The man's face was flushed and indignant, and his
voice shook when he spoke. "Why, in my day, young lady--" he began.
Wookiee, Sirra corrected him, growling in her own language.
"Yes, well, Wookiee then," the man said: "In my day, trainees understood
how to follow instructions.
And they did it politely with a 'Yes, Captain Thorn' or a salute.
No grandstanding."
Sirra reminded Captain Thorn that she was not in the military, nor did
she ever intend to be. Then, with sly deliberation, she pointed out
that she had actually followed every one of his instructions. She had
simply added a bit of . . . embellishment.
"Precisely," Thorn said, "embellishment. I did not tell you to
embellish."
But he hadn't told her not to embellish, Sirra insisted in a mild voice,
wrinkling her black nose.
Lowie, nearly shaking with laughter, chose this moment to heave himself
up onto the landing platform where his sister could see him.
Sirra uttered a yelp of happy surprise and crossed the platform in two
long leaps. She threw herself into her brother's arms, and the two
Wookiees set up a joyous interchange of growls, barks, and chuffing
laughter.
Captain Thorn flushed a deep red all the way up to the scalp that showed
through his thinning hair and stalked off the platform, mumbling
something about needing a pay raise.
Sirra wanted to know why Lowie had come unannounced, when he had
arrived, why his little translating droid had not accompanied him, how
he had gotten to Kashyyyk . . . and whether or not he had heard
anything from Raaba.
Lowie tried to explain without giving away Raaba's secret. Sirra gave a
pleased growl, not noticing how he had evaded her questions.
His timing was perfect, she assured him--though she cast an annoyed look
in the direction of her departed instructor. She hoped that Lowie could
stay a while and watch how well she had learned to fly since she, too,
had completed her rite of passage down in the dangerous underworld.
She had so much to tell him, it might take days.
At early evening, Lowie and Sirca made their way to the amphitheater
just outside the treetop city. · Their parents were already there,
along with half the city's inhabitants.
Sirra complained that they would have more fun staying home and playing
combat-simulation games on their entertainment unit. Why in the sector
would he .want to attend an open city forum in the Great Tree Arena?
Such meetings were always dull and never had any relevance to the
younger members of society.
With a mysteriously cocked brow, Lowie hastened to assure his sister
that she would find this particular meeting very interesting.
Sirca threw him a doubtful glance, but did not argue further.
They chose seating branches high in the amphitheater, where they could
get the best view. The sun sank below the horizon of the sprawling
forest, and the sky grew rich and dark overhead. Lowie had a hard time
distinguishing between the soft rustling of Wooldees finding their seats
and the whisper of leaves in the evening wind.
Sirra grew restless for the meeting to start. Lowie began to worry that
something had gone wrong or that Raaba had changed her mind.
Maybe she had reconsidered her confession, and was ashamed after all to
tell how she had staged her own death.
Then, just as the first few stars brightened in the sky, a shaft of
blazing light stabbed upward from the center of the stage. In the
center of the light stood a chocolate-furred female Wooldee--wearing her
own dazzling belt made of syren fiber. Fresh syren fiber!
Sirca nearly fell backward off her branch in surprise, and Lowie fared
no better. He had known Raaba set up this meeting, but the implications
of her belt were enough to stun him as much as everyone else in the
assembly. Surprised murmurs of recognition spread through the crowd,
and Lowie heard Raaba's name repeated over and over. Sirra glared at
her brother accusingly. He had kept this a secret from her!
Before Lowie could explain why he had kept silent about her friend's
return, Raaba raised her arms to quiet the crowd. In a loud, clear
voice she introduced herself, so that there could be no mistaking who
she was.
Next, the beam of light in which Raaba stood split into a hundred
smaller rays that opened and spread themselves flat on the stage, like
the petals of some gigantic fiery flower with her at its center.
She told everyone how she had been all but dead after attempting her
rite of passage... and how the Diversity Alliance had given her back
her life.
In much the same way, she said, the Empire's enslavement of Wookiees had
taken the life of Kashyyyk. To a great extent, Wookiees still slaved
for humankind, in one way or another. Lowie sat listening uneasily. He
had not known Raaba was going to make this a political speech. Sirra,
though, seemed thoroughly enthralled.
Raaba continued. Aliens of all species had suffered similar treatment
since before the rise of Emperor Palpatine--all at the hands of humans.
And the most shameful part, she said, spreading her arms to the crowd,
was that none of it would have
been possible if the nonhuman peoples hadn't allowed it to happen.
The Diversity Alliance and its visionary leader, Nolaa Tarkona, were
ready to show the way. If Wookiees and Talz and Biths and Twi'leks and
all other species would band together, unified under one leader, they
would never need to fear the domination of humans again.
She urged anyone who was willing to help to send a message to the
Diversity Alliance, to go to Nolaa Tarkona herself on Ryloth, or to talk
their friends into joining the cause as well. · Wookiee murmurs ran
through the crowd again, this time sounds of approval. Raaba's voice
grew no louder, but her words became more persuasive.
Each of the glowing rays around her shattered into a million tiny shards
of light, surrounding her like a swarm of phosfieas.
Individually, Raaba explained, each of them was no more than one of
these tiny specks. Alone, they could do nothing. But together--she
raised her arms high over her head and the phosflea-specks of light
coalesced into a hundred dazzling rays--they could change the galaxy!
The rays snapped together again into a single brilliant beacon that
speared upward toward the stars.
Then the stage went completely dark.
Wookiees on every side shook the branches to show their approval.
Swept along by the emotion, Lowie and Sirra joined in.
Suddenly and without warning, Raaba stood there with them, out in the
amphitheater seats. With a roar of joy, Sirra hurled herself upon her
friend, pounding Raaba on the back and growling happily.
Raaba chuffed her own delight to see Sirra again as she showed off her
glossy new belt.
Unable to restrain his curiosity any longer, Lowie asked Raaba when and
how she had gotten her trophy. The chocolate-furred Wookiee flashed her
fangs in a wide grin, pleased by his surprise.
She had gone down to the world below only that afternoon, just before
returning home to visit her stunned parents. Raaba had been hiding for
almost a year, running away--and she wanted to have her trophy before
she showed herself again. Completing the fateful mission that had been
interrupted so long ago had made her return even more dramatic.
But then her expression grew serious again.
Raaba looked shrewdly at her two friends. She needed to return to
Ryloth that very night, she said; she had to report in to Nolaa Tarkona
and the Diversity Alliance. There was no time to waste. Her eyes
burned with an intensity Lowie could not entirely understand.
Then Raaba eagerly clasped both of their shoulders.
If Lowie and Sirra would accompany her to
Ryloth, just for a few days, she would tell them all about her
adventures in the lower levels and her battle with the syren plant.
Before Lowie could consider the question, Sirra enthusiastically agreed
for both of them.
SPARKS FROM THE mined targeting lasers continued to sputter into Tyko
Thul's administrative office. The young Jedi Knights stood frozen in
shock after hearing Raynar's uncle issue orders to the deadly assassin
droid.
Perturbed, Tyko tried with little success to step around the metallic
hulk of IG-88. "Out of the way, you big clod," he said as he pushed
against the assassin droid's body core. The droid clanked dutifully
sideways to give Raynar's uncle room to pass.
Tyko strode to the nearest of the wrecked automatic weapons in his
office, grimaced, then turned to face Raynar and his friends. "You
didn't need to destroy them all, did you? I specifically calibrated the
targeters not to hit anybody," he said with a huff. "Now the entire
defense grid in this room is mined, and I'll have to have it replaced."
He heaved
a long-suffering sigh. "As if I didn't have enough to do already."
"But," Raynar spluttered, "Uncle Tyko, what's going on?"
Tyko rolled his eyes. "Isn't it obvious, my dear boy? I was trying to
lure your irresponsible father out of hiding by making it look as if I
were in incredible personal peril. I did it for all of us--so we can
get everything back to normal working order again. But I see Bornan
doesn't care a whit about me after all."
IG-88 stomped to the doorway and took up a position guarding the room's
entrance. He held out his powerful upper limbs, high-energy armaments
fully extended. Tyko flashed the droid a sidelong glance.
"Oh, deactivate your weapons, you half-witted hunk of antiquated
machinery! Can't you see you're not intimidating anyone anymore?"
Tyko shook his head in disbelief. "Droids! No matter how sophisticated
you make them, they still have no sense of propriety."
"I beg your pardon?" Em Teedee said.
Jaina shushed the little .translating droid and turned to Tyko.
"We could use some explanations, sir. This whole situation is pretty
complicated, and we only came here to help. This isn't what we expected
to find at all."
Tenel Ka's muscles tensed as she faced Tyko Thul, her voice gruff.
"We believed you were in true
danger. We risked much for you on Kuar--yet you say your entire
abduction was a mere hoax?"
"I had to make the whole thing look believable, of course," Raynar's
uncle said with a shrug. "But my droids were very careful."
Standing by the desktop computer pad, he punched in commands that shut
off power to the security systems and stopped the flow of sparks from
the broken targeting lasers. "Well, we'll have to fix that some other
time. Come with me. I'm scheduled to check one of the assembly lines.
We can discuss this as I go about my business." With that, Tyko turned
and bustled out of the room, his bright robes swirling around him.
The young Jedi Knights followed, still perplexed.
The assassin droid stood motionless and threatening, guarding the empty
room.
"Well?" Tyko called over his shoulder. "Don't just stand there, IG-88.
Come with us."
The droid strode after them, metallic feet pounding on the floor.
"I know my brother very well. Unfortunately--and I'm sorry you have to
hear this, Raynar--" Tyko said, looking sympathetically at the young
m.an, "your father has always tried to outsmart everyone in
negotiations, relying on his wits . . .
and that frequently gets him into trouble. I'm convinced he's on the
run because some scam backfired on him--something too embarrassing to
admit. And now he's simply hiding, without bothering to consider the
incredible inconvenience he's causing the rest of us."
They stopped at a broad lift platform big enough for all of them to
climb aboard. Tyko pushed a button, and the floor suddenly dropped out
beneath them as the lift plunged down to the lower manufacturing levels.
"Bornan's dear wife Aryn is in constant torment," Tyko went on.
"The trading fleet has stopped most of its work, subcontracted their
primary merchandising accounts until further notice, and gone on the run
from imaginary enemies. Poor Raynar here is worried sick about his
father." He huffed.
"I decided I'd simply had enough of this charade, so I staged my own
kidnapping, hoping that I could flush Bornan out. It was perfectly
reasonable to suppose that if he thought his own brother was in danger,
he would finally come out and set things to rights." Tyko sighed.
"But instead of him coming to find me, you children arrived. Now he'll
never show up."
The lift stopped, and they entered a tube shuttle that rocketed them to
another factory complex. A symphony of industrial noises thundered. all
around them. Silvery pistons gleamed under harsh lights, whooshing up
and down. Jets of superhot steam hissed, while pumps circulated
supercold gases through cylinders of bubbling liquids.
Conveyor belts hummed as they hauled sparkling new parts to various
assembly stations where meticulous multiarmed droids pieced the
components together. Bulky worker droids thumped from one end of the
cavernous room to another, using portable repulsorsleds to move
completed machinery to the shipping areas.
"My, this is fascinating, isn't it?" Em Teedee said. "Look at all the
activity."
Raynat's uncle stopped, distracted by one section of the line where
droids were installing dozens of optical sensors like black blisters on
a dome-shaped head assembly; farther down the same line, other droid
workers attached the head assembly to a mobile torso equipped with small
rocket engines.
The entire unit was then installed in a self-contained hyperdrive pod.
"This is the production line once used to create the thousands of probe
droids Darth Vader commissioned, back when he was hunting down Rebel
bases like the one on Hoth," Tyko said. "Now we've retooled the probot
apparatus and programming to produce these mapping and surveyor droids.
They proved quite useful during the Black Fleet Crisis.
"The New Republic needs an accurate map of the galaxy, so that they
&
nbsp; won't be ignorant of lost colonies or uninhabited worlds rich in
resources.
The best surveys are centuries out of date, and many aren't up to the
standards our modern technology will allow."
Proudly, Tyko rapped his knuckles on the hemispherical assembly, and
spoke to the droids on the construction line. "Good work. Keep it up."
Then he strode away. The droids took no notice of the compliment. IG-88
marched behind them like a bodyguard.
"But what about IG-887" Jaina said, still more interested in Tyko Thul's
explanations than in his tour. "The whole attack on Kuar? The assassin
droids?"
Tyko clasped his hands behind his back and pressed his lips together.
"The other assassin droids on IG-88's commando team were of . . .
recent manufacture. I happened upon some old plans in the assembly
facilities here on Mechis III, so I produced an extra dozen or so."
Raynar sounded indignant. "But it's illegal to manufacture assassin
droids, Uncle Tyko! That was clearly stated in the New Republic charter
when they turned this planet over to you. I just read all of those
documents, because I was coming to help run this place while you were
gone."
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