Honor Among Thieves (Page 16)

“That’s him with the sparring floaters,” Scarlet said.

“Seems charming,” Han said. “I’m guessing not your old boyfriend.”

“He’s the Emperor’s pet astrocartographer. Runs private missions for the highest ranks of the Empire. Answers to no one, but sometimes he shares information with the security services. He’s also a megalomaniac, a fanatic, and a murderer.”

CZ turned off the hologram and Galassian vanished. Han accepted the rough paper with its load of egg and pepper. It was still warm, and the smell made his stomach feel empty and eager. He scooped up a mouthful with two fingers. It tasted better than he’d expected.

“I’ve been infiltrating his operations for the last year and a half,” Scarlet went on. “He was on an exploratory mission of some sort. Very quiet. And when he showed back up, he was very, very pleased with himself. The rumor was he’d found something interesting. The sort of discovery that the Emperor would give his favorite pet a treat for. Only someone stole the report and all the preliminary data from his private station on Tyybann, and wiped his file system.”

“Someone being you,” Han said.

“Unfortunately, no,” Scarlet Hark said. “An amateur got lucky. No planning ahead of the heist, and no back end once it was over. Galassian figured out he’d been compromised almost at once, and he threw a fit. Had his entire household staff killed or wiped and reprogrammed.”

“Harsh,” Han said, sitting on the edge of her bed.

“CZ and I were in his household staff at the time,” Scarlet Hark said. “So, yes. It was unpleasant. I was three days from getting a covert copy of his whole records system, and he would never have known it happened. Instead, I wound up tracking through an ice jungle for three weeks, breathing stale air out of tubes and drinking recycled water.”

“Recycled water doesn’t sound good,” Han said.

“It was undignified.”

“Still very sorry about that, ma’am,” the droid said.

“But,” Scarlet went on, “it also gave me enough time below Galassian’s radar that when I made it back to a civilized port, he’d moved on. Taken his personal Star Destroyer and headed out … somewhere. There was a full investigation going, trying to track down what had happened to the data.” She finished the last of her eggs and crumpled the paper in her fist. “Security had a task force on it for a month and a half. They must have pulled in a hundred people for interrogation, and probably three-quarters of those came back out in enough pieces that they could get sewn back together.” She tossed the wadded paper across the room, and the droid plucked it out of the air.

“Did they find anything?” Han asked despite himself.

“Yes.”

“What?”

“Don’t know,” Scarlet said with a sunny smile. “Whatever it was, it has half the Imperial fleet getting pulled off missions and the security services scrambling like a kikka nest on fire.”

“Can I take that for you, sir?” the droid asked, extending its hand. Han put the torn paper with its eggy film into the blue metal palm, still chewing thoughtfully.

“What did this astrocartographer find in the first place?” he asked.

“Good question. That’s what I was trying to find out. Only the amateur got it sloppy before I could get it clean.”

“Well, did the Imperials get whatever it was back, or did they just find out who stole it?”

Scarlet lifted her hands. “Dunno.”

Han scratched the back of his neck. “Well, that’s …”

“It really is. The good part is that the security forces’ complete and final report on the theft is about ten minutes from here by hired flier. Maybe an hour on foot. Losing that data has the security forces throwing a quiet seizure, and everything they know is right there for the taking.”

Han smirked. “Unless another bunch of amateurs gets to it before you.”

“Not likely. It’s on a physically isolated deck in the Imperial Intelligence Service Center. It’s encrypted with Galassian’s personal cipher. And they have a constant audit routine that sounds the alarm if anyone so much as makes a copy.”

“Well, that’s too bad then, sister,” Han said. “Because I wasn’t hired on to have the security service blow my brains out. I was supposed to get in, get you, and get out. And that’s what I plan to do.”

“Well then, sister, you’ll have to wait until I’m done. I’ve spent too long on this to walk away.”

“Brother. If I call you sister, you call me brother, see, because—”

“CZ? Let’s see the layout.”

“Of course, ma’am,” the droid said, and five layers of architectural schematics appeared floating above the sheets. The lines glowed in crisp blue. Scarlet reached into the display. “The first problem is getting into the building at all. The intelligence services control the eightieth and eighty-first floors, but there are access ways on seventy and seventy-three. No one gets into the complex without authorization.”

“Which you don’t have,” Han said. Scarlet pulled a card from her pocket and tossed it through the projection to him. Her face looked out from identification for Choya Sebastiao, environmental technician third class. “I was thinking I’d make you my apprentice, but if you’re the guard acting as escort, that’s probably better. CZ? Can we arrange that?”

“The card is already being programmed, ma’am. I took the liberty of capturing sir’s image when he arrived.”

“Spiffy.”

“Hey!” Han said.

“Once we’re in, we make our way here,” Scarlet said, tracing her finger through the tiny, glowing corridors. A pathway of soft green followed where she traced. “It’s the probe and sensor encoding regulatory council annex. Still part of the intelligence services, but lower security. We’ll need to watch for security droids here and here.” Two blobs of dull orange appeared in the schematic. “And there are regular patrols that take this path. And this.” Two orange pathways appeared, intersecting the green. Tiny orange dots tracked along them, marking the positions of the guards in time.

“This is a terrible plan,” Han said.

“There’s a cable conduit access here.” The green pathway wormed up through the floors. “It carries the main trunk cables from the transmission towers on the roof to the processing levels down in the forties. Bad place to slip and fall, but it’ll get us up to the intelligence service center. We’ll need to cut our way through.”