Star Wars_ X-Wing 06_ Iron Fist - Aaron Allston [42]
“No, sir. Thank you for letting me stay, sir.”
“I know all about the relative value of fresh news. Dismissed.”
When she was gone, Janson said, “I’ve got some of the mad painters unloading the Narra. We came back with some entertainment holos, some luxury holos, some more ID sets squeezed out of Intelligence, an interceptor simulator module for the TIE-fighter simulator, and that passive sensor set you wanted to monitor the Imperial base.”
“Good.”
“Is everything all right?”
Wedge nodded. “Just feeling my years. Speaking of which, I think I’ll get in some simulator practice and beat up on the youngsters.”
“That’ll make you feel better. It always does me.”
Wedge punched his personal code into the keypad located on the hatch of the TIE-fighter simulator. Instead of being located atop the ball-shaped cockpit, where the standard hatch was on real interceptors, the simulator hatch was at the cockpit’s stern, where the twin ion engines would normally be mounted.
The hatch swung open. Beyond, a shadowy figure pointed a blaster at Wedge. Wedge dropped out of reflex, rolled to the side, came up on his knees with his own blaster in hand.
But no enemy emerged to fire upon him. He kept his own aim on the hatch and reached for his comlink.
“Is there a problem, Commander?” That was Face, leaning unconcerned against the X-wing simulator only a few meters away.
“Get down, there’s a hostile in there—”
Face half ducked behind the corner of his simulator, then took another look. “I don’t think so, sir.” His mouth twitched, a partially successful effort to hide a smile.
Wedge rose and came forward, leaned out far enough for a quick peek into the simulator cockpit, then leaned in again for a longer look.
His intruder was an Ewok.
Not even a living Ewok. It was a stuffed toy the size and girth of a real Ewok, and designed to look just like one, but just a toy.
It was dressed in a scaled-down version of a New Republic fighter pilot’s uniform, down to the authentic-looking suit system control panel on his chest, helmet on his head, and blaster in his paw.
In his other paw was a datapad. Wedge retrieved it and looked at the message. It read:
Lieutenant Kettch reporting for duty, sir.
Yub, yub, Commander!
Wedge shook his head sorrowfully. “Sometimes I miss my sanity.” He retrieved the toy and handed it to Face. “Deal with that.”
Face, who was working so hard to repress a laugh that he couldn’t speak, simply threw a salute and escaped with the Ewok pilot.
“Transferred to Colonel Repness’s group?” Lara glanced again over her orders and feigned ignorance. “I don’t understand. I haven’t completed my basic training set in X-wings. I’m going to get advanced training now?”
The student leader of her own group, a redheaded man, barely out of boyhood, whom she could outfly on the worst day of her life if she weren’t shackled by the demands of the role she was playing, gave her a superior smile. “You don’t understand. Repness handles the remedials. Including you. Notsil, you’ve washed out. All Repness is, he’s a temporary reprieve for you. This time next week, you’re going to be an empty bunk.”
“Lowan, you’re a stain.”
“I’ll forget you said that. You’ll be tossed out of here fast enough without my putting you on report.”
Lara stared after him as he departed, and pictured a target painted on his back, a blaster in her own hand, and a sudden improvement in the average merit of this class of candidates.
But, no, that wouldn’t be appropriate. Better still to make her way to Zsinj’s company, return as a TIE-interceptor pilot, and flame Lowan in a dogfight.
Then again, what if she came up against Lussatte, who was also not her equal as a pilot but was not the blemish Lowan was? A simple matter to vape her … but Lara had the uneasy feeling that such