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decided that the brutes were merely bodyguard escorts. The Abyssin no doubt intimidated everyone else in the cantina, and now all the gunrunners on Peridon’s Folly knew that IG-88 had been hired by Grlubb.
    The petty dictator was a small, rodent-faced creature with a scarred nose and stubby feline whiskers that had been burned off in a recent duel. Grlubb surrounded himself with dozens of monstrous guards armed to the teeth, sometimes including teeth.
    “One of my rivals,” the rodent-faced dictator said, “has begun to develop unethical weapons. I simply cannot tolerate such behavior, especially from an inferior.”
    “What weapon can be unethical?” IG-88 asked, curious as to what this weasely creature considered beyond the pale of possibilities.
    “Biological weapons, insidious nerve gases—you know, things that don’t make a bang. That takes most of the fun out of it.”
    Grlubb slid a datadisk across his desktop, and IG-88 reached forward to pick it up in one powerful metal hand. As he moved, a dozen weapons suddenly cocked and trained themselves on the assassin droid, as if daring IG-88 to make a move against Grlubb. Because IG-88’s metal framework body could show no expressions, the other bodyguards had no idea how amused he was that they believed they could protect this dictator should IG-88 actually want to kill him.
    For his own amusement IG-88 ran a target map and calculated that he could probably kill every one of the guards in less than five seconds while sustaining minimal damage to himself. It might be enjoyable, he thought, but not true to his programming—certainly not if he hoped to sell his services as a bounty hunter to other clients. This first mission must go off perfectly.
    IG-88 fed the datadisk into his input reader, summarized the information. “It shall be done,” he said. “Give me until this afternoon.”
    Grlubb cackled and rubbed his clawed hands together. “Thank you! Thank you very much.”
    •   •   •
    IG-88 chose to use brute force rather than finesse. Blatant destruction would leave a much clearer calling card.
    He marched across a blasted wasteland that had been used for testing projectile weapons and detonating explosives that spread clouds of caustic gases. IG-88’s bulk left cratered footprints on the lifeless hardpan as he headed directly toward the target stronghold dug deep into a rust-red rockface. Lookout turrets and weapons emplacements guarded the corroded metal access door, but IG-88 walked straight up to the fortress. Not until the last moment did he see anyone stir in the guard turrets, and by that time he easily ducked under the range of the defensive laser cannons, standing too close in to be a decent target.
    He halted three meters from the scabbed surface of the armor-plated doorway and launched his first concussion grenade. He calculated that even from here the shockwave wouldn’t damage him.
    The detonation struck the center of the door and reverberated like an immense gong up and down the canyon. Rocks fell in a small avalanche from the cliff walls. The sentries in the turrets ineffectively blasted down with their laser cannons, leaving only scorched trails, but missing the droid.
    Using various spectral filters, IG-88 scanned the damaged door. The center blazed in infrared as the heat dissipated. He analyzed the vibrational signature and noted where the structure of the metal now showed fine crystalline cracks.
    Satisfied, he prepared a second concussion grenade.
    IG-88 had twelve in his store, and he expected this door would require only three.
    Actually, it took four grenades to completely destroy the door. As the smoldering molten wreckage of the doorway crashed to either side, IG-88 clomped into the fortress, determined to recalibrate his sensors and his predictive models when he had the time.
    He strode down the dark corridor, knowing that even now the target would be rallying his defenses, setting up ambushes along the way. But IG-88