“It is when they offer you full pardons.”
And that is the statement that vacuums the air from the cabin. They’re all left in shock by that offer. A pardon has meaning. They each have a list of criminal sins longer than a Hutt-slug’s tail. And with the galaxy shifting as it is toward the New Republic—the day will come sooner than later when bounty hunters are forced to flee to the fringes if they don’t want to get swept up and locked away. The tension in the ship rises. Jas seizes it.
She goes on: “You work with me, I cut you in. You all get full pardons. Embo, Dengar. You both worked with Sugi. Maybe there’s something to be said for a little tradition, isn’t there?”
“They won’t leave me,” Swift protests with a vulpine stare. “They know their place. Won’t do them any good to betray Gyuti and make enemies of Black Sun. They’ll stay with me.”
“You forgot one part,” Dengar says.
Mercurial raises an eyebrow. “What?”
“We don’t really like you.”
The old bounty hunter clubs Swift in the side of the head with his blaster. The pretty boy collapses next to her, but he’s not content to go down quietly, oh, no—Swift moves fast, getting behind her and pulling his forearm against her windpipe. With the back of his heel, he kicks out and opens the side of the shuttle—the wall lifts, the ramp descends, and the brightness of the Jakku sun fills the cabin, nearly blinding them all.
He backs Jas toward the door, using her as cover.
“You could’ve all been rich,” he seethes.
Dengar has his rifle pointed but can’t get a shot. Embo stands but seems casually disinterested in the events. She knows that look. It’s not disinterest she sees. Rather, it’s a look that says he trusts her to handle this.
“You…forgot…one thing…” she says as Swift’s arm tightens.
“I forgot nothing,” he snarls in her ear.
You forgot that I didn’t remove all my horns, idiot.
With a hard grunt, she slams her head backward into his face. Her thorn-shaped horns dig into the meat of his other cheek and Swift howls—and for the hair’s breadth of a moment he relaxes his grip on her throat.
Jas moves fast. She slides free like a man slipping a noose, then ducks quickly and kicks out with a hard foot— It catches Swift right in the middle.
And the bounty hunter sails out the now open door of the shuttle.
Panting, Jas slams her heel against the button, and again the ramp ascends as the door closes. She rubs her eyes and collapses against the wall, weary. Dengar is looking at her with both surprise and satisfaction on his face. He gives her a curt nod. “Nicely done, Jazzy.”
Embo nods, too. In Kyuzo: “I am glad it turned out this way.”
The Rodian—whose name she doesn’t even yet know—calls back: “What’s going on back there?”
Jas winces. “She loyal?”
“Who, Jeeta? Pssh. Not to Swift, she isn’t.”
“Then I guess I have a new crew,” Jas says.
Dengar offers a sloppy smile and a wink. “Guess you do, love.”
“Lobot, we’re home.” Lando lifts a dubious eyebrow as he looks around, exasperated. “Guess the Empire didn’t keep up with housekeeping.”
This is the Casino level. Game machines line the smooth blue alactite floors far as the eye can see. Sabacc tables, too. And pazaak. And jubilee wheels. Along the far wall are banks of holoprojectors meant to show the latest swoop race down on the track-tubes piped through Bespin’s toxic Red Zone atmosphere. Once, this was a shining pillar of gambling excess: classy and bright with light coming in through windows looking out over the sun-kissed clouds. Now it’s wrecked. Trash drifts and tumbles. Machines have been turned over, their credits cut from inside like food from a beast’s belly. The windows are covered over with metal. The holoprojectors are dark.
Lobot steps up alongside Lando. The computer forming a half-moon around the back of the man’s bald head blinks and pulses, and at Lando’s wrist is a communication from his friend and cohort:
I’ll look into rehiring staff immediately.