Star Wars_ Coruscant Nights 01_ Jedi Twilight - Michael Reaves [67]
He wished Barriss Offee were here. She had been everything his concept of a Jedi called for: courageous, compassionate, strong, and kind. He wondered what had happened to her. He hoped she’d somehow managed to escape the massacre.
He doubted it, however. From everything he’d heard, the Jedi had been pretty much exterminated. And if Jax Pavan was indeed the last Jedi in the galaxy, he was a poor representative of the Order’s past glory.
And that “Shorty” remark didn’t gain you any points, either, friend …
* * *
“You’re moody,” Laranth said.
Jax stood on the edge of a small blast crater, one of thousands that bore grim testament to the Separatists’ saturation bombing of Coruscant. The fused surface of the concavity was glossy black. From it, his own reflection, warped and distorted, looked back at him.
“Look who’s talking. Or who’s not, usually. You’re calling me moody?”
She ignored that. “That’s a strange droid,” she said. “All that chatter about its being ‘friends’ with your father—”
“My parents left me with the Temple because I had the potential to be a Jedi. I’m sure it was an agonizing decision for them, but they made it for the greater good. I admire them for that, but I don’t wish to know anything further about them. Anything else is secondary to their sacrifice.”
Laranth raised an eyebrow. “What about that line about your father being a hero and trying to save the Republic?”
Jax shrugged. “Why should I believe a droid?”
“Why would it lie?”
“Maybe because it was programmed to. It’s a droid, after all. And speaking of droids, we’ve got more pressing matters to attend to, such as fulfilling Master Piell’s last request by finding the other droid—you know, the important one—before Vader and now Rokko, too, probably, find it first.”
Laranth looked over his shoulder, back down the street. “They’re coming,” she said.
As the droid and the Sullustan approached, Jax focused his attention on the latter. He smiled. “I’m sorry about powering your droid down back there,” he said. He held out his hand. “My name’s—”
“I already know your name,” the Sullustan interrupted, ignoring Jax’s outstretched hand. “And it isn’t me you owe an apology to. It’s him.” He aimed a thumb over his shoulder at the droid behind him.
Jax frowned, perplexed. “Apologize? To your droid?”
The Sullustan rolled his eyes—which was quite impressive, given their size. “He’s not my droid. He’s his own master. Once you’ve hammered that into your head, we’ll all get along a lot better.”
Jax blinked in surprise. Once again, he was certain he’d heard wrong, and once again, it was apparent that he hadn’t. He glanced at Laranth, standing behind him. Even she looked slightly confused.
“No apology is necessary,” the droid said, somewhat stiffly. “I overstepped my bounds. I forgot that Jedi Pavan would have no way of knowing about the unique arrangement between his father and me. It is I who should apologize.”
The Sullustan turned and stared at the droid. “Excuse me? You’re just going to let this go?”
“I am a droid, Den Dhur,” I-Five said. “I’m not programmed to take offense.”
Jax noticed that the droid’s voice was much more artificial and stilted than when it had first spoken to him. Also, its face was an expressionless metal mask again.
The Sullustan wasn’t pacified. “Don’t worry. I take offense enough for us both.”
Jax was getting tired of this. Fortunately, he knew an easy way to get him and Laranth out of the situation. It wouldn’t work on the droid, of course, but the Sullustan should be easily susceptible. And even if the droid did feel some sort of bizarre claim to sentience and refused to listen to its companion—well, it was easy enough to power it down again.
“It’s best if we all go our own ways,” he said in a soothing tone while he made the mesmerizing gestures of the mental snare that had so often gotten him out of ticklish situations since