Aftermath: Empire's End (Star Wars: Aftermath #3)(95)

Well. All that is over and done. No need to dwell.

Cloud City is his once again. Lando starved out Adelhard. Most of the Imperials surrendered. It’s over. Thank the lucky stars.

He steps forward into the Casino level, and he and Lobot aren’t alone. He’s got a ragtag force with him: some of his Wing Guard security forces, but some New Republic soldiers, too. It’s just enough to perform cleanup on those who linger behind, clinging to the illusion they can still win this thing.

Together they march forward through the wreckage of the Casino level. He asks Lobot: “The holdouts are ahead?”

Yes. In the Bolo Tanga room.

“Fine, fine, let’s get this over with and evict our final tenants.”

As they walk, Lobot looks over at him as a new communication flashes across his wrist: I am told to remind you that the princess will soon give birth and you have not yet procured for them the standard natal gift.

“What? That’s impossible. She was just—I swear they just got married—didn’t I just get them a nuptial gift?”

It has been the proper biological time. You just do not realize how much time has passed. We have been busy.

“So have they, I guess.”

Also, you never got them a nuptial gift.

He sighs. “Okay, okay. Buying gifts for a kid. Can we get him a cute little cape and a mustache so he looks like old Uncle Lando?”

Lobot doesn’t respond, offering only a humorless stare.

“Fine, fine, I’ll think about it.” His mind drifts briefly to Han and Leia. Han, one of his oldest and greatest friends. And sure, one of his greatest rivals, too. He misses that old reprobate. The crazy times they had!

Good times even when they were bad. And now, Han is with Leia. Hoo, boy. Those two are a pair of rocket boosters firing full-bore. Lando just hopes those two engines are both firing in the same direction—because if they’re ever pointed at each other, they’ll burn each other up.

We’re here.

That, from Lobot. Ahead waits the door to the Bolo Tanga room. Lando can see it’s been sealed with mag-alloy. He turns to Captain Gladstone of the Wing Guard. “We got imaging?”

Gladstone nods. “They’re holed up in there. They’ve broken through to the beam outtake shaft, which in theory would lead them to the engineering sublayer—”

“But the fumes coming up through the shaft will kill them if they try.”

“That’s exactly it, Baron Administrator.”

“So they’re trapped.”

“Like crete-bugs in a beetle-bag.”

“All right, let’s open it up—no, you know, wait. Can they hear me through that door?”

“They can, if you get close.”

Lando nods, pulling his blaster—it’s a fancy-looking piece of work from back when they put a little art into their design. It’s a Rossmoyne Vitiator pistol, a bolt-thrower from a more elegant age. (Lando won it recently in a game of Six-Card Gizka Limit from a spice-drunk Aybarian diplomat.) Every Rossmoyne that came off the line was engraved by hand with scrollwork by artisans from the original family. The grip in particular shows these wonderful whorls and curves—like a spiraling maze you could follow with a blind fingertip. Maybe with the Empire gone, craftsbeings will return to the galaxy. And with it, their beauty.

That’s later. For now—

He taps on the door with the Vitiator.

“Hello, this is Lando Calrissian,” he says loudly so they can hear him. “I’m baron administrator of Cloud City, not to mention hero of the Rebellion. I suspect you’ve heard of me. Can you hear me all right? Tap on the door if you can.”

Nothing. But then—

Three taps. Good enough. He keeps talking, putting a little extra smooth in his voice to keep them calm, to keep them listening—

“Here’s how this is going to go. I’m a gambling man, and so I’m gonna bet that you’re in there, hungry and scared and feeling like people without a country—and you are, because by now I’m sure you heard, Adelhard’s story about Palpatine being alive was a big old nasty lie. I’m gonna take that bet and I’m gonna say you’d be fine, just fine, with dropping your weapons so we can open up this door, escort you out, and get you a hot meal and a warm bed. I’m not interested in prosecuting you. Not gonna throw you into some New Republic dungeon. I’ll even put my blaster away so when I walk inside, you know how serious I am about this. Tap if you hear me.”

Tap, tap, tap.

“Good.” He steps away, tucking his blaster into the holster at his hip. Lando signals to Gladstone. “Unseal it.”

The Wing Guard engineers get to work, crouching on each side of it, blast masks over their eyes as they ignite plasma lances to burn through the line of puffy metal alloy sealing the door. Sparks sear lines in the air.

And then it’s done. Two engineers stand by the door, one on each side. They use the lever ends of their lances to jack the door.

It falls hard in Lando’s direction, and he gently steps aside as it hits the floor. Wham. A puff of smoke and a whirl of embers follow. Lando knows that a hail of lasers might come sizzling out of that doorway and cut him to pieces—but he also knows that whoever is in there realizes they’ll get cut to pieces in return.

No hot meal. No warm bed. Just body bags for each of them.