Star Wars - Han Solo and the Lost Legacy by Brian Daley

under control again. The others laughed, particularly Chewbacca, whose Wookiee chortles made the bulkheads ring. Badure rapped time on the gameboard and even Han was tapping a toe or two. He opened the flask, took a swig, and passed it to the Wookiee. “Here, this’ll put some curl in your pelt.” Chewbacca drank, then sent the flask along. Even Skynx accepted a drink.
    They demanded another number after that, and a third. Badure eventually jumped up, both hands over his head, to demonstrate the Bynarrian jig. He capered around the compartment as if he were twenty kilos lighter and as many years younger.
    At the height of the Bynarrian jig the ship’s hatch signaled. Badure and Chewbacca rushed off, eager to see what Hasti had brought back. Bollux and Blue Max looked up from the strobing rapid-readout screen, and Skynx began extricating himself from his instruments.
    “Step one completed!” he said in his quick fashion. “Skynx, of the K’zagg Colony, off on a treasure hunt! If my clutch-siblings could see me now!”
    But when the Wookiee reentered the compartment, he slumped dejectedly over to his partner and sank into the couch, head in hairy hands.
Bad as that
? thought Han. Badure followed, one arm clasped around a despairing Hasti. She took a sip from the flask, coughed, told her story quickly, then took another.
    “Voice-coder?” Han exclaimed. “Nobody said anything about a voice-coder.”
    “Maybe Lanni never realized her voice was being printed,” Badure replied.
    “That steward,” Hasti muttered. “I should’ve jabbed my gun into his bellybutton and offered to glaze his gallstones for him.”
    Han handed the half-empty flask to his copilot and rose. “Now we do it
my
way.” He headed for the cockpit, pulling on his flying gloves. Chewbacca fell in behind. “Want to know how to make a withdrawal? Stick around.”
    Badure hurriedly interposed himself between the two partners and the main passageway. “Steady there, boys. Just what’ve you got in mind?”
    Han grinned. “Swooping down on the vault, blowing the doors with the belly-turret guns, going in, and taking the disk. Don’t bother getting up, folks; it’ll all be over in a minute.”
    Badure shook his head. “What if a Tion patrol cruiser shows up? Or an Imperial ship? Would you care to have a hunter-killer team on your neck?”
    Han made a move to step around him. “I’ll chance it.”
    Hasti jumped up. “Well, I won’t! Sit
down
, Solo! At least consider the options before you risk the death penalty for all of us.”
    Chewbacca awaited his friend’s decision. Bollux watched impartially and Blue Max with a certain excitement.
    “Some forethought might not be out of place here,” Skynx contributed in a very subdued voice.
    Han disliked complications and subterfuge, but his hasty action was stayed, for the moment, by the conviction that being dead was the least interesting thing in life. “All right, all right; who’s hungry?” he asked. “I’m sick of ship’s rations. Let’s go see what kind of meal we can get in town. But if nobody thinks of a new one, my plan still goes.” He clipped the flask to his gunbelt while Chewbacca gathered up his bowcaster and bandoleer of ammunition. Badure found the small purse of local currency he had brought, and Bollux shut his plastron halves on Blue Max.
    Hasti saw Skynx shedding his instruments. “Hey, I never got to hear anything.”
    Badure looked around. “Bring them along,” he bade Skynx. The Ruurian began tucking his instruments into carrying cinches he fastened around himself.
    Pulling on his flight jacket, Han shut and sealed the hatch behind them. Storm clouds had moved in, and electrical discharges illuminated the clouds in strange flashes of red. Badure pointed out that the landlord’s cousins had disappeared. “They probably figured out they were guarding empty boxes.”
    “More likely they didn’t want to sit around in that leaky barn,” Hasti reasoned. The rest of