by Timothy Zahn
CHAPTER 11
Someone gasped, a sharp intake of air, just as quickly cut off. “What did you say?” Bearsh demanded, his comlink sagging forgotten in his grip. “You say. . . survivors?”
“Unless the Chiss are running a vacation transport service,” Mara said, stretching out harder to the Force as she tried to sort out the twisting tapestry of sensations. “There are humans down there, at least a hundred of them. Probably more.”
“But that’s impossible,” Jinzler said, his voice hoarse. “This ship died fifty years ago. It died.”
Mara frowned, drawing some of her concentration away from the distant minds to focus on Jinzler. His lined face was tight, his sense swirling like storm clouds in a crosswind, every mental barrier stripped away in a strange combination of hope and dread and guilt.
And in that moment she knew that he hadn’t been lying, at least not about his sister having been aboard.
Or was she possibly still aboard? Was that the thought that was sending this emotional groundquake through him? “Maybe the ship died, Ambassador,” she told him. “But not everyone aboard died with it.”
“Well,” Fel said, his voice studiously matter-of-fact. “This complicates things.”
“It does indeed,” Formbi said, his glowing eyes narrowed in concentration. “It complicates things tremendously.”
Mara caught Luke’s eye. “What do you think?” she asked. “Shall we leave them here to discuss the diplomatic ramifications while you and I just go find these people?”
The gambit worked. “No,” Formbi insisted, snapping out of whatever deep thoughts he’d been working on. “You cannot go alone.”
“Absolutely not,” Drask agreed, gesturing to the standard-bearer. “You—return to the Chaf Envoy and instruct Captain Brast’alshi’barku to issue a drace-two alert. He is to prepare three squads—”
“Wait a minute,” Luke interrupted. “You can’t bring a contingent of soldiers in here.”
“This vessel is still the property of the Chiss Ascendancy,” Drask said, glaring warningly at him. “We will do whatever we please.”
“I’m not disputing that,” Luke said. “I’m simply concerned about what the passengers may do if they see a group of armed Chiss coming down the corridors toward them.”
“He raises a fair point,” Formbi said reluctantly. “They may remember that it was a picket unit of the Chiss Defense Fleet that destroyed their vessel.”
“And so they will be afraid until we can speak with them and assure them of our intentions,” Drask said impatiently. “I do not think a few minutes of fear is too much to ask of them.”
“I wasn’t worried about how they would feel,” Luke said. “I was thinking about what they might do if they saw a corridor full of armed Chiss. Bearing in mind what happened the last time they saw a group like that.”
“Syndic Mitth’raw’nuruodo did not send warriors aboard,” Drask said. “There is no record in any testimony of his doing so.”
“But they would have seen someone with blue skin and red eyes,” Mara pointed out. “Either Thrawn himself or some other envoy. Unless you’re suggesting he would have attacked without even offering them the chance to surrender?”
Drask glared at her. “No,” he growled. “Not even Mitth’raw’nuruodo would have done that.”
“Right,” Mara said. “So they’ll have known who the enemy was. And they’ve had fifty years to prepare for attack.”
“And as Commander Fel pointed out, Dreadnaughts were designed as warships,” Luke added.
There was a moment of silence from the others as the implications of that finally sank in. “What do you suggest?” Formbi asked.
“What Mara just said,” Luke told him. “She and I go find them. Alone.”
“No,” Bearsh pleaded. “You must not leave us apart. We wished to pay tribute to the memories of these brave people. How much more should we not pay tribute to the people themselves?”
“We can bring you down afterward,” Mara told him. “Once we’ve explained the situation—”
“No,” Bearsh repeated, starting to become agitated. “You must not leave us apart.”
“Your plan is unacceptable to us, as well,” Drask put in. “I accept your reasoning as to why we should not bring a full boarding party. But Aristocra Chaf’orm’bintrano and I must at least be present at your first contact with these survivors. And the Aristocra must have a guard.”
“He’ll have the Five-Oh-First, General,” Fel reminded him. “They can handle anything these people can throw at us.”
“Your assurances are welcome but insufficient,” Drask said stiffly. “We will bring a half squad of three Chiss warriors. No fewer.”
He looked a challenge at Luke. “Do you argue that, Jedi?”
“No,” Luke said, giving up. “Three warriors should be all right. I take it you’re coming, too, Ambassador?”
“Absolutely,” Jinzler said firmly. His tension had faded a bit into the background of his mind, but it was definitely still there. “My si—my superiors on Coruscant would insist on it.”
“Then it’s unanimous,” Fel commented. “Good. Now all we’re doing is wasting time.”
“After fifty years, I do not think a few more minutes will make any difference,” Drask said acidly. He turned back to the standard-bearer, who had stopped when the discussion began and was standing awaiting orders. “Return to the Chaf Envoy and signal drace-two alert,” the general said. “Then order the Number Two Honor Squad to report to this chamber. They must be standing ready in the event we require immediate assistance.” His blazing eyes dared anyone to argue with him.
No one did. “Very well, then,” Formbi said. “Let us all return to the Chaf Envoy and obtain such equipment as each person wishes to carry on this journey through the past.” He glanced down at his elaborate robes. “And perhaps a change of clothing would be in order, as well,” he added. “We will reassemble here in thirty standard minutes and begin our search.”
* * *
The first stretch of the trip went smoothly enough. The place felt like an extended tomb, with the bare metal decks and bulkheads dully reflecting the dim glow of the permlight emergency panels set into the ceilings and the brighter light from the party’s own glow rods. But at least the passageways were open and relatively uncluttered by debris. Various rooms opened off the main corridor, some of them large enough for the glow rod beams to fade into the darkness, and the distant walls and ceilings of those larger rooms echoed their footsteps eerily as they stepped briefly inside for a look. Most of the rooms were loaded with silent equipment or dusty storage boxes. Occasionally they came across a sleeping area with rows of empty bunks and personal items scattered on the deck around them.
Mara walked up front with Luke, trying to read beyond the reach of her glow rod beam and wondering a little how this particular marching order had been set up. She and Luke were the most reasonable ones to take point, of course, and she had no particular problem with Formbi, Drask, and Jinzler following directly behind them.
But then came Fel, Feesa, and one of the stormtroopers, with the Geroons behind them. At the very back, walking silently despite their armor, came the other three stormtroopers.
The more she thought about it, the more the arrangement bothered her. Her own training would have put Fel and all four stormtroopers at the back, where they could act as a rear guard in case of trouble from that direction. If Fel still insisted on detaching one of his men, that spare stormtrooper ought to be closer to the front, probably directly behind her and Luke, where his firepower would be available without him having to worry about shooting around Jinzler and both of the senior Chiss.
Twice in that first stretch she thought about halting the party and calling for a rearrangement. But both times something stopped her, and eventually she gave up on the idea. Fel’s military training was certainly more recent than hers, and it was possible the Empire of the Hand’s tacticians had come up with a more efficient mi
litary doctrine than she’d been taught.
After the first fifty meters, travel abruptly became more difficult. Shattered slabs of insulation material, buckled bulkheads, and twisted support beams seemed to be everywhere, littering the corridors and sometimes blocking doorways and the smaller side corridors completely.
“What happened here?” Feesa murmured as Luke carefully pushed aside a set of dangling power cables covered with splintered armor sheaths.
“We’ve reached the part of the ship where the main turbolasers were located,” Fel told her. “You remember Mara pointing out that the weapons blisters had been severely damaged? They would have been Thrawn’s primary target.”
“He did a thorough job, too, I see,” Formbi said. “Why haven’t the maintenance machines fixed this?”
“None of the droids they had aboard would have been big enough to handle damage this extensive,” Fel said. “The survivors must have decided it wasn’t worth the trouble to clear it away themselves.”
“Or were unable to work in safety,” Drask added. “With so many stars in such close proximity to each other, the radiation levels are higher inside the Redoubt cluster than most humans are accustomed to.”
“Are we therefore in danger?” Bearsh asked nervously.
“We won’t be here long enough for that,” Luke assured him. “The outer hull is thick enough to stop most of the radiation. You’d have to live here months or years before you started having problems.”
“Which probably explains why they decided to live in one of the lower Dreadnaughts,” Mara put in. “Whatever the hull doesn’t block, all that rock out there should be able to handle.”
“Or else the other Dreadnaughts aren’t damaged this badly,” Fel said.
Luke shrugged. “We’ll find out.”
“Is that where we’re going?” Jinzler asked. “To the lower ships?”
“That seems to be where the survivors are,” Luke said. “Before we try to find the way down, though, I’d like to see if we can work our way up a few levels to the command deck. If it’s in decent shape, there may be records left that’ll tell us exactly what happened.”
Bearsh made a subdued whistling sound in the back of his throats. “And what truly is the chance of that?” he asked darkly. “We see here how thoroughly this Thrawn was committed to its destruction.”
“Thrawn never destroyed more than was absolutely necessary,” Fel said. “There would have been no reason to wreck the command deck if taking out the shield generators and turbolasers was all he needed.”
Jinzler turned his head. “What in the worlds are you talking about?” he demanded. “All he needed? What did he need to destroy Outbound Flight for in the first place?”
“He had his reasons,” Fel insisted.
“He had reasons for killing civilians?” Jinzler shot back. “Men, women, and children who never did him any harm? What, he just needed some target practice that day and they conveniently happened along? And you.” He turned his glare on Formbi and Drask. “You Chiss. What did you do to stop him?”
“That’s enough, Ambassador,” Mara put in, flashing a warning at him with her eyes. Formbi had already said the Chiss were carrying their own load of guilt over this thing. There was no need to hammer it into the ground. “The past is over and done with.”
“Is it?” Jinzler asked her pointedly. “Is it really?”
“Yes,” Luke put in firmly. “And bringing up anyone’s failures—anyone’s—isn’t going to accomplish anything. Let’s concentrate on finding these people and seeing what we can do for them, all right?”
“Of course,” Jinzler muttered. “I’m sorry. I’m just—”
“Something’s coming,” the stormtrooper beside Fel cut in, swinging his BlasTech toward a half-crushed equipment crawl space branching off the corridor to their right.
The other three stormtroopers were at his side in an instant, spreading themselves into a defensive semicircle between the crawlspace and the rest of the party, their weapons leveled at the opening. “Steady,” Fel warned. “If there’s going to be shooting, we don’t want to be the ones to start it.”
Soft but steady footsteps could be heard now. Mara drew her lightsaber but didn’t ignite it, stretching out to the Force. There didn’t seem to be any presence that direction that she could detect. “Probably a droid,” she said.
“What kind of walking droid could fit through that opening?” Fel objected.
A few seconds later he got his answer as a low-slung, badly dented box about half a meter long and a few centimeters high rolled into view on battered treads. “A walking droid with a bad limp?” Luke suggested as one of the treads gave a soft thunk that sounded exactly like a footstep. “What is that, a floor cleaner?”
“Probably does floors and small-object retrieval,” Fel said, stepping back as the droid rolled past his feet toward a pile of shattered plastic insulation, leaving faint tread marks in the dust as it went. “Part of the main cleaning system, I’d guess.”
“I see,” Luke said, looking over at Mara.
She nodded back. Given the layer of dust on everything, it seemed unlikely that their group had shown up just as the cleaner was starting its monthly or yearly run. It was far more likely that the droid had been equipped with a holocam and comlink and sent to check out the intruders.
Either as an observer, or as a decoy.
She shifted her attention away from the droid, searching the corridor ahead. There was too much debris to see very far, but it looked like the passageway widened a short way ahead. A perfect place for an ambush. She caught Luke’s eye and nodded toward it; he nodded back and slipped past her into the corridor.
“It is truly amazing,” Bearsh said, shaking his head in wonderment as they watched the cleaner droid extend a pair of slender arms and begin sorting through pieces of the insulation. “So that is a droid. And it runs all by itself?”
One of the stormtroopers looked over at Luke as he disappeared behind a section of hanging ceiling material, the armored chest lifting slightly as he took a breath to speak. Mara shook her head in warning; his helmet dipped slightly in acknowledgment and he remained silent. “This one’s probably connected to a central housekeeping computer,” Jinzler told the Geroon. “Small units like this don’t have the logic capacity to run completely on their own.”
“I see,” Bearsh said. “But there are those that do, correct?”
“All sorts,” Jinzler confirmed. “Everything from protocol droids to astromech droids to medical droids.”
“And battle droids and droidekas?” one of the other Geroons asked. “Did they also run independently?”
“Some of the later versions could,” Jinzler said. “But again, most of them were run off a central computer system.”
“A terrifying weapon,” Bearsh murmured.
“Not really,” Fel said. “The whole droid army concept is pretty well outmoded these days, at least in the Empire of the Hand. How about in the New Republic, Ambassador?”
“A few systems still use droidekas,” Jinzler said. “Mostly smaller colonies on undeveloped worlds in Wild Space where people need perimeter guards at night to protect against native predators.”
Bearsh shivered. “Such awesome power in your hands. Yet you make no use of it?”
“We’re not in the conquering business anymore, Steward,” Jinzler reminded him.
“Besides, power’s only one part of the equation for good soldiers,” Fel said. “The problem with battle droids was that they were really pretty stupid. . .”
Mara felt the urgent touch of her husband’s mind. Leaving Fel to his lecture, she slipped quietly down the corridor.
Luke was standing just inside the wide area she’d spotted earlier. “What’ve we got?” she murmured.
He pointed at a stack of flat gray boxes along the left-hand bulkhead. “Looks a little too neat for random debris,” he murmured back. “Booby trap?”
Mara ran through the Jedi sensory-enhanceme
nt techniques and took a slow, careful breath. The subtle background smells of the ship suddenly jumped into full focus: dust, plastic, metal, rust, a general odor of age. She took another breath, sorting through them all.
And this time she caught the faint but unmistakable tang of explosives.
“If it’s not, it’s a terrific imitation of one,” she confirmed, letting the odors fade into the background again. “Remote-triggered, you think?”
“You’re the demolitions expert in the family,” he reminded her. “They can’t have it on timer, though, and I can’t see anyone wasting a droid to come in and set them off.”
“Me, neither,” Mara agreed. “I presume we’re not stupid enough to just rush the stack?”
“I don’t even think we’re stupid enough to get anywhere near it,” Luke said. “Let’s back up a bit and see if we can find another route.”
“I don’t know,” Mara said doubtfully, looking around at the devastation. “There’s enough damage here in the central corridor. The other, smaller passageways are likely to be even worse.”
“Only until we get through the weapon and shield sections,” Luke said. “The rest of the ship may be in better shape. Actually, this is one of four central corridors through this part of the ship. They run parallel to each other on opposite sides of the centerline, collapsing down to two main corridors as you get closer to the bow.”
“Really,” Mara said, frowning. “Since when do you know so much about Dreadnaughts?”
“Since Han and I had a running battle with a bunch of Imperials aboard the Katana,” Luke told her dryly, “You learn a lot about a ship’s architecture when you’re dodging blaster bolts. Come on, let’s go tell the others.”
Fel had finished his lecture by the time they rejoined the group. “There you are,” Drask said, his eyes flashing. “Where did you go?”
