Star Wars Black Fleet Crisis 02 Shield of Lies Michael P Kube McDowell

[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

a smile. "Go right on in--she's in her conference room, reviewing last
week's Senate debate."
When he reached the doorway from the office to the conference room,
Ackbar hesitated. Leia was standing at the end of the room with her
back to him, hugging herself as she looked up at her holoviewer. The
image on the screen was of Senator Tuomi. His tone was earnestly
reasonable, his words subtly inflammatory.
"Is this door still open to me?" Ackbar's voice boomed in the confined
space.
Leia turned away from Tuomi only long enough to steal a look back over
her shoulder. "If you didn't have to shoot your way past Tarrick, then
the door's still open."
"I shall try to remember to take a cue from the presence of weapons in
the reception area."
Pausing the playback of the recording, Leia turned toward Ackbar. "Did
you really think you might not be welcome here?"
"We have not had a chance to talk since you returned, and we only spoke
once while you were away--a short and businesslike conversation, as I
recall," Ackbar said. "Before that--well, I am not sure that I would
have been included in the meeting the night of the pirate broadcast if
it had been convenient to exclude me. I have been afraid to try my key
again."
"Then you haven't seen Han, either? I told him to tell you it was
fixed. And here I thought it was me you were avoiding," Leia said,
coming to where he stood and hugging him. "I can't stay angry at you
for long. And besides--you're one of the few people I've told myself I
have to keep listening to, even when I am angry at you."
Patting Leia on the back with one large hand, Ackbar sighed. "That is
good to know."
"I've missed you," she said, easing out of the embrace.
"Anakin misses you. No one on the staff's caught sight of you for
days. What have you been up to?"
"I have been preoccupied," Ackbar said, and gestured toward the
viewer.
"Why are you bothering with this? It can't be pleasant to hear
yourself be talked about that way, and I cannot see the use of it."
Leia glanced back over her shoulder at Tuomi's face.
"I suppose I have a morbid curiosity about whether anything is
considered out of bounds."
"'Greed has no limits, envy no boundaries, in the heart of a petty
man." A favorite quote from Toklar, a much-quoted Mon Calamari
philosopher," Ackbar added.
"Was he also the one who said, 'Don't look back--something may be
gaining on you'?" Leia asked lightly.
"I do not believe so," Ackbar said. "But Toklar did write, 'One sting
is remembered longer than a thousand caresses." For every voice that
supported Tuomi's challenge, there were a hundred saying it was
foolish, unjust, and cruel. Listen to them instead."
"I'm not offended for myself," Leia said, pointing her controller at
the holoviewer and ending the projection.
"But it's hurtful to those of us who are left to hear Alderaan spoken
of that way. And it seems as though suddenly everyone's finding
reasons to object to my being here."
"People find what they look for," said Ackbar.
"Look to their motives, not their words."
"Tuomi says that his motive is justice," Leia said with a shrug.
"Alderaan is a nation of refugees, sixty thousand people with no
territory except for our embassies here and on Bonadan. Tuomi
represents five inhabited planets and nearly a billion citizens. Why
should Alderaan rule Bosch, he asks."
"But you do not lead us for Alderaan. You lead us for the New
Republic."
"In which Alderaan is a member only due to misguided pity, according to
Tuomi."
"Tuomi is an ignorant fingerling," Ackbar said with sharp contempt.
"Alderaan's membership is neither a courtesy nor a violation of the
Charter. The New Republic is an alliance of peoples, not planets."
Leia nodded an acknowledgment. "Something often forgotten, even
here."
"Then I will presume to remind you that the structure of the New
Republic was crafted to avoid dominance by the most populous worlds--to
prevent what Kerrithrarr called a tyranny of fecundity," Ackbar said.
Leia laughed tersely, tossing her hair. "I remember that argument."
"Perhaps you remember another quote I am fond of," Ackbar said.
"'Today, we become a galactic family--a family of the great and the
small, the young and the old, with honor to all and favor to none.""
Leia recognized the words from her own Restoration Day address.
"That's cheating."
"I trust you still believe what you said then."
"Of course I do."
"Then it does not matter if Alderaan now means sixty thousand, or six
hundred, or six."
"No," agreed Leia. "The exact number matters only to the assessors and
accountants. Our claim to membership is valid, and just, and
moral--regardless."
"I am glad to hear you say that," Ackbar said, and dug into a large
flap pocket in his belt. "I have brought something here for your
endorsement." He unfolded a single sheet of pale blue document vellum
and handed it to her. "That is an emergency petition for membership
for Polneye, offered by its representative on Coruscant."
Leia eyed Ackbar questioningly as she circled the table toward the
window. "I think I've been manipulated."
"This claim, too, is valid, and just, and moral--regardless."
"Is there any reason at all to think that anyone else on Polneye
survived the Yevethan assault?"
"There is no evidence either way," said Ackbar.
"Why does it matter?"
"If Plat Mallar wants to sit in the Senate--" "Plat Mallar wants to sit
in the cockpit of a fighter.
The Senate seat for Polneye will remain vacant, unless other survivors
are found--as a reminder."
"I see your handprints all over this, Ackbar."
"I am trying to help the boy," Ackbar admitted.
"But he has his own mind."
"Let me ask a different question," Leia said. "Have you made him aware
of the offer from Jobath of Galantos, for sanctuary and membership in
the Fia?"
"Plat has spoken with Jobath."
"And?"
"In the days after Alderaan was destroyed, how would you have looked on
an invitation to become a citizen of Lafra or Ithor?"
Leia placed the vellum on the table and bowed her head, pressing her
palms together and touching her fingertips to her mouth. "I'm being
roundly criticized already for the applications I approved when I came
back."
"If that's so, then one more can hardly make any difference," said
Ackbar. "But it will make all the difference in the world to the
Polneya. And I must add thisfor whatever it may be worth to you, I was
proud of you for what you did."
Frowning, Leia leaned forward and rested her hands on either side of
the document as she studied it intently.
"You know," she said slowly, "I felt pretty good about it, too." She
keyed her comlink with the remote.
"Alole--bring me an endorsement tablet, please. Admiral Ackbar has
called my attention to an application that was overlooked." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

Podstrony