[Republic Commando] - 03(153)

“So, Et’ika, you can see why keeping my mind on cooperation is hard.”

What harm could it do? Ko Sai couldn’t touch her, and Darman had everything to lose.

“Okay,” she said. “But you’re going to do a lot of babysit-ting to make up for this.”

“I’d love that,” he said. He smiled, and he had such an artless, genuinely joyful smile that it was hard to square what he did with what he was. “It’s going to be wonderful.”

Etain spent a few minutes composing herself before she went into that room. She walked the circular path through the corridors that had quickly become her routine in the last couple of days, concentrating on a Force-bond with the baby. She could feel him growing now: before, she’d been in control of accelerating the pregnancy in healing trances, but now it was as if he had taken the reins and was deciding on his own pace. She had the strongest sense of him being impatient, of wanting to be out in the world and doing things, and it alarmed her. It was as if he felt she was a dangerous place that he needed to escape before she took him into any more battles or traded him for a deal with a scientist whose ethics were repellent.

Venku, we live in an age of chaos. You ‘re going to change many lives. Maybe this is where you start, saving your father and your uncles before you’re even born.

She could have sworn he calmed a little within her. Venku was the future, and Skirata acted as if he knew it, or at leas: was an instrument of the Force. “Okay, aiwha-bait.”

Etain took a breath and walked into the room. Ko Sai didn’t look half as impressive or elegant in a borrowed shapeless gown, which was all that Bralor had managed to find to cover a being more than two meters tall. It had probably been furnishing fabric hurriedly sewn together: Mandalorian women didn’t wear dresses. Without the well-cut, close-fitting suit with its spectacular high collar, Ko Sai looked faintly ludicrous, like a tau serpent trying to escape from a sack.

“I hear Mereel has been talking about my baby,” Etain said, sitting down opposite her with a slightly exaggerated effort that announced how pregnant she was. It also let Ko Sai see that she had not one but two lightsabers on her belt. “Being a Jedi, I’m very pragmatic. We’re trained to find peaceful compromises.”

“Are you really a Jedi? You’re not exactly General Kenobi…”

Etain concentrated on the most powerful Force grab she could muster and sent a chair crashing from one side of the room to the other, shattering it into splinters against the wall.

“Jedi enough for you?” she asked. She patted her bump. “I could run through my list, but I’ve got heartburn, so can we take it as read?”

“Impressive.” Ko Sai could never sound impressed, so Etain took it at face value. “It’s hard to tell from appearance.”

“You’re not interested in my conjuring tricks, though, are you? You want to crack a Jedi genome and take a look at those midichlorians.”

“It would be fascinating.”

“And instead of being the chief scientist who ended her career in disgrace and obscurity, you could be the preeminent authority on Force-user genetics.”

“What do you care about scientific knowledge?”

“I don’t, unless it can help the people I love.”

“I find it staggering that anyone could destroy so much precious knowledge on a whim.”

Ko Sai meant Ordo. If he’d tried to design a way to really get back at her, he couldn’t have come up with a better one than vaping those datachips.

“Yes, that did come as a shock,” Etain said.

“I thought it was one of Skirata’s little games until I saw the effect it had on him. He’s lost a great deal, too, or you wouldn’t be in here-would you?”

“No.” Etain stood up and walked around the room slowly, just to give Ko Sai something to ponder. The more interested the Kaminoan seemed-and she did exude a powerful curiosity-the bolder Etain felt. “If it means giving you a few cells to play with in exchange for the clones having a normal life span, it’s worth it to me. Not an extra-prolonged life. Not whatever the Chancellor wanted you to do for him. Just undo what you did, for these few men, and nobody cares what you do in the future.”

“Skirata cares.”

“Skirata is a practical man who loves his sons, not a moral philosopher.”

Ko Sai looked her in the eyes. Etain understood what Skirata meant when he said they were creepy. It was a good description: no warmth, no understanding, just intense, pitiless scrutiny.

“We all sell out in the end,” she said. “Even me,” said Etain.