Part 32 (1/2)
Her apartment was on the five-hundredth floor, and armored rats didn't make it into her neighborhood, let alone know how to use the turbolift. She looked around, realizing she'd left the blaster on the table, and as her gaze swept past the sliding transparisteel doors to the balcony, she saw it: a salky, a domesticated version of the Kath hound, a popular pet among the trendy set in Galactic City because it didn't shed fur and didn't need much walking. The animal stared at her, head c.o.c.ked appealingly on one side, and put one paw against the gla.s.s in a mute plea to be let in.
It must have jumped across from an adjacent balcony. Some people had no idea how to look after their pets. Besany tutted loudly and opened the doors just wide enough to talk to it without letting it in. It thrust its muzzle through the gap, whimpering and trying to lick her hand.
”Aww, sweetie, where did you come from?” Salkies had a thick mane that covered their whole head from shoulders to eyes, and looked a much cuter creature than the savage predator they were bred from. ”Did some silly person leave the doors open? Where's your collar?” She risked fumbling through its mane to look for some ident.i.ty tag; these creatures were expensive, so it was certain to have one. ”We'll get someone to collect you, sweetheart. You just hold still...”
”What is this?” said the salky in a liquidly rich male voice. ”Has your building got a no-pets rule or something? Let me in before somebody spots me.”
Besany yelped and jumped back, stunned. Before she could even begin to panic about hallucinations, the salky deformed into a smooth shapeless ma.s.s and squeezed through the gap like molten metal before changing color. Now Besany was looking at a pool of black glossy material that resolved into a four-legged, fanged creature like a sand panther.
”Fierfek,” she said, and that wasn't a word she used often. ”It's you.”
The Gurlanin narrowed brilliant orange eyes and padded over to the sofa. ”I'm not Jinart, but I suppose we all look the same to you. Am I allowed on the furniture?”
”Look, I...”
”Don't worry about the name.” He sniffed around the room as if checking for something. ”Your people kept your side of the bargain. The last human has left Qiilura. So as a parting gesture of goodwill to those charming soldier boys, I have some information for you.”
The Gurlanins had said they could be anywhere and no-body would know. She almost asked this one if he'd thought about a career in Treasury Audit, then had a chilling thought that a Gurlanin could have been working right next to her or following her in the street at any time. What did you say to a shapes.h.i.+fting spy? ”That's very kind.”
”One, make sure you keep that blaster with you at all times, because your meeting with Senator Skeenah did not go unnoticed, and you're under surveillance by Republic Intelligence, and I don't mean Sergeant Skirata's men. I mean the highest level of government.” He shoved his snout into the kitchen and snuffled again. ”Two, you won't find Dhannut Logistics, because they don't exist. They're a front for moving credits around inside Republic finances. You did well to find the connection with Centax Two, but if you keep cras.h.i.+ng around you're going to get caught, so I'll save you some time. Yes, there are clones now being produced in facilities outside Kamino-some here, most on Centax, and a lot of them. No, the Grand Army command hasn't been told, be-cause those Jedi generals will want the extra men to deploy right away, but they won't get them. So you can pa.s.s that on to your contact.”
Besany didn't think she'd been cras.h.i.+ng around any-where. She was mortified. ”Why should I believe you?”
”Because Qiilura has a fragile ecology and we know Skirata is a vengeful little piece of vermin who really could persuade the fleet to melt it to slag. We want to be left alone now. Really alone.”
”I see.”
”We'll maintain a presence here, by way of insurance,” said the Gurlanin. ”Not that you'd notice.”
”Okay, but can I ask...”
”No.”
”Just the..”
”I said no. And don't be tempted to dig further, because you have no idea what you're really dealing with.” The Gurlanin sat back on his haunches and looked as if he was shrugging his shoulders, rippling long muscles, and then she realized he was changing form again. ”Things can always get a lot worse.”
”Did I really crash around?”
”Actually, you did exceptionally well-for a human. But that's not going to be good enough. And things might be get-ting too dangerous even for us.”
He lapsed into silence without explaining what that meant, and then became a shapeless lump of marble before extruding-there was no other word for it-into a man, up-right and all too familiar.
Gurlanins were perfect mimics. She'd seen one posing as a civilian employee she worked with, and never spotted it. They could pa.s.s as anyone and anything!
It seemed they could also pa.s.s as clone troopers. Besany stared back at a man in white armor who could have been Ordo, except he wasn't behaving like him, and he didn't have a helmet. The replica smiled coldly at her; her stomach churned, and it took every sc.r.a.p of strength to stop herself from thinking through the implications of that chilling little trick.
”I'll let myself out the front door,” he said. ”It's not as if people don't know about Ordo now, is it?”
For a long time after the Gurlanin left, Besany couldn't bear to sit down on the sofa or even use the refresher, be-cause she no longer had any idea what was real and what was illusion. She paced around, horribly awake with no prospect of getting to sleep tonight, and wondered what she could safely do and say even within her own home. But she had her secure comlink, and she needed to trust something right then.
She keyed in Ordo's code and tried not to think of the Gurlanin who could metamorphose into him so fast, so easily, and so convincingly.
Outskirts of Eyat, Gaftikar, 478 days after Geonosis A cl.u.s.ter of blue-lit T-shapes wobbled toward him in the darkness, and Darman checked the chron in his HUD.
”Lights out, vode,” Niner said, and the blue lights vanished. Omega Squad were now invisible to infrared and EM scans, and very nearly invisible to the naked eye as well, although it was still easier to see them than detect them with sensors. ”Torrents approaching from the south, time on tar-get eight standard minutes.”
”I'm s.h.i.+fting the remote,” said Atin. ”There's activity on the eastern side of city, vehicles moving. Has Leveler got any high-alt.i.tude scans online yet?”
Darman's HUD display was a ma.s.s of image icons: the views from the remote they'd sent up earlier to observe the positioning of mobile anti-air cannon, the point-of-view screens from each of his brothers-Fi's was shaking slightly in a definite rhythm, showing he was back in his private world of deafeningly loud glimmik music-and a composite feed from Leveler, currently displaying a Torrent pilot's view of a low-level approach over the unspoiled countryside.
Darman never liked having time to think too much, especially now. He kept seeing the restaurant and the mini mall in the unirail station. A'den told him he was overidentifying as part of adjusting to the presence of the civilian world, seeing what he could have been in that world, and that it'd settle back down to worrying about his own shebs very, very fast. He hoped so.
Niner opened the link to Leveler. ”Leveler, this is Omega, do you have any real-time imaging you can show us yet?”
”Omega, we do, and we're trying to identify the civil defense headquarters and the comm station.”
”Leveler, we have anti-air units moving around here. Please advise Torrents.”
”Omega, can you confirm this marked coordinate as the comm station?”
”Leveler, affirmative, but is that now a target?”
”Omega-only for ground forces. We're targeting the relay satellite from orbit.”
Niner made his impatient-Skirata noise, clicking his teeth. ”Leveler, we'd like voice links to the Torrents. Please advise on frequency.”
It wasn't supposed to be done that way because it made for confusing voice traffic, but Niner always wanted the option of aborting a strike himself rather than relying on a relay via the s.h.i.+p. Leveler's end of the link went silent.
”I hope he's asking Pillion or whatever his name is for per-mission, and making it snappy,” said Fi. ”Six minutes to tar-get.”
Atin huffed. ”Two triple-A units on the move, Sarge. I'm transmitting the coordinates anyway.”
”Leveler,” Niner said, ”triple-A units moving. You should have new coordinates. Can you confirm you've identified those?”
”Omega, confirmed.”
”Leveler, I'll run through the frequency range and ident.i.ty the Torrent channel...”
”Omega, please avoid direct comm because of risk of conflicting orders. Stand by for sitrep.”
Niner snapped over to the closed squad link for a brief, angry moment. ”In your dreams, di'kut. If I lock on, you can't block me.” Then he flicked back to the s.h.i.+p's link. ”Leveler, understood. Omega out.”
”Mir'osik,” Fi muttered. ”We're the ones on the ground.” Niner checked his Deece. ”We're going to have to teach them respect for special forces someday.”
”Etain thinks Commander Levet is a good vod,” Darman said. ”But I'd still feel happier if I could interrupt and point out if they were hitting the wrong target. It gets a bit frantic in the comm center sometimes.”