much attention, though. Quinlan Vos removed a black-sheathed knife with an extendable blade from his supplies and slipped it onto his belt.

As for his lightsaber – well, thieves often raided cockpits when there was no one around. Starfighters, on the other hand, weren't especially easy to steal. After a moment's thought, Quinlan slipped beneath the fighter and reached up, putting his saber in the opening for the retractable landing gear. Good enough.

Drawing his hood over his eyes, he sauntered away from the platform, along one of the many narrow walkways that crisscrossed the airlanes.

No one who was afraid of heights could function here for long. The airlanes stretched beneath the walkways, broken every thirty meters by another set of walkways and tunnels, and the constantly changing levels of light and noise could be disorienting.

Of course, Quinlan had spent a lot of time sneaking about the lower levels of Coruscant, so he was more used to it than many others. Still – there was something about the predominantly blue lights of Nar Shaddaa that made shadows much deeper than the yellow lights of Coruscant did.

Pausing in the center of the walkway, the Jedi stared down into the unending rows of traffic. This area of Nar Shaddaa was too quiet for his taste. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that the Prince's headquarters were scarcely a hundred meters away, but the few people that were in sight moved fast, keeping their heads down. Even the traffic was slower and quieter here. No gunning engines, no jockeying for position, no cutting from one level to the other.

He felt eyes on the back of his head and started walking again, glancing casually to one side. A flicker was all he saw, but he didn't need his eyes to sense the watchfulness emanating from the figure.

A few meters away from the end of the walkway, Quinlan paused again, as though uncertain of his destination. He took a hesitating step forward, glanced up at the tall building in front of him, and turned to look the other way.

The figure was approaching rapidly now, and Quinlan smirked. Trap set.

A weather-skinned man slipped into his path, a long rifle held loosely at his side and a belt of miniature grenades hung across his chest. He wore black pants and a loose pilot's jacket, and stared darkly at Quinlan from beneath a red turban. "Lost something?"

"Not exactly, no," he answered, folding his arms and resting his weight on one foot.

Red Turban narrowed his eyes. "Looking for something, then."

"That's more like it." Quinlan idly fingered the knife at his belt. "Maybe you can help me. Word on the streets is, there's work around here for skilled bounty hunters."

"Yeah?" The man gestured toward the tall building with his rifle. "Well, if you think 'around here' means this building, you're wrong."

Quinlan decided to gamble. "If it's not this building, it'll be the next one over. The number of guards means there's something in one of them. And, given that you don't exactly have an 'apply here' notice up . . ." He shrugged. "I figured this was the best way to get the Prince's attention."

The man's expression turned cautious. "The employer's name was not given to the bounty agency."

Quinlan shrugged and drew his knife, toying with it. "Open secrets and all that. All I know is, there's a well-paying job around here."

Dropping his casual demeanor suddenly, he raised his knife with a jerk and pointed it at the man's chin. "You wouldn't be trying to cheat me out of it, would you?"

The man didn't even blink. "Did the agency send you?"

"Nah." Quinlan sheathed his knife. "I work alone."

"Well, that's too bad." Red Turban looked suspicious now. "The job was advertised for teams of bounty hunters."

"Yeah." Quinlan squinted thoughtfully upward. "I heard about that. But I also heard that people with unusual skillsets were encouraged to apply regardless. Hm – you look like a loner yourself. Did you show up here with a team?"

Red Turban scoffed, but didn't answer. His gaze focused on the yellow-gold tattoos on Quinlan's forehead and across the bridge of his nose. "I take it you think there's something special about your abilities," he said. "You're a Kiffar, huh?"

"No, I'm just impersonating one because I think it makes me less noticeable."

The man shoved him towards the warehouse. "Go on in. My employer will decide whether or not to hire you."

Employer? But no one is allowed to speak directly with the Prince, Quinlan thought, slowing to a walk. This is too easy. . .

It was too late to back out, though. As he approached the door, it slid silently open before him, revealing nothing but darkness. A strange whisper seemed to emanate from the room, a swirl of invisible blackness in the Force that swooped out and faded. A warning of evil? It wasn't a feeling of danger – more like a premonition than anything to do with a person . . .

Quinlan hesitated for only half an instant before stepping beneath the doorframe.

A faint yellow light clicked on at the far end of the room, revealing a small computer station – but no employer. Where was the Prince?

He closed his eyes briefly, sending out his thoughts. A pinprick of inanimate black flickered somewhere to his left, and he turned to face it. There was a lifeform there, too, but that wasn't what he had sensed.

"Ah," whispered a woman's voice from the shadows. "You are no normal bounty hunter, I think."

The accent was familiar, and Quinlan placed it in an instant. The woman spoke very much like Kit Fisto. "You're a Nautolan," he guessed.

"Hmm. And you are a Kiffar with psychometric abilities."

"How . . ." He paused. She wasn't Force-sensitive, that much he could tell. So how did she know he was psychometric?

The shadows shifted as a purple Nautolan woman stepped into the edge of the light. A red crystal – a kyber crystal – gleamed on her forehead.

Quinlan felt his eyebrows contract, but he didn't ask where she'd gotten it. He was supposed to be a simple bounty hunter, who would have no way of recognizing a kyber crystal on sight. "So . . ." He stared at the red jewel in the center of her headdress. "What exactly is that?"

"You sensed its presence."

Quinlan noticed two things: despite in the dim light, he could tell this woman was beautiful even by Nautolan standards; and, there was something unidentifiable in her large eyes that made him uneasy.

He forcibly pushed the thought aside. "That's impossible," he told her, voice purposefully arrogant. "Psychometrics can't sense things without touching them and trying to sense them."

"No," she agreed. "But the crystal is touching you. It touches your mind."

He drew his knife again and stepped forward. "I heard the Prince had a job for bounty hunters. I didn't come here to deal with a witch."

"The Dathomirian Nightsisters are witches, not I," she said dismissively. A red gleam passed through her eyes – or maybe that was the Force trying to tell him something. "I . . . am merely the Prince's right hand."

"So, I'll be working for you?" He lowered his knife and shrugged, although his mind was still on the small crystal. "Fine, long as I get paid."

One side of her mouth lifted in an odd, dissatisfied smile. "A mercenary like all the rest, then? I thought you might be something more."

Quinlan stepped back, sheathing his knife. "Listen, lady, I'm just here for the work . . . and the pay. I heard there was a job here finding antiques, or artifacts – valuable stuff, for the right people."

The woman seated herself at the computer and cast a brief, thoughtful glance over one shoulder. "And what else do you know? Do you know that the Prince will not hire those who have worked for Grakkus the Hutt?"

"Nope." They've been watching me. "I, uh. I was at Grakkus' palace earlier today, which I assume you know – but I only went to deliver a message from my previous employer."

"Yes, of course," she agreed with a mocking tilt of her head. "I don't suppose you can tell me what that message was."

He raised his eyebrows. "Bounty hunters live by their reputations. If word got out I'd broken confidence, I'd never be hired again. However . . ."

"Yes?"

"If you were to pay me ten million credits up front, and then have the Prince hire me permanently, I'd be willing to tell you."

The Nautolan laughed, then turned back to the computer. "I do not want to know that badly. What are your terms? Do you have a ship?"

Quinlan walked towards the computer station, ready to negotiate terms that he might never fulfill. His gamble had paid off – for the moment. All he had to do, really, was to investigate the Prince . . . and to capture him, if the chance arose. He thought it would be a fairly straightforward mission – break into the Prince's headquarters, rifle through his business records, find a reason to arrest him, and bring him back to Coruscant. Of course, every time he thought something would be straightforward, it turned out to be the opposite.

He paused beside the woman, who looked up at him with large black eyes. The red crystal gleamed again. He tried to ignore it. The crystal was awake, but kyber crystals were inanimate unless the user was a Force-wielder.

Or – so he'd always heard. And this woman was no Force-wielder.