Star Wars_ X-Wing 04_ The Bacta War - Michael A. Stackpole [7]
“I’d not go that far, Pash.” Wedge shared a grin with Tycho. “You are good, very good. The Imps have every right to fear you.”
“Thanks, Wedge. It means a lot coming from you.” The pilot brushed fingers back through his red hair. “As for my being comfortable returning to my unit, yeah, I’m okay there, too. One thing being with Rogue Squadron taught me is that to be a unit, everyone has to pull their own weight. I’ve been afraid that my people wouldn’t think for themselves and would follow me into disaster if I make a mistake. What I’d missed is exactly what you do. You give your people responsibilities and make them rely on each other. If we’d just followed your lead while on Coruscant, the Imps would still own this world. I need to do just that with my people. If I give them responsibility, they’ll learn that I trust them. Once they realize that, they’ll also trust in themselves and won’t follow me blindly when I do something stupid.”
Wedge stood and offered Pash his hand. “You’ll be sorely missed, Captain Cracken, but our loss is your unit’s gain. We’ll see you soon at the Yag’Dhul station.”
“Thanks, Wedge, Tycho. I look forward to seeing you there.”
The door closed behind Pash, prompting Wedge and Tycho to exchange glances again. “Well, Tycho, it seems our housing problem is solved. Now all we need is a dozen or more X-wings, munitions for same, droids, techs, foodstuffs, and other supplies, not to mention all the equipment necessary to repair any damage to our new base.”
Tycho winced. “That’s quite the tall order. Dare I say it?”
“What?”
“I wish we had Emtrey to help us put this whole package together.”
Wedge smiled as he thought of the black 3PO droid with a spaceport controller droid’s clamshell head. Installed as the unit’s Quartermaster, the droid had really been meant to keep an eye on Tycho in case he was a spy in the Empire’s control. Despite his espionage duties, he had been a wonder at procuring supplies in a timely manner. Even so, he could be annoyingly voluble, which is why Wedge spent as much time as possible away from him.
Wedge sighed. “Yeah, I guess I miss him, too.” He shrugged. “In his absence, I guess we’ll just have to do the best we can.”
“True, and hope that’s going to be good enough.”
3
His move to Thyferra left Fliry Vorru in a perpetual state of simmering anger. After years spent in the spice mines of Kessel, with its thin, arid atmosphere, and then his short stay on Coruscant—similarly dry but decidedly more metropolitan and to his tastes—Thyferra was all but unendurable. Green predominated, from the deep and dark tones of the tropical planet’s rain forests to the lighter shades used in decorating, fashion, and even cosmetics. After Kessel’s barren mines and the gray canyons of Coruscant, Vorru found the omnipresence of verdant life oppressive.
The world’s humidity dragged on him as he walked the halls of the Xucphra corporate headquarters. One does not breathe the air here, one drinks it. The heavy humidity meant most of the fabric used on the world was light and thin, in many cases quite sheer, while the fashions themselves tended to be abbreviated. Although this did offer some distractions—for the women of Thyferra tended strongly toward tall, lean, and beautiful—many of the people he had to deal with were short, hairy, lumpen creatures who should have been swathed in bolts of the most opaque cloth available. Their positions as the scions of the various families that ran the Xucphra corporation and, now, the civil government, required him to be polite and even deferential.
This requirement to courteously entertain the most stupid of ideas ground on him most of all. Under the Empire’s rule, the Xucphra and Zaltin corporations had been given a monopoly on the production of bacta. Thyferra served as the heart of the operation, with alazhi harvesting and kavam synthesis taking place primarily on Thyferra, but also at a few colony worlds elsewhere.