Star Wars - Credit Denied - Unpublished by George R. Strayton

Author:George R. Strayton
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 1998-02-24T04:52:23+00:00

She adjusted the macroscope until the readings indicated she had a perfect shot at Aaregil’s chest. Meaningless ideals…! I should have had you speak to my father years ago.

If her father knew what she was about to do, he would have shot her himself. Good old Dad, always placing ideals before everything else—including his family, Rendra had committed her life to avoiding that mistake and…

Look where it had gotten her.

She stared at Aaregil through the sights. What was she doing?

Saving herself from returning to the life she had struggled so hard to escape, that’s what. She pushed away her misgivings. Ideals get you killed. Your father learned that the hard way. Don’t follow in his footsteps.

She breathed out, hoping to send her inner conflict along with it, when her comlink beeped. She yanked it out of her pocket without bothering to hide the blaster. “Yeah.”

“I got through to Oro and Vakir. They know the new plan.” He paused. “You sure killing him is worth a ship?”

Just what she needed right now, another outsider questioning her life.

“No,” she said crisply, “but it is worth my life.”

“And that of millions of Weequay and Houk, as well, apparently.”

It was a damning statement…

And yet, it was true. She could not deny the logic, no matter how much she wanted to.

Aaregil continued his remarks. “But I was not alone in this struggle to bring about peace…”

“Time’s running out,” came Nopul’s filtered voice.

She couldn’t believe she’d come this far only to question herself now. She should just do it and get it over with. Then she’d have no decision to make.

But by then it would be too late.

“He is not only my colleague,” Aaregil said from the podium. “He is also my friend.”

Rendra raised her blaster again and targeted Aaregil. She could now see that another Weequay had risen from his seat and was standing behind the ambassador. Sunlight suddenly flashed on an object hanging from the being’s clothing, blinding her for a moment. When she looked again, he had shifted just enough to stop the reflection.

She adjusted the zoom on her blaster’s macroscope, favoring the spot that had glinted a second before.

From a long chain around his neck hung a crescent-shaped amulet made from a lustrous metal, its hue falling somewhere in the bluish green range.

Her mind flashed on an image of the meeting with her employer in the temple—the Temple of Quay, Weequay god of the moon. The realization came instantly: it had all been a set-up. For what reason, she had no idea—not that it mattered right now. She could take time to figure that out later.

“Here he is,” Aaregil’s voice boomed over the loudspeakers, “Minister Pon Svale.”

She put the comlink to her mouth. “Don’t shoot!”

Ambassador Svale clasped Aaregil’s arm in peace.

Rendra keyed her comlink again, recycling the entire system in case it had gone on the blink. “Repeat. Terminate mission. Confirm?”

On the dais, Svale situated himself at the podium as Aaregil moved off the side.

“Confirm?” she whispered as loud as she could in the sea of onlookers.

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