by Timothy Zahn
Car'das shook his head. "You misunderstand. Bombaasa doesn't work for me, nor I for him. In fact, aside from Entoo Nee and the other few in my household, no one actually works for me at all."
"Right—you're retired," Shada growled. "I forgot."
"Or else you don't truly believe," Car'das countered. "Tell me, what is it you want for Emberlene?"
"What everyone else wants," she shot back. "At least what they want for big, important worlds like Caamas. I want justice for my people."
Car'das shook his head. "Your people don't want justice, Shada," he said, an infinite sadness in his voice. "They never did."
"What are you talking about?" Shada demanded, feeling her face warming. "How dare you judge us? How dare you judge anyone? Sitting out here all high and mighty, never deigning to get your own hands dirty, while everyone else fights and bleeds and dies—"
She broke off, her rising fury at his attitude battling against her deeply ingrained fear of losing control. "You don't know what it's like on Emberlene," she bit out. "You've never seen the suffering and squalor. You have no business saying we've given up."
Car'das's eyebrows lifted. "I never said you'd given up," he corrected her gently. "What I said was that you didn't want justice."
"Then what do we want?" Shada snarled. "Charity? Pity?"
"No." Car'das shook his head. "Vengeance."
Shada felt her eyes narrow. "What are you talking about?"
"Do you know why Emberlene died, Shada?" Car'das asked. "Not how it died—not the firestorming and massive air and space attack that finally crushed it—but why?" She stared at him, a dark uneasiness beginning to swirl into the flame of her anger and frustration. There was something behind his eyes that she didn't like the look of at all. "Someone feared our growing power and prestige and decided to make an example of us," she said carefully. "Some think that person was Palpatine himself, which is why we've never worked for his Empire." The eyebrows lifted again. "Never?"
Shada had to look away from that gaze. "We had millions of refugees to feed and clothe," she said, her voice sounding hollowly defensive in her ears. "Yes, sometimes we worked even for the Empire."
For a moment the room was filled with an awkward silence. "Principles are so often like that, aren't they?" Car'das said at last. "So very slippery. So hard to hold on to." Shada looked back at him again, trying to come up with a properly scathing retort. But nothing came to mind. In Emberlene's case—in the Mistryl's case—his quiet cynicism was all too true.
"At any rate, that particular principle was of no real value," Car'das continued. "As it happens, Palpatine had nothing to do with Emberlene's destruction."
He stepped past her and around to the data case behind Threepio. "I have the true history of your world right here," he said, waving at the top row of datacards. "I pulled all the information together once I knew you'd be coming here with Karrde. Would you like to see it?" Automatically, Shada stepped toward him... hesitated. "What do you mean by true?" she asked.
"What does anyone mean by true? We both know history is written by the winners."
"History is also written by the bystanders," Car'das said, his hand still up beside the datacards.
"By the Caamasi, and the Alderaanians, and the Jedi. Peoples who had no part or stake in what happened. Would you accuse all of them of lying?"
Shada swallowed, fear and a horrible sense of inevitability twisting itself around her throat. "And what do all these disinterested parties say?" she asked.
Slowly, Car'das lowered his hand. "They say that three years before its destruction," he said gently, "the rulers of Emberlene set off on a rampage of conquest. That for the first two and a half of those years they destroyed and conquered and plundered every one of the dozen other worlds within their reach."
"No," Shada heard herself whisper. "No. That can't be true. We wouldn't... we couldn't have done something like that."
"The average citizens weren't told the true story, of course," Car'das said. "Though I imagine most could have read between the lines if they'd truly wanted to know what their leaders were doing. But they had triumph and spoils, pride and glory. Why bother with mere truth?" Again, Shada had to look away from those eyes. It wasn't my fault, she wanted to protest. I wasn't there. I didn't do it.
But the words were hollow, and she knew it. No, she hadn't been one of those who had toasted Emberlene's conquests and looked eagerly ahead for more. But in dedicating her life to the Mistryl, she had in her own way helped to perpetuate the lie.
All because she had wanted to make a difference.
"You shouldn't take any of this personally, Shada," Car'das offered softly into her thoughts. "You didn't know; and the desire to make a difference is something held deeply within all of us." Shada looked sharply at him. "Stay out of my mind!" she snapped. "My thoughts are none of your business."
He bowed his head briefly. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to intrude. But when someone is shouting, it's usually difficult not to overhear."
"Well, try harder." Shada took a deep breath. "So what happened? How were we finally stopped?"
"Your victims and potential victims were too weak to fight back on their own," Car'das said. "So they pooled their resources and hired a mercenary army. The army was... perhaps overly thorough." Overly thorough. Again, Shada searched for a blistering retort. Again, there was nothing she could say. "And all in the sector rejoiced," she murmured.
"Yes," Car'das said quietly. "But for the stopping of a dangerous war machine. Not for the suffering of the innocent."
"No, the innocent are never a very high priority, are they?" Shada said, hearing the bitterness in her voice. "Does your true history tell who the army was who destroyed us? Or who their sponsors were?"
His face seemed to settle subtly. "Why do you want to know?"
Shada shrugged, an uncomfortable hunching of suddenly tired shoulders. "My people have never known who did it."
"And if I give you that information, what will you do with it?" Car'das asked. "Turn the vengeance of the Mistryl against them after all these years? Create more suffering among still more innocents?" The words were a sudden stab in her heart. "I don't know what they'll do with it," Shada said, a sudden misting in her eyes blurring her sight. "All I know is that it's the only thing I can take back that might let—" She broke off, swiping viciously at her eyes.
"You don't want to go back to them, Shada," Car'das said. "They're living a lie, whether they know it or not. That's not for you."
"I have to," Shada said miserably. "Don't you understand? I have to work for something larger than myself. I've always needed that. I have to have something to hold on to and serve that I can believe in."
"What about the New Republic?" Car'das asked. "Or Karrde himself?"
"The New Republic doesn't want me," she bit out. "And Karrde..." She shook her head, an acid burning in her throat. "Karrde's a smuggler, Car'das, just like you were. What kind of purpose is that to believe in?"
"Oh, I don't know," Car'das said thoughtfully. "Karrde has altered the organization considerably since my days with it."
"It's still the fringe," Shada said. "It's still illegal and underhanded. I want something honorable, something noble. Is that so much to ask for?"
"No, of course not," Car'das said. "Still, Karrde's much more an information broker now than he is a smuggler. Isn't that at least a little better?"
"No," Shada said. "In fact, it's worse. Information brokering is nothing more than selling people's private property to those who don't deserve to have it."
"Interesting point of view," Car'das murmured, his gaze shifting to Shada's right. "Have you ever considered it that way?"
"I haven't up till now," Karrde's voice said.
Shada spun around, shaking the last lingering tears from her eyes. Off to her right, dressed in a robe and ship slippers, Karrde was standing just outside the inner circle, regarding her with an odd expression on his face. "Perhaps I need to reassess my t
hinking," he added.
"What are you doing here?" Shada demanded.
"Car'das called me," Karrde said. He looked at Car'das, his forehead wrinkling. "At least, I think he called me."
"Oh, yes, definitely," Car'das assured him. "I thought you should be in on this part of the conversation." He bowed his head to Shada. "Forgive me again, Shada, if I startled you." Shada fought back a grimace. "He's just full of surprises, isn't he?" she commented.
"He's always been that way," Karrde agreed, stepping over to her side. "All right, Car'das. Your two puppets are assembled and awaiting your commands. What do you want from us?" Car'das's eyes widened in a look of innocence. "Me?" he protested. "I want nothing from you, my friends. On the contrary, I wish to present you with a gift."
Shada glanced at Karrde, found him throwing her the same suspicious look. "Really," Karrde said dryly. "And what kind of gift might that be?"
Car'das smiled. "You were never one to appreciate surprises, were you, Karrde?" he said. "Not too bad at dealing them out, mind you, but extremely poor at accepting them. But I think you'll like this one."
He turned to the data case behind him and selected two datacards from the top shelf. "This is the gift I offer," he said, turning back to face them, holding one of the datacards in each hand. "This"—he held up his right hand—"is the history of Emberlene I was just speaking to Shada about. Something she very much wants, or at least has thought in the past that she wanted. This"—he held up his left hand—"is a datacard I made up especially for you. One which I personally think will be far more beneficial for everyone in the long run."
"What's on it?" Karrde asked.
"Useful information." Car'das laid them down side by side on the computer desk. "You may have one of them. Please choose."
Beside her, Shada felt Karrde take a deep breath. "It's your choice, Shada," he said quietly.
"Take whichever one you wish."
Shada stared down at the two datacards, waiting for the inevitable emotional turmoil to twist through her. Her only hope of rejoining the Mistryl—perhaps her only hope of even staying alive through the death mark they'd put on her—lay there to her left. To her right was an unknown quantity, put together by an old man who might easily be half insane, for the supposed benefit of another man whose whole purpose in life was the antithesis of what she herself had always yearned for. But to her weary surprise, the turmoil never came. Had Car'das's earlier revelations merely burned all of it out of her, she wondered vaguely, leaving no strength left to drive such emotions as anger or uncertainty?
But no. There was no turmoil because there was no real decision to be made. Car'das was right: she could no longer work with the Mistryl, who served and killed and died so that Emberlene could someday rise again. Not now that she knew what Emberlene had once been.
And certainly not now that she could see what the Eleven might do with the knowledge on that datacard.
The justice she had once thought she was seeking had already been carried out. All that datacard could create was vengeance.
Reaching across the desk, distantly aware that she was now finally crossing the final bridge from her past, she picked up the datacard on the right.
"I'm pleased with you, Shada D'ukal, child of the Mistryl," Car'das said with a warmth she had never heard in his voice before. "I promise you won't be disappointed." Shada looked at Karrde, steeling herself for his reaction to Car'das's revelation. But he merely smiled. "It's all right," he said. "I've known who you are for a long time." She looked back at Car'das. "Who I was," she corrected Karrde quietly. "What I am now... I don't know."
"You'll find your way," Car'das assured her. Abruptly he straightened and rubbed his hands together. "But now, it's time to go."
Shada blinked. "Already? I thought we had until morning."
"Why, it is morning out there," Car'das said, coming around the computer desk and taking Karrde and Shada each by an arm. "Close enough, at least. Come, come—there's a great deal yet for you to do. You, too, Threepio—come along."
"What about this?" Shada asked, waving the datacard as Car'das hustled them up the aisle toward the exit.
"You can read it on the way to the rendezvous point," Car'das told her. "Just the two of you together—no one else. After that, I think you'll know what to do."
They reached the door and Car'das waved it open. "What about you?" Karrde asked as the old man steered them back down the hallway, now properly lit again, toward their rooms.
"My door's always open to you," Car'das said. "Either of you, of course. Come back anytime you want to visit. But for now, you must hurry."
* * *
An hour later, the Wild Karrde lifted from Exocron and headed out into space. An hour after that, after assuring himself they were properly on their way to their rendezvous with the waiting Aing-Tii ship, Karrde took Shada back to his office.
And sitting together in front of his desk display, they read the datacard. Shada was the first to break the silence. "He was right, wasn't he?" she murmured. "This is incredible. If it's true, that is."
"Oh, it's true," Karrde said, gazing at the display, his mind spinning furiously. Shada had vastly understated the case: incredible didn't even begin to cover it. "If he was nothing else in his entire life, Car'das was always reliable."
"I can believe that." Shada shook her head. "I take it we're going to have the Aing-Tii take us straight back to Coruscant with this?"
Karrde hesitated. Coruscant was of course the obvious choice.
But there was a complete range of possibilities here. Some very interesting possibilities indeed.
"Karrde?" Shada cut into his thoughts, her tone suddenly suspicious. "We are taking this back to Coruscant, aren't we?"
He smiled at her. "Actually, no," he said. "I think we can do better than that." He looked back at the display, feeling his smile turn grim. "Much, much better."
* * *
Standing astride the command walkway of the Imperial Star Destroyer Tyrannic, Captain Nalgol stared out into the blackness beyond the viewports.
There was still nothing to see out there, of course, unless one of their probe ships happened to dip into the edge of the cloaking shield or he wanted to contemplate the dirty edge of the comet at their side. But it was tradition for a ship's captain to gaze at the universe from his bridge, and Nalgol was feeling rather traditional today.
Four days. Four more days and the long, stultifying idleness would finally be over. Just four days, assuming the strike team was still on schedule.
Four days.
From the far end of the command walkway he could hear Intelligence Chief Oissan's slightly clunky footsteps approaching. Nearly ten minutes late, he noted with disapproval as he glanced at his chrono. "Captain," Oissan said, puffing slightly as he came up beside Nalgol. "I have the latest probe ship report for you."
Nalgol turned to him, noting the slight redness of Oissan's face. "You're late," he said.
"There was more analysis required than usual," Oissan said stiffly, holding out a datapad. "It seems the ships over Bothawui nearly started the war a few days early." Nalgol felt his eyes narrow as he took the datapad. "What are you talking about?" he demanded, keying for the proper file.
"One of the Ishori warships decided to push at the Diamala," Oissan said. "He came within half a blink of pushing them into open combat."
Nalgol swore under his breath, glancing over the report. If those hotheaded alien fools started their hostilities before the strike team was ready— "What stopped them?" he asked. "Never mind; there it is," he added, skimming the section. "Interesting. Did anyone get an ID on that freighter?"
"None of the probe ships were close enough for a positive ID," Oissan said. "But the follow-up comm traffic through the fleet said it was High Councilor Organa Solo. That's unconfirmed, though."
"But highly likely," Nalgol grunted. "Here to help Gavrisom calm everyone down, no doubt."
"No doubt." Oissan lifted his eyebrows. "The ru
mors also say she brought a Caamasi Trustant with her."
"Do they, now," Nalgol said, feeling a slow smile starting to tug at the corners of his mouth. "Do they really."
"We should know for sure in a day or two," Oissan pointed out. "If Gavrisom has a real Caamasi there with his peace envoy, he's sure to parade him out in front of everybody as soon as he can."
"Indeed," Nalgol murmured. "And if he can keep him here talking peace for four more days, we'll be able to say there was a Caamasi present at the destruction of Bothawui. Present and, by implication, fully approving." He shook his head wonderingly. "Amazing. I wonder how Thrawn pulled that one off?"
"It's amazing, all right," Oissan agreed, not sounding nearly so enthusiastic. "I just hope he hasn't miscalculated somewhere along the line. A hundred ninety-one warships would be a little much for three Star Destroyers to take on all by ourselves."
"You worry too much," Nalgol chided, handing back the datapad. "I've seen Thrawn at work; and he never miscalculates anything. The strike team will do their job; and then those warships of yours will commence tearing each other apart. All we'll have to do is eliminate the survivors and demolish whatever's left of the planet."
"Or so goes the theory, anyway," Oissan said sourly. "May I recommend, Captain, that you at least put the Tyrannic and the others on standby alert for the remainder of our time out here? That way we'll be able to move quickly if things break sooner than expected."
"It'll also mean four extra days' worth of worn-off combat edges," Nalgol reminded him. "I hardly think that will be useful."
"But if things break too soon—"
"They won't," Nalgol cut him off brusquely. "If Thrawn says four days, it'll be four days. Period." Oissan took a deep breath. "Yes, sir," he muttered.
Nalgol eyed the other, a mixture of contempt and pity flickering through him. Oissan, after all, had never met Thrawn; had never heard the confidence and authority in the Grand Admiral's voice. How could he possibly understand? "All right, we'll compromise," he said. "I'll order preliminary battle prep to begin this afternoon; and one day before the projected flash point, we'll go to standby alert. Will that make you feel better?"
