And right on target, the overripe blicci fruit hit the door, splashing with a sickening thud and leaving a brilliant red stain behind.
There was a startled gasp from a couple of Duros standing nearby. But neither they nor anyone else in the crowd was going to be given enough time to think about what they were being suckered into here. From a half-dozen other places in the crowd the cry for justice was echoed, and a half-dozen other pieces of fruit splattered the building. “Justice for Caamas!” Navett shouted again, hurling another blicci fruit. “Vengeance for genocide!”
“Vengeance!” someone picked up the call, the cry accompanied by more of the nuisance missiles. “Vengeance for genocide!” Navett threw another blicci fruit, and another&mdash
And then from somewhere an alien voice called hoarsely, echoing the call for vengeance … and as if that were somehow a signal, the crowd suddenly and gratifyingly collapsed into a mob. A rain of foodstuffs began to pelt the building, drawn from lunch bags and cartons and propelled by the mindless fury and pent-up rage that Klif had s o skillfully stirred up in them.
A rage that Navett had no intention of wasting on a few fruit stains. Reaching past the last blicci fruit in his bag, he pulled out a rough stone. Violence begets violence, he silently quoted the old maxim, and let fly.
It hit its target window dead on, shattering the plastic with a crash that could barely be heard above the roar of the mob. “Vengeance for genocide!” Navett shouted, waving his fist at the building and pulling out another stone.
The crowd were fast learners. The rain of fruit and eggs continued, but it began to be joined by some of the edging stones that lined the plaza’s walkways and flower beds. Navett threw another stone as four more windows became jagged holes, then took a quick moment to search the skies around them. Even taken by surprise this way, the Dordol authorities wouldn’t take forever to respond.
And there was the expected response now, rapidly approaching from the direction of the spaceport: three brightly colored customs airspeeders with an escort of maybe half a dozen speeder bikes. Moving fast, too; they’d be at the plaza in less than two minutes.
Which meant it was time to go. Slipping a hand inside his tunic to his hidden comlink, Navett tapped the call button twice, the signal for the rest of his agitation team to move to the edges of the mob and vanish into the afternoon sunshine. Then, reaching past the last two stones in his pouch, he pulled out his final present to the Bothans.
It was a grenade, of course. But a very special grenade. Navett had personally taken it from the dead hand of a Myomaran resistance fighter ten years ago, during the Empire’s brief reoccupation of that world under the meteoric reign of Grand Admiral Thrawn. What made this particular grenade so useful was that that resistance cell had somehow talked a visiting Bith into designing their weaponry for them. When the remains of the grenade were studied-as they most certainly would be-the New Republic would b e forced to the conclusion that even the generally pacifist Bith were beginning to join in on the side of the anti-Bothan sentiment.
Perhaps that wouldn’t matter. Perhaps none of this really mattered. Perhaps the aliens and alien-lovers had so beaten down the Empire that nothing Navett and his team did could make any difference anymore.
But as far as their duty was concerned, such possibilities didn’t really matter either. Navett had seen the glory of the Empire, as well as its darker days … and if that glory couldn’t be revived, then it was only fitting that he help bury it beneath the ashes of the New Republic.
Pulling the safety, he flicked the detonator and threw. The grenade dropped neatly through one of the broken windows on the upper floor and vanished inside. He was halfway to the edge of the crowd when it went off, collapsing the roof and sending a spectacular fireball roiling into the sky.
He was out of the plaza and walking unconcernedly down the street with the rest of the noonday strollers when the authorities arrived at the scene of the fire.
***
The petition scrolled to the end past the long list of signatures. Leia looked up from her datapad, an ache in her stomach. No wonder President Gavrisom had looked so solemn as he ushered her into his private office. “When was this delivered?” she asked.
“Approximately one hour ago,” Gavrisom said, the tips of his wings brushing restlessly across the stacks of datacards that awaited his attention. “Under the circumstances, I thought you and Councilor Fey’lya should be given advance notice.”
Leia looked at Fey’lya. The Bothan was hunched in his seat, fur pressed completely flat against his skin. “Why me?” she asked.