"Simmer down. You didn't come over here to talk to me just to point out the obvious, did you?" The glass was empty in front of Bossk; he pushed it away with one claw-tipped finger. "You must have had your reasons. Some-body like you always does."
Figh's black, beadlike eyes still flashed with irritation. "So smart, then you say. My reasons, talk with you."
Bossk had dealt with other Mhingxins in the past. They had a simple, easily manipulable psychology.
"Sim-ple," he said. "You think the two of us can do some busi-ness together." Mhingxins had a low self-image, due probably to their resemblance to the kind of furtive crea-tures that crept into food supplies on any number of worlds, and a well-aimed personal remark could easily provoke them. That's when their guard slipped. "You know what I want to do; maybe you got some notion of how you could help me accomplish that."
"Help you? Not likely!" Figh thrust his tapering snout forward; his long, hairy, and knobby hands flattened themselves against the table. "Want to track down Boba Fett, get name back, do it on your own. Got information that could help, but give to you, think again."
"Come on, Figh; nobody gives anybody anything, not in this galaxy. But now that we've established that you've got something to sell, we can talk about price."
" 'Sell'?" Figh drew back, eyeing Bossk warily. "What would be?"
"Information, obviously. You don't have to play around with me. You must have something on Boba Fett, some-thing that you think I'd be interested in. Okay, you're right about that; I am interested." Bossk jabbed a finger toward the creature on the other side of the table. "I was interested even before you came around, trying to get the price jacked by getting me all worked up about Fett. So let's deal."
"Deal... price ... sell..." Figh shook his head. "All need something else, if happen."
"What's that?"
"Credits," Figh said bluntly. "Your credits. Got?"
"I've got enough." Bossk shrugged. "For the time being."
"Said before. Doesn't look like it."
It was Bossk's turn to grow irritated. "Appearances can be deceiving."
"Very." Figh had recovered enough of his compo-sure to show his unpleasant smile again."But have to be credits up-front. Pay as you go. Not running a tab; not with me." Figh nodded toward the bartender at the other side of the cantina. "Stiff that fool, you want. Here, business."
Business was all that mattered. Bossk had already made some decisions along that line. It wasn't just a mat-ter of his own personal priorities, his thirst for revenge against Boba Fett, that had led him to put off going after Gleed Otondon and the pilfered treasury of the old Bounty Hunters Guild. He was caught in a double-bind situation: as useful as all those credits would be—there was more than enough to buy a new ship and completely outfit it with all the necessary weaponry for hunting down and eliminating Fett—his chances of successfully tracking down Otondon were virtually nil as long as his own reputation was so badly impaired, with every other bounty hunter with a grievance against him in the way. It was a better idea, with the limited resources at his dis-posal, to reestablish his reputation by settling his own grudge against Boba Fett; that would make him a feared individual once more in the galaxy-wide community of bounty hunters, and he would have a free hand in going after the stolen property that should rightfully have been his all along.
"All right," said Bossk. "Business it is. Pay as we go." He leaned across the table, bringing his hard, unsmiling gaze close to Figh. "What've you got for me?"
"Very valuable." Figh didn't flinch. "Location of Boba Fett. Where at. Now."
Bossk was impressed. "You got that?"
"No. But can get."
Unimpressed now, Bossk sat back, his spine against the booth's padding. "Let me know when you do. Then you get paid."
"Don't worry." Figh slid out of the booth. "You see me again."
Bossk watched the Mhingxin work his way through the crowd that had started to fill up the cantina. Then Figh was gone, up the stairs to the surface and the streets of Mos Eisley. Where presumably such marketable infor-mation could be found.
He hoped that Figh did come back with the info. That was something he wouldn't mind paying for, no matter how slim his finances were at the moment. You can't hit a target, he told himself, if you don't know where it is. All the time he had been traveling toward Tatooine, he had made attempts to discern Boba Fett's whereabouts. That had been a big part of Bossk's rea-sons for coming to the planet on which Boba Fett had last been spotted, taking off from the Dune Sea with another bounty hunter named Dengar and some danc-ing girl who had managed to escape from Jabba the Hutt's palace; Bossk didn't even know her name, or why Fett would have had enough interest in her wel-fare to have kept her around. But those two had been with Fett when another low point in the continuing litany of Bossk's humiliations at his hands had occurred. With another one of his underhanded psycho-logical ploys, Boba Fett had managed to chase Bossk out of his own ship, the Hound's Tooth, and once more into an emergency escape pod, hurtling away from what Bossk had thought was certain destruction but which had turned out to be only a dud autonomic bomb.
It was a good bet that Boba Fett was still in pos-session of the Hound's Tooth. Fett's own ship, Slave I, had been found abandoned by a Rebel Alliance patrol squad. Along with Dengar and the female, Boba Fett must have transferred over to the Hound and piloted it toward some unknown destination. Which makes, Bossk thought grimly, one more thing he's stolen from me. Bossk's reputation and his ship; Boba Fett had a lot to answer for.
And Bossk had already vowed that he would. That kind of payback could only be made in one kind of coin. Death. The taste of blood in Bossk's jaws would not just be imagined then; soon it would be real.
He sat brooding for a while longer, hunched forward at the table, the empty glass in front of his claws. Brood-ing and wondering where Boba Fett was right now; he was already impatient for Eobbim Figh to return with that information.
Probably taking it easy somewhere, Bossk thought bitterly. The Hound's Tooth was a good ship, well ap-pointed in the best of Trandoshan taste; not just an effi-cient hunting craft, but one with a minimal but necessary degree of comfort for its rightful owner. Thinking of Boba Fett lounging about in the Hound's comforts infu-riated him even more.
He's there, seethed Bossk, and I'm stuck here. His claws closed into fists, aching for a throat to break in-side them.
There was no justice in the galaxy. While he scrabbled for a place to lie low, on a backwater hole like Tatooine, Boba Fett was safe in the peace and tranquillity of inter-stellar space, far from harm.
No justice at all...
3
She had just about decided to kill them both.
Neelah looked at the back of Boba Fett's helmet as he sat at the cockpit controls of the Hound's Tooth. There was no indication that he was aware of her standing in the hatchway behind him. But knowing Fett, with his constant, preternatural awareness, she felt sure that nothing was getting by him. He can bear the blood rush-ing in my veins, thought Neelah. He knows.
The other bounty hunter, the one named Dengar, was still asleep in the ship's cargo area. Neelah had left him there, worn out from relating Boba Fett's grim history to her. Like most bounty hunters, Dengar was a creature of action; shifting words about, bringing the past to life in even the rawest, most direct terms, was hard labor for him. Especially under duress; she had woken him up be-fore this last time with a blaster pistol aimed at his head. She had been impressed with the degree of motivation that had inspired in Dengar.
She still had the blaster pistol with her; in fact, it dan-gled from her hand as she watched Fett adjusting the ship's navigational controls. Originally, it had been one of Boba Fett's weapons; she had managed to slip it away from him here in the cockpit, before he had been able to stop her. That had earned Neelah a grudging congratula-tions from him. Very few creatures had ever managed a stunt like that.