[Republic Commando] - 03(69)

“Mind the actuator housing, vod’ika.” Ordo laid the metal plate on the deck. “I need to check on Kal’buir. Something’s going on.”

“Call me if you need to break them up…”

Vau and Skirata were sitting facing each other on the square of sofas, and they were both talking on their corn-links. They also appeared to be listening to each other in a bizarre jigsaw of a four-way conversation.

“You’re a good lad, Bard’ika, and I appreciate the risk you’re taking.”

“What do you mean, no med droid?”

“So where are they now?”

“Levet should have cleaned them out by now. They’re only farmers.”

“Shot at? Who knew they were even there?”

“Kal’s going to have another meltdown.”

Skirata paused and stared hard at Vau. “Bard’ika, can you hold on for a moment?” Vau held out his hand and they swapped comlinks. “So, Jinart, what exactly am I going to be angry about?”

Skirata listened, head down, and then shut his eyes. Ordo glanced at Vau, who shook his head. “Delta,” he mouthed and gestured with Skirata’s comlink. “They followed Ko Sai as far as Napdu and then they ran into some competition. No further contact.”

Napdu was one stage behind them in the hunt; events were getting out of hand. Ordo stood by Vau’s seat and tried to fol-low both conversations, which was suddenly much harder now that he knew some of the facts and his brain was trying to fill in too many gaps. His mind wasn’t on Delta’s safety, and he felt guilty about that. Somehow getting hold of Ko Sai seemed much more important. There were millions of lives hanging on her, after all.

“We need to get a move on,” he said. He glanced at his chrono; TK-0 and Gaib had a few more hours to come up with the pilot who transported Ko Sai to Dorumaa, but he needed that information now. If Delta were that close-they were physically closer to Dorumaa than Aay’han was, in fact-then they stood a chance of getting there first, provided they made the connection. “I’m not throwing away this lead.”

The lead would be… a pilot. It was hard to move Kaminoans around and find them accommodation without somebody noticing, even if they didn’t recognize the species.

Skirata seemed to be getting increasingly upset rather than angry. He had one hand shielding his eyes as if to ignore distractions; all that Ordo could hear was occasional grunts and sighs as if Jinart was telling him bad news in extreme detail. Eventually he spoke.

“Okay, I’m sending Ordo … no, don’t let her move a mus-cle, Levet’s perfectly capable of doing the job without her… he’ll probably be happier with her out of the way, in fact. I’ll call in later.”

Skirata handed the comlink back to Vau, who resumed his conversation with Jusik. Mereel wandered up and stood be-side Ordo.

“Where am I going?” Ordo knew perfectly well where he was going, but he didn’t want to go, not with Ko Sai within reach. He wanted to be in at the end of the hunt. “Buir? I heard Jinart, so I assume it’s Qiilura.”

Skirata stood up and gave both Nulls a playful but half-hearted shove in the chest. “Ad’ike,” he said, “I need Etain out of there fast. She’s bleeding where she shouldn’t be, and the farmers have settled in for a fight. They’re having to pick them off one at a time, asking them to surrender very politely each time.”

“No wonder we’re not winning, if that’s how Jedi fight wars,” Mereel said.

“Rules of engagement, son … last resort.”

Ordo had never understood it, either. He could recite any statute or regulation, including all 150 Contingency Orders for the Grand Army-which all clone officers had to know by heart-with all the ease granted by his eidetic memory. But making sense of rules was another matter. Why start a killing war if you were going to slam on the brakes and declare one way of killing someone morally preferable to another?

“They’ll end up killing them all anyway,” Ordo said. He would never disobey his father, and he loved him too much to allow him to be even slightly disappointed, but he had to at least ask. “Kal’buir, are you certain you want me in Qiilura? I can be more use to you finding Ko Sai.”

Father. Yes, he’d always felt like Skirata’s son, but now… he actually was.

“Etain’s used to you, Ord’ika.” Skirata had promised he would never lie to his men, but he’d admitted not telling Ordo everything. Perhaps he wasn’t leveling with him now. “She might get gedin ‘la if Mereel or Vau show up. You know how cranky women are when they’re pregnant.”