[Legacy Of The Force] - 03(14)

Chapter Four


After a long mission Force-hibernating in the cold, cramped cockpit of a StealthX, what Jaina wanted was a hot sanisteam and a nerf steak as large as her plate. What she got, as she passed the fastidious officers on the command deck of the Admiral Ackbar, were sudden glances and-sometimes-wrinkled noses. She was still wearing the same black flight suit in which she had spent the last week, and the climate-controlled warmth of the Star Destroyer was doing nothing to mask the fact. Jaina stopped at the edge of the Tactical Salon and waited for Admiral Bwua’tu to free himself. After a decade of off-and-on service in Rogue and various other X-wing squadrons, it was hard to avoid saluting or reporting her arrival in a clear, sharp voice. But she was no longer in the military-she had been discharged for refusing to obey Jacen’s order to fire on a fleeing blockade-runner- and Jedi Knights seldom needed to announce themselves. The tactical holodisplay in the center of the salon suggested that the Corellian situation had not changed during her week at the observation post. Fleets enforcing the Alliance Exclusionary Zone still surrounded Centerpoint

Station and all five of Corell’s habitable planets, and the Kiris Asteroid Cluster continued to glow in faint, cautionary yellow. The location of Bwua’tu’s ambush fleet-lying in wait three light-years from the edge of the system-was indicated by a simple blue arrow and a distance marker. Were the situation to remain static for another year, the two sides might actually have time to work out their differences.

But the galaxy was not going to be that lucky. There were too many schemes under way, too many factors on a collision course-and Jaina was about to bring another big complication into play. When High Command learned that the Corellians were in contact with Hapes-one of the Alliance’s most supportive member states-spies would be tasked to investigate and diplomats sent to make inquiries. Forces would be mobilized and assets moved into position, and the war would grow that much harder to stop.

Jaina did not even want to consider what might happen if High Command heard that her parents were involved. There would be a lot of unjustified concern, perhaps even panic. Scouts would be dispatched to locate them, and a task force assigned to capture-perhaps even destroy-the Millennium Falcon. That possibility had run through her mind over and over during the long journey back from the Kirises, reinforcing the notion that her report might not need to include certain things.

Jaina looked from the holodisplay to a niche high on the salon’s back wall, where a larmalstone bust of the great Admiral Ackbar kept watch over his namesake. She knew enough about the political instincts of Bothans to realize Bwua’tu was only displaying the statue to curry favor with the Alliance’s new Mon Calamari Supreme Commander, Cha Niathal. But the effigy struck her as deeply ironic. Ackbar had been a firm believer in the benevolent power of a united galaxy, and no one could be more disturbed to see the Galactic Alliance going to war against one of its own member states than he would have been.

The trouble was, Jaina just did not see how Omas could have avoided it. Thrackan Sal-Solo and his cohorts had been trying to bring Centerpomt Station back online, and they had been building a secret invasion fleet in the Kiris Asteroid Cluster. Clearly, Corellia had been preparing to attack someone-and the inability to discover the intended target did not excuse the Alliance from its duty to intervene.

Jaina sensed Bwua’tu approaching and turned her attention in the admiral’s direction. With small burning eyes and graying chin fur, the Bothan cut a feral and surprisingly dignified figure in his white uniform.

“A reminder,” Bwua’tu said in his gritty voice.

Jaina frowned in bafflement. “Sir?”

Bwua’tu pointed a finger at the bust of Admiral Ackbar. “The statue,” he said. “It has nothing to do with Admiral Niathal, as you were thinking. It’s there to keep me humble.”

Jaina was too surprised to ask Bwua’tu exactly how he knew what she had been thinking. Perhaps that was what everyone thought when they saw the statue-or perhaps he was just that good at reading faces. “Humble?” she asked. “How is that, sir?” The fur rose along the back of Bwua’tu’s neck. “Jedi can’t possibly be that poorly informed. I was the laughingstock of the entire space navy over the incident in the Murgo Choke.”

“Not the entire space navy, sir,” Jaina said. During the recent peacekeeping operations in the Unknown Regions, the Ackbar had been captured by a swarm of Killik commandos-smuggled aboard in busts of Admiral Bwua’tu himself. ‘Tm pretty sure Admiral Pellaeon didn’t find it at all funny.”