Star Wars_ X-Wing 04_ The Bacta War - Michael A. Stackpole [43]
Wedge stood up behind his desk as Booster Terrik’s bulky form filled the doorway to the station manager’s office. “I appreciate your coming here so quickly, Booster. I know you wanted to spend some time with Mirax before she heads out.”
The older man shrugged. “She’s helping prep this Horn for his part in the mission. There’s only so much of him I can take.” Booster plopped himself down in a steel-frame canvas chair. “I think she took up with him to annoy me.”
Wedge laughed and sat back down. “I’m sure it does seem like that, but I think there’s a lot more there.”
“CorSec has always wanted to steal our women.”
Wedge arched an eyebrow in Booster’s direction. “You can impart whatever motives you want to Corran, but you know your daughter better than that, my friend.”
Booster frowned. “He’s using those Jedi sorceries to addle her mind.”
“The only person confused about his Jedi heritage is Corran.” Wedge shook his head. “Luke Skywalker has been transmitting material about the Jedi to him to keep alive the possibility that Corran will train to become a Jedi, but Corran’s a bit focused right now on getting at Isard and freeing her prisoners. He’s almost obsessive about it—a trait you know something about.”
Booster planted his massive hands on the arms of the chair. “If you want to scold me about disapproving of the man my daughter is seeing, the message is received. Anything else?”
“That wasn’t my intention—that would be like teaching a rancor to dance. It probably won’t work, you will get your head bitten off, and even if you do succeed, the result won’t be very pretty.” Wedge shivered. “Actually, I wanted to offer you the chance to pilot the Mimban Cloudrider on the run to Thyferra.”
Booster sat back and brushed the fingertips of his left hand over his chin. The Mimban Cloudrider was one of the Thyferran tankers. Wedge had pulled the crew from it and, with Booster’s help, had gotten identification files sliced together that listed Mirax, Corran, Elscol, Sixtus, and Iella Wessiri as the crew under various pseudonyms. Once in orbit at Thyferra, they could make planetfall in a shuttle and hook up with the Ashern. Wedge still needed someone to command the mission and thought Booster would be invaluable in that position because of his experience and instincts.
Booster lowered his left hand to the arm of the chair. “No.”
“No? You’ll be able to chaperone your daughter.”
“She can take care of herself.”
“You’ll get to pilot a ship again.”
Booster smiled and his body convulsed with silent laughter. “Closer, but still off the mark. The Cloudrider is too small. Too little to do.”
Wedge frowned. “Wait a minute. When I got my freighter and started hauling cargo, weren’t you the one who told me that being the master of my own ship and fate was the greatest thing to which I could aspire?”
Booster nodded and sat forward. “I did, but that was before Kessel. Five years in the spice mines changed me.”
“Five years spicing would change anyone.” Wedge frowned. “Don’t tell me Kessel broke your spirit, because I flat refuse to believe it.”
Booster’s booming laughter filled the office. “Broke me? It would take more than no air and lots of work to break Booster Terrik. The mines could be a brain cracker for a lot of folks, especially the pols the Empire tossed in there. Others of us were content to wait our time out. Fliry Vorru, for example, is very patient, which makes him very dangerous. We knew the Empire would never let him out, but he was confident he’d be out someday. I knew I would get out, but the time there still ground on me.”
The flesh around his eyes tightened, leaving the red light in his left eye burning like a laser in the darkness. “The time I spent in Kessel was unbelievably boring, Wedge. Monotony. Day after day the same things would happen with the same people. There was no night, no day, just shift after shift after shift. Prisoners might come