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Aves frowned. “You were going to sell him the Last Resort?”

“I only wanted to lease it from Karrde, provide him some retirement income.”

Karrde laughed. “As I recall, you don’t have any money.”

Booster’s head came up. “I’m not as liquid right now as I would like to be, but that is beside the point. Karrde told me the Last Resort was not available, but that the new commander might consider some sort of an arrangement. That’s why you brought Aves here, isn’t it, Karrde?”

“Oh, you thought …?” Karrde shook his head. “It’s the right answer for all the wrong reasons. This is what makes you dangerous, Booster.”

Mirax’s father nodded. “Don’t forget it.”

“Not likely.” Karrde reached out and took Mirax’s right hand in both of his. “I actually came to see you. I would never intrude on your grief, but I think I have some good news for you.”

Mirax rested her left hand on top of his and smiled. “Thank you.”

Karrde freed a hand and waved back at the Blastboat’s hatchway. Mirax heard a triumphant squeal, then tore her hands from Karrde’s and ran up the gangway. Dropping to her knees, she wrapped her arms around Whistler’s cylindrical body. She clung tightly to the droid, feeling the breeze caused by his dome spinning around.

She eased her hug open, then sat back on her haunches. “Whistler, you’re okay!” Another droid behind him hooted and she smiled at him, too. “Gate, you’ve survived!”

Karrde rested a hand on her shoulder. “Both of them are brimming with data, but a fair amount of operational secrecy is involved here. We might want to move to your father’s office.”

“Good idea.” Mirax stood and walked down the gangplank with Whistler. She kept her hand on his dome, relishing the coldness of his metal flesh. Even without word of Corran’s survival, she knew he lived. If he were dead, Whistler would have been destroyed along with him. If he were injured, Whistler never would have left him. The only way Whistler could be here is if Corran sent him, which means Corran’s alive. Same thing goes for Wedge and Gate, so I have to imagine that most of Rogue Squadron survived and is elsewhere.

The two droids, Booster, Aves, Karrde, and Mirax crowded into Booster’s small office. Booster took the chair behind the desk, leaving Aves and Karrde to shift debris from other chairs to the floor. Booster slid the holoprojector plate on his desk toward the forward edge and Whistler approached it with his datajack extended. Yet before he could plug himself in, a light on the projector’s comlink console blinked and Booster hit it.

“Booster here, this better be good.”

Iella’s head and shoulders appeared above the device. “Very good, Booster. I just had a message from General Cracken. He wants us on Coruscant as fast as possible. He didn’t say much, but I gather he has news about Wedge. I can’t believe it, but I gather Wedge and the others might be alive.”

Booster smiled. “I think you can believe it, Iella. Come down to my office and you’ll have more proof than you ever needed.”

29

General Airen Cracken pointed the remote at the holo-projector set up in the center of the New Republic Ruling Council’s private briefing room. The Councilors’ tables made a three-sided square and the projector had been set up at the open end of the formation. It had been oriented toward Chief Councilor Mon Mothma, so when Wedge Antilles’s image appeared, it looked straight at her.

“Admiral Ackbar, General Cracken, you have my sincere welcome. I apologize for any shock you feel at seeing me again. I am alive and on the day I recorded this message, Sienar Fleet Systems stock hit sixty-seven and seven-eighths on the Coruscant market, with twenty-three billion shares traded.

“Rogue Squadron survived the battle at Distna through the intervention of a group that has as much reason to hate Krennel as we do. They have offered their aid in destroying him and his Hegemony. Toward this end they have been training Rogue Squadron for a mission that will leave Ciutric