New Threat Read Online Free PDF Page B

friend,
    Ygabba
    Boba shook his head, marveling.
    “Ygabba, you definitely have the best taste in presents,” he said at last. He locked the holoshroud in place on his belt. “Guess that’s it…”
    He was ready to go. For a moment he looked longingly at his jet pack. That would sure make it faster to get around.
    But as he reached for the jet pack, he heard a burst of laser fire from outside. There was an answering volley, followed by an explosion.
    Boba shook his head. “Too risky.”
    Reluctantly he left the jet pack where it was. He adjusted his helmet so it covered his face and stepped forward, opening the airlock. For one last instant, he stopped and stared back at the
interior of his ship—he hoped he’d make it back here. Then he closed the airlock and opened the outer door.
    A rush of warm, marshy air surrounded him, thick with the smells of rot and stagnant water. A flare of cannon fire made the towering mushrooms shake like grass in the wind. He heard distant comm
static and shouting, the scream of something that was not human.
    Boba smiled. “Wat Tambor, here I come!”
    His hand poised above his blaster, Boba Fett took his first step onto the surface of Xagobah—and into the unknown.

CHAPTER EIGHT
    Slave I
had landed in a small clearing in the mushroom forest. After checking that the area was safe, Boba ran quietly until he reached the edge of the clearing. He
stopped and looked back.
    His ship was gone.
    For a moment Boba’s heart stopped. “What?”
    Could the Republic forces have found him so soon?
    Suddenly he remembered. Jabba’s interstitial shield! He laughed hoarsely. “Guess that proves the cloaking device works!”
    Boba gazed to where his ship was hidden.
I’ll be back as soon as I can,
he thought.
With Wat Tambor—dead or alive!
    He touched his helmet in farewell, turned and began to make his way through the forest.
    “Ugh!”
    Boba swatted at a thick, slimy purple-green tendril that reached for him from an overhanging branch. The tendril recoiled like a cratsch preparing to strike. A cloud of green mist puffed out
from it, and a smell like rotten meat.
    Boba grimaced. “Funny, Jabba didn’t mention moving, stinking mushrooms!”
    He activated his helmet’s filtration system. As he stepped for ward his boots sank into sticky ooze.
    “Ugh!” Boba groaned again.
    From the air, Xagobah’s fungus-covered surface had appeared solid. But now that he stood on it, or in it, Boba saw it was about as solid as mugruebe mucus. He pulled his foot up. There was
a loud belching sound, as the ground beneath sucked at his boot hungrily.
    Maybe leaving the jet pack behind hadn’t been such a good idea….
    Before he could take another step, a deafening sound tore the air overhead, followed by a blinding burst of flame. Instinctively Boba flung himself back toward an umbrella-shaped fungus three
times his height.
    That was his first mistake.
    “Hey!” Boba shouted.
    The huge mushroom had a gash in its side, big enough to hold Boba. He thought he could hide there from whoever was firing. Instead, great slimy folds of fungus suddenly extended from the
mushroom, like huge mynock wings. They covered him until he was wrapped in a slimy cocoon, with only his head free. Then they yanked him backward to the base of the fungus-tree. A putrid scent
filled his nostrils. Boba’s hands lashed out, struggling to free himself.
    That was his second mistake.
    The instant his fingers touched the rippling fungus, they were stuck fast. And the more he struggled, the worse it got. Within minutes, he was entirely stuck. He could feel his blaster at his
waist, but he couldn’t move to retrieve it. His fingertips grazed the handle of his vibroshiv, but he couldn’t free it. He could scarcely breathe.
    And that, unfortunately, seemed to be the point.
    Because Boba could still see. And what he saw was that he was slowly, inescapably, being pulled toward the gash in the side of the great mushroom-tree.
    Only