Servants of the Empire Read online

  Seven heads poked up from behind their terminals to peer at her. Most were human or near-human males, though she spotted a horned Gotal and a Bith she thought might have been female. They had tattoos and goatees and hair colored supernatural shades. All were wearing goggles and headsets.

  “Welcome to our kingdom,” a blue-skinned Pantoran boy proclaimed. “Now who are you and what do you want?”

  “I’m Merei. Merei Spanjaf. I’m interested in intrusion countermeasures.”

  Laughter filled the cramped room.

  “Of course you are,” the Gotal said, whinnying in amusement. “You want to know how to break into networks so you can stop the bad guys and make the Empire a better place.”

  “Is there any other reason to break into a network?” asked a teenaged human with hair arranged into fearsome spikes.

  “I can’t think of one,” the Pantoran replied, winking at Merei.

  “I don’t want to break into networks, for any reason,” Merei said. “I’m looking for how to collect information from a network you’re already inside.”

  The V-SIS students exchanged amused glances.

  “Purely to monitor traffic patterns, right?” the Bith girl asked. “Not to, say, intercept messages and obtain access codes.”

  “Of course not,” Merei said, offering what she hoped was a devil-may-care shrug. “That would be wrong.”

  “I’ve never seen you down here before,” a tall, thin boy wearing infochant’s goggles said from the back. “New student?”

  Merei nodded and the boy scoffed.

  “You’re a first year, and you want to intercept network traffic,” he said, flicking his fingers at her dismissively. “Let me give you some advice, sister—you wanna see the spice mines of Kessel, get a tourist visa. It’s less permanent than a detention cell. Now come back in a year or two when maybe you’ll know what you’re doing.”

  The students bent back over their terminals and datapads as if Merei were a hologram that had finished delivering its message. She looked around the gloomy room for a few seconds in frustration, then turned and hurried out.

  “HEY! SPAMJACK!”

  Merei killed her jumpspeeder’s engine and raised her goggles, puzzled. The Pantoran boy from the computer lab was hurrying across the V-SIS lawn toward her, looking not entirely happy with being beneath the warm Lothal sun.

  “Spamjack, wait.”

  “It’s Spanjaf,” she said. “Merei Spanjaf.”

  “Merei,” the boy said as he came to a halt, breathing hard. “Sorry about what happened back there. The other guys like to play a little rough, you know what I’m saying? But they don’t really mean it.”

  “I’m pretty sure they did,” Merei said.

  “Well, I didn’t,” the boy said. He looked away, his cheeks flushing indigo.

  “I’m Jix,” he said. “Jix Hekyl. You were serious back there, weren’t you?”

  Merei nodded.

  “Look, I’m not going to ask what you have in mind—that’s so not my business,” Jix said. “You’re talking about a snooper—a program that records information and transmits it to an outside source. A basic one’s pretty easy to configure, but you don’t want a basic one—unless you don’t care if someone finds it.”

  “I think I care about that,” Merei said drily.

  Jix grinned. “I think you do, too. What you need is something that won’t throw off the traffic flow or do anything else that will get noticed. That’s not so easy to program.”

  “I know my way around a terminal,” Merei said.

  “I’m not trying to insult you, Merei,” Jix said hastily. “I’m saying I wouldn’t do it. It’s tricky. And illegal.”

  Neither of them said anything for a moment.

  “How important is this to you?” Jix asked.

  “Very,” Merei said.

  Jix sighed.

  “I was afraid you’d say that. Look, I’ve done some programming work now and then—stuff I can’t put on my school transcript, you know what I mean? I know a guy who knows a guy who maybe could help you with it. But that kind of help doesn’t come cheap, or without strings attached.”

  “I understand,” Merei said.

  “I really hope you do,” Jix said. “This is heavy firepower you’re talking about, Merei.”

  “Good. Because that’s what I need.”

  When Merei got home she commed the Leonises. After two chimes, the screen lit up, filled by the angular, copper-colored face of Auntie Nags, the family’s ancient nanny droid.

  “Merei Spanjaf, what a pleasure!” Auntie Nags said, her photoreceptors turning a cool green.

  “Hello, Auntie,” Merei said. “Is Tepha there?”

  Auntie Nags’s photoreceptors flared yellow. “Let me see if Mrs. Leonis is available,” she said, turning away from the screen.

  “She told me to call her Tepha, you know!” Merei said as the old droid rolled away.

  Tepha Leonis appeared on the comm. She smiled at Merei, but there were deep hollows beneath her eyes.

  “Merei! How are you? How’s the new school?”

  “I’m figuring it out,” Merei said. “I wish I knew how Zare was doing, though.”

  “So do I,” Tepha said with a sigh. She raised a mug to her lips, and Merei saw her nails were jagged and bitten.

  “Have you heard anything new?” Merei asked.

  Tepha looked off to the side, and Merei understood that Zare’s father, Leo, was in the room—Leo, who didn’t know that the Empire was lying about Dhara, or the real reason Zare had entered the Academy.

  “Commandant Aresko’s assistant commed two days ago,” Tepha said. “He assured us the Empire is monitoring every channel in case Dhara turns up.”

  “I haven’t heard anything either,” Merei said. “But I have a feeling that will change soon.”

  Tepha’s eyes widened with concern. She blinked hurriedly, then tried to smile.

  “Well, we all hope so, Merei,” she said, looking over at Leo before leaning closer to the comm.

  Be careful, she mouthed.

  Merei nodded. I will.

  First came the helmets and harnesses, issued to each cadet at dawn by Currahee with orders to know every function backward and forward by the next day. The white cadet helmet was a variant of that worn in the Imperial Army, with a retractable faceplate that looked like a stormtrooper’s, down to the frowning speaker grille.

  Zare stared into the blank polarized lenses. The idea of putting the helmet on frightened him all of a sudden, as if he might never be able to remove it.

  Oleg was standing atop his bunk, helmet on, pantomiming firing laser pistols at imagined enemies. Pandak was slumped against the wall, morosely trying to untangle his harness with his helmet at his feet.

  “Cadet Oleg, ready to save the galaxy from Separatist scum,” Jai said with a grin, poking at the innards of his helmet and then peering at the manual that had been automatically loaded on their datapads. “Say, Zare, is this the atmosphere intake or the suit air intake?”

  “What does it matter?” Oleg asked, his voice filtered by the helmet’s microphone. “Nothing’s hooked up to anything.”

  “I bet it will matter to Curry,” Zare said, peering at his own datapad. “Atmosphere intake’s on the left, Jai. Suit air’s on the right.”

  “Gotcha. Wait—my left or your left?”

  “Your left—my right,” Zare said, cycling his helmet’s vision processors from infrared to smoke filter and then to maximum polarization.

  “Got it,” said Jai’s voice, now modulated by his own helmet.

  Zare looked at his fellow cadets, their faces replaced by Imperial masks. He forced himself to raise the helmet above his head and slide it over his hair, then his eyes and ears. He hesitated, then closed the faceplate.

  I wonder if Ames didn’t want to put his on at first either.

  The cadets were instructed to wear their helmets except on breaks, then marched across the Academy for their first day of classr
oom instruction. The cadets who couldn’t figure out how to operate their audio pickups struggled miserably as Chiron and a succession of gray-haired instructors lectured them about operating as a squad, clearing hostile territory, and ballistics.

  “If I wanted to study math I’d have stayed home,” Oleg muttered to Zare.

  Chiron turned from the parabola he was explaining, one eyebrow arched.

  “Lesson one, Cadet Oleg: you can whisper, but the speakers in your bucket have no volume setting. That’s a demerit.”

  Despite rumors to the contrary in the mess hall, the cadets weren’t ordered to sleep in their helmets, and Zare sighed gratefully as he finally removed his before hitting the shower. But they wore them again the next day, which began with every cadet issued an E-11 blaster rifle and told to take it apart, then put it back together—the first of a dozen such orders. By lights-out Zare’s hands were cramped and he dreamed of nothing but blaster rifles, all of which turned out to be missing the trigger assembly or power cell that could have saved his life.

  The day after that, they had to take their rifles apart and put them back together blindfolded. Then they donned their helmets and marched to the classroom.

  The next morning, when Currahee burst in before dawn screaming for everyone to get in line, Zare wasn’t surprised but simply dropped to the floor, reached for the crisply folded uniform atop his footlocker, and began to dress. Currahee’s eyes flicked over him as he stood beside Jai, their chins raised, helmets against their hips under their left arms.

  “Tolerable, Unit Aurek,” she said grudgingly. “Now fall out—our troopship is waiting.”

  Troopship? Zare risked a glance at Jai, who shrugged.

  Minutes later, the cadets rushed to the hangar, where Chiron was waiting in front of a landing ship, its triangular wings raised. A row of backpacks stood in front of them.

  “A Sentinel class—wizard,” Jai murmured as the cadets grabbed their packs and raced up the ramp to take seats on the benches in the troop compartment. When the last squad was aboard, Chiron and Currahee strode up the ramp, grabbing handholds as the hatch sealed behind them.

  “Buckets off, cadets!” Chiron yelled. “Inside each pack you’ll find a pauldron with a neck seal. Put it on and buckle the leads to the corresponding ports on your field pack, then put on your bucket. Make sure your neck seal is tight, or you’ll regret it.”

  The deck of the landing ship began to thrum beneath their boots. The whine of the engines rose to a howl and then the cadets felt the ship lift off. A couple of cadets from the all-female Unit Forn cheered, earning a savage dressing-down from Currahee.

  “Do you think we’re going into space?” Pandak asked, and Zare could hear the nervousness even in his filtered voice.

  “Not without environment suits, you fool,” Oleg said. “They don’t want to kill us during training. Though in your case it would be a good idea.”

  “Cadets!” yelled Chiron. “Switch your intakes to suit air!”

  Zare made the switch as directed, suddenly glad for all the recent practice. He tapped at his atmosphere intake to make sure it was sealed, then elbowed Pandak to make sure he did the same.

  The hatch opened and wind tore at the cadets. Chiron put one hand on his cap. Outside it was dark.

  “Unit Aurek, assemble!” Currahee yelled, and Zare and the others scrambled to their feet.

  “Move it, cadets!” Currahee shouted. “Jump! Your rendezvous point is due east!”

  Oleg was first, and Zare saw him hesitate as he peered into the darkness around them. Before Currahee could yell he leapt out of the ship. Zare felt his legs shaking as he stood in the hatch, the wind whipping at his uniform.

  “LEONIS! GO!”

  Zare flung himself out of the Sentinel and tumbled through the sky. Impact jolted the air out of his lungs and he heard a splash. He was in the water, he realized—and sinking, weighed down by the heavy pack.

  Do something!

  He drew in a mouthful of suit air and began to kick. Everything around him was dark. He engaged his low-light filter and continued kicking, grunting with the effort, then broke the surface of the water. Where was everybody else?

  He turned his comlink on and selected the channel reserved for his unit.

  “Jai! Pandak! Oleg! Acknowledge!”

  “It’s Jai. Quite the wake-up call, huh, Zare?”

  “Yep,” Zare said. “Pandak? Oleg?”

  “Already headed for the shore,” Oleg said. “See if you slugs can keep up.”

  Scowling, Zare activated his helmet’s compass and kicked until his head was pointed east. He switched to his infrared filter and saw a red blob that had to be Oleg ahead of him.

  “Wait, Oleg—we advance as a unit, remember? Pandak?”

  “I’m here,” said Pandak. “Couldn’t find the comlink controls. But I’ve got it now.”

  A few minutes later Zare felt mud and rocks beneath his feet and exhaled gratefully. The sun was just peeking over the horizon. Seatroopers in white armor were standing in the shallows of the lake, waiting to retrieve any cadets who sank or had problems with their air supplies.

  They’re not actively trying to kill us, Zare thought. That’s something.

  His comlink buzzed.

  “I’m sending the next rendezvous point to your helmet navigation system,” Chiron said. “It’s ten klicks to the southeast. Arrive with your E-11 assembled and await further orders. Countdown begins now.”

  “Zare! We only have an hour,” Jai said. “And nobody gave me an E-11.”

  Zare detached his pack and rummaged inside. “The rifles are in our packs—in pieces,” he said. “We’ll have to put them together while we run. Come on!”

  Pandak was doing a good job of keeping up, Zare saw with relief, but he had to help him through two of the trickier aspects of assembling his E-11—and ignore Oleg, squawking impatiently over their comlinks for Zare to leave the other cadet behind.

  “We’re almost to the rendezvous, Pandak,” Zare said. “Test your blaster—make sure it’s drawing from the power pack.”

  Pandak fumbled with the rifle, gasping over the comlink.

  “Indicator’s green,” he said. “Thanks, Zare.”

  “No worries,” Zare said as they reached the knot of cadets and officers waiting at the rendezvous point. Jai gave them a jaunty salute, while Oleg waited with his arms crossed over his chest. A dozen other cadets sprawled dejectedly in the grass by the roadway, reassembling their rifles.

  “LEONIS! SYMES!” Currahee said. “HAND OVER THOSE RIFLES!”

  She glanced at Zare’s power pack, thumbed the safety on and off, then pointed the rifle at the roadway and pulled the trigger. A white bolt of energy struck sparks from the roadway.

  “Very well, Leonis,” she said, extending her hand for Pandak’s rifle and firing another bolt into the pavement, then inclining her head toward Oleg and Jai. “You two join your squad.”

  “You only made it by five minutes,” Oleg said. “You endangered our mission by playing babysitter.”

  “We had time, Oleg,” Zare said. “We’re stronger with four—when are you going to learn that?”

  “About the same time you figure out that depends on the four,” Oleg said.

  A chime sounded over the cadets’ comlinks—the hour was up. Currahee stood in the roadway, waiting to intercept the cadets who hadn’t finished yet, while Chiron yelled for the others to gather around him, with the boys and girls who hadn’t assembled their rifles correctly watching resentfully.

  “Buckets off and listen up,” Chiron said.

  Zare pulled his helmet off gratefully, rubbing his forehead on the sleeve of his uniform. Jai had his hands on his knees, E-11 and helmet in the grass at his feet.

  “Ahead of you is an obstacle course—each unit has a goal, the location of which will be loaded into your helmets. If your unit’s below full strength, you’ll just have to do the best you can. The course features broken terrain, and it’s defended by Imp
erial troops—don’t worry, today their blasters are on training setting. Get hit and you’re out. Form up by unit, select a leader, and move out on my mark. You’ll have ten minutes to reach your objective.”

  “I’m the leader,” Oleg said as they walked up a path to the start of the obstacle course.

  “Says who?” asked Jai. “Zare should lead.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous—”

  “I vote for Zare,” Pandak said.

  Oleg scowled, then reached for his helmet.

  “Whatever,” he said.

  “Wait, Oleg, I haven’t voted yet,” Zare said. “It could still be a tie.”

  The other three looked at him.

  “Really?” Oleg asked.

  Zare shook his head. “Of course not. I’m unit leader.”

  He put on his helmet and scanned the area ahead of them. It was a grassy field broken up by clumps of rock and boulders.

  A chime in their ears signaled the start of the exercise. Cadets began moving in threes and fours across the field. There was no sign of the trainers awaiting them.

  “Let’s move out,” Zare said, thinking back to the classroom demonstrations. “Wedge formation, but be ready to shift to file formation at the chokepoints. I’m point. Pandak, you’re on my left. Oleg and Jai, on my right.”

  “I see the goal,” Oleg said. “Keep up a field of fire and I can get there before you three get taken out.”

  “Back in line,” Zare said. “We’ll do it together. Now come on.”

  They crept into the field, bent low over their E-11s. Ahead of them Zare could hear the sizzle of blaster bolts and cadets yelling. A trainer in a gray uniform popped up and they dove into the grass as a brilliant bolt illuminated their hiding place.

  “Spread out,” Zare said. “Pandak, go left and attract his attention. Oleg, Jai, move right to encircle him.”

  Not so different than the grav-ball grid, he thought, smiling.

  The other cadets crept away through the grass. Pandak popped up, firing his E-11 wildly. Oleg and Jai dashed forward, crouched low, as Zare moved forward on his knees, cycling his helmet to infrared and cranking his helmet’s audio inputs as high as they would go.