Sleek grinned at me from the other side of the table. "Exactly. That's why you can't beat me."
As exasperating as it was to admit, the scoundrel had a point. He wasn't entirely undefeated, but at 20 games of Sabaac to my 3, his advantage was clear. Either his strategy was iron-clad, or he was cheating. Knowing Ronin, I expected the truth was somewhere in between.
Just then, Shakalakahh's growl sounded over the ship's intercom. We were coming up on our destination. Ronin and I rose and joined him in the cockpit of the Corellian Hawk.
Outside the front viewports floated the planet of Ord Mantell, its two moons hanging silently nearby. Shortly after departing Yormban Prime, we had dropped out of hyperspace briefly to change course. We had headed for Corellia, to throw any potential followers off our trail, and had then set a course for the Bright Jewel system more or less at a whim. We'd all heard that it was an interesting place to visit, but none of us had ever been there.
We put down just outside a small town, choosing to try to remain inconspicuous rather than draw attention to ourselves by setting down in a starport, which would immediately put us on the grid. It would mean some extra hassle for the repairs we had to make, but we decided the effort would be worth our protection.
The region we found ourselves in was a desert, spotted with odd rock formations and seemingly unending expanses of sand. It was late at night, and the temperature was well below the freezing point of water. We decided to rest for the night and venture into town the next day, to see what we could see.
