Star Wars - The New Jedi Order - Force Heretic I - Remnant - Book 17

by Sean Williams

  Unfortunately, the answer to that question still eluded him.

  "Well," Pellaeon went on, "we've been attacked now. No one could've missed that. But does that mean we're relevant?" He shook his head. "No. It means that Supreme Overlord Shimrra took a moment to stamp out a potential threat lingering around his rear lines. A p6ten-tial threat, mind you, not an actual threat. The force he sent wasn't sufficient to disable us, even with surprise on its side, but it was nothing compared to the resources he committed to Coruscant. B'shith Vorrik, furthermore, is no Tsavong Lah or Nas Choka. Had we really mattered to the overall war, Shimrra would have wiped us out years ago, not tried now as an afterthought.

  "But we refused to roll over and be destroyed, even when we were grievously injured. We insulted the enemy as he retreated, and we liberated some of those taken captive. We showed them that we are not easy prey, and that we will not be so easily dismissed.

  "If Shimrra didn't consider the Empire a threat before, he will now. How long he considers us a threat, however, is entirely up to us."

  "And why is that?" Moff Flennic asked, obviously unable to contain his disapproval of being lectured at any longer. Jacen could feel the resentment radiating from the man.

  "Isn't that obvious, Kurlen?" Ephin Sarreti said from across the table. The Moff, recently released from a medical barge evacuated from Bastion, sported one arm in a sling and a dour expression. "If we sit here expecting to defend our territories indefinitely, we'll all be dead within months."

  Pellaeon nodded. "And giving Vorrik time to petition another strike force from Shimrrafresher, larger, and certainly more eager for our bloodwould be suicide. We remain a threat only so long as we remain alive."

  Flennic inclined his head slightly. "I can't help but feel apprehensive about the alternative you're about to propose."

  "It's the only alternative that I can see," Pellaeon said softly, regarding each of the Moffs around the table before continuing. "We must take the fight to the Yuuzhan Vong."

  A murmur of unrest immediately rippled around the room, but it was Moff Flennic again whose voice was heard. "You would have us leave our worlds behind?" he asked disbelievingly. "Undefended?"

  "Not entirely," the Grand Admiral said. "Every planet would retain a token defense forceat least enough to repel the sort of attack Yaga Minor suffered."

  "But not enough to repel a serious invasion," came a woman's voice from the far end of the table.

  Jacen recognized the woman as Moff Crowal from Valc VII, a system on the very edge of the Unknown Regions.

  "If the Yuuzhan Vong are kept busy elsewhere, there won't be one," Sarreti pointed out.

  "Can we be absolutely certain of that, though?" Flennic countered hotly. He faced Pellaeon. "Admiral, you are gambling with our very lives here!"

  "Isn't that what all leaders must do in times of war?" he returned. "I'm offering you a chance of victory as opposed to the certainty of our destruction. Mark my words if we do nothing, we will be destroyed."

  "If, as you say, we can't beat the Yuuzhan Vong here," Moff Crowal said, "then how do you propose we beat them on their own territory?"

  Pellaeon nodded. "A fair question," he said. "And one that has occupied my mind these last couple of days."

  "Go on then," Flennic said. "Give us your answer."

  "There is only one possible answer." The ageing Grand Admiral took a moment to look around hima staged moment of reflection, Jacen knew, but effective. The man was clearly a veteran of these types of meetings, and could employ all manner of body language to strengthen his argument. "In order to survive intact, the Empire needs to see itself objectively; it needs to cultivate a certain distance from its immediate past and see itself in the context of the wider galaxy and its history. We are not alone here, as much as we might sometimes like to pretend we are. We cannot avoid what is happening outside, as the Yuuzhan Vong have so convincingly demonstrated. For too long have we kept to ourselves; for too long have we ignored what is going on out there in the wider galaxy. We have remained content to direct our attention inward, at our own navels.

  "I do not exclude myself from this criticism, either," he went on. "There have been times I could have fought harder to do what my gut told me was right. That I didn't will be my undying shame, because it was almost our undoing. But I will not let it happen again."

  "You will not?" Moff Flennic mocked. "Grand Admiral, I trust we are coming to some sort of point here. If you have gathered us together to dictate your terms, then please get on with it so that we can vote on your dismissal and put this behind us forever."

  Pellaeon smiled, and held the smile a moment longer than was comfortable. There was something in the silence around the table and the way the Moffs glanced at one another that told Jacen that Pellaeon had taken the gloves off. Now was the moment to deliver the message

  he'd gathered them all to hear. Mara must have felt it too, for he heard her take in a deep breath in anticipation and hold it.

  "As Grand Admiral of the Imperial Navy," Pellaeon said, "I am formally advising the Moff Council that at our earliest possible convenience we must strike a formal agreement with the Galactic Federation of Free Alliances to share military resources in order to repel the threat of the Yuuzhan Vong from the galaxy." He had to raise his voice to be heard above the hubbub that immediately filled the room. "Furthermore, I advise that this agreement be ongoing after the immediate threat has passed. The only way to survive in the future is to turn our back on the past. As much as some of you may dislike to hear it, it is time for us to make peace with one another."

  Flennic was the first to his feet. "Join the Galactic Alliance? Have you gone mad? You can't believe that any of us would ever agree to this!"

  "I don't need your agreement, Kurlen." Pellaeon spoke softly, but his voice carried over the howls of dissent. "When I say that I am advising the council, I am only following a formality. This is the way it will be, because this is the way it has to be. I am simply saving you the need to think it through for yourselves." "This is treason!" another Moff gasped. "It's common sense," Ephin Sarreti countered. The Grand Admiral nodded his thanks to Sarreti for the support the Moff was giving him. "My loyalty to the Empire is as strong as it has ever been," he said. "I will do what I must to ensure its survival."

  "By forcing us to submit to them?" A fin ger stabbed at where the robed Jedi stood off to one side. "We have spent our lives fighting this scum, and now you wish us to"

  "Be mindful of your words, Moff Freyborn," Pellaeon interjected firmly. "These 'scum,' as you call them, saved my life back at Bastionas well as saving the Empire from an early grave."

  "A grave they dug for us in the first place," Flennic snarled. "At our peak we would never have fallen to the Yuuzhan Vong as they have. We would have sent them back from whence they cameimpaled upon their own amphistaffs!"

  "Do you really believe that, Kurlen? We weren't able to resist a handful of Rebels, so how would we have resisted the massed might of the Yuuzhan Vong?" Pel-laeon's stare was cold and hard. Clearly visible behind the Grand Admiral's bluff, mustachioed appearance was the man who had faced down far worse threats than a hostile Moff Council. "Your reasoning is both faulty and circularand it is precisely the kind of reasoning that has brought us to these straits. The Empire is foundering not from forces exterior to it, but as a result of its own internal weaknesses. Our current circumstances are our own fault; it is foolish to lay blame elsewhere for our own failings."

  "The Empire will never surrender to the Galactic Alliance, Admiral," Flennic said firmly. "And I cannot believe you would ever consider this after all your years resisting their insidious advance!"

  Instead of responding angrily, Pellaeon just chuckled. "Like it or not, they have ruled the galaxy for almost as many decades as we didand with less bloodshed and military expenditure, I might add. Right now, they are the one thing that stands between us and enslavement and death at the hands of the Yuuzhan Vong, and it is time we acknowledged that. And
we need to do it now before we bury ourselves beneath old grudges and an inability to accept reality."

  "I refuse to accept defeat," Flennic said, still on his feet and regarding Pellaeon with undisguised contempt. "And I don't regard that inability as a disability, either. The Empire is strong; we proved thatyou proved thatby repelling the invasion. Why, on a day when we should be celebrating our victory, are we contemplating the end of the Empire?"

  "First," Pellaeon said, "allying ourselves with the Galactic Alliance isn't the same thing as dissolving the Empire. That should be obvious even to a child, Kurlen. They're not asking us to surrender our sovereignty; nor will we. We will simply combine forces to our mutual benefit. Second, as I said earlier, the Empire exists today only because of luck luck that the Yuuzhan Vong didn't attack sooner, and luck that the emissaries from the Galactic Alliance came along when they did to show us how to fight effectively. Third, if we don't fight back now, the Yuuzhan Vong will return and strike us down without any mercy whatsoever. If we don't drive them back and join with our neighbors to keep them back, then no one will ever be safe again. And this Empire we hold so precious will completely cease to be. If you can't accept that argument, Kurlen, then you'll have to learn to accept your irrelevance to the council instead." Flennic's eyes narrowed. "Are you threatening me?" Pellaeon's response was almost shocking in its blunt-ness. "Yes, Kurlen, I am," he said. Then, eyeing each of the Moffs present, he added, "The council will unanimously accept my proposal, or I will take the entire fleet with me when I leave."

  The shock of his pronouncement provoked gasps of astonishment and dismay among those who had, perhaps, thought that Pellaeon could be talked around, or at least placated with a slightly softer alternative. No one had seriously considered that their Grand Admiral might gamble the Empire itself over something so outrageous as allying themselves with their old enemies.

  Jacen felt a spike of animosity from Moff Flennic in the Force at the same time he saw the blaster come out of the fat man's robes. In an instant, everyone's attention in the room had gone from Pellaeon to the weapon aimed at him.

  "This is treason of the worst kind, Admiral," Flennic said steadily.

  Jacen was about to use the Force to whisk the blaster from Flennic's hand, when he felt Luke's hand touch his arm.

  Pellaeon faced the blaster as calmly as he had faced Flennic's criticism. A dozen stormtroopers stationed at the exits rushed forward with their blasters raised to shoot Flennic down, but Pellaeon waved them back.

  "How strong are your convictions, Kurlen?" he asked. "Are you prepared to die for them?"

  "You can't threaten us, Admiral!" The Moffs voice was even and calm, but Jacen noted that the blaster in his hand had begun to waver. "We are the Council of Moffs; we appointed you. We can always appoint another Grand Admiral to take your placeone who won't lead us down such a treacherous path!"

  "Another warlord choking on remembered glories, you mean? There aren't many left, Kurlen. Our numbers have dwindled in futile attempts to reclaim something that was taken from us long ago. The galaxy isn't ours by right; we have lost it. The sooner we accept that, the sooner we can begin to understand what role exists for us now. And if that new role is to be part of the Galactic Alliance, then so be it. It has to be better than extinction. I for one am sick of fighting a war we can never win and against the wrong enemy, what's more."

  For the first time, Pellaeon's reserve slipped. Jacen saw real passion warring below the surface, like the molten core spinning under the crust of a civilized planet. And it wasn't lost on Flennic, either.

  "This is madness," the Moff said, appealing now to the rest of the council. "Are you all just going to stand by and let him destroy everything we've managed to salvage?" "It's better than being dead, Kurlen," Sarreti said. 'Or enslaved," Moff Crowal added. Flennic winced as though he'd been mortally wounded. "You, Crowal?" he said. "You believe this nonsense?"

  "It's not nonsense, Kurlen," she said. "I argued against joining the Galactic Alliance when the enemy wasn't on our doorstep, thinking that if we didn't provoke the Yuuzhan Vong, they would leave us alone. But that proved to be a mistake."

  "No." Flennic's gaze swept the faces before him, assessing the expressions and weighing up what support remained with him. Pellaeon watched patiently as he came to the only possible conclusion. "No ..."

  The Moff's certainty faltered, and the blaster dropped. He seemed on the verge of capitulating when a dangerous look came to his eyes and his fingers around the blaster's grip tightened. "No!" he cried. "I will not submit!" The blaster came back up.

  He's going to do it, Jacen realized. He's going to shoot Pellaeon!

  Ignoring the pressure of Luke's hand on his arm, he gathered the Force around him in order to actbut he was too late. The blaster cracked at the same time as he felt the flex of someone else's invisible will, and he saw the gun fly out of Flennic's hand and clatter across the floor. The blaster's bolt discharged harmlessly over Pellaeon's shoulder. The Grand Admiral hadn't even flinched.

  Two stormtroopers were at Flennic's side in an instant, each taking an arm as they arrested him. He struggled in vain against them, staring wildly at the Jedi standing beside Pellaeon.

  "You!" he yelled. "You and your vile mind tricks have poisoned us!"

  "Nonsense," Mara said, stepping forward. "We use our powers to save lives, not waste themunlike you, Moff Flennic."

  The dark tone to her voice made it clear who had saved Pellaeon.

  "You are not the only one here who served under Pal-patine," she continued. "I have changed, and so has the Grand Admiral. And I suspect that you must have, too, for our former master would never have tolerated such idiocy in one of his servants. What were you thinking? That Yaga Minor would become capital now that Bastion has fallen? That you would lead the council? Don't be a fool, Flennic."

  Flennic's glare at Mara was cold and piercing, but Jacen could tell by the way he relaxed in the grip of the guards that her words were getting through.

  "Stand down, Kurlen," Pellaeon said quietly. "Stand down now and abide by the will of the council, and I swear that no action will be taken for what has happened here today."

  Flennic's face twisted as he gathered his injured pride and anger and swallowed them both. Jacen suspected that it wouldn't have tasted good at all, and would have burned going down.

  The Moff looked from Pellaeon to Mara, then back again. "Very well," he said quietly. "I give my support to your proposal of allying ourselves with the Galactic Alliance. But I stand by my opinion, Admiral."

  "As it is yours to stand by," Pellaeon said, nodding sagely. Then he took a few steps toward Flennic, fixing the corpulent Moff of Yaga Minor with a steely gaze. "But hear this, Kurlen you have pulled a weapon on me this day, an act of treason that under normal circumstances would be punishable by death. But these are not normal circumstances, and so I am prepared to overlook your insurrection. However, from this moment on you would be wise to be mindful of your actions. Because if you so much as breathe in a manner that I think is treacherous, then I will have your head. Is that understood?"

  Moff Flennic swallowed thickly, but didn't speak. He could only nod mutely.

  With a glance from the Grand Admiral, the storm-troopers released their grip on the Moff. Then Pellaeon returned to his place at the head of the table without another word.

  Mara crossed the room and collected the discarded blaster, then stepped over to Moff Flennic and handed him the weapon. He accepted it with some surprise, his brow creased in puzzlement.

  "Personally, Kurlen," she said, "I prefer my allies to be armed."

  With that she faced the Grand Admiral.

  "If it's all the same to you, Admiral, I think we should take our leave now," she said. "I imagine there is still much that needs t o be discussed here, and given the general feeling toward us in this room, it might be easier for you to do this without us here."

  The Grand Admiral acknowledged Mara with a curt bow. "Thank you," he sai
d. Then, with a glance to the other Jedi standing there, added, "for everything."

  One by one the Jedi filed from the roomLuke, Mara Saba, Tekli, and Jacenleaving the Grand Admiral alone with the Moffs to go over the details of his plans. As the rest of the party continued to move down the corridor, Jacen paused outside to look back briefly into the room. Already the discussion was becoming heated again, with those gathered around the table gesticulating wildly as they raised their voices to make their opinions heard on the matter of the Empire's new allies.

  The door hissed shut, muting the ongoing debate. Jacen turned to catch up with the others, only to find Mara still standing there waiting for him.

  "You look worried," she said.

  He swallowed a sound that might have been a laugh, but could just as easily have been an exclamation of annoyance. "Try as Ior Giladmight," he said, "I find it hard to believe that anyone in that room will ever really regard us as allies. Despite everything we did for them, they still hold us in such mistrust."

  "Not all of them." She shrugged. "We've made a lot of progress today"

  "I know, I know, and we'll probably end up with some kind of shallow alliance in place before long. But ..." He gesticulated vaguely in lieu of actually finding words for what he wanted to say. "Is that enough?"

  "Maybe," Mara said. "And maybe you're right. Maybe it won't come to anything more than pretty words from an ugly mouth. But when it comes to the fight against the Yuuzhan Vong, I'll happily take a shallow alliance over none at all."

  "True." He offered a half smile in the face of his aunt's optimism.