“If anyone finds out that I'm expecting a child, I'll be thrown out of the Jedi Order and I won't be able to serve. I have to carry on. I can't let the men down.”
Skirata was furious. She felt it. She could see it, too. And if she thought that was bad, it would be nothing compared with how the Jedi Council would react. She'd be kicked out of the Order. She'd no longer be a general, no longer able to play her part in the war.
But you knew that.
You should have thought that through.
The reality felt very different. And yet she didn't regret it one bit, and that was why she hadn't thought about the Jedi Council's reaction. It was right. The Force had guided her to this point.
“And how are you planning to disguise this fact?” Skirata asked, still cold calm. “It's going to be pretty visible.”
“I can go into a healing trance and accelerate the pregnancy. I can bear this child in five months.” She put her hand on her belly. “It's a boy.”
That was probably the worst thing she could have told Skirata. Etain should have known Mandalorians better by now. The father–son bond was paramount. Every scrap of warmth that he had ever shown her had evaporated: and it devastated her. She had grown to love him as a father, too.
And a good Mando father put his son first.
“In this great plan of yours, then, this plan to give my lad a future, what did you think his son might become? A Jedi?”
“No. Just a man. A man with a normal life.”
“No, ad'ika.” Skirata's hands were thrust in his pockets now. She could see the rise and fall of his chest as his breathing labored with suppressed rage. A little black vortex in the Force opened up around him. “No, Darman's son will be Mandalorian, or he has no son at all. Don't you understand? Unless the kid has his culture and what makes him Mandalorian, he … he has no soul. That's why I had to teach them all, all my boys, what it was to be Mando. Without it they're dead men.”
“I know how important it is.”
“No, I don't think you do. We're nomadic. We have no country. All we have to hold us together is what we are, what we do, and without that we're … dar'manda. I don't know how to explain it … we have no soul, no afterlife, no identity. We're eternally dead.”
Etain repeated dar'manda to herself. “That's how he got his name, isn't it?”
“Yes.”
It began to dawn on her why Skirata and Vau were both so obsessed with teaching their trainees about their heritage. They weren't just giving them a cultural identity: they were literally saving their lives, their very souls. “He'll be a Force-user. That will make him—”
“Are you insane? Do you know what that makes him worth to creatures like the Kaminoans? Do you know how very interested people will be in his genetic material? He's in danger, you di'kut!”
The value of her son's unique genetic heritage had never crossed Etain's mind. She was appalled. She struggled to cope with the hazards that sprang up around her as if from nowhere. “But how can Dar raise him?”
“You didn't ask that question when you started all this? Do you really love him?”
“Yes! Yes, you know I do. Kal, if I don't have his child and he dies—”
“When he dies. He's designed to die young. I'll outlive him. And you're built to live a long time.”
“You said it yourself—just one broad generation of men. Then there's nothing of the clones left eventually, nothing to show they ever lived and served and died. They all deserve better than that.”
“But again, Darman isn't given any choice,” Kal said. “No choice about fighting. No choice about being a father.”
He lapsed into silence, walking to the far side of the balcony and leaning on it, just as he had when she'd seen him agonize over whether he had been a monster, a man who turned small boys into soldiers and sent them to fight the aritedise's war.
Etain waited. There was no point arguing with him. He was right: she took choice out of Darman's hands just as every Jedi general did.
“Kal,” she said.
He didn't turn.
She put a cautious hand on his back. She felt him tense. “Kal, what do you want me to do to make this right? Don't you want at least one of your men to leave something behind him, someone who'll remember him?”
“You can only remember what you know.”
“I'll keep the child safe—”
“You've got a name for him, haven't you? I know it. You know you're expecting a boy so you'll have thought of a name. Mothers do that.”
“Yes. I—”
“Then I don't want to hear it. If you want my help, I have conditions.”
She knew that. She should have known. Skirata took his paternal role obsessively, and he was a hard man, a mercenary, a man whose whole instinct had been honed to fight and survive since he was a small boy.
“I need your help, Kal'buir”
“Don't call me that.”
“I'm sorry.”
“You want my help? Then here are my terms. Darman is told he has a son when it's safe for him to know, not when it suits you. And if that isn't when the kid's born, then I name the boy as a Mando'ad. Fathers name their sons, so if Dar can do that, then I'll make sure that he does.”
“So I don't have any choice.”
“You could skip town to any one of a thousand planets if you wanted to.”
“And you'd find me.”
“Oh yes. I find people. It's my job.”
“And you'd tell the Jedi Order. You hate me.”
“No, I actually like you, ad'ika. I just despise Jedi. You Force-users never question your right to shape the galaxy. And ordinary people never realize they have the chance to.”
“I think … I think it would be very fitting for Darman's son to know his heritage.”
“He'll do more than that. If Darman can't raise him as a Mando, then I will. I've had plenty of practice. Plenty.”
Etain was helpless. Her only choice was to run—and she knew that wasn't fair to anyone, least of all to the baby. It would have confirmed to her that all she wanted was a child, something to cling to and love and be loved by in return, regardless of how she got it.
This had to be for Darman. His son could not grow up an ordinary man. And Etain had no idea how to raise a Mando son. Skirata did. If she refused, she knew exactly how far he would go to get his way.
“How will you cope with a Force-using child?” she asked.
“The same way I raised six lads who were so disturbed and damaged by being placed in live-fire battle simulations as toddlers that they never stood a chance of being normal. With a lot of love and patience.”
“You actually want to do this, don't you?”
“Yes, I do. More than anything. It's my absolute duty as a Mando'ad”
So that was his price. “I can disguise the pregnancy—”
“No, you're going to have a nice quiet few months under deep cover on Qiilura, with one of Jinart's people to keep an eye on you. And just watch me make that happen. Then you return with the child, and I raise it here. A grandson. Given my family history, nobody will turn a hair.”
“What will you call him?”
“If Darman is in a position to know when the child's born, it'll be his choice. Until then, I'll keep my ideas to myself.”
“So you agree Darman shouldn't know yet.”
“If I tell him, or you do, then how is he going to go off to war again and keep his mind on his own safety? He ships out again in a few days. So will you. This isn't like telling a regular lad that he's made a girl pregnant, and that can be bad enough. He's a clone with no rights and no real idea of the real world, and he's made his Jedi general pregnant. Do I have to draw you a picture?”
Etain had never truly enraged anyone. The Jedi who had raised her and trained her all her life had been far beyond that emotion. They allowed themselves a little impatience or irritation, but never anger. And on Qiilura, when she had the responsibility for four commandos thrust upon her for
the first time in a desperate, dangerous mission, Jinart's anger at her inexperience had been well short of rage.
But Skirata was now drowning in it. She could feel his blind anger and how he was holding it in check. She could see the ashen tone of his face, drained of blood. She could hear the strain in his voice.
“Kal, you of all people should know how much it matters. Your own sons disowned you for putting your clone soldiers before them. You must know what it feels like to risk hatred and contempt to do the right thing for those you love. And why you'd do the same again.”
“If you had been Laseema telling me she was carrying Atin's child, things would have been very different,” he hissed.
There was a movement behind them.
“Kal'buir?”
Etain turned. Ordo stood in the doorway. She hadn't felt him approaching; compared with the disturbance Kal was generating in the Force, he was invisible.
“It's okay, son.” Skirata looked embarrassed and beckoned him across. He managed to feign a smile. “So Captain Maze got his own back, then?”
Ordo, attuned to Skirata's reactions, looked at Etain suspiciously. He felt like the strut in the Force right then, except there was no joyful sense of a wild infant at play, just ferocity. “Honor has been satisfied, as they say. I wondered if you wanted to join us for a drink. Besany is anxious to see you again.”
“Ah, us sounds as if you two are getting on very well.” Skirata smiled, and it was real: Besany Wennen was not, of course, a jetii, a Jedi. She was acceptable. “I'd love to, Ord'ika. Etain and I were just finishing our chat anyway.”
Skirata left as if nothing had happened. Etain leaned on the rail, forehead on her crossed arms, and felt almost completely crushed. But Skirata was right in everything he had said: and he would honor his promise to help her. The price was inevitable. She would pay it.
She focused on the joy that surrounded her son in the Force. However hard things became, that was one thing nobody could take from her—not even Kal'buir.
25
Of course I've planned a way out. I've been a mercenary since I was seven years old. You always plan for what happens when the current war is over. It's called an exit strategy, and mine's been in the planning a long, long time.
–Kal Skirata to Jailer Obrim, discussing the future in an uncertain galaxy
Coruscant Security Force Staff and Social Club, 0015 hours, 389 days after Geonosis
“Well, that was fun,” Jailer Obrim said, heaving himself onto a bar stool. The club was almost deserted now. “They don't drink much, your boys, do they?”
“They make up for it with eating.” Skirata was working out how he would deal with the current crisis. Jinart the Gurlanin had disappeared in that way that only shapeshifting Gurlanins could. She didn't have a comlink, and he wouldn't run into her eating a fried breakfast at the Kragget. He had to find another way of summoning her. “Enormous appetites. It's the accelerated aging that boosts their metabolisms.”
Obrim scratched his cheek, looking embarrassed. “I know, friend. I've not been through what you've been through with them, but anyone in our game will understand just how you feel.”
“Yeah.” But Darman has a son now. I'm angry that Etain let that happen without even asking him, but he has a son. Even if I never get hold of that Kaminoan aiwha-bait Ko Sai, he does have some kind of future now. “I'm sorry if I take it out on you sometimes.”
“Don't you ever worry about that.”
“Thanks.”
“What would you do if you could run the galaxy now, Kal? I mean anything.”
Skirata didn't even pause to think. “I'd stop the war right now,” he said. “Then I'd go back to Kamino and grab those gray freaks by their rotten skinny necks and make them engineer a normal life span for every single last one of our boys. Then I'd take the whole army home to Mandalore and spend the rest of my life making sure they had wives and families, and a purpose that was theirs, not some aruetii's private feud.”
“I thought you might say that,” Obrim said. “I ought to be getting home now. Last few days have been a bit rough on my wife. Y'know, never at home. Why don't you come around for dinner sometime?”
“I'd like that.”
“Can I drop you off?”
“I'm waiting for Ordo. He's talking to Besany.”
“I noticed.” Obrim just smiled. “He's a smart boy.”
Skirata was left contemplating a future that had seemed no more tangled than it ever had just a few hours ago, but was now totally upended. He stood up and threw his knife into the carvings around the bar a few times and thought about his bank account on Aargau, and the fact that Mereel was very close to finding Ko Sai. Skirata felt he was now in striking distance of making a better life for a handful of cloned soldiers—a tiny number out of so many, but that was all he could do. That had to be enough.
And he had an even sharper focus now. Darman had a son, and he would see that Darman was around to watch the boy grow up.
“Sorry I kept you, Kal'buir.” Ordo strode into the bar and attempted a smile, but winced at his split lip. “We can go now.”
“Everything working out with Besany?”
“Yes.”
“Just yes?”
“Ummm … I think it is.”
“Good.” He resisted the urge to interfere. “I have a question for you. I need to get hold of Jinart. How would I do that?”
“Easy. She's a spy. She monitors the GAR troop movements to and from Qiilura. I can put a message in the logistics system that will get her attention. Something subtle. Give me a time and place, and leave the rest to me.”
Skirata had to smile. Almost everything was easy for Ordo. “Back to the barracks then.”
“I have a question for you, too, Kal'buir.”
“Okay.”
“Is it true what Etain said? Did your sons disown you because you stayed on Kamino with us?”
Ordo wasn't stupid and he wasn't deaf. Skirata's family shame was the one thing he never wanted any of them to know about, and not only because it might make them feel guilty. He didn't want them to fear he might abandon them with equal ease.
“It's true, Ord'ika.”
“Why would you even think of paying such a terrible price for us?”
“Because you needed me. And I never regretted it for a second. My relationship with my … former family was as good as dead before you were even thought of. Don't you ever give it a second thought, because I'd do it again in a heartbeat. No question.”
“But I wish we had known.”
Do I have the right to keep another secret, then? “I'm sorry.”
“So apart from Darman's unborn son, is there anything else you keep from us?”
He'd heard him arguing with Etain, then. Skirata felt the most agonizing shame he had ever experienced in his life. His whole existence now rested on the absolute trust between him and his clone family. He couldn't bear to lose that.
“So you know what I'm going to ask of Jinart, then. I heard the news when you did, Ord'ika. And no, there is nothing else. I swore I would never lie to you, and I never have.” Skirata pointed to Ordo's matched blasters. “If I ever do, I'd rather you used those on me. Because being there for you was the only decent thing I ever did in my life. Understand?”
Ordo just stared at him. Skirata put both hands up on his shoulders and stood there in silence.
“Okay, son, tell me what I should do about Darman, and I'll do it.”
Ordo still had that look of blank appraisal, the expression he adopted when dismantling a new and fascinating puzzle. “I don't think the time is right. We have to do what's best for our brothers.”
It was the pragmatic thing to do. Skirata fastened his jacket and checked that his knife was in place, his ritual for leaving any building and walking out into the unknown night.
“Agreed, Ord'ika. Now all I need to do is have a little chat with General Zey.”
Arca Company Barracks, Special Forces HQ, Coruscant,
395 days after Geonosis
It was an op order—an operational order—like many others they had been given. Niner glanced at the datapad and shrugged.
“Well, that'll be interesting,” he said. “Never worked with the Galactic Marines before.”
Skirata sat on the table in the briefing room, swinging his legs. Delta Squad had left that morning to prepare the battlefield—a nice military understatement for going ahead of the main assault and sabotaging strategic targets—on Skuumaa. Omega had drawn the slightly longer straw and had a similar task to carry out for the Marines.
“Everyone okay?” The question was directed at Darman as much as anybody. “Any questions?”
“No, Sarge.” Fi sounded a little subdued. Atin actually seemed more cheerful than Fi did, which was an interesting reversal of attitudes. “It'll be nice to see Commander Gett again.”
“Gett wants you embarked in Fearless by oh-seven hundred tomorrow. So if there's anything you want to do, do it today.” Skirata reached in his jacket pocket, took out four high denomination credit chips, and passed them around. “Go on. You know your way around the interesting bits of Coruscant now. It'll be a few months before you're back here.”
“Thanks, Sarge.” Atin stood up to leave. “You'll still be here when we get back today?”
“I always see you off, don't I?”
“Yeah, Sarge. You do.”
Fi took his chip and pressed it back into Skirata's hand. “Thanks. I've got to do some calibration on my HUD. I'll stick around the barracks today.”
“He's gone all sober,” Niner said. “Don't know what's come over him.”
“I'm an unsung hero,” said Fi. “I've got my public image to protect.”
The Omega boys, like all squads, were well attuned to one anther's sensitivities. They knew Skirata was hanging around to talk to Darman on his own. Niner shoved Atin and Fi toward the doors. “See you later, Sarge.”
There was no question of Darman joining them for a last day out in town. They knew where he'd want to spend his time. Skirata waited for the briefing room doors to close and slid off the table to stand in front of Darman's seat.
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