Scheming

Just then, in the outer space of Roon.

The Lancer YT-1000 emerged from hyperspace. Inside the ship, Tang Xiao opened his eyes and sat up. "Have we arrived?"

"That's right, this is Roon. But we still don't see who we're supposed to hand this thing over to." Cun Te weighed the storage device in his hand.

"Let's wait a little. I don't think this will be that simple," Tang Xiao said.

"Funny, I was thinking the same thing. How are you feeling, boss? If anything goes wrong later, we'll have to rely on your strength." Cun Te smiled at Tang Xiao.

Tang Xiao glanced at the stainless steel cup beside him, raised a hand, and focused. The cup trembled before being lifted by an invisible force, flying over and landing at his feet with a clang.

"Looks all right. I can do quite a few things." Tang Xiao clenched his fist.

Just then, a transmission suddenly came through on the ship's open channel. The holographic projection showed the very Falin woman who had commissioned them on Tatooine. She sneered. "You did well and got the item. Now hand that storage device over to me, take your payment, and this will no longer concern you."

"I think it would be better to hand this thing directly to Lord Hego." Cun Te smiled. How could such a petty trick possibly fool him?

The Falin woman's expression turned cold. "Don't refuse a toast only to drink a forfeit! Bring it over and give it to me now, or I'll come take it myself!"

"Radar signals incoming! From the asteroid belt!" Kunto suddenly said. After a flurry of operations at the console, images of two ships appeared on the screen.

One was a thirty-eight-meter-long vessel that looked like a turtle, while the other was a larger, trapezoidal medium-sized ship measuring 52.3 meters long.

Kunto's face went pale when he saw the two ships. "A Ghtroc Class 720 light freighter and a YV-865 Auro class freighter!! What the hell? They could clearly have handled this job themselves, but they made us do it instead!"

"Oh, those ships both look quite a bit bigger than ours. They'll probably be hard to deal with." Cun Te glanced back at the screen and even let out a relaxed whistle.

"Looks like they just wanted to reap the benefits without having to wade into that mess on Makito," Tang Xiao snorted.

"I think they want more than an easy score. They also want to take care of us while they're at it." Cun Te said, "I'll bet twenty Wupi of Kunto's money that the second we hand over the storage device, blaster bolts will blow our heads apart."

"I'll bet a hundred Wupi of Kunto's money that we'll get shot in the head the moment we board their ship." Tang Xiao smiled.

"Then do we have time?" Cun Te asked another seemingly random question.

"I think we do." Tang Xiao's gaze fell on T-850.

"Hey! Why are you two so completely unaware of the situation?!" Kunto felt like he was about to collapse. "We're out of fuel and ammunition! Unless we land at a port on Roon to resupply, we can't make another hyperspace jump! And this!!"

He turned the screen toward them. The two freighters, modified to look like hedgehogs, filled everyone's view. "Those two ships are much bigger than ours! After all those modifications, we're absolutely no match for them! I'm just a smuggler at best, and this ship barely has any upgrades!"

"You might as well just admit you didn't have the money for upgrades. Because you never dared take on the high-risk, high-reward jobs." Cun Te hit the nail on the head. "And this ship definitely wasn't bought with your own earnings. Someone either gave it to you, or you inherited it. Am I right?"

"That doesn't matter!" Kunto pointed at the screen and shouted. "They're coming!"

"Looks like you still want to struggle? Ha, that's fine. I'll come take it myself. Don't worry, I'll leave you intact corpses. I'll try." The Falin woman's venomous voice came over the open channel.

Cun Te exchanged a glance with Tang Xiao, then shouted in feigned panic, "No! Please don't do this! We surrender! We'll give you the item right away..."

"Hahahaha! Now that's a good boy. Lower your shields, power down your weapons, and dock with my ship. Don't try anything! There are twenty people aboard my ship!" the Falin woman said sharply.

"Okay, okay, I'll do it, I'll do it." As Cun Te spoke, he shut down the weapons system and lowered the ship's shields. The entire vessel was now completely defenseless as he guided it toward the YV-865 Auro class freighter.

"Good. I'll be waiting for your item." The Falin woman sneered and cut the transmission.

"What do we do? Are we really giving it to her? She'll definitely kill us once she gets it!" Kunto shouted, but before he could finish, Tang Xiao tossed something at him.

He caught it on reflex, only to find it much heavier than he had expected. Looking down, he saw a black assault rifle!

"This is... a gun? It even uses solid ammunition? Do people still use these?" Kunto froze.

"A gun that can kill is a good gun, whether it fires blaster bolts or bullets." Tang Xiao said. "Do you think shield generators grow on trees?"

Kunto fiddled with the rifle and suddenly understood. A bead of cold sweat slid down from his temple. "Wait, are you planning to fight them?"

"What else? We came all the way from Makito, practically crossing the Milky Way Galaxy. We're short on fuel and ammunition now. Are we supposed to have a firefight with those two modified freighters?" Tang Xiao said as he helped Kunto pull the charging handle and disengage the safety.

The YT-1000 light freighter slowly approached the Auro class freighter and opened its docking bay. Aboard the freighter, the Falin woman directed more than twenty fully armed mercenaries to surround the entrance. "Open fire the moment the door opens! I want the storage device, not those mud-dwellers! Fis! Pilot that Class 720 and keep watch. If they try anything, destroy their ship immediately!"

"No problem, boss."

A tremor ran through the ship. It looked as though the two vessels had begun docking. The Falin woman stepped back a few paces, took out a sniper rifle, and stood behind the mercenaries, staring fixedly at the door.

The hatch slowly opened, but a large amount of sterilizing mist suddenly sprayed out from the passageway, obscuring their view. Cun Te's panicked voice came from behind it. "Wait! Don't shoot! Otherwise, I'll destroy the storage device immediately!"

"Kill him. Take the storage device and leave," the Falin woman whispered from the rear.

The hatch opened fully. Before the sterilizing mist had completely dispersed, the mercenaries already had their fingers on the triggers. Suddenly, a huge black shadow came crashing down on them!

It was the wreckage of a speeder!

Why was there something like that aboard a spaceship?!

Bonus illustration 1: Falin