“And I think it was wise not to mention the new clone programs. Zey really would go charging in to demand that Windu got answers on that one. I’d prefer the Chancellor’s office not to notice us.”
“Besany did a fine job there, but I don’t want to get her killed.” Skirata nudged Ordo in the plates with his elbow. “She’s good all around, that one. But put her out of her misery, give her the sapphires, and ask her how she likes the idea of living in the middle of nowhere with a depressed Kaminoan for a house guest. Okay?”
“I’ll tell her they’re stolen. She’s touchy about that kind of thing, being Treasury.”
“Ord’ika, just take a couple of days out and spend quality time with her. You know what I’m saying.”
“Yes, Kal’buir”
Skirata spat the fibrous remains of the ruik into the flowerbed next to the wall. “In a year’s time, if we’ve still got a year, then I want everything in place for an instant ba’slan shev’la.”
It meant “strategic disappearance,” a Mando tactic for scattering and disappearing from sight, only to coalesce into an army again later. For them, it meant banging out to the bastion on Mandalore and helping any like-minded clones that they could.
They never did get around to talking about Jusik. Zey would realize that and come back for round two with Skirata sooner or later. But unlike Skirata, he didn’t have the luxury of ba’slan shev’la.
Maybe he needed to think about that. Everyone needed a plan B-even Jedi.
Chapter 18
It took me a long time to understand that winning a war often has nothing to do with ending it, for governments at least.
-General Arligan Zey, Director of Special Forces, Grand Army of the Republic, on his recent interest in military history
Kyrimorut bastion, northern Mandalore, 539 days after Geonosis
I don’t want you to get upset,” Vau said, “but Fi’s not as you remember him.”
Etain nodded gravely as they waited for Aay’han to land. Vau wasn’t sure if an emotional shock was a good idea for a pregnant woman so close to term, but he had Rav Bralor here if any of that female stuff needed attending to. Mird followed Etain around, staring fascinated at her belly.
“He’s still Fi, and I think I understand post-coma recovery now,” Etain said. “You have no idea how much medical literature I’ve read recently. But Mird’s worrying me.”
Bralor flicked her thumbnail against the butt of her blaster, making Mird whip its head around to stare balefully at her. “And I can worry Mird. Can’t I, my little stinkweed?”
Vau felt the need to defend his comrade. “Strills have very acute senses, remember. It knows the baby’s coming soon.”
“As in snack opportunity?”
“As in parenting, Rav. Mird is hermaphroditic, remember.
It’s capable of being a mother, too, and you know how fe-male animals will mother anything.”
“Even you, Walon …”
Etain looked up at the first distant throb of a drive decelerating for landing. “I really wish Darman knew right now. I really do.”
“Nearly there, kid,” Bralor said, squeezing her shoulders. “There’ll be a right time. Soon.”
But there was probably never a right time for her to see Fi again. Aay ‘han settled on her dampers, ticking and creaking as the drives cooled, and the cargo hatch eased open. Jaing stepped out, steering Fi on a repulsor chair.
“I was just passing through,” Jaing said, “but this crazy Mando ‘ad said he’d booked a vacation here.”
Etain didn’t even pause. She rushed up to Fi, at a respectable speed for a woman laden with cargo, and flung her arms around him. But he didn’t quite have the coordination to respond and simply flopped his arm over her shoulder.
He was wearing Ghez Hokan’s armor, at least on his upper body. The leg plates probably needed extending; Hokan had been a much shorter man. Jusik understood motivation very well.
“We’re going to have to feed you up,” Etain said. “You’re all bone now.”
“Fizz,” Fi said indistinctly.
“He means physiotherapy,” Jaing explained. “You might struggle to understand his speech, but give him a stylus and he can manage to write a lot of what he can’t say. He has to point to objects, too-he can’t find the right words. Oh, and he forgets a lot. But for a dead man, he’s doing great.”
Vau found it particularly cruel that Fi-a funny, eloquent lad-had been effectively silenced by the injury. But it was very early days. Bralor went over to fuss over him, too, but Fi had spotted that Etain had filled out rather a lot in the mid-section. He pointed.