The Last Command (45 page)

Thrawn saw him, too. “What’s wrong, Captain?”

“Urgent message from Wayland, sir,” Pellaeon said, gesturing toward the hologram pod. The image of an Imperial officer was already waiting, and even in a quarter-size holo, Pellaeon could see the younger man’s nervousness.

“Probably C’baoth,” Thrawn predicted darkly. They reached position in front of the hologram pod, and Thrawn nodded to the image. “Colonel Selid, this is Grand Admiral Thrawn. Report.”

“Sir,” Selid said, his parade-ground posture stiffening even more. “I regret to inform you, Admiral, of the sudden death of General Covell.”

Pellaeon felt his mouth fall open a couple of centimeters. “How?” he asked.

“We don’t know yet, sir,” Selid said. “He apparently died in his sleep. The medics are still running tests, but so far all they can suggest is that large portions of the General’s brain had simply shut down.”

“Brain tissue does not ‘simply’ shut down, Colonel,” Thrawn said. “There has to be a reason for it.”

Selid seemed to wince. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry, sir; I didn’t mean it that way.”

“I know you didn’t,” Thrawn assured him. “What about the rest of the passengers?”

“The medics are checking them all now,” Selid said. “No problems so far. Rather, they’re checking all those still within the garrison. General Covell’s troops—the company that arrived on the
Draklor
with him—had already been dispersed outside the mountain when he died.”

“What, the whole company?” Pellaeon asked. “What for?”

“I don’t know, sir,” Selid said. “General Covell gave the orders. After the big meeting, I mean, before he died.”

“Perhaps we’d better have the story from the beginning, Colonel,” Thrawn cut him off. “Tell me everything.”

“Yes, sir.” Selid visibly pulled himself together. “General Covell and the others were landed via shuttle approximately six hours ago. I tried to turn over command of the garrison to him, but he refused. He then insisted on having a private word with his troops in one of the officers’ mess halls.”

“Which troops?” Thrawn asked. “The whole garrison?”

“No, sir, just the ones who’d accompanied him on the
Draklor
. He said he had some special orders to give them.”

Pellaeon looked at Thrawn. “I’d have thought he’d have had plenty of time aboard ship for special orders.”

“Yes,” Thrawn agreed. “One would think so.”

“Maybe it was C’baoth’s idea, sir,” Selid suggested. “He was at the general’s side from the minute they got off the shuttle. Muttering, sort of, the whole time.”

“Was he, now,” Thrawn said thoughtfully. His voice was calm, but there was something beneath it that sent a shiver up Pellaeon’s back. “Where is Master C’baoth now?”

“Up in the Emperor’s old royal chambers,” Selid said. “General Covell insisted they be opened for him.”

“Would he be above the ysalamiri influence up there?” Pellaeon murmured.

Thrawn shook his head. “I doubt it. According to my calculations, the entire mountain and some of the surrounding area should be within the Force-empty bubble. What happened then, Colonel?”

“The general spent about fifteen minutes talking to his troops,” Selid said. “When he came out, he told me that he’d given them secret orders that had come directly from you, Admiral, and that I wasn’t to interfere.”

“And then they left the mountain?”

“After stripping one of the supply rooms of field gear and explosives, yes,” Selid said. “Actually, they spent a couple more hours inside the garrison before leaving. Familiarizing themselves with the layout, the general said. After they left, C’baoth escorted the general to his quarters and then was himself escorted to the royal chambers by two of my stormtroopers. I put the rest of the garrison back onto standard nighttime routine, and that was it. Until this morning, when the orderly found the general.”

“So C’baoth wasn’t with Covell at the time of his death?” Thrawn asked.

“No, sir,” Selid said. “Though the medics don’t think the general lived very long after C’baoth left him.”

“And he was with the general up until that time.”

“Yes, sir.”

Pellaeon threw Thrawn a sideways look. The Grand Admiral was staring at nothing, his glowing red eyes narrowed to slits. “Tell me, Colonel, what was your impression of General Covell?”

“Well…” Selid hesitated. “I’d have to say I was a bit disappointed, sir.”

“How so?”

“He just wasn’t what I was expecting, Admiral,” Selid said, sounding distinctly uncomfortable. Pellaeon didn’t blame him: criticizing one senior officer in front of another was a serious breach of military etiquette. Especially between different branches of the service. “He seemed…
distant
is the word I’d have to use, sir. He implied that my security was poor and that he would be making some important changes, but he wouldn’t talk to me about them. In fact, he hardly spoke to me the whole time he was here. And it wasn’t just me—he was short with the other officers who tried to talk to him, as well. That was his privilege, of course, and he may have just been tired. But it didn’t seem to fit with what I’d heard of the general’s reputation.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Thrawn said. “Is the hologram pad in the Emperor’s old throne room operational, Colonel?”

“Yes, sir. Though C’baoth may not be in the throne room itself.”

“He will be,” Thrawn said coldly. “Connect me with him.”

“Yes, sir.”

Selid’s image vanished, replaced by the pause symbol. “You think C’baoth did something to Covell?” Pellaeon asked quietly.

“I see no other likely explanation,” Thrawn said. “My guess is that our beloved Jedi Master was trying to take over Covell’s mind, perhaps even replacing entire sections of it with his own. When they hit the ysalamir bubble and he lost that direct contact, there wasn’t enough of Covell left to keep him alive for long.”

“I see.” Pellaeon turned his head away from the Grand Admiral, a darkening anger flowing through him. He’d warned Thrawn about what C’baoth might do. Had warned him over and over again. “What are you going to do about it?”

The pause symbol vanished before Thrawn could answer; but it wasn’t the standard quarter-size figure that replaced it. Instead, a huge image of C’baoth’s face suddenly glared out at them, jolting Pellaeon an involuntary step backwards.

Thrawn didn’t even twitch. “Good morning, Master C’baoth,” the Grand Admiral said, his voice mirror smooth. “I see you’ve discovered the Emperor’s private hologram setting.”

“Grand Admiral Thrawn,” C’baoth said, his own voice cold and arrogant. “Is this how you reward my work on behalf of your ambitions? By an act of betrayal?”

“If there is betrayal, it’s on your side, Master C’baoth,” Thrawn said. “What did you do to General Covell?”

C’baoth ignored the question. “The Force is not so easily betrayed as you think,” he said. “And never forget this, Grand Admiral Thrawn: With my destruction will come your own. I have foreseen it.”

He stopped, glaring back and forth at the two of them. For a handful of heartbeats Thrawn remained silent. “Are you finished?” he asked at last.

C’baoth frowned, the play of uncertainty and nervousness easily visible in the magnified face. For all its intimidating majesty, the Emperor’s personal hologram setting clearly had its own set of drawbacks. “For now,” C’baoth said. “Have you some feeble defense to offer?”

“I have nothing to defend, Master C’baoth,” Thrawn said. “It was you who insisted on going to Wayland. Now tell me what you did to General Covell.”

“You will first restore the Force to me.”

“The ysalamiri will stay where they are,” Thrawn said. “Tell me what you did to General Covell.”

For a moment the two men glared at each other. C’baoth’s glare crumbled first, and for a moment it looked as if he was going to fold. But then the old man’s jaw jutted out, and once again he was the arrogant Jedi Master. “General Covell was mine to do with as I pleased,” he said. “As is everything in my Empire.”

“Thank you,” Thrawn said. “That’s all I need to know. Colonel Selid?”

The huge face vanished and was replaced by Selid’s quarter-size image. “Yes, Admiral?”

“Instructions, Colonel,” Thrawn told him. “First of all, Master C’baoth is hereby placed under arrest. You may allow him free run of the royal chambers and Emperor’s throne room but he is not to leave there. All control circuits from those floors will be disconnected, of course. Secondly, you’re to initiate inquiries as to precisely where General Covell’s troops were seen within the mountain before they left.”

“Why don’t we ask the troops themselves, sir?” Selid suggested. “They presumably have comlinks with them.”

“Because I’m not certain we could trust their answers,” Thrawn told him. “Which brings me to my third order. None of the troops which left the mountain under General Covell’s orders are to be allowed back in.”

Selid’s jaw dropped visibly. “Sir?”

“You heard correctly,” Thrawn told him. “Another transport will arrive for them in a few days, at which time they’ll be rounded up and taken off the planet. But under no circumstances are they to be allowed back into the mountain.”

“Yes, sir,” Selid said, floundering. “But—sir, what do I tell them?”

“You may tell them the truth,” Thrawn said quietly. “That their orders came not from General Covell, and certainly not from me, but from a traitor to the Empire. Until Intelligence can sort through the details, the entire company will be considered as under suspicion, as unwitting accomplices to treason.”

The word seemed to hang before them in the air. “Understood, sir,” Selid said at last.

“Good,” Thrawn said. “You are of course reinstated as garrison commander. Any questions?”

Selid drew himself up. “No, sir.”

“Good. Carry on, Colonel.
Chimaera
out.”

The figure vanished from the hologram pod. “Do you think it’s safe to leave C’baoth there, sir?” Pellaeon asked.

“There’s nowhere in the Empire safer,” Thrawn pointed out. “At least, not yet.”

Pellaeon frowned. “I don’t understand.”

“His use to the Empire is rapidly nearing an end, Captain,” Thrawn said, turning and walking beneath the archway into the main section of the bridge. “However, he still has one last role to play in our long-term consolidation of power.”

He paused at the aft edge of the command walkway. “C’baoth is insane, Captain—that we both agree on. But such insanity is in his mind. Not in his body.”

Pellaeon stared at him. “Are you suggesting we
clone
him?”

“Why not?” Thrawn asked. “Not at Mount Tantiss itself, certainly, given the conditions there. Most likely not at the speed which that facility allows, either—that’s all well and good for techs and
TIE
fighter pilots, but not a project of this delicacy. No, I envision bringing such a clone to childhood and then allowing it to grow to maturity at a normal pace for its last ten or fifteen years. Under suitable upbringing conditions, of course.”

“I see,” Pellaeon said, struggling to keep his voice steady. A young C’baoth—or maybe two or ten or twenty of them—running loose around the galaxy. This was an idea that was going to take some getting used to. “Where would you set up this other cloning facility?”

“Somewhere absolutely secure,” Thrawn said. “Possibly on one of the worlds in the Unknown Regions where I once served the Emperor. You’ll instruct Intelligence to begin searching for a suitable location after we’ve crushed the Rebels at Bilbringi.”

Pellaeon felt his lip twitch. Right: the dangerously ethereal Bilbringi attack. What with this C’baoth thing, he’d almost forgotten the main business of the day. Or his reservations concerning it. “Yes, sir. Admiral, I’m forced to remind you that all the evidence still indicates Tangrene as the probable point of attack.”

“I’m aware of the evidence, Captain,” Thrawn said. “Nevertheless, they will be at Bilbringi.”

He sent his gaze leisurely around his bridge, his glowing red eyes missing nothing. And the crewers knew it. At every station, from the crew pits to the lateral consoles, there were the subtle sounds and movements of men aware that their commander was watching and striving to show him their best. “And so will we,” the Grand Admiral added to Pellaeon. “Set course for Bilbringi, Captain. And let us prepare to meet our guests.”

Wedge drained the last of his cup and set it back on the chipped and stained wood of the small table, glancing across the noisy Mumbri Storve cantina as he did so. The place was as crowded as it had been when he, Janson, and Hobbie had come in an hour earlier, but the texture of the crowd had changed quite a bit. Most of the younger people had left, couples and groups both, and had been replaced by an older and decidedly seedier-looking bunch. The fringe types were drifting in; which meant it was time for them to be drifting out.

His fellow Rogue Squadron pilots knew it, too. “Time to go?” Hobbie suggested, his voice just audible over the noise.

“Right,” Wedge nodded, getting to his feet and fumbling in his pouch for a coin that would cover this last round. His
civilian
pouch; and he really hated the awkward things. But it would hardly do for them to go wandering around town in full New Republic uniforms, complete with the distinctive Rogue Squadron patches.

He found a proper-size coin and dropped it into the center of the table as the others stood up. “Where to now?” Janson asked, hunching his shoulders slightly to stretch out his back muscles.

“Back to the base, I think,” Wedge told him.

“Good,” Janson grunted. “Morning’s going to come early enough as it is.”

Wedge nodded as he turned and headed toward the exit. Morning could come anytime it wanted to, of course: well before then they were going to be off this planet and driving hard toward their assigned rendezvous point outside the Bilbringi shipyards.

They wove their way between the crowded tables; and as they did so, a tall, thin man shoved his chair back almost into Wedge’s knees and got unsteadily to his feet. “Watch out,” he slurred, half turning to throw his arm across Wedge’s shoulders and much of his weight against Wedge’s side.

“Easy, friend,” Wedge grunted, struggling to regain his balance. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Janson step to the tall man’s other side and put a supporting arm around him—