Sacrifice

"I think we have help."

"I hate help I didn't ask for."

But help it was, so he took the breathing space with grudgingly grateful caution. Maybe their invisible benefactor was saving them for himself. Slave /was standing between two battered freighters, looking nothing special to anyone who didn't know the ship, just an old Firespray idling her drives.

Fett grounded the speeder bike and ran for the ship. Who would pick off Fraig's morons for him? Generosity like that came with a price. Fett left Mirta to dock the speeder in the hold and climbed up into the cockpit.

"Come on, girl, what's keeping you?" He tapped the console switches and Slave I whined up to full power, a faint tremor passing through her airframe. It said safe. It said home. It was the most reassuring sound he knew. "You've got twenty seconds before I close the cargo hatch."

There was no answer, and just as that fact registered, Slave I's entry warning light flashed. There was someone else on board. The systems didn't recognize them.

"Mirta? Mirta!"

The internal security cams showed nothing but the speeder. Fett grabbed his blaster and went aft to check. Even through the helmet filter, he could smell a strong, oily stench that he hadn't smelled in years.

He couldn't quite place it, but he knew it.

The speeder was stowed. The hatch was open. He raised the blaster and wondered whether to just seal the hatch and launch Slave I, and hate himself for the rest of his life, what was left of it.

Dad wouldn't have left you stranded. He'd have risked anything for you.

Fett had abandoned quite a few people over the years. He'd even left