Star Wars - Thrawn Trilogy - Dark Force Rising 02

by Timothy Zahn

  The place where she'd been when it had ended.

  Her fingernails grated across the carved swirls of the window frame as well-remembered faces rose before her: Grand Admiral Thrawn, Lord Vader, Grand Moff Tarkin, advisers and politicians and sycophants by the hundreds. But above them all was the image of the Emperor. She could see him in her mind's eye as clearly as if he were staring in at her through the window, his wrinkled face frowning, his yellow-tinged eyes bright with anger and disapproval.

  YOU WILL KILL LUKE SKYWALKER

  "I'm trying," she whispered to the words echoing through her mind. But even as she said it she wondered if it were really true. She'd helped save Skywalker's life on Myrkr; had come begging for his help on Jomark; and had now uncomplainingly come to Coruscant with him.

  She wasn't in any danger. Neither was Karrde. There was no way she could think of why Skywalker would be useful to either her or any of Karrde's people.

  She had, in short, no excuses left.

  From the next room over came the faint sound of a door opening and closing: Karrde, returned from his meeting. Turning from the window, glad of an excuse to drop this line of thought, she headed toward the door connecting their rooms.

  Karrde got there first. "Mara?" he said, opening the door and poking his head through. "Come in here, please."

  He was standing by the room's computer terminal when she arrived. One look at his face was all she needed. "What's gone wrong?" she asked.

  "I'm not entirely sure," he said, pulling a data card from the terminal's copy slot. "That Bothan on the Council put up a surprising amount of resistance to our offer. He basically forced Mon Mothma to hold off on any serious retrieval mission until the location's been checked out. He's getting a ship set up now for a morning flight."

  Mara frowned. "A double-cross?"

  "Possibly, but I can't see any point to it." Karrde shook his head. "Thrawn already has Hoffner. He'll get to the fleet soon enough. No, I think it more likely Fey'lya's playing internal politics here, perhaps connected to his campaign against Admiral Ackbar. But I'd rather not take any chances."

  "I've heard stories about internal Bothan politics," Mara agreed grimly. "What do you want me to do?"

  "I want you to leave tonight for the Trogon system," he said, handing her the data card. "Best guess is that's where Aves will have holed up. Make contact and tell him I want everything we have that can both fly and fight to rendezvous with me at the Katana fleet as soon as possible."

  Mara took the card gingerly, her fingers tingling at the touch of the cool plastic. There it was, in her hands: the Katana fleet. A lifetime's worth of wealth or power : "I may have trouble persuading Aves to trust me," she warned.

  "I don't think so," Karrde said. "The Imperials will have reinstated the hunt for our group by now-that alone should convince him I've escaped. There's also a special recognition code on that data card that he'll know, a code the Grand Admiral couldn't possibly have extracted from me this quickly."

  "Let's hope he doesn't have a higher opinion of Imperial interrogation methods than you do," Mara said, sliding the data card into her tunic. "Anything else?"

  "No-yes," Karrde corrected himself. "Tell Ghent I'd like him to come to Coruscant instead of going to the Katana fleet. I'll meet him here after all this is over."

  "Ghent?" Mara frowned. "Why?"

  "I want to see what a really expert slicer can do with that suspicious lump in Ackbar's bank account. Skywalker mentioned a theory that the break-in and deposit happened at the same time, but he said that so far no one's been able to prove it. I'm betting Ghent can do so."

  "I thought this involvement in New Republic politics was supposed to be a one-shot deal," Mara objected.

  "It is," Karrde nodded. "I don't want to leave an ambitious Bothan at my back when we leave."

  "Point," she had to concede. "All right. You have a ship for me to use?"

  There was a tap at the door. "I will in a minute," Karrde said, crossing to the door and pulling it open.

  It was Skywalker's sister. "You wanted to see me?" she asked.

  "Yes," Karrde nodded in greeting. "I believe you know my associate, Mara Jade?"

  "We met briefly when you arrived on Coruscant," Organa Solo nodded. For a moment her eyes met Mara's, and Mara wondered uneasily how much Skywalker had told her.

  "I need Mara to go on an errand for me," Karrde said, glancing both directions down the corridor before closing the door. "She'll need a fast, long-range ship."

  "I can get her one," Organa Solo said. "Will a reconnaissance Y-wing do, Mara?"

  "That'll be fine," Mara said shortly.

  "I'll call the spaceport and make arrangements." She looked back at Karrde. "Anything else?"

  "Yes," Karrde said. "I want to know if you can throw together a tech team and get it into space tonight."

  "Councilor Fey'lya's already sending a team," she reminded him.

  "I know that. I want yours to get there first."

  She studied him a moment. "How big a team do you want?"

  "Nothing too elaborate," Karrde told her. "A small transport or freighter, perhaps a starfighter squadron if you can find one that doesn't mind risking official wrath. The point is not to have Fey'lya's presumablly handpicked crew the only ones there."

  Mara opened her mouth; closed it again without speaking. If Karrde wanted Organa Solo to know that his own people would also be coming, he would tell her himself. Karrde glanced at her, back at Organa Solo. "Can you do it?"

  "I think so," she said. "Fey'lya has built up a lot of support in the military, but there are enough people who would rather have Admiral Ackbar back in charge."

  "Here are the coordinates," Karrde said, handing her a data card. "The sooner you can get the team moving, the better."

  "It'll be gone in two hours," Organa Solo promised.

  "Good," Karrde nodded, his face hardening. "There's just one more thing, then. I want you to understand that there are exactly two reasons why I'm doing this. First, as gratitude to your brother for risking his life to help Mara rescue me; and second, to get the Imperials off my back by eliminating their chief reason to hunt me down. That's all. As far as your war and your internal politics are concerned, my organization intends to remain completely neutral. Is that clear?"

  Organa Solo nodded. "Very clear," she said.

  "Good. You'd better get moving, then. It's a long way to the fleet, and, you'll want as much head start on Fey'lya as you can get."

  "Agreed." Organa Solo looked at Mara. "Come on, Mara. Let's get you your ship."

  The comm beside Wedge Antilles' bunk buzzed its annoying call-up signal. Groaning under his breath, he groped in the darkness and slapped in the general direction of the switch. "Come on, give me a break, huh?" he pleaded. "I'm still running on Ando time."

  "It's Luke, Wedge," a familiar voice said. "Sorry to drag you out of bed, but I need a favor. You feel like maybe getting your people into some trouble?"

  "When aren't we in trouble?" Wedge countered, coming fully awake. "What's the deal?"

  "Get your pilots together and meet me at the spaceport in an hour," Luke told him. "Docking Pad 15. We've got an old transport; we should be able to fit all your X-wings aboard."

  "It's a long trip, then?"

  "A few days," Luke said. "I can't tell you any more than that right now."

  "You're the boss," Wedge said. "We'll be there in one hour."

  "See you then. And thanks."

  Wedge keyed off and rolled out of bed, feeling a stirring of old excitement. He'd seen a lot of action in the decade he'd been with the Rebellion and New Republic; a lot of flying, a lot of fighting. But somehow, the missions he remembered as being the most interesting always seemed to be the ones where Luke Skywalker was also involved. He wasn't sure why; maybe Jedi just had a knack for that.

  He hoped so. Between politics on Coruscant and cleaning up after Imperial raids across the New Republic, things were getting more and more frustrating
around here. A change would do him good.

  Keying on the light, he pulled a fresh tunic out of his wardrobe and started getting dressed.

  There was no problem getting the midnight transport off Coruscant; Leia's authorization guaranteed that. But a freighter with a cargo consisting of a dozen X-wings was unusual enough to spark comment and speculation : and it was inevitable that the speculation would eventually reach the ears of one of Fey'lya's supporters.

  By morning, he knew everything.

  "This goes well beyond internal political infighting," he snarled at Leia, his fur rippling back and forth like short stalks of grain caught in a succession of dust devils. "It was blatantly illegal. If not treasonous."

  "I'm not sure I'd go quite that far," Mon Mothma said. But she looked troubled. "Why did you do it, Leia?"

  "She did it because I asked her to," Karrde put in calmly. "And since the Katana fleet is technically not yet under New Republic jurisdiction, I don't see, how any activity related to it can be considered illegal."

  "We'll explain proper legal procedure to you later, smuggler," Fey'lya said acidly. "Right now, we have a serious breach of security to deal with. Mon Mothma, I request an executive order be made out for Solo's and Skywalker's arrest."

  Even Mon Mothma seemed taken aback by that one. "An arrest order?"

  "They know where the Katana fleet is," Fey'lya bit out. "None of their group has been cleared for that information. They must be sequestered until the fleet has been entirely brought into New Republic possession.

  "I hardly think that will be necessary," Leia said, throwing a look at Karrde. "Han and Luke have both handled classified information in the past-"

  "This is not the past," Fey'lya interrupted her. "This is the present; and they have not been cleared." His fir flattened. "Under the circumstances, I think I Lad best take personal charge of this mission.

  Leia threw a look at Karrde, saw her own thought reflected in his face. If Fey'lya was able to personally bring back the Katana fleet- "You're certainly welcome to come along, Councilor," Karrde told the Bothan. "Councilor Organa Solo and I will appreciate your company."

  It took a second for that to register. "What are you talking about?" Fey'lya demanded. "No one's authorized either of you to come along."

  "I'm authorizing it, Councilor," Karrde said coldly. "The Katana fleet is still mine, and will remain so until the New Republic takes possession of it. Until then, I make the rules."

  Fey'lya's fur flattened again, and for a moment Leia thought the Bothan was going to launch himself physically at Karrde's throat. "We will not forget, this, smuggler," he hissed instead. "Your time will come."

  Karrde smiled sardonically. "Perhaps. Shall we go?"

  Chapter 27

  The proximity alert warbled, and Luke straightened up in his seat. After five days, they'd made it. "here we go," he said. "You ready?"

  "You know me, Han said from the pilot's seat beside him. "I'm always ready."

  Luke threw a sideways glance at his friend. To all outward appearances, Han seemed perfectly normal, or at least as close to it as he ever got. But beneath the casual flippancy Luke had noticed something else over the past few days: a darker, almost brooding sense that had been with him since they left Coruscant. It was there now; and as he studied Han's face, Luke could see the tension lines there. "You all right?" he asked quietly.

  "Oh, sure. Fine." The lines tightened a little further. "But just once I'd like them to find someone else to go off on these little jaunts across the galaxy. You know Leia and I didn't even get a day together? We didn't see each other for a whole month; and we didn't even get a day."

  Luke sighed. "I know," he said. "Sometimes I feel like I've been running full speed since we blasted out of Tatooine with the droids and Ben Kenobi way lack when."

  Han shook his head. "I hadn't seen her for a month," he repeated. "She looks twice as pregnant as she did when she left. I don't even know what happened to her and Chewie out there-all she had time to tell me was that those Noghri things are on our side now. Whatever that means. I can't get anything out of Chewie, either. Says it's her story, and that she should tell it herself. I'm about ready to strangle him."

  Luke shrugged. "You have to face it, Han. We're just too good at what we do."

  Han snorted. But some of the tension left his face. "Yeah. Right."

  "More to the point, I guess, we're on the list of people Leia knows she can trust," Luke continued more seriously. "Until we find that information tap the Empire's got into the Imperial Palace, that list is going to stay pretty short."

  "Yeah." Han grimaced. "Someone told me the Imperials call it Delta Sourse. You got any ideas who or what it might be?"

  Luke shook his head. "Not really. Got to be close in to the Assemblage, though. Maybe even to the Council. One thing's for sure-we'd better get busy and find it."

  "Yeah." Han stirred and reached for the hyperdrive levers. "Get ready :"

  He pulled the levers; and a moment later they were again in the blackness of deep space. "Here we are," Han announced.

  "Right." Luke looked around, an involuntary shiver running up his back. "Dead center in the middle of nowhere."

  "Should be a familiar feeling for you," Han suggested, keying for a sensor scan.

  "Thanks," Luke said, "but getting stuck between systems with a d,e,ad hyperdrive isn't something I want to get familiar with."

  "I didn't mean that," Han said innocently as he keyed the comm. "I was talking about Tatooine. Wedge?"

  "Right here," the other's voice came over the "Looks like we've got a target at oh-four-seven mark one-six-six," Han told him. "You ready to fly?"

  "Ready and eager."

  "Okay." Han took a last look out the viewport and keyed the cargo hatch release. "Go."

  Luke craned his neck to look in the direction Han had indicated. At first all he could see was the normal scattering of stars, achingly bright against the total blackness around them. And then he saw them: the softer glow of a ship's running lights. His eyes traced the empty space between them, his brain forcing a pattern to the lights; and suddenly the image coalesced. "It's a Dreadnaught, all right."

  "There's another one just past it," Han said. "And three more to port and a little below."

  Luke nodded as he located them, a strange tingle running through him. The Katana fleet. Only now did he realize just how little he'd really believed in the fleet's existence. "Which one do we check out?" he asked.

  "Might as well take the closest," Han said.

  "No," Luke said slowly, trying to focus on the vague impression tingling through him. "No. Let's try:that one over there." He pointed to a set of running lights a few kilometers farther away.

  "Any particular reason?"

  "I don't really know," Luke had to admit.

  He could feel Han's eyes on him. Then the other shrugged. "Okay," he said. "Sure. We'll take that one. Wedge, you getting all this?"

  "Copy, transport," Wedge's voice confirmed. "We're shifting into escort formation around you. So far it looks clean."