THE BLACK FLEET CRISIS #3 - TYRANTS_TEST

by Michael P. Kube-Mcdowell

recon probes had been destroyed on deep penetration mis

  sions. Five

  battle groups of an expanded Fifth Fleet had actually moved into the

  cluster, and smaller units were actively searching for the former

  Imperial shipyards. So far the Yevetha had not responded to the

  intrusions, but it seemed inevitable that they would.

  But the real source of concern for Luke was the first confirmation that

  J't'p'tan--referred 'to by its catalog name, FAR202019S--had been

  involved in the fighting.

  The recon ship sent there had identified a Yevethan thrustship in orbit

  before being fried; though the probe had completed only thirty-four

  percent of its ground scan, the destruction of the H'kig commune,

  estimated at thirteen thousand strong, was listed as "probable."

  Balancing that bleak prospect, at least in part, was the report from

  Doornik 319 that the Yevethan warships were carrying hostages taken

  from the destroyed colonies. If the Fallanassi had not died on

  J't'p'tan, they were now prisoners of the Yevetha, aboard one of the

  more than six hundred ships of the Duskhan League fleet--a fleet that

  could at any moment be hurled against the New Republic forces

  challenging Nil Spaar's sovereignty.

  Suddenly Luke's journey to Koornacht seemed joined to Leia's crisis at

  home, and in a way he had not anticipated. If he had a part to play in

  what was coming, the flow of the Current pointed to J't'p'tan, not

  Coruscant. Perhaps everything that had happened was part of a larger

  tapestry he had not yet been able to glimpse.

  But even without that understanding, he knew that he had to go on, not

  turn back.

  With both his and Akanah's day bags slung over his shoulder, Luke rode

  the slidewalk back to Starway Services, where the lights and sounds

  emanating from the covered work bays told him that some of the mech

  crews were chasing a completion bonus. A few minutes later, depot

  manager Notha Trome awoke with a start from the nap he was taking on

  his office floor.

  "Li Stonn's ship should be given top priority," he said aloud, as

  though it were a revelation that had come to him in his sleep. A

  minute later, he repeated that declaration in front of the yard boss.

  "I want half," is all the yard boss said, taking the berth slip and

  signaling for the tow dolly.

  Outside the depot, Luke nodded to himself, satisfied.

  Then he turned and looked out on the nightscape of Taldaak. It was

  time to find Akanah. He did not fully understand what her part in

  these events was, either, but his tumultuous life had taught him to

  respect what looked like coincidence. For the first time since leaving

  Coruscant with Akanah, he believed that his destiny and hers were bound

  together, and that whatever lay ahead on J't'p'tan awaited both of

  them.

  Akanah stood on the dockwalk looking up at a sleek curving hull bearing

  the name Jump for Joy in a flowing royal blue script. It was the best

  starship in port, at least for Akanah's purposes--a Twomi Skyfire,

  barely a year old. Six places, the lines of a fighter, and the engines

  of a racer.

  If she was going to leave Utharis--if she was going to leave Luke

  behind--the means to do so was before her.

  She had already been aboard and assured herself that the pilot assist

  system was the equal of the luxury appointments. Autolanding,

  autonavigation, crash and collision-avoidance overrides, voiceassisted

  preflight--despite an advertising campaign heavy on images of danger

  and adventure, the Skyfire had been designed to make the occasional

  pilot comfortable at the controls.

  More importantly, Jump for Joy should be able to outrun any other ship

  in port, except perhaps the snub fighters belonging to the Utharis

  Sector Patrol. That kind of speed could be useful in a war zone. Luke

  had already totted up Mud Sloth's shortcomings in combat, and they were

  numerous enough to give Akanah pause.

  She moved a step to her right and looked down the side of the sprint.

  A pretty ship, she thought, and sighed. And it would be so easy to

  take it.

  But leaving now meant abandoning the greater part of her purpose with

  her goal in sight but not yet achieved. Luke was open to her

  now--beginning to understand, beginning to change. More time. All I

  need now is more time. If she was there when the next test came, she

  might see the transformation. Luke was that close--aware of the flow

  of the Current, almost able to read it, nearly ready to join "It's a

  beauty, isn't it?" a man said, coming up beside her. He was wiping

  his hands on a cloth, as though he had been doing some work somewhere

  out of sight.

  Akanah had felt his presence moments before he spoke, but allowed

  herself to startle girlishly. "Oh! I didn't see you. Yes, it's

  beautiful--it looks like it's ready to leap into the air at any

  moment."

  Even in the darkness, Akanah could feel the man beaming with pride.

  "Would you like to see the inside?"

  Akanah laughed at him silently, realizing his intent.

  "I don't think so," she said. "I need to be getting home."

  He leaned toward her conspiratorially. "Have you ever had sex in

  hyperspace?"

  This time she could not contain her bubbling laugh of bemusement.

  "Yes," she said, and melted away into the night.

  The skids of the fleet launch kissed the plating of the flight deck so

  gently that Plat Mallar could scarcely feel the vibration under him.

  "Contact," he said, reaching overhead to the auxiliary control panel.

  "Grapples on. Systems to standby.

  Shutting down engines."

  "All right!" said the check pilot. "That's good enough. Come on out,

  Mallar, and I'll give you your scores."

  With a sigh of relief, Mallar released the double harness with a sharp

  poke of his fingers. Climbing out of the flight couch, he made his way

  to the egress hatch at the back of the simulator's cabin.

  He had just flown an imaginary approach and landing to the number two

  flight deck of the carrier Volant, his tenth exercise of that session

  and his eighteenth of the day. His flight suit was dripping with

  perspiration, his shoulders aching, his feet half numb from being

  confined in flight boots that weren't yet broken in.

  The launch was the larger of the two boats used for intrafleet travel

  and had proven the harder for Plat to master. A fleet gig was similar

  in size to an X-wing or TIE interceptor, and he had had little trouble

  getting one in and out of the enclosed space of a combat flight deck.

  But a fleet launch was two and a half times longer and a full meter

  taller than a gig, and Plat had hit two simulated E-wings and the

  flight deck roof three times before he made the adjustment.

  "Like going through adolescence all over again," he had muttered to

  himself after making the cockpit shake violently for the fourth time.

  But the last exercise had felt good to him--good enough to allow him to

  enjoy his break. He paused at the top of the simulator's ladder to

  remove his helmet, then swung his leg over
and slid down the handrails

  on his heels. The check pilot, Lieutenant Gulley, met him at the

  bottom.

  "Well?"

  "You have a nice touch when you're not putting holes in the bulkheads,"

  Gulley said. "I'm going to qualify you for the gig now. Come back

  offshift and spend a few more hours working the launch, maybe hitchhike

  with me or One-Eye on a few runs, and I should be able to qualify you

  for the launch soon enough." He handed Plat his updated identifier

  disc.

  "We're done?"

  "You're going on duty," he said. "Get yourself down to Blue Deck and

  report to the flight controller.

  Your first passenger should be there by the time you check in."

  A grin spread across Plat's face. "Yes, sir," he said, saluting.

  "Thank you, sir."

  Plat jogged through the corridors, helmet tucked under his left arm,

  until he rounded a corner and brushed against a round-bellied major.

  "Is there a combat alert, pilot?"

  Coming to a sudden stumbling stop, Plat whirled and saluted. "No,

  sir."

  The dressing-down that followed cost him two minutes but did nothing to

  dampen his spirits. He showed his ID at the controller's window and

  collected the enabler key for fleet gig 021, then ran out across the

  flight deck to where it was berthed. For a long moment, he stood and

  stared at it unbelievingly.

  "Is there a problem?"

  Plat whirled, recognizing the voice. "Colonel Gavin. No problem,

  sir!"

  "Then let's get going," Gavin said, moving past Plat and twisting the

  hatch release. "I'm your passen-ger-and I've got an appointment on

  board Polaron."

  With all possible care, Plat ran through the pre-flight checks and

  eased G-021 forward to the launch area, then out into space. Picking

  up Polaroh's locator signal, he brought the gig around to the intercept

  heading and accelerated smoothly to the prescribed velocity.

  "This what you wanted, son?" Gavin asked, leaning forward in his

  couch.

  "Yes, sir. Thank you for the chance."

  "No gunsights on a fleet gig. Nothing to fire the blood and feed that

  hunger for revenge."

  "I know that, sir," said Plat. "But my being here puts a more

  experienced pilot in a cockpit that does have gunsights and the firing

  buttons to, go with them.

  When the time comes, what he does, he'll be doing for me--if you look

  at it a certain way."

  Gavin nodded. "That's right. That's just the way to look at it." He

  settled back against the acceleration cushions, checked the readout on

  his command comlink, then glanced out the side viewport at Intrepid,

  rapidly falling away behind them.

  "Oh, and there's one other thing worth remembering," the colonel

  said.

  "You'll get a lot of cockpit time in this duty--more hours in a single

  duty shift than most pilots log in a week. Before you know it, you

  just might find yourself turning into one of those more experienced

  pilots." Plat heard Gavin's grin as he added, "But save the

  hammer-eights and counterbreaks for the simulator.

  I don't want to hear that my gig pilots have been practicing combat

  maneuvers on intership runs."

  Plat Mallar smiled. "I'll remember, Colonel."

  Han did not know whether it was a matter of contempt or carelessness,

  but he was neither blindfolded nor rendered unconscious for the

  transfer from the dirt-side prison to the brig of Pride of Yevetha.

  All his captors did was bind his wrists to a bar behind his hips and

  give him an escort composed of two towering Yevethan nitakka. Then he

  was walked through a maze of corridors and chambers to a driveway where

  a three-wheeled, box-bodied transporter awaited.

  From the open viewports of the transporter, he saw every detail of his

  surroundings and tried to memorize everything he saw--the route that

  led from the complex where he had been held to the port, the markings

  on the face of the gate that closed behind them, the design and

  function of the other vehicles sharing the road, the architecture and

  arrangement of the buildings they passed.

  He also studied the faces and physiques of not only the guards, but the

  gate proctor, the transporter driver; and any Yevethan pedestrians he

  could catch a good long look at. With the help of those examples, he

  made a start at learning to distinguish one Yevetha from another.

  At the same time, Han's busy mind assessed the effectiveness of his

  restraints. The similarity to the bench in the audience room prompted

  Han to wonder if the method had been designed for Yevethan

  physiol-ogy-it seemed as though the bar would either prevent

  the murderous dew claw from emerging or render it useless if

  extended.

  But the effectiveness of the bar depended on the priSoner being unable

  to either pass the bar under his feet or to simply slide a wrist out to

  one end. Yevethan physiology might not allow for either of those

  motions, b ut Han was confident that human physiology--even his

  less-than-ideally-limber variant--would. He did not immediately test

  his theory, but he was buoyed by the thought that he could free his

  hands at any time and--as a bonus--have the bar to use as a weapon.

  That happy thought lasted only until they reached the spaceport, where

  the transport was met by more guards and one of the Yevetha who had

  been present for Barth's execution. The moment the Yevethan official

  first saw Han clearly, he barked angry words and cuffed one of the

  guards sharply across the face. Almost immediately, another guard

  moved behind Han and wrapped a thick strap around his upper arms, just

  above the elbows. With it in place, the escape Han had planned was

  quite impossible.

  "An understandable but quite dangerous oversight," the Yevetha said to

  Han in Basic. His diction was excellent, his delivery almost

  irritatingly smooth. "The guard detail at the palace is not accustomed

  to handling human prisoners."

  That same Yevetha led the way across the rough pavement of the

  spaceport apron to where a delta-type Imperial shuttle waited on its

  skids. Han was surprised to see that the two Yevetha already seated in

  the cockpit wore no more clothing than any of the others--no pressure

  suit, not even a helmet. He filed that fact away as he climbed into

  the spartan cabin.

  One guard and the Yevethan official climbed in after him, and Han

  realized that he was to have a traveling companion. The guard sat

  beside him on the long portside bench, the official opposite him.

  "I am Tal Fraan, proctor cogent to the viceroy."

  "I'm sure your mother's very proud of you," Han said. The hatch was

  secured from outside, and the idling whine of the engines increased

  sharply. He noted that the engines sounded tight and smooth--much

  better than the typical Imperial offerings.

  Tal Fraan loosed an open-mouth hiss that Han thought might be a

  laugh.

  "Tell me, did you enjoy thinking that you might escape?"

  Han said nothing and directed his gaze out the viewport as the shuttle

>   began to climb.

  "Do you know that we have no prisons?" Tal Fraan said. "In a city of

  more than one million, on a planet of nearly seven hundred million,

  there is not a single Yevethan jail, penitentiary, or stockade. We

  have no need of such things. There is no equivalent in our language

  for convict or incarcerate."

  "I guess that'd be one of the often overlooked advantages of summary

  execution," said Han; "Keeps the taxes down."

  "So true," said Tal Fraan, with no apparent awareness of Han's ironic

  tone. "That you choose to sustain those who harm you was a great

  puzzlement to me for some time."

  "It can't have been a complete surprise," said Han.

  "The place you kept us looked a lot like a prison to me."

  "Those you call Imperials made up for this lack of experience on our

  part," Tal Fraan said. "The cell in which you were kept in the grand

  palace was built by the overlords during the occupation. And the

  Imperial starships are well equipped in this regard, as you will

  see."

  "If this is just a goodwill tour, you could save yourself the trouble,"

  Han said. "I've already visited an Imperial detention center."

  "Yes, I know," said Tal Fraan. "I have studied your past. I learned a

  great deal from it. It is how we know how important you are to your