[Republic Commando] - 02(103)

“Knock it off,” Skirata said. He didn’t want Darman pitching in to defend Etain. Everyone’s nerves were raw: tired, stressed people were dangerous, and they needed to be dangerous to the enemy, not each other. “Ordo, what are we going to do with Supervisor Wennen?”

Besany Wennen was propped in a chair, arms folded gingerly across what must have been a very painful bruise to her whole chest. She was lucky that Etain’s close-range PEP round hadn’t killed her, but now the woman was just an extra complication they didn’t need. Ordo was looking her over as if she was a new species.

And she was. There was a comfortable zone of attractiveness in females, and then there was a point beyond which it became too much. The very beautiful were intimidating and unwelcome. Wennen had passed that threshold, and Skirata was ambushed by his own unexpected hostility toward her.

“You’ve probably guessed what we’re doing, ma’am,” Ordo said.

“Anti-terrorist operations?”

“Correct.”

“I’m sorry. I had no idea.” But there was no screaming outrage or threats that her boss would rip the guts out of their boss, the usual response of bureaucrats. She just indicated the unconscious Gurlanin with a shaky hand. “Where does the Gurlanin fit into all this?”

“Other than mimicking Jiss, we have no idea.”

Wennen seemed to be taking refuge in investigation, continuing to do her job even though she knew she was in a serious situation. Skirata respected that. “So if you two are Jedi, why didn’t you spot the creature?”

“Gurlanins can hide in the Force and shut us out,” Etain said. “When I first encountered them I even thought they were Jedi. They’re telepathic, we can’t detect them, we don’t know how many there are, and they appear to be able to mimic any species up to tall humanoid size.”

“Perfect spies,” Jusik said. “And perfect predators.”

“And we didn’t honor our pledge to help them, so I suspect they’ve run out of patience.”

“Look, no disrespect to our Treasury colleague, boys and girls, but can we refrain from discussing classified intelligence in front of Agent Wennen?” Skirata said. “I need to talk to CSF. Corr, you call up the recce teams and see how far they’ve got on the main locations.”

Skirata wandered out onto the landing platform and breathed in cool night air. The strill was curled up under the bench where, true to his word, Vau had slept each night. He probably thought it proved the point that he was a hard case, but there was no doubt that he worshiped that stinking animal and it loved him.

Atin’s going to take a knife to him when this is over. I know it. Well, worry about that when it happens…

He raised his wrist comlink to his lips. “Jailer?”

There was a pause and the sound of a woman grumbling and sheets rustling. Of course: Obrim had a wife and kids. Skirata often forgot that other people had lives beyond their jobs. “You know what time it is, Kal?”

“To the second. Look, which of your people was on surveillance in the Bank of the Core Plaza?”

There was a long, sleepy, irritable pause. “What, today? None of my people, I guarantee it.”

“Organized Crime Unit?”

“I could ask, but they play these things close to their chests … getting to be an epidemic, this secrecy, isn’t it?”

“Tell you what,” Skirata said, dropping his voice. “Pay your OCU buddies a visit and tell them that anyone we see in our scopes who isn’t us gets slotted as a matter of course, okay? You think they’ll understand that?”

“I can but try.”

“Try hard, then. I don’t want them crashing in like the di’kutla Treasury did tonight.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. An audit officer was sent in to monitor GAR staff siphoning off supplies. But that isn’t my biggest problem right now.” Don’t mention the shapeshifter yet. “Okay, here’s my offer. I now have forty-three individual locations that we believe the Separatists are using or visiting in Galactic City. We have to concentrate on the high-value targets, and you really don’t want to know what we’ll be doing there, so what if we give you a list of the others to pick off as you see fit?”

“When?”

“When we’ve recce’d the high-value ones and have an op order planned out-you know, precise timings. That way we don’t fall over each other.”

Obrim had gone rather quiet. “I can authorize that. But I’ve got no control over the OCU.”

“Then find someone who does. I mean it, Jailer. We’re not playing by rules of evidence.”