Part 35 (1/2)
”Look, I'm sorry Qiilura went to osik. I'd never have suggested it if I'd thought the vhette were going to put up a fight.” He stood up and faced her with the awkward air of someone trying not to notice or comment on her b.u.mp, but it seemed to trigger some anxiety in him. Mereel still looked as if he was meditating. ”Jusik's intercepted Delta. He can't steer them away from Tropix, not since our chatty Twi'lek buddy mentioned it to them, but he's giving them a very rambling and unspecific briefing on the geology of the islands.” Ordo's comlink chirped, and he walked a few meters aft to sit on the cowling of the port drive to answer it. Mereel got to his feet and went to join him.
Etain had expected Skirata to get as far away from Dorumaa as he could. ”Aren't Delta going to be a little conspicuous in their full Katarn rig on a tropical island-in Sep s.p.a.ce?”
”If you've seen some of the fas.h.i.+ons we've seen parading by in the last hour, ad'ika, I'd say they might get away with it.”
”I don't understand why you're still here.”
”You think we'll be any more secure on Coruscant?”
”Maybe...”
”Guess who Ko Sai was running from.” It took Etain a few moments before the light went on. ”Oh. Our respected leader?”
”Head of the queue. Plus the Kaminoan government, the Seps, and us. Coruscant's the last place I can stash her.”
Etain didn't think that would be a problem for Skirata given his business contacts. ”Can't your Wookiee a.s.sociate find her a soundproofed apartment where Vau can beat the living daylights out of her without upsetting the neighbors? Like last time?”
”She's scoping out other locations, ad'ika. Besides, Vau won't get a look in. My boys don't have happy memories of Ko Sai.”
”I'm missing a few details in this, aren't I?”
”That's why I think we should go down below and have a quiet discussion, all of us.”
The hatch set abaft the c.o.c.kpit turned out to have a ramp rather than the ladder Etain was dreading. A pungent scent of strill wafted up from below. She thought Skirata was right behind her, but when she looked, he was still up top, and Walon Vau was waiting for her with Mird, who seemed to re-member her if the excited grumbling and snuffling were any guide. The crew cabin was oddly un-s.h.i.+p-like, with a square of scruffy sofas facing one another around a low table bolted to the deck. She sat down and Mird laid its head in her lap, s...o...b..ring happily.
But there was something else on board. Etain's Force-senses detected what she could only articulate as a cold void: the three-dimensional shape it conjured up somewhere be-hind her eyes was a smooth concave, not the rippling, multi-layered, and colorful impressions she got from most beings. She didn't need to be told who or what was in one of the crew cabins that opened onto the main crew lounge. Ko Sai was in one of the compartments, disdainful and unrepentant as she awaited her captors.
”My father would have called this the mess deck,” Vau said. When it suited him, he had an effortless patrician charm that was hard to square with how he disciplined his men. ”I admit I still flinch when I hear Kal using terms like backward and on a s.h.i.+p. I also admit that it's confusing to have a vessel that's both a maritime and air a.s.set, though.”
”So what do you plan to do with her?”
”Ko Sai or Aay'han?”
”Ko Sai.”
”It's rather like watching a kragget rat chase a delivery speeder in the lower levels. If they catch one, they realize they have no idea what to do with it, and just sink their fangs into the fender.”
”Oh, I think Kal knows what to do.”
”Etain, I'm quite used to judging who'll want to divulge their innermost thoughts to me after a little persuasion, and I don't think her cooperation is likely.”
”What's she holding out for?” Etain was now distracted slightly by the delay up top, and the foreboding she'd felt ear-lier was now solid and spreading like an oil slick. ”What does the life span of a clone matter to her anyway?”
”Professional ego, my dear. She can create life, or shape it to her design, or snuff it out. That G.o.d-like power warps any-one. She's not bargaining with us.”
”You've got everything she ever worked for.”
”Yes, it must be sobering for her to realize that we only need a fraction of it and we don't care about the rest.” Etain noted the we. ”Kal's not going to sell it... is he?”
”Absolutely not. He's pretty cavalier about the property of others, but this has become his life's cause. It's literally do or die for him.” Vau frowned slightly and went to the foot of the ramp to peer up into the fading light. ”What are they doing ip there? Delta's going to pa.s.s this way and see them, and that'll blow everything.” He took a few steps up the ramp and called to them. ”Special sea duty men to stations, secure all hatches ...”
Vau was almost smiling, clearly in a good mood and playing the sailor, but that smile faded as Ordo came down the ramp with his comlink clutched tight in his fist. Mereel and Skirata followed him, all of them with that same dazed look. Etain could see her bad news coming. I'd know if it was Dar. I really would. It's not Dar. It can't be. She waited, one hand resting on her belly, refusing to even consider it in case thinking it made it happen. ”Who is it?” she asked quietly, ”Fi,” said Ordo. ”He's been wounded. He's in a coma.” Etain found she had suddenly veered from accepting the reality of warfare to believing it would never happen to the men she knew, and that it wasn't fair when it eventually did. ”That was Darman calling. He said they were caught in an explosion during the a.s.sault on Gaftikar, and Fi took a pounding. He's in Leveler's medbay, in low-temperature bacta. Ruptured spleen, too, but it's mainly the head trauma.
He's stable. That's a good sign. Really, it is. It's just a matter of waiting until he regains consciousness.”
Ordo was rea.s.suring himself. It didn't seem to have occurred to him to let Darman speak to Etain, but the fact that he'd swept past that told her everything was okay. She felt angry with herself for thinking of Dar first and not concentrating on Fi, Now she was painfully aware of Ordo's dis-tress. Me and Fi were close.
”Better let Bard'ika know,” Skirata said. ”Leveler will be on station out on the Rim for a few more days yet, so if you give me an order, General Tur-Mukan, I'll recall Corr and he can make up the numbers for Omega until Fi's fit again.”
”Of course, whatever you need to do.” Skirata usually did as he pleased, but he was in a conciliatory mood today. ”Where is he, anyway?”
”Doing some a.s.set denial with Jaing.”
”I had to look up the data on Gaftikar when I knew where Dar was deployed,” Etain said. ”What a marginal thing for us to get involved in. Somehow I always thought the casualties would be in the big battles.”
The gathering had taken on a somber tone, and they all sat around trying not to meet one another's eyes. Eventually Ordo broke the silence.
”I'll go visit as soon as he's transferred from Leveler.”
”Which facility do troops get taken to?” she asked. ”Does Fi end up in a neurological unit?”
”I don't know.” The look on Ordo's face said it was more . than just being uncertain which of Coruscant's many hospitals would receive him. ”Men normally get treated by mobile units or in theater. They either recover, or die.”
”Atin was treated at Ord Mantell base last time,” Skirata said. ”He's got a chipped bone in his ankle, by the way. Dar's fine. Niner's fine. A'den's fine, too.”
”I hadn't forgotten them, Kal.” He sounded a little pointed. Etain was still processing the previous sentence, feeling uneasy. ”But I don't understand the medical system. Do they have that level of care within the Grand Army? Jedi gossip as much as troops do, and I hear that the mobile units are seriously under-resourced. I'd hate to think of Fi waiting in a long queue to be healed by one exhausted Jedi.”
Etain didn't know why she hadn't asked the question be-fore. She'd asked what happened to the bodies of those who died in action, and had no answer; but from that point she'd been working with special forces, and-after the initial disastrous casualty rate when they were deployed badly by novice Jedi generals-they didn't lose many men. The question went away. But now it was back.
Ordo glanced at Skirata as if asking permission to mention something, and got a barely perceptible nod.
”There's a Senator Skeenah who's made a nuisance of himself by demanding answers on what happens to badly injured men, and about long-term provision for troops in general.” Ordo's impression in the Force was still tinted with fear, but it was more like anxiety for the welfare of others. Etain knew him well enough to work out who was at the top of that list. ”But somehow I don't think his well-meaning campaign to set up charity homes for us when we're basket cases is actually addressing the problem.”
”Of course,” said Skirata, ”we don't know if he's aware that the Republic sends out hit men to execute clones who want to try their luck in Civvy Street, either.”
Vau was watching the conversation with an air of boredom, which usually meant quite the opposite. He kept looking across to the one closed cabin, which had to be Ko Sai's holding cell, and exuding impatience. ”If you broadcast that on the hour, all day on HNE, n.o.body would care, Kal. I guarantee it.”
”They'll care if the Seps start attacking Coruscant and interrupt their holovid viewing, all right.”
”But there's not going to be this ma.s.sive wave of protest on behalf of Our Brave Boys. You'll be knocked flat by the wave of apathy. Goodness, our slave army, bred to fight, dis-posed of when it's too much trouble? What a sensible system! Good for the Chancellor! That's what we pay our taxes for!” Vau dropped the bored act and came very close to ex-posing emotion for once. ”It saves all those civilians from having to look after their own democracy. The most you'll get is a few creds dropped in a charity box on the anniversary of Geonosis. No Senator is going to change a thing.”
Skirata jerked his thumb in the direction of the cabin door. ”Time we had another chat with Ko Sai now that we've got our Force-powered lie detector on board.”
Etain bristled. ”It's good to feel valued, Kal.”
”You can do something none of us can, ad'ika. Yes, it's valued.”