Star Wars - X-Wing 02 - Wedge's Gamble

by Michael A. Stackpole

  Isard waved Loor into her office. As he had on each previous visit to it, he marveled at the sheer emptiness of the cavernous room. Whereas other Imperial officers and bureaucrats managed to cram their cramped offices with treasures from countless worlds, Isard reveled in the greatest luxury of all on crowded Imperial Center— uncluttered space. The external transparisteel wall gave her a view of the world she ruled as the sun set on it and the red strip edging the room's blue carpet appeared to be just an extension of the red sunset.

  "You wished to see me, Madam Director?"

  Isard hit a button on a remote and shields slowly de­scended to eclipse the sun. She let the office fall com­pletely dark before slowly bringing the lights up. "I did indeed wish to see you. General Derricote now wants Sullustans for his experiments?"

  "He does. They were his second choice. He would have preferred Wookiees, but I explained to him the fool­ishness of killing off a valuable labor source."

  "Did you think to explain to him the foolishness of choosing Sullustans?"

  Loor nodded. "I did, but he countered that since SoroSuub had chosen to back the Rebellion, punishing them is hardly out of the question. I suggested he should use Ewoks as a substitute, but he actually has some sound scientific reasons for wanting to work with Sullustans. The Quarren are an outlink to some of the more aquatic species, Gamorreans to another set of creatures, and the

  Sullustans, he says, will be a bridge race to Shistavanen, Bothan, and similar species."

  Isard frowned. "I would prefer avoiding the slaughter of Sullustans—like Wookiees they are useful. However, if their sacrifice will give me dead Bothans, the advantage outweighs the immediate disadvantage. Perhaps we should quarantine a breeding stock of Sullustans so they can repopulate their world."

  Her reasoning seemed logical to him, which surprised Kirtan Loor. On one hand she was plotting a way to slaughter millions of creatures in a most horrible way, yet on the other she was concerned with having enough of one species left alive to repopulate devastated worlds. While he had no love for Sullustans, and did see them as being inferior to humanity, he did think of them as some­thing more than grain that could be poisoned and fed to rats, with some pristine kernels held back as seed stock.

  Was there a time I would have seen this as insanity? That question lurked in his brain and he was surprised that he did not have a clear answer to it. Does it truly matter? These are extraordinary times, and they call for extraordinary action.

  "Your precaution, Madam Director, is wise, but I wonder if it will be needed."

  "You are approaching a subject obliquely, Agent Loor. Please be more direct." She clasped her hands at the small of her back. "You see a problem with Derricote's Krytos virus?"

  "I do. It can be cured by bacta."

  "I know."

  "You do?"

  "Yes, of course." Isard smiled slightly. "That a cure can be affected by the use of bacta was one of my original design parameters for the virus."

  Loor's jaw dropped. "But I thought your goal was to kill the aliens here on Imperial Center so that when the Rebels came here they would be horrified."

  "Oh, I expect that, but in a way you never imagined. The problem with your scenario is that it will not cripple

  the Rebellion." Her eyes sharpened. "Warlord Zsinj, Darth Vader, and even the Emperor failed to see that a single strike at the Rebellion will not destroy it. The Re­bellion is a fire. You have to extinguish each and every hot spot, or you have to deny it fuel, so it cannot burn any longer. They settled on the former method, whereas I will use the latter."

  "I am not certain I follow you." "This is not a surprise." She held a hand up. "What do the Rebels do when one of their comrades is killed?" "Bury him, burn him, whatever." "And if one of their comrades is wounded}" "Get him help." The simplicity of the question and the speed with which the answer came to him undercut its importance. He thought for a moment, then added, "Res­cuing the man, getting him medical help, rehabilitating him, and getting him back into combat all require more resources than a memorial service."

  "There is hope for you, Agent Loor." Isard's smile grew, as did the lump of ice in Loor's stomach. "The Re­bellion has done a great deal with severely restricted re­sources, both in terms of materiel and personnel. If a trained warrior cannot be saved by medical intervention, the Rebellion has lost him and all the hours spent training him. While there are always more bodies willing to be sacrificed to tear down the Empire, training them is a strain.

  "Another question for you: What will the Rebels do when they find people beginning to be sick with the Krytos virus."

  Loor frowned. "They will heal them, if they can." "Which means they will require unbelievably vast amounts of bacta. Just stabilizing a Krytos victim in the disease's incubation period—before the virus has begun to reproduce out of control—will result in the loss of a full liter of bacta. That doesn't seem like much, of course, since a bacta tank holds considerably more than that, but the losses will become significant as the disease spreads. Total production on Thyferra last year was seventeen bil-

  lion liters. The amount needed to treat all the victims here on Imperial Center will require three quarters of last year's production. At the current prices for bacta, saving everyone they can will bankrupt the Rebellion."

  "With no fuel they cannot burn." Loor stared down at the floor, then shook himself. "When Derricote gets the virus perfected, you'll turn the planet over to the Rebels."

  "Exactly. And because the virus will not infect hu­mans, I force the human Rebels to act to save as many aliens as they can. If they do not, because they are unaf­fected it will appear to their alien allies that they are just as unconcerned about aliens as they accuse us Imperials of being. Moreover, because elements of Rogue Squadron are here on Imperial Center now, we can begin to weave together lies that will implicate them in spreading the vi­rus."

  "No one would believe that of them."

  "No one would believe they would free vicious crim­inals from Kessel and send them to Imperial Center, but they did." Isard slowly rubbed her hands together. "While that morsel will be a lie, it is a lie that the Bothans will use as a pry bar to work more power into their hands. Those aliens we do not kill or drive away into a self-imposed quarantine will see the wisdom of repudiating their alliance with treacherous humans. The Rebellion will tear itself apart from within."

  Loor gave himself a few moments and let all she had said sort itself out in his brain. "Am I to assume, then, that you do not want the members of Rogue Squadron we have identified swept up?"

  "No, I want them to scout out the world and decide on one or another plan of attack to take this world away from us. As long as they are seeing what we want them to see, and our agent keeps us apprised of their timetable, they are useful to us. We cannot allow them to act before we have sufficiently infected the alien population of the world. If they strike prematurely, they will never take the world and our efforts to gather them here and present to them the Krytos crisis will fail."

  Isard closed her eyes for a moment, then nodded. "You will send out the appropriate code phrases to alert our agent that you desire a meeting, face-to-face."

  "Isn't that risky?"

  "I think it is vital. Arrange for it this evening—you will go yourself."

  "But . . ."

  Ysanne Isard's light laughter came laden with sharp barbs. "You are afraid of Corran Horn finding you, yes?"

  Loor knew denying the truth in her question was foolish. "He would kill me if he had the opportunity to do so."

  "But the chances of your running into him here, on Imperial Center, are what, one in trillions?"

  "Corran Horn has an annoying facility for beating those kinds of odds and showing up where he is least wanted." Loor's frown deepened into a scowl, but not be­cause he resented the fear he had of Corran Horn. That fear was well founded and useful, just as the fear of a rancor might keep someone away from its lair. If Corran had the opportunity to kill him, he
would take it and likely succeed.

  What bothered Loor more than that eventuality was Ysanne Isard's willingness to put him in jeopardy by sending him out to meet the traitor in Rogue Squadron. So far information generated by the spy had only been used actively once. That use had resulted in the death of Bror Jace, but things had been arranged so that every­thing appeared coincidental. That could have been enough to leave Corran without suspicion, but if it was not, then Loor's sojourn could lead to a confrontation and his death.

  To her I am expendable—an opinion I do not share. While she can take chances with me, I cannot afford to take chances myself. Fortunately I am not entirely with­out resources of my own here on Imperial Center. I will have to take precautions myself. I must prevent Corran from having a confrontation he devoutly desires and one I heartily wish to avoid.

  Isard studied him with no mercy in her eyes. "Horn is not what should concern you—assuring our spy of our support is. Without timely and reliable reports, things could collapse and that would not please me."

  "Yes, Madam Director."

  "Oh, and order the collection of some Sullustans. Keep General Derricote happy." She hesitated for a mo­ment, then smiled. "Or, at least, keep him productive. The Empire is a house afire and he is the means to smoth­ering the blaze. When his work is done, the Rebellion will have ceased to be a problem. Then and only then will we be able to begin to restore the galaxy to the way it should be."

  21

  Though Mirax's appearance surprised Wedge and had him a bit off balance, Iella took it immediately in stride. She looped an arm through Mirax's and smiled sweetly. "We have some catching up to do, so you boys just fol­low along and don't you dare try to overhear us." Though her smile remained in place, and she kept a light tone in her voice, Wedge read tension and wariness in her eyes.

  "As you wish, ladies." He sketched a short bow, then followed them to the lifts. They descended in one cage, then headed out onto the rain-slicked promenade. Iella and Mirax chatted and laughed as their path meandered around, entering buildings, stopping at vistas, and going from point to point of interest while always descending. Wedge could tell, from the way they traveled, that Iella made some choices at random, but others with a purpose. With the frequent stops and passes through clothing bou­tiques that made him feel uncomfortable, Iella made it very difficult for anyone following them to go unnoticed.

  Wedge realized that being forced to wait amid racks of women's clothing samples made him uneasy because of more than his gender making him feel utterly out of place there. For the past seven plus years he had been at war. While there had been relaxing times and he'd been given leaves, he'd never slipped out of his identity of being a pi­lot. Without family to visit—his parents were dead, and because of his connection to the Rebellion, visiting any other relatives would put them in jeopardy—he'd taken time off but not time away. Wandering through the by­ways of Coruscant was as close as he had come to what others might see as normal life since his parents were killed.

  He smiled. Even the time he had put in as a touring hero for the Rebellion had been far from normal. He found himself whisked around from planet to planet, banquet to banquet, wearing a dress uniform he didn't even know the Rebellion had. At receptions and parties and dinners he found himself congratulated for his part in the Rebellion by creatures he never knew existed before. Gifts had been bestowed upon him, honors given him, and opportunities provided him to do things he'd never had the courage to even dream about as a child.

  He watched as Iella and Mirax played with a garment-fabricator holo-unit, lengthening and shortening, trimming and coloring dresses they'd never order. They laughed and were having fun. Just the way normal folks do when enjoying a normal life.

  The word "normal" stuck in his brain for a moment and he realized that "normal" was a goal for most folks that had no definition. When Rogue Squadron's chief tech, Zraii, ran diagnostics on Wedge's X-wing, normal was defined by a series of benchmark readings established in Alliance specifications and Incom performance manu­als. There was a way to determine if the fighter was per­forming normally or not. And if it was deficient in some way or other, that defect could be corrected.

  Normal in terms of life, on the other hand, was not so easy to determine. For Mirax, hauling contraband be­tween worlds was normal, yet to someone like Iella or Corran, that was grossly abnormal behavior. For his par­ents normal life had been owning a fueling depot and

  raising a family. That version of normal, or some minor variation of it, seemed to fit most folks' view of what life should be.

  But does that mean that anything else is not normal? For him, living the life of a pilot fighting against the Em­pire seemed normal. Moreover, it seemed to be a life that was based on reality. The Empire, weakened though it was, cast a pall over the entire galaxy and until it was eliminated, the home, job, and family sort of normal would always be in jeopardy. A hint of wrongdoing could shatter the cocoon of normalcy most people tried to spin around themselves and disrupt their lives forever.

  Wedge and Pash trailed silently in the women's wake as they moved on. Iella seemed to move a little more de­liberately, and as they emerged from a stairwell onto a promenade that hung out over an urban canyon with a river of shadow filling it, a repulsorlift cab came to a stop. The doors opened and Iella motioned them all into it. Wedge didn't recognize the driver, but that somehow made him feel better about the situation than not.

  Without instructions from Iella, the driver took the vehicle away from the building and down. The route he flew seemed as twisted and circuitous as the one Iella had employed, but the journey ended quickly. The driver dropped them on another walkway, but this one was sev­eral kilometers down and away from where they'd been picked up, leaving them submerged in the thick shadows of the undercity.

  Iella led them along to an alley, then down it and into a building. Three floors up she opened a door and led them into a sparingly furnished room. Its most impressive features were the two large picture windows that domi­nated the far walls. They provided a rather panoramic view of the intersection that the apartment overlooked, or underlooked, depending upon one's perspective.

  Iella closed the door, then nodded toward the two couches that faced each other in the center of the room. "Please be seated."

  Mirax sat with her back to one of the windows and

  let a slight smile play across her lips. "Which do you want first? The story of why I'm here on Coruscant, or how I managed to find you?"

  Iella shrugged easily. "Which one will convince me you're not an Imp?"

  Wedge frowned. "Mirax is clean. I've known her all my life. She's no Imp."

  "Convince me."

  Wedge started to say something, but Mirax cleared her voice. "I can handle this, Wedge, honest." She smiled. "I appreciate the caution, especially here. I'll start with the museum and work back only as far as needed, that way you won't know more than you need to."

  Iella nodded. "Coruscant is a world that has billions of people on it. The chances of your being in the right place to spot someone you know are astronomical. Even luck or believing in the Force doesn't begin to cover those odds."

  "Quite true, but I had a house edge on the wager." Mirax jerked a thumb toward Wedge and Pash. "They're snubfighter jockeys. Sooner or later they'd have to go to the Galactic Museum and check the display that talked about Endor. It's ego and these pilots can breathe vacuum easier than they let slip a chance to see what lies the en­emy is telling about them. Corellian pilots are notorious egotists, so staking out the museum seemed natural."

  Wedge arched an eyebrow at Mirax. "You think I'm egotistical?"

  "Wedge, I love you like a brother, so it hurts me to say this, but you're so egotistical you think you can keep your ego under control. Most of the time you do, which is your only saving grace. And the times you don't, well, I've not been on the receiving end of a display, but I imag­ine there are some Imps who would regret that experi­ence, if they were alive to t
hink about it."

  Despite the slight sting of her words, Wedge knew there was more truth in them than he really wanted to ac­knowledge. In the second run at Borleias he'd let himself be outraged at the tactics the Imps thought would stop

  him from completing his mission. That was quite the dis­play of ego and they paid a dear price for letting me in­dulge myself.

  He turned toward Iella. "Well, at least you can tell she knows me."

  "From that explanation I can tell she knows Corellian pilots. I had a partner who was a hot hand with an X-wing. If he ever joins the Rebellion, he'll give you a run for your credits." Iella looped a lock of brown hair back behind her right ear. "Since you didn't run Com­mander Antilles in to Coruscant, you didn't know he was here. That means you brought more pilots in and were figuring they'd visit the museum. Probably more from Rogue Squadron."

  Mirax inclined her head to the left. "You certainly could conclude that scenario is accurate."

  "Oh, I'm sure it is." Iella sat down on the arm of the couch opposite Mirax. "Your presence means your exit identity was blown, which means the rest of the pilots could have been compromised somehow."

  Mirax looked up at Wedge. "Are you and I the only folks from Corellia who don't sound like we were trained in deductive reasoning by CorSec?"

  Iella patted Mirax on the knee. "I was trained in de­ductive reasoning by CorSec."

  "So you were part of CorSec?"

  "Yes, why?"

  Mirax sighed and held her hand out. "I'm Mirax Terrik."

  Iella's hand stopped short of sliding into Mirax's grip. "You're Booster Terrik's daughter?"

  Mirax's hand dropped back to her lap. "I bet you liked it better when you thought I was an Imp agent."

  "You'd lose the bet." Iella kept her hand held out. "I'd just joined the force when Hal Horn put your father away. Booster was smart enough that I can believe his daughter was sharp enough to stake out the museum. And he was lucky enough that I can believe you suc­ceeded in your long shot. I'm Iella Wessiri."