Treason - Timothy Zahn

by Star Wars

  “He was impressively vague on that point,” Lochry said. “But I got the impression that he feared for his safety.”

  Savit felt his lip twist. His safety, or perhaps the safety of his prize.

  Hardly unreasonable. Haveland had worked hard to have one of Stardust’s supply lines run through her sector. Suggestions that her people weren’t doing their jobs would not be well received at the governor’s mansion.

  Actual solid proof of malfeasance would undoubtedly be met with something even stronger.

  “Do you believe him?” Savit asked.

  Lochry hunched his shoulders in an uncomfortable shrug. “I don’t know, Admiral. His ID looks good, his face matches the records, and his uniform is the right one.”

  “All of which can be bought,” Savit pointed out.

  “Yes, sir, exactly,” Lochry said. “But then there’s the business at the spaceport. The expertise demonstrated during the Brylan Ross’s escape attempt was far outside the skill set one would expect of a high-level bureaucrat. He even knew about the boost level in the freighter’s thrusters and how to access it.”

  “I thought you said he had a pilot.”

  Lochry snorted. “Right,” he said scornfully. “A no-account drifter with a no-point history and no-hope future.”

  “You ran his ID?”

  “Oh, yes, sir,” Lochry said. “Name’s Mole. About as checkered a past as you can get. Cross-checking with the Tiquwe records pinned him as currently working for one of the pirate groups in town, probably as a slicer or expendable bumper. Got a history of spice use, too. Fair chance Ronan had to wake him up and carry him bodily to the freighter.”

  “He wasn’t the pilot, then?”

  “I don’t see how,” Lochry said. “He was drifting in and out during his interrogation.”

  “Enough,” Haveland said sternly. “I don’t care about whatever dregs you’ve pulled out of the drain. What I care about is this impersonator, and since Esaga sector is my jurisdiction it’s my decision. If Captain Lochry doesn’t want to go to the trouble of delivering the prisoners, I’d be happy to send one of my ships to take them off his hands.”

  “I appreciate your thoughtfulness,” Savit said. “But for now, I think we’ll let Captain Lochry keep them. If we’re able to contact either Director Krennic or Grand Admiral Thrawn, we may be able to clear this up without further bother on anyone’s part.”

  “That’s not even remotely a possibility, and you know it,” Haveland growled. “The man is a criminal, a liar, and a saboteur. I demand that he be turned over to me immediately.”

  “Your request is so noted,” Savit said coolly. “If you wish to appeal to the Emperor, you may do so. Until then, I stand by my decision.” He reached for the comm switch. “Thank you, Governor Haveland. I’ll be in touch.”

  “Admiral—”

  Savit tapped the switch, and Haveland’s image vanished.

  “She is a pip, isn’t she, sir?” Lochry growled, his holo finally letting loose with the contemptuous expression he’d so obviously been holding back while Haveland was still in the conversation.

  “She’s a woman who sees a threat to her little domain and is scrambling to protect it,” Savit said. “Quite predictable, really. What do you think of her claim that your Ronan impersonator is a saboteur?”

  Lochry’s eyebrows went up a couple of millimeters. “You don’t think he’s really Ronan, either?”

  “I’ve met Director Krennic,” Savit said, letting out some disdain of his own. “I can’t imagine for a minute he would send an administrator hunting for sabotage or theft or whatever he thought he was doing on Aloxor.”

  “I suppose,” Lochry said. “As to the sabotage…I don’t know that, either. He freely admits they pulled off the outer thruster sleeve, but as near as I can tell all he’s proven is that someone was trying to use the Brylan Ross to smuggle an extra tank of Clouzon-36. There may be more of it stashed elsewhere, but if there’s a crime here I don’t want to go poking around and possibly contaminate the evidence.”

  “Quite right,” Savit agreed. “Best to leave the freighter exactly as it is.”

  “Yes, sir,” Lochry said, nodding. “I’ve got it cordoned off in a corner of the hangar bay with a squad of troopers guarding it.”

  “Good,” Savit said. “Well. I admit I’m intrigued by all this. I think it’s time to see this man for myself.”

  “Sir?” Lochry asked carefully. “I thought you’d agreed that I’d hold on to the prisoners for now.”

  “I’ve reconsidered,” Savit said. “Whoever they are, it sounds like they’re genuinely afraid of Haveland. That suggests that the prudent course would be to get them as far out of her reach as possible. Rendezvous with me—” He peered at his navigational chart. “Let’s make it the Sev Tok system.”

  “Yes, sir,” Lochry said, still sounding reluctant. “I’ll set course immediately.”

  “Good,” Savit said. “And as long as I’m taking the prisoners, I might as well take the freighter, too. The whole litter in one pen, as it were. Make sure it’s prepped to be transferred over by the time I arrive.”

  “Of course, Admiral,” Lochry said.

  “And don’t look so glum,” Savit chided with a small smile. “The reason you were at Aloxor in the first place was that Haveland insisted that we watch over her cargo for her. It’s only fair that whatever glory comes from catching this thief or saboteur should reflect on us, not a lazy moff who couldn’t be bothered to handle her own security.”

  “I suppose so,” Lochry said. “Especially if some of that glory comes in the form of not letting them get killed?”

  “Indeed, Captain. Indeed.”

  The walk back through the Tiquwe spaceport to the pirate and smuggler section was long and wearying. Fortunately, the pirates and smugglers infesting that part were too busy getting ready for the anticipated Imperial raid to bother with strangers.

  Which was just as well for them. The mood Eli was in, he would have welcomed any excuse to turn the death troopers loose and slaughter every single one of them.

  What the hell kind of game was Ronan playing at? Ditching Eli and the others, and flying off on his own?

  Especially since he might not even have gotten away. It had been hard to tell from the ground, but it had sure looked like the Brylan Ross doing the tractor beam dance with that Star Destroyer overhead. Had Ronan tried to escape and botched the job?

  Or was it something more sinister? All that jinking and maneuvering—Pik had said he spotted Dayja in the cockpit as the freighter was lifting off. Had that crazy flying been Ronan and Dayja fighting for control? Had one of them wanted to take the ship to the Star Destroyer while the other didn’t?

  And if so, which one of them had won the struggle?

  Eli didn’t know. But the only conclusion that made sense was that one of the two was secretly working with the thieves.

  But again, which one? And why?

  The flight off Aloxor was nerve racking. If Ronan was the one who’d surrendered the Brylan Ross to the Star Destroyer, then by now the Imperials knew all about the shuttle they had arrived in. If they wanted to make a clean sweep of it, it would be trivial to pluck the shuttle out of the sky.

  But no challenges came. Pik joined with the rest of the traffic flow, right under the Star Destroyer’s nose, and made the jump to lightspeed without interference.

  Leaving Eli still wondering what had happened.

  The questions would probably have driven him crazy on the trip back to the Grysk observation post except for one thing. Thrawn was there, and Thrawn would be able to figure it out.

  * * *

  —

  Only Thrawn wasn’t there. Nor was the Chimaera.

  “First Officer Khresh says the Chimaera left to go chase down the Grysk supply ship that got away from us,”
Eli told the death troopers after a short conversation with the Steadfast. “That was a few hours ago, and they haven’t heard anything since.”

  “Really,” Waffle growled, eyeing the Chiss ship.

  “I don’t like it,” Pik said flatly. “Fair bet that other admiral—Ar’alani—sent him off on a fake chase.”

  “I doubt it,” Eli said. “Khresh says she went with him.”

  Pik swiveled around in the pilot’s seat to stare at him. “Ar’alani went with him?”

  “That’s what Khresh said,” Eli confirmed. And not just Ar’alani, but also Vah’nya.

  And that was the part that particularly worried Eli. Vah’nya was a one-of-a-kind navigator, and he knew how protective Ar’alani was of the young woman. The situation must have been extraordinary for the admiral to let her out from behind the Steadfast’s weapons and deflectors. Especially aboard a foreign ship.

  The two death troopers were talking quietly together. “Is there a question?” Eli asked.

  “We’re deciding what to do next,” Pik said. “Best course is to head back to Aloxor, contact the local governor, and get someone to send a ship to hunt down the Chimaera.”

  “We have a perfectly good ship right here,” Eli reminded them, gesturing out the viewport at the Steadfast.

  Waffle snorted. “No.”

  “We’re death troopers, Vanto,” Pik said. “We don’t go aboard non-Imperial ships unless our Primary does.”

  “Okay, fine,” Eli said. “You can wait here after you drop me off.”

  “Did you hear what I said about non-Imperial ships?” Pik asked.

  “You don’t have to go aboard.”

  “That includes non-Imperial hangar bays.”

  Eli glared at the back of his head. “Grand Admiral Thrawn is your Primary,” he said tartly. “He assigned you to protect me. Unless you think dropping me near the Steadfast in a vac suit and letting me swim the rest of the way comes under that heading, you’ll take me into the hangar bay as I asked. After that, if you want to go to Aloxor, that’s fine with me. Or you can sit here by the observation post and wait for the Chimaera to return. Your choice.”

  The two men exchanged looks. “Fine,” Pik growled. “But we’re staying aboard the shuttle. You’ll be on your own.”

  “That’s fine,” Eli said. “I’m sure they’d prefer you do that anyway.”

  “I’m sure they would,” Pik said. “Call them and get clearance for us to dock.”

  “Thank you for seeing reason,” Eli said. “And I already did.”

  First Officer Khresh was waiting as Eli left the shuttle and stepped into the hangar bay. “Welcome back, Lieutenant,” Khresh said, the words and tone perfunctory. “We have a potential crisis that we need your assistance with.”

  “Admiral Ar’alani?” Eli asked.

  “Yes,” Khresh said. “She’s been gone too long, and some of the crew are becoming uneasy.”

  Translation: Mid Commander Tanik was pushing at him to do something, possibly stirring up members of his family and their allies to add their own pressure to the mix. That kind of political maneuvering and infighting was supposedly forbidden aboard military vessels, but with the heightened tensions simmering back in the Ascendancy that policy was starting to show cracks. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know where they went,” he told Khresh.

  “Of course you don’t,” Khresh said impatiently. “But we know that she and Mitth’raw’nuruodo went to find the Grysk forward base. The only person aboard the Steadfast who knows how to find it is Navigator Un’hee.”

  “Then all you need to do is ask—”

  “She’ll only talk to you.”

  Eli blinked. “To—what?”

  “She says she’ll only take the Steadfast to that place if you ask her,” Khresh said, the frustration that had been lurking beneath the surface boiling over. “You are—” He muttered something Eli’s Cheunh lessons hadn’t covered. “She’ll only talk to you.”

  “I’ll be happy to speak with her,” Eli said. “Where is she, the navigators’ section?”

  “The admiral’s office,” Khresh said. “I thought the surroundings there might spark thoughts of loyalty and duty.”

  Eli resisted the reflexive urge to ask if it had worked. Obviously, it hadn’t. “All right. Let’s go.”

  * * *

  —

  The little girl was sitting in Ar’alani’s contemplation chair, swiveled to face the admiral’s memory wall. She jerked a little as Eli and Khresh came in and hastily turned the chair away from the wall. Her eyes darted back and forth between them before settling on Eli. “Are you Lieutenant Eli?” she asked tentatively.

  “This is Lieutenant Eli’van’to,” Khresh said, his voice stiff and formal. “He will speak with you.” With a final unreadable look at Eli, he turned and left the office.

  Eli waited until the door had closed behind him. Then he took a step forward, giving the girl his best smile. “Hello, Navigator Un’hee,” he said. “As First Officer Khresh said, I’m Lieutenant Eli. I understand you wanted to talk to me?”

  “Yes,” the girl said, her voice soft and nervous. “Do they also call you Ivant?”

  “That’s my core name,” Eli said. “Or it would be if I were a Chiss. Obviously, I’m not. In my culture, my friends and family would call me Eli.”

  “Eli,” Un’hee said, frowning. “So just the first part?”

  “Yes.”

  “Strange.”

  “Some of the things about us are strange,” Eli conceded. “Of course, to us some of the ways of the Chiss are equally strange. But that’s good. Learning about each other’s ways and learning how we’re alike despite our differences is a way to enrich our lives.”

  “Maybe,” Un’hee said, her body seeming to hunch into itself again. “But differences aren’t always good. There are bad differences among the Chiss. Some Chiss can’t be trusted. Vah’nya showed me.”

  “She showed you? How?”

  “Through Second Sight,” Un’hee said, lowering her eyes as a shiver ran through her. “Our minds…entwined.”

  “I see,” Eli said, nodding as it finally clicked. So Vah’nya had somehow touched Un’hee’s mind through this Second Sight in order to find out how to locate the Grysk forward station from Un’hee. In the process, Un’hee had apparently gotten some of Vah’nya’s thoughts and memories in return. “Did Vah’nya say you could trust me?”

  “She told me you weren’t Chiss,” Un’hee said. “She said you don’t stand on either edge, but act only for the whole Ascendancy.”

  “That’s correct,” Eli said, thinking about the various family-driven tensions aboard the Steadfast. “Admiral Ar’alani also acts only for the Ascendancy,” he said. “As do you navigators.”

  “That’s what Vah’nya said,” Un’hee said. “But Admiral Ar’alani isn’t here. Vah’nya said that if she wasn’t here, I could trust you. Was she wrong?”

  “No, not at all,” Eli assured her. “You can absolutely trust me, just as I can trust you. But it’s Admiral Ar’alani who needs you the most right now. She and the humans of the Chimaera have gone to destroy the Grysks who once enslaved you. But we don’t know where they went, and some of the others are worried. You’re the only one who can take us to her.”

  “Are you worried about her?”

  Eli pursed his lips. “I’m worried, yes,” he said. “But only in the sense of uncertainty. Without full knowledge, a person has to rely on trust and hope. Insufficient hope usually comes out as concern.”

  He nodded toward the memory wall, the collected trophies and mementos of Ar’alani’s life and career. “But I’m not worried that Admiral Ar’alani’s in overwhelming danger,” he added. “I’ve watched her during the time that I’ve served aboard the Steadfast, and I know that she’s smart, capable, and resourceful. More tha
n that, she’s in the company of one of the greatest military minds the Chiss culture has ever produced. Standing together, I don’t believe there’s a force in the universe that can defeat both Admiral Ar’alani and Grand Admiral Mitth’raw’nuruodo.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “I’d like to prove that to you. Would you help me prove it to you?”

  “You want me to take the ship there?” Un’hee asked.

  “Yes,” Eli said. “Can you do that?”

  The girl hesitated, and he saw her eyes drift to the memory wall. “All right,” she said. “But only if you stand beside me.”

  Eli nodded. As soon as Un’hee went into the Navigator’s Trance necessary to guide the ship, she would be essentially helpless, blind to anything else going on around her. If she was already nervous about who among the Steadfast she could trust, that situation could be overwhelming. “I’ll stand beside you and protect you,” he promised. “No one will approach or interfere. Not as long as I live.”

  She looked at him. Back at the memory wall…and when she turned back the final time, there was a new resolution in her eyes. “Navigator Vah’nya trusts you,” she said, working her way to the edge of the chair and climbing down. “So does Admiral Ar’alani. I guess I can, too.”

  * * *

  —

  Khresh was pleased and relieved that Un’hee had agreed to lead them to Ar’alani and the Grysk forward base.

  He was less pleased when Eli requested that he be allowed to wear a sidearm on the bridge during the flight.

  For Khresh, it was a bending of standard protocol. For Eli, it was a non-negotiable obligation. Un’hee would only be able to function if she felt safe, he insisted, and only an armed protector could give her the proper sense of security.

  It seemed to work. Eli’s eyes were on Un’hee when Khresh finally gave in and called for a sidearm, and he could see some of the tension lines in her face smooth out. He walked with her to the helm; and as he stood beside her, the weapon strapped around his waist, she rested her hands on the controls, bowed her head, and slipped into her trance.