Thanaer's jaw tightened, the only change to his expression Wedge could
see through the beard and ridiculous ribbons. Thanaer, all business, lunged.
Janson twisted toward the attack and brought Thanaer's blade out of line
with his own. Thanaer's forward momentum brought them together, their hilt
guards crashing into one another.
Janson brought his right forearm up in a blow that snapped Thanaer's head
back and smashed the man's nose flat. With his right hand, Janson seized
Thanaer's sword hand and slammed it down across his upraised knee. Thanaer's
sword point hit the floor with a loud blaster pop and the hilt followed,
dropping from Thanaer's nerveless fingers.
Janson gave Thanaer a shove and the Cartann pilot staggered backward,
suddenly disarmed and disoriented. Janson brought his boot heel down on the
other man's sword blade, just above the guard. The blade parted with a
metallic sound and its point ceased hissing, ceased drawing glowing lines in
the air.
Janson smiled at the man. "Your orders are simple." He switched off the
power to Cheriss's blastsword and tossed the weapon, with feigned negligence,
back in the direction he had come from. Wedge caught it out of the air. "I
punch. You suffer. Got it?"
Thanaer responded by reaching for his dagger. Janson let him get it into
his hand, then spun into a kick that further punished Thanaer's sword hand and
sent the dagger flying. It clattered to the ground near the edge of the crowd
and skidded past the feet of the foremost observers.
"Forgot to mention," Janson said, "on some worlds people fight with their
feet, too. Feet, hands, rocks, pure cussed willpowerthey're warriors. You,
you're just a dilettante." He brought his hands up in a standard unarmed
combat pose, left arm and left side leading.
Confused and uncertain, blood streaming from his nose, Thanaer brought up
his own hands in an imitation of Janson's posture.
Janson smiled and waded in.
Wedge struggled to keep a wince from his face. It was a massacre. Janson
fired off blows into Thanaer's midsection. When the Adumari pilot tried to
block those shots, Janson concentrated on his ribs, and Wedge could hear
occasional cracks as bones gave way under his blows. When Thanaer tried to
strike, Janson took the blows on his forearms or shoulders, or, in the case of
especially clumsy shots, withdrew a handspan or two and let Thanaer unload his
blows into empty air.
And always Janson returned to pounding, to beating, his blows sounding
like someone using a hardwood club on a side of hanging bantha meat.
He didn't hit Thanaer in the face again. Wedge knew this wasn't mercy,
but common sensejawbones being more likely to break fingers than the other
way around.
Thanaer's final few blows made it clear that he could barely see and
wasn't thinking at all; he lashed out against empty air half a meter to the
left of Janson's position, then stared around, looking randomly for a foe in
clear view a meter before him.
"At least you could say you were knocked out by a well-struck blow of the
fist," Janson said. "If I were going to be nice to you, that is." He held up
his open hand, palm toward his opponent, until Thanaer's bleary gaze fixed on
it. Then he stretched his hand full out to his sideand slapped Thanaer, a
blow that sounded like the crack of an energy whip.
He drew his hand back again.
But Thanaer's eyes rolled up in his head as a red mark the approximate
shape of Janson's hand appeared on his cheek, and his knees collapsed under
him. He hit the floor with a grunt and his eyes fluttered shut.
Janson waved jauntily at the crowd and returned to Wedge's side,
whistling something Wedge recognized as a Taanabian dancing melody.
Applause broke out in the crowd, but it was not universalexclamations
and murmurs competed with it in volume.
Wedge helped him put his jacket back on. "That was it?" he asked. "You
staked the entire fight on the assumption that you could block his first shot
at you?"
Janson nodded. "Pretty much. I just couldn't see him throwing his best
attack on the very first attack of the match. That gave me one crack at him,
maybe two." He tied his belt back around him.
Janson peered at him. "This whole world is full of 'shouldn't haves,'
Tomer. Without that humiliation, there was no chance he'd learn anything. With
it, I figure he has about a five percent chance of realizing that he's a big
bag of Hutt droppings. Which is five percent more than he had a few minutes
ago." He shrugged. "Who's hungry?" Wedge grinned. "Let's get out of here. I'm
buying."
9
The rest of the day offered hopeful news, and more than once.
By the time Wedge and Janson, joined by Hobbie, found a dining
establishment where a small private room would afford them a certain amount of
peace, the verdict was in on Cheriss. "She'll make it," Tycho explained via
comlink. "She's responding well to the bacta and should be released in a day,
maybe less."
"Good," Wedge said. "Make sure the medical staff knows to notify me when
they're to release her. I want to be there as a friendly face when they cut
her loose." "Will do."
"And get down here. We have plenty to do today." "Have you ever thought
about sleeping, boss?" Wedge grinned. "Which is, exactly, what?" "Sort of like
being shot until you're unconscious, except there's no bacta, and you often
end up feeling better than when you started."
"Sounds good. I'll give it a try someday. Call in when you reach
groundside. Out." Wedge folded up his headset and returned his attention to
the menu, a flexible flatscreen that showed the evening's available dishes as
a series of animations running around the screen engaged in blastsword duels
with one another. "I don't think I want to eat anything that looks like it
wants to cut its way back out of me."
Hobbie gave him a dubious look. "Did you say we had plenty to do still?"
Wedge nodded.
"What, exactly?"
"We're going to try to subvert an Imperial admiral."
"Oh," Hobbie said. "Something easy. While you're doing that, why don't
Wes and I smuggle ourselves aboard Agonizer and destroy her with thrown rocks?
"
Wedge gave him a grin. "With the right toolssay, a hundred thousand
Ewoks and a month to prepareyou could probably do that. In the meantime, we
have the right tools to subvert our Imperial admiral."
"What tools?"
"Oh, Wes's maturity, your optimism, and my diplomatic skills."
Hobbie buried his face in his hands. "We're doomed."
Though he picked up a more powerful comlink from his quarters, Wedge kept
its power output turned low, so that his signal could not possibly carry as
far as Agonizer or even the nearest Cartann city. And every half hour, he or
one of his pilots put in a call for Admiral Rogriss.
Shortly after Adumar's sun sank and the first of her two moons rose, he
got an answer and arranged an appointment.
An hour later, he stood alo
ne at the periphery of a Cartann plazanot the
one where he and his pilots had landed, days ago, but another of the same size
some distance away. Its central feature was a large fountain; at its center
was a round island of something like duracrete supporting a sculpture made of
some brassy metal. The sculpture showed the perator in his younger days,
wearing a Blade fighter-craft pilot's suit, waving to a crowd that was not
present at this hour; behind him was a semicircle of seven fungus-shaped
explosion clouds, representing, Wedge assumed, seven military campaigns or
bombing runs.
Admiral Rogriss was not too long in coming. Wedge saw two silhouettes
approaching from the opposite side of the plaza; one, larger, stayed back in
the vicinity of the fountains, while the other moved unsteadily forward toward
Wedge. Soon enough, moonlight illuminated his features, revealing him to be
the admiral.
Wedge bit back a comment. Rogriss had deteriorated in the short time
since Wedge had seen him last. Though the man's expression was cheerful and
carefree, his posture and movements made it clear that he was as drunk as a
new soldier on his first leave. In addition, something had changed in the
man's face. Wedge had seen the expression before, the change that takes place
when a cocky young pilot loses a battle but survives to realize that he isn't
immortal, that he can be beaten.
Wedge nodded toward the figure who had hung back. "Your bodyguard? A
local or an Imperial?"
"A faithful son of the Empire," Rogriss said, his tone jovial. "Come to
protect me and to witness from afar your bribe attempt."
Wedge smiled and shook his head. "Bribe attempt? I'm afraid I'm here
empty-handed."
"Ah. As skillful a spy as you are a diplomat, I see. You're not here to
offer me a command, a salary, the gratitude of the Rebel Alliance if I'd only
just betray those I've served faithfully for longer than you've been alive? I
must say, my boy, I'm disappointed."
"No, that sort of thing is for the real spies. I'm just a pilot." Wedge
lost his smile. "But I do have something to offer you. A way out."
Rogriss laughed. "A way out of what? My pension?"
"Out of your dilemma. Just listen for a minute, Admiral. I don't expect
you to admit to anything I'm saying; you won't offer up any information, and
that's fine. But I want you to hear what I have to say."
Rogriss considered, then nodded.
"It's obviously in your best interest if the Adumari choose to side with
the Empire," Wedge said.
Rogriss laughed again. "Thank you for pointing that out. You really are
adapting to life as a diplomat."
"Not because it's your mission, but because the alternative will mean
your ruin. Probably your death. A suicide, I expect."
Rogriss didn't answer. He just cocked an eyebrow, his expression dubious,
and waited.
"Because if Adumar sides with the New Republic, you're obliged to contact
your superiors, in spite of the oath you swore on their behalf, and they send
in an invasion force. The invasion force hammers Adumar so badly that it's
shattered, probably not worth sweeping up the pieces. A metaphor, I suppose,
for your word of honor, which will be just as ruined. Just as irreparable."
"See here, Antilles"
"No, just listen, Rogriss. We're in kind of the same position here. Play
by the rules, do as we're told, keep our careersand lose everything. Or risk,
and probably lose, everythingexcept our word. The thing is, our word is the
one thing no one can take from us unless we leave it vulnerable. All I'm
saying to youif I'm right about what you're being called on to dois that you
shouldn't offer up your honor like that. You should refuse to break your word.
And if your world suddenly becomes hostile to you because you choose to
preserve your honor, you can come to us instead of going home and facing
execution." "You're absurd." "I've been told that before." Rogriss turned
away... but did not move. After a mo - ment he turned back. "Speaking
hypothetically, if what you said were true, and I did what you recommended, my
children could never be made to understand what I'd done."
"Have you raised them to be like you? Analytical, intelligent,
suspicious, mean?"
Rogriss smiled again, this time showing teeth. "I'd express it a
different way. But yes."
"Then they won't believe what they're told just because someone in
authority told them. And you've got it backward. If my suspicions about your
orders are correct, and you disobeyed them and went home, you'd be executed
and might never even have last words to say to your children. If you come
over, our Intelligence division can get messages to them, and I'll guarantee
they'll do so... or I'll arrange to do it personally. You'll have your chance
to make your reasons known to your daughter and son. Even a chance to offer
them passage to the New Republic, if that's something they want."
"Ah." Rogriss shrugged. "You spin interesting fictions, Antilles."
Wedge held out a datacard to him. "On this is my emergency contact
frequency. You should be able to reach me this way at any time. If you want to
accept my offer. Even if you just want to gloat."
Rogriss took it. "I can't pass up an opportunity to gloat."
"What Imperial admiral could?"
"Good-bye, General."
"Good evening, Admiral."
Rogriss's walk, as he left, was slower than before, but more sure. Was he
weighed down by Wedge's offer, or by being reminded of the dilemma before him?
Or had he simply sobered up a bit? Wedge didn't know.
Before the pilots turned in for the evening, their datapads received a
transmission from Tomer. The perator had called another gathering on the world
government question for his palace the following evening.
Wedge and Red Flight spent the next morning and afternoon at their usual
pursuit, what they were now calling "flight school"accepting challenges from
Adumari pilots and demonstrating to them the New Republic way of doing things.
There were fewer challenges today, giving them some long, peaceful stretches
when they could just fly for the joy of it.
Today, after the flying, there was no parade lining of well-wishers
accompanying them on their way back to their quarters, just a few admirers
crowded at the air base gates. There was no Cheriss to tell them how the
Imperial flyers had done with their day's challenges. The ride back to their
building was quiet and uneventful.
"No friends left," Janson said, leaning against the rail. "We've managed
to make everyone hate us."
Tycho offered him a half smile. "I thought that's what you'd been trying
to achieve your whole life."
"Good point." Janson straightened. "What am I complaining about? No,
wait, I knowthey haven't yet erected statues of us to throw rotten fruit at."
"Give us another day," Hobbie said.
They again wore their New Republic dress uniforms for the night's event.
This time, entering the Royal Outer Court ballroom, they had no problem
spotting the Imperial pilotsthey, too, were in dress uniform
s, the spotless
grays that spoke of decades of the Empire's rule. Dull by the standards of
Adumari dress, they still stood out in the crowd.
"They followed our lead," Janson said. His grin was infectious. "I bet
they had to be ordered to. Stings a bit, doesn't it, General Phennir?" He was
more than a dozen meters from the Imperial officer, who could not have heard
his words, but Phennir still glowered at him.
Tomer joined them. "It's going to be war," he said, his tone regretful.
"There's no stopping it now."
"Do me a favor and kill power to this performance," Wedge said. "Maybe
you are a little sad that a war is resulting... but the rest of it is all
according to your plan."
Tomer looked confused. "My plan? I think you're more than a little mixed
up, General."
"No. It's pretty much cut and dried. Let's go back in time a little bit.
You're assigned here as regional head of Intelligence with the task of
bringing Adumar into the New Republic."
"I'm just a diplomat"
"Shut up. But they need a world government to make the task a simpler one
and you get to work persuading the rulers of Adumar's nations to consider such
a change. All very well and good so far."
Tomer shook his head, a denial, but his attention was fully on Wedge.
"Now, it gets sticky. They want to talk to famous pilots, so you send for
me, intending to keep me around as entertainment for the Cartann court, since
I have no diplomatic skills to speak of. As soon as I arrive, you discover
that the Empire is also here, which drastically moves up the time frame you're
working in. The longer the Empire has to work on it, the more they can appeal
to the Adumari love of blood sports and death in combat, so you have to act
fast. That means creating a world government by the fastest means possibleby
persuading the perator of Cartann to implement one through leverage and
conquest, something that appeals to him anyway. We fly fighters for the
public's amusement while you arrange to sacrifice hundreds, maybe thousands,
of innocents in a war that will accomplish your mission."
"You're interpreting everything in the most negative possible way."
Wedge felt a surge of triumph; Tomer was no longer denying his role in
the Intelligence side of these affairs. "And the thing is, you have to win.
Bringing this off successfully is the only thing that will save you. You know