PROLOGUE THE IDIOT'S HAND Oh the stories I could tell So many of them true Hondo Ohnaka to Ezra Bridger far as wretched hives of scum and villainy went As Bazine Netal thought that Black Spire Outpost seemed friendlier than most Certainly the Trandoshan running the supply company was more than willing to point her in the direction of her quarry He didn't even ask her why she was looking for the Weequay He just sold out his neighbor for a few credits She moved through the crowded streets Although she looked striking in her black leather skull cap and Rishi eel ink tipped fingers no one paid her any attention The locals were used to all manner of beings coming and going Still Bazine knew better than to turn her back on any of them Especially not when she was so close to her goal She had been a long time getting there After being led on a chase across the galaxy she had tracked the Millennium Falcon to the planet Batuu and its infamous port Black Spire Outpost
Glancing above the roofline of the buildings Bazine could see how the place found its name Rising above the shops and dwellings were the petrified trunks of what were once giant trees that had dominated the skies of that world Now their blackened remains stood as silent sentinels on the outskirts of the town The outpost was not an easy place to find unless you knew about it first It was located where the Unknown Regions met Wild Space a stopover for smugglers and those of less savory occupations a place for rogues and opportunists con artists thieves and of course pirates So it made a sort of sense that her target would be there After all the infamous Hondo Ohnaka had been all those things and more Bazine's intelligence had told her that the notorious Weequay scoundrel was there on Batuu where he was running a shipping operation called Ohnaka Transport Solutions Doubtless it was a thin front for a smuggling operation But it didn't matter to Bazine what it was She wasn't interested in his services just his ships or rather one of them in particular One very special ship She found the old pirate in a busy cantina where a repurposed RX-series pilot droid was playing upbeat music to an audience that mostly ignored it But there was Hondo He was sitting at a corner table playing
sabacc with a nervous looking Ithorian a furry Yarkora and a grinning Suerton Surprisingly the Weequay didn't even have his back to the wall If she had gone there to kill him he would already be dead Fortunate for him then that she wasn't planning to At least she wouldn't unless she had to And that remained to be seen Still the way he had his back to half the room struck Bazine as unnecessarily careless and ridiculously trusting trusting It certainly spoke to his legendary overconfidence In fact Hondo wasn't so much sitting in his chair as sprawling in it a drink in one hand and three sabacc cards in the other He wasn't playing it close to the vest either but swinging his sabacc cards in time with the music As she approached him from one side Bazine could easily glance at his hand He had a two a three and the face card known as a sylop sometimes called the idiot He was grinning like one too although judging from the pile of credit chips on the table it looked as though the Suerton was the one who was winning winning the most My friends said Hondo his voice ringing out with a happy lilt that was almost musical I cannot tell you how much it pains me to take all of your credits today you I make it too easy And as my sweet mother used to say if you're going to bet bet big But He tossed an impressive handful of credit chips onto
