Zorba the Hutt's Revenge Read Online Free PDF

amateur, totally inexperienced at the game. If Lando could talk Zorba into settling their dispute by playing a game of sabacc, then getting rid of this meddlesome Hutt would be a breeze.
    "Tell you what, Zorba," Lando offered. "I’m a gambling man and a fair sport. I challenge you to a game of sabacc. If you lose, you agree to get out of the casino, leave Cloud City, and never come back."
    "And if you lose the game," Zorba said to Lando, "you will leave Cloud City and never come back. And before you go, you’ll appoint me as your replacement as governor! Do we have a bargain?"
    Lando scratched his chin, thinking it over, recalling the time he’d gambled away the Millennium Falcon to Han Solo in a sabacc game. But Lando had learned a lot about sabacc since then. In fact, he was now the best player in Cloud City, second to none.
    "We have a deal," Lando said with a grin.
    Zorba spit into the palm of his right hand and held it out toward Lando. "Shake on it, then."
    Lando’s heart sank as he thought about having to touch Zorba’s saliva-covered hand. He held up two fingers like a Junior Galaxy Scout. "What if I just say, ’Cross my heart and hope to die’?" Lando asked.
    "Then you will die."
    Reluctantly Lando spit into his own palm. And in the most disgusting moment of his life, Lando clasped Zorba’s scale-covered hand and shook it.
    Then Zorba opened up his pouch that had the gemstones and took out his own deck of sabacc cards. "What’s that deck for?" Lando asked.
    "We play with my deck," Zorba replied.
    "Now wait just a minute," Lando protested. "We’re in the Holiday Towers Hotel and Casino. So we’ll play with a deck that belongs to the house-"
    Zorba wagged his fat tongue and chuckled. "I own the house," he said. "This is my casino, therefore we shall use my deck."
    "You don’t have any legal claim to this casino," Lando replied. "Jabba the Hutt died without a will. This hotel and casino automatically belongs to the government of Cloud City."
    Zorba roared out a belly laugh. "A-HAW-HAW-HAWWW! ." Then, with his huge, glaring reptilian eyes, Zorba glanced at the barrel-shaped droid at his side. "CB-99, show Lando the hologram of your file called JTHW --Jabba the Hutt’s Will!"
    As instructed, the little droid projected a hologram into midair. It showed the bloated, wrinkled face of Jabba the Hutt, reading his will. His instructions for what to do with his property upon his death were perfectly clear: "Since I have no wife or children," the hologram of Jabba explained, "if I should die before my dear father, then everything I own shall belong to Zorba the Hutt, including my palace on Tatooine, my hacienda in Mos Eisley City, the Holiday Towers Hotel and Casino in Cloud City, and-"
    The list of Jabba’s possessions went on and on. Then the hologram ended. And with it Lando’s self-confident mood also ended.
    Zorba laughed again, exposing the inside of his slimy mouth. "A-HAW-HAW-HAWWWW! . . ." he roared. "Just as I said, since I own the house, we shall play with my deck of sabacc cards!"
    Lando’s heart sank again. He inspected Zorba’s deck-twice. And to his surprise, he couldn’t find anything wrong with Zorba’s sabacc cards.
    Was it possible that it wasn’t a rigged deck after all, Lando wondered? Lando wasn’t able to discover the answer. He did discover, however, that it was the worst day he had ever lived. He lost every single round of the game. His foolish bet had wrecked his life.
    Lando didn’t know-or even suspect-that Zorba had won because the deck had marks that could only be detected by a creature that could see ultraviolet light!
    For the moment, all Lando knew was that within an hour of his losing, he was up in his penthouse suite for the last time, packing his things, ready to depart forever. And now Governor Zorba the Hutt was running the hotel and casino-and all of Cloud City!

CHAPTER 5
    Trioculus’s Factory Barge
    Han Solo was disappointed that his party ended without Lando