Balance Point (22 page)

Mara was ordered not to land at Gateway’s main gate. “The decontam area just inside’s under quarantine,” they told her—doubtless from the evacuation of infested Settlement Thirty-two. A young voice directed her northeast, to a smaller, blasted-out landing area that was actually bordered by green plant growth. The scientists really had made progress here. The world was coming back to life. Whether or not it survived could depend on what she found out.

A fringe of slender boarding tubes clustered from the northeast gate. Mara waited shipboard until Gateway’s crew connected one to
Shadow
’s starboard access hatch, then threw a thin cloak over her finery and hurried up the synthplas tube.

Inside the huge Gateway dome, to the southwest, she spotted a gray building, two stories tall, ringed with lower constructs. Steam boiled out of one of the outbuildings. In an open area to her left, sandy soil had been raked into short rows that suggested settlers’ private gardens. To the right, behind a powder-blue city of tents, low ruins bit into the skyline. A distant rumble pulsed, some kind of digging or mining apparatus.

Not bad, for a refugee city. She pulled a deep breath. It even had good air, when most refugee settlements were stinking mudholes.

Sympathetic administration.

She decided to speak with Leia before she poked around. If her mysterious contact gave her trouble, she might have to leave in a hurry.

The admin building’s lower story was centered on a staircase instead of lift tubes, its duracrete blocks crumbly in spots. She climbed the stairs, found a door marked
ORGANA SOLO
, and strode in.

A familiar protocol droid stood inside. “Good morning,” he greeted her. “I am See-Threepio, human-cyborg relations—”

“So I see.” Remaining in character, she dropped her cloak on a metal-frame chair and looked haughtily around the room. Large desk, cot, focus cooker, storage lockers—one room for all functions. But no Leia. “I am Baroness Muehling of Kuat. I wish to speak with the administrator.”

The droid spread his arms. “I am terribly sorry, Baroness. Administrator Organa Solo is engaged at present. We have had a series of rather vexing shipping problems. Perhaps I could deliver a message.”

Mara shook her head, letting the masquerade lapse. “You certainly can, Threepio. Tell Leia her sister-in-law wants two minutes.”

C-3PO swiveled his head. She almost laughed at his perpetually puzzled expression, and just how appropriate it looked at the moment.

“I … shall attempt to break her free … Baroness?” His voice sounded dubious. “Wait here, please.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

C-3PO swish-whirred out the door. He needed lubrication. If Leia was missing little details like oiling C-3PO, she
was
busy.

The door opened again forty seconds later, and Leia
hustled in. She’d swathed her head in a white scarf, and her cheeks looked a little hollower, her eyes darker, than Mara had seen before. She looked long and hard at Mara.

“It is you,” she finally pronounced.

She leaned forward and embraced Mara—cautiously, as one overdressed diplomat would greet another. C-3PO backed away, shaking his head.

Mara bent down to squeeze Leia’s shoulders. “I’ve got to talk with you.”

“I didn’t know you were insystem.”

“Just arrived.”

“Is Luke with you?”

“And Anakin.”

“Sit down. I could stand to sit a few minutes.”

Mara took the metal-frame chair, facing the large window. Steam from the outbuilding created a sort of exterior curtain.

Leia sank into a similar chair behind the massive desk. SELCORE had probably shipped it. Opposite the cot and cooking area, Mara spotted a pair of incongruously ornate wall sconces, crafted of dark iron in fantastic shapes.

“Can I get you something?” Leia asked. “We have the basics.”

“Just a glass of water.”

Leia sent C-3PO to the cooking area. While he clattered and poured, Mara caught Leia up to date on the military situation at Coruscant. She said nothing about the Force-warm spot under her belt line. Instead, she related what she’d heard at Bburru—and what else she’d found.

“A Rhommamoolian code?” Leia’s eyebrows rose toward her white turban. “I hope we don’t end up with Red Knights of Life here.” She tapped the edge of her
desk with a writing stylus, and her voice turned bitter. “From ten to thirty percent of our supplies aren’t getting through. I just sent Jacen to check on that.”

Mara raised an eyebrow.

Leia chuckled. “Always in character, aren’t you?”

“It’s a survival instinct.”

“Don’t change it for me.”

C-3PO brought over a pitcher and two glasses. Mara drank deeply as Leia finished cataloging her recent troubles. The water tasted musty, and one admission obviously came hard: Leia had been twenty klicks from Han, and neither one knew it.

“We’ve put it behind us,” she insisted, “but it’ll take me a long time to live it down. For all they knew, I was back on Coruscant. I wasn’t there for Jaina.”

“Jaina’s grown up, Leia.”

“So she reminds me. You know, daughters are tricky. They’re your closest friend and your worst competitor, all rolled up in a package that reminds you how
you
used to look.”

Mara almost told her.

Instead, she asked, “Who made last week’s SELCORE report about seeding the toxic swamps?”

“Dr. Cree’Ar.” Leia turned to the master board on her desktop, touched a few panels, and nodded. “My head researcher. He’s a miracle worker. Why?”

That wasn’t what Mara expected. “What do you think of him—personally?”

Leia shrugged. “I’m sure Threepio tried to chase you off by telling you how busy I am? Well, it’s true. And I haven’t met Dr. Cree’Ar. He’s—”

The door slid open. Jaina strode in, wearing a gray flight suit, a narrow-rimmed cap pulled low, and a peculiar face mask. Mara felt a whisper of energy brush against her.

“Aunt Mara,” Jaina exclaimed.

“Very good. I needed an introduction to get through to your mother.”

Jaina’s smile faded. “Before you ask what’s wrong, I was too close to a ship that blew. I should have perfect vision again in a couple of weeks. So whatever that fancy blur is you’re wearing, it didn’t even register.”

Mara laughed.

Jaina swept off her cap to display a faint brown stubble. “Decontamination. Quite a mark of status, in here.”

Mara eyed Leia’s white scarf. “Was this necessary?”

“Maybe not,” Leia said, “but the gesture was appreciated. A lot of refugees forget that my world was destroyed twenty-five years ago. They like seeing this. It reminds them I’m a refugee, too. We’re already having minor problems with the Ryn.”

“What are they doing?”

“Nothing. The problem is other people. They’ve grown up thinking Ryn are baby-snatchers and compulsive thieves. They’re shunned. It’s amazing how stoically they take that.”

“Mm,” Mara said. Her mind had shifted back to another subject. “I need to speak with your Dr. Cree’Ar, but I won’t ask for an introduction, since you haven’t met.”

“I’ll go with you,” Jaina said. “I’m not doing anything important at the moment.”

“Can you see well enough?” Mara demanded. “If this Duros is somehow connected to Rhommamool, he might not be much of a host. Remember our reception there?”

Jaina laughed shortly. “Don’t worry, I can use the Force to amplify what I can’t see—and don’t tell me that isn’t a justified use.”

“It is,” Mara murmured. “And I can use you. A real Kuati wouldn’t travel without at least one servant. I’ve got some things back at the
Shadow
to dress you up.” She shot a glance at Leia. “If you don’t mind my borrowing your assistant for a few hours.”

Leia flicked her hand. “She isn’t at my beck and call, Mara. Even if your children ever come home, they really aren’t yours anymore.”

The research building was a showpiece—banks of scientific instruments and devices, all manufactured on Core worlds—smooth, sterile white walls and acoustically textured ceilings. Its main floor was divided into six laboratories, looking exactly like labs on any other world, thanks to SELCORE. In each one, some experiment or another was humming.

Mara found Dr. Cree’Ar’s lab and walked in. Two aides sat at a long lab bench. One supervised what looked like a titration experiment, involving a six-by-ten array of transparent tubes. Another poured dollops of viscous liquid out of a flask into flat dishes.

She waved Jaina forward.

“Good morning,” Jaina said imperiously. “Is the doctor about?”

The near tech, a hefty young man with a red mustache, set down a flask of cloudy liquid. “He’s gone out. Said he’d be in Sector Seven.”

Mara looked around at the scientific setup. According to the file she’d just studied, Dr. Cree’Ar had produced plants and protozoans that were creating an arable zone, gleefully chowing down on soil toxins that would’ve killed everything but fefze beetles.

“Very well.” Mara laid a hand on Jaina’s shoulder.

Jaina, dressed in the carpet-textured gown of a Kuati
servant, clasped her opposite wrists inside her long, draped sleeves. Mara had found her a braided wig.

“We can wait,” Mara said.

Two hours later, Mara leaned one arm against a laboratory counter and fixed a still-imperious stare on one of Dr. Dassid Cree’Ar’s human and Sullustan aides. Unlike Leia, Mara did have the time to hunt down Dr. Cree’Ar, and as she’d told his technicians several times, she was perfectly willing to wait out the day. She amused herself striding around the laboratory, lifting flasks and examining culture gels, making the techs nervous.

Finally, another aide—who’d been trying to center a row of tiny glass tubules under an array of slender nozzles—rocked back on his stool. He brushed hair away from his face.

“Baroness,” he said wearily, “why don’t you and your servant get a couple of breath masks out of the first-floor storage bin, go down through the tunnel, and see if you can find Dr. Cree’Ar outside in the swamps?”

Now we’re getting somewhere
. “You can see I am not dressed for swamp travel.”

“The ground’s dry around them. I’m sure he’d be willing to talk with a distinguished visitor.”

Mara raised an eyebrow. “If he returns in my absence,” she said firmly, “direct him to follow the … tunnel, you say?”

“Down the stairs, turn right. Last door on your right is storage, and be sure to get those breath masks. Right outside this building, you’ll see a covered stair. Admin let us dig our own route to the research fields, since the north gate’s so far out of our way. We’re in the soft-rock zone. It only took a couple days.”

“Very well.” Mara overlaid her voice with a measure of irritation. “Emlee, come along.”

Jaina bowed slightly. “Yes, Baroness.”

Mara led the way downstairs, found the breath masks where the harried tech described, and headed straight for the tunnel entry. It dropped quickly at first, then more slowly, scantily lit by occasional overhead glow rods.

Mara slowed enough to murmur, “You’re all right with this?”

Jaina shrugged. “I’ve gotten used to feeling my way in the dark.”

“All right. Back into character, then. And stay in character unless I make it obvious that we’re through playacting.”

“Right,” Jaina whispered.

Mara led on. The tunnel gradually curved right—headed, she guessed, through the soft-rock cliffs toward the flatland she’d seen on approach.

“Wait,” she murmured.

She backstepped several meters. She’d heard a faint change in their footsteps’ echo.

At the darkest point between two glow rods, a side passage had been cut. A sheet of stiff fabric, roughly the shade of the surrounding stone, covered the passageway.

“Ah,” Mara said, slipping back into character. She peeled the fabric away from the stone’s edge and found a faint glow, illuminating a narrower passage. “This way, I think.”

She marched five meters to a ninety-degree bend in the passage, turned left, and found a sizable chamber. Standing beside a lab bench was a tall, slender Duros, holding two flasks of opaque brown liquid.

“Dr. Cree’Ar.” Mara raised her chin. “You are difficult to find. I hope you will make this journey worthwhile.”

The Duros scientist set down his flasks. “Madame,”
he said sternly, “this is my prrrivate research area. State your business.”

The chamber’s walls, floors, and ceiling were bare stone. Mara spotted a sleeping pad against an inner wall and several elevated … were those reagent tanks? The petcock assemblies looked organic. In a compartment along one wall, she recognized an open water-bath incubator, warmed by a flame from below. It looked like a storage facility.

Jaina shuffled forward, keeping her hands inside the drape of her sleeves. “Doctor,” she said, “this is Baroness Muehling of Kuat. She has come to you with a grave concern.”

Mara spotted a backless chair that had the look of a cutout shipping crate. She strode toward it and seated herself.

Finally, Cree’Ar stepped toward her. His large red eyes seemed to glow. “Why have you honored me with a visit, Baroness?”

“Even on other worlds,” she said, “word has reached us of your fine work, your dedication. Indeed, Administrator Organa Solo calls you a miracle worker.”

He spread his hands modestly.

“Duro,” she said, “has obviously been made a dumping ground for other species. My people may face a similar fate. Contacts whom I met up in Bburru City say that you are a close disciple of someone who is trying to turn that tide, on behalf of your own people.” In the baroness role, she usually got further by piling flattery on a subject than by bullying.

She piled it deeper.

From the moment they entered the chamber, Jaina had sensed something odd. She hadn’t encountered any Duros here—her med runner had been cleared directly to
ground, without stopping in orbit—but she didn’t like this guy.

Hesitantly, she reached out with a flicker of the Force. How hostile was he, really?

She felt nothing. She couldn’t even find him.

She kept her eyes lowered with an effort. She hadn’t heard of Yuuzhan Vong masquerading as Duros, but if they could breed creatures that made them look convincingly human, this would be only a small step further. The only way she’d know for sure would be to unmask him.