My head pounded something ferocious. I felt as battered as a helpless nuna smashed between two aggressive midfielders in a game of nuna-ball.
Forcing my eyes open I winced at the harsh daylight pouring in through my bedroom window. I wasn't sure how long I'd slept; tiredness had gotten the better of me almost as soon as I had shambled through the door. I was still wearing my blue Dervdisi suit, rich with the stench of smoke and marred with tiny burn marks. It looked more black now than blue, the difference between lower atmosphere and deep space.
I willed myself to sit up, blinking my sight into focus and rubbing the sleep out of my eyes. My limbs felt heavy and sluggish as I rose and shambled to the refresher, liberating myself of my smoke laden suit like a reptile shedding its skin. Looking into the mirror I barely recognised the face, aged beyond its years, that was staring back at me: soot marred my cheeks and my eyes were adorned with sullen bags. I looked like all nine of the Corellian hells rolled into one.
Before long the warm water of the shower rained against my skin, washing away the worst of my fatigue. My sluggish mind kept replaying the events of the previous night. Something wasn't adding up but my brain was still to foggy to place it.
Once I was content that I no longer smelled like nerf-brisket, I shaved off the light stubble that was painting a decorative shadow on my jawline and returned to my bedroom, still shambling more than walking. Waking up was the least favourite part of schedule.
My fingers rifled through my wardrobe as I decided on a suit to wear. At the end of the rail hung a suit quite unlike the others. My old Imperial Intelligence uniform, a pale off-white, as crisp as the day it has been issued. The back of my hand brushed the rank plaque on its breast; two red squares over two blue. I wondered why I still kept the thing; for all my sins it was the one bit of evidence left against me yet I could not see it thrown out or destroyed. Nostalgia is more potent than any spice.
I picked out a burgundy suit, paired it with a slim cut black shirt, and finished the outfit with a polished pair of black boots that rode the line between industrial practicality and formal elegance.
I made sure my underarm holster was fitted tight and slid my holdout blaster into it, but not before checking the power cell and making sure the sights were aligned. It was an old habit, automatic at this point, but the old girl didn't sit properly in the holster unless I did it.
Leaving the jacket open to keep myself cool, I went into the kitchen, set a large pot of caff to brew, and waited as the dark brown liquid began to drip the pot slowly and relentlessly. Airspeeders droned past outside, and a horn blared. I kept waiting. Drip, drip, drip. The noise echoed in my head, gnawing at me more efficiently than a torture droid. I scowled and headed for the office.
It looked just as I'd left it the night before; I'd made a break for my bed as soon as I'd arrived home. I sank into my couch feeling the stiff springs poke into my back. It was oddly comfortable, like being massaged by a Besalisk. I needed to book a session at the massage parlor, I thought, rolling my neck and feeling my shoulders click.
I turned on the wall-mounted vidscreen and switched to the news, keeping an eye out for any reports of last nights escapade. A chipper Bothan was sat behind a desk with a datapad in his hands.
"... sources report that a sequel to the holodrama Hitchhiker is in development. The original starred actress Wynissa Starflare, who disappeared almost three years ago. It is reported to..."
I zoned out from the gossip reporting, despite being a ardent holodrama enthusiast in my free time. Instead my focus shifted to the ticker bar at the bottom of the screen. Headlines scrolled along, barely giving time to register. 'Bacta supply will take time to resume, says Zaltin Corp'. 'Comkin declares allegiance to Imperial Warlord Zjinj' "NARDAQ down 16 points as stocks plummet"
"And in local news" the Bothan continued. My interest piqued, and I shifted my focus back to the reporter. "A fire was reported in the early hours in the warehouse district."
I leaned forward, paying careful attention to the vidscreen.
"Clouds of thick black smoke could be seen rising in the warehouses on the east side of New Vertica from surrounding areas this morning, sparking health concerns for beings in the local vicinity. The blaze was under control within an hour, with no injuries reported."
Interesting. No mention of Heater's body, I noted. The cleanup crew had done their job well. I was glad I didn't stick around.
"Representatives from Whirlbat Assurance Company, who responded to the fire, say they believe it was caused by a fault in a droid charging unit."
Nothing unusual there, the charging unit lie was convenient, clean and plausible. Whirlbat were just one of many private companies that provided fire insurance on Nar Shaddaa.
Whilst no central government meant no tax it also meant no emergency services, so that duty fell to insurance firms and only if you paid. If you didn't have the credits for your monthly payments they'd let your building burn to ash. There were rumors that these companies sometimes started fires themselves to intimidate and extort those unwilling to pay. There's not an industry on Nar Shaddaa without a dirty streak like that so I didn't doubt it for a second.
An electronic beeping dragged me out of my thoughts and back to reality. My caff was ready, and my caff-machine was letting me know in an unreasonably loud, flat tone that sounded like an astromech droid trying to recite poetry. I winced at the noise. My head wasn't done punishing me yet.
I ambled back into my kitchen and poured a mug of caff from the freshly brewed pot. The steaming black caff smelled robust and strong; the scent alone sharpened my senses, chasing away the stiffness of my mind. I took a sip, feeling the warmth roll across my tongue. It was smoky and bitter, but at least it didn't taste like carbon scoring and bad decisions.
When I returned to the office the Bothan newsreader had been replaced by a flat faced Woostoid with skin the colour of a sunset, gesticulating at a map of Nar Shaddaa behind him with long, spindly arms as he reported the local weather.
"Today in Champio Muni Municipality, expect it to be sunny and hot with a high near 37 degrees Celsius. The heat index might go as high as 42, so stay cool and hydrated. The northwest wind will be blowing at around 10 to 15 kilometres per hour." In other words it was going to be hot, but at least it wasn't raining.
"Tonight, things are scheduled to be mostly clear with a low around 27 degrees." The Woostoid continued. His large, unblinking eyes were unsettling, but there wasn't a hint of malice behind them. "The west wind will continue its gentle breeze at 10 to 15 kilometres per hour."
I switched off the vidscreen and stepped over to the window, watching the passing speeder traffic come close enough to rattle the duraplex. Sure it wasn't as clear as glass or clari-crystal, nor as tough as transparisteel, but they were all too expensive for almost anyone without the honorary epithet "the Hutt". Duraplex gave a good enough view and wouldn't shatter if you fell in to it. Most of the time anyway.
The low morning fog that hung between the city spires had mostly lifted, and on a walkway a few stories below a vendor extolled the virtues of his freshly grilled beef skewers into the patter of foot traffic passing by.
I turned back to my desk and sat in the leather chair. A light blinked on the desks inbuilt terminal. I hadn't noticed it until now. The light indicated that I'd received a holomessage, so I deftly started up the terminal and played it.
A miniature bust of Hatra Luthri appeared from the desk's tiny holoprojector. Her orange skin was tinged with an effervescent blue but she was no less beautiful.
The image blinked out and I realised I hadn't listened to what she said at all. Truthfully I hadn't even realised she had said anything. Her visage was beyond a doubt mesmerising.
I replayed the message, forcing myself to listen to her words rather than just watching her rouge lips move invitingly.
"Detective Maarloch," she began, "I'm safe and staying with a friend. I hope you can sort his whole situation out for me quickly. It's made my nerves just dreadful. Please contact me on this channel as soon as you have anything."
The holomessage was encrypted. I could reply, but all the usually attached data had been scrubbed. It was smart, if a little paranoid. Nobody would be able to track her location from that message. That wasn't part of a singer's standard repertoire. Perhaps the friend that was putting her up had some slicing skill, but wiping data that thoroughly was beyond the ability of any amateur slicer I'd ever encountered, and a few professional ones too.
I rubbed my temples, mulling the case over in my mind.
McGrrrr must have stashed the holos he wanted to use to leverage Miss Luthri somewhere. He didn't have them on his person and they weren't on the terminal at the warehouse. Maybe he had a terminal at his home, wherever that was. If he did it was probably secured using his code cylinder, which I now had.
He was dead now at any rate. Even if someone did manage to slice into the theoretical home terminal and get their hands on the holos, they'd have to recognise Hatra for them to be of any use, and have means and motive to use them. Far from impossible, but the odds stacked at safe enough. A Corellian would probably bet the other way.
McGrrrr's death was still a sticking point in my mind, however. Given the not-so-subtle Imperials that had visited the Poolia just before he left and the Imperial tracker on his cloud-car, Heater had probably crossed some Imperial upstart, reneging on a black market deal.
The name I had seen on the terminal, Fyyar, stood out. It sounded more familiar than I could remember at the time, but something scratched at my mind that it was a name I had come across during my Imperial years. Specifically an Imperial name. I had a hunch, and hoped it would pay off.
I keyed my terminal and pulled up the NewsNets, filtering the source to Big CYN. Cynabar's Infonet, or Big CYN as it was affectionately called, was the premium go-to source for information for smugglers and traders in the galaxy but it also kept tabs on any Imperial of note. I'd made it in there myself a couple of times, not by name of course, but it was still nice to know that someone had taken notice of the ops I had run back in the day. They'd even been one of the first to report Palpatine's death to the wider galaxy. Nobody knew Cynabar's true identity. Some theorised it was infamous smuggler Platt O'Keefe, or that it had to be a high ranking Imperial turncoat, but they had covered their tracks too well for anyone to find out for certain.
A prompt appeared on the screen and I entered my credentials. Access to Cynabar's was an exclusive club, one that I'd leveraged certain contacts to gain access to several years ago. I didn't plan on taking up smuggling any time soon but it paid to have access to it. Or rather I paid an unpleasant sum each month from an offworld account to have access to it. It had been more than worth the credits over the years.
I took a brief skim of the headlines:
42:9:15/CYN/YDH. /TRD/Cynabar
New Republic Maintains Presence in Thyferra System
42:9:15/CYN/ANS. /MIL/Cynabar
ISD Admonitor Spotted at Kril'Dor Sparking Rumors of Grand Admiral's Survival
42:9:15/CYN/XOL. /TRD/Cynabar
Doole Reinforces Kessel Defense Fleet with Carrack Cruisers
They were interesting, but not what I was after. Instead I pulled up a search query and the name Fyyar, then I leaned back in my chair and waited, enjoying my caff. It only took a few minutes before lines of text scrolled across the screen.
30:4:27/CYN/NAR. /TRD/Cynabar
Imperial Grey Men To Receive New Armor
A cutting-edge armor system has been trialled among select Imperial Intelligence agents, boasting enhanced cloaking systems and increased durability. This improvement over the Katarn-class armor used since the Clone Wars represents a significant leap forward in counter-espionage technology, making it even harder for smugglers and information brokers to slip past the Empire's watchful eye.
Sources close to Cynabar suggest that the mastermind behind this breakthrough is none other than Rear Admiral Galak Fyyar, a rising star in the Imperial hierarchy. Formerly the Chancellor of the University of Garos, Fyyar is believed to have spearheaded the project, his technical expertise fast-tracking him to a position of power.
Reading the article brought a flood of memories washing over me like a waterfall falling over some vast cliff. No wonder Fyyar's name had sounded familiar: I had been one of the poor bastards that had tested out that armor of his. I was still young then, straight out of the Carida Academy with a face as fresh as cool breeze and all the vigour and enthusiasm of a spiced-up Jawa in a junkyard.
That blasted armor had been twice as heavy as the old model. Fyyar had been the bright spark that had the genius idea to line the cursed thing with durasteel plating, making it as manoeuvrable as a speeder with busted repulsors, the only upside being that you could take a blast from a laser cannon to the face and shrug it off like you'd only been punched by an angry Wookiee. It still hurt like hell but you'd at least survive it. When I peeled that armor off me after an hour of testing my body ached like it hadn't since I had done a whole week of jetpack training.
In the production model they'd switched out the durasteel plating for a much lighter durasteel weave, and I had been thankful for it. I'd never met the gearhead Rear Admiral, never even laid eyes on him, but he must have read my reports after the tests.
My thoughts drifted back to Heater - McGrrrr - whatever name he'd be remembered by. The fat man had some deal with Fyyar but something had gone wrong. That spoilage rate on the warehouse terminal; at the time I had clocked it was unusually high for spice. Perhaps he was trying to skim off the top and Fyyar had gotten wind of it. It sounded plausible enough. I didn't know enough about Fyyar to know if he was the type to take up a side-hustle dealing spice, but he wouldn't have been the first to do it, nor the highest ranking; Grand Admiral Takel's glitterstim addiction had to have been one of the worst kept secrets in the Imperial Navy.
I peered intensely into my now empty cup, as if I expected to find the lost treasure of Xim in there. This case was done. No blackmailer, no blackmail. It wasn't a satisfying answer, but it was the simplest one.
Nothing else to do but to close it out. I closed down the link to Cynabar's Infonet, then recorded an message for Miss Luthi. Audio only, there was no point sending a bigger file than I needed to.
"It's Maarloch. Please meet me for lunch at Jool's Bar on West Ostrander. I've got an update on your case." I said into the receiver, and sent the message off. Her reply was almost instant. She must have been sat waiting for it on tenterhooks like a Nexu ready to ambush its prey.
I had a little time to kill so I poured myself another caff, stood back at the window, and watched the world roll by.