Star Wars, page 7
“Intrepid indeed,” Master Char-Ryl-Roy said with only a hint of disapproval.
Gella remained deferential but winked at Enya, who offered a friendly smile.
The chancellor continued, tangling his thick fingers through his face-tentacles in the same way Master Roy tugged at his short beard. “Jedi Nattai, please give us a report on what you saw out there. Be our eyes and ears.”
Gella looked to the masters. She’d never been given a direct command from a representative of the Republic, and even if he was one of the leaders of the Republic, she was not about to break protocol. Again.
The Cerean Jedi gave an almost imperceptible nod, likely not to offend Mollo. She felt him reach out through the Force with encouragement, and so she told them everything, though she did not retrace the moment she went rogue. One of the chancellor’s aides took furious notes while the Quarren clung to her account—how they’d done everything to stop the E’ronoh ship from crashing into Eiram, and it still hadn’t been enough.
When she was finished, Gella turned her gaze to the red and turquoise planets. “I’m almost certain the captain and the general were alive when their ships went down.” There had even been a moment when Gella had wanted to follow, but she knew her best course was to rendezvous with her fellow Jedi.
“Captain A’lbaran is E’ronoh’s princess and the Monarch’s last living heir,” Enya said, radiating worry.
When the pilot of the ice hauler had said, “Many apologies, Princess,” she’d assumed he was being patronizing as he dropped the cargo to get clear of the melee. The severity of the situation stretched the silence between them.
“Katrana, what’s the status on repairs?” Chancellor Mollo asked.
The human aide looked up from her tablet. Her hair was in the elaborate braids Gella had seen on representatives from Alderaan. The young woman gave a small shake of her head. “A couple more hours at least.”
“My diagnostics test turned up nothing unusual,” Enya said. “What if we’re being jammed?”
“We haven’t detected anything coming from either planet,” Katrana said.
“Master Sun,” Gella said. “I’d like to volunteer to take the Alpha-3 on a recon mission to learn Captain A’lbaran’s whereabouts.”
The Jedi Master was deep in thought before he said, “The path is not clear. We shouldn’t separate. And if we can’t communicate with them, I don’t want to risk the city defenses perceiving foreign vessels as a threat.”
Enya grimaced. “That wouldn’t bode well for the princess, then.”
Gella believed Captain A’lbaran was alive. She had no proof, and had only briefly known the young woman, but it was a feeling she needed to explore. She needed a moment alone.
Gella took steady breaths and opened herself up to the Force. The sensation, here on the salt-strewn moon, felt like traversing along the edge of the horizon, as if at any moment she could launch herself into the endless sky and know she’d be safe in the blanket of night. She might not always follow orders, but she did follow her intuition, even when it got her in trouble.
Letting that sensation guide her, Gella broke from the cohort. She took careful steps across the launch pad. She wasn’t certain of what she was looking for, but she was certain she would know it when she came upon it. There was no breeze, just salt crunching under her boots, and bits of glass from the front of an abandoned shop. Partial footprints were still imprinted in the sediment. She wished she had the skill to touch objects and see the impressions through the Force. She breathed through the knot of frustration building in her core, untangled it like a spool of thread, and kept going.
Her master, who passed into the Force years before, had commended Gella’s intuition, her desire to devour knowledge, to question everything around her. One of Gella’s most treasured memories was of the wise old Jedi saying, “Curiosity is your strength, my Padawan. It is your next step on your Jedi path.” At times she wanted her strength to be some special ability like psychometry or healing, but then she remembered that every Jedi’s connection to the Force was as unique as the stars in the galaxy. Hers still felt distant, though bright.
It was there, in the rubble of overturned crates and the remnants of the refueling station, that she noticed something she hadn’t registered at first glance. Faint rings of disturbed salt, blast marks as if from turbo engines. Perhaps a small, single-pilot ship.
“Gella.” Master Sun’s voice was low, concerned. He approached carefully, his brown robes rustling in his wake. “What is it?”
“I think I found something,” she said, even if she couldn’t put a name to the thing she’d found. Only that the Force had guided her to this spot, this stack of scavenged crates, arranged almost too carefully. She reached inside one crate and found it wasn’t empty.
Master Sun got on one knee to examine the cylindrical object that had metal pipes and the flat dome of an astromech droid. He scratched the graying spot on his left temple and let his fingers drag across his jaw in consternation. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think someone cobbled together a jamming beacon out of salvage yard finds.”
Gella unholstered one of her lightsabers, the black moonstone hilt cool against her palms. She thumbed on the violet plasma blade, felt the familiar hum of its kyber core.
“Wait, no!” Master Sun began, drawing up a blocking blow with the Force. It knocked the trajectory of her downward swing off by a hair, though she still decapitated the beacon.
Gella disengaged her lightsaber and turned in confusion to the Jedi Master. “What was that for?”
He pinched the bridge of his nose, then loosed a long-suffering sigh. “We could have traced it back to whoever cobbled this together.”
“Oh,” she said, wincing at the canopy of space above. “Right. Perhaps we still can?”
Master Sun stood, still holding a severed piece of the homemade jamming beacon. There was no time for apologies as moments later the others began running toward them.
Katrana waved her datapad.
“She’s alive. The princess is alive!”
“Whatever you did, a message from Eiram came through on every frequency,” Enya added.
Gella turned her sights on Eiram’s turquoise surface. She whispered, “Thank the Force.”
“The princess is the answer,” Master Roy said with certainty. “Arranging safe passage home for Captain A’lbaran is how we can invite the Monarch and the queen to a peace summit.”
“Coruscant, perhaps?” the Nautolan aide asked.
Master Sun shook his head thoughtfully. “We should keep this summit here.”
“Here, here?” Enya asked, gesturing around at the moon.
A reminder of a scavenged, abandoned place would not have been Gella’s first choice. To her understanding, each world had a different name for it. The Valiant was a neutral place. Though not exactly equipped for royalty and still packed with medical relief for Eiram. But Chancellor Mollo was used to traveling with senators and world leaders.
“What about the Paxion?” Gella asked.
The Quarren’s blue eyes burned with pride as he turned to his ship. “I was going to suggest it myself, my intrepid Jedi.”
When the Master Jedi agreed, Chancellor Mollo wasted no time in ordering his aides. “Dispatch messages to both capitals at once. The Paxion will be stationed in the corridor between worlds. A stepping-stone on the route to lasting peace.”
THE ROOK, E’RONOH
It was happening again.
Not Lieutenant Segaru’s report of the day’s skirmish. Not another lost cargo. Not the riots he could hear despite the servants shutting the glass panes of his war room. For the Monarch of E’ronoh, war was inevitable. A guarantee. A promise to defend the might and honor of his great house and lineage against any and all who would threaten them.
None of that mattered when his daughter was—
He swallowed the foreign emotion that wedged itself in his throat as he watched, then rewatched the holorecording of the clash that broke the cease-fire and ended with the explosion of Thylefire Nine’s ship. It would have been an instant death, thank the old gods. But Xiri—Xiri’s starfighter had been too close to the explosion, and she’d plummeted into enemy territory. There was no word of her whereabouts. No word if the enemy across the corridor of space had taken her hostage. If she’d been lost to those terrible waters.
“Monarch,” Lieutenant Segaru said, with the impatience of someone who had to repeat themself.
The Monarch adjusted the cuffs of his tunic. Balled his fingers into a fist as he was unable to stop his hands from trembling. He had to pull himself together. It was time to act. His council and his lieutenant were waiting for an answer he did not have because all he could think of was that it was happening again. He’d lost his boy, his first son and heir, to those waters. If something had happened to Xiri—
Well.
He’d rip Eiram apart, pollute their oceans, blacken their clouds. He’d find a way. He’d do anything and everything in his power to destroy them.
“Yes, Lieutenant?” the Monarch said, leaning against the bronze head of his cane.
Jerrod Segaru’s broad frame moved around the table. He’d come straight to the palace the moment he landed, judging by the haphazard way his flight suit was rolled down to the waist, exposing the sweaty shirt underneath. “I heard General Lao’s last order. If, and that’s a very big if, the barnacles powered down their anti-missile cannons like he ordered, there’s a chance Xiri’s still alive.”
“A cunning girl,” Viceroy Ferrol said. “Thank the old gods Princess Xiri was stubborn enough to reject your gift of a new ship.”
Lieutenant Segaru cocked a brow. “Tevin wasn’t as lucky.”
“Though surely happy to give his life for E’ronoh.” The viceroy smiled with yellow teeth. “My son also flew under Xiri’s squadron, and he’s still in the medbay. I am certain he feels the same way.”
The Monarch nodded absently, then used his cane to point. “What triggered the explosion?”
“Sabotage,” the viceroy supplied eagerly. “From Eiram, naturally. They’ve done nothing but cower against our attacks, and they’ve finally struck at our heart.”
His adviser was right. Hailing from one of the founding families of E’ronoh, the man had been at the Monarch’s side for decades. He was a constant in the sea of death that surrounded him. The only thing that had changed in Viceroy Ferrol was threads of gray in his auburn coif.
“Of course,” the Monarch said.
Lieutenant Segaru cleared his throat. “My monarch, if I may?”
Viceroy Ferrol’s lip curled with a barely perceptible snarl. But the Monarch motioned for the boy to proceed.
“Our ports are secure. Entry codes are routed to the capital’s traffic tower. Anyone suspected of sympathy for Eiram is under surveillance. Whoever is responsible would have to have had knowledge of our hangar bays, and I simply cannot give the barnacles that much credit.”
“Are you saying there’s a traitor among us?” the viceroy asked.
“I’m saying,” Segaru said, straightening to make himself a fraction taller than the other man, “that this is a distraction. Our eyes should be on Eiram.”
“In that, we agree. We must strike,” the viceroy said.
“That’s not what I meant. We must get Xiri—Captain A’lbaran—back. The Republic and the Jedi have arrived in our sector,” Lieutenant Segaru argued, pointing at the ceiling. “In our orbit. It would be unwise to move against them.”
Viceroy Ferrol turned his cheek to the younger man. “If they have come to choose sides, then they deserve to be shot down. You must learn to make tough decisions, Jerrod.”
Lieutenant Segaru had the nerve to smile, though there was no humor in the way he bared his teeth. He took a step, and the viceroy flinched as the soldier removed his eyepatch, exposing the brutally scarred tissue that had been mended shut. “Talk to me when you can make the call to send our soldiers to their deaths. Better yet, talk to me when you can look someone in their eyes and watch the light leave them. You’ve grown too comfortable, Viceroy, while our people starve.” He tapped the flat of his hand against the older man’s suit.
The viceroy balked, wrapping a hand around the bane blade at his hip. “You insolent—” He blubbered. “My son—”
“Do not hide behind your son,” Segaru shot back, securing the eyepatch back in place. “His sprained wrist will heal.”
The Monarch had had enough. He raised his cane and slammed it onto the marble floor, hearing the satisfying crack of metal on stone. The two men stood at immediate attention. In their restrained silence, the roar of unrest in the streets slipped through the cracks. The Monarch’s tremors returned, more and more prominent with every step he took to the windows. Wrenching them open, he let in the evening dust. Opened his mouth and let it coat his tongue. Dust of his world, of E’ronoh. It was in his veins. In the long line of Monarchs that came before him. His family stewarding the safety and endurance of their planet, unchallenged for more than a century.
All that power and it granted him everything but peace. Now his enemies surrounded him. Eirami who had stolen his land, his son’s life. Viceroy Ferrol was right. If the Republic and the Jedi were adamant about getting involved, he would make enemies of them, too.
His daughter would caution reason, diplomacy. She’d talked him into a cease-fire, and this was the result.
He knew, whether Xiri was alive or not, that he needed to show strength.
“Captain Segaru,” the Monarch said. The young man’s storm-gray eye widened with surprise before he lowered himself into a reverent bow. “Prepare to attack.”
Gella Nattai raced to the communications center aboard the Paxion with Enya Keen at her side. The Republic Longbeam ship was cavernous compared to her starfighter, and it felt more so with only a skeleton crew keeping the ship operational in the “late night” shift.
“It should be right here,” Enya said, turning into a dimly lit corridor that emptied out into an—aquarium. “Or not.”
Gella absently touched her pocket as if the datacard Master Sun had entrusted them with had vanished since the previous second she’d checked. She glanced back in the direction of the meeting parlor and frowned. “Chancellor Mollo certainly modified the ship to his tastes.”
Though the Jedi traveled in the same class ship, this one had a briefing room where he recorded his Holos from Mollo segment for the HoloNet, a room entirely dedicated to artifacts and gifts given to the Republic from the worlds he’d visited, a training room (though it seemed entirely unused), and apparently an aquarium.
“Real glowing plankton from Mon Cala,” the Padawan marveled. “I wonder if he gets homesick.”
Gella hadn’t considered that a chancellor of the Republic, a being whose position was to lead a huge portion of the galaxy, could get homesick. As a youngling, she’d felt a longing for a place she no longer could recall except in flashes. But that longing had vanished over time.
Enya, who had a penchant for getting sidetracked, began to step into the pale-blue light of the room, but Gella tugged the Padawan by the hem of her tabard. The doors slid shut, and they resumed heading down the corridor.
“Let’s retrace our steps before we get even more lost,” Gella suggested.
“A Jedi is never lost,” Enya said, taking on the severe baritone of her master, Char-Ryl-Roy. “As long as the Force is on their side.”
Though she realized Enya was only half joking, Gella did, in fact, reach into the Force and found a very anxious, very worried someone nearby.
“This way.” Gella took off in that direction, the network of corridors dimly lit, likely to redirect power to repairs and conserve fuel. When she heard a groan of frustration, followed by a fist pounding a screen, Gella knew they had the right place.
The communications room buzzed with Republic officials. Several beings made quick work of piecing back together an astromech droid while a human woman tinkered with the wiry guts of a control panel, her riot of curls falling into her eyes every time she reached for her tool belt.
Enya cleared her throat, but no one looked up.
Gella approached the nearest Republic official, sensing the anxiety radiating from them. The green Mirialan had black markings on their chin, like Master Roy’s beard, and wore large goggles that made their dark eyes appear magnified.
“Excuse me,” Gella began.
“You’re excused,” they said, punching several buttons on a control table all at once.
Gella tried again. “Hello, I am Jedi Knight Gella Nattai. Chancellor Mollo said you could help us send a message.”
Then Enya added brightly, “Please.”
“Well, I am tech supervisor Oshi Karmo, and I’m sorry to tell you that no one is sending any messages anytime soon.”
Gella reached into her pocket and traced the datacard. “But Chancellor Mollo said—”
Oshi rubbed their face in frustration. “I’m sorry. It’s been—”
“Rough day?” Enya offered, tacking on a smile to her empathetic question.
“Yes.” The fellow nodded. Finally, they looked up, deflating into the swiveling chair. “Yes, it has been a day.”
“Perhaps we can help.”
Oshi returned Enya’s infectious smile. “Is either of you a mechanical engineer?”
Enya thought on it very briefly before saying, “No.”
“Then, no, you can’t help.” Oshi spun on their chair and pointed at the datacard in Gella’s hand. “Transmissions are down.”
Gella felt the pinch of anger, then noticed how weary the young Mirialan looked. Their entire ship had dropped into a war zone, and from what the Jedi had told her in their private quarters, Chancellor Mollo’s venture to Eiram and E’ronoh was a bit rogue. Gella had been prepared to join the fray, Oshi wasn’t. She wasn’t used to smiling at everyone and everything like Enya, but she tried.
