Star Wars: The New Rebellion

by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

  “He might have had nothing to do with the attack.”

  Han nodded. “I know. In that case, the investigators you’ve assigned are following all the possible leads.”

  “What if there’s another attack, Han?”

  “It hasn’t come. I’ve been waiting for days but it hasn’t come.”

  “That’s strange, isn’t it?” Leia said. “I’ve been thinking it’s very strange.”

  “So have I.”

  She smiled at him then, the quirky half-smile she got when she knew she should fight with him, but didn’t have the heart to.

  “I’ll stay if you need me,” he said.

  She shook her head. “I don’t need anyone, you big oaf.”

  “I know that, Your Worship,” he said, grinning. Then he let the grin fade. “But I mean it. If you need me—”

  “We’re better if we work as a team, Han.”

  He knew that too. He’d been trying to say that all along.

  “My only concern is the children.” She slipped a hand out from underneath his, and put the brush on her dressing table. “What if the next attack is on them? What if R’yet is right? What if the attack was meant for me or my family?”

  “If it was meant for you, it was meant as a warning,” Han said.

  “Like Jarril’s visit.”

  He nodded.

  “Winter says the base at Anoth has been rebuilt. Maybe we should send them there with her.”

  “A visit to their babyhood homes?” He got off his haunches and stood. “Can you do without them, Leia? I’ll be gone, and they’ll be gone, and then you’ll have the political crisis to deal with.”

  She took a deep breath. He could see the struggle in her face. He knew how much she relied on her family, how important it all was to her.

  “I’ll work better if I know everyone is safe,” she said.

  “That’s why you want me to stay, isn’t it?”

  She didn’t look at him. He pulled her hair back and kissed the nape of her neck.

  “I can take care of myself, Princess.”

  “I know,” she said, still not looking at him.

  “You’re the one in the greatest danger. Maybe you should go with Winter and the children to Anoth.”

  She lifted her head, finally looking at him. “I can’t do that. I have duties here. I have to take the same risks as the rest of the government.”

  He knew. He had to take risks too. Protecting him and forcing him to remain on Coruscant would be as bad as making Leia go to Anoth.

  He waited, watched the realization dawn on her face as she understood what he had done.

  “You’ve manipulated me,” she said.

  He nodded.

  She stood and wrapped her arms around him, pulling him close. In the last few days, she had lost weight. She felt thin and fragile. He held her tightly, knowing that more strength lay within her slender form than he would ever have. He had to trust in her abilities, just as she had to trust in his.

  “Don’t you wish that, just once, we could live calmly and comfortably like normal people?” Her voice was soft, almost a whisper.

  “No,” he said. He stepped back just far enough so that he could see her face. “Because if we had been normal people, we would never have met. Your Highness-ness.”

  She laughed, and he kissed her. Deeply. Passionately.

  As if he would never be able to kiss her again.

  Ten

  Jarril’s ship was a treasure trove of unusual junk. Lando had towed the Spicy Lady to Kessel, and had spent half a day exploring his old colleague’s cargo. The body remained in the cockpit. Lando wasn’t certain yet what to do with Jarril. He supposed he’d have to go through the records, looking for next of kin.

  He wanted to save that until last.

  Jarril hadn’t been carrying any cargo when he was killed. Or so it seemed. But someone could have cleaned out the cargo while the ship listed in space.

  Still, Lando found numerous abandoned items. Taken separately, they were explicable. But together, they were inexplicable.

  He found a blaster handle, a single stormtrooper glove, a laser cannon, and pieces of a Carbanti signal-augmented sensor jammer. He found power cells and the schematics for cannons designed for the all-terrain armored transports. He found bolts for a repulsorlift, and, most disturbing of all, a case of needles made specifically for an Imperial interrogator droid.

  But no credits, no jewels, and no spice.

  Either Jarril had been involved in something sinister, or he had stumbled on something.

  Lando liked to believe Jarril had been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  But what Lando wanted to believe and what was true were probably two different things.

  So he almost decided to take the Spicy Lady back into space and set her free. Lando was halfway back to his ship when he remembered Jarril’s laugh.

  It had been a hearty, deep, almost choking laugh. Lando had thought Jarril was going to laugh himself to death the day he smuggled Lando out of Smuggler’s Run. Right under Nandreeson’s nose.

  I owe you, Lando had said.

  Jarril grinned. I know, pal. And someday I’ll collect. Big.

  But he never had. And now it was too late. Ever since he’d seen Han Solo slide into the carbon freeze in Cloud City, Lando had placed a higher priority on old debts and friendship.

  The old Lando would have walked away, sent the Spicy Lady back where he had found her, and forgotten the whole thing.

  The new Lando sighed, bypassed the main hatch, and walked to the cockpit.

  The cockpit on the Spicy Lady was an exact replica of the Millennium Falcon’s. It comfortably fit four humanoids, and was tall enough to accommodate a Wookiee. Blaster scars had left rips in the seats and had charred one of the viewports. When Lando turned on life support, Jarril’s body had fallen between the pilot’s seat and the wall, crumping like discarded clothing.

  Lando bent over the body. Blaster at close range, just as he had thought. Jarril’s eyes were open, and filled with terror. Lando gently closed them. Too many times he had been afraid he would die that way, alone, attacked in space by someone he’d crossed. Or someone he hadn’t.

  “Let’s see what we can do for you, Jarril,” Lando said. He sat in the copilot’s chair, as far from Jarril’s body as he could get. Then he logged on to the Spicy Lady’s computer. This part of the computer was not tied to the slave system.

  When Lando logged on, a cargo manifest floated on the screen. It had been left there by whoever had gone before. The manifest was dated for a week before—and it was empty.

  It had clearly been erased.

  Lando searched the backups, but whoever had erased the manifest had been thorough. There were no backups of any of the manifests. In fact, all he could find were the ghosts of the files: the names and the dates of issue.

  Jarril’s cargo had been so secret, he hadn’t even kept personal records of it.

  Lando left the cargo manifests and went to the address files. The hailing codes for all of Jarril’s contacts had to be here. With a few keystrokes, Lando opened the files.

  He recognized all the names as smuggling contacts except for three. One was on Fwatna and hadn’t been used in more than three years. Another was on Dathomir, and the third was on Almania. He looked up the Fwatna address first. It was for a contact named Dolph, and Jarril had noted [NAME RETIRED] in the hidden-words section. From Lando’s cursory examination of Jarril’s system, it seemed that Jarril deleted unusable information. Lando made a note of the name, the out-of-date address, and continued searching.

  The address on Dathomir had no name attached to it. Instead, it had notes that appeared to be directions, along with stars marking it as a Big Find. The address was new enough that Lando suspected Jarril hadn’t had a chance to exploit the Big Find, hence its continuation in the records.

  He opened the file on Almania to find that Jarril had sent a message there on the day the manifest was erased. The m
essage had been deleted as well, but Jarril had based the Spicy Lady on the Falcon. He had followed all the schematics for the cockpit—the schematics that Lando had—and had bragged about it. Which meant that he had put in all of Lando’s back doors.

  Once erased, not always erased.

  Jarril had never been a brilliant man. He not only put in Lando’s back doors, he had used the same codes. Or perhaps that was bright. Who would think that two such diverse ships had the same coding system?

  Except, of course, Lando.

  It only took a moment for Lando to find the message. He put it on speaker, only to have the computer tell him the message was coded.

  And written.

  Stranger and stranger.

  Lando uncoded the message and brought it onscreen. The message had no addressee and it was unsigned. Typical smuggler. That way no one who intercepted it would know who it was for.

  CARGO DELIVERED. FIREWORKS SPECTACULAR.

  It was followed shortly thereafter by another message.

  SOLO KNOWS. WE CAN COUNT ON HIS INVOLVEMENT.

  Then nothing. Those were the last messages Jarril had sent.

  Lando copied them to his own computer. He glanced at Jarril. Jarril had known something, told Han, and now Jarril was dead. Which meant that someone was after Han.

  Someone who had taken the A-wing and left the Spicy Lady to drift.

  Lando got out of the copilot’s chair. He had a call to make to Coruscant, and he couldn’t make it from here.

  Brakiss. Luke sat on the rubble-covered stair. He wasn’t willing to leave the Hall, not yet. Not until he had gotten all the remnants of emotion and knowledge he could get.

  Brakiss. One of the failures. One of the students who had turned to the dark side. Luke remembered each student who left Yavin 4 before completing training. Some had left because of family crises (Decide you must how to serve them best), and those crises always came at the wrong point in the training. (This is a dangerous time for you, when you will be tempted by the dark side of the Force.) He remembered Ben and Yoda; he always let those students go although he gave them the same admonition Yoda had given him: Mind what you have learned. And in his mind he always added the next sentence: Save you it can.

  Some did. They returned for more training. Others disappeared. Luke hoped that they too would return someday.

  But none of them had left in the same spectacular manner as Brakiss. Brakiss was one of the handful of Imperials who had tried to infiltrate the Jedi Academy. Unlike the others, Brakiss had a true talent for the Force. Luke decided to see if he could keep Brakiss away from the dark side.

  The training went well. Brakiss softened, and Luke thought it time to give him the equivalent of the dark cave on Dagobah. Luke sent Brakiss on a journey in which Brakiss had to face himself. Brakiss emerged, terrified and angry. He left Yavin 4 and went back to the Empire.

  Luke knew that one day he would see Brakiss again.

  He had feared it would be like this.

  “Master Luke! Master Luke! Oh, thank heavens we found you!” Threepio’s voice cut through Luke’s reverie. Luke glanced over his shoulder. Threepio stood in the door with Artoo at his side. They started to come in.

  “No!” Luke said. “It’s too unstable in here. Meet me outside.”

  “But Master Luke—”

  “I’ll be right there, Threepio.”

  “I hope so,” Threepio said. He walked away from the door. Artoo bleeped at Luke and then followed Threepio. It had to be something serious, then. Artoo sounded distressed.

  Luke stood. He got no more of Brakiss than that initial sensory impression. And it bothered him. He wasn’t used to such superficial feelings. But all he had felt around this blast had been strange.

  He climbed out. One of the workers in the outer corridor looked at him. “Those your droids, Master Skywalker?”

  Luke nodded.

  “They seemed agitated.”

  Luke smiled. “Threepio always seems agitated. I’m sure it’s nothing.”

  He continued outside. Threepio and Artoo stood on the dirt-covered lawn. They were facing the door. Threepio turned and said something to Artoo when Luke appeared.

  “What’s so important?” Luke asked.

  “Master Luke, Artoo and I had a dreadful experience in the maintenance bays. Artoo insisted that we go down there and we were taken prisoner by this horrible Kloperian who seemed to have no idea who we were. I wouldn’t have brought this to you, sir, but Artoo insisted. He said you needed to know—”

  “What were you doing in the maintenance bays? Those are off-limits to all but specialized droids.”

  “Artoo insisted,” Threepio said. “He’s been behaving quite badly. In fact, the language he used in front of the Kloperian—well, it made my gears freeze if you get my meaning, sir. And—”

  “Artoo?” Luke asked.

  Artoo bleebled, then a compartment opened near his base and a small tube arm emerged. Luke held out his hand, and Artoo dropped several tiny chips into it.

  He crouched and examined them. “These are the X-wing’s memory chips.”

  Artoo moaned, a mournful sound.

  “The X-wing is in pieces, sir. If I had known that Artoo was going to steal parts—”

  “In pieces?” Luke said. He closed his fist around the chips. The X-wing and Artoo had been flying together so long that their memories were linked. They had their own special language. The X-wing was as much of a person as a ship could be. “Who authorized this?”

  “Why, I thought you did.”

  “I authorized routine maintenance.” Luke stood. “This would have to happen the moment I need the X-wing. How bad is the damage?”

  Threepio said, “There is no actual damage.”

  Artoo beeped and squawked.

  “Aside from the pieces,” Threepio said.

  Luke’s grasp on the chips was tight. “It sounds more like they’re rebuilding the X-wing. Why else remove the memory chips?”

  Artoo whistled an affirmative.

  “I know nothing about technical matters, sir,” Threepio said. “It just seems to me that routine maintenance is routine maintenance, at least on Coruscant.”

  “Which is why they imprisoned you?” Luke shook his head. “I don’t like the sound of any of this.”

  “We didn’t exactly appreciate it either, Master Luke. Why, if I hadn’t told them that we belonged to you and Mistress Leia, we would still be in that closet. Or”—and Threepio’s golden body shook in an imitation shudder—“we’d have had our memories wiped and our bodies sold for scrap.”

  Artoo moaned.

  “Good thinking on your part, Threepio, and yours too, Artoo.” Luke gave the memory chips back to Artoo. “Keep these safe. I’ll see about the condition of the X-wing. We’ll get it back together in no time.”

  But he wasn’t as sure as he sounded. Routine maintenance did not require the disassembly of the X-wing. He should have been more cautious in his instructions when he arrived. But he hadn’t thought there would be a threat to him, his droid, or his X-wing on Coruscant. Even with the bombing and the strange feelings he had had.

  Someone was watching them. He glanced over his shoulder. They were alone on the street.

  But someone was watching him. He had had that feeling since Yavin 4. Someone was watching, planning, and outguessing him.

  It was time to regain control.

  “Come on, Artoo,” Luke said. “Let’s get our X-wing.”

  “With all due respect, sir,” Threepio said, “I would prefer not to return to that den of iniquity. I think it better if I return to my duties.”

  Luke nodded. “Threepio, tell Leia about your adventure, and tell her about the X-wing. Tell her that—” Then he stopped. Better to tell her in person. In person he could communicate the depth of his unease. “Tell her that I will speak to her before I leave.”

  “Very good, Master Luke,” Threepio said, and toddled off toward the Imperial Palace.

  Luk
e disagreed. It wasn’t very good. But it was the best he could do.

  For now.

  Eleven

  The Inner Council met in the Ambassadorial Dining Area. It was another large, gold-leafed room, filled with decorations that dated from the Emperor’s reign. Leia couldn’t wait for the investigations to end so that she could rebuild the Senate Hall. The temporary offices only reminded her how much she missed it.

  The room had an antiseptic smell, probably from a recent cleaning. She had decided on this room as a meeting place at the last moment, and planned to continue random room choices until the murderers were caught and the Senate could return to normal business. She didn’t want anyone to have days to plan another attack.

  Leia sat at the head of the table, and the other members of the Inner Council surrounded her. Three of her most valued friends had died in the attack. One had died in the medical center. She missed them. Han had been right about the gaps in her life. She had sent the children and Winter off that morning to Anoth. Han was gone, and she knew it would only be a matter of time before Luke left too. She could work well on her own, but with her family spreading to all corners of the galaxy, and with so many friends injured or dead, she felt as she had in those first few days after the destruction of Alderaan. All alone with only herself to rely on.

  “The news has reached the Outer Rim,” Borsk Fey’lya said. His melodious voice contained his concern. The fur near his face was shorter than usual, where the medical personnel had cut off the singed areas. “The Rim Worlds are agitating for revenge.”

  “Vengeance isn’t the issue,” Leia said. “Stopping another attack is. I hope you’ve all let your people know that the investigations are underway.”

  “They don’t care about the investigations,” C-Gosf said. She was petite, even for a Gosfambling. They were delicate furred creatures, intelligent and soft-spoken. Her whiskers curled around her face as she talked. Leia had to lean forward to hear her. “It is the loss of representation. With so many serious injuries, and so much loss of life, the Senate is unable to vote on any but simple-majority declarations. We barely have a quorum.”