The Last Command (39 page)

Lando walked up beside him, brushing a few last bits of acidic tree root off his hands. “Fun place, isn’t it?” he commented.

“I should have brought the
Falcon
down closer,” Han grumbled. “Or moved it closer in when we found out we couldn’t use the speeder bikes.”

“If you had, we might be dodging Imperial patrols right now instead of fighting acid root and vine snakes,” Lando said. “Personally, I’d call that a fair trade.”

“I suppose so,” Han agreed reluctantly. In the near distance something gave out with a complicated whistle, and something else whistled back. He looked that direction, but between the brush and vines and two different levels of trees he couldn’t see anything.

“Doesn’t sound much like a predator,” Lando said.

“Maybe.” Han looked back over his shoulder, to where Threepio was talking soothingly to Artoo as he inspected the squat droid’s latest acid burns. “Hey—short stuff. Get your scanners busy.”

Obediently, Artoo extended its little antenna and began moving it back and forth. For a minute it clucked to itself, then jabbered something. “He says there are no large animals anywhere within twenty meters,” Threepio said. “Beyond that—”

“He can’t read through the undergrowth,” Han finished for him. It was getting to be a very familiar conversation. “Thanks.”

Artoo retracted his sensor, and he and Threepio resumed their discussion. “Where do you suppose they’ve all gone?” Lando asked.

“The predators?” Han shook his head. “Beats me. Maybe the same place the natives went.”

Lando looked around, exhaling gently between his teeth. “I don’t like it, Han. They’ve got to know by now that we’re here. What are they waiting for?”

“Maybe Mara was wrong about them,” Han suggested doubtfully. “Maybe the Empire got tired of sharing the planet with anyone else and wiped them out.”

“That’s a cheerful thought,” Lando said. “Still wouldn’t explain why the predators have ignored us for the past two and a half days.”

“No,” Han agreed. But Lando was right: there
was
something out there watching them. He could feel it deep in his gut. Something, or somebody. “Maybe the ones that got away after that first fight passed the word down the wire to leave us alone.”

Lando snorted. “Those things were dumber than space slugs, and you know it.”

Han shrugged. “Just a thought.”

Ahead, the greenish glow vanished as Luke closed down his lightsaber. “Looks clear,” he called softly back. “You get Artoo out?”

“Yeah, he’s all right,” Han said, stepping up behind them. “Any snakes?”

“Not this time.” Luke pointed with his lightsaber at one of the trees bordering the creek bed. “Looks like we just missed having to tangle with another group of clawbirds, though.”

Han looked. There, in one of the lower branches, was another of the plate-sized mud-and-grass nests. Threepio had brushed against one of them the day before, and Chewbacca was still nursing the slashes he’d gotten in his left arm before they’d managed to shoot or lightsaber the predator birds that had come out of it. “Don’t touch it,” he warned.

“It’s okay—it’s empty,” Luke assured him, nudging it with the tip of the lightsaber. “They must have moved on.”

“Yeah,” Han said slowly, taking a step closer to the nest. “Right.”

“Something wrong?”

Han looked back at him. “No,” he said, trying hard to sound casual. “No problem. Why?”

Behind Luke, Chewbacca rumbled deep in his throat. “Let’s get moving,” Han added before Luke could say anything. “I want to get a little further before it gets dark. Luke, you and Mara take the droids and head out. Chewie and me’ll take the rear.”

Luke wasn’t going for it—he could tell that from the kid’s face. But he just nodded. “All right. Come on, Threepio.”

They started down the creek bed, Threepio complaining as usual the whole way. Lando threw Han a look of his own, but followed after them without comment.

Beside him, Chewbacca growled a question. “We’re going to find out what happened to the clawbirds, that’s what,” Han told him, looking back at the nest. It didn’t look damaged, like it should have if a predator had got it. “You’re the one who can smell fresh meat ten paces upwind. Start sniffing.”

It turned out not to take much in the way of Wookiee hunting skill. One of the birds was lying beside a bush just on the other side of the tree, its wings stretched out and stiff. Very dead.

“What do you think?” Han asked as Chewbacca gingerly picked it up. “Some predator?”

Chewbacca rumbled a negative. His climbing claws slid from their sheaths, probing at a dark-brown stain on the feathers under the left wing. He found a cut, dug a single claw delicately into it.

And growled. “You sure it was a knife?” Han frowned, peering at the wound. “Not some kind of claw?”

The Wookiee rumbled again, pointing out the obvious: if the bird had been killed by a predator, there shouldn’t have been anything left but feathers and bones.

“Right,” Han commented sourly as Chewbacca dropped the clawbird back beside the bush. “So much for hoping the natives weren’t around. Must be pretty close, too.”

Chewbacca growled the obvious question. “Beats me,” Han told him. “Maybe they’re still checking us out. Or waiting for reinforcements.”

The Wookiee rumbled, gesturing at the bird, and Han took another look. He was right: the way the wound was placed meant that the wings had been open when it had been killed. Which meant it had been killed in flight. By a single stab. “You’re right—they’re not going to need any reinforcements,” he agreed. “Come on, let’s catch up with the others.”

Solo had wanted them to keep going until it got dark, but after another disagreement between Skywalker’s astromech droid and a tangle of acid vines, he gave up and called a halt.

“So what’s the word?” Mara asked as Skywalker dropped his pack beside hers and stretched his shoulder muscles. “We going to have to carry it?”

“I don’t think so,” Skywalker said, looking over his shoulder to where Calrissian and the Wookiee had the R2 on its side and were tinkering with its wheels. “Chewie thinks he’ll be able to fix it.”

“You ought to trade it in on something that wasn’t designed to travel on a flat metal deck.”

“Sometimes I’ve wished,” Skywalker conceded, sitting down beside her. “All things considered, though, he does pretty well. You should have seen how far across the Tatooine desert he got the first night I had him.”

Mara looked past the droids to where Solo was setting up his bedroll and keeping one eye on the forest around them. “You going to tell me what Solo was talking to you about back there? Or is it something I’m not supposed to know?”

“He and Chewie found one of the clawbirds from that empty nest,” Skywalker said. “The one near the second vine cluster we had to cut through today. It had been killed by a knife thrust.”

Mara swallowed, thinking back to some of the stories she’d heard when she was here with the Emperor. “Probably the Myneyrshi,” she said. “They were supposed to have made an art of that kind of close-blade combat.”

“Did they have any feelings one way or the other about the Empire?”

“Like I told you before, they don’t like humans,” Mara told him. “Starting with the ones who came here as colonists long before the Emperor found the planet.”

She looked at Skywalker, but he wasn’t looking back. He was staring at nothing, a slight frown creasing his forehead.

Mara took a deep breath, stretching out with the Force as hard as she could. The sounds and smells of the forest wove their way into her mind, flattening into the overall pattern of life around her. Trees, bushes, animals, and birds…

And there, just at the edge of her consciousness, was another mind. Alien, unreadable… but a mind just the same.

“Four of them,” Skywalker said quietly. “No. Five.”

Mara frowned, concentrating on the sensation. He was right: there was more than one mind out there. But she couldn’t quite separate the various components out from the general sense.

“Try looking for deviations,” Skywalker murmured. “The ways the minds are different from each other. That’s the best way to resolve them.”

Mara tried it; and to her slightly annoyed surprise discovered that he was right. There was the second mind… the third…

And then, suddenly, they were gone.

She looked sharply at Skywalker. “I don’t know,” he said slowly, still concentrating. “There was a surge of emotion, and then they just turned and left.”

“Maybe they didn’t know we were here,” Mara suggested hesitantly, knowing even as she said it how unlikely that was. Between the Wookiee roaring at everything that came at them and the protocol droid whining about everything else, it was a wonder the whole planet didn’t know they were there.

“No, they knew,” Skywalker said. “In fact, I’m pretty sure they were coming directly toward us when they were—” He shook his head. “I want to say they were scared away. But that doesn’t make any sense.”

Mara looked at the double leaf-canopy overhead. “Could we have picked up an Imperial patrol?”

“No.” Skywalker was positive. “I’d know if there were any other humans nearby.”

“Bet that comes in handy,” Mara muttered.

“It’s just a matter of training.”

She threw him a sideways look. There’d been something odd in his voice. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He grimaced, a quick tightening of his mouth. “Nothing. Just… I was thinking about Leia’s twins. Thinking about how I’m going to have to train them some day.”

“You worried about when to start?”

He shook his head. “I’m worried about being able to do it at all.”

She shrugged. “What’s to do? You teach them how to hear minds and move objects and use lightsabers. You did that with your sister, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” he agreed. “But that was when I thought that was all there was to it. It’s really just the beginning. They’re going to be strong in the Force, and with that strength comes responsibility. How do I teach them that? How do I teach them wisdom and compassion and how not to abuse their power?”

Mara studied his profile as he gazed out into the forest. This wasn’t just word games; he was really serious about it. Definitely a side of the heroic, noble, infallible Jedi she hadn’t seen before. “How does anyone teach anyone else that stuff?” she said. “Mostly by example, I suppose.”

He thought about it, nodded reluctantly. “I suppose so. How much Jedi training did the Emperor give you?”

YOU
WILL
KILL
LUKE
SKYWALKER
.
“Enough,” she said shortly, shaking the sound of the words from her mind and trying to stifle the flash of reflexive hatred that came with them. “All the basics. Why?—you checking for wisdom and compassion?”

“No.” He hesitated. “But as long as we’ve got a few more days until we reach Mount Tantiss, it might be a good idea to go over it again. You know—a refresher course sort of thing.”

She looked at him, an icy chill running through her. He was just a little bit too casual about this…. “Have you seen something about what’s ahead of us?” she asked suspiciously.

“Not really,” he said. But there was that brief hesitation again. “A few images and pictures that didn’t make any sense. I just think it would be a good idea for you to be as strong in the Force as possible before we go in.”

She looked away from him.
YOU
WILL
KILL
LUKE
SKYWALKER
.
“You’ll be there,” she reminded him. “What do I need to be strong in the Force for?”

“For whatever purpose your destiny calls you to,” he said, his voice quiet but firm. “We have an hour or so left before sundown. Let’s get started.”

Wedge Antilles slid into his place on the long semicircular bench beside the other starfighter squadron commanders, glancing around the Star Cruiser war room as he did so. A good crowd already, and more were still filing in. Whatever Ackbar had planned, it was going to be big.

” ‘Lo, Wedge,” someone grunted in greeting as he sat down beside Wedge. “Fancy meeting you here.”

Wedge looked at him in mild surprise. Pash Cracken, son of the legendary General Airen Cracken, and one of the best starfighter commanders in the business. “I could say the same about you, Pash,” he said. “I thought you were out in Atrivis sector, baby-sitting the Outer Rim comm center.”

“You’re behind the times,” Pash said grimly. “Generis fell three days ago.”

Wedge stared at him. “I hadn’t heard,” he apologized. “How bad was it?”

“Bad enough,” Pash said. “We lost the whole comm center, more or less intact, and most of the sector fleet supply depots. On the plus side, we didn’t leave them any ships they could use. And we were able to make enough trouble on our way out to let General Kryll sneak Travia Chan and her people out from under the Imperials’ collective snout.”

“That’s something, I guess,” Wedge said. “What was it got you, numbers or tactics?”

“Both,” Pash said with a grimace. “I don’t think Thrawn was there personally, but he sure planned out the assault. I’ve got to tell you, Wedge, that those clones of his are the creepiest things I’ve ever tangled with. It’s like going up against stormtroopers: same rabid dedication, same cold-blooded machine-precision fighting. The only difference is that they’re everywhere now instead of just handling shock-troop duty.”

“Tell me about it,” Wedge agreed soberly. “We had to fight off two
TIE
fighter squadrons of the things in the first Qat Chrystac assault. They were pulling stunts I didn’t think TIEs were capable of.”

Pash nodded. “General Kryll figures Thrawn must be picking his best people for his cloning templets.”

“He’d be stupid to do anything else. What about Varth? Did he make it out?”

“I don’t know,” Pash said. “We lost contact with him during the retreat. I’m still hoping he was able to punch through the other side of the pincer and hook up with one of the units at Fedje or Ketaris.”

Wedge thought about the handful of times he’d gone nose-to-nose with Wing Commander Varth over something, usually involving spare parts or maintenance time. The man was a bitter, caustic-mouthed tyrant, with the single redeeming talent of being able to throw his starfighters against ridiculous odds and then get them back out again. “He’ll make it,” Wedge said. “He’s too contrary to roll over and die just for the Empire’s convenience.”