Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 21_ The Unifying Force - James Luceno [230]
“Warmaster,” Jakan cut him off. “Hold your reply until all has been laid before you.”
“Great things are still expected of you,” Harrar added.
Nas Choka glared at the priest. “This from a defector.”
Harrar made no effort to parry the accusation. “What I did, Warmaster, I did for all of us.”
Nas Choka made a chopping motion with his right hand. “I no longer wear that title, priest. If we are neither to be executed nor enslaved, what would the Alliance do with us? This bold new order holds no place for the warrior caste.” He turned to Skywalker. “The Jeedai are warriors. What will you do without war?”
Skywalker rose from his chair. “From the start you’ve mistaken us for warriors, when we are nothing more than the guardians of peace and justice. You could be that, as well, Nas Choka. Though it would require that you adapt your battle traditions to a new form.” He held up his lightsaber and ignited the blade. “This was once a weapon.”
Nas Choka laughed ruefully. “Thousands of my warriors would willingly attest to the fact that it is a weapon still.”
Skywalker acknowledged the remark with a nod. “In peaceful times it is only a symbol of the fight we wage with ourselves—to keep us from taking the wrong path.”
Nas Choka lifted his chin. “We have always acted in accord with the warrior decree.”
“We accept that,” Skywalker said. “But you’re going to have to learn to do without many of the biots that defined you as warriors.”
“Name them, Jeedai.”
“Your amphistaffs and coufees, your blorash and firejelly, your thud bugs, razor bugs, and plasma eels, your vessels and war coordinators …”
“In exchange for what—digging implements and plows?”
“That remains to be decided by your custodian.”
Nas Choka scanned the officers and officials. “Who is that to be?”
“Zonama Sekot,” Skywalker said.
Nas Choka stared at him in alarm. “You would surrender us to our true enemy! The living world we tried to poison! The world where our amphistaffs slither away, our thud bugs take flight, our villips and dovin basals turn to fruit … And yet you deny that we will be executed! Send us instead back to the intergalactic void, where we can at least die with dignity!”
“Perhaps our biots have something to teach us,” Harrar said. “If they can overcome their conditioning, perhaps the warriors can.”
“Words!” Nas Choka snapped. “Because the priests, shapers, and intendants have nothing to lose by imprisonment on the living world.”
“We lose more than you know, Nas Choka,” Harrar said sadly.
“We honor a tradition that cannot be altered!”
Harrar stepped from behind the table to approach. “You honor a much older tradition, Warmaster. One that began on the planet that was parent to Zonama Sekot.”
“Parent?”
“Zonama Sekot is our world, Warmaster. It is Yuuzhan’tar.”
Nas Choka threw his head back and bellowed at the ceiling. “Then we are truly defeated!” He looked at Harrar again. “Was all this due to Shimrra, priest? Were our wanderings nothing more than a ruse to return us to the world from which we were cast?”
“Only the gods can answer that.”
Nas Choka narrowed his eyes. “Do the gods reside there?”
“In the sense that Zonama Sekot incorporates all aspects of Yun-Yuuzhan, Yun-Ne’Shel, Yun-Shuno …”
“You make no mention of Yun-Yammka.”
“That one we concocted,” Harrar said, “when we turned to war.”
Nas Choka snorted in disdain. “I thought as much. You’ve been deceived, priest. The Shamed Ones proclaimed that the Jeedai incorporated all aspects of the gods, and clearly they are not gods.” He allowed his words to trail off, then said in a more controlled voice, “On these matters, I speak only for myself. We are the defeated. Do with us what you will. But tell me, Jeedai, is our imprisonment to endure in the shadow of your Coruscant, as a constant reminder of our failure?”
Skywalker shook his head. “Zonama Sekot has no desire to remain in known space, risking reverence, exploitation, or both. Zonama Sekot will return