Free 501st: An Imperial Commando Novel by Karen Traviss

and walk outside anytime she pleased.
    But she wouldn’t get far. There was nowhere to go that didn’t involve struggling through deep snow for thebest part of a hundred klicks to the nearest town, Enceri. Fi, the clone recovering from a brain injury, told her that Enceri was the pimple on the
shebs
of Mandalore and that she’d like Keldabe a lot better. She worked out what a
shebs
was fairly fast.
    Now Fi brought her breakfast. She wasn’t sure if he’d taken a shine to her, or was simply curious to see what a creator of genocidal weapons looked like at close quarters. She was sure they all saw her as a monster. What else could she expect when their mission had been to destroy her project, and hers had been to destroy them?
    Yes, I can kill every one of these young men. I still don’t know how I feel about that
.
    “Eggs again,” Fi said, appearing at the door. “You’re a woman of habit, Dr. Uthan.”
    “Protein,” she said. “I believe in protein.”
    “So what do you think of our ancient aiwha-bait?”
    “Is that what you call Kaminoans?”
    “Fair’s fair, Doc. They called us
units.
”
    “I think I might have
depersonalized
you somewhat, too.”
    “I never felt a thing. Honest.”
    “Did Kal send you to charm me, so that I might see the error of my ways?” Uthan uncovered the breakfast tray and admired the spread. Mandalorians
ate
. It wasn’t elegant food, but it was certainly filling. “Make me ask myself how could I possibly want to wipe out such witty and charming young men?”
    “Well, I am, yes, but do you still want to kill me?”
    Uthan had to laugh. She was used to oblique people with hidden agendas that she had to hunt and dissect, so Fi’s child-like directness was disarming. But that was probably the whole idea.
    “Nothing personal,” she said. “I just wanted the Republic to get off my homeworld, and quite a few other governments agreed with us.”
    “So you don’t hold it against us for getting you shot and then locked up in a loony bin for three years.”
    “We’re probably even, aren’t we?”
    He gave her a big grin. “I reckon.”
    Uthan settled down at her table and beckoned him in to sit down. He didn’t move quite as crisply as the other clones. He was a little thinner, too.
    “So,” she said, “you were in a coma.”
    “Yeah. They switched off my life support. But I went on living anyway. I’m stubborn when it comes to not being dead.”
    “And?”
    “Besany rescued me from the medcenter at blaster-point and the next thing I remember is
Bard’ika
healing me. They said it was really exciting. I missed it all, unfortunately.”
    “If this is what Jedi healing can do, I’m more than impressed.” Uthan passed him one of her mealbread rolls. Clones definitely craved carbohydrate, and looking at Ko Sai’s research on rapid maturation and metabolism, she could see why. “Do you all think of yourself as Mandalorian? Not just clones. All of you. Besany, Laseema, Jusik?”
    “Sort of. Jilka doesn’t, but then she didn’t have any choice. Arla Fett—well, the poor woman’s totally
dini’la
. But she’s not Mando anyway.”
    “I never really thought about it before, you see. I only knew Ghez Hokan, and he had a very different view of the world from Skirata’s.”
    “He did after …” Fi’s voice trailed off, the only time that Uthan had seen that permanent good humor fade. She took a guess that he was going to make a joke and then recalled something distressing. “Our old boss, General Zey, said he used to be in the Death Watch but they threw him out.
Kal’buir
says he wasn’t.”
    “Hokan thought the kindest thing was to kill you all rather than let you live as slaves to the Jedi.”
    Fi smiled. “It’s good to know everyone has sensible reasons for wanting us dead, Doc. I’d hate to be killed on a pointless whim.”
    A voice from the doorway made Uthan jump. “That’s a dirty word around here,
Death Watch
. Two, actually.”Mij Gilamar