Dark Nest_ The Swarm War Part 8

"Just don't try anything," Grees warned. "You're not as quick as you used to be."

Lizil c.o.c.ked its head and stared at Leia out of one bulbous green eye. "Uuu rru buur?"

"Sligh is nervous because we haven't seen each other in a long time," Leia said, taking a guess at what the insect had asked.

"And Sylune and I looked a lot different back then," Han added.

"I'm sure our appearance must be shocking," Leia said to the Squibs. "But there's no need to be alarmed. We're not here to start trouble-as long as no one else starts it, either."

She cast a meaningful glare at the Squibs' hands, and all three returned their palms to the edge of the table.

"Then why are you here?" Grees demanded. "Lizil already told you the Colony doesn't need a magcannon."

"Can't an old friend pay a social call?" Han smiled and fixed Grees with a threatening glare. "I just wanted to tell you that I ran into a couple of your contract employees not so long ago. They were a great help to me and a good friend of mine." He glanced at the Killik behind them. "I thought maybe I should tell you about it."

"No!" all three Squibs said together.

"We mean there's no need," Sligh added quickly. "We already know everything."

"You're sure?" Leia asked. "Even about how they-"

"We heard!" Grees said. He turned toward the same corridor from which Emala's son Krafte had emerged. On cue, a small female with silky black fur appeared. "Now we really are very busy. Seneki will see you out."

"That's all the time you have for your friends?" Han turned toward the black female and shooed her back toward the corridor. "I'm hurt!"

Seneki froze halfway into the salon and looked to Emala for instruction.

"Time is money," Emala said, waving Seneki forward. "You understand."

"Not really," Leia said. She held her hand out to Seneki-presumably Emala's daughter-and used the Force to hold her back, drawing a gasp of surprise from the young Squib. "But I'm beginning to think we really should talk about your employees. You could take a lesson from them in politeness."

The three Squibs sighed and looked at each other, then Emala shook her head and said, "You know how valuable our time is, and our schedule is very tight today. You'll just have to buy another-"

"Maybe we can make it worth your while," Leia interrupted.

"I doubt that," Sligh said. "If you'll just leave-"

"We're not leaving," Han growled. He turned back to Leia. "You were saying, Syrule?"

Leia smiled and propped her hand on her hip. "Well, I'm sure the Colony wouldn't want our magcannon to end up in the hands of the Chiss or the Galactic Alliance."

Lizil clacked its mandibles in a very definite "No!"

"Then maybe we should sell it to our old friends," Leia said. "I'm sure they could find a safe buyer for it-and that way, we would be free to run a load of cargo to Tenupe."

"Tenupe is in a war zone," Sligh said. "The Colony only allows insect crews to run supplies into war zones."

"So talk to them for us," Han said. "It looks like you've got plenty of pull around here."

"Ruruuruur bub?" the Killik asked.

"Lizil wants to know why you're so interested in Tenupe," Emala translated.

"We're not," Han answered. "It's the StealthXs we want to see."

The Squibs, who had almost certainly figured out that Han and Leia wanted to see Jaina and Zekk, rolled their eyes.

But Lizil asked, "Bub?"

"We have a client who could benefit from the technology," Leia answered. She smiled conspiratorially. "And I'm sure it would only help the Colony's war effort if the Galactic Alliance suddenly had to divert even more resources to chasing pirates in stealth s.h.i.+ps."

Lizil's antennae tipped forward in interest; then the insect turned to Grees. "Uubbuu ruub buur?"

Grees sighed, then said, "Sure, we'll vouch for 'em." His sagging red eyes glared blaster bolts at Leia. "And if they disappoint you, we'll make sure they take their secrets to the grave with them."

SEVEN.

Luke usually sensed when the outer door to his office suite in the Jedi Temple was about to open. Today, however, he was so engrossed in Ghent's work that he did not realize he had a visitor until someone stopped at the entrance to the inner office and politely cleared his throat. The micro-grabber in Ghent's hand jerked ever so slightly, and a tiny tick sounded somewhere deep inside R2-D2's casing. The slicer uttered a colorful smuggler's oath-something about Twi'lek Hutt-slime wrestlers, which he had no doubt learned during his stint in Talon Karrde's smuggling syndicate. Then he slowly, steadily backed the micrograbber out of R2-D2's deep-reserve data compartment.

"That didn't sound good," Luke said. Without turning around, he motioned whoever was at the door to wait there. "How bad is it?"

Ghent turned his tattooed face toward Luke, his pale eyes appearing huge and bug-like through his magnispecs. With his unkempt blue hair and tattered jumpsuit, the scrawny man looked more like a jolt-head from the underbelly of Talos City than the Alliance's best slicer.

"How bad is what?"

"Whatever it is you're swearing about," Mara said. She was kneeling beside Ghent, holding a handful of ancient circuits they had taken from the R2 prototype Aryn Thul had given them. "It sounded like you dropped the omnigate."

"I heard it hit inside Artoo," Luke said helpfully.

Ghent nodded. "Me, too," he said, as though it were an everyday occurrence.

He retrieved a penglow from his tool kit and s.h.i.+ned it down into R2-D2's casing, slowly playing the beam over the internal circuitry without answering the original question. Luke accepted the neglect as the price of genius and reluctantly turned toward the entrance to his office, where his nephew Jacen was waiting in his customary garb of boots, jumpsuit, and sleeveless cloak. Now that he had shaved off the beard he had grown during his five-year absence, he looked more than ever like his parents, with Leia's big brown eyes and Han's lopsided smirk.

"Twool said you wanted to see me." Jacen glanced toward Ghent and Mara. "But if I've come at a bad time-"

"No, we need to talk." Luke motioned him toward the outer office. "Let's go out here. I don't want to disturb Ghent."

"That's okay," Ghent said, surprising Luke by reacting to a remark that wasn't directed at him. "You're not disturbing me."

"I think Luke needs to talk with Jacen privately," Mara explained.

"Oh." Ghent continued to work, peering through his magnispecs into R2-D2's data compartment. "Doesn't he want to see if the omnigate works?"

"Of course," Luke said. The omnigate was a sliver of circuitry Ghent had found inside the prototype droid. Supposedly, it was a sort of hardware pa.s.skey that would unlock all of R2-D2's sequestered files. "You mean you're ready?"

"Almost," Ghent said. "And you'd better not leave. The omnigate is pretty deteriorated-it might not last long."

"You've figured out a way to unlock Artoo?" Jacen started across the room without seeking permission from Luke. "You can bring up a holo of my grandmother?"

"Sure." Ghent pulled his micrograbbers out of R2-D2's data compartment, then flipped up his magnispecs. "Either that or lose Artoo's entire memory to a security wipe."

"At least the risks are clear," Luke said, following Jacen back over to the slicer's side. This was hardly the reason he had sent for his nephew, but Jacen had almost as much right to see the lost holos as Luke himself. "Which is more likely?"

Ghent shrugged. "Depends on how much you trust the Thul woman. Her story makes sense."

Luke waited while Ghent's gaze grew increasingly distant ... as it often did when the slicer actually had to discuss something.

After a moment, Luke prompted, "But?"

Ghent's eyes snapped back into focus, and he restarted the conversation where he had left off. "But if that isn't the real Intellex Four prototype in there, the omnigate will trigger every security system your droid has. We'll be lucky if our memories aren't erased, overwritten, and reformatted."

"So it depends entirely on whether Aryn Thul is being honest with us?" Mara asked.

"And on whoever sold her the prototype," Ghent said. "Droid antiquers are always getting crisped by counterfeit prototypes."

"That's one thing we don't have to worry about," Mara said. "n.o.body is going to swindle Aryn Thul. That woman is a business rancor."

Luke turned to Jacen. "What do you think?"

Jacen finally looked surprised. "Me?"

"You have an interest in this, too," Luke said. The conversation he wanted to have with his nephew would be difficult enough, so it seemed wise to rea.s.sure Jacen that he was still held in high regard. "You should be part of the decision."

"Thanks . . . I think." Jacen furrowed his brow, then said, "Madame Thul certainly has reason to be suspicious of you--even angry. But I don't see any advantage to her in erasing Artoo's memory."

"So you think we should try?" Luke asked. The answer had been exactly what he wasn't looking for, relying as it did on calculation and logic instead of the insight and empathy that had been Jacen's special gifts before the war with the Yuuzhan Vong had changed him. "You want to take the chance?"

Jacen nodded. "I don't see that Madame Thul could gain anything by slipping you a counterfeit omnigate."

"That's not what Luke asked," Mara said, apparently sensing Luke's disappointment. "He wants to know how you feel about it."

"How I feel?" Jacen's eyes lit with comprehension. "That's a silly question. How do you think I feel?"

Luke smiled. "I'll take that as a go-ahead." He turned to Ghent and nodded. "Do it."

"Okay, n.o.body even breathe for a second." Ghent flipped his magnispecs down. "I need to seat the omnigate."

As Ghent lowered his micrograbbers into R2-D2's data compartment, Luke's heart began to beat so hard that he half feared the pounding would break the slicer's concentration. As much as he wanted to learn his mother's fate, more depended on the omnigate than filling the gaps in his family history.

During his stay on Woteba, the Dark Nest had insinuated that Mara might be trying to hide her involvement-during her days as the Emperor's Hand-in the death of Luke's mother. Of course, Luke had realized even then that the insinuation was unfounded. But the known facts left just enough room to keep doubt alive, and doubt could be a very stubborn enemy ... especially when it was bolstered by the Dark Nest.

Lomi Plo thrived on doubt. If she sensed any doubt in a person's mind at all, she could hide behind it in the Force and make herself effectively invisible. That was how she had nearly killed Luke the last time they met .

. . and if he hoped to defeat her the next time, he had to cast aside all doubt-in Mara, in himself, in his fellow Jedi. To a greater extent than he had admitted to anyone except Mara, that was one of the driving forces behind his reorganization of the Jedi order. He simply could not allow any doubt in his mind about where it was going.

A few moments later, Ghent let out a sigh of relief and pulled the micrograbbers from the data compartment.

"Okay, you can breathe now," he said. "The gate is attached to the sequestered circuit."

He flipped Artoo's primary circuit breaker, and the little droid came to life with a sharp squeal.

"It's okay, Artoo," Luke said. "Ghent has just been working on those memory problems you've been having."

R2-D2 swiveled his dome around, studying the stacks of prototype parts surrounding him, then trained his photoreceptor on Ghent and beeped suspiciously.

"He didn't add anything you need to worry about," Luke said. "Now, show us what happened between my mother and father after he finished in the Jedi Temple."

Artoo started to squeak a refusal-then let out an alarmed whistle. He spun his photoreceptor toward Luke and reluctantly chirped a question.

"Your parameters are too vague," Ghent chastised. "He probably has a thousand files that fit that description."

"I mean after the file he showed to Han and me in the Saras rehabilitation center." Luke tried to remain patient; he suspected R2-D2 was just stalling to buy time to defeat the omnigate, but it was possible that the droid really did need a more specific reference. "It's the record you stole from the Temple's security system, where my father supervised the slaughter of the students."

Though Luke had already told Jacen and everyone else in his family about the record, he still felt a jolt in the Force as Jacen and the others were reminded that the deaths and screams of the innocents had actually been caught on holo.

When R2-D2 still failed to activate his holoprojector, Luke said, "I think my request is clear enough, Artoo. Stop stalling, or I will have Ghent wipe your personality. You know how important this is."

R2-D2 gave a plaintive chirp, then piped a worried-sounding trill.

"I'm sure," Luke said.

The droid emitted an angry raspberry, then tipped forward and activated his holoprojector.

The veranda of what looked like an elegant, old Coruscant apartment appeared in the holo. Padme Amidala rushed into view, followed closely by a golden protocol droid that looked very much like C-3P0. A moment later, Anakin Skywalker appeared from the opposite direction and embraced her.

"Are you all right?" Padme asked, pulling back a moment later. "I heard there was an attack on the Jedi Temple . . . you can see the smoke from here!"

Anakin's gaze slipped away from hers. "I'm fine," he said. "I came to see if you and the baby are safe."

"Captain Typho is here. We're safe." Padme looked out of the holo, presumably toward the Jedi Temple. "What's happening?"

Anakin's response was m.u.f.fled as the protocol droid blocked their view of Padme and Anakin, then the droid asked, "What is going on?"

"Is that See-Threepio?" Jacen gasped.

Luke shrugged and motioned for quiet. He would solve the mystery of the golden protocol droid later, after he discovered what had become of his mother.

"You can't be any more confused than I am!" the golden droid said, replying to a string of squeaks and beeps from R2-D2.

He moved out of the way, and Anakin and Padme came back into view.