“I know Hokan’s concerns because I can make a very convincing old man as well as an excellent grandmother,” Jinart said. The reply made no sense. “I’ll catch up with Darman’s comrades and try to direct them to somewhere safe. They have no reliable intel, as you call it, a finite amount of ordnance, and no advantage of surprise any longer. Hokan knows what you have come to do and he has enough firepower and droids to stop you. That makes your mission next to impossible without some change of plan or intervention.”
Darman considered her carefully. Jinart’s news hadn’t dented that tangible confidence: Etain saw not a flicker on his face. “It could be worse. I quite liked the sound of a single transmitter.”
“Might I also add that the locals will turn you in for one chance to get disgustingly drunk.”
Darman looked at Etain. She squirmed. “Out of ideas, soldier?” she asked.
“I await your orders, Commander.”
It was the final straw. Weeks of fear, hunger, and fatigue on top of years of doubt and disillusion suddenly brought Etain’s fragile edifice crashing down. She had done all she could do, and there was nothing left in her to give.
“Stop it, stop calling me Commander.” She felt her nails dig into her palms. “I am not your blasted commander. I haven’t a clue what to do next. You’re on your own, Darman. You’re the soldier. You come up with a plan.”
Jinart said nothing. Etain felt her face burn. She had lost all dignity. A lifetime of careful training in the art of control and contemplation had come to nothing.
Darman changed before her eyes. He transformed not in the physical sense that the Gurlanin had, but the change was just as startling because the sense of the child that Etain detected so clearly simply evaporated. Its place was taken by calm resignation and something else, a rather forlorn feeling. She couldn’t pin it down.
“Yes ma’am,” he said. “I’ll do that right away.”
Jinart jerked her head in the direction of the door. “Get some air, Darman—I need to talk to Commander Tur-Mukan.”
Darman hesitated for a moment and then slipped outside. Jinart rounded on Etain.
“Listen to me, girl,” she whispered, all harsh sibilants. Droplets of fine saliva glittered briefly in the dim light. “That soldier may think a Jedi’s every word is a divine pronouncement, but I don’t. You’d better sharpen up fast. The commandos and I are all that stands between maintaining some kind of order in the galaxy and its fragmentation, because if the clone army can be wiped out, then the Separatists will win.
“You can either help us or stand aside, but you will not be an obstacle, and that’s what you are if you can’t lead those men. They’ve been bred to obey Jedi without question. Sadly, in this case that means you.”
Etain was used to feeling worthless. There was no lower place that Jinart could cast her. “I didn’t ask for that responsibility.”
“And neither did Darman.” Jinart flashed back into a mass of seething black sinews for a terrifying second. “That’s the nature of duty. It calls and you give your all. He will. So will his comrades, every single one of them. They need you to help them do their job.”
“I’m still learning how.”
“Then learn fast. If those soldiers weren’t conditioned to obey you I’d consider cutting you down now and have done with it. My kind have nothing to thank Jedi for, nothing at all. But we share a common enemy, and I want to see Valaqil again. Think yourself lucky.”
Jinart swept out. Etain sank down on her knees in the hay and wondered how she had come to this. The barn door creaked open slowly, and Darman peered around.
“Don’t mind me,” she said.
“You okay, ma’am?” He winced visibly. “Apologies. Etain”
“You probably think I’m useless as well, don’t you?”
“I came up with a plan, as you ordered.”
“Bred for diplomacy, too, eh?”
“If Hokan has set the facility as a decoy, then we need him to think that we believe it’s still the genuine target. So we split—”
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
Darman lapsed into silence.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “Carry on.”
He knelt down, facing her, and swept the floor clear with i his hand, creating a clear space on which to demonstrate something. He reached for some crusts of bread and a lump of insect-eaten wood.
“What do you think I am?” he asked quietly,
“From what Jinart says, a clone soldier bred to obey.” She watched him break the wood and the crusts into separate chunks and place them in a row like game pieces. “No choice.”
“But I do have a choice,” he said. “A choice in how I interpret your orders. I’m intelligent. I’ve seen Jedi fight, so I know what you’re capable of. Once you’re exposed to situations that call on your skills, you’ll be the same.”
He was all contradictions. She wondered for a moment if he wasn’t a clone soldier at all but another Gurlanin playing spiteful games with her. But she could feel a combination of quiet desperation and… faith. Yes, faith.
He was the only person in many years who had shown any degree of confidence in her, and the first since Master Fulier who had shown her real kindness.
“Very well,” she said. “This is your overriding order. Whatever happens, you are to intervene if anything I do or say compromises your mission. No, don’t look at me like that.” She held up her hand to stifle the protest she could see forming on his lips. “Think of me as a commander in training. You must train me. That might mean showing me the correct way to do things, or even saving me from my own lack of… experience.” She could hardly bring herself to say it. “And… and that’s an order.”
He almost smiled. “This is why I have confidence in obeying a Jedi commander. Your wisdom is unequaled.”
Etain had to think about that for a few seconds. If Jinart had said it, she would have seethed. Darman meant it. And perhaps he meant it in a number of ways.
Yes, he was intelligent and subtle, not a droid at all. How did a ten-year-old get that way? Disturbed, she concentrated on the comfort of believing that he had seen things that she never had, and so knew best. “Go on,” she said. “You had a plan.”
RV Gamma, laying-up point, nightfall
“How do you feel now?” Niner asked.
Atin moved his arms, bent at the elbow in a swimming motion, testing his pectoral muscles. “Nearly good as new. No breathing problems, either. No, just a hard smack on the plate.”
Fi’s disembodied voice spoke up in their helmet comlinks. He was tucked under a bush on the edge of the ridge, keeping watch on the track below. “I’m such a good field medic. Wait till you see me do a tracheotomy.”
“I’ll pass if that’s all right with you,” Atin said, easing off his helmet. “Dinner?”
“What do you prefer,” Niner asked. “Dry rats, dry rats, or maybe dry rats?”
“Let’s go with the dry rats for a change.” Yes, Atin was definitely feeling better, and not just physically. “Who used to say that, then?”
“Uh?”
“The dry rations thing.”
“Oh. Skirata. Our old instructor sergeant.”
Atin took a bite out of the white cube and washed it down with a gulp of water from his bottle. “He never trained us. Heard a lot about him.”
“Trained Fi and Darman, too. Our squads were all in the same battalion.”
“We had Walon Vau.”
“That explains where you get your cheery outlook.”
“Sergeant Vau taught us the importance of planning for the worst scenario,” Atin said, all loyalty. “And maximizing your tech. Being hard is good, being hard with superior tech is better.”