Triple Zero

by Karen Traviss

  “Spit it out.”

  “Delta does rapid neutralization. Omega does the more considered stuff. Why not split our tasking that way?”

  For once, rock-solid Niner took the bait. “Yeah, you blow up everything without checking and we think first. I certainly agree with your analysis, ner vod.”

  “And we have the unbroken track record of successful missions.”

  “Like we don’t.”

  “You said it.”

  Skirata wasn’t quite fast enough crossing the room and Niner had slammed Boss hard against the wall without a moment’s warning. If Skirata hadn’t yelled “Check!” Niner would have smashed his drawn-back fist into Boss’s face. The two men stood almost nose-to-nose, locked in a frozen standoff.

  “This stops right now,” Skirata barked. “You hear me? Stand down!”

  He’d never seen Niner react like that. Soldiers got into scraps all the time; it was an inevitable part of being encouraged to fight. Sometimes they took a swing at each other, but it was rarely serious, no more than a bit of bravado. But not his boys—and certainly not Niner.

  There was a switch in all men somewhere, no matter how deeply buried, that could be thrown.

  “You have never lost brothers.” Niner took one grudging step back from Boss. “Never. You have no idea.”

  “Ever wondered why?” said Boss.

  “Enough.” Skirata put an arm between them. “Next one to open his mouth gets a thump from me, okay?”

  This was the brief moment where the fight would erupt or vanish, and Skirata was secretly uncertain if he had what it took to separate two bigger, younger, fitter men. But Niner muttered, “Yes, Sarge,” and sat down in a chair on the far side of the room, face white with anger. Boss paused, then followed him to hold out a placatory hand.

  “Apologies, ner vod.”

  Niner just looked up at him, unblinking. Then he took Boss’s hand and shook it, but his mind was clearly elsewhere, and Skirata knew exactly where. Some things didn’t go away with time. Niner had lost another Sev, plus DD and O-Four, at Geonosis; and during training he’d lost Two-Eight. Republic Commandos never forgot the brothers they grew up with in that tight pod from the time they were decanted.

  But Delta still had their pod intact. The world was different for them. They thought they were invincible; death only happened to others.

  “I think we need to take a step back,” Skirata said, bleeding for Niner. He’d thought the squad was as close as a true pod, but they still nursed their loss. “Delta, you break off and get a meal downstairs and report back at nineteen-hundred. Omega, you break when they get back. Maybe we’ll all feel better on a full stomach.”

  There was no point turning this into a contest between the squads. But mixing them hadn’t helped that much. Skirata watched Delta troop out toward the turbolift. It was going to take more than food to distract them, although it usually did the trick.

  “Are we all okay?”

  Atin looked up from a datapad he was cannibalizing. Dismantling things seemed to keep him happy. “We’re okay, Sarge. Sorry. I just don’t feel happy calling you Kal. Except in public, of course.”

  “That’s okay, son.”

  Skirata made a point of sitting down where he could see Darman and make a discreet assessment. There was something about the way he was turned slightly toward Etain in his seat, and she made a lot more eye contact with him than she had earlier. Skirata wondered why he hadn’t spotted it earlier, and also when it had happened.

  If he was right…

  It was bad for discipline to let an officer and an enlisted man have a relationship. But Etain wasn’t an officer, and Darman had never chosen to enlist. The risk lay more in how Darman would handle it, and how left behind his brothers might feel now that they were out in a world where everyone who wasn’t wearing armor was free to love.

  Skirata stood up and limped across to Etain. “Come and explain some Jedi stuff to me,” he said quietly. “I’d ask Bard’ika, but he’s still in disgrace at the moment.” He winked at Jusik to indicate he was joking: the kid took his ribbing far too seriously sometimes. “Outside.”

  It wasn’t subtle, but Darman obviously didn’t think anyone else had noticed what was going on between them. He probably thought Skirata wanted to discuss the unsavory side of interrogation with her.

  Skirata sat down next to Etain on the rickety bench against the landing platform wall. It was late afternoon and the air smelled of hot speeder drives and the powdery sweet scent of a solitary mayla vine that had taken root in a crack in the permacrete. Etain folded her hands in the lap of her pale blue tunic. Without the dull brown robes she didn’t look like a Jedi at all.

  “You and Darman,” Skirata said carefully.

  She closed her eyes for a second. “He told you, then. I suppose he tells you everything.”

  “Not a word. But I’m not stupid.” It was amazing how easily people told you things when you didn’t even ask a question. Perhaps she actually wanted people to know. But it seemed Darman didn’t, and he had a right to keep what little privacy he had. “I heard the squad’s comments after Qiilura.”

  “Are you telling me to stop?”

  “No, I’m asking where this is heading.”

  “Are you going to tell him to stop?”

  “Not if you make him happy.” Skirata trod carefully, but he knew where he drew the line and whose interests he would put first, war or not. “See, I know that much about Jedi. You can’t love.”

  “We’re not supposed to. But we sometimes do. I do.”

  “You’re serious about him, then.”

  “I never stopped thinking about him after Qiilura.”

  “Have you really worked this out?”

  “That I’ll outlive him? Women outlive their men all the time. That I might be thrown out of the Jedi Order? As prices go, that’s worth paying.”

  “Etain, he’s more vulnerable than you think. He’s a grown man and he’s a killing machine, but he’s a kid, too. Crying over girlfriends can be dangerously distracting for him and the whole squad.”

  “I know that.”

  “I’d hate to see him used. If you’re going to carry on with this, you’d better mean it.” He paused to make sure she understood what he was saying. “You know I’ll protect him come what may, don’t you?”

  Etain’s lips parted slightly and her cheeks looked suddenly pink. Her gaze flickered slightly. “I want him to be happy, Kal. I’d never use him.”

  “I’m glad we agree,” he said.

  Threatening a Jedi general was probably a court-martial offense. Skirata didn’t care. Darman and his last remaining sons came before everything, before the needs of a likable young Jedi, before even his own life—and certainly before the interests of the Republic’s politics.

  It was a matter of honor, and love.

  But Etain would give Darman a little comfort and tenderness in his life that would tide him through the dark and inevitable days ahead, days that for him and his brothers were already destined to be limited.

  Skirata would just have to keep an eye on the situation. “Make him happy, then, ad’ika,” he said. “Just make him happy.”

  Qibbu’s Hut, 2100

  The sign above the ’freshers read PATRONS PLEASE OBSERVE THE NO WEAPONS RULE. But although it was written in five languages as well as Basic, most of the patrons appeared not to understand it.

  Ordo slipped among the motley assortment of drinkers and gamblers, now diluted considerably by a sea of dark red GAR fatigues, and hoped none of the species here were scent-followers. That was the trouble with some explosives. They had a distinctive smell. He’d scrubbed himself as thoroughly as he could and changed into the ubiquitous red fatigues as well.

  Laseema, the Twi’lek female who had fled from the kitchens when he found her cowering behind a table, smiled nervously at him across the bar. By the time he reached it, she had his favorite muja juice waiting for him without the prompt of his distinctive armor.
/>
  “How do you know I’m me?” he said, puzzled. “I could be any clone.”

  “The way you hold yourself.” She had a very soft voice, and he had to strain to hear her in the noisy bar. “You stand as if you’re still wearing that skirt.”

  “Kama,” he said patiently. “Belt-spat. It’s based on a traditional Mandalorian hunting kama. It was designed to protect your legs.” Yes, the pauldron and kama did tend to make him stand more upright out of habit, his back a little arched. He’d have to watch that if he wanted to pass for an ordinary clone trooper. “But it’s just for show now.”

  “Ah,” she said. “It’s certainly very showy.”

  Ordo was getting used to the attention of Twi’lek females, and he rather liked it. “Is Qibbu treating you properly?”

  “Yes. Thank you.” Laseema sounded as if she really was grateful. She leaned forward a little. He was still taken aback by the vivid blue of her skin, but he was willing to get used to it. She had a little scar on the point of her chin that was turquoise and more decorative than disfiguring. “Is your friend a captain?”

  She glanced sideways and Ordo followed her gaze to Omega Squad and Skirata, who were eating something unidentifiable and occasionally lifting a lump of it on a fork to inspect it communally with worried frowns. “The one with the scar. He’s nice.”

  “That’s Atin,” Ordo said, crushed. Oh. “He’s… not a captain. He’s a private.” The vast majority of the army was made up of privates: it wasn’t restricted information. Atin glanced up with that unerring soldier’s sense of knowing when someone was targeting you. He managed a shy smile. “Yes, he’s very reliable.”

  “He’s got a lot of scars. Has he been in many battles?”

  Oh, she really had been studying Atin carefully: apart from the thin diagonal scar across his face, the rest were harder to spot, just a couple on his hands and one telltale line that was visible above the neckline of his red tunic.

  “Yes,” Ordo said. “They’ve all been in quite a few battles.”

  “Poor Atin,” she said, looking smitten. “I’ll bring your meal over in a moment.”

  He forced a smile as Kal’buir had taught him, picked up his glass, and went to join Omega’s table.

  “What d’you reckon this is, Ordo?” Darman said. He held his fork so that Ordo could inspect the object skewered on it.

  “A tube of some sort.”

  “That’s what we were afraid of.”

  “It’s all protein.” Ordo stared at Atin. “Laseema has taken a fancy to you, ner vod.”

  There was no jeering or barracking as Ordo had seen ordinary males do at the mention of females. The squad simply sat in silence for a moment and then resumed their debate on the anatomical content of Qibbu’s dish of the day. Skirata got up and moved along the bench to sit next to him.

  “Successful shopping trip?”

  “I have everything on the list now. Sorry for the delay. And I have a few extras.”

  “How extra?”

  “Surprising extras. Very noisy, too.”

  Laseema glided up to the table and placed a dish in front of Ordo. She smiled at Atin before making her way back to the bar. Ordo picked up his fork to eat, and the squad studied his plate intently.

  “But that’s all vegetables,” Niner said accusingly.

  “Of course it is,” Ordo said. “My intelligence score is at least thirty-five percent higher than yours.”

  It happened to be true. Skirata laughed. Ordo cleared his plate as fast as he could and then indicated the turbolift. Skirata followed him up to their rooms, where Delta Squad sat cleaning their DC-17s.

  “Just dusting,” Fixer said, subtle as a bantha.

  “Dust away,” Skirata said. “They’ll see action soon enough. So, Ordo, what did you get?”

  “A hundred kilos of thermal plastoid plus five thousand detonators.”

  Even Scorch looked up from his dismantled rifle at the mention of that. “That’s a lot of ordnance to make disappear without anyone noticing, let alone store it.”

  “I liberated it in stages from different sources.”

  Skirata tapped him on the arm. “Now explain the extra surprise.”

  “The delay was because I enriched it all—minus a pack or two.”

  “How?”

  “A little chemical refinement that’ll make it unstable if anyone attempts to use it in devices.”

  “How unstable, exactly?” Skirata asked.

  “If they don’t work a stabilizer compound into the plastoid, it’ll blow their workshop into orbit as soon as they attach a det to it.”

  Scorch sniggered appreciatively.

  “Just a precaution,” Ordo said. “If we end up using it for a sting operation and by some chance it goes wrong, then we’ll at least remove a few hut’uune in the process.”

  “And half of Galactic City.” Sev grunted to himself and peered through his scope to calibrate it against the view from the window. “You spook boys overdo it sometimes.”

  Skirata patted Ordo’s arm. “Nice job, son. Now tell me where you’ve stored it.”

  “Half at the safe house and half under Fixer’s bed.”

  Scorch guffawed. Boss smacked his ear but it didn’t stop him from laughing. “I’m sharing Fixer’s room, di’kut.”

  “Well, you won’t even wake up if that blows.”

  Ordo accepted it was a risk, but risks were relative. And Skirata hadn’t expressed interest at his advanced ordnance skills, so he could still keep Mereel’s return as a surprise.

  He was going to be pleased with Mereel’s news on Ko Sai, too.

  “So all we have to do now is work out how we get them to take the bait,” said Skirata. “Maybe Vau is getting somewhere with our GAR colleague.”

  Boss looked up. “You more interested in using the stuff to kill them, track them, or make them think everything’s going fine on the terror front?”

  “I’ll take all three.”

  “Does it usually take this long to get anywhere?”

  Skirata laughed. “Long? Son, it normally takes years to shut down a network. This is lightning speed. It might still take years, and it’s just a fraction of the trouble out there.”

  “Makes you wonder why we bother.”

  “Because we can’t not bother,” Skirata said. “And because it’s for us.” He sat back in the chair in the corner and put his boots up on the low table, shutting his eyes and folding his arms on his chest. “Vau’s calling in shortly. If I don’t hear the comlink, somebody wake me up.”

  Ordo had rarely known Skirata to sleep before his men did. And he had seldom seen him use a bed. He always slept in a chair if he had the choice, and while it might have been a mercenary’s need to be ready to wake and fight immediately, Ordo suspected it had a lot to do with that first night on Kamino. His normal life had ceased, and would remain suspended until that elusive normality had been achieved for his troops. He always seemed to be waiting for the Kaminoans to come through the door.

  His breathing changed to the shallow, slow rhythm of a man asleep.

  Scorch started whistling, distracted by his task. Ordo walked up behind him and clamped his hand hard over his mouth. Quiet. Quiet for Kal’buir.

  Scorch took the hint.

  Ordo waited, memorizing Mereel’s download from his datapad with a single glance at each screen.

  Then Skirata’s wrist comlink chirped. He opened his eyes and lifted his hand nearer his mouth.

  “Walon…”

  “Try Jaller,” a weary voice said.

  Skirata sat bolt upright. Delta Squad froze.

  “Where are you?” said Skirata.

  “Sweeping up a pile of dead guys with colleagues from the Organized Crime Unit.”

  “Sorry?”

  “I think your boys just kicked off a gang war. Can I borrow a Jedi, please?”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Ten members of a criminal gang have been killed in what’s thought to be a gang feud in the lowe
r levels. Sources close to Coruscant Security Force suggest the crimelords’ battle broke out in a row over gun-running territories.

  —HNE late bulletin

  Forensics Unit morgue,

  CSF Divisional HQ, Quadrant A-89,

  2345 hours, 380 days after Geonosis

  “There’s your lizard,” Obrim said, pulling back the sheet. “Paxaz Izhiq.”

  Fi and Skirata looked at the elegant green-scaled face, or at least the half that was still intact. Blasterfire was cleaner than ballistic damage but it still did nothing for your looks.

  “Not very attractive to the ladies now, is he?” said Fi.

  The morgue was cool and quiet. Fi had never seen one before and he was both fascinated and disturbed, not because it was full of dead things but because he now wondered what would happen to his own body.

  Left on a battlefield. Does it matter? Mandalorians don’t care about remains. We have our soul. My brothers can retrieve some of my armor, and that’ll be enough.

  The pale green room with its polished durasteel doors also had an antiseptic smell that reminded him of Kamino. He wasn’t comfortable here.

  “You okay?” Obrim said.

  “Just interested.” Fi stared. “Yes, that’s him. You can match him with the images Sev grabbed, too. Is he important?”

  “Not on our files, but Falleen don’t visit Coruscant to get nice jobs in the clerical service. Best guess is Black Sun or an offshoot.”

  “So,” Skirata said. “Purely hypothetically, if we picked up a woman friend of his who had access to GAR weapons shipments…”

  “Purely hypothetically, because you don’t exist… imagine she’s diverting a few weapons for his business, but you snatch her and so he refuses to complete the deal because he thinks you’re the customer trying to intimidate him.” Fi listened, riveted. Obrim’s mental gymnastics were hard to follow. “But the real customer thinks the Falleen just made an excuse to run out on their agreement. So they come after you, thinking you’re his foot soldiers. And you waste them. So their buddies come back to settle a few scores with young Scale-Face’s colleagues.” Obrim took one final look at the Falleen’s face and covered it up again. “And if they were all waiting on a shipment of explosives anyway—the one you intercepted—then you have a very jumpy assortment of bad guys around town.”