"You're one of Skirata's undisciplined rabble, aren't you?"
"Proud to say so, yes."
"You've got no love for the Republic, then. Ever wondered what happens to us when we're no more use?"
"Yes. But I didn't know vow had..."
Darman was sure every clone did. He thought about it almost as much as he thought about Etain, which was a lot. He held his breath, waiting for some insight. Somehow he knew it wasn't going to be good news.
"So did Alpha-zero-two," said Sull. "Remember him? Spar? First off the line."
"I've got perfect recall," A'den said. "Of course I remember. He went missing more than a year before we shipped out for Geonosis. And you lot were the second batch-after us."
Darman marveled at the ability of any trooper to make it off Kamino. He must have been given help, and Darman could think of at least two people who would have done just that.
Sull leaned forward slightly, unable to sit back because of his handcuffs. "Spar saw what was coming and thought he would be better off taking his chances outside. And once we knew he was gone-well, quite a few of us started thinking."
"Heard from him since?"
"No."
"He's doing a little bounty hunting and mere work now." Nulls seemed to hear about everything one way or another. Darman never asked how or why, but the comment looked designed to show Sull that A'den had better intel than he did. "The family business. He's not exactly trained to do anything else, is he?"
"The Republic sent someone after him to kill him."
"Sure?"
"Sure. They didn't get him, but my buddy Tavo decided to make a run for it a few months ago, and they caught him. Then they blew his brains out."
"They."
"Republic Intelligence agents. The Chancellor's hit men." Sull didn't seem preoccupied with escape now. His mind was on events, and he looked past A'den as if there were someone standing to one side of him. He saw ghosts; Darman and every commando who'd lost close brothers saw them, too. "We're not the only hired help in town."
He's just like us.
Darman realized he didn't know the Alpha ARCs at all. Commandos and ARC troopers led totally separate lives on Kamino during training, bar necessary contact on exercises. Despite being part of Skirata's company, Omega never spent time with the Nulls during those years, and they'd seemed every bit as scary and alien as the Alpha ARCs.
So Alpha ARCs had buddies. Somehow he'd seen them as solitary killing machines, incapable of forming bonds like the tight-knit commando squads, and then...
That s how everyone sees us.
Darman realized he'd done what most civvies seemed to. He'd drawn a line beyond which someone else was less than him, just as citizens thought all clones were flesh machines, wet droids as Skirata used to call them, things sent to die be-cause they weren't like real people and so it was okay.
If that s how easy it is to think that way ...
Miner risked a comment. "So that's the punishment for going over the wall. I'm not sure we should be surprised."
"No, chum, you've got it wrong," said A'den. "This isn't punishment. Is it, Sull?"
All the fight seemed to have drained out of the ARC. Maybe he was just waiting to die. "No, because punishment is a deterrent. And to deter anyone, they have to know what'll happen to them. But nobody gets told about ARCs who are executed."
"Killed because they know too much?" Atin asked.
"Killed because they're nek battle dogs." A'den ran the tip of his vibroblade under his nails and inspected the manicure. "Once they're too old to fight, they can't be tamed as house pets. Dangerous, savage things. They have to be put down-Don't they, Sull'ika?"
"You can shove your Mando camaraderie," Sull said, "but you've got it about right. And they'll come for you, too, when you can't-or won't-fight any longer, Null boy. No-body leaves the Grand Army. What do you think they had in mind for us when we weren't any more use, putting us out to stud?"
"Well, I was sort of hoping..." Fi said wistfully.
"We're not even any special use as a DNA bank. We're second-generation Jango. They might as well get fresh mate-rial from troopers. They're less trouble."
Darman didn't want to look at his squad comrades. He knew what was going through their minds. It had to be the same dread: that this limited life was all there would ever be for them.
It hadn't seemed to matter back in Tipoca City. None of them had seen the world outside. Now they'd lived in cities, and met nice girls, and seen how other beings lived their lives. And they knew what they were missing.
Not me. I 'm not going to end up like that.
Niner clicked his teeth in annoyance. "He ran. Most of the ARC troopers are still doing their duty. You'll forgive me if I don't get sentimental about his inner turmoil."
"Yeah, whatever, Niner." A'den spun the blade and gazed at the tip. "Welcome to the complex world of morality." He paused, then bent over to face Sull almost nose-to-nose. Dar-man expected to hear a crack of bone as the ARC head-butted him, but the two men just stared. "So what were you doing in Eyat?"
"I got a job. An apartment."
"Military sort of job? Advising the enemy?"
"Driving repulsor cabs. And Eyat's not the enemy. They're just more ordinary folks who are going to get creamed in an-other war."
"But if you wanted to stay there, you'd have made sure they didn't lose, wouldn't you?"
"I've been there a few months. I'm not going to walk straight in, tell them I'm defecting, and show them the plans, am I?"
"Sooner or later, Sull, you'll have to take sides, before the Marit coup happens. The attack you were training the lizards to carry out."
"So?"
"You want out?"
"I'll draw you a picture, shall I?"
"You can't stay here. I can't risk you on the outside, giving the Eyati the codes and overrides, and getting more clones killed. And you aren't coming back inside. So . . ."
A'den straightened up with the vibroblade, and for a moment Darman thought he was going to kill Sull on the spot. But he cut the plastoid cuffs and then held the point of the blade just under Sull's chin, pressing into the flesh.
The ARC rubbed his wrists. "You waiting for something?"
"Get off the planet," A'den said. He took some cash credits out of his belt pouch. "This is plenty to set you up again. I'll fix you transport to get a long way from Gaftikar, on condition that you don't compromise another clone's safety."
Sull shrugged. A'den's offer seemed to have caught him off guard. "This brotherly solidarity is touching, but we each have to look out for ourselves."
A'den glanced at his chrono. "Put it another way," he said. "You get off this rock and stay out of the war, or I put you out of circulation the permanent way."
"I like it here."
A'den looked up and jerked his thumb in the direction of the doors. "Omega, thin out. We're going to have a little ARC-to-ARC chat. About kama fashions or some such osik."
Niner got up without protest and made a follow-me gesture. The squad trooped out behind him and sat down, backs propped against the wall of the HQ building.
"He's still a traitor," Niner said at last.
Darman stared ahead in defocus. The Marits had built a mock-up of a house and seemed to be rehearsing rapid entry, minus ordnance. They paused to stare back, then returned to their drill, but Suit's arrival had grabbed their attention. Did they know who he was? Darman wondered if they could tell one clone from another except by uniform.
"He just doesn't trust the Republic," Darman said.
"I don't trust the Republic, either." Atin picked a blade of grass and studied it intently. "But that doesn't mean I'd join the Seps."
"So what's not to trust?" asked Fi. "Apart from the fact they bred us to die and treat us like dirt? Aww, anyone can make a mistake . . ."
''All that osik about the droid threat, for a start. I went on that sabotage mission with Prudii. I saw the factory. I saw the production count. They're missing quite a few decimal places. It's bogus, but I still don't know where Intelligence got it."
"At'ika. everyone lies like a hairy egg about troop strengths and kit and stuff," Darman said. He knew Skirata never told them the whole story-he said so-but the more the war ground on, the more Darman realized that it was ail lie upon lie. on both sides. Nothing ever added up. There were too few droids around to support the kind of numbers coming out of Republic Intel. The CIS's claims were unsuhwuntiated. "Propaganda. All part of the armory."
And handy for getting the Senate to blindly approve spending. Yes, Darman could understand the politics now.
The day you know what's actually going on in a war, son, you'll know you 're watching a holovid. That's what Skirata said. Wars ran as much on lies and propaganda as they did on munitions. All you could ever really know was what was right in front of your own eyes, and even then it was open to interpretation.
Even so, the Nulls seemed... different in the last week or so. It was right after Atin came back grumbling that Kal and Ordo had sent him home after the sabotage mission. Atin didn't need to know what they were doing, they said. They denied it was connected to the hunt for General Grievous.
Darman thought Skirata sailed too close to the wind these days. It was part of what made him a beloved buir but it also kept Darman awake some nights.
I don 't mind being shot at. It s having a government that lies to me that I hate.
The clump-clump-clump of boots vibrated through the frame of the building, and Darman felt it in his back. A'den and Sull were coming out. He checked that his sidearm was fully charged.
"Master Sull will be leaving Gaftikar in a few days," A'den announced, not looking at any of the squad. Sull trailed out after him, looking grim. "Keep him fully entertained until his transport arrives."
Niner just couldn't keep his mouth shut. Standing up for what you believed was terrific, but sometimes it was just missing the point. "But..."
"ARC trooper Lieutenant Alpha-Thirty died of his injuries following an unknown incident, okay?" A'den announced pointedly. "He was too decomposed to ascertain a cause of death. But I recovered his armor and I'm returning his tally to SO Brigade for records purposes. Got it? Because if you didn't, I can repeat it even more slowly."
Fi raised an eyebrow. "He looks pretty decomposed to me. We'll give him a decent burial. Can I have his boots and kama?"
But Niner wasn't giving in to A'den without a speech. That was Niner all over. Darman suspected he would have given Ordo an equally hard time. His ultrastraight decency anchored the squad.
Sometimes, though, he just needed to look the other way and shut up.
"At what point does improvisation turn into complete col-lapse of discipline, ner vod?"
A'den stared down at him as if he'd just noticed him. "You think I should stick him on a desertion charge and return him to Zey for due process."
"That's what the regs say ..."
A'den looked away for a moment as if he'd taken sudden interest in the Marits, who'd now managed to demolish the training house even without ordnance. They emitted excited triumphant little squeals, totally at odds with their ferocity. Then the Null took his comlink from his belt and held it out to Niner.
"Okay, mir'sheb, why don't you flash Zey and tell him we have a renegade ARC on our hands?" He got fed up waiting for Niner to take the link, reached down to grab his hand, and slapped the thing into his palm. "Go on."
Niner inhaled deeply, knuckles white as he gripped the device. Darman caught Fi's eye and wondered if either of them would stop their sergeant. Atin looked studiously blank.
"Go on, Mouth Almighty," said A'den. "Turn him in, if you've got the gett'se to do it."
"You didn't answer me." Niner stood his ground. "Where's the line between bending the rules out of common sense and failing in our duty?
"Duty my shebs."
"I don't mean duty to the Republic. I mean to our own. So some ARC can choose to do a runner because he's so kriffing independent, but the poor grunts in the Galactic Marines have to stay and suck it up? When do they get to choose?"
A'den squatted down level with Niner. He grabbed his wrist and forced Niner's hand and comlink up to the commando's mouth. "So tell Zey, then. You want to know what happens next? This isn't like a proper army. Sull won't get a court-martial. He won't get jailed or busted down a rank. They'll put a blaster round through his head, because they can't trust him again and they can't have an ARC on the loose."
Niner and A'den were frozen, eyes locked on each other.
"Maybe that's what someone who leaves his buddies to do the fighting deserves," said Niner.
"Go ahead, then. Finish it."
A'den let go of Niner's wrist as if he were throwing it away and stood up. Sull ambled around at a short distance, head down, arms folded, looking for all the world as if he were listening to comlink chatter in a nonexistent helmet. Darman suddenly found himself preoccupied with unknowns that Skirata had never covered in training: Who would fire the shot? who executed renegades? He couldn't imagine a brother clone or a Jedi officer pulling the trigger. Maybe they called in Republic Intel.
They certainly couldn't call on CSF to do it. CSF was now very friendly with clones in general, thanks to Skirata.
"Shabii'gar," Niner snapped, and tossed the comlink back at A'den. Then he got up and stalked off. Niner wasn't sulking. Darman knew he was walking away from the temptation to hit the Null, because he'd never heard him use language like that before. "Just remember that if you ever expect us to haul your shebs out of the fire."
A'den watched him go and shook his head. He had weather-beaten skin that made him look older than Ordo and Mereel, and a distinctly paternal air. "Don't you get it?" He turned to the three remaining commandos. "What'll happen to any clone who can't be patched up and deployed again? Or when we get too old to fight?"
Darman found himself pinned down by A'den's intense stare. He had to answer. "Yeah, I think about it a lot"
"And? You noticed any pension plans or retirement facilities?" A'den rolled his eyes. "Attended any career resettlement courses, did you?"
In quiet moments with Etain, the moments when he began to get a glimpse of what was tearing Fi apart, Darman tried not to dwell on it, because there was nothing he could think of doing that didn't mean leaving his buddies in the lurch, and-statistically-he wasn't likely to be around to worry about premature old age anyway.
But the idea of being too badly hurt to be worth saving did trouble him. He liked life, all right. He loved it. Anyone who thought clones didn't have a sense of fear or mortality was a fool-or maybe a civilian justifying that it was okay to use them, because they weren't like real humans.
The whole squad was silent. A'den seemed to be getting exasperated.
"You're ex-pen-da-ble," he said, all slow deliberation, emphasizing each syllable. "All soldiers are, always have been. but you are extra-expendable. No rights, no vote, no families to kick up a stink about your treatment, and no connection to any community that'll fight for you. Bred, used, and disposed of when you're beyond economic repair or show too much dissent. Fine, be noble martyrs, but do it because you choose it, not because you're a cage-farmed nuna and you don't know how to think otherwise."
Fi was usually the one with all the chat and a knack for defusing situations, but he was disturbingly silent now. He seemed to have an increasingly uneasy relationship with the outside world. He craved it-Darman could almost taste the envy when Fi caught glimpses of other beings' lives- but he looked like he tried to put it out of his mind, too, maybe because he was sure he'd never have a life beyond the GAR. Niner had proved to be far better at shutting things out than Fi.
It must have been easier for the rank-and file-troopers. They saw almost nothing of the world beyond the battlefield. They hadn't been raised by father figures like Skirata or Vau, so they clung to one another. It was all they had. Yeah, cage-farmed nuna, and the cage could look like a safe haven when you left it. It was a good comparison. The outside world was unknown and scary. Institutional neurosis, Skirata called it.
"Problem with wars," Fi said at last, voice suddenly a stranger's, "is that they show people what they can really do when they put their minds to it, and that makes peace pretty uncomfortable for governments when it finally comes. You can't put them back in their box."