Drask obviously knew that, too. Which meant that the offer of joint command had been made solely as a face-saving gesture for Fel himself, to protect his position and his status among his men.
There were some aspects of the Chiss warrior philosophy that still drove Fel crazy. But clearly, there were other aspects he could learn to live with. "Very well, General," he said. "I accept."
"Good." Drask's eyes glittered as he lifted his charric. "Then let us show the Vagaari what it means to wage war on the Chiss Ascendancy and the Empire of the Hand."
Fel smiled, looking at his stormtroopers. "Yes," he said softly. "Let's."
They attacked Mara together, all three wolvkils charging across the council meeting room like furry proton torpedoes. They leapt to the attack, their primary target clearly the hands holding the strange blue-bladed weapon.
Dodging coolly to the side, she cut them down with three quick slashes.
Across the room, Jinzler and the others in the makeshift refuge were already pushing aside the chairs that had made up the roof. "Hurry, please," Feesa pleaded, pushing away one of the chairs and then bending back down to take Formbi's arm. "Aristocra Chaf'orm'bintrano is badly hurt."
Mara closed down her lightsaber and hurried over, throwing a quick look at the three Chiss warriors and two young men sprawled on the floor as she passed them. Pressor was already kneeling beside one of the men, but it was clear to her that all five of them were beyond help.
They had pushed over the table and Feesa was helping a shaky and blood-soaked Formbi out when Mara arrived. "Everyone else all right?" she said, glancing around for other signs of injury as she refastened her lightsaber to her belt.
"No one else is hurt," Feesa confirmed, apparently ignoring the line of blood across her own shoulder. "Please, help him."
"Just relax," Mara soothed her, taking a moment to study the three old men who had left the refuge and gathered together against the back wall, as if trying to stay as far away from her as they could. Probably some of the original survivors of the Outbound Flight's destruction, she decided.
"Luke? Mara?"
She lifted Formbi's arm with one hand for a closer look as she pulled out her comlink with the other. "Right here, Fel. You all right?"
"We had a brief tussle with some of the Vagaari and their furry little pets," Fel said. "Watch out for those wolvkils—they're extremely hard to kill."
"Not if you have a lightsaber," Mara told him.
"I'll make a note to start issuing them to the troops," Fel said dryly. "Anyway, we're clear, and heading to D-Five in one of the aft turbolifts. Any new instructions?"
"For the moment, just take out any Vagaari you run into," Mara told him. "We still don't know how many there are, though, so make sure you don't get trapped in an attrition zone. And if you run into any colonists, try to move them somewhere safe."
"Copy. We're on our way."
"We'll be pushing our way back toward you soon," Mara said. "Luke?"
"Right here," his voice came back. "I've put all the wolvkils to sleep, and I'm on my way. What's your situation?"
"Under control," Mara told him. "You might as well not even stop here. Keep going and see if you can drive the Vagaari back toward the Five-Oh-First. I'll finish here and catch up with you."
"Right."
Mara returned her comlink to its pouch and gently let Formbi's arm down. "It's bad, all right," she agreed. "I think you're going to need more than our medpacs can handle. Pressor?"
Pressor looked up from his examination of the other young Peacekeeper, his eyes smoldering. "What?"
"Aristocra Formbi needs medical attention," she told him, wondering at his sudden change in attitude. "Where are your facilities?"
"You mean our medical facilities?" Pressor growled. "For the wounded?"
Mara frowned; and then, belatedly, she got it. Pressor, kneeling beside one of his dead Peacekeepers... "I'm sorry about your friend," she said gently. "But there's nothing we can do for him now."
"So we should instead give our supplies to help an alien?" one of the older men by the wall demanded bitterly. "The very alien who was responsible for bringing these murderers aboard our ship?"
Mara turned to face him. "Look," she said, fighting to keep her voice and temper under control. "I understand your anger. But there's a time for analysis and blame setting, and this isn't it. You've lost two men—"
"Six," Pressor corrected harshly.
"You've lost six men," Mara snapped, resisting the temptation to remind him that none of them would have died at all if Pressor hadn't locked her and Luke away in that turbolift car. "That's the way warfare goes. They were armed, and they at least had a fighting chance."
She nodded back at the door. "That's more than you can say for the rest of the people out there. Unless we move, and move fast, they're all going to die. Is that what you want?"
"So go help them, Jedi," the old man bit out. "Who's stopping you?"
Mara shook her head. "We're not going to do this piecemeal, running around at cross-purposes and getting in each other's way," she said. "We do this together, or we don't do it at all. Our part is to fight. Pressor's part is to tell us where the enemy is, and to assist us."
She leveled a finger at the three of them. "Your part is to stay behind the battle line, treat the wounded, and protect our civilians until we get back. If that's unacceptable, we can leave right now."
"So nothing has changed," one of the other old men murmured.
"Apparently not," the spokesman agreed, his voice edged in bitterness. "Very well, Jedi. We'll heal your wounded. As you command." He drew himself up. "But when this is over, you will leave us. Is that understood?"
"Perfectly," Mara said, turning her back on him in disgust. "All right, Feesa, you and the Aristocra can go with them. You, too, Ambassador."
"A moment, if I may?" Jinzler asked, stepping up to her. "I'd like to ask you a favor," he added, lowering his voice.
Mara stared at him in disbelief. A favor? "Jinzler, we don't have time for this."
"It's a very small favor," he assured her. "I want you to take Evlyn with you."
Mara frowned past his shoulder at the woman and the girl huddling together uncertainly behind Feesa and Formbi. "You must be joking."
"Not at all," Jinzler insisted. "She has rudimentary Force abilities. And you've already seen how Director Uliar and the other Survivors feel about Jedi. I think she'll be safer with you than with them."
"She'll be safer in a war zone?" Mara countered pointedly.
Jinzler's eyes were steady on her. "Please?"
Mara shook her head in exasperation. But even in her annoyance, she could sense that Jinzler was deadly serious.
And now that she was focusing her attention on the woman and girl, she could feel the gnawing fear within them, as well. A fear that seemed more personal than just the fact that there were armed Vagaari running loose aboard their ship. "Fine," she said with a sigh. "But she stays way behind me where it'll be at least halfway safe."
"Thank you," Jinzler said, beckoning to the girl. "Evlyn? Come on."
Mara shook her head again as the girl hurried toward her. How to make a difficult situation even harder, in one easy lesson. She just hoped it would be worth it.
"Mara?"
She turned to see Pressor coming toward her. "Yes?" she asked in a tone designed to warn him away from any further arguments.
But to her mild surprise, he hadn't come to argue. "Here—you might need these," he muttered, thrusting a pair of comlinks toward her. "Like you said, we have to work together here. These will connect you directly to me and to the other Peacekeepers."