by Timothy Zahn
"And then, of course," Corran added, "there are our friends at the Exoticalia Pet Emporium."
Wedge looked at Moranda, waiting for her rebuttal. But it didn't come. "There's them, all right," she said instead, frowning down at the tabletop. "I don't like that one at all."
"I thought you said none of them had jumped out at you," Wedge reminded her.
"No, they didn't," Moranda agreed. "That's just the point. The pet guys acted just perfect. But how many pet shop owners do you know who also happen to be experts at getting rid of vermin? And exotic ones like metalmites, yet?"
"We should be able to backcheck them and see if that kind of experience shows up in their records," Corran said. But he didn't look any happier than Moranda did. "I just wish we knew where exactly this metalmite invasion had taken place."
"Has to be someplace with really high security," Wedge said. "They weren't even going to let them in at first."
"And at the same time, that decision got overruled real quick," Moranda said, nodding. "Someplace with ultra high security, but yet extremely sensitive and vital."
For a moment the three of them looked at each other. Corran broke the silence first. "It's the shield generator building," he said. "There's nothing else in Drev'starn that fits."
"Agreed," Moranda said, sipping at her drink. "Question now is, was the metalmite incursion the attack or the bait? If it's the attack"
She broke off at a muffled beep from Wedge's comlink, buried deep in a pocket of his jacket. "Who knows you're here?" she asked.
"Our shuttle," Wedge told her, digging out the instrument. "We set up a relay for any incoming transmissions." Thumbing it on, he keyed for low volume. "Go Red Two," he gave the codeword.
The message was very short. "This is father," Bel Iblis's familiar voice said. "All is forgiven; come on home."
Wedge squeezed the comlink hard. "Acknowledged," he said. "On our way."
He keyed the comlink off and looked up to find Corran's gaze hard on him. "Dad?"
Wedge nodded. "Dad," he confirmed. "Time to go home."
"Meaning?" Moranda asked.
"Meaning we have to leave," Wedge told her. "Right now."
"Oh, that's convenient," Moranda growled, glaring at him. "What about the shield generator?"
"From now on the Bothans are on their own," Wedge said, draining his drink and sorting out coins onto the table. "I'm sorry, but we were only on temporary loan anyway."
Moranda grimaced, but nodded. "I understand," she said. "Well, it was fun while it lasted."
"You should probably give Bothan Security a call," Wedge said, standing up. "Point them to our friends at the pet shop."
"Whatever," Moranda said, waving a hand. "Happy flights."
"Thanks," Wedge said. "Come on, Corran."
"Just a second," Corran said. He hadn't moved from his chair, and there was a glint in his eyes as he looked at Moranda. "I want to know what Moranda's going to do now."
"Oh, go on," she chided him, making little shooing motions with her hands. "I'll be fine."
"In other words, you're going to stay on this," he said bluntly.
She lifted her eyebrows. "That's very good. CorSec teach you how to do that?"
"You haven't answered the question," Wedge said, sitting back down again. "You are going to call Security, aren't you?"
"And tell them what?" she countered. "We don't have a scrap of proof. It's worse than that, reallythey presumably already did a backcheck on Navett and his buddy, and they still let them into the generator building."
"So what are you going to do?" Wedge persisted. "Stay on this by yourself?"
Moranda's mouth set itself into hard lines. "I was given an assignment, Wedge," she said quietly. "I'm supposed to stay here and watch for Vengeance attempts against Bothawui."
Corran shook his head. "That's not a good idea," he said. "If Vengeance is being driven or guided by Imperials"
"So where are you two off to?" Moranda demanded scornfully. "A vacation on the beaches of Berchest? I'll lay you fifty-to-one it'll be a lot more dangerous wherever you're going than anything I'm likely to run into here."
"Moranda" Wedge began.
"Besides which, you don't have time to argue about it," she cut him off. "If 'Dad' is who I think he is, he's not going to be happy if you two get home late. Now scoot, both of you. Thanks for all the drinks."
Reluctantly, Wedge stood up again. She was right, of course; and she was certainly more than old enough to make this kind of decision for herself. But that didn't mean he had to like it. "Come on, Corran. Moranda... you watch yourself, okay?"
"You, too," she said, smiling up at him. "Don't worry about me. I'll be just fine."
CHAPTER
26
There was a strange, almost unworldly aroma tugging at her senses as Mara drifted toward consciousness. Something strange, yet vaguely pleasant...
"Good morning," Luke's voice came through the haze. With a jolt, Mara came fully awake.
And in that first disorienting moment wished she hadn't. Even as she opened her eyes to the dimly lit gloom around her, she suddenly became aware of a hundred sparks of pain jabbing through her muscles from her heels through her legs and back and right to the nape of her neck. "Ow," she grunted under her breath.
Luke's face appeared overhead, looking down at her with concern. "Is your shoulder still hurting?" he asked.
Mara frowned, blinking away a little more of the haze clouding her mind. Righther badly burned shoulder. Craning her neck down, focusing eyes that still weren't entirely awake, she peered down at her charred jumpsuit.
At her charred jumpsuit, and the smooth, unmarked skin showing through the hole there.
"No," she said, not quite believing it. "The shoulder feels just fine. It'soh, right. Your healing trance."
"Some disorientation is normal when you first come out of it," Luke assured her. "Don't worry."
"I wasn't." She eased her shoulders around, trying to ignore the extra wave of tingles the movement sent running through her back. Luke's hand was there, gripping her arm and helping her sit up. "You said it was morning?"
"Well, afternoon, actually," Luke amended. "But Han once told me that anytime you woke up was technically morning."
"That sounds like his casual slant on things," Mara said. "How longin real timehave I been lying there?"
"About five days," Luke told her. "Easy, now."
"Oh, you bet," she agreed, wincing as muscles that had been laid on for five straight days continued to complain loudly about their mistreatment. "I'm impressed. I don't think even a bacta tank would have done the job that fast."
"You have a strong Force gift," Luke said, his hand hovering ready by her arm. "That usually helps the healing process."
"It's definitely one I'm going to have to learn," she decided, looking around. That aroma she thought she'd dreamed was still there...
"It's some kind of roast avian," Luke explained, nodding toward the back of the landing. "A wake-up gift to you from the Qom Jha."
"Really," Mara said, hoisting herself carefully to her feet and hobbling over there on unsteady legs. It was a roast avian, all right, simmering on a cooking pad. "Awfully nice of them. Where did you get the cooker?"
"I sent Keeper Of Promises back to your Defender for the rest of the survival gear," Luke explained. "I'd rather have sent them back to my X-wingthe spare kit Karrde put together was a lot more complete. But after our brush with the Threateners they're not all that eager to go roaming around outside."
"This from the species that eats fire creepers raw?" Mara pointed out as she eased back into a sitting position by the cooking pad. "Pretty selective skittishness."
"It's a little more complicated than that," Luke said, seating himself cross-legged on the floor across the cooking pad from her and gesturing toward the food. "Hence the gift, actually. They've come to the conclusion that you saved their lives in there."
"I don't know how they figure that," Mara gr
unted, tearing off a piece of the roast. "We were the ones being shot at, not them."
Luke's lips puckered. "Actually, there's some question about that. Splitter Of Stones thinks it was the Qom Jha who the Threateners were firing at, not us, at least until you started shooting back. And as I've gone back through my memories of the battle, I think he's right."
Mara took a careful bite. The meat was a little overcooked for her taste, but not bad for all that. Anyway, as her loudly growling stomach reminded her, a person who hadn't eaten in five days couldn't afford to be too choosy. "Interesting thought," she said, "but I'm not sure where it gets us. Whoever they were shooting at, the fact is, they're still touchy about strangers."
"Maybe," Luke said, his tone odd. "But maybe not. Haven't you wondered why the Threateners never came into the cave looking for you after you knocked yourself out?"
"Are you sure they didn't come in?" Mara countered around a mouthful of food.
"The Qom Jha say they didn't," Luke told her. "There were a couple of flybys with their ships, and that was it. In fact, as far as Child Of Winds knows, they never even conducted an outside ground search of the area."
Mara chewed thoughtfully, resisting the urge to point out that Child Of Winds was not exactly the most reliable source of information around. "Okay," she said. "Let's assume the Threateners lost interest in me. Where does that get us?"
"If they simply lost interest, I don't know," Luke said. "But what if they didn't lose interest, but just decided to wait until you found your own way into the High Fortress?"
Mara took another bite. That was a disturbing thought. In fact, it was an extremely disturbing thought. All the more so since that exact course of action was one she had actually considered early in her captivity. "I don't know if Karrde mentioned it to you," she said slowly, "but the way we found this system was by tracking the escape vectors from two of their ships to an intersect point. My assumption has always been that they simply didn't know we could track their vector for a few microseconds after they jumped to lightspeed. But now I'm not so sure."
"You think they wanted you to come here?"
"It would fit with them not searching all that hard for me after I landed," Mara pointed out. "Of course, if we argue that direction we then have to come up with an explanation as to why they tried to shoot you down."
"Maybe they're not interested in having more than one guest at a time," Luke suggested, gazing out into space. "Or maybe they don't want to talk to anyone from the New Republic until they've talked to you first."
Mara eyed him closely. There had been a flicker in his emotions just then... "Is that just off the top of your head?" she asked. "Or are you getting something from the Force about it?"
He shook his head, still gazing at nothing. "I'm not sure," he admitted. "But I have the feeling... no, never mind."
"No never mind what?" Mara demanded suspiciously, pressing at the corners of his mind. "Come on, we don't have time for games."
A muscle in his cheek twitched. "I get the feeling it's you they want to see," he said. "You, specifically."
Mara lifted her eyebrows. "I'm flattered. My fame just continues to spread."
"Eater Of Fire Creepers did say they'd heard the Threateners talking about you," Luke reminded her. "I wish we knew the context of the conversation."
There was a flapping from the stairway, and one of the Qom Jha appeared. It spoke"Thank you, Flyer Through Spikes," Luke said. "Go see if Keeper Of Promises has any news, if you would."
The Qom Jha replied, and with a flurry of wings was gone down the stairway. "I've had some of the Qom Jha patrolling the upper areas of the stairway and listening for activity outside the doors," Luke explained. "Flyer Through Spikes tells me the upper areas of the fortress were active for a while this morning, but they seem to be quiet again."
"Ah," Mara said, tearing off another bite with perhaps a bit more force than necessary. Those blasted Qom Jha and their blasted unintelligible voices
"Something wrong?" Luke asked.
Mara glared at him. "You know, Skywalker, it's really hard to keep any thoughts to yourself when you're around."
He gave her an innocent look that had far too much amusement in it for her taste. "Odd. I seem to remember a situation not too long ago when you couldn't wait to unload some of those choicer thoughts on me."
Mara grimaced. "Feeling a little more cheerful about our past mistakes this morning, are we?"
He sobered. "Not cheerful, no," he said. "Just learning how to acknowledge them, learn from them, and then pick up and move on. I've had a lot of time for thinking during these past five days, you know."
"You reach any particular conclusions?"
He looked straight at her. "I know why you didn't turn to the dark side," he said. "And why you keep coming up against limits on what you can do through the Force."
With a casualness she didn't especially feel, Mara took another bite and settled her back against the stone wall behind her. "I'm listening."
"The essence of the dark side is selfishness," Luke said. "The elevation of yourself and your own desires above everything else."
Mara nodded. "Fairly obvious so far."
"The point is that all the time you were serving the Emperor, you were never doing so out of selfish motives," Luke said. "You were serving, even if it was Palpatine and his own selfish ends. And service to others is the essence of being a Jedi."
Mara thought about that. "No," she said, shaking her head. "No, I don't like it. Service to evil is still evil. What you're saying is that doing something wrong isn't really wrong if your motives are good. That's nonsense."
"I agree," Luke said. "But that's not what I'm saying. Some of the things you did were certainly wrong; but because you weren't doing them for your own purposes, the acts themselves didn't open you to the dark side."
Mara glowered at her food. "I see the difference," she said. "But I still don't like it."
"Actually, it's not that much different from the situation with the Jensaarai that Corran and I ran into on Susevfi," Luke said. "They didn't know how to be Jedi, but were still serving the best they knew how."
"And in the process had gotten themselves so bent around that you were years untwisting them," Mara reminded him tartly. "Anyway, they at least had the memory of a role model to follow, didn't they? That what's-his-name Jedi?"
"Nikkos Tyris," Luke said, nodding. "Which brings up an even more interesting thought. Maybe you had a role model, too."
Mara shook her head. "Not a chance. There wasn't a single person in the inner court with a scrap of what I'd consider virtue or morality."
"Then maybe it was someone in your life before you were taken to Coruscant," Luke suggested. "Your parents, or some close friend."
Mara bit off the last bite of her meal and tossed the carcass back into a corner. "This is a dead-end conversation," she declared firmly, wiping her hands on her jumpsuit legs where the oils and grime would eventually flake off. "Let's get back to the job at hand. Where did you stash my blaster?"
Luke didn't move. "I know you don't remember much about your past," he said quietly. "For whatever it's worth, I understand how you feel."
"Thanks," Mara growled. "That certainly helps."
"Would you like to have that past back again?"
She frowned at him, conflicting emotions surging suddenly against each other. "What do you mean?" she asked cautiously.
"There are techniques Jedi can use to pull out buried memories," he said. "And you could be a Jedi, Mara. You could be a powerful Jedi."
"Right," Mara bit out. "All I have to do is declare I'm ready to serve the galaxy, right?"
Luke's forehead creased, and she caught the flicker of puzzlement from him. "What is it about that that scares you?" he asked. "You've served and worked with people all your lifePalpatine, Karrde, Leia and Han and me. And once you've offered your loyalty, it's for keeps. You can do thisI know you can."
Mara squeezed her hand into a fist,
half minded to close the subject again and this time make sure she sat on the lid. But deep inside she knew he deserved an answer on this one. "I can't just offer that kind of blank-line invitation," she said. "Sure I can be loyal; but only to the people I choose to be loyal to. I'm not ready to open myself up to anyone who walks in off the street."
She grimaced. "Besides, I keep remembering stories about how the last step to becoming a Jedi is usually making some supreme and rather ugly personal sacrifice. I'm not crazy about that one, either."
"It's not always as bad as it seems," Luke said, and Mara could sense his discomfort as unpleasant memories of his own floated back to the surface. "Just before he died, Master Yoda told me that before I would truly be a Jedi I needed to face Vader again. I jumped to the conclusion that that meant I had to either kill him or let him kill me. As it turned out, it didn't happen either way."
"But you had to be willing to make that sacrifice if necessary," Mara pointed out. "Thanks, but I'm not interested."
"Then you automatically limit your capabilities," Luke said. "If you aren't willing to make a commitment"
"Commitment?" Mara snorted. "You're the one telling me about commitment? What about Callista, or Gaeriel, or any of the other women you've brushed paths with over the past ten years? Where's been the commitment there?"
Luke's flash of anger was so sudden and so unexpected it physically shocked her back against the stone wall. "You should talk," he snapped. "What about Lando? Huh?"
For a long moment they just glared at each other. Mara held her breath, bracing herself for another outburst, stories of uncontrolled Jedi anger running ominously through her mind.
But instead, she felt his anger drain away, replaced by shame and a deep embarrassment. "I'm sorry," he said, dropping his eyes away from her face. "That was uncalled for."
"No, I'm the one who should apologize," Mara said, trying to hide her own guilt feelings from him and knowing she was being only partly successful. She knew better than to fight like that. "I know how you felt about those women, and what happened to them. I'm sorry."
