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

we will rock Xucphran society to its foundations."
Iella had protested the whole idea. "Dlarit is hardly a
military target in any real sense. He's a fop. We can undercut him by hitting
other targets and making his assurances lies."
"We could, but hitting such sites still doesn't bring the nature of war home to
the people. We need to frighten them, deeply."
"And hitting military targets won't do that?"
"Eventually. This will be faster."
Iella frowned. "Wouldn't just shooting random people accomplish the same thing?"
Elscol shrugged. "Probably. It's a backup plan."
"You can't be serious." Iella looked at the smaller woman in utter disbelief.
"That would be murder. This is murder, for all intents and purposes. You can't
kill innocent people."
"Look, Iella, there are no innocent people here." Elscol planted fists on her
hips. "Over the years I've helped dozens of worlds liberate themselves from the
Imps, and part of each fight is making the populace wake up to what's really
going on. People assume that if they say nothing and do nothing they're not
involved in the fight, but the fact is that their apathy is a tacit vote of
support for the status quo. They have to be made to see that by making no choice
they have indeed made a choice. When they understand that, they begin to think
about those choices, and we make choosing the Imps out to be a very bad choice."
lella's head came up. "Black Sun used to use that same rationale to justify
murdering all sorts of folks."
"There's a difference between Black Sun and us."
"Oh, do tell."
"Black Sun was all about greed and selfishness." Elscol looked around at the
humans and Vratix gathered in the room. "We're fighting for freedom, for the
right to live the way we want to live. We're fighting for the only thing worth
fighting for."
"And if these people want to be ruled by the Empire?"
"They can consider our action an eviction notice." El-scol's brown eyes
narrowed. "You come from a law-enforce-ment background where you were out to
protect the innocent from the ravages of the criminals. You could do that
without resorting to this drastic an activity because you had the weight of the
government behind you. You had a justice sys-
tern that would reinforce the will of the people. I understand that and respect
it. By the same token, I also know that you saw criminals out there that you
knew could only be stopped by a blaster bolt.
"That's what we're up against here. Dlarit might seem harmless, but he's helping
prop up a system that keeps the Vratix in virtual slavery. He's propping up a
system that means billions of individuals suffer needlessly from diseases
because they cannot afford the cure. He's got the blood of everyone who died
because of a lack of bacta on his hands, as well as that of the families of the
Alazhi's crew."
Iella had nodded. "I can't deny the validity of what you're saying about Dlarit.
Add to it the fact that his daugh-ter spied on the Alliance for the Imps and got
Corran cap-tured. The problem still is that I'm uncomfortable with assassinating
him, especially in his home."
"The act has much more impact there. We'll make a ho-logram of the execution and
start circulating it. That will get our point across, and fast, too."