Star Wars: Scourge (10 page)

And, Mander thought as their ship limped into one of the stern landing bays, it was probably the jewel of its commander’s eye.

They were met by a squad of CSA security, headed up by a young IRD pilot with sharp features and a stern expression. His uniform, visible beneath his flight suit, was pressed to perfection. Even before he opened his mouth, Mander knew that this was the owner of the voice they had heard on the transceiver. They were this pilot’s trophy, and he would only hand them over in the presence of a superior officer.

“Lieutenant Orrell Lockerbee, Corporate Sector Authority ship
Resolute
,” he said, and if he had clicked his heels Mander would not have been surprised.

“Mander Zuma of the new Jedi Order,” said Mander.

“My companions Reen Irana and Eddey Be’ray. We appreciate your help back there.”

The young flight officer scowled in the textbook-approved imitation of displeasure. “Your ship should not have been present in the system. We are under quarantine interdict.”

“We are aware of the situation and are on a mercy mission,” said Mander. He felt tempted to put a bit of the Force into the words, but resisted. “I presume you will present us to your commanding officer.”

The flight officer stammered for a moment, the Jedi taking the next line of his carefully crafted speech away from him. Then his frown deepened and he said, “This way, please.”

“A moment,” said Reen. “The ship’s taken some hard knocks, and Eddey and I should start repairs immediately.”

Mander looked at her and raised an eyebrow. She had practically insisted on meeting with the Hutts back on Makem Te, but was now passing on meeting with the Corporate Authority. “Very well,” he said, but the Bothan was already examining the long gouges in the side of the
New Ambition
, shaking his maned head. Mander motioned for the pilot to proceed. Two security officers fell in behind the Jedi, while the others stationed themselves at the dock exits. As he walked, the flight officer punched information into his wrist datapad. Mander knew there would be little small talk.

The interior of the CSA ship was spotless, of course, the halls patrolled by mouse droids searching for any speck of dust or hint of the untidy. There was no doubt that this was a warship, though—distant klaxons sounded for drills, speakers belched out muddled Basic, and the personnel—all neatly uniformed and used to sudden inspections—moved about with purpose. No one gave
a robed Jedi following an officer fresh off the flight deck a second look.

Three long hallways and a turbolift later, Mander was ushered into the command conference deck. The room was spacious but neatly appointed, with only a few personal items hanging on the wall. A holo-chess set, one of the few additions that showed a personal touch, idled along one wall, its creatures repeating themselves in looping animations. An impressive readout desk was parked in front of the viewport, three chairs set up in front of it. The commanding officer faced away from them, staring out the viewport at the planet below. The planet was a swirl of reddish brown clouds, but a major storm blazed like a white scar across its northern hemisphere.

“Lieutenant Orrel Lockerbee reporting, Commander,” said the flight officer, saluting, and Mander was sure this time his heels clicked. “I’ve brought the Jedi from the surviving vessel.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” said the commanding officer, and turned to regard them both. She was a tall young woman, her blood-red hair pulled back in a stern bun. Her uniform was regulation issue, but its creases were pressed to vibroknife-edge sharpness. This one had risen far and fast in the meritocracy of the Corporate Sector, Mander thought, and wondered if this was a first command for a capital ship. She pressed the glowing symbols on the translucent desktop and said, “The other vessel?”

“A Ghtroc Seven-twenty light freighter, retrofitted as a raider,” responded the flight officer. “It was destroyed in the engagement.”

“It belonged to the Bomu clan, if that helps,” said Mander. “Rodians. I don’t suppose there were any survivors to question?”

The commanding officer gave Mander a stern look,
then said, “Good job, Lieutenant. That will be all.” Lockerbee saluted again and retreated. Mander wondered if they had done a time study to calculate how much profitable work was lost due to saluting, and if the commensurate increase in better discipline merited it. Knowing the CSA, someone probably had.

“Lieutenant Commander Angela Krin,” said the officer, “in command of the CSA ship
Resolute
, and overseeing the quarantine on Endregaad.”

“Mander Zuma of the new Jedi Order,” responded Mander, hands folded patiently in front of him. “My companions are currently checking out the damage to our ship. We would like to thank you and your pilots for the timely rescue out there.”

“You were lucky,” said the commander. “We don’t run as many deep patrols as I would like.”

“Fortune favors the prepared,” said the Jedi. “We were aware of the situation on Endregaad, and trusted that if we had difficulty, your well-organized and well-equipped forces would be able to come to our aid.”

The corner of Commander Krin’s mouth tugged slightly in what Mander could only ascribe to bemusement. She motioned for the Jedi to take one of the seats, and settled herself down across the table from him. “If you are aware of the situation on the planet, then you know that the CSA is not allowing anything on or off that rock until the disease is under control.”

“Have you had any problems?” asked the Jedi.

“Early on, there were a number of attempts to get off the planet. Fortunately, there weren’t a lot of vessels present at the time. Ships were intercepted, disabled, and impounded. There were a few spacers with pressing business, too, but as word spread of the interdict, that trailed off as well.”

“And raiders like the Bomu clan trying to pick off
ships coming in-system.” Mander let his voice trail off. “Endregaad is more dangerous than I had presumed.”

“Yet you came here in any event.”

Mander nodded. “A mission of mercy, as I told your officer.”

Angela Krin pushed a few glowing squares on her desk. Their arrangement made Mander think of the holo-chess board. “We don’t have your ship on any of our registries,” she said.

“It is new,” said Mander. “Maiden voyage. More of a trial by fire, it turned out.”

Again, the tug at the corner of her lips. Mander could imagine, in another circumstance, she would have a pretty laugh. “Indeed. You are far from Yavin Four, Jedi. Why is the Order interested in Endregaad?”

“They aren’t,” said Mander, and Angela Krin’s neat eyebrows rose in surprise. “Or rather, they are not any more or less interested in Endregaad than in any other planet. I am here on behalf of Popara of the Anjiliac clan of the Hutts. They provided the ship. I hired the crew.”

Lieutenant Commander Krin’s jawline tightened and her brow furrowed at the mention of Popara’s name. “The Hutts, then. That’s a surprise. You’re working for them?”

“With them,” said Mander. “And you know why Popara is interested in Endregaad. His son is somewhere on the surface.”

“I know,” said the commander, and she slumped a bit in her chair. “I have received
numerous
requests as to his status, ranging from the demanding to the insulting. I will tell you what I told them: I have no information of this Hutt, and no spare resources to find him. Not with a planet already weakened by the plague. I am afraid you came all this way for nothing. The Hutts wasted your time—and mine.”

“It was not something I could turn away from, regardless of its likely outcome,” said Mander.

“Now, about your cargo …,” began the commander, leaning forward and tapping a few symbols on her desk.

“It is yours,” said Mander, simply.

Again, Krin was surprised, but tried not to show it. “We have to confiscate it.”

“No you don’t, since I just gave it to you,” said the Jedi. “You and your organization are better established to distribute the medicinal spice than three people in a damaged freighter. I assume you can add it to your own supplies.”

Angela Krin smiled now, a sad smile of someone who has been dealing with her own bureaucracy. Mander saw it at once: there were no additional supplies, at least not yet. “Help is on the way,” she said.

“And some of it is here, now,” said Mander. “With the heartfelt wishes of Popara Anjiliac, and with the hope of creating a lasting trust in these trying times.”

The commanding officer ran a slender finger over the glyph-dotted desktop. After a moment, she said simply, “I can’t let you land on Endregaad.”

“I understand. We will conduct what investigations we can from here.” Mander tilted his head slightly and smiled.

“We can provide some support, in particular in repairing your ship. Payment in kind for your … donated spice.”

“That is greatly appreciated,” said Mander. “If we are fortunate, perhaps we can find Mika Anjiliac before we have to return.”

Angela Krin smiled now in agreement. “We will do what we can. Would you and your crew be interested in joining me for mess this evening?”

“I would love to,” said Mander, “but I will have to ask the others.”

*  *  *

“You did
what
?” said Reen, her face flushing to a richer blue, her bruised eye taking on a violet hue. They were standing in the crew lounge of the
New Ambition
. Eddey had one of the gyros disassembled on the table and was going over it with a fine-tipped vibro-pick, pulling away the worst of the scorched metal.

“I gave her the spice,” said Mander. “After all, that is one of the reasons we came here—to help relieve the plague.”

“That was our only bargaining chip!” said Reen, “And you gave it away at the very start!”

“It was not as if they would let us keep it,” noted Mander. He had returned to the docking bay to find that Reen Irana was already in a tense standoff with Lieutenant Lockerbee and the security squad. She was adamant about not letting the CSA on board her ship, and only relented when Mander gave the approval to off-load the cargo. Polite security team members cleaned out the cargo in record time and retreated to their positions at the doors.

“They also have been more helpful in giving us supplies and equipment,” said Eddey, slipping on his data goggles and grimacing at the readout. “I think you sufficiently convinced the commanding officer that we are not raiders ourselves.”

“Did you Voice her?” asked Reen.

“ ‘Voice’ her?” replied Mander, looking perplexed.

“You know.
Voice
her. Jedi Hoodoo. Mind tricks.” She made a theatrical wave of her hand. “Tell her
You want to let us land on the planet
or something like that. And then she agrees and we go off.”

“Did Toro tell you we can do that?” asked Mander.

“I saw it in the holofilms,” said Reen.

“She watches too many of those,” Eddey put in.

“It doesn’t work quite like that,” said Mander.

“So it’s a myth,” said Reen. “Jedi can’t do that.”

“It is no myth,” said Mander with a sigh. “But it is not as easy as you portray it.”

“So you can’t change people’s minds,” Reen pressed.

“We can,” said Mander patiently, “but there are consequences. A person’s mind will be changed, and their immediate actions will be influenced, but it has a long-term effect as well. If it is as simple as getting past a guard or encouraging someone to share information, the damage is minimal. The guard will probably not think about the situation again, or will blame it on a lapse of attention or judgment. We use it to avoid fights or gain information. But when you try to move someone to do something they don’t honestly want to do, they rebel.”

“And they won’t do it,” said Reen.

“Worse,” said Mander, “
they will
. And then the effect will spiral further, as they unconsciously seek to justify those actions to themselves. And that is hard on a lot of people’s minds. It is like an avalanche started from small stones. Your very presence bothers them, since something went wrong when you last saw them. Sometimes using it again against a target will remind them they have been subject to the effect previously, with unpleasant consequences. The Jedi seek not to do damage, so we use the ‘mind tricks’—as you call them—only sparingly, and usually on individuals we don’t think we’re going to encounter again. We don’t know how long we’re going to be here, so no, I did not ‘Voice’ her.”

“Does it feel like anything?” pressed Reen. “Would the person know if it had happened?”

“If you’re asking if I have used it on you, the answer is again no, for all the reasons I previously mentioned,” said Mander. “Free will, for all its problems, is easier to work with. When it is attempted—and yes, Jedi are trained to resist this sort of thing—it feels like a pressure
against your mind, like a wave passing over you. An impulse, a strong desire, a random thought. And if you are subject to it, when the wave passes, you have little knowledge that it struck in the first place.”

Reen looked at him long and hard and said, “So what you’re saying is that you didn’t Voice her.”

Mander let out a deep sigh. “And on that note, you are invited to the commander’s table for dinner.” He gave her a smile.

Reen did not return it. “No.”

Mander blinked. “No? Any reason?”

“I don’t like the Corporates,” she said.

“You didn’t like the Hutts, either,” Mander said, “but it did not stop you from meeting with Popara.”

“That’s different,” said Reen. “The Hutts are treacherous, but you can count on them to be treacherous. The Corporate Sector is completely by the book, and when they feel they are right, according to that book, there is no stopping them. One of the reasons I was keeping them off the ship was to give Eddey a chance to pull the navigation unit offline. I didn’t want their slicers getting the coordinates for the Indrexu Spiral.”

“Before we get a chance to sell them,” added the Bothan.

“But you managed that, and they are none the wiser,” Mander said. “So you should come to dinner with our gracious hosts.”

Reen shook her head. “We need to get the ship back together and out of here.”