Star Wars_ MedStar 02_ Jedi Healer - Michael Reaves [31]
“Tell me, if you actually had a chance to meet Count Dooku, face to face, and you had it within your power to kill him—would you?”
He reflected on that for what seemed a long time. Barriss could hear the rhurp-rhurp of the nearby croaker bushes, the high, thin buzzing of fire gnats swarming around her, the leathery slap of an Ishi Tib’s bare feet striding through a nearby mud puddle.
“Probably not,” Uli said.
“There you are.”
“But I’m not certain I wouldn’t. After all, he’s been directly or indirectly responsible for planetary genocide, the destruction of things like the Museum of Light on Tandis Four…”
“This is true. On the other hand…are you familiar with the Vissëncant Variations, by Bann Shoosha?”
He nodded. “Less than two years old, and already considered one of the great musical works of the millennium.”
“They were a great favorite of Zan Yant’s. The music was written to celebrate the Shoosha family’s escape from Brentaal. Had that battle not taken place,” Barriss said, “the Variations might never have existed.”
Uli looked troubled. “But is any work of art worth thousands of lives?”
“Probably not. I’m not saying it is—I’m just saying things aren’t simple. That’s really what it’s all about, isn’t it? Making choices and living with the consequences?”
“I guess…” He still sounded doubtful.
Barriss relit her lightsaber. “Well,” she said to Uli, as she resumed her practice, “that’s all we’ve got.”
12
Seated near the top row of the hastily constructed bleachers, Jos, Den, and Uli, along with several others of the trauma team, watched as various species filled the rest of the seats rapidly. It was evening, and the short tropical twilight was rapidly darkening into night. The area was lit, brilliantly but without glare or shadows, by powerful full-spectrum LEDs. Doctors, nurses, assistants, techs, workers, and other Rimsoo staff personnel had one set of staggered plasticast row seating for themselves, while the troopers and other enlisted personnel occupied two others.
Uli watched as the clones filled the rows, dozens of identical faces and forms. “It’s one thing to see them one at a time on repulsor gurneys,” he commented to Jos. “But all lined up like that… well, it’s pretty remarkable. Like they came out of a holoduplicator.”
Jos nodded without comment. He, too, was watching the clones. They sat next to each other, laughing, chatting, some boisterous and outgoing, others quieter, more preoccupied. He could see no real difference in their behavior from that of a group of soldiers anywhere in the galaxy who were anticipating being entertained for a couple of hours. True, many were eerily alike in their mannerisms and gestures, and they also had little reticence in sharing drinks or bags of cracknuts, but such behavior, he knew, was common among monozygotic twins as well. Still, identical whorls of DNA did not necessarily mean identical personalities, even if those personalities had been geared toward certain similarities since birth—or decanting, in the clones’ case.
Jos bit his lip thoughtfully. He knew now that he had come to think of the troopers as being interchangeable mostly because their organs were—because transplantation could be performed without the need to pump them full of immunosuppressants to prevent rejection syndrome. Klo Merit had been right: his training as a surgeon, however benevolent its intention, had conditioned him to look upon the vat-born as less than human. Now that he knew the truth, he wondered how he ever could have seen them any other way.
The bleachers were full now, with some latecomers sitting on the ground. There was no structure on the base big enough to hold the troupe of entertainers, so a half-rotunda stage had been set up in the large center compound. Now, abruptly,