Prudii gave Ordo a friendly shove in the back. "It's Ord'ika's turn to explore the Outer Rim now."

It was. Ordo didn't want to leave Skirata's side if he could help it, but he was always conscious that he spent more time at base than any of the Nulls. Kal'buir doesn't have favorites. "I'll swap drafts with you, then."

Mereel took off his helmet and grinned. "Yes, and I can look after Agent Wennen while you're gone."

The others laughed. Ordo bristled. "We're here to read Kal'buir the riot act, vod'ikase. Remember?"

"I thought that maybe we could grab a meal in the wardroom and celebrate still being alive," Skirata said. "After you've had your say."

"We'll make it quick, then," Prudii said. "One, you show up for surgery and get that ankle fixed, and no crying off like all the other times. Two, we'll find your daughter, and that way if your no-good offspring is trying to bleed you because he thinks you're rich now, we'll cut off his-"

All Skirata had done to stop Prudii in midsentence was look faintly pained.

"You don't owe him anything, Kal'buir." "D'ika, he's my son."

"He disowned you. Your wife wouldn't let you bring up your kids as Mandos, but they accepted your creds happily enough, didn't they? Funny how they declared you dar'buir. It was the only Mandalorian custom they ever observed."

Ordo watched the color drain from Skirata's face. It was a question he'd never dared raise, because there was only one reason why sons who'd turned their backs on their Mandalorian heritage would use the ancient law to disown their father; they knew it would hurt him. They knew how much it mattered.

"Whatever they do to me," Skirata said quietly, "they'll never stop being my kids. Now, why don't we get a meal, and you can all tell me what you're up to. Jaing, how's the fund-raising going?"

Jaing followed Skirata out through the hatch. "On target, and the investment income is starting to roll in."

"Nice job, son. And you, Kom'rk?"

"Grievous still comes and goes on Utapau, Kal'buir, and he gets visits from interesting allies we didn't know he had. The Regent of Garis, in fact."

"And there was I thinking he was in the Republic camp."

Kom'rk handed Skirata a datachip. "A crumb to toss to Zey-here's the voice traffic between the two of them, minus the locations, of course. We don't want Windu or Kenobi charging in there and blowing it before we've milked the situation." He lowered his voice. "And Grievous keeps asking Dooku what's happened to all these gazillions of droids he was promised poor old dear. I think he's been set up."

"Told you so," Skirata said. "All propaganda. All osik."

"Can I have a change of scene, then? It's boring out there."

Mereel raised an eyebrow. "You need to learn to find your own entertainment, ner vod..."

The Nulls laughed all the way to the wardroom. They breezed in, took a table, and Skirata ordered nerf steaks all around from the steward droid. The wardroom was usually the preserve of nonclone officers, but those who were there sensibly made no comment about an influx of ARC troopers, and nothing about the presence of two sergeants-if they even recognized Skirata and A'den as such. They knew what ARCs did and that it was a good idea to avoid them.

The meal was as much a rare celebration as a meeting, and the Nulls even had a few glasses of Chandrilan wine. "I should have done this many years ago, adi'ke." Skirata raised his glass. "Ni kyr'tayl gai sa'ad-Mereel, Jaing, Kom'rk, A'den, Prudii. There. It's formal, legal. You're my sons and heirs."

"And we won't bankrupt you," Jaing muttered.

"Not with the amount you're skimming, ner vod," Mereel said raising his glass in return. "Thank you, Buir'ika. An honor."

At least one cause for guilt had been lifted from Ordo's shoulders. He was no longer the only Null formally adopted by Skirata. It was a legal detail, nothing more, but Ordo didn't want to be singled out as the favorite. He already felt he had a far easier time than his brothers. They carried on chatting-nothing confidential, not until they were back on the secure helmet link-until Ordo noticed a couple of the mongrel lieutenants, the nonclones in their drab gray fabric uniforms, looking past him toward the entrance with mild amusement.

Ordo turned. Behind him, a young ensign stood glowering at the Nulls, and caught his eye.

"Clone!" snapped the ensign. "What's the meaning of this?"

Clone.

It was never a good opening line. Mereel stifled a smile. "Remember, no entrails, Ord'ika. Folks arc still eating."

But Ordo couldn't laugh it off. Not only was it a gross insult, it was also a test; if he allowed this upstart to disrespect him, he encouraged him to treat all clones badly. A lesson was needed.

"Ensign," he said slowly. "I'm not clone. I'm Captain." He tapped his red pauldron meaningfully. "Captain Ordo, ARC en-one-one, Special Operations Brigade, Grand Army of the Republic. And you'll address me properly."

The wardroom fell silent. The ensign had taken on an ARC trooper, and he was going to get his shebs handed to him. Ordo could sense their anticipation without any need for telepathy.

"You can't talk to me like that," the ensign said. "You're a clone."

Ordo stood and ambled slowly toward him, both thumbs hooked in his belt, coming to a halt almost nose-to-nose. It was hard not to hit the brat and be done with it. He wanted to very badly, and noted the COMPOR pin next to the ensign's flash. Political ideologue, eh? It was the Commission for the Protection of the Republic, strutting little twerps who wanted firm government as long as it was imposed on lesser beings and not them.

"And proud to be one," Ordo said, feeling his throat tightening and his pulse accelerating. "Designed to be superior. And looking at you, I can see why the Republic had to buy in a real navy. What's your problem?"

"You can't bring noncommissioned ranks into the wardroom." The ensign hadn't backed down, so he was doing better than most. "Officers only-"

"Quote him the regs, Ord'ika." Prudii laughed. "Chapter and subsection. That'll teach him."

But the ensign was on his suicide run now. He pointed at Skirata. "And as for bringing the hired help in here, that mercenary-"

Up to that point, Ordo had balanced on that fine edge between finding things almost funny and being irritable. He was aware of his moods and occasionally explosive temper. They said the Nulls were all psychos, screwed up by too much genetic tinkering, and Ordo knew his reactions weren't those of a normally socialized human being. But he had bigger issues on his list than satisfying this ensign's desire for a sergeant-free wardroom, and he let his instincts take over. His instincts were very, very angry.

"GAR regulation five-six-one-one, subsection A-an officer may invite guests into the wardroom," Ordo said. "And you'll apologize to Sergeant Skirata right now."

"I will do no such thing. I'll have you court-martialed."

Ordo answered to nobody but Skirata. This little gut-worm had to apologize. It was a matter of honor, and not just his. "Really? Court-martial this." He brought his head down sharply in a well-practiced head-butt and the crack of bone-not his-split the wardroom air. The ensign fell backward with a shocked oof sound, hands cupped to his nose. There was plenty of blood.

"I'm sticking you on a charge," Ordo said calmly, picking up a pristine white napkin to wipe his forehead. Without a helmet, it always hurt more than he expected. "Insubordination. What's your name?"

The ensign was stunned, in more ways than one. "Lu . . . Luszgoti."

"And now, Ensign Luszgoti, you'll say the magic words." He grabbed the kid's collar, hauled him upright, and stood him in front of Kal'buir. "Apologize to Sergeant Skirata."

The ensign glanced around, maybe calculating his chances of dropping Ordo, maybe looking to more senior officers to back him up. Nobody else moved. Ordo tightened his grip.

"I apologize," the ensign said at last. "Sergeant."

Skirata raised his glass. "Apology accepted, son. Now usen'ye before my boys really lose their tempers."

Ensign Luszgoti left to a polite ripple of applause from one corner of the wardroom. He obviously wasn't popular. A steward droid trundled up to the table with a jug of ale that Skirata hadn't ordered.

"Most entertaining, Captain." A commander sitting at a nearby table nodded, indicating the drinks were on him. "How I've longed to do that."

The ensign would think twice about treating another clone like dirt. But so would the more polite officers here. Violence had its place in education.

"K'oyacyi," said Skirata. "Cheers."

It was a telling phrase, k'oyacyi; it was a command that meant "stay alive." And so it was a toast, or an exhortation to hang in there, or even to come home safely. Staying alive and making the most of each day's living underpinned much of the Mandalorian language.

"K'oyacyi," A'den said. "Oya manda."

Ordo, never fond of alcohol, stared into his glass and wondered what the Republic's armed forces would be like if they had to recruit wholly from nonclones. Whoever had ordered the clone army had excellent foresight.

But, as Fi had once said, they might have set up the whole war anyway, not that a carefully planned war looking for an excuse to start was anything remotely new in the galaxy.

It was still important to find out exactly who could plan so far ahead, and so well.

Hangar deck, Redeemer, two hours later Skirata found a quiet corner of the hangar deck as he waited for the transport, staring at the comlink in his hand for a long time before keying in Tor's code.

It had taken him three days to work out what to say. He thought he'd comm his estranged son straight back and demand to know what had happened to his daughter, buoyed up on a wave of anxiety, but there was too much water under the bridge, and the boy was a stranger.

Boy.

Tor was thirty-nine now. Maybe he even had grandchildren. That was possible, if he'd been Mandalorian and married very young as Mando'ade did; but his mother wouldn't have allowed that. Ilippi thought the beskar'gam was dashing when she married Skirata, but his long absences on deployment started to wear on her with three small kids to care for, and then she hit the big cultural wall-Tor was coming up on eight years old and Skirata wanted to do as all Mando fathers did to take his son to train and fight alongside him for five years.

Skirata could picture Ilippi now, five-year-old Ruusaan and six-year-old Ijaat clinging to her legs, crying, while she yelled that no baby boy of hers was going to war. From that argument-and she shouldn't have yelled like that, not in front of the kids-their marriage went rapidly downhill. The next time he came home on leave, the kids were with her parents on Corellia, and she told him she wanted a divorce.

It took thirty seconds, Mando-style-a short oath to wed and a shorter one to part. Skirata handed her all his earnings and left for another war.

Every credit. Every credit I didn't absolutely need to survive, until the day I left for Kamino. Then I was dead and gone.

He waited for Tor to answer with comlink set on audio-only. He had no idea what to call him. Son? He called most younger men "son" by default. This time it wasn't a reflex.

"Skirata here," said a voice. For some reason he expected Tor to have rejected his name, and it shocked him into brief silence to hear it. "Hello?"

"It's me ... Kal Skirata."

"I ... I didn't think you'd call back."

Skirata plunged in as he would with Zey, and bit back the urge to ask every detail of their lives. They'd decided not to be his sons, and begging for crumbs would only make things worse. Cool distance was the only way to deal with it. "You used the word missing. Is Ijaat okay?"

"He's fine."

"Tell me about Ruusaan."

"We lost contact with her some months ago."

"And now you start looking?"

"We ... drifted apart."

The adult Tor was a stranger; the Tor that Skirata was reaching out to had grown up and changed years ago. There was nothing familiar even about his voice. Skirata's finger hovered over the hologram key, wanting to activate it to see what his boy had grown into, and finally he gave in to thirty-two years of wondering.

The hologram shimmered into life, blue and unreal. Tor was dark-haired thickset, smartly dressed and that was all Skirata could tell. Low-res holograms were lousy on detail.

And Tor could see him and what was immediately behind him.

"Where are you?" he asked. "Who's-oh, wow, that's the Republic army."

"They're clone troops," Skirata said. My boys, too. "I'm on the front line."

"You always were."

Tor was on neutral Corellia if his comm signal was real-it would be, of course-and his only contact with the war was probably via HNE bulletins. How could he ever understand his father? "Tor, tell me what happened to Ruusaan. I need all the data you can give me."

"Yes, we thought you'd be best placed to find her."

"When, where, how?" How can I talk to a kid I raised as if he's a client? "I need detail."

"She was living on Drall, last we knew. We didn't see her more than once a year, but when her comm code didn't function, we got worried. Her apartment was cleared out and there was no sign of her."

"Did you check her bank account?"

"Why?"

"Activity. Withdrawals, or a complete lack of them."

"No. I don't have any access. We weren't that close."

I would have raised you smarter, son. And we'd have been close. "What does she do for a living?"

"She drifts. Security . . . bartending ... a bit of courier work now, she says."

Please don't let her be a mercenary. I wasn't there to teach her how to stay alive. "Did you report her missing to the Corellian cops?"

"They said she was an adult free to go where she liked, and we'd have, to come back with evidence of a crime before they could get involved."

"Okay. I need her state ID number and a recent holoimage." I've got her date of birth. She's my girl. She's still my daughter. "I'll do the rest."

"I know it'll cost you, but we can pay."

"No. Thanks."

"You look ... like you've had a tough time ... Dad." So now Skirata was Dad again.

That hurt. In his peripheral vision, he could see Mereel and Ordo chatting, thinking they were keeping a discreet eye on him when he knew perfectly well that they were standing by to pick up the pieces. Would he take Tor and Ijaat back? Would he swap any of his clone sons for those he had some genetic investment in?

Never. Is that bad? Understandable? Noble? I still don't know. It just.

...is.

"I'm doing fine," Skirata said, struggling with the mix of remembered heartbreak and resentment that he couldn't link to the person he was looking at now. I didn't want to leave. I wouldn't have left. I sent you every cred I earned. "Comm me the data and I'll find her. It's what I do."

Tor seemed to be hovering on the brink of saying something. His fidgeting was visible. "I just want you to know we're sorry. It was about Mama, that's all. We just wanted you to be there when she was dying."