Hero of Cartao Part 1

Hero of Cartao.

Hero's call.

by Timothy Zahn.

ONE YEAR AFTER THE BATTLE OF GEONOSIS.

"Master Doriana?" Emil Kerseage's deep voice called. "We're here."

Kinman Doriana awoke with a start, blinking his eyes against the sunlightstreaming in through the shuttle's viewports. For a moment he gazed at thelandscape rolling beneath him, trying to remember where exactly he was. Therehad been so many systems...

The disorientation cleared. He was on Cartao, major trading center forPrackla Sector, carefully nonaligned in the war between the Republic and theSeparatists. And home to...

'There it is," Kerseage said. He turned the control stick delicately,rolling the shuttle slightly to the left to give Doriana a better look."Spaarti Creations."

Doriana gazed out the side viewport, impressed in spite of himself.Situated among a group of forested hills just north of the compact town ofFoulahn City, perhaps three kilometers northwest of the equally compact Trivs.p.a.ceport, was the unique manufacturing plant known as Spaarti Creations. Overa kilometer across at its widest, it had the patchwork look of something thathad repeatedly been added onto over the decades. The roofline echoed thefrozen chaos, with towers, heat exchangers, antennas, and skylights poking outat apparently random spots along the building's overall three-story height.There were no windows he could see, ventilation apparently being handled by aline of small, louvered air vents dotting the outer walls about midway up thesides. "Impressive," he commented.

"You think so?" Kerseage shrugged. "Personally, I've always considered it an architectural version of a weed patch. No order or organization anywhere."

"Ever been inside?"

"No one but employees get to go in," the other said, his lip twisting with disgust and resentment. 'Them, and the high and mighty."

"Like me?" Doriana asked.

Kerseage glanced at him, as if suddenly remembering just who hispa.s.senger was. "No, no, I was thinking about Lord Binalie's chums," hebacktracked hastily. 'The Prackla Trade Council-that sort of crowd."

"You don't think much of them?"

Kerseage shrugged again, uncomfortably this time. "It's nothing to do with me," he muttered. "I got a shuttle; I fly people places. That's all."

"I see," Doriana said, returning his attention to the manufacturing plant now pa.s.sing directly beneath them. Clearly, Kerseage didn't want to say any more.

But then, he didn't have to. Like everything else he ever did, Dorianahad made sure to research Cartao before coming here and hiring this particularman to bring him across the spa.r.s.ely settled planet to Spaarti Creations. Thecargo transport company Kerseage had once owned had been inadvertently run outof business two years earlier by a poorly worded regulation the Prackla TradeCouncil had issued after the Battle of Geonosis.

Kerseage's appeal was still crawling its way through the system, but bynow the issue was essentially moot. His company was gone, and he clearlyblamed Lord Binalie for it.

"What about the plant's satellite facilities?" he asked, his eyesflicking around the forested areas north and west of the main facility. 'Thebuildings where they store raw materials and finished product."

"You mean the three Outlinks?"

"Right," Doriana said. "Where are they?"

"I don't know, exactly," Kerseage said. 'The closest one's supposed to be about three kilometers northeast, just past that big gray-topped worker barracks thing." He pointed.

"Mm," Doriana said, peering into the distance. There was nothing showingin that direction that he could see. Well camouflaged, either by accident orby design. That could be useful. "Where does Lord Binalie live?"

"There." Kerseage pointed to the left as he brought the shuttle around in a wide semicircle. "You see Foulahn City, just south of that kilometer-wide stretch of gra.s.sland?"

"I see it," Doriana said. "I don't think I've ever seen a city come to a stop that abruptly before. Except where there's a lake or cliff to limit it, of course."

"It might as well be a cliff," Kerseage grunted. "That particular line of gra.s.sland marks the southern edge of Spaarti land, and no one travels or builds there. The Cranscoc insist on it. Anyway, you see that big open area on the northern edge of the city, b.u.t.ting up against the gra.s.s strip?"

"Yes," Doriana said. It looked like a park-gra.s.sland, quite a few clumpsof trees, large sections of sculpted bushes-with a few small buildings and onevery large one. Even from this distance, the place reeked of wealth and power.On one of the low hills facing the plant, he could see a pair of figuresstanding together. 'The Binalie estate?"

"You got it," Kerseage said. "You seen enough?"

Doriana took a last look around, fixing the geography in his mind.Foulahn and Navroc Cities lay to the south and southeast of the plant, withthe craggy Red Hills pushing up against the southern ends of both cities. Trivs.p.a.ceport was to the east, with low, increasingly forested rolling hills tothe north, and a small river winding its way between the two cities and thenbetween Foulahn and the s.p.a.ceport.

"Yes," he told the pilot, resettling himself in his seat. "Let's go see

Lord Binalie."

They're turning around some more," Corf Binalie announced, shading his eyes with his hand as he peered upward into the sky.

"I think they might be coming here."

"Who, the people in the shuttle?" Jafer Tories asked, his white hairblowing past his cheek as he gazed downward at the ground, trying to pick outthe particular siviviv vine he and the boy had been following for the pasthalf hour. "Yes, I know."

"You know who they are?" Corf asked, frowning up at him. "Did Dad say something to you about visitors?"

"No, but he didn't need to," Tories a.s.sured the boy. "It's been obvious for nearly a minute now."

"Oh, come on," Corf objected in that tone of strained patience twelve- year-olds did so well. "How could you?"

"Simple logical deduction," Tories told him in that pedantic instructor's tone seventy-three-year-olds did equally well.

"There was no reason for them to pa.s.s directly over the plant unless thatwas what they were specifically looking at. After realizing how little thatgained them, their natural next step is to want to take a look from theinside. For that, they need to come see your father."

Corf shook his head in amazement. "Boy," he said. "I wish I were a Jedi."

"If you were, you'd probably have to goto war someday," Tories warned.

"You didn't have to," Corf pointed out.

"Not yet," Tories said with a grimace. "But I could be called up at anymoment. The Council merely decided to leave a few Jedi where we are for themoment in case of unexpected Separatist moves in our areas. I could get to thescene of trouble anywhere in Prackla or Locris Sectors long before they couldsend someone from Coruscant or one of the major battle areas. Being a Jedi isnever easy, and can be downright dangerous."

"Yeah, but you're real smart," Corf said. Clearly, distant rumblings of war didn't faze him in the slightest. "You're good at figuring out stuff."

"Logical thinking is hardly the exclusive preserve of Jedi," Tories admonished him. "Anyone can learn to put facts together in their proper order.

"Maybe," Corf said. "I still think it's a Jedi thing." Tories smiled,shading his eyes with his hand as he watched the shuttle approach. In point offact, of course, he hadn't really known the shuttle was coming to the BinalieEstate, but had merely concluded there was a high probability of it. If itturned out the pilot was merely showing off Spaarti Creations to some visitingfriend, he was going to look pretty foolish.

This might not be a bad thing. Tories had spent the past thirty years onCartao, dispensing wisdom, mediating disputes, and handling the occasional pirate or overeager crime lord. Some of the locals had come to respect him, others had chosen to hate him, while most had never been more than vaguely aware that Prackla Sector even had a resident Jedi guardian.

But never in those thirty years had he run into a case of hero-worship like Corf Binalie's.

In his earlier days, it would have been highly gratifying, not to mentionflattering, to be held in such high esteem. From the perspective of his years,though, he could see the danger lurking beneath that kind of unthinkingadulation. Even at twelve Corf should be able to recognize a person'sweaknesses as well as his strengths; should be learning how to accept peopleas they were, not creating a lens of perfection through which to gaze at them.Instead, the boy insisted on regarding him as the Ultimate Jedi: tall andstrong, wise and kind, and never, ever wrong.

This particular incident wasn't going to do much to change thatperception, either. The shuttle pa.s.sed low over their heads, leaving no doubtthat it was indeed making for the private landing pad beside the Binaliemansion.

And as it did so, Tories got a clear look at the company name on the shuttle's side.

"Come on," he said, taking Corf's arm and turning him toward the house.

"We're going back?" Corf asked, frowning. "I thought you were going to help me track this siviviv vine back to its root."

"We can do that later," Tories told him. "Right now, I think we ought to go see what these people want with your father."

"Okay," Corf said, clearly not understanding but willing to accept Tories' word for it. "You're the boss."

"I'm not the boss," Tories reminded him as they headed down the hilltoward the distant house and the shuttle settling onto the pad. "I'm just theJedi."

"Yeah," Corf said off-handedly. "Same thing."

Tories sighed to himself. Hopefully, the boy would grow out of it on his own.