spider’s body. All were closed save one. Light spilled out into the sky through the open doors.
“There is a crowd near the port’s entrance,” the pilot said.
Malgus looked away from the open launch doors to see dozens of people pouring out of one of the entrances to the spaceport and milling about. Most were port workers in dungarees, citizens of Coruscant whom the Empire had pressed into service to do menial labor at the port, but he counted perhaps twenty Imperial soldiers, a dozen navy sailors, and a handful of other soldiers in half armor.
He pressed his face to the window to look more closely at the soldiers. He saw Captain Kerse, one of those he had picked to accompany Eleena.
But he did not see Eleena.
“Set down near the doors,” he said. “Quickly.”
The shuttle touched down with a heavy thud and Malgus hurried out. Upon seeing him, the Imperial soldiers snapped to attention and offered a salute. The workers backed away, fear in their eyes. Perhaps they’d heard of what he’d done at the hospital.
Malgus walked up to Captain Kerse, a powerfully built man whose bald head sat like a boulder upon his thick neck. Malgus towered over him.
“Darth Malgus, there is a fuel gas leak in the small-craft landing area. We evacuated while the safety system—”
“Where is Eleena?” Malgus asked.
“She is …” Kerse looked around the crowd. His skin turned blotchy. To one of his men, he said, “Where is the Twi’lek?”
“I saw her near the other shuttle, sir,” replied another of the soldiers. “I assumed she followed.”
Malgus grabbed Kerse by his plasteel breastplate and pulled him nose-to-nose.
“She was with you before the gas leak?”
Kerse’s head bobbed on his neck. “Yes. She—”
“Take me.”
“The fuel gas, my lord.”
“There is no fuel gas! It is a ruse to get to Eleena.”
To get to him.
“What?” Kerse said.
Malgus threw Kerse to the ground and strode past him for the port’s doors. Behind him, he heard Kerse call out for the other soldiers to follow. By the time the doors slid open before Malgus, he had six elite soldiers with blaster rifles in orbit around him.
“This way, my lord,” said Kerse, taking position beside him.
“SPEED AND PRECISION,” Zeerid said, as much a reminder to himself as to Aryn. “Speed and precision.”
They watched the launch doors pull back to vent nonexistent fuel gas. The open doors revealed the landing pad below. Zeerid saw the two Imperial shuttles, the Dragonfly-class drop ship. The sirens continued to scream. The automated voice on the speakers continued to drone on.
Zeerid would hijack the drop ship. He’d have to dodge Imperial fighters and cruisers on his way out of Coruscant’s space. The shuttles would fly like the square heaps they were, and he’d get shot down as soon as he cleared the atmosphere. The dropship, at least, would give him a decent chance of getting clear.
He took Aryn by the bicep. “You can still come with me, Aryn.”
She looked him in the face and he saw once more, for the first time since seeing her again, the deep understanding that lived in her eyes.
“I can’t,” she said.
“You can,” he insisted. “You’ve honored your Master’s memory.”
“Time to go,” she said. “Speed and precision, you said.”
He bit back his reply and once more they wrapped T7 in their shared grasp and leapt into the void. Again Aryn’s power slowed their descent and cushioned their landing.
They hit the pad’s metal-and-duracrete floor, assaulted on all sides by the wail of the sirens and the relentless voice on the loudspeakers. Zeerid took quick stock of the situation.
He saw no one in the landing area and the only way out—a pair of double doors leading into a long corridor beyond—were open. Everyone must have evacuated.
Both of the Imperial shuttles had their landing ramps down. The drop ship did not and the canopy of its cockpit was dimmed, as opaque as dirty water.
“Tee-seven, I need you to crack open that Dragonfly. Right now.”
The droid beeped agreement and wheeled toward the drop ship’s rear door. Zeerid looked to Aryn and gave it another try.
“Reconsider, Aryn.” He stood directly before her, forcing her to see him, to hear him. “Come with me. Please.” He smiled, trying to make light. “We’ll start a farm on Dantooine, just like I said.”
She smiled, seemingly amused by the thought, and he was pleased to see it. “I can’t, Zeerid. You’ll make a good farmer, though. I’m going to find the Twi’lek and—”
She stopped in mid-sentence, her eyes fixed on something over Zeerid’s shoulder.
He