The Hand Of Thrawn Duology_ Specter Of The Past Part 30

"They are lights of peace," Tre said. "Tonight, the peoples of Cejansij gather together in support of justice."

"Yes," Luke said. He could see all too well where this one was going. "Justice."

"I perceive from your tone of voice that you do not yet understand," Tre said, his own tone one of mild reproof. "The High Council and Senate dismiss all such demonstrations as riots by the violent or ignorant, or else as plots by the Empire. But such is not always the case."

"I don't think the Senate sees things quite that simplistically," Luke said. Still, he had to admit that Tre had a point. "So what third category would the demonstration down there fall into?"

"As I said: the support of justice," the Rellarin said. "The white lights you see are in remembrance of the peoples of Caamas.' Soon now-yes; there. Do you see?"

Luke nodded. Around the group of white lights, a thin circle of blue lights had appeared.

As he watched, more were added, creating an ever-growing ring of blue around the white. "I see them."

"They signify remembrance for the victims of the Vra.s.sh Slaughter," Tre told him. "The land the perpetrators gained by that act has yielded great wealth to them; yet neither the Pas'sic government nor the New Republic has insisted that any of that wealth be given to the survivors' families, as both the custom and ancient law of that world demand."

"One of my Jedi students was of the Vra.s.sh," Luke said, his heart stirring at the memory.

"He had a great deal of anger to work through before his training could properly begin."

"Their rage is understandable," Tre said. "Yet there is no such anger in those gathered below." He gestured again toward the growing circle of lights. "Not in the way humans define anger. They are quiet and peaceful, threatening no one. But they will not forget those who were wronged, nor will they allow those in power to forget."

"Yes," Luke murmured. "There are indeed some things that must never be forgotten."

For a few minutes they stood in silence and watched. The circle of blue lights continued to grow; and then, as the white center had given way to blue, the blue gave way to yellow.

The yellow was joined and encircled in turn by red, then by pale green, then violet, and finally an outer ring of white. "They are all gathered," Tre said when the series of concentric rings was complete. "Those are the ones who have tonight donated their time in remembrance. Others will donate their time other nights; and as all look down upon the lights they too will remember. And all of Cejansij will strengthen in their resolve to pet.i.tion the seats of power until all such wrongs are righted."

Luke shook his head. "Except that none Of these wrongs can be righted, un'Yala Tre," he said. "Not Caamas, not any of them."

"The Cejansiji understand that," the Rellarin said. "They know the dead cannot be brought back to life, nor devastated worlds be made whole again. They merely seek such justice as is within the power of mortal beings to grant"

"And what justice would they seek for Caamas?" Luke persisted. "The punishment of the entire Bothan race for the crimes of a few?"

"Many would say that such would not be true justice," Tre agreed. "But others would not share that opinion, and their voices too must be heard." He pointed to the circles of lights. "But now see. They demonstrate that justice cannot be limited to any one people or event. Justice must exist for all."

Luke frowned. The neat circles were breaking up, the different colors starting to mix together at the edges. His first thought was that the demonstration had ended and the partic.i.p.ants were starting to leave. But the overall group of lights didn't seem to be getting any larger. The colors continued to bleed together, the rings giving way to a more h.o.m.ogeneous mix of color&mdash And suddenly he understood. The partic.i.p.ants were leaving their own circles of remembrance and interweaving with the people in the other circles. It was a quiet yet deeply moving demonstration of unity.

"Some of those now in the Common do indeed believe that the entire Bothan species should be held accountable for the crime of Caamas," Tre said quietly. "At least in regard to reparations to the surviving Caamasi. Other Cejansiji reject that argument, yet agree that in suppressing knowledge of their part in the crime the Bothan leadership has forfeited any right to claims of innocence. There will also be visiting' offworlders in the Common, holding lights alongside them, whose opinions will be equally varied."

"Sounds like it's about the same here as everywhere else in the galaxy," Luke said.

"True," Tre said. "The point I wished to make, Master Skywalker, is that these differences are not the result of enemy plots or even posturings among political rivals. They are the genuine and honest differences of opinion among the many beings who make up the New Republic. To dismiss any of them as unimportant or unthinking is to insult the honor and integrity of those beings and their cultures."

"I know," Luke said. "I'm sure the Senate does, too. The problem is how to reconcile all those differences. Not just over Caamas, but also in a thousand other matters."

"I do not know how you will succeed," Tre said. "I only know that it must be done, and that it must be done quickly. Already I have heard the stirrings of genuine anger at the Senate's inaction on this matter. There are other even more disturbing stirrings: whispered suggestions that the New Republic no longer cares what any world does against its neighbors or adversaries. Even now some are preparing to settle old grievances, while others seek new alliances for protection."

Luke sighed. "I've lost track of how many times the New Republic government has been accused of being too heavy-handed in one crisis or another over the past few years. Now they're trying to let the sectors and systems do more of their own governing, so of course they're being accused of doing nothing."

"Does this surprise you?" Tre asked. "The one truism in all politics is that loud voices will be raised against any decision that is made."

"Yes," Luke said, looking down at the flickering lights below.

"Many of those now demonstrating will be gathering later tonight at the ThoughtsAreFreedom tapcafe," Tre said. "It is on the far side of the Common, at the western corner of the diamond. If you choose to meet with them, they will be pleased to speak their thoughts to you."

"I'm sure they will," Luke said, carefully hiding a grimace. "Thank you for taking the time to show, me this."

"It is my sworn duty to provide information to the leaders of the New Republic," the Rellarin said gravely. "It is a swearing I take most seriously."

He placed his fingertips together and inclined his head. "I thank you in turn for your time and attention, Master Skywalker, and I urge you to visit the ThoughtsAreFreedom this night. You will gain much knowledge there." Inclining his head again, be turned and headed back along the Promenade.

Behind Luke, Artoo whistled softly, and he turned to see the little droid standing up on mechanical tiptoe as he gazed at the lights of the Canyonade below. "It's impressive, all right," Luke agreed soberly. "That's what makes this so hard to deal with. So much of it really is honest differences of opinion."

Artoo warbled again, his dome swiveling pointedly in the direction of the skyarch to their left the direction they would go to get across the Canyonade and down to the tapcafe Tre had mentioned. "I suppose we ought to go take a look," Luke said reluctantly. "Though I doubt we'll get any new information there. It'll just be more opinions."

He pushed away from the guardwall and started walking toward the entrance to the skyarch.

"If you want real information you have to go to someone like Talon Karrde," he continued as Artoo rolled alongside like a well-trained pet. "In fact, I've been thinking that maybe we ought to try to get in touch with him."

Artoo made a rude-sounding noise. "I hope that's for the current att.i.tude toward him on Coruscant," Luke warned, "and not for Karrde himself. He's done a lot for the New Republic."

The droid gave an ambiguous twitter, followed by a remarkably good impression of a pile of coins clinking together. "Yes, I know he's been paid for his help," Luke acknowledged.

"You might remember that money was the reason Han first got involved with the Rebellion, too, and he's turned out pretty good."

They reached the entrance to the skyarch and stepped onto the umbrella-roofed, guardwalled bridge. Like the Rim Promenade itself, the Canyonade's skyarches were remarkable examples of engineering skill, curving gently and gracefully across the half-kilometer gorge without the benefit of extra supports or suspension cables. The right side of the walkway was finished in a simple nonslip surface, clearly designed for casual strollers or those who wanted to pause and linger over the view of the Canyonade be low. The left side, in contrast, was equipped with a pair of slideways for the serious traveler who merely wished to go from one side to the other.

It would have been a pleasant walk, Luke thought with a quiet pang of regret, but he didn't seem to have the time lately for such simple pleasures. "The important point is that Karrde has always come to us first with information that we need," he added to Artoo, ushering the droid onto the slideway and stepping on behind him. "Whether he admits it or not, he really is on our side."

Artoo swiveled his dome around to face Luke, made an I-suppose-so sort of grunt, then rotated back to face forward again. The slideway was speeding up, Luke noted with interest, accelerating steadily as they approached the center of the arch. Presumably the entire strip wasn't speeding up, which would create quite a challenge for anyone trying to get onto the strip behind him. Composed of some kind of pseudofluid material, he guessed, using a variant of laminar flow to create variable speeds along its l ength. One more engineering marvel to add to the list.

They reached the top of the arch, and he was just thinking of asking Artoo to a.n.a.lyze the slideway for him, when be felt a flicker in the Force. It wasn't much; little more than a twinge in the near distance. But it was enough.

Somewhere very near at hand, someone was preparing for murder.

He stepped off the slideway, fighting for a moment with the abrupt change in speed before be regained his balance. Artoo, suddenly missing him, squawked in surprise-then squawked again as Luke stretched out with the Force and lifted him bodily into the air. "Quiet,"

Luke admonished as he set the droid down on the stationary section of the walkway. Looking around, he stretched out again with the Force.

The murderous intent was still there, somewhere close by. But though there were a handful of other pedestrians in sight, there was nothing he could see that appeared to fit the sensation.

At least, not on this particular skyarch.

He turned around, peering upward beneath the edge of his skyarch's roof and through the guardwall mesh of the skyarch running parallel one level above him. And there they were, perhaps ten meters farther along from where he stood: two cloaked and hooded figures standing with their backs pressed against the guardwall, the smaller child-sized figure clinging to the taller one. Beyond them, Luke could just make out the shadowy forms of three a.s.sailants moving slowly and confidently in on them. In the hand of one of them, be caught the glint of a blade.

There was no time to waste, and exactly one route that had any chance of getting Luke to them in time. It would take a hefty jump, but nothing that a Jedi drawing on the Force couldn't easily handle. The only imponderable was whether the Canyonade's safety tractor beams would react fast enough to s.n.a.t.c.h him in midair and whisk him helplessly away.

There was only one way to find out. "Wait here, Artoo," be murmured. Stretching out to the Force, he hopped over the slideway to the top of his skyarch's guardwall. For a pair of heartbeats he crouched there, steadying his balance as he did one final visual measurement of the distance up and across to the other sky-arch. Then, taking a deep breath, he again drew on the Force and leaped.

The emergency tractor beams were obviously not as hair-trigger as he'd feared, and he reached the other side without so much as a nudge from them. Catching the top of the other skyarch's guardwall, he swung his legs through the opening between guardwall and roof to land in a slight crouch on the nonmoving section of the walkway.

He took in the tableau laid out before him in a glance. The two prospective victims, as he'd already seen, were standing ahead and to his right, their backs pressed against the guardwall. The hood on the taller of them bad slipped back, revealing the lined face and white hair of an old woman. The face of the child clinging to her side-most likely a grandchild or even great-grandchild, considering the woman's age-was still completely in shadow. But Luke didn't need to see an expression, the way the child clutched the old woman's side was all the evidence anyone needed to recognize the silent terror there.

A terror that was well founded; From the lower skyarch Luke had seen three knife-wielding men closing in on them. Now, from his new vantage point, he could see that those three were merely the inner circle of a much larger group. Nine other men were standing a few paces farther back, forming a semicircle around their intended prey. All nine of them had the hardened faces of men whose lives had been shaped by violence and cruelty; all nine had blasters out and ready.

And at the moment, all nine of those faces-and five of those blasters-were pointed at Luke.

"That's far enough," Luke called, straightening up from his landing crouch. "Put down your weapons."

"I've got a better idea," one of the men snarled, his voice as nasty as his appearance.

"Why don't you turn around and walk away. While you still can."

"I don't think so," Luke said, trying to sound more confident than be felt. With five-six; now-blasters trained on him, it was going to be a race to see whether be could get his lightsaber out fast enough to deflect the shots that would be coming his direction the instant he made a move toward the weapon.

But there was the slideway two steps to his left. One section in each direction; both moving at reasonably high speed. "We're wasting time," one of the other men spat "Burn him and let's-"

And in that instant, in the middle of the sentence, the child moved.

It was so quiet and so smooth that at first Luke didn't realize what was happening. The child rotated out of his panicked death rip on the old woman toward the nearest of the knife-wielding a.s.sailants, one arm swinging across the man like a stylized slap cross his chest that fell short of its intended mark. The arm movement seemed to deflect the child like a ricocheted stone toward the second a.s.sailant; the slapping movement again, and he was now winging toward the third man&mdash And with a gurgling gasp, the first man collapsed into a heap on the ground.

Someone swore with startled viciousness, the blasters pointed at Luke wavering as sudden confusion intruded on what had two seconds earlier been a solidly secure situation. Heads turned back toward the child and his grandmother&mdash And then the second man crumpled, and the third man started to do the same, his knife now inexplicably in the child's hand. But only briefly; an instant later, with an abbreviated flick of the wrist, the knife flashed across the short distance to bury itself in the chest of one of the other a.s.sailants.

And as it did so, the hood fell back far enough to finally expose the child's face.

It wasn't a child beneath that cloak. It was a Noghri.

That single glance was the last clear view any of them had of the he alien. For some, it was the last clear view of anything they would ever have. Even as Luke grabbed for his lightsaber the Noghri became a blur of motion: diving, rolling, slashing with blades now in both hands, evading the frantic sputtering of blaster shots with casual ease. A grenade clattered to the walkway at the old woman's feet, vanished as Luke reached out through the Force to maneuver it through the gap between guardwall and roof and, send it hurling straight up.

By the time it exploded harmlessly far above them, the battle was over.

"Master Skywalker," the Noghri said, nodding gravely from the center of the carnage as be slid his two a.s.sa.s.sin's knives back to concealment. "I am honored by your presence, and grateful for your a.s.sistance."

"Such as it was," Luke said, shaking his bead in astonishment. seen Noghri in training and practice combat and had thought knew the limits of their fighting skills. He hadn't even been close. "Somehow, I think you would have managed quite well without me."

"Your pardon, but that is not true," the Noghri demurred, stepping over the bodies and coming over to him. "Your distraction was most timely, allowing me nearly four extra seconds I would otherwise not have bad."

"Not to mention the grenade," the old woman added. She had crouched down beside one of the dead and was going through his pockets with practiced fingers. "If not for your quick action, we would all have been killed. Thank you."

"You're welcome," Luke said, eyeing her with growing doubts she finished her search and moved on to the next body. A Noghri warrior and a woman with the expertise of a professional pickpocket were not exactly what he'd had in mind when he'd come leaping to the rescue. "May I ask who you are?"

"Not who you're probably afraid I am," the woman said, pausing in her search to flash him a smile. "It's really quite honest and mostly respectable. My name is Moranda Savich; Plakhmirakh here is currently attached to me as my bodyguard. We work for an acquaintance of yours: Talon Karrde."

"Really," Luke said. "Oddly enough, I was just thinking out trying to make contact with Karrde."

"Well, you've come to the right place," Moranda said, straightening up. "He's just arrived on Cejansij."

"You're joking," Luke said, frowning. "What's he doing here?"

"Who ever knows what Karrde's doing anywhere?" Moranda interred philosophically. "Why don't you come along and ask him yourself?"

Luke looked down through the guardwall at the city lights below. Once again, he'd managed to be in the right place at the right time. The Force was indeed with him. "Thank you," he said to Moranda. "I believe I will."

"Chief?"

Karrde looked up from his desk to find Dankin's head poking around the open office doorway. "Yes, what is it?"

"Savich and her Noghri guard are here," Dankin said. "She's got the data drop you wanted."

"Good," Karrde said, frowning slightly. Back when the Wild Karrde's bridge crew had been preparing to spring Booster Terrik's Errant Venture on the unsuspecting H'sishi, Dankin had been wearing a half-concealed grin. He was wearing the same grin now. "And?" Karrde prompted.

The grin came fully out of concealment "And they also brought you a surprise."

"Really," Karrde said, letting the temperature of his voice cool a couple of degrees. "I hope you remember hew much I like surprises."

"You'll like this one, Chief," Dankin a.s.sured him, stepping aside and gesturing.

Plakhmirakh and Moranda Savich emerged around the doorway and stepped into the office, the latter holding a data drop cylinder in her hand. And coming in behind them&mdash "Well, I'll be Kesseled," Karrde said, getting to his feet. "A pleasant surprise indeed.

h.e.l.lo, Skywalker."

"Karrde." Skywalker nodded in greeting. "I'm surprised to find you here."

"The feeling is mutual," Karrde agreed. "Are you alone?"

"Artoo's with me," Skywalker said, nodding back over his shoulder. "He spotted a GV9T repair droid working off your cargo bay and stopped for a chat."

"I hope he enjoys it," Karrde said, taking the cylinder from Moranda and glancing at its markings. "That's the last GV9T I'm ever going to buy. Any trouble, Moranda?"

"We were jumped on the way back," she told him. "Twelve men, very professional, no indications as to who they were working for."

"Probably one of the Hutts," Karrde said, turning the cylinder over in his hand. "They weren't exactly thrilled about losing this."

"Could be," Moranda said. Whoever they were, Plakhmirakh took care of them."

"With a.s.sistance from Master Skywalker," the Noghri added in his gravelly voice. "He arrived at exactly the proper moment."

"Jedi Masters have that knack," Karrde said dryly, handing the cylinder back to Moranda.

"Good. Take it to Odonnl, then you can go and relax in the crew lounge while he checks it out and issues your payment. Would you be interested in taking on another a.s.signment?"

"Only if it's more fun than courier work," Moranda said. "Apart from the attack, it was all rather boring." She waved a hand each toward Luke and Plakhmirakh. "And with these two around, even that part wasn't very exciting."

"I'll try to do better the next time," Karrde promised. "As a matter of fact, I have one job in particular where your talents might prove useful. Check back here after you've been paid and we'll talk, all right?"

"Fine," Moranda said, nodding. Plakhmirakh gave an abbreviated Noghri bow, and together they left the office.