Star Wars - Black Fleet Crisis - Shield Of Lies

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Star Wars - Black Fleet Crisis - Shield Of Lies Page 18

by Michael P. Kube-Mcdowell

You've tramped around, Luke mused as he skimmed the list. I haven't

  even heard of most of these places.

  The list was spotty, obviously incomplete. There were many stretches

  of a month or longer--well more than the ship's rated stand-alone

  endurance--with no port calls listed. But a footnote explained that

  early records from some Alliance worlds were unavailable, records from

  worlds heavily involved in the war were incomplete or had been

  destroyed, and some recently acquired records hadn't yet been

  processed.

  "THE ABSENCE OF DATA SHOULD NOT IN AND OF ITSELF BE CONSIDERED

  INDICATIVE OF PROSCRIBED TRAVEL OR ILLEGAL ACTIVITIES," read the

  disclaimer at the top of the port call list.

  That didn't stop Luke from wondering and speculating.

  The longest gap, a few days short of a year, started just three months

  after the name Mandarin had been burned off the hull. The gap began

  weeks before the Battle of Endor and continued through the worst of the

  fighting of the last year of the war against the Empire.

  According to the record in front of Luke, Star Morning had left Motexx

  fully loaded, heading for Gowdawl under a charter license. The liner

  wasn't seen again until she turned up, cabin and cargo holds empty, at

  Arat Fraca some three hundred days later.

  All things considered, that was a good time for an unarmed liner to lie

  up in port or another safe haven. But where had she gone? Motexx and

  Arat Fraca lay nearly two sectors apart, separated not only by

  thousands of light-years, but also by the unnavigable Black Nebula in

  Parfadi, with its twin supermassive neutron stars. And what had

  happened to the passengers from Motexx?

  There was no record that Star Morning had ever berthed at Gowdawl.

  Another port conspicuous by its absence was Atzerri. Star Morning's

  first destination after Teyr had been Darepp. In the weeks that

  followed, it wandered erratically toward the Rim, stopping at colony

  worlds named 23 Mere, Yisgga, New Polokia, Fwiis, and Bab-badod before

  turning back toward the heart of the galaxy and, in time, its

  appointment at Motexx. As best Luke could determine with the

  Adventurer's navicom, the closest Star Morning had come to Atzerri was

  en route to Fwiismbut without enough unaccounted time for it to have

  made a 150-light-year side trip.

  Luke felt himself girding for an argument with Akanah. The Fallanassi

  didn't go straight to Atzerri from Teyr--so why is it so important that

  we do? Did they know when they left that they would end up there? Why

  didn't the pointer point to Darepp? I wish I knew exactly what the

  message at the commonal said.

  But it was the third discovery Luke sifted from the report that seemed

  the most urgent. That was the one that prompted him to leave his couch

  and go back to the service access compartment, where Akanah was putting

  on a good show of being otherwise occupied.

  Akanah's vehicle for that was what Luke thought of as her stretching

  exercises and what she called active meditation. At that particular

  moment she was sitting with eyes closed and, without evident stress,

  with her ankles crossed behind her neck. A light touch of the tips of

  her forefingers on the deck pad maintained her upright balance.

  "Found something," he said quietly, and waited for her to acknowledge

  him. When that acknowledgment was slow in coming, he added,

  "Akanah?"

  Drawing a deep breath, she let her body roll forward and unfold, then

  sat back up in a more conventional position. Her eyes opened slowly,

  and her gaze was steady. "What did you find?"

  "Star Morning," Luke said. "For most of the last few months, she's

  been way over in Farana, on the far side of the Corporate Sector. But

  she put in at Vulvarch not twelve hours ago."

  "Why do you think that that's important?"

  "Vulvarch is just thirty-four light-years away," Luke said. "We could

  be there in half the time it would take us to get to Atzerri. Less

  than half."

  "The ship is not important," Akanah said. "Our path leads to

  Atzerri."

  "That path's overgrown with fifteen years of bramble," Luke said.

  "Look at what's happened so far--the chances are that all we'll find on

  Atzerri is another message telling us to go somewhere else, to Darepp,

  or Bab-badod, or Arat Fraca. Star Morning's been all over the galactic

  map."

  "The ship is not important," Akanah repeated. "It's a

  tool--property.

  We were told to go to Atzerri."

  "Anything or anyone waiting for us on Atzerri has been waiting fifteen

  years and can wait a few more days," Luke said, growing frustrated with

  her stubbornness.

  "But this lead is only twelve hours old. If we jump right now, we

  should be able to reach Vulvarch before Star Morning lifts again."

  She shook her head. "We won't find the circle there."

  Luke's tone betrayed his impatience. "The same pilot's been listed for

  the ship since Kell Plath took it over.

  She has to be one of you, or at least in the know.

  Akanah, we could spend months following the circle's movements over

  fifteen years. But Star Morning could send us--maybe even take

  us--right to where the Fallanassi are today. I thought that was what

  you wanted."

  "I'll follow the way left for me," Akanah said. "It's what I know.

  It's what I was promised--the way home will be marked."

  Luke turned his face away, one hand clenched in a fist at his side,

  then retreated to the forward compartment.

  When he had shed the anger, he returned. She had already resumed her

  meditation.

  "Will you at least talk to them before we jump out of here?" Luke

  asked. "I have Star Morning's hypercomm receiver address--I can set up

  a secure link for you. You can have all the privacy you want to

  exchange whatever recognition signs you need to with the crew. Maybe

  they can save us at least one wasted trip."

  "No," Akanah said without looking up. "They can't."

  "Why not?"

  She paused and turned her face to him. "Even if the crew of the ship

  is of the circle, they will never reveal themselves to a stranger such

  a distance away. As I will not reveal myself to anyone I cannot feel

  in the Current.

  The outward signs and spoken words are only ritual--the recognition

  lies in sensing another adept beside you.

  I'm sorry."

  Her refusal left Luke wordless with frustration, and she saw it in his

  eyes.

  You should understand," she said. "It's the same with you and those

  like you. The only recognition that matters is what you feel here."

  She tapped between her breasts with three fingers of her left hand.

  "That is the truth that can never deceive."

  The dispute hung in the air between them as unspoken suspicion and

  resentment.

  A kanah did not try to forbid Luke to contact Star Morning on his own.

  But she hovered close enough to the flight stations to make it

  impossible for Luke to do so without her knowledge. It was absolutely

  clear that she meant to prevent any more surpris
es like the one that

  had greeted her after her nap.

  For his part, though he had said nothing of it, Luke had already

  concluded that hailing the other ship without Akanah's cooperation

  could only be counterproductive.

  And since he had reluctantly accepted her decision and resigned himself

  to taking Mud Sloth to Atzerri, he resented her vigilant scrutiny.

  Her scrutiny also prevented Luke from collecting the report on the Mud

  Slotb's history, which was surely ready for him in Ship Registry's

  Pending queue. His discoveries in the Star Morning report and Akanah's

  stubbornness over Atzerri made him more curious than ever to see it.

  But that curiosity was being thwarted, leaving him doubly resentful and

  harboring some suspicions of his own.

  When the time came to jump out from Teyr, Luke handled the details

  without announcing them to Akanah, then climbed into the bunk to sleep

  through the short hop he had programmed. When he did, he purposefully

  left the Star Morning report open on the flight station's secondary

  display. Whether Akanah was tempted by that invitation, he did not

  know. Opening wide his connection to the Force, Luke allowed the

  discordant emotions to bleed away, and he was asleep within minutes.

  Three hours out from Teyr, the Verpine Adventurer dropped out of

  hyperspace as programmed. Climbing out of the bunk, Luke found a

  friendly smile for Akanah, who managed a quick, somewhat tired smile in

  return.

  less you know some reason not to," Luke said, sliding into the pilot's

  seat.

  "No," she said. "Do you need privacy?"

  Luke shook his head and keyed the hypercomm.

  "Nothing secret here--just limited access." He tried another smile and

  found it still felt sincere. "There's a shortage of privacy here,

  anyway."

  It took only a few minutes to put in his requests, and the responses

  started coming back immediately.

  Luke chose not to mention that all seven additional worlds for which he

  requested backgrounders were onetime ports of call for Star Morning.

  If she recognized the names from reading the report, she would know his

  reason.

  If not, it would never be an issue.

  "I'm going to start my inspection," Luke said, standing.

  "May I look at these files?"

  "Of course," Luke said. "It's better if you do, in fact. As I said,

  no secrets. I'll be in earshot--feel free to talk to me if you find

  something you think I should know."

  The interior inspection took nearly an hour. Beginning at the rear of

  the skiff's small service compartment, Luke systematically opened every

  removable panel and access door inside the ship, searching for anything

  that looked as if it might not belong. His examination turned up a

  clumsy retrofit to the water recycler that accounted for one of the

  Adventurer's eccentricities, and half a dozen lost objects of the

  slipped-through-the-cracks variety, but nothing more.

  "I don't understand why the spaceport wouldn't allow service work in

  the parking area," Akanah said when he rejoined her.

  "Probably protecting the interests of the ship services licensee. Have

  to keep those maintenance bays full, you know." Luke gestured toward

  the displays. "Interesting reading?"

  "There's no Flight Control Zone at Atzerri," she said. "We can jump

  right into orbit if we like and pick our own landing site--all the

  spaceports are indepen dent. There's not much government of any kind

  there, it seems."

  "I've been on Free Trader worlds before," Luke said. "Free Traders are

  the closet anarchists of the galaxy.

  If they could figure out how to do without any government at all and

  not risk losing their finer things to bandits, they wouldn't

  hesitate.

  Even as it is, they tend to tolerate a lot of fighting over the

  scraps.

  You don't want to be poor or slow on a Free Trader world."

  Luke missed the look that crossed her face, but he felt the shiver of

  revulsion. "Carratos was a lot like that, after the Imperial garrison

  left," she said. "I should feel right at home."

  "But would the Fallanassi?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "It just doesn't strike me as any more your people's sort of place than

  Teyr was," said Luke. "Did you find anything in the background to

  suggest why they would go there--much less stay there?"

  "They're your people, too," she said with a sad little smile. "I don't

  have an answer to your question. Perhaps being what it is made it a

  better place to disappear."

  "I suppose that could be an answer."

  "Let's not guess," she said. "Is the ship clean?"

  "I couldn't find anything."

  "Then let's go. Let's go directly to Atzerri."

  "I'm not saying there aren't people who could hide things I couldn't

  find," Luke warned.

  "I know that."

  "Well--let's see if a direct route is available from here," Luke said,

  turning to the astrogator. "I'd been planning to line it up with the

  next one."

  They jumped out twenty minutes later, with the report on the Mud Sloth

  still waiting for him on Corus-cant.

  The skiff had a way of getting smaller the longer they were in it, and

  the recent tensions had accelerated the process. As soon as they were

  on their way to Atzerri, Akanah and Luke resumed sleeping in shifts.

  It worked largely because the active noise-canceling system in the bunk

  was effective enough that the curtain divided the ship into two worlds,

  dark and light, awake and asleep. For most of a day's cycle, no matter

  which side of the curtain they were on, both Luke and Akanah could

  enjoy the illusion of being alone on the ship. They allowed just

  enough time between shifts with both awake to avoid military-style

  hot-bunking--though Luke could usually catch Akanah's gentle scent on

  the pillow even after he turned it.

  The jump to Atzerri was a long one. The travelers did not have much to

  say to each other at the first turn--she was impatient for bed and he

  to read the diplomatic files. It was little different at the second

  turn, when the conversation was polite and perfunctory.

  By the third, they were both just lonely enough again to welcome some

  company and to linger together in idle talk. And by the fourth, Luke

  ventured to broach a subject that had kept touching his thoughts in the

  time he spent alone.

  "Akanah--if telling me what the scribing says violates your oath, why

  do you do it?"

  "Because I consider you one of us," she said, her expression carrying a

  hint of surprise. "You are un-trained-you are not an adept--but you

  are Fallanassi."

  "Why? Because my mother was--is?"

  "That, and because of the potential within you, given proof by your

  skill with the Force."

  Luke returned to the pilot's couch and curled up sideways in it. "How

  do people become part of the circle?"

  "Curiosity is not sufficient--which I hazard you know. Some are born

  to it. Some come to it. Is it any different in your discipline?"

  "Born with the gift
, do you mean, or born to someone who already

  belongs, to a trained adept?"

  "Is the gift not in the blood?"

  "Sometimes it seems that way. Sometimes it seems as if the talent goes

  wild, almost as if the Force chooses its own," Luke said, turning on

  his back and propping one foot on the control panel.

  "Why, what do you mean?"

  "Look at the way the Jedi are coming back," said Luke. "The Empire

  hunted us so relentlessly that most everyone who escaped thought they

  were the only Jedi left. But it isn't just that a few solitaries who

  were hiding have resurfaced. I've found students with no family

  history whatsoever, in species that were never represented before in

  the Order."

  "Some of your number may have been adventurous travelers," said

  Akanah.

  "On Carratos, I heard many jokes about how the Emperor spent his

  evenings. If a Jedi sleeps alone, surely it must be by choice, as it

  is with you."

  "Are you saying that you expected me to warm a bed with you?" Luke

  said. "I didn't think that was our bargain."

  "No," she said. "I never expected that."

 

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