seemed their planet was trapped between the Republic and the Confederacy,
and they hoped to ride it out, survival temporarily transformed
into a more urgent motivation than profit.
To the Five Families, a game was being played out that could end
with their power broken, or raised to the highest levels. Palpatine
might win. Count Dooku might win. No matter which, they intended
to survive.
True, a storm had been unleashed upon Cestus, but as long as they
survived, Confederacy contracts might yet be honored. After all, the
entire galaxy was watching, and this would be a perfect time for
Count Dooku to provide an objective example of the advantages to
be found in trading the Separatists.
There were other factors, of course, factors discussed only among
the Families, or by those who had reviewed very private evaluations
distributed solely to the top families. But those factors, and their implications,
would be meaningless if they did not survive the next few
days . . .
"This will end in . . . perhaps twenty hours." Ventress glanced at
the two Jedi, still trapped within the energy shield. "I regret that I
will not have the opportunity to match lightsabers with you again,
Obi-Wan Kenobi. Count Dooku wants you alive," she said, prowling
at the edge of the shield. So intense was her hunger that the tips of
her twin sabers trembled. "But mightn't he forgive me if I simply slew
you in single combat?"
"Please." Obi-Wan locked eyes with her. "Try me."
"I'd rather that honor be mine," Kit said.
"Ohhh," she breathed. "Oh, yes, you and I. It will happen, Obi-
Wan Kenobi. But I must remember that the operation is more important
than my individual satisfaction or advancement. Surely you
can understand this."
She looked up at the craggy ceiling above him. "The Supreme
Chancellor will humble Cestus as an example to other breakaway
planets. The fate of this one small planet will push hundreds of star
systems into the Confederacy's arms. Mission accomplished."
"What of the biodroids? Don't you want them?"
She smiled. "It would be good, but volume production will require
cloning, and our efforts to clone the dashta tissue will require another
year, at least. For the time being, that is a dead end. A bluff."
She smiled and came closer, so close that her face almost touched
the wall of shimmering energy. "Those beacons you planted in Clandes.
Very nice. You could not enter the actual plant, so you triangulated
three external signals. A good plan. But one easily countered.
What a shame that the coordinates have been recalibrated," she said.
"What are you talking about?" Obi-Wan said, fearing that he
understood her meaning precisely.
"You planned to destroy the filtration and power plants with minimal
loss of life." She tsked. I'm afraid that that won't do. Our plans
require a more . . . dramatic event."
"What have you done?" he whispered.
"No . . . better you should ask what is it you have done," she said.
"And why would you have a cruiser deliberately strike a cave fault,
destroying the entire industrial complex and its millions? Yes, I think
that a slaughter like that will polarize the galaxy, don't you?"
His head spun. And Count Dooku had no way of cloning or massproducing
dashta tissue for at least a year? "Then your droid order
was a sham?"
"Intended to frighten Palpatine and your precious Jedi Council
into an overreaction. I would say our plan worked, wouldn't you?"
Her laughter was as warm as dry ice. "The resulting slaughter will tip
the galaxy in our favor. Then once we do clone the tissues, who needs
Cestus?"
"You're a monster," Kit said, voice calm as a dead sea.
At that moment the vast energies within Obi-Wan swirled and
stilled. As hopeless as the situation seemed, he believed to his core
that this was not over. Somewhere, Ventress had made a mistake.
And when that single mistake manifested, he would be ready to take
advantage . . .
75
s,'till under direct order, the four surviving clone troopers remained
confined to base. They were fully aware of the forces struggling around
Jangotat's mind swam with visions and possibilities. He more than
anyone knew the ARC mission mandate. It was engraved on his
brain like his own number. Stop the production of JKs. Preserve the social
order.
Preserve the order? But the order was corrupt! The Five Families
were willing to murder countless civilians to make a profit. If that was
not the very definition of betrayal, what was? Even worse, only a fool
couldn't see that they had already allied themselves with the Separatists,
and the Jedi were no fools, that much was certain.
They, then, were caught in events, controlled by their programming.
Just like a clone, he thought.
The Nexu hovered in orbit above them. Any minute now a message
might come from General Kenobi to begin bombing. If not, within a
few hours the ship would take out the beacon-marked targets without
additional authorization.
These people were going to die. Ordinary citizens with roots
couldn't just throw their homes in a rucksack and ship off when
danger came. They railed against the darkness, they fought on for
their loved ones, they prayed in silence.
The troopers waited, but the longed-for communication with the
generals did not come. Dead? Captured? Time was running out. In a
few hours the bombardment would begin, and that was all to the
good, wasn't it?
Jangotat stalked the camp's perimeters, chewing on a nervestick
while acid boiled his gut. Something is wrong.
When he circled back around to the others, Seefor was talking.
"What do we do now?"
Forry shrugged. "If he doesn't come back, it didn't work. Then the
bombardment begins, we call in transport, and we go home. Nothing
to do but wait."
Jangotat wandered away, mind racing, hoping against hope that
their Jedi commanders would call in, that the word would come that
the line was shut down without the vast damage of an orbiting strike.
He was a bit surprised when old Thak Val Zsing and the X'Ting
woman Resta approached him. Val Zsing had seemed broken, but
now there was something alive and almost aflame about him. "I know
things," he said. "Please. Listen to me."
Jangotat, remembering what he had learned in the cave, opened
his senses. He saw the man's wounds as well as his strength. He believed
that this miserable wretch needed, deserved, one chance to redeem
himself.
We are more than our actions. More than our deeds, or programming.
"What is it?" he asked.
"No one talk to Resta. No one talk to Thak Val Zsing," she said.
"So we two talk. Talk about the old days. What Gramps say 'bout the
prisons, how Resta's hive forced to dig in them. I remember things
about them." She tapped her finger against her temple. "I see I know
thi
ngs about 'Secutive 'resort.'" She snorted. "You know, the one
they rip away power away to build? The one that kill my man?"
The X'Ting leaned closer, her thick red eyebrows arched and erect.
"I look at 'puter map."
"Our computers?"
Thak Val Zsing nodded. The old man's eyes were piercingly hot.
"Same routing map you used to get through the tunnels, when the
Jedi put on their little show, remember, star-boy?"
Jangotat agreed that he did, still not seeing the point.
"That program charts energy usage, utilty bills, all kindsa real-time
routing information on the major systems." Val Zsing's voice hushed
to an excited whisper. "And we saw something. Oh, brother, did I
ever see something."
"In last five hours, since big ship pull into orbit, 'resort' light glow."
Resta leaned forward, so excited she could barely contain herself.
"That where Five Families hide!"
"I want to discuss a possibility with you," Jangotat said to his
brothers. He struggled to conceal his excitement.
"Possibility?" Seefor asked. "What kind of possibility?"
"The Families may have made a critical mistake. If this intel is
good, for the first time we know where they are. They've powered up
present emergency, I'd say there's a high level of confidence that
they'll be there. If we grab them, we can force them to make a deal. If
they capitulate, we can end this and stop the bombing."
For a long moment no one spoke. Sirty was the first to break the
silence, and was shocked. "But you'd be countermanding direct orders!"
Jangotat slammed his fist on the table. "We could win the day!"
"Brother," Seefor said, "under the Kamino Accords I am compelled
to warn you that your suggestion is not to Code."
Forry glared. "You don't do this," he said. "Besides—" He gave an
ugly laugh. "—the old man's a coward. Probably a liar, too."
Against Code? Seefor's accusation struck Jangotat like a physical
blow, but he didn't allow himself to cower. Even the idea filled him
with physical nausea. No clone had ever broken Code or disobeyed
an instruction of any kind. He felt an energy wall slam down in his
mind, and his every muscle trembled as he even contemplated the
forbidden. "I believe him," he said, and had to grit his teeth for a moment
to stop them from clattering. "Ask yourselves: if you'd lost your
honor, wouldn't you do anything to regain it? Wouldn't you want
someone to give you that chance?" He knew that he had scored with
that one: a clone commando had nothing if not his reputation. Seefor
flinched in sympathetic pain at the very concept.
And yet at the same moment that he mentioned such a thing, he
realized that he had drawn a line between himself and the others.
There was something different about him, and they could feel it, but
had yet to comment. By mentioning the unmentionable, however, he
had given a focus to their instincts.
He was no longer completely one of them. He was something else,
and his brothers were on guard.
"It is not Code, Jangotat," Seefor said, and stared at him. He knew
he could take it no farther.
Jangotat returned to his bedroll. He knew what he contemplated,
and why. He knew it was forbidden but he believed, believed with
everything inside him, that if the generals knew what he knew, they
would approve of his actions.
And yet...
He would be breaking Code.
His chest muscles constricted, and he felt a cold sweat dampen his
armpits. What was right? What was truly Code? Was it the letter, or
was it doing what he believed his commanders would do if they had
his information?
Jangotat wrestled with that for hours before he made up his mind
and slipped out of his bedroll. He had almost made it back out to the
open when Forty caught up with him.
"Where are you going?"
"You know I have to do this," Jangotat said.
Forry nodded. "And you know I can't let you."
"Then stop me if you can," Jangotat replied. All things being
equal, Jangotat and Forry should have been roughly equivalent fighters.
But things were no longer equal. Jangotat was fighting for everything
Forry fought for, plus just a little bit more.
Sheeka. Tonote. Mithail. Tarl.
The Guides.
It's not what a man fights with. It's what he fights for.
The two moved toward each other, paused for an instant just as
they reached critical distance, judging. In the next instant there followed
an eye-baffling flurry of punches and kicks. Forry was stronger
and faster . . .
But it didn't make a difference. Jangotat saw more clearly now,
more than he ever had in his life, as if the entire moment were frozen
in invisible ice. He saw Forry's patterned responses, the programmed
blows and chops. Jangotat felt outside this somehow, watching the
motion without being involved in it. Forry might as well have sat
down and detailed his every intended motion in advance. Moving
slowly, with greater calm than he had ever experienced in combat,
Jangotat simply slid between Forry's movements. As he strove to
keep the balance between them he contracted his stance, and Jangotat's
natural flinch response moved his elbow into perfect position to
clip his brother's jaw.
Forry slid to the ground, and was still. Jangotat stood there for a
moment, shocked. Was that what it felt like to be a Jedi? Was that
even a fraction of how it felt?
Or was this just how it felt to be free? He didn't know what door
had been opened in his head, what training and . . . and . . .
And love had done for him.
He felt a deep excitement. He might be heading into death, but he
was more alive than he had ever been, than any of his kind had ever
been.
He could, he would, succeed. There was no other option.
He met with Thak Val Zsing and Resta by the speeder bikes. It
took them only a few minutes to sabotage the other speeders—it
would take his brothers an hour to fix them, by which time he would
be long gone.
For fifty minutes they rode to the northwest. The air riffled his
hair, and the new sun flared to his left as dawn breached the darkness.
He enjoyed the solitude, the sense of being beyond it all. Of knowing,
for the first time in his life, that he had chosen his fate.
A new, precious day. Perhaps his last.
He grinned ferociously. Best not waste a moment of it.
Fifteen kilometers north of Resta's farm a lava tube gaped in the
middle of a mud plain. That is where they entered, carrying with
them knapsacks filled with ordnance. For ninety minutes they
crawled through darkness, bruising and slicing their knees on the
glassy surface. Thak Val Zsing led the way, and from time to time he
called back to them. "The prison was to the east now, and we're in
one of the escape tunnels." He laughed with self-mockery. "Escape
tunnels. What a joke: the whole planet was a prison—there was nowhere
to
escape to. But the central computers say that the Five
Family resort was built in one of the wings of the old prison after it
was abandoned."
They reached a larger section, crawling out into a cave tall enough
for them to stand. More than tall enough: this was part of an old
mine, with smaller shafts twisting off in all directions.
"This is as far as I know," the old man said. "This is where my
grandfather escaped." Cestus Penitentiary's deepest pits were now
bunkers for the Five Families. A savage irony, that.
"Let's go," Resta said, and tried to shoulder her way ahead.
Jangotat stood in her path. "You must live," he said.
"Got nothing live for. Lost mate. Lost farm."
Jangotat shook his head. "What happened here, to your people,
shouldn't have happened. What you have done here will not go unnoticed.
When this is over, file a report using the phrase A-Nine-
Eight tac code twelv." He held her eyes. "That means that you
performed extraordinary service for me during official business. You
are a friend of the Republic, and the Republic looks after its own."
She glared at him, unwilling to believe. To trust that there was any
way for her save revenge and death. "No. Go with you."
"Someone must sing your hive's song," Jangotat said. "Find a new
mate. Make strong children. Never stop fighting."
She was so astonished that she didn't react when Jangotat spun her
and placed her in a sleeper hold. Resta struggled to free herself, and
she was strong—stronger than most human males. But he had the
right angle and position. No matter how she struggled, he hung on.
She ran him back against a wall, but he hung on. A hundred different
alien physiologies flashed through his mind, then he remembered
the Geonosians. They were also insectile, and air strangles were considered
worthless. But there were nerve clusters—
There, at the base of the skull. He disengaged one of his arms and
leaned in with his elbow, pressing from both sides, gambling everything.
Impact could prove fatal, but pressure alone . . .
Resta went limp and rolled over, unconscious.
Jangotat stared down at her, panting. What a fighter! What had it
taken to sap the will of these people? "What are their men like?" he
whispered to Thak Val Zsing.
"You don't want to know," Val Zsing replied.
Jangotat took a few moments to calm himself. Then Thak Val
Zsing pointed out the last tunnel, and together they descended into