Part 15 (1/2)
”Does your brother know how you handle a lightsaber?”
”Yes...”
”So maybe I can show you how he might use that tech-nique against you.”
Humility, girl. Remember humility. ”Of course. Thank you.”
The barn was roughly constructed out of timber and du-raplast sheeting, pierced by shafts of sunlight from dozens of gaps in the boards. All Jaina could see those gaps as now were sniper positions, vulnerabilities, and she'd never felt exposed like that before. She had strong enough Force powers to get herself out of trouble, didn't she? She could deflect blaster bolts. She could leap clear. She could Force-throw.
Fett had psyched her out.
That was it. It had to be. It was all the family baggage, all the stories she'd grown up with about what he'd done to her father, and how he never stopped, never gave up, how he just kept on coming and not even the Sarlacc could kill him. But that wasn't going to help her defeat Jacen. Now that she could pause to look at her small audience, she found it was a big man in dark gray armor, face obscured by a helmet, a young, blond, bearded man who seemed to be with Mirta, and another older man with magnificent black matted braids strung with gold clips, his ebony skin marked with raised scars. He gave her a knowing wink. If she'd met him in another context, she would have taken an instant liking to him.
”Don't you get it, Solo?” Fett asked.
”You played on your propaganda, I think.”
”No, I played on your mistakes. You read my body lan-guage wrong.
You a.s.sumed you were safe.”
”It's hard to sense danger from you.” Oh, that's clever. You're just confirming how he can kill more Jedi. She ges-tured with her thumb at Beviin. ”I was picking up more from our friend here.”
”And you still held back.”
She pointed to the burn across his plates. ”Hey, I hit you fair and square.”
”You a.s.sumed too much. You're just training, n.o.body wants to hurt you, the nice Mando is helping you, he's standing all wrong to attack...
you want to win? Start out to win. Hit first.”
”You're telling me to fight dirty. I get that.”
”No, I'm telling you this isn't about lightsaber tech-nique. I'm more than twice your age, no Force powers, and I still got you to drop your guard. Winning isn't about being better. It's finding your opponent's weakness and ex-ploiting it.”
”So what's Jacen's?”
”What's yours?”
Jaina chewed her lip in thought, aware of Mirta's gaze.
She looked like more trouble than her grandfather. What if I'd just walked in and laid into Fett, no h.e.l.lo, how are you, anything? Just went for him? Could any of them have stopped me? I...
The realization dawned on her. ”I use appropriate force. With a small f. I follow the rules of combat.”
”Good.” Fett rolled the lightsaber hilt in his palm and then slid it into the dump pouch on the thigh of his pants. ”You're learning. Next lesson-Goran will show you how to go crazy with a blade.”
”But what about Jacen's weaknesses?”
”They're yours.”
”He's my twin. I know him.”
”And he knows you. Be someone else.”
Jaina clipped her lightsaber to her belt and understood both the simplicity and enormity of her task. The solution was obvious. It was just very hard to achieve. She didn't need to be fitter, or stronger, or more skilled; she needed to play it so out of character that Jacen wouldn't be able to counter or antic.i.p.ate her.
”If I could be that different, Fett, I wouldn't be a Jedi.”
”There you go, ”said Fett, and walked away.
Mirta and the two men without helmets followed him. Beviin stayed.
The big guy in dark gray took off his helmet and gave Jaina the kind of look that said she was some-thing he'd wipe off his boots.
”Is this Fett's idea of mystic enlightenment?” she asked.
Beviin shrugged. ”It's not hypers.p.a.ce engineering.”
”Pity.” Jaina considered wiping the scowl off the big silent guy's face but decided it was impolitic. ”I could handle that.”
Beviin walked toward the doors and jerked his head for her to follow. The man in gray ambled along beside him.
”We'll try to give you an alter ego, ”Beviin said. ”A nasty Jaina.
A crafty, cheating Jaina. A bounty-hunting Jaina. You up for that, Med'ika?”
”I'm all for giving folks a second career option, ”he said. He was very well spoken, surprisingly so, as if he was a highly educated man.
Jaina had expected him to be an inar-ticulate brute. ”But she can service the tiller droids first. Can't we send her back and get an AgriCorps Jedi instead?”
Beviin laughed. ”Ingrate.”
Fett had vanished. Jaina wondered what he got up to in his private hours, and when Beviin pointed out the hovel Fett was staying in, she was genuinely shocked. He could have had a palace. Beviin's farmhouse, with its shantytown of outbuildings and moat-like boundaries, reminded her more of a bastion than a haven of rural peace. The tunnels and pa.s.sages seemed to run everywhere. Nothing was quite as it seemed.
She stood in the grimy workshop with her arms in the oily guts of a tiller droid, listening to the whine and roar of vessels overhead-fighters, definitely, the way the falling note indicated something moving away from her at high speed. While she adjusted clearances and checked filters, a small girl-five, not a day older, she was certain-appeared in the doorway to stare at her. She wore a tiny version of the flight suit every Mandalorian had, with scaled-down but loose fitting plates that looked a couple of sizes too big, and a hold-out blaster hanging from the belt that looked full-size on her.
The blaster was real.
”Hi, kid.” Jaina smiled, ready to deflect a bolt.
”Su'cuy, jetii.”
”Is that your blaster?”
”Mama gave it to me.” The girl unholstered it like a pro-fessional, checked the safety catch, and held it with the muzzle pointing safely away from Jaina. ”I'm five and a half. I'm training.”
”You and me both, sweetheart.” Jaina swallowed hard, more touched than worried. ”You and me both.”