Tyrant's Test

by Michael P. Kube-Mcdowell

  “Then let’s look outside my office, at the people who just visit. The first administrator?” she asked challengingly. “How about Admiral Ackbar?”

  “No.”

  Leia looked down the table to where Ackbar sat. “Admiral?”

  Ackbar placed both hands flat on the table. “It is true that I have taken a special interest in Plat Mallar. I have made no secret of it, except where it might allow Mallar to escape the taint of my favoritism. It is also true, Admiral Graf, that I have in the past urged the President to release the Mallar recording, and I am glad that it has happened, by whatever means.”

  “No one could question—” Graf began.

  “Wait.” The admiral craned his neck until he could meet Leia’s gaze. “To answer your unspoken question, yes, I have a copy of the recording, in a secure partition at my home. But I give you my word that neither I nor that copy was the source of the leak. I do not know who was responsible.”

  “I accept your assurances, Admiral,” said Leia, turning to Graf. “I don’t accept yours. No one is to be exempt from your inquiry.”

  A chastised Graf said quietly, “Understood, Princess.”

  For General Carlist Rieekan, head of New Republic Intelligence, the problem was to assess the damage Ourn had done and prevent a recurrence. The first meant discovering exactly what information he had provided to the Yevetha. The second meant explaining how Ourn had escaped official attention until he turned the black box over and turned himself in.

  “Not that it’s of any great consequence, Princess, but it looks as though you decked the wrong spy,” said Rieekan.

  “Why is that?”

  “I had seventy people up all night looking into this, and there’s no plausible link between Belezaboth Ourn and the interception of Tampion,” Rieekan said. “He’s a nobody, with no connections—a small-time parasitic little sneak all puffed up with air. He simply didn’t have an opportunity to acquire and deliver anything at the level of sensitivity of General Solo’s appointment or Tampion’s flight plan.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  “Very. Ourn fell apart during the night, started telling the truth as fast as he could blubber it out. He doesn’t even know that the general is missing.”

  “Then there’s another Yevethan spy—more highly placed.”

  “At least one,” said Rieekan.

  “The viceroy’s afternoon callers,” said Graf. “Senators Marook, Peramis, and Hodidiji.”

  “They are all getting a close look,” said Rieekan.

  “What about the black box?” asked Leia.

  “Interesting device,” said Rieekan. “Not quite entirely black, but close. We took it into the cold room and opened it in the dark, under vacuum. Good thing we did. The power supply is wired with an oxidation fuse, set to go critical if the box is opened. The yield would probably be about equal to a proton grenade. We took holos and closed it up again, very carefully.

  “Then we put it on a dummy transceiver rig, connected the way Ourn showed us. The dummy rig looks like a real transceiver to the device but has only one ten-millionth of the output power needed to actually open a hypercomm channel—just enough for us to record the signal for analysis.

  “I just got an update on that before I came in,” Rieekan said, looking down at his datapad. “Apparently the box uses a burst-compression algorithm that we haven’t quite deciphered yet to hide the signal in the noise. Very efficient.” He looked up at Leia. “And distinctively Imperial, according to my senior engineer. Probably hatched right here on Coruscant, back in the days of Section Nineteen and Warthan’s wizards.”

  “Can you use what you’ve learned about this one to find the others?” Leia asked.

  “Possibly. We should be able to catch any new transmissions. We might get lucky and find some old ones hiding in the archived traffic, now that we know what we’re looking for,” said Rieekan. “But I’d like to suggest another way we might use what we’ve learned.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “We have the tools for a small campaign of disinformation,” he said. “We have a working black box and a desperately willing turncoat who’ll do most anything we ask. What if we just let him keep talking to the Yevetha?”

  Leia nodded thoughtfully. “Do you have any ideas about what we might want to have him say?”

  “I have one,” Nanaod Engh interjected, drawing attention to his end of the table for the first time. “We don’t really know for certain if the Yevetha have General Solo, or—forgive me—if the general is alive. Nil Spaar has ignored every message we’ve sent him. He hasn’t even tried to communicate with us since leaving Coruscant, except through his deeds. Perhaps Ourn can get him to break his silence—”

  On his return to Pride of Yevetha, Nil Spaar’s first concern was to inspect his new breederies. There were three of them, each with forty-eight alcoves. Before the conversion, they had been detention blocks, and they still largely retained that character—the conversion had required surprisingly little renovation.

  Picking cells at random, Nil Spaar satisfied himself that each was well suited for the hanging and nurturance of a birth-cask. The walls were plain and clean, the plumbing suitable for feeding lines, and the ventilation fully isolated from the systems for the rest of the ship. There were even individual drains in each alcove for the sacrifices and the rite of emergence.

  The new breederies required a new crop of tenders, eighteen in all. After inspecting the new facilities, Nil Spaar had the tenders called together so that he could assess their fitness. Most were experienced hands who had known many successful nestings, but only a few had been neutered.

  “Long before all these alcoves have been filled with ripening mara-nas, you will begin to feel the power of the breeding magic,” the viceroy warned. “The cry of the ancient imperatives of flesh and joy will become a distraction, then a compulsion. You must become immune to this call, lest you betray your solemn duty as custodians of the future.”

  Nil Spaar gave no thought to giving them the option of withdrawing from his service. Service to the darama was an unequaled honor, and service aboard the grand flagship an unprecedented honor. It was unimaginable that any of the tenders would refuse those honors merely to preserve their own poor chance of parenthood. The breeding guildmaster of Giat Nor had made the recommendations and arranged for the affected households to receive replacements—that was all the consideration necessary.

  After that, all that was left was to inspect the marasi who had been brought aboard to help Nil Spaar fill the new breederies. Chosen from the thousands who had offered themselves, the twenty young females waiting in what had once been detention block F were without exception appealingly supple, pleasingly eager, and understandably anxious.

  Nil Spaar found the combination energizing, and indulged himself, selecting one of the marasi for a mating on the spot. By the time they were finished, the marasi in the adjoining cells were writhing with need in response to the scents and sounds, and a reinvigorated Nil Spaar took each of them in succession. When the third act was breathlessly complete, he called to the narada-ti, who had discreetly removed herself to a distance at which she could pretend not to have heard the passion-cries.

  “This one,” he said, walking down the corridor, pointing into a cell at one still untouched. “And this one. Bring them to me in my chambers this evening, after the tolotan has been read.”

  “Yes, darama,” she said, bowing with respect.

  “When will the others be brought aboard?”

  “The next group is expected in twenty days,” she said.

  “Are there nest-quarters free?”

  “Yes, darama, both here and in block G.”

  “Then accelerate the selection,” said the viceroy. “Have the next group received as soon as it can be accomplished.”

  “Yes, darama. Only, your senior tender cautioned that the mara-nas should be hung at intervals, out of consideration for the timing of the births and the demands
on the breedery. Too many too close together—”

  “That is not your problem,” he said. “Fill the nest-quarters with your best, and keep them filled.”

  “Yes, darama.”

  Only then did Nil Spaar return to make himself available to Tal Fraan, who had pestered Eri Palle with queries as to the viceroy’s schedule and pleas for an early audience. They met in the upper command lounge, a large semicircular compartment high on the forward face of the command tower. The command lounge’s double-shielded viewpanes provided a spectacular view of the Star Destroyer’s broad eight-kilometer-long spear-point hull.

  “Is it not invigorating,” Nil Spaar said as Tal Fraan was led in, “to see how much power has passed into the hands of the Blessed? Can any doubt that we are the children of the All, the inheritors of the ancient glory?” He turned away from the viewpanes and accepted Tal Fraan’s surrender with a touch. “How far shall that glory carry us, my young disciple? How much shall we claim with our ambition?”

  “We are truly the inheritors, darama,” said Tal Fraan. “But even within the boundaries of the All, our claims have been contested. It would seem that ambition alone cannot measure our destiny.”

  “Nowhere is there a ship the equal of this one. Nowhere is there blood as powerful as that of the Pure,” said Nil Spaar. “They will all yield to us, in time.”

  “I have come to speak with you of one who still resists,” said Tal Fraan. “I have had a new insight into the heart of the pale ones. We must not send them the recording from the viewing hall. It will move them to anger, not to surrender.”

  Nil Spaar flexed his large hands. “Does my memory deceive me, or was it not you who counseled that we must show Leia our hostages?”

  “I did so in error,” Tal Fraan said bluntly. “Only fear will give us the result we desire—fear for themselves, for their own safety. Fear for the safety of a hostage can stay a hand, but it will not turn a heart. And when a hostage is harmed, fury replaces fear.”

  “And from where does this insight come?”

  “From the vermin,” said Tal Fraan. “I spoke with him aboard the shuttle. I wished to measure his response to the execution of his companion—whether it had served to make him fearful for his own life. I wished to know if the experience had heightened his sensitivity to our concerns or increased his eagerness to be helpful.”

  “You were disappointed.”

  “I was alarmed. I am now convinced that if you transmit the recording of the execution, the vermin will never turn away,” said Tal Fraan. “My alarm was so great that I ordered that message held until I could speak with you.”

  “So Vor Duull informed me,” said Nil Spaar. “Knowing me well, he wondered at your presumption and came to me for confirmation.”

  Tal Fraan’s face was painted with dismay. “Have I forfeited your trust, darama?”

  “That remains to be seen, Proctor.”

  A flicker of relief crossed Tal Fraan’s eyes. “Has the message been sent, then?”

  “No,” said Nil Spaar. “But I am not yet convinced it should not be. When there has been a problem of obedience with the Imperial slaves, the public slaughter of a handful has always been sufficient to guarantee the behavior of the rest.”

  “There is little spirit in them after so many years,” Tal Fraan said. “They were bred for obedience. These others—the vermin queen, her consort, even the pilots we have faced—seem different. They show a foolish stubbornness and a dangerous independence.”

  “You find them unpredictable, then.”

  “No, darama. I will still risk my own blood on my understanding of them. Showing them the ones we hold will strengthen them, not weaken them. Uncertainty better befriends us.”

  “And yet there is this,” said Nil Spaar. “An hour ago Vor Duull brought to me news of a conversation one of his guildsmen had with Belezaboth Ourn.”

  “The Paqwe spy? He has given us nothing of value for many weeks.”

  “Perhaps he has done so now,” said Nil Spaar. “The vermin reports that Leia does not believe we hold her consort—that she does not think us capable of such an interception.”

  “But we allowed there to be witnesses!”

  “Then their witness went unheard or unbelieved,” said Nil Spaar. “Ourn said she grieves for him but continues on her course unchecked, even in the face of an effort to unseat her. Surely this confirms that your first counsel was correct. We must show our hostage to the vermin queen. That will surely change her tone.”

  The backs of his hands pressed to his cheeks, Tal Fraan walked the length of the viewpane wall and back before responding. “No, darama. I cannot agree. There is nothing in what he says that promises that knowledge of the truth will deter her aggressions. Han Solo answered me with defiance and threat. Surely her fire is of the same temperature as his. You yourself have noted the uncommon closeness of the bond between them. They have risked all for each other—boldly, surrendering nothing. It is in the material you yourself gave me.”

  Nil Spaar directed his gaze out at the great vessel beneath and before him, noting how the unfiltered light of N’zoth’s golden sun made lines and edges gleam like burnished metal.

  “Then what course do you now counsel to remove the infection from these stars?” he asked at last.

  “We have not managed to make them fear us,” said Tal Fraan. “But there are already shadows they will not enter. And the greatest of these is the fear that the horrors of the past will be repeated. The strength of her challengers feeds on this fear. We can confirm their prophecies. We can help them to destroy her.”

  With more than fifty connected structures and twenty thousand rooms and chambers, the great size and complexity of the Imperial Palace had inspired many stories.

  It was said that near the end of construction, eight workers were lost for nearly a month when their comtracker failed. Rumors persisted about a chamber with no doors, sections with a hundred or more rooms that had never been occupied, and the hidden treasure compartment of “the pirate general,” Toleph-Sor.

  There were at least eleven offices and nine other rooms with their own true stories of murder, plus the grisly tale of Frona Zeffla, who died at her desk and went undiscovered for more than a year. Longtime staffers recalled how the children of Palpatine’s aides, given free rein to roam at will, played three-day-long games of “Hunter” in the lifts and corridors.

  Though much of the old palace had been damaged or destroyed by the clone Emperor’s Force Storm, what survived or had been rebuilt was still easily large enough to either hide in or get lost in. That was a key reason the first administrator had required everyone above the third rank to carry a comlink and to keep it active. Nearly everyone above the third rank required those who served below them to carry them as well.

  But Engh’s edict did not apply to Leia, whose comlink was typically off as much as it was on. So at the outset of the Yevethan crisis, Alole and Tarrick had conspired with the security teams to make certain that someone with an active comlink was constantly in touch with the President whenever she was in the Palace.

  Alole had had the duty that afternoon, but in a busy moment, Leia had slipped away unannounced through her office’s second exit. The aide did not discover the President’s absence until General Rieekan’s red-border alert pushed everything else off the comm displays throughout the suite.

  Her first call was to The Sniffer, who should have been standing by at the only entrance to the executive level. “Are you with the President?” Alole asked.

  “No, ma’am. She has not left the floor.”

  Next Alole paged Tarrick, who by then had already heard about the alert. “Have you seen the President?”

  “No. She’s not with you?” he asked.

  “She scampered sometime in the last half hour.”

  “I’ll query the spotters,” said Tarrick, referring to their private list of nine offices and seven ministry officials it was Leia’s habit to visit. “Have you looked in the cave?
”

  “I’m on my way there now.”

  Her feet carried her flying down the back corridor toward the little-used private spaces in the adjacent tower. Mon Mothma had used them as an extension of the President’s office, holding private meetings in the small, intimate lounge, taking air and exercise in the sunny garden courtyard. Leia rarely went there—when her office walls closed in on her, the Princess usually preferred to escape the executive level entirely.

  But that was where Alole found her—dead asleep on the triangular corner bed in the privacy room. Looking down on Leia’s peaceful expression, Alole hesitated to wake her. Leia’s fatigue had been obvious to everyone that morning, and this was the first time in many days that she had seen Leia’s face unmarked by tension and frown lines.

  Then, sighing, Alole reached out and took hold of the golden-green metal post at the nearest point of the triangle. Shaking it gently, she said Leia’s name twice, then stepped back.

  “Tarrick—she’s here,” she said quietly into her comlink. “We’ll be out in a minute or two. Set up the recording for replay. See if General Rieekan wants to come up.”

  “I’m on it,” Tarrick said. “Admiral Ackbar is on his way over from Fleet.”

  The distinctively tinny sound of Tarrick’s voice as heard through a comlink seemed to be what finally reached through Leia’s fatigue and demanded her attention. She sat up with a wordless cry, unfocused eyes, and balled fists.

  “It’s all right. It’s only me, Alole,” the aide said, slipping the comlink back into her pocket. “Come—hurry. Nil Spaar is on Channel Eighty-one.”

  Four of the six people at the conference table with Leia were seeing the viceroy’s announcement for the second time. Only one of them ventured to try to prepare her for what she would see.

  “If this is an answer to Ourn’s message,” said Admiral Graf, “the message is that we’ve been worrying about the wrong thing. Han Solo is no longer important.”

  “Let me hear it for myself,” Leia said, reaching for the controller.