"Michael Stackpole "The Bacta War"" - читать интересную книгу автора

less about the Jedi Knights than most other kids my age. If not for various
holodramas that painted the Jedi Knights as villains and later
reminiscences by his grandfather about the Clone Wars, Cor-ran would have known
little or nothing about the Jedi. Like most other children, he found them
vaguely romantic and all too much sinister, but they were distant and remote
while what his father and grandfather did was immediate and excit-ing.
He raised a hand and pressed it to the golden Jedi medal-lion he wore around his
neck. It had been a keepsake his father had carried and Corran inherited after
his father's death. Corran had taken it as a lucky charm of sorts, never
realizing his father had kept it because it bore the image of his own father,
Nejaa Halcyon. Wearing it had been my father's way of honoring his father and
defying the Empire. Likewise, I wore it to honor him, not realizing I was doing
more through that act.
Skywalker's explanation to him of what his relationship to Nejaa Halcyon was
opened new vistas and opportunities for him. In joining CorSec he had chosen to
dedicate his life to a mission that paralleled the Jedi mission: making the
gal-axy safe for others. As Luke had explained, by becoming a Jedi, Corran could
do what he had always done but on a larger scale. That idea, that opportunity,
was seductive, and clearly all of his squadron-mates had expected him to jump at
it.
Corran smiled. / thought Councilor Borsk Fey'lya was going to die when I turned
down the offer. In many ways I wish he had.
He shook his head, realizing that thought was unworthy of himself and really
wasted on Borsk Fey'lya. Corran was certain that, on some level, the Bothan
Councilor believed he-not Corran-was right and his actions were vital to
sus-tain the New Republic. Re-creating the Jedi order would help provide a
cohesive force to bind the Republic together and to drape it in the nostalgic
mantle of the Old Republic. Just as having various members of nation-states
placed in Rogue Squadron had helped pull the Republic together, having a
Corellian become a new Jedi might influence the Diktat into treating the New
Republic in a more hospitable manner.
Skywalker had asked him to, and Fey'lya had assumed he
would, join the Jedi order, but that was because neither of them knew of or
realized that his personal obligations and promises exerted more influence with
him than any galactic cause. While Corran realized that doing the greatest good
for the greatest number was probably better for everyone in the long run, he had
short-term debts he wanted to repay, and time was of the essence in doing so.
The remnants of the Empire had captured, tortured, and imprisoned him at
Lusankya, which he later came to realize was really a Super Star Destroyer
buried beneath the surface of Coruscant. He had escaped from there-a feat never
before successfully accomplished-but had gotten away only with the aid of other
prisoners. He had vowed to them that he would return and liberate them, and he
fully intended to keep his promise. The fact that they were imprisoned in the
belly of the SSD that now orbited Thyferra made that task more diffi-cult, but
long odds against success had never stopped him before. I'm a Corellian. What
use have I for odds?
His desire to save them had increased with a chance dis-covery that embarrassed
him mightily when he made it. In Lusankya the Rebel prisoners had been led by an
older man who simply called himself Jan. Since his escape, Corran had caught a
holovision broadcast of a documentary on the he-roes of the Rebel Alliance.