Aftermath: Star Wars (37 page)

“What’s your name? Your rank?” Olia asks.

The man at the head of the prisoner procession seems taken aback. “I’m Corporal Argell. Camerand Argell. M…ma’am. You are?”

But she doesn’t answer. Instead she demands:

“What is this?” She gestures to the lineup of prisoners. Imperials still in uniform, partly: stormtroopers in their underclothes, officers in their grays and blacks. Not a big group: just a dozen or so.

“I feel like…that’s obvious. Prisoners.” He continues, looking nervously over to Lug the Trandoshan, standing there with the camera. “We captured a small holdout garrison down on Coruscant. They’re going to be stationed here at one of the camps and Commander Rohr thought it prudent to parade this lot about a bit given the…the, ahhh, the triumph of the day and all that.” He blinks. “Am I on camera?”

“You
are,
” she says, “and this isn’t right. Take these men to where they belong. They’re not cattle. They’re not a prize!”

“But we should be proud of winning this war…”

“Nobody should be proud of war, Corporal. Nobody. This isn’t a thing we do because we like winning. Because of what glory it is to subjugate anybody. We do it because we want to be on the right side of things. This…” She fritters her hands in the air, trying (and failing, somewhat) to contain her anger. “This kind of thing is what the Empire would do. March their prisoners around—a display to rile the blood of the faithful. We don’t do that. We have to be better than that. Nod if you understand me.”

Hesitantly, he nods. “Of course. Ma’am.”

“Good. Good. Go on now. Tell your commander plans changed.”

Argell swallows visibly and gives an awkward wave to the camera. Then he snakes back the way he came, bringing the line of prisoners with him. Olia stands there, fuming.

Tracene approaches. The camera is still on.

She puts a hand on the Pantoran’s shoulder. A small gesture, but enough: Olia lets out a captive breath.

“That was something, too. You’re actually good at this.”

Olia smiles stiffly. “We just need to do better. All of us. If we’re going to keep this up, we need to do it right.”

“Are you worried that the New Republic will get it wrong? That these things—the protestor, the orphans, the parade of prisoners—are warning signs? Will the New Republic survive?”

Olia turns. She lifts her chin. She speaks with authority.

“This is democracy,” she says. “It is strange. And it is messy. It’s not about getting it right. It’s about trying to get it right. Yes, it’s a bit chaotic. Certainly we will get some things wrong. The Empire? They cared nothing for democracy. They valued order above everything else. They wanted to be right so badly that anybody who even hinted at getting it wrong or doing it differently was branded the enemy and thrown in a dark prison somewhere. They destroyed other voices so that only their own remained. That is not us. We will not always get it right. We will never have it perfect. But we will listen. To the countless voices crying out across the galaxy, we have opened our ears, and we will always listen. That is how democracy survives. That is how it
thrives.
Look. There.”

She points.

And now, a new procession:

Senators. A hundred of them, maybe more. From systems all across the galaxy—even a few from the Outer Rim now. Marching toward the old Chandrila Senate house. Small crowds of citizens gathering, applauding, whistling. It’s just a start. A humble new beginning. But there it is.

Olia smiles.

“That is democracy. That is the New Republic. And if you’ll excuse me, we have a great deal of work to do. May the Force be with you, Tracene.”

The newswoman smiles. “Knock ’em dead, Olia.”

Rae stands on the bridge of the
Ravager.
There, staring out the window at the glowing Vulpinus Nebula, is the fleet admiral.

His hands behind his back. Humming a little. Something classical. Something from the Old Republic days. She listens a little: the Sestina of Imperator Vex, maybe.

“Sir,” she says.

He holds up his finger. A sign for patience. He continues humming, his head swaying, until it reaches a small crescendo. Then, without turning toward her, he lowers his finger and says:

“Yes, Admiral Sloane?”

“Something I’ve been wanting to ask you.”

“You may always speak frankly with me.” He turns to face her. His countenance is cold. His stare, scrutinizing. Like she’s wet, fresh meat and he’s picking her apart to look for the tastiest bits. “Please.”

“The summit. On Akiva.”

“Dreadful thing.”

“It did not go as planned.” She hesitates. “Though now I’m not so sure. Did you…plan for it to go that way?”

He smiles. “Explain.”

“I’ve…been thinking. Everything happened so fast. Faster than it should have. Faster than any timeline predicted. And I wondered: Did we have someone in our midst who summoned the rebels? I went and I looked and I found…communications. From an encrypted channel on this very ship. Sent out to what appears to be a rebel frequency.”

“Enlighten me. Why would I have cause to do that?”

She hesitates. “I’ve been thinking about that. I would guess…to eliminate competition.”

“An interesting theory.”

“I’m more interested if it’s an accurate one, Admiral.”

He takes her hand and gives it a squeeze. “It was a test.”

“I could have died there. On Akiva. Or been taken captive.”

“But that did not happen. You were not captured. And you remain alive. You are my best and my brightest, and that is why you passed this test. I need people like you.”

This, a question she hates to ask: “And if I hadn’t survived?”

“Then my assessment of you would’ve been wrong. You would not have been my best and my brightest. It’s like the others. Pandion, Shale, and so forth. They were weak. Sick animals that had to be culled from the herd. They did not pass the test and now they are no burden to us.”

She tries to repress a shiver.

“Here,” he continues, pointing out at the glowing red bands of the Vulpinus Nebula—the swooping whorls of crimson clouds and the stars beyond them. “Look out there. That is no longer our galaxy.”

“Admiral, we have not lost yet.”

“Oh, but we have. I see the dismay in your eyes, but this is no cause for despair, Admiral Sloane. This is how it must be. The Empire became this…ugly, inelegant machine. Crude and inefficient. We needed to be broken into pieces. We needed to get rid of those who want to see that old machine churning ineluctably forward. It’s time for something better. Something new. An Empire worthy of the galaxy it will rule.”

Sloane doesn’t know what to feel. Right now it’s some strange mix of terror, disgust, but also? Hope.

Did he try to betray her?

Or was it truly a test he expected her to pass?

All she manages to say right now is: “Of course, Admiral.”

“Now, if you will excuse me? I have thinking to do.”

He gently touches her shoulder—a seemingly warm gesture, until he uses it to turn her around and send Sloane on her way.

To Tracy for taking me to see my first
Star Wars
movie (
The Empire Strikes Back
at a drive-in theater!).

To Mom for buying me all those sweet Kenner toys.

To Michelle and to Ben for going along on this crazy speeder ride with me and making it ten times as awesome as it already is.

The writer is like Han Solo: captain of the ship but lost without a crew to man it. And so I must acknowledge those folks who have helped make this book happen: Shelly Shapiro, Jen Heddle, Gary Whitta, Jason Fry, David Keck, Pablo Hidalgo, and my agent, Stacia Decker. Thanks, too, to some of my writer pals who keep me sane: folks like Kevin Hearne, Delilah S. Dawson, Stephen Blackmoore, Ty Franck, Adam Christopher, Julie Hutchings, Mur Lafferty, J. C. Hutchins, and Sam Sykes. Thanks finally to the
Star Wars
fan community for having fun with me on Twitter (GeekGirlDiva, I’m lookin’ at you).

Thanks, in fact, to all of Twitter because without social media, I don’t think I would have ever gotten to write this book.

*clinks my glass of blue milk against yours*

Aftermath

Under the Empyrean Sky

Blightborn

The Harvest

Blackbirds

Mockingbird

The Cormorant

Zer0es

The Blue Blazes

The Kick-Ass Writer

C
HUCK
W
ENDIG
is a novelist, screenwriter, and game designer. He’s the author of many novels, including
Blackbirds, Atlanta Burns, Zer0es,
and the YA
Heartland
series. He is co-writer of the short film
Pandemic
and the Emmy-nominated digital narrative
Collapsus
. He currently lives in the forests of Pennsyltucky with wife, son, and red dog.

terribleminds.com

Find Chuck Wendig on Facebook

@ChuckWendig

The rain on Haidoral Prime dropped in warm sheets from a shining sky. It smelled like vinegar, clung to the molded curves of modular industrial buildings and to litter-strewn streets, and coated skin like a sheen of acrid sweat.

After thirty straight standard hours, it was losing its novelty for the soldiers of Twilight Company.

Three figures crept along a deserted avenue under a torn and dripping canopy. The lean, compact man in the lead was dressed in faded gray fatigues and a hodgepodge of armor pads crudely stenciled with the starbird symbol of the Rebel Alliance. Matted dark hair dripped beneath his visored helmet, sending crawling trails of rainwater down his dusky face.

His name was Hazram Namir, though he’d gone by others. He silently cursed urban warfare and Haidoral Prime and whichever laws of atmospheric science made it rain. The thought of sleep flashed into his mind and broke against a wall of stubbornness. He gestured with a rifle thicker than his arm toward the nearest intersection, then quickened his pace.

Somewhere in the distance a swift series of blaster shots resounded, followed by shouts and silence.

The figure closest behind Namir—a tall man with graying hair and a face puckered with scar tissue—bounded across the street to take up a position opposite. The third figure, a massive form huddled in a tarp like a hooded cloak, remained behind.

The scarred man flashed a hand signal. Namir turned the corner onto the intersecting street. A dozen meters away, the sodden lumps of human bodies lay in the road. They wore tattered rain gear—sleek, lightweight wraps and sandals—and carried no weapons. Noncombatants.

It’s a shame,
Namir thought,
but not a bad sign.
The Empire didn’t shoot civilians when everything was under control.

“Charmer—take a look?” Namir indicated the bodies. The scarred man strode over as Namir tapped his comlink. “Sector secure,” he said. “What’s on tap next?”

The response came in a hiss of static through Namir’s earpiece—something about mop-up operations. Namir missed having a communications specialist on staff. Twilight Company’s last comm tech had been a drunk and a misanthrope, but she’d been magic with a transmitter and she’d written obscene poetry with Namir on late, dull nights. She and her idiot droid had died in the bombardment on Asyrphus.

“Say again,” Namir tried. “Are we ready to load?”

This time the answer came through clearly. “Support teams are crating up food and equipment,” the voice said. “If you’ve got a lead on medical supplies, we’d love more for the
Thunderstrike.
Otherwise, get to the rendezvous—we only have a few hours before reinforcements show.”

“Tell support to grab hygiene items this time,” Namir said. “Anyone who says they’re luxuries needs to smell the barracks.”

There was another burst of static, and maybe a laugh. “I’ll let them know. Stay safe.”

Charmer was finishing his study of the bodies, checking each for a heartbeat and identification. He shook his head, silent, as he straightened.

“Atrocity.” The hulking figure wrapped in the tarp had finally approached. His voice was deep and resonant. Two meaty, four-fingered hands kept the tarp clasped at his shoulders, while a second pair of hands loosely carried a massive blaster cannon at waist level. “How can anyone born of flesh do this?”

Charmer bit his lip. Namir shrugged. “Could’ve been combat droids, for all we know.”

“Unlikely,” the hulking figure said. “But if so, responsibility belongs to the governor.” He knelt beside one of the corpses and reached out to lid its eyes. Each of his hands was as large as the dead man’s head.

“Come on, Gadren,” Namir said. “Someone will find them.”

Gadren stayed kneeling. Charmer opened his mouth to speak, then shut it. Namir wondered whether to push the point and, if so, how hard.

Then the wall next to him exploded, and he stopped worrying about Gadren.

Fire and metal shards and grease and insulation pelted his spine. He couldn’t hear and couldn’t guess how he ended up in the middle of the road among the bodies, one leg bent beneath him. Something tacky was stuck to his chin and his helmet’s visor was cracked; he had enough presence of mind to feel lucky he hadn’t lost an eye.

Suddenly he was moving again. He was upright, and hands—Charmer’s hands—were dragging him backward, clasping him below the shoulders. He snarled the native curses of his homeworld as a red storm of particle bolts flashed among the fire and debris. By the time he’d pushed Charmer away and wobbled onto his feet, he’d traced the bolts to their source.

Four Imperial stormtroopers stood at the mouth of an alley up the street. Their deathly pale armor gleamed in the rain, and the black eyepieces of their helmets gaped like pits. Their weapons shone with oil and machined care, as if the squad had stepped fully formed out of a mold.

Namir tore his gaze from the enemy long enough to see that his back was to a storefront window filled with video screens. He raised his blaster rifle, fired at the display, then climbed in among the shards. Charmer followed. The storefront wouldn’t give them cover for long—certainly not if the stormtroopers fired another rocket—but it would have to be enough.

“Check for a way up top,” Namir yelled, and his voice sounded faint and tinny. He couldn’t hear the storm of blaster bolts at all. “We need covering fire!” Not looking to see if Charmer obeyed, he dropped to the floor as the stormtroopers adjusted their aim to the store.

He couldn’t spot Gadren, either. He ordered the alien into position anyway, hoping he was alive and that the comlinks still worked. He lined his rifle under his chin, fired twice in the direction of the stormtroopers, and was rewarded with a moment of peace.

“I need you on target, Brand,” he growled into his link. “I need you here
now.
”

If anyone answered, he couldn’t hear it.

Now he glimpsed the stormtrooper carrying the missile launcher. The trooper was still reloading, which meant Namir had half a minute at most before the storefront came tumbling down on top of him. He took a few quick shots and saw one of the other troopers fall, though he doubted he’d hit his target. He guessed Charmer had found a vantage point after all.

Three stormtroopers remained. One was moving away from the alley while the other stayed to protect the artilleryman. Namir shot wildly at the one moving into the street, watched him skid and fall to a knee, and smiled grimly. There was something satisfying about seeing a trained stormtrooper humiliate himself. Namir’s own side did it often enough.

Jerky movements drew Namir’s attention back to the artilleryman. Behind the stormtrooper stood Gadren, both sets of arms gripping and lifting his foe. Human limbs flailed and the missile launcher fell to the ground. White armor seemed to crumple in the alien’s hands. Gadren’s makeshift hood blew back, exposing his head: a brown, bulbous, widemouthed mass topped with a darker crest of bone, like some amphibian’s nightmare idol. The second trooper in the alley turned to face Gadren and was promptly slammed to the ground with his comrade’s body before Gadren crushed them both, howling in rage or grief.

Namir trusted Gadren as much as he trusted anyone, but there were times when the alien terrified him.

The last stormtrooper was still down in the street. Namir fired until flames licked a burnt and melted hole in the man’s armor. Namir, Charmer, and Gadren gathered back around the bodies and assessed their own injuries.

Namir’s hearing was coming back. The damage to his helmet extended far beyond the visor—a crack extended along its length—and he found a shallow cut across his forehead when he tossed the helmet to the street. Charmer was picking shards of shrapnel from his vest but made no complaints. Gadren was shivering in the warm rain.

“No Brand?” Gadren asked.

Namir only grunted.

Charmer laughed his weird, hiccuping laugh and spoke. He swallowed the words twice, three, four times as he went, half stuttering as he had ever since the fight on Blacktar Cyst. “Keep piling bodies like this,” he said, “we’ll have the best vantage point in the city.”

He gestured at Namir’s last target, who had fallen directly onto one of the civilian corpses.

“You’re a sick man, Charmer,” Namir said, and swung an arm roughly around his comrade’s shoulders. “I’ll miss you when they boot you out.”

Gadren grunted and sniffed behind them. It might have been dismay, but Namir chose to take it as mirth.

Officially, the city was Haidoral Administrative Center One, but locals called it “Glitter” after the crystalline mountains that limned the horizon. In Namir’s experience, what the Galactic Empire didn’t name to inspire terror—its stormtrooper legions, its Star Destroyer battleships—it tried to render as drab as possible. This didn’t bother Namir, but he wasn’t among the residents of the planets and cities being labeled.

Half a dozen Rebel squads had already arrived at the central plaza when Namir’s team marched in. The rain had condensed into mist, and the plaza’s tents and canopies offered little shelter; nonetheless, men and women in ragged armor squeezed into the driest corners they could find, grumbling to one another or tending to minor wounds and damaged equipment. As victory celebrations went, it was subdued. It had been a long fight for little more than the promise of a few fresh meals.

“Stop admiring yourselves and do something
useful,
” Namir barked, barely breaking stride. “Support teams can use a hand if you’re too good to play
greeter.
”

He barely noticed the squads stir in response. Instead, his attention shifted to a woman emerging from the shadows of a speeder stand. She was tall and thickly built, dressed in rugged pants and a bulky maroon jacket. A scoped rifle was slung over her shoulder, and the armor mesh of a retracted face mask covered her neck and chin. Her skin was gently creased with age and as dark as a human’s could be, her hair was cropped close to her scalp, and she didn’t so much as glance at Namir as she arrived at his side and matched his pace through the plaza.

“You want to tell me where you were?” Namir asked.

“You missed the second fire team. I took care of it,” Brand said.

Namir kept his voice cool. “Drop me a hint next time?”

“You didn’t need the distraction.”

Namir laughed. “Love you, too.”

Brand cocked her head. If she got the joke—and Namir expected she did—she wasn’t amused. “So what now?” she asked.

“We’ve got eight hours before we leave the system,” Namir said, and stopped with his back to an overturned kiosk. He leaned against the metal frame and stared into the mist. “Less if Imperial ships come before then, or if the governor’s forces regroup. After that, we’ll divvy up the supplies with the rest of the battle group. Probably keep an escort ship or two for the
Thunderstrike
before the others split off.”

“And we abandon this sector to the Empire,” Brand said.

By this time Charmer had wandered off, and Gadren had joined the circle with Namir and Brand. “We will return,” he said gravely.

“Right,” Namir said, smirking. “Something to look forward to.”

He knew they were the wrong words at the wrong time.

Eighteen months earlier, the Rebel Alliance’s Sixty-First Mobile Infantry—commonly known as Twilight Company—had joined the push into the galactic Mid Rim. The operation was among the largest the Rebellion had ever fielded against the Empire, involving thousands of starships, hundreds of battle groups, and dozens of worlds. In the wake of the Rebellion’s victory against the Empire’s planet-burning Death Star battle station, High Command had believed the time was right to move from the fringes of Imperial territory toward its population centers.

Twilight Company had fought in the factory-deserts of Phorsa Gedd and taken the Ducal Palace of Bamayar. It had established beachheads for rebel hovertanks and erected bases from tarps and sheet metal. Namir had seen soldiers lose limbs and go weeks without proper treatment. He’d trained teams to construct makeshift bayonets when blaster power packs ran low. He’d set fire to cities and watched the Empire do the same. He’d left friends behind on broken worlds, knowing he’d never see them again.

On planet after planet, Twilight had fought. Battles were won and battles were lost, and Namir stopped keeping score. Twilight remained at the Rebellion’s vanguard, forging ahead of the bulk of the armada, until word came down from High Command nine months in: The fleet was overextended. There was to be no further advance—only defense of the newly claimed territories.

Not long after that, the retreat began.

Twilight Company had become the rear guard of a massive withdrawal. It deployed to worlds it had helped capture mere months earlier and evacuated the bases it had built. It extracted the Rebellion’s heroes and generals and pointed the way home. It marched over the graves of its own dead soldiers. Some of the company lost hope. Some became angry.

No one
wanted to go back.