Two hours to go.
Darman tapped a few observations on exit routes into his datapad, chewing happily on a tube of pastry packed with minced roba and spices, and wondering when he might get a comlink window to contact Etain. Skirata was right: focusing on the people you loved could keep you sane in a war or distract you, and he thought he’d found the balance point. He had something to look forward to, to live for, even if he had no idea what would happen to the army when they won the war.
“We have to get Fi sorted out, At’ika”
“Get him a date, you mean?”
“Hasn’t Laseema got a friend or something? I hate seeing him like this.”
“Maybe Agent…”
Darman waited, distracted by his datapad, but Atin didn’t finish. “Agent what?”
Atin was staring at the traffic again, lips slightly parted. “Don’t look out the window. Just turn away slowly.”
“Okay …” Darman shifted position. He was starting to hate plainclothes ops; he longed for his helmet sensors yet again. “What is it?”
Atin’s lips barely moved. Darman strained to hear him over the noise in the tapcaf. “I thought I was looking at my own reflection for a second until I remembered I’m in disguise … and I have scars.”
It took Darman a moment to work it out.
Atin had seen another clone, up close. He’d have recognized Fi, Niner, or A’den, and there weren’t supposed to be any other troops here-except A-30, Sull.
“Sure it’s not a Null?”
“Only ones I haven’t met are Jaing and Kom’rk, and they’re still after Grievous.”
“Says Kal…”
“Whatever. That’s not one of them. He was a meter from me. He’s moving away now.”
Darman held his position for a little longer. Atin put his food down and made for the doors, Darman following. It wasn’t what they’d come to Eyat to do, but an ARC who’d gone AWOL was-impossible. Jango Fett had raised and trained them personally, with an emphasis on absolute loyalty to the Republic. Sergeant Kal said that Jango was an unhinged shabuir, but he always stuck to his contract, and that contract had included creating a loyal, totally reliable army.
Darman had heard rumors to the contrary, and the Nulls were living crazy proof that a clone soldier could be as eccentric and wayward as any random human, but nothing had ever been confirmed.
“See him, At’ika?”
A broad back in a black leather coat vanished into a crowd of pedestrians, but a moment later the ARC’s ultrashort black crop bobbed up a little above the heads of the crowd. Atin touched his finger to his ear, activating the miniature comlink nestled deep inside; sensors under his chin and on each side of the thyroid cartilage picked up the nerve impulses from his brain and converted silent subvocalization to audible speech. It took a little practice to think in words and not speak aloud, but Darman now found it was just like talking to himself.
“Miner, change of plan …,” Atin said. “Just eyeballed our MIA.”
Darman picked up Niner’s voice on his earpiece. “I’ve got your coordinates. Need backup?”
“Let’s see where he goes.”
Darman cut in. “Check with Jusik. See if there’s something we haven’t been briefed on.”
“Zey said MIA,” Niner said. “Unless this is a front for another mission.”
A’den’s voice interrupted with that gravelly indignance that marked him out. “If it is, then I don’t know about it, either.” Darman didn’t like the sound of that. There was need-to-know, and there was denying information, and not knowing where other special forces were placed struck Darman as being the latter. And the Nulls always seemed to hear about everything, whether they were intended to or not. “This would be easier on Triple Zero,” Atin said. “He’s an ARC. It wouldn’t be easy anywhere.” Sull, not missing and seemingly at ease in Eyat, swaggered down a tree-lined promenade and dipped down a flight of steps. The two commandos quickened their pace.
It was one thing tailing an ARC trooper. It was another thing entirely working out what to do once you caught up with him.
Rendezvous Point: Mong’tar Cantina and Brasserie, Bogg V, Bogden system, 473 days after Geonosis
“You’re late,” said Mereel.
“We had to pick up groceries.” Ordo straddled the chair and rested his folded arms on the back. “And Vau had to stop off at the bank to get some creds.”
“Next round’s on him, then.” Mereel lounged in the seat, legs stretched out in front of him. It was a noisy, seedy cantina of the type that Mereel seemed to enjoy. A droid and a young human male were at the table, too, concentrating on their datapads. Nobody blinked at the presence of Mandalorians in a place like this, but the two strangers were in a world of their own anyway. “So Old Psycho’s okay now? Where is he? Where’s Kal’buir?”