The New Jedi Order - 06 - Balance Point by Star Wars

Author:Star Wars
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science Fiction
Published: 2010-08-26T08:25:48+00:00

Mara dropped her datapad on a console as she reentered the rental unit. A quick check of both rooms confirmed that they were empty, and her practiced eye saw no sign that anyone else had entered.

Sporting her new disguise around Bburru, she'd had no trouble finding a Duros willing to talk, especially when she explained that she was afraid she'd wake up one morning to find Kuat pocked with refugee camps.

The Duros merchant talked freely, sensing a potential convert. She recorded his philosophy on her datapad, pressing harder and deeper for clarification on doctrinal points. Finally, convinced by her eagerness, he promised to forward her the very latest "word of wisdom," which should arrive in two days.

At that point, her ear for intelligence pricked. How, she asked casually, could he know so exactly?

He shrugged. That was always the day it arrived.

Mara thanked him regally, departing with more information than he knew he'd given out.

Without bothering to lose her costume, she sat down at the rental room's data port and plugged in her pad. Minutes later, thanks to codes Ghent developed years ago for Talon Karrde, she was deep into Bburru's communications bureau.

Dozens of broadcasts "always" arrived on that day of the week. Out of those, she narrowed her possibilities to three that came from outsystem and one that arrived from the surface, an official report from SELCORE's Gateway dome, where research was conducted. SELCORE in its wisdom still tried to keep the Duros duly impressed with the detoxification process.

That source, she could check quickly. She keyed up the most recent broadcast. On the surface, it was nothing more than a series of progress reports Two toxic swamps seeded with reclamation organisms. Three enclosures drained and plowed for planting. Small mammals loosed on the grass prairie; that experiment hadn't turned out so well - half died, and the other half showed no eagerness to nest and breed.

She carried one of Ghent's decoding programs in her datapad. It was the matter of a minute to copy the transmission and run the program. She waited while it applied various codes to the program, coming up with only gibberish ...

Until it hit pay dirt. Her hair tail fell over her face as she leaned into the datapad. One of the dirtdown scientists had used an old Rhommamoolian military code.

Mara remembered the passionate, even illogical antagonism of the Rhommamoolians' slain spiritual leader, Nom Anor. Toward the end of this text, she even spotted some of the exact phrases that Duros orator had used at Duggan Station.

She pushed away, tilting her chin to let the hair tail settle behind her head. Someone down at Gateway - a Duros, or someone else with reason to make trouble in the Duro system - had connections to Rhommamool, where she'd already heard this kind of rhetoric.

The Jade Shadow had belonged to a spice merchant before Lando's refit droids installed its camouflaged armament. It would pass as a noblewoman's runner. As Kuati nobility, she ought to have at least one servant, but she couldn't always get what she wanted.

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