Aftermath: Empire's End (Star Wars: Aftermath #3)(73)

In a ship.

He blurts it out: “They could be in a ship.”

He watches the realization cross Solo’s face. “Right. Right! Dor Wieedo’s ship was gone from the docking bay.”

“That’s where they are. But they must be close. In orbit.”

Solo grins. “Let’s take the Falcon for a spin.”

—

Tolwar Wartol spends his time ricocheting between periods of brooding, simmering silence and moments of rage against her. In those latter times he stands and marches about and threatens to destroy her in the media for what he calls her “nasty tricks,” playing games as she does with the political process.

Mon simply sits still and quiet, occasionally reminding Wartol that he is free to talk to the media if he so chooses. “I’m sure HoloNet would be very interested in a story where your entire political mechanism was held hostage by one woman and a small fruit.”

He rages, then sits, then goes quiet once more.

On the outside, she is a calm fa?ade—an undisturbed Chandrilan lake, placid and unbroken. Inside she is tumult and tumble. She knows time is fast escaping. Her delay will not work forever.

The Nakadian inspectors come aboard, clothed in thick bubble-suits with aerator masks. They do a slow and steady sweep of the ship, both outside and inside. Wartol, to his credit, is polite even if his anger ripples just beneath the surface. He does not berate them; he does not chide them to hurry. The inspectors sweep handheld scanners across all the nooks and crannies of the cruiser—an emerald beam searching for further contaminants. The chief inspector, a woman named Rekya, explains to them in great detail how Nakadia is a protected environment that takes great care to balance its ecosystem and keep out invasive species—and she reminds them, if a bit testily, how all the Senate should have received messages in their personal digital folders reminding them of exactly this. “Democracy grinds to a halt when protocol is broken,” Rekya tells them. “And believe me when I tell you, protocol has been broken.”

All the while, Mon nods and smiles, listening carefully while hoping the delay is worth it. Leia’s agents on the ground must find something, and soon. Because when the inspectors leave, the ship begins to move once more toward landing on Nakadia. Wartol says, “There. Your nasty tricks have bought you little time.” He informs his guards that he and the chancellor will be heading directly to the Senate chambers immediately upon docking. “No more delays,” he says. “It is time to face your failure, Chancellor.”

—

The Falcon perches in empty space. Most of the ships above Nakadia have gone and landed, now—the Senate vote was scheduled for an hour ago, which means all of the voting body should be present down below for when the delay (caused by the chancellor herself in a plan that was of Leia’s design) is finally rectified.

There, through the viewport, hangs Wartol’s cruiser.

They watch as a pair of Nakadian ships—each a talon-shaped cruiser, four-person, small and nimble—drifts away from the Ganoidian-made tri-deck vessel. Those ships reenter atmosphere with a hot burn.

And Wartol’s ship begins to move toward the surface, as well.

Sinjir curses. “We’re nearly out of time.” And we’ve found nothing. Dor Wieedo’s ship isn’t up here. Which means it either leapt into hyperspace and is gone, or is simply somewhere else on the surface of Nakadia. The former doesn’t make much sense, though—Wieedo and the others will need to be present to vote. That means they’re back on the surface. “Coming up here was a waste of time. It was a mistake. I made a mistake.”

He’s talking directly to Solo, who sits in the pilot’s seat, staring out.

“Solo?” he asks again.

“Yeah, I hear you.” The man’s voice is quiet, like he’s far away even though he’s sitting right there. It takes little effort to see what’s happening. Solo thinks he’s good at being the tough-talking, rough-skinned scoundrel—he’s always got his shields up, ready to defend with swagger and bluster.

But Sinjir sees how the man keeps looking over in this direction. At the console. At the copilot’s seat. He really does miss that Wookiee. At first, that made little to no sense to Sinjir. Because, really. It’s a Wookiee. Chewbacca is lovely and all, but he’s a gargantuan pillar of hair who smells not unlike a moist gundark’s undercarriage. And all that nonsensical growling? And the hugging?

And yet—that was the man’s copilot. His friend. His family.

I have copilots, too. It’s taken Sinjir some time to see that. Certainly he’s come to see these people around him as his friends, as his family.

And yet there’s one more copilot out there.

Conder Kyl.

Damnit, blast, damnit.

I never should’ve left him.

Conder makes Sinjir a better man. Just as Chewie helped to make Solo one, too. We both need our copilots, it seems.

“We need to think,” Sinjir says, “because I need to get Conder back. He’s important to me, Solo. You understand?”

“I hear you loud and clear.”

“Why would they even take him?”

“Bargaining chip, maybe. Or because he’s a slicer and they want him to do something for them.”

“Bargaining chip. Yes. Because even if we intercept the other senators before the vote, they’ll have Conder to play. That’s their plot, isn’t it? We have him, so don’t disrupt the vote or he gets it.”