Star Wars the Truce at Bakura - Kathy Tyers [68]
“Really.”
Maybe Captison did know. Maybe he’d cultivated Commander Pter Thanas. “At any rate, here are the droids I offered. May we try translating whatever you have?”
“I’m not fond of droids,” Captison said drily. “But at this point I’m willing to use them, if there’s a chance they could help.”
She shot at Threepio with the Owner. It whirred softly.
As if he’d never been silenced, Threepio chimed in. “I am fluent in over six million forms of communication, sir.”
Leia had heard that sentence so many times she’d forgotten how impressive it was. Captison’s sudden interest reminded her. “That’s right, Your Highness said so over dinner.” He touched a panel on his desktop console. “Zilpha, key in those ship-to-ship recordings we picked up from the Fluties.” He leaned back in his chair and explained, “We’ve got plenty of their chatter. Sounds like a flock of birds—great big ugly ones, with deep voices.”
“Well, if anyone’s good at talking, it’s our Goldenrod.” Han rapped Threepio’s metal shoulder.
Threepio’s head whipped toward him. “Thank you, General Solo!”
A light changed color beside Captison’s elbow. “Here we go. Have your droid listen to this.”
“You can talk to him directly,” Leia put in. “His full designation is See-Three-Pee-Oh, and he answers to Threepio.”
“All right,” said Captison. “Listen, Threepio. Tell me what they’re saying.”
The console emitted a series of whistles, clicks, and grunts, some as high as an alto voice, and others eerily basslike. The “Flutie” played a very large instrument. As Leia listened, she stared around Captison’s office. His dual windows looked down on a round park scattered with stone figures. Bordering the clear window panels, tall leafy trees with straight trunks had been executed in three-dimensional colored glass. Namana trees, she guessed.
Threepio’s head cocked. He shook it. “I am sorry, Prime Minister, but I can make nothing of it. It is entirely outside my comprehension. I have been in service for many years, and I can communicate in every language ever used within Republican or Imperial space.”
“Our Fluties are from outside Republican and Imperial space,” Captison declared. “I believe that was mentioned.”
Han rubbed his chin. Leia couldn’t think what to say.
From behind her came a whistling echo. Startled, she spun around. Artoo stood his place in a wood-paneled corner, warbling what seemed to be a perfect imitation of Prime Minister Captison’s recording.
“Threepio,” she said when Artoo finished, “wasn’t that exactly how the Ssi-ruuk sounded?”
“No,” Threepio answered firmly. “He missed one note by a full four vibrations.”
Artoo honked.
“Soak your own transistors,” Threepio retorted. “I won’t stand for that language.”
Captison raised a white eyebrow. “It can duplicate them that closely?”
“I wouldn’t doubt Artoo, though it never occurred to me that he’d be able to do that,” Leia admitted. “Sir, I’m certain that given enough time and recordings, Threepio could make a solid effort at decoding that language.”
“If he can,” Captison said, pointing at the little blue-domed droid, “we’ve got a native speaker if we need one. Take your metal friends to my aide’s office. Zilpha will set them up with enough recordings to keep them busy well into tomorrow night.”
Governor Wilek Nereus bit the end off a namana twist and chewed thoughtfully. In this cool greenway lined with tall fern trees and passion-bud vines, he could momentarily ignore the menace surrounding Bakura and ponder his own career. With both Palpatine and Vader dead, the Rebel Alliance—downtalked so disdainfully on all official communiqués—became rather more of a threat.
Still, all odds favored the Empire, and he had two high Rebel leaders within striking distance. He could weaken the Alliance substantially.
He thrust the distraction aside. Strolling down the greenway, he returned to his original thought path. Someone new would undoubtedly spring onto the Imperial throne. Nereus would’ve cautiously evaluated the risk of attempting that leap himself, except that this far out