Winter nodded, her gaze sympathetic. Bria was a bit surprised at herself for opening up to the girl this way, but the Alderaanian teenager was amazingly easy to talk to. It was obvious that she wasn’t just making conversation, she really cared about what Bria was saying.
The commander shrugged slightly. “It cost me everything that was important to me, basically. Love, family … security. But it was worth it, to be myself.
And it brought me a new purpose in life.”
“Fighting the Empire.”
The older woman nodded. “Fighting the Empire that condones and encourages slavery. The filthiest, most degrading practice ever developed by supposedly civilized sentients.”
“I’ve heard about Ylesia,” Winter said. “The Viceroy ordered an investigation of the place a few years ago, when a few unpleasant rumors surfaced. Since that time, he’s kept up a public information campaign to let Alderaanians know the truth about the place—about the spice factories, the forced labor.”
“That’s the worst thing about it,” Bria said, bitterly. “They don’t force you. People work themselves to death there, and they do it willingly. It’s horrible. If only I had the soldiers and weapons, I’d head for Ylesia tomorrow with a couple of squadrons. We’d shut that stinking mudhole down for good.”
“It would take a lot of troops.”
“Yes, it would. They have eight or nine colonies there, now.
Thousands of slaves.” Bria cautiously sipped the hot beverage. “So .
. . are you looking forward to tomorrow’s session?”
Winter sighed. “Not really.”
“I don’t blame you,” Bria said. “It must be pretty boring, hearing us wrangle all day over whether or not a Rebel Alliance is the right course of action. You ought to skip tomorrow’s session, and go have some fun. Cloud City has tours to go watch the beldon herds, and there are aerial rodeos where thranta riders do stunts. I’ve heard it’s an amazing thing to watch.”
“I have to be at the conference tomorrow,” Winter said. “Minister Dahlney needs me.”
“Why?” Bria was puzzled. “For moral support?”
The girl smiled faintly. “No. I am his recorder. He needs me to help him prepare his report for the Viceroy.”
“Recorder?”
“Yes. Everything I see, or experience, or hear, I remember,” Winter said.
“I cannot forget, though sometimes I wish I could.” Her lovely features grew sad, as though she was recalling some unpleasant scene from the past.
“Really?” Bria was thinking how handy that would be, to have someone like that on staff. She herself had taken lessons and hypno-conditioning to improve her own recall, because so little of what she did could be entrusted to datafiles or flimsies. “You’re right, that would make you invaluable.”
“The reason that I said I wasn’t looking forward to tomorrow’s session,” Winter said, leaning forward across the table, “wasn’t that I was bored, Commander. What I meant was that it’s hard for me to listen to Hric Dahlney stubbornly insist that Alderaanian ethics are more important than defeating the Empire.”
Bria cocked her head. “Oh … now, that’s interesting. What makes you say that?”
“Twice, when I accompanied Leia and the Viceroy to diplomatic functions on Coruscant—” she stopped herself, then smiled ruefully, “I mean, to Imperial Center—I saw the Emperor. One of those times, Emperor Palpatine stopped and spoke to me, just a perfunctory greeting, but .
. .” She hesitated, biting her lip, and for the first time, Bria saw her maturity slip, and a frightened child in those youthful features. “Bria, I looked into his eyes. I cannot forget them, no matter how I try.
Emperor Palpatine is evil. Unnatural, in some strange way …. “The girl shuddered, despite the cozy warmth of the bar. “He frightened me.
He was .
. . malevolent. That’s the only word that fits.”
“I’ve heard stories,” Bria said. “Though I’ve never met him. I’ve seen him from a distance, but that’s all.”
“You don’t want to meet him,” Winter said. “Those eyes of his …
they fasten on you, and you feel as though they will drink up your spirit, all that makes you what you are.”
Bria sighed. “That’s why we must resist him,” she said. “That’s what he wants, to engulf us all … planets, sentients …
everything.
Palpatine is determined to become the most absolute despot in history.
We have to fight him, or we’ll all be ground to dust.”