by Timothy Zahn
The comm went silent. Four days, Leia thought, a shiver running up her back. Four days in which to learn all that she could about both Khabarakh and the Noghri people.
And to prepare for the most important diplomatic mission of her life.
As it turned out, she didn’t learn much about the Noghri culture during the trip. Khabarakh kept largely to himself, splitting his time between the sealed cockpit and his cabin. Occasionally he would come by to talk to Leia, but the conversations were short and invariably left her with the uncomfortable feeling that he was still very ambivalent about his decision to bring her to his home. When they’d set up this meeting back on the Wookiee world of Kashyyyk, she had suggested that he discuss the question with friends or confidants; but as they neared the end of the voyage and his dark nervousness grew, she began to pick up little hints that he had not, in fact, done so. The decision had been made entirely on his own.
It was not, to her way of thinking, a very auspicious beginning. It implied either a lack of trust in his friends or else a desire to absolve them from responsibility should the whole thing go sour. Either way, not exactly the sort of situation that filled her with confidence.
With their host generally keeping to himself, she and Chewbacca were forced to come up with their own entertainment. For Chewbacca, with his innate mechanical interests, such entertainment consisted mainly of wandering through the ship and poking his nose into every room, access hatch, and crawlway he could find—studying the ship, as he ominously put it, in case they needed at some point to fly it themselves. Leia, for her part, spent most of the trip in her cabin with Threepio, trying to deduce a possible derivation of Mal’ary’ush, the only Noghri word she knew, with the hope of at least getting some idea of where in the galaxy they might be going. Unfortunately, with six million languages to draw on, Threepio could come up with any number of possible etymologies for the word, ranging from reasonable to tenuous to absurd and right back again. It was an interesting exercise in applied linguistics, but ultimately more frustrating than useful.
In the middle of the fourth day, they reached the Noghri world … and it was even worse than she’d expected.
“It’s incredible,” she breathed, a hard knot forming in her throat as she pressed close to Chewbacca to stare through the ship’s only passenger viewport at the world they were rapidly approaching. Beneath the mottling of white clouds the planetary surface seemed to be a uniform brown, relieved only by the occasional deep blue of lakes and small oceans. No greens or yellows, no light purples or blues—none of the colors, in fact, that usually signified plant life. For all she could tell, the entire planet might have been dead.
Chewbacca growled a reminder. “Yes, I know Khabarakh said it had been devastated in the war,” she agreed soberly. “But I didn’t realize he really meant the whole planet had been hit.” She shook her head, feeling sick at heart. Wondering which side had been most responsible for this disaster.
Most responsible. She swallowed hard at the reflexively defensive words. There was no most responsible here, and she knew it. Khabarakh’s world had been destroyed during a battle in space … and there had been only two sides to the war. Whatever had happened to turn this world into a desert, the Rebel Alliance could not avoid its share of the guilt. “No wonder the Emperor and Vader were able to turn them against us,” she murmured. “We have to find some way to help them.”
Chewbacca growled again, gestured out the viewport. The terminator line was coming up over the horizon now, a fuzzy strip of twilight between day and night; and there, fading through to the darkness beyond was what looked like an irregular patch of pale green. “I see it,” Leia nodded. “You suppose that’s all that’s left?”
The Wookiee shrugged, offered the obvious suggestion. “Yes, I suppose that would be the simplest way to find out,” Leia agreed. “I really don’t know if I want to ask him, though. Let’s wait until we’re closer and can see more of—”
She felt Chewbacca go stiff beside her a split second before his bellow split the air and left her ears ringing. “What—?”
And then she saw it, and her stomach knotted abruptly with shock. There, just coming over the curve of the planet, was an Imperial Star Destroyer.
They’d been betrayed.
“No,” she breathed, staring out at the huge arrow-head shape. No mistake—it was a Star Destroyer, all right. “No. I can’t believe Khabarakh would do this.”
The last words were spoken to empty air; and with a second shock, she realized that Chewbacca was no longer beside her. Spinning around, she saw a flash of brown as he vanished down the corridor leading to the cockpit.
“No!” she shouted, pushing away from the bulkhead and taking off after him as fast as she could run. “Chewie, no!”
The order was a waste of air, and she knew it. The Wookiee had murder in his heart, and he would get to Khabarakh even if he had to tear down the cockpit door with his bare hands.
The first clang sounded as she was halfway down the corridor; the second came as she rounded the slight curve and came within sight of the door. Chewbacca was raising his massive fists for a third blow—
When, to Leia’s amazement, the door slid open.
Chewbacca seemed surprised, too, but he didn’t dwell on it long. He was through the door before it was completely open, charging into the cockpit with a ululating Wookiee battle yell. “Chewie!” Leia shouted again, diving through herself.
Just in time to see Khabarakh, seated at the pilot’s station, throw up his right arm and somehow send Chewbacca spinning past him to crash with a roar into the underside of the control board.
Leia skidded to a halt, not quite believing what she’d just seen. “Khabarakh—”
“I did not call them,” the Noghri said, half turning to face her. “I did not betray my word of honor.”
Chewbacca thundered his disbelief as he fought to scramble to his feet in the cramped space. “You must stop him,” Khabarakh shouted over the Wookiee’s roar. “Must keep him quiet. I must give the recognition signal or all will be lost.”
Leia looked past him at the distant Star Destroyer, her teeth clenched hard together. Betrayal … but if Khabarakh had planned a betrayal, why had he let Chewbacca come along? Whatever that fighting technique was he’d used to deflect Chewbacca’s first mad rush, it wasn’t likely to work a second time.
She focused again on Khabarakh’s face; on those dark eyes, protruding jaw, and needle-sharp teeth. He was watching her, ignoring the threat of the enraged Wookiee behind him, his hand poised ready over the comm switch. A beep sounded from the board, and his hand twitched toward the switch before stopping again. The board beeped again— “I have not betrayed you, Lady Vader,” Khabarakh repeated, a note of urgency in his voice. “You must believe me.”
Leia braced herself. “Chewie, be quiet,” she said. “Chewie? Chewie, be quiet.”
The Wookiee ignored the order. Finally back on his feet, he roared his war cry again and lunged for Khabarakh’s throat. The Noghri took the charge head-on this time, grabbing Chewbacca’s huge wrists in his wiry hands and holding on for all he was worth.
It wasn’t enough. Slowly but steadily, Khabarakh’s arms were bent steadily backwards as Chewbacca forced his way forward. “Chewie, I said stop,” Leia tried again. “Use your head—if he was planning a trap, don’t you think he’d have timed it for when we were asleep or something?”
Chewbacca spit out a growl, his hands continuing their unwavering advance. “But if he doesn’t check in, they’ll know something’s wrong,” she countered. “That’s a sure way to bring them down on us.”
“The Lady Vader speaks truth,” Khabarakh said, his voice taut with the strain of holding back Chewbacca’s hands. “I have not betrayed you, but if I give no recognition signal you will be betrayed.”
“He’s right,” Leia said. “If they come to investigate, we lose by default. Come on, Chewie, it’s our only hope.”
The Wookiee snarled again, shaki
ng his head firmly. “Then you leave me no choice,” Khabarakh said.
And without warning, the cockpit flashed with blue light, dropping Chewbacca to the floor like a huge sack of grain. “What—?” Leia gasped, dropping to her knees beside the motionless Wookiee. “Khabarakh!”
“A stun weapon only,” the Noghri said, breathing rapidly as he swiveled back to his board. “A built-in defense.”
Leia twisted her head to glare at him, furious at what he’d done … a fury that faded reluctantly behind the logic of the situation. Chewbacca had been fully prepared to throttle the life out of Khabarakh; and from personal experience, she knew how hard it was to calm down an angry Wookiee, even when you were his friend to begin with.
And Khabarakh had tried talking first. “Now what?” she asked the Noghri, digging a hand through Chewbacca’s thick torso hair to check his heartbeat. It was steady, which meant the stun weapon hadn’t played any of its rare but potentially lethal tricks on the Wookiee’s nervous system.
“Now be silent,” Khabarakh said, tapping his comm switch and saying something in his own language. Another mewing Noghri voice replied, and for a few minutes they conversed together. Leia remained kneeling at Chewbacca’s side, wishing she’d had time to bring Threepio up before the discussion started. It would have been nice to know what the conversation was all about.
But finally it ended, and Khabarakh signed off. “We are safe now,” he said, slumping a little in his seat. “They are persuaded it was an equipment malfunction.”
“Let’s hope so,” Leia said.
Khabarakh looked at her, a strange expression on his nightmare face. “I have not betrayed you, Lady Vader,” he said quietly, his voice hard and yet oddly pleading. “You must believe me. I have promised to defend you, and I will. To my own death, if need be.”
Leia stared at him … and whether through some sensitivity of the Force or merely her own long diplomatic experience, she finally understood the position Khabarakh was now in. Whatever waverings or second thoughts he might have been feeling during the voyage, the Star Destroyer’s unexpected appearance had burned those uncertainties away. Khabarakh’s word of honor had been brought into question, and he was now in the position of having to conclusively prove that he had not broken that word.
And he would have to go to whatever lengths such proof demanded. Even if it killed him.
Earlier, Leia had wondered how Khabarakh could possibly understand the concept of the Wookiee life debt. Perhaps the Noghri and Wookiee cultures were more alike than she’d realized.
“I believe you,” she told him, climbing to her feet and sitting down in the copilot seat. Chewbacca she would have to leave where he was until he was awake enough to help her move him. “What now?”
Khabarakh turned back to his board. “Now we must make a decision,” he said. “My intention had been to bring you to ground in the city of Nystao, waiting until full dark to present you to my clan dynast. But that is now impossible. Our Imperial lord has come, and is holding a convocate of the dynasts.”
The back of Leia’s neck tingled. “Your Imperial lord is the Grand Admiral?” she asked carefully.
“Yes,” Khabarakh said. “That is his flagship, the Chimaera. I remember the day that the Lord Darth Vader first brought him to us,” he added, his mewing voice becoming reflective. “The Lord Vader told us that his duties against the Emperor’s enemies would now be taking his full attention. That the Grand Admiral would henceforth be our lord and commander.” He made a strange, almost purring sound deep in his chest. “There were many who were sad that day. The Lord Vader had been the only one save the Emperor who cared for Noghri well-being. He had given us hope and purpose.”
Leia grimaced. That purpose being to go off and die as death commandos at the Emperor’s whim. But she couldn’t say things like that to Khabarakh. Not yet, anyway. “Yes,” she murmured.
At her feet, Chewbacca twitched. “He will be fully awake soon,” Khabarakh said. “I would not like to stun him again. Can you control him?”
“I think so,” Leia said. They were coming in low toward the upper atmosphere now, on a course that would take them directly beneath the orbiting Star Destroyer. “I hope they don’t decide to do a sensor focus on us,” she murmured. “If they pick up three life-forms here, you’re going to have a lot of explaining to do.”
“The ship’s static-damping should prevent that,” Khabarakh assured her. “It is at full power.”
Leia frowned. “Aren’t they likely to wonder about that?”
“No. I explained it was part of the same malfunction that caused the transmitter problem.”
There was a low rumble from Chewbacca, and Leia looked down to see the Wookiee’s eyes glaring impotently up at her. Fully alert again, but without enough motor control yet to do anything. “We’ve cleared outer control,” she told him. “We’re heading down to—where are we going, Khabarakh?”
The Noghri took a deep breath, let it out in an odd sort of whistle. “We will go to my home, a small village near the edge of the Clean Land. I will hide you there until our lord the Grand Admiral leaves.”
Leia thought about that. A small village situated off the mainstream of Noghri life ought to be safely out of the way of wandering Imperials. On the other hand, if it was anything like the small villages she’d known, her presence there would be common knowledge an hour after they put down. “Can you trust the other villagers to keep quiet?”
“Do not worry,” Khabarakh said. “I will keep you safe.”
But he hesitated before he said it … and as they headed into the atmosphere, Leia noted uneasily that he hadn’t really answered the question.
The dynast bowed one last time and stepped back to the line of those awaiting their turn to pay homage to their leader. Thrawn, seated in the gleaming High Seat of the Common Room of Honoghr, nodded gravely to the departing clan leader and motioned to the next. The other stepped forward, moving in the formalized dance that seemed to indicate respect, and bowed his forehead to the ground before the Grand Admiral.
Standing two meters to Thrawn’s right and a little behind him, Pellaeon shifted his weight imperceptibly between feet, stifled a yawn, and wondered when this ritual would be over. He’d been under the impression they’d come to Honoghr to try to inspire the commando teams, but so far the only Noghri they’d seen had been ceremonial guards and this small but excessively boring collection of clan leaders. Thrawn presumably had his reasons for wading through the ritual, but Pellaeon wished it would hurry up and be over. With a galaxy still to win back for the Empire, sitting here listening to a group of gray-skinned aliens drone on about their loyalty seemed a ridiculous waste of time.
There was a touch of air on the back of his neck. “Captain?” someone said quietly in his ear—Lieutenant Tschel, he tentatively identified the voice. “Excuse me, sir, but Grand Admiral Thrawn asked to be informed immediately if anything out of the ordinary happened.” Pellaeon nodded slightly, glad of any interruption. “What is it?”
“It doesn’t seem dangerous, sir, or even very important,” Tschel said. “A Noghri commando ship on its way in almost didn’t give the recognition response in time.”
“Equipment trouble, probably,” Pellaeon said.
“That’s what the pilot said,” Tschel told him. “The odd thing is that he begged off putting down at the Nystao landing area. You’d think that someone with equipment problems would want his ship looked at immediately.”
“A bad transmitter isn’t exactly a crisis-level problem,” Pellaeon grunted. But Tschel had a point; and Nystao was the only place on Honoghr with qualified spaceship repair facilities. “We have an ID on the pilot?”
“Yes, sir. His name’s Khabarakh, clan Kihm’bar. I pulled up what we have on him,” he added, offering Pellaeon a data pad.
Surreptitiously, Pellaeon took it, wondering what he should do now. Thrawn had indeed left instructions that he was to be notified of any unusual activity anywhere in the system.
But to interrupt the ceremony for something so trivial didn’t seem like a good idea.
As usual, Thrawn was one step ahead of him. Lifting a hand, he stopped the Noghri clan dynast’s presentation and turned his glowing red eyes on Pellaeon. “You have something to report, Captain?”
“A small anomaly only, sir,” Pellaeon told him, steeling himself and stepping to the Grand Admiral’s side. “An incoming commando ship was slow to transmit its recognition signal, and then declined to put down at the Nystao landing area. Probably just an equipment problem.”
“Probably,” Thrawn agreed. “Was the ship scanned for evidence of malfunction?”
“Ah …” Pellaeon checked the data pad. “The scan was inconclusive,” he told the other. “The ship’s static-damping was strong enough to block—”
“The incoming ship was static-damped?” Thrawn interrupted, looking sharply up at Pellaeon.
“Yes, sir.”
Wordlessly, Thrawn held up a hand. Pellaeon gave him the data pad, and for a moment the Grand Admiral frowned down at it, skimming the report. “Khabarakh, clan Kihm’bar,” he murmured to himself. “Interesting.” He looked up at Pellaeon again. “Where did the ship go?”
Pellaeon looked in turn at Tschel. “According to the last report, it was headed south,” the lieutenant said. “It might still be in range of our tractor beams, sir.”
Pellaeon turned back to Thrawn. “Shall we try to stop it, Admiral?”
Thrawn looked down at the data pad, his face tight with concentration. “No,” he said at last. “Let it land, but track it. And order a tech team from the Chimaera to meet us at the ship’s final destination.” His eyes searched the line of Noghri dynasts, came to rest on one of them. “Dynast Ir’khaim, clan Kihm’bar, step forward.”
The Noghri did so. “What is your wish, my lord?” he mewed.
“One of your people has come home,” Thrawn said. “We go to his village to welcome him.”
Ir’khaim bowed. “At my lord’s request.”
Thrawn stood up. “Order the shuttle to be prepared, Captain,” he told Pellaeon. “We leave at once.”
