Star Wars the Truce at Bakura - Kathy Tyers [69]
If the Ssi-ruuk didn’t take it away. He despised them on principle, even without the entechment complication. As a youth, he’d pursued two hobbies: alien parasitology and alien dentition. The Empire had quietly used both talents. Aliens were creatures to dissect or fight—not to ally with.
His aide snapped to attention several paces away from the southeast greenway’s central fountain. Nereus had issued strict orders that he was not to be disturbed, and he let the messenger wait. He’d come here to enjoy a few minutes’ peace, and by all the forces and balances that those idiots worshiped, he was going to have it.
He took another fruity bite and stared into the fountain’s heart, measuring the pleasant glow the candy gave him. He controlled his namana habit: nectar in the evenings only, and only two candy breaks a day, usually here by the fountain. Water leaped from a hundred sonic motivators in gravity-defying swirls, finally captured by Bakura and pulled into the turbulent blue pool.
The Empire could weather turbulence too. Nereus’s Imperial colleagues had made the galactic bureaucracy self-perpetuating; and employed by the Empire, Wilek Nereus would rise farther, grasp more authority, and wield more power than in any other system of government. Therefore, he would sell anyone and anything to keep the Empire on Bakura. The loss of another Death Star peeved him. Fear was his ultimate tool for keeping Bakura subdued.
Well, the natives were afraid now. Sighing, he turned to the aide. “It’s important, I trust.”
“Sir.” The aide saluted. “You have a personal message waiting on holo from the Ssi-ruuvi fleet.”
The Fluties had captured several Imperial ships since sending the Sibwarra recording, so now they had access to Imperial holonet. “Idiot,” Nereus snapped, “why didn’t you speak up? I’ll take it at my desk.”
The aide pulled a communicator from his belt to relay the reception order. Nereus marched up the greenway’s mossy path. Two uniformed guards held glass doors open at the corner of a long, artificially lit tunnel connecting this greenway with the other. Nereus strode sharply left, then left again through his personal staff’s station and into his broad-windowed private office.
On the holonet reception pad alongside his desk, a green light blinked. He straightened his collar and whisked one hand over the rank insignia on his chest to make sure they hadn’t picked up any passion-bud pollen, then swiveled his repulsor chair to face the transmission pickup. “Receive,” he told his desk. He curled his hands around his armrests. What did the Fluties want now?
A meter-high, translucent figure appeared over the reception grid: human, in striped white robes. “Governor Nereus.” The figure bowed at its waist. “Perhaps you remember me, I’m—”
“Dev Sibwarra,” Nereus growled. Now that was an alien parasite. “I know you as well as I want to. What joyful news do you have this time?”
Sibwarra shook his head. “Less joyful than before, I fear, but perhaps in the short run it will please you better. The mighty Ssi-ruuk, seeing your hesitancy to join the Imperium’s quest for galactic unity, to experience freedom from physical limitations—”
Nereus snatched a long ivory Llwelkyn tooth off a pile of flimsies. “Make your point.”
Sibwarra extended one palm. “Admiral Ivpikkis is willing to move our fleet out of your system, if you’ll grant us one boon.”
“Keep talking.” Nereus fingered the tooth’s serrated slashing edge. If the holo had been flesh, he could’ve sliced it just … so.…
“Among the new visitors in your system is a man named Skywalker. If you can hand him over to a special Ssi-ruuvi delegation, we will leave immediately.”
Nereus made a deprecating sound. “What do they want him for?”
Sibwarra cocked his head and squinted, looking reptilian. “We simply mean to rid you of an unpleasant presence.