Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 08_ Ascension - Christie Golden [65]
“Crush the uprisings,” Daala said harshly. “Call it what it is.” She was done with the kind of metaphors and justifications she had used when speaking to Wynn and Nek.
“Fine by me. I like plain talk,” Fett said. “We’ve gotten some information from some of the slaves. But they can’t tell us what they don’t know. And most of them don’t know much.”
“It was underground before it became so high-profile,” Daala said. “Three beings can keep a secret if two of them are dead.” It was an old quote that many worlds claimed as theirs, and it was still brutally true.
“Or if they only know a little,” Fett continued. “It’s like a link in a chain. Each being could only implicate a handful of others, and none of those was anybody worth going after. Except one. A Minyavish had apparently discovered some things that linked Lecersen and a few other highly placed individuals to the Flight. We weren’t able to recover the actual physical evidence, or any other names, but he certainly sounded convincing about Lecersen.”
“Should I ask how you got this information?”
Fett shrugged. “You didn’t hire us to calm tempers with jeru tea and sweetcakes.”
“No, I didn’t,” Daala replied. “This is most enlightening. Things that made no sense whatsoever before suddenly have become quite plain.”
“Such as the attack on Admiral Bwua’tu.”
She gazed levelly at where his eyes would be, if she could see them. “Such as that, yes.”
Someone had gone to great lengths to implicate the Jedi in the assassination attempt on Nek, but had botched the job. “It also explains the attack on the Solos and Fel at the Pangalactus Restaurant.”
“You had no part in that?”
Her green eyes, thoughtful a second before, turned to jade ice. “Even if I wanted them dead, I wouldn’t put a child in the line of fire. There are other ways.”
Fett nodded, as if satisfied. “It all fits.”
Yes. It did all fit. Another troupe of players had come onstage, after lurking in the wings unobserved for so long.
“And so,” Fett said, “we have a common enemy, you and I, and we get to the issue of my payment.”
“I knew we’d get to that eventually. Proceed.”
“I’ve overheard some of your plans,” he said, “which you clearly didn’t mind or else you’d have declined when I offered you the use of my communications array. Sounds like you’ve got some pretty powerful contacts and a solid base of operations. I’m prepared to give you still more. Continued, if covert, use of my people and our technology. I want you safe and solid.”
“I’m touched, old friend,” she said, and there was actually a hint of sincerity in the words.
“Friendship is a part of it, I don’t deny that,” he said. “But once you’re safe and solid and the head of the Empire, you’ll be in a position to say thanks. And you can do that by finding a cure for this hut’u-unla nanovirus.”
One hand curled into a fist as he spoke. Slowly, he unclenched it and returned it to the controls.
Daala understood, and sympathized. No one, it appeared, was untouched by Darth Caedus’s treachery. Toward the end of the Second Galactic Civil War, the Moffs had created an airborne nanovirus that could be specifically tailored to a certain genetic code. It was first used in the Battle of Roche, where it targeted and killed only the Verpine soldier caste. Later, it was used to attack the Hapan royal house, causing the death of the young Chume’da, Allana, and ensuring Tenel Ka’s enduring hatred for the Moffs.
Another family would share that sentiment. Caedus had obtained a sample of the blood of Fett’s granddaughter, Mirta Gev. From that, the Moffs had attacked their next target—the Fett line. Fortunately for grandfather and granddaughter, neither had been on Mandalore at the time of the nanovirus’s release, but because of the nature and lengthy life of the concoction, Boba Fett