Everyone was at his granddaughter’s wedding feast, including the barkeep, Cham. Fett waited for Admiral Daala, thinking that it was a perfect freeze frame from his life that he was waiting to do business here while his granddaughter and his ex-wife were doing the right thing and celebrat-ing the marriage.
He watched Daala walk through the doors, reflected in the mirrored panel next to his table.
“I’ve been arranging Gil’s funeral with Reige, “she said.
“Did that involve a strafing run over Bastion?”
“The somewhat depleted Council of Moffs couldn’t see why we wouldn’t release the body for a state funeral. I gave them back a few dead Moffs to bury instead.” “Corellia, then.”
“Reige said Gil would have preferred that anyway.” “You can invite Jacen Solo. He’s a popular man on Corellia. They’d give him a warm welcome…. heat-seeking missile, maybe.”
Daala didn’t sit down. She looked as if she had somewhere else to go. “Niathal’s formally declared the government in exile of the Galactic Alliance on Fondor.” “Who says Mon Cals don’t have a sense of humor?” “And the Fondorians. Forgiveness is a wonderful thing.” “Sit down.”
“You said, if I might remind you, that I could have an ale at Mirta’s wedding.” “So I did.”
“You seem reluctant. Is that because your ex-wife will be there?”
“My ex-wife saw my face today for the first time in fifty-two years.”
“I’ve never seen you without the helmet.” “Time was when I said this was my face.” “Seen one Mando, seen them all.” Fett clamped his hands on the helmet’s cheek pieces, thumbs under the rim, and twisted slightly as he lifted the helmet clear of his head. Daala watched in complete silence with her arms folded. The silence went on a little too long for him to feel comfortable.
“It’s not about the scars, “he said. Daala looked him in the face, eyelids closing a fraction, the faintest of smiles passing across her lips.
“You scrub up well for an old man, Fett. I bet you broke a few hearts back in the day.”
If he had, it was only distant admiration. “There was only ever Sintas.”
“Ah.”
“I do a job right, or I don’t do it at all.”
She understood. “Ah.”
Daala was as hard as a Hutt’s heart on payday; she hadn’t made Imperial admiral in a male-dominated navy by weeping into her handkerchief. But something had cracked that beskar deck plating of hers, and her gaze flickered for a moment.
“That’s a long time to devote to… perfectionism.”
“Saves me trouble I don’t get paid to handle.”
“And trouble that you can’t ever buy again.”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
“Perfection isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, Fett. Sometimes good enough is all you need. No point surviving if you don’t live.”
Fifty-two years alone. Not what I’d planned, but it could have been fifty-two years of misery with bad company. I know which hurts less.
“That thing’s not your face, actually.” Daala stopped a fraction short of actually touching his jaw, but he thought she was going to jerk his face toward the mirrored panel and make him look at himself like some gawky, self-conscious adolescent being told he was fine just the way he was. “And that’s not your father’s face, either.”
Fett had never flinched from his reflection-not out of sore conscience, or insecurity, or because it was also Jango Fett’s face. He had always been able meet the gaze flung back at him-until today. Koa Ne’s smug, sterile, Kaminoan judgment wormed into his brain: But what use is your wealth to you now? Maybe Daala was right. He was already dead, and beating his tumors had only given him more years to contemplate just how very dead he was.
“You’re right. It’s mine.” Fett looked at the reflection again, and survived seeing time ignoring his plea to stop, just like he’d ignored the pleas of so many targets. “And are you another one who thinks it’s unfair I got a blessing I couldn’t use, like Jaina Solo does?”
“I got my second chance with Liegeus. I grabbed it.”
“But Liegeus never stopped loving you.”
“I didn’t make him stop, either.”
Daala stood at the Oyu’baat’s doors, hands in her pockets, and looked up at the cloudless sky. “Lovely day. I need my exercise. I’m cooped up on a ship most days.” She held out her hand to him, palm down, as if telling a dawdling kid to hang on to her and not get lost in the crowd. “Com-ing?”