Light of the Jedi(70)

A piece of the doomed Legacy Run dropped out of hyperspace about thirty light-seconds from the New Elite, exactly where Kassav had predicted it would. Thank you, Marchion Ro and the Paths and whatever mastery of hyperspace allowed him to know the routes all the fragments would take—it was about to earn Kassav millions of credits.

He glanced at the targeting holos projected on the vidwall on the bridge, which had already locked onto the fragment. It looked like a compartment, intact. He’d heard that some of these things had people on board, settlers who had been aboard the ship before it disintegrated.

Oh well. Not his problem, either.

“Fire,” Kassav said.

Gravhan’s team was very good. A spread of laserfire and torpedoes shot out from the New Elite’s weapons array, headed straight for the fragment. They all impacted at once, hard, and the compartment vaporized, vanishing from the battle array on the vidwall. Perfect shot. Of course, they’d known what they were aiming at ahead of time, and had planned this all out…but still, it had to look impressive.

“There,” Kassav said, turning back to look out the front viewport where, somewhere sunward, Governor Mural Veen was probably feeling a bit less sure of herself. “Now you see that I’m on the up-and-up. Two more Emergences coming. Next one’s in ninety seconds. You have the account information. Pay up, or face the consequences.”

“You bastard,” Governor Veen said.

“Could be,” Kassav said. “Never knew my mom or my dad, though. Don’t think it matters. What matters are the choices you make in your life, not where you come from. Like the choice you need to make right now, Governor.”

The seconds ticked by. Kassav glanced over at Wet Bub, who shook his head. No transfer yet. A bit disgusted, Kassav gave him a go-ahead gesture.

Another set of coordinates was sent, with twenty seconds to spare before the Emergence. The New Elite wasn’t close enough to this one to get there in time. This time, the Emergence was going to happen, and nothing was going to stop it. But still…it could serve a purpose.



“You just got the coordinates for the second Emergence,” Kassav said. “You could have stopped what happens next, Governor. Remember that.”

Another piece of the Legacy Run flashed back into realspace, moving too fast for anyone to react.

Eriadu had one primary export—lommite, a mineral used in creating transparisteel, the alloy that formed the main component for starship viewscreens and portholes. When Chancellor Soh put her blockade in place, the cargo transports heading offsystem with full loads of lommite were stuck with nowhere to go. Those transports had clustered together in an open space not far from the nearest spot where it was safe to enter hyperspace, waiting for the moment the lanes reopened.

The fragment ripped through one of them, causing it to detonate immediately—and the shock waves took out four other vessels before they got their shields up.

“Ouch,” Kassav said. “That was a few hundred crewmembers, easy…not to mention all that lommite. What’ll that cost your system, Governor? Big money, I bet. Now you’re in a worse spot than you were before. And remember, one more Emergence on the way. You’ve got about four minutes. And this time it won’t be hundreds dying. It’ll be billions. Even you, probably. You’ve got the account information. Don’t wait too long.”

“This is evil,” the governor said. “You realize that, don’t you?”

Kassav turned to face his Tempest and rolled his eyes—more laughter.

“You’re laughing?” came the incredulous words over the comm. “You’re laughing?”

“Yeah, Governor. It’s funny, that’s all. It’s not evil. It’s business.”

“You’re sending these Emergences somehow, aren’t you? You’re doing this. It’s the only way it’s possible.”

“Does it matter? Time’s wasting, Governor. Two minutes.”



Kassav was getting a little nervous, truth be told. They needed to move, fast, to get in the path of the third Emergence, otherwise they wouldn’t be able to stop it—and he figured it was important that they did stop it, otherwise, well, this scam might not work so well next time, would it? He wasn’t even sure he’d go back to the Nihil at all after this, not with fifty million credits in his account and an entire Tempest loyal to him, and a list of all the other Emergences he could exploit.

Yep, Marchion Ro was absolutely not his father, just handing out valuable information like that. The man had this weird sense of loyalty to the Nihil. He thought they were something more than they were. The Nihil were a gang of criminals, and if there was one thing Kassav knew about criminals, it was this: You couldn’t trust them.

He was a perfect example.

Ninety seconds.

“Governor, you’re running out of time.”

“You’re monsters.”

“So are you, if you don’t save your people.”

“Fine,” Governor Veen spat. “The funds are being transferred now.”

He looked at Wet Bub, who gave him another thumbs-up. Kassav pointed at Dellex, who fired up the engines for the burn that would put them in the path of the third Emergence just as it appeared.

Gravhan’s gun crew got to work again, preparing the salvo that would destroy the final fragment and earn them their pay.