Leia started to speak but then looked back down at her hands in her lap, forcing her emotions more deeply inside herself. When she looked up Mothma was simply waiting, a gentle smile on her face.
“Go on, Leia,” she said.
“Before I got the call to come here, my convoy lost a blockade runner—the Ranolfo—to an Imperial patrol,” Leia said. “And the Remembrance was damaged during the fighting, taking casualties.”
Mothma said nothing.
“That convoy was assembled to protect me,” Leia said. “Because I’m one of the leaders of the Alliance. Because I’m a symbol. And it’s not the first time people have paid with their lives to protect me. I accept that—I accept it and I understand it. The least I can do, in return for that sacrifice, is dedicate myself fully to the Rebellion. Particularly now, given what we face.”
Mothma said nothing. She simply waited with her hands folded. It was a diplomat’s tactic, used when the people on the other side of the table were in the worse bargaining position, when talking would just dig them deeper into a hole.
But Leia was a diplomat, too. So she did what the people on the other side of the table didn’t do enough: she stopped talking.
Mothma surrendered first, which made Leia feel both slightly satisfied and a bit guilty.
“Do you blame yourself for what happened to Alderaan?” Mothma asked quietly.
Leia looked at her in shock.
“How can you ask me that?” she managed.
“I wasn’t aware there were things we couldn’t ask each other,” Mothma said, then leaned forward. “Let me tell you a bit of intel I decided not to include in today’s briefing. Once the new Death Star is complete, the Emperor plans military operations to eliminate all opposition to his rule. Massive invasion fleets—larger than any seen in centuries—will advance on Mon Cala and Chandrila. Their mission will be to destroy all resistance, blockade both planets, and then wait for the Death Star to arrive. The destruction of both worlds, the Emperor feels, will provide an excellent object lesson for anyone who might oppose him.”
Leia felt numb. It would be Alderaan all over again—except planets would die whenever the Emperor commanded it.
Now it was Mothma who needed a moment to get control of her emotions.
“For decades, many on Chandrila have begged me to stop opposing the Empire—because of the danger to my homeworld,” she said. “If what Palpatine desires comes to pass—if his new Death Star is built and his invasion fleets fly—will Chandrila’s fate be because of my actions?”
“Of course not,” Leia said.
“I wish it were that simple,” Mothma said. “It will be because of me—but only because the Emperor is willing to destroy an entire planet for the opinions of one person. Which is monstrous. Monstrous and evil. And if we accept that—if we let ourselves be ruled by such twisted logic—we may as well surrender.”
Mothma smiled, but her eyes were full of pain.
“At least that’s what I tell myself during the day,” she said. “But in the middle of the night? That’s harder.”
Leia started to say something, then stopped. How many times had she left her bunk to study intel because she feared sleep would bring another nightmare about Alderaan?
“You make the Alliance proud every day,” Mothma said. “By representing our cause—and by doing your duty. But duty won’t give you comfort, Leia—and you need that. We all do. The comfort of friends—and of love. You were Bail and Breha’s greatest joy, Leia—the love you shared was what sustained them through the dark years. Don’t deny yourself another chance at love because of what the Empire did to them. Don’t give Palpatine that victory, too.”
“I haven’t,” Leia said. “And I won’t.”
“I hope that’s true,” Mothma said. “Because it’s the kind of battle you can lose without knowing it.”
She got smoothly to her feet.
“Operation Yellow Moon is approved,” she said, in the tone Leia had worked so hard to imitate as a girl. “You’re to tell me anything you need.”
“Thank you,” Leia said. “I promise I will.”
“And you’re to come back safe and sound,” Mothma said, in a far quieter voice. “Losing you would be unbearable to me—to me and many others.”
That’s something I can’t promise, Leia thought.
THE ALLIANCE MEETING broke up the next morning, with rebel officers slipping into Zastiga’s many docking bays in twos or threes to leave the planet. Luke had to catch his own shuttle back to the Redemption but accompanied Leia to the Mellcrawler first. C-3PO and R2-D2 followed them, the protocol droid’s baleful tales of slavers and pirates prowling Zastiga accompanied by derisive honks from Artoo.
In the docking bay several boxy power droids were ignoring Nien Nunb’s orders, grumbling to themselves in their electronic language.
“Hey, we were supposed to be in space half an hour ago!” Nien yelled, hands on his hips in mock indignation. “I charge by the minute, you know—and there’s no discount for royal titles!”
Leia waved that away and turned to Luke.
“I’ll be back soon,” she said. “Take care of yourself.”
“You too,” he said. “Be careful. And may the Force be with you.”
“I’ll take all the help I can get,” Leia said, putting her arms around him. They stayed like that for a moment, taking comfort in each other, then parted. R2-D2 whistled mournfully.
“Speak for yourself,” Threepio said. “I welcome the chance to avoid some ghastly peril for once.”
Artoo hooted something rude.
“What a ridiculous sentiment. ‘Adventures’ is just a different name for ‘terrible ideas.’”
Leia shook her head and hoisted her duffel bag onto her shoulder, leaving Luke and the droids behind.
“In fact, I charge nobility twice my usual rate, you know!” Nien yelled.
Leia was the last member of the crew to board the Mellcrawler—the others were waiting in the cramped lounge. She dropped her bag in the cabin she was sharing with Kidi—she’d refused Nien’s repeated offers of his own single cabin—then emerged to find the rest of the crew waiting silently, their eyes on her.
“What I’m about to tell you is highly classified,” she said. “Our mission has two objectives. I’ll be meeting with local resistance leaders on three planets we’re visiting. And we’ll be recruiting ships to join us in a system we’ve given the code name Yellow Moon.”
Kidi, the Cerean communications operator, nodded eagerly. She was thin and pale, with multiple pairs of headphones wrapped around her tall, conical head and datapads strapped to her spindly arms and legs. The datapads were blinking as data constantly flowed into them.
It pained Leia not to tell them that the rendezvous was a deception, but she’d spent the morning reminding herself that it was necessary. That way, if any of them were captured, Operation Yellow Moon would still fool the Empire, keeping its focus far from the fleet gathering at Sullust.
“In each of the three systems we visit, we’ll set up a beacon designed to repeat a coded message,” she said. “It will tell the starship captains we recruit the location of Yellow Moon and when to rendezvous with the ships we’re committing to this operation.”
Antrot, the tinkerer, looked up from checking the beacon in his lap. He was a member of the Abednedo species, with a knobby ridge atop his small black eyes. One of those eyes was magnified by a powered monocle.
If Leia felt bad about the story she was telling her crew, she felt worse about what could happen to any starship captains who responded to the beacon. Because there would be no rebel rendezvous—no fleet awaiting them. At best, there would be nothing but empty space, leaving the captains perplexed. And at worst? Imperial Star Destroyers and TIE fighters might be waiting to disable or destroy them.
She swallowed at the thought, hating it, then steeled herself to go on.
As General Cracken said, we’re at war, she told herself. I hope we don’t have
to sacrifice any lives. But if we can save trillions of people elsewhere in the galaxy, isn’t that an acceptable price to pay?
“While we’re in port, maintain operational security,” she said. “Be careful who you talk to and what you say. There’s no reason for the Empire to think we’re anything but a private craft. But the Emperor has fleets, intelligence agents, and bounty hunters searching the galaxy for any sign of rebel activities. And Nien, Lokmarcha, and I are all wanted by the Empire.”
Lokmarcha, the Dressellian commando, sat stock-still on the end of the acceleration couch, his wrinkled face expressionless, one hand lovingly tracing his blaster rifle.
“It’s good to be wanted,” Nien said in Sullustese, grinning. Kidi twisted a dial on her headphones, activating her translator unit, and asked him to repeat that. When he did, she nodded and smiled, then told Antrot. But the tinkerer just looked puzzled.
Leia wondered what they’d think if they knew Cracken’s agents planned to seed various communications networks with rumors about their mission. It was strange to begin a mission by voluntarily endangering its secrecy, but it was necessary. Operation Yellow Moon would fail if the Empire captured them, but it would also fail if they did their jobs too well, attracting no Imperial attention.
“Any questions, come to me,” Leia said. “All right then, at ease.”
“One moment,” Lokmarcha said, getting to his feet and standing beside her.
“I’m trained to spot threats and to terminate them,” he said gruffly, his voice low and gravelly. “That means look to me and listen to what I say. It’ll keep you alive. Got it? In a potential combat situation, I’m in charge.”
“What’s a potential combat—” Kidi began to ask, but Leia held up her hand.
“One moment, Major,” she said. “I’m grateful to have you on this mission, but someone has given you incorrect information. I’m in charge—at all times and in all situations. No exceptions. Is that clear?”
The others nodded, but Lokmarcha was staring at her in shock. She held his yellow eyes with her own until he looked away, taking a sudden interest in cleaning a part of his gun that he’d just cleaned.
“It’s clear,” he said, hesitating a moment, “Princess.”
“Good,” she said, ignoring the emphasis he’d put on her title and turning to Nien. “And now, time to leave Zastiga behind. Let’s see what the Mellcrawler can do, shall we?”
LEIA DIDN’T HEAR the argument begin—she was in her cabin reviewing intel about their first stop, the planet Basteel. By the time she reached the Mellcrawler’s lounge, a red-faced Kidi was staring up at Lokmarcha, fists clenched. The Dressellian commando had his arms crossed and was grinning at the communications specialist.
“What’s happening here?” Leia demanded, glancing over at Antrot where he sat at the Mellcrawler’s tech station, fiddling with a beacon’s innards.
“Some kind of dispute,” Antrot said. “I didn’t hear any statements whose veracity I could assess, so I have been trying to ignore it.”
“He’s a monster!” Kidi said, her voice quavering, but Lokmarcha just grinned and shrugged.
“What happened?” Leia asked. “Kidi, you first.”
“We were just talking. About how we wound up signing on with the Alliance. And this monster said—”
“Stop there,” Leia said. “We’re not referring to other members of this crew that way, no matter what they’ve said. Now try again, Kidi.”
“I’m sorry, Princess. You’re right. I told him how I’d been a signals analyst in the Imperial Survey Corps, before I deserted, and how I hope my former colleagues will get amnesty after we defeat the Empire. How the best way to have peace is to offer forgiveness. And he called me a, a—”
“I called her a naive conehead who’d been given one heart too many and one brain too few,” Lokmarcha said. “I think that was it, anyway. I told her when we defeat the Empire we’ll have mass trials—with most of her old colleagues going to prison or facing a firing squad.”
His wrinkled face hardened and his eyes grew cold and reptilian. “Or at least that’s what would happen if I were in charge.”
“That’s barbaric!” Kidi yelped, lapsing into silence when Leia held up a finger.
“So the two of you are arguing about how the Alliance should deal with Imperial war criminals,” she said. “After we depose the Emperor, and defeat the Imperial starfleet and the Stormtrooper Corps, and dismantle the bureaucracy, and find and neutralize every moff, admiral, and general who refuses to disarm and keeps up the fight. Do I have that right? That’s what you’re arguing about?”
“Their argument didn’t include a discussion of reconstruction efforts,” Antrot objected.
“Do I have that approximately right?” Leia asked.
“Approximately is not a useful term,” Antrot complained.
Kidi nodded, and Lokmarcha shrugged.
“I tell you what,” Leia said. “When all those things have been accomplished, you two can argue about what to do next all you like. But since at the moment we’re sharing space aboard one very small space yacht and hoping we reach Corva sector without being intercepted by about a thousand Imperial patrols, let’s stick to the task at hand. Is that understood?”
Lokmarcha shrugged, but an embarrassed Kidi nodded repeatedly.
“I’m sorry, Princess,” she said. “I never should have—”
“No need to apologize,” Leia said. “Major, I have some intel I need to review with you in private. I’d appreciate it if we could do that right now.”
She headed out of the lounge without looking to see if Lokmarcha was following her and was relieved to hear the sound of his boots a moment later. She waited for him to enter the cabin she shared with Kidi, then shut the door.
“I don’t know what General Madine taught you as a commando, but I’m pretty sure what I just saw isn’t the best way to build unit morale,” she said instantly, hoping to keep Lokmarcha off guard.
The Dressellian just shrugged, a gesture that was beginning to irritate Leia.
“Kidi’s a naive bleeding heart, Princess,” he said. “Which means she’ll freeze up when the shooting starts. Which means she’ll die. I’m trying to toughen her up so that doesn’t happen. After all, we’re at war.”
“We are,” Leia said. “But Kidi can’t do her job if she’s constantly angry at another member of the team. So go easy, Major—that’s an order. Can you follow that order? Or shall I ask Nien to divert to the nearest planet and put you on a commercial liner back to Zastiga?”
“No need for that, Princess,” Lokmarcha said coolly. “Though I’d welcome it. My unit has a new Death Star to crack, back at Endor.”
Leia looked at him in shock.
“What did you say?”
The Dressellian grinned.
“We’d already had our first briefing before Madine reassigned me,” he said. “So I know the real mission. We’re a decoy, a diversion. You’re wise not to let the others in on it—neither Kidi nor that scrap collector would last an hour under Imperial interrogation. Well done, Princess.”
“You listen to me, Major,” Leia said. “Not a word of this to anyone, under any circumstances. Or I’ll have you before a court martial inside of a nanosecond.”
That time Lokmarcha didn’t shrug but just stared down at Leia.
“Back in the early days, before the Rebellion formally existed, a lot of guerrillas got their hands dirty doing things no one else wanted to do—or even think about,” he said. “The Alliance would never have existed without them, Princess. Those men and women were my mentors—I’ve spent my entire career trying to live up to their example.”
“Is there a reason for this history lesson, Major?”
“It’s so you understand I’ll take the secret to my grave,” Lokmarcha said. “One thing you’ll learn about me, Princess—I always do my duty.”
“WELCOME TO BASTEEL,” Nien said. “Never thought I’d be back on this rock.”
&nb
sp; Leia leaned forward in the copilot’s seat. The planet below the Mellcrawler was small and gray. A scattering of ships—a motley collection of short-range freighters and boxy transports—were in orbit.
“Not exactly the garden spot of the Corva sector,” she said.
“Corva doesn’t have a garden spot,” Lokmarcha grunted from the seat behind her, “just a bunch of compost heaps.”
“Kidi, scan all rebel message frequencies to see if anyone’s trying to contact us,” Leia said. “And keep your ears open for Imperial traffic. The Empire garrisoned Basteel a few years ago in response to rumors of a resistance movement, but from what we’ve heard, it’s a token presence. The thing to worry about is the TIE patrols. With any luck we’ll be in and out before we have any trouble with them.”
“Scanning now, Princess,” Kidi said enthusiastically, her fingers a blur as they tapped at various datapads. Leia wondered how she kept track of what information she had on which device.
“Eladro City is the biggest settlement on the planet,” Nien said as the Mellcrawler began to shimmy and bounce through the turbulent outer layers of Basteel’s atmosphere. “Which isn’t to say that it’s big.”
He took his hands off the controls and brought up a holographic representation of the planet, then zoomed in on the dot indicating Eladro City. The Mellcrawler lurched to port and Nien absentmindedly lifted his knee, bumping the control yoke to turn the little yacht back to starboard.
“Basteel’s almost entirely mountain ranges—there’s almost no flat ground and little vegetation,” Nien said, tapping at the display as the Mellcrawler began to rattle and shake. “Eladro City’s subterranean—a warren of tunnels carved out of the rock over the centuries.”
“No flat ground? Where do we land?” Kidi asked, and Leia saw her fingers were white where they gripped her harness.
“Inside the mountains,” Nien said, bumping the Mellcrawler’s controls again with his knee. “See this canyon—”
“Put your hands back on the controls!” Kidi said, unable to stand it any longer. “You can show me later!”
Moving Target: A Princess Leia Adventure Page 4