by James Luceno
Klauskin tuned back in to the words of his aide, Fiav Fenn, a female Sullustan. She was saying something about the accuracy of their arrival pattern, which had apparently been pleasingly within the parameters he had set down in the previous day’s staff meeting. He gently shook his head and waved to brush the topic aside. “Ground response?” he asked.
She paused as if to change gears. “None so far.”
“None?” Klauskin frowned. “How long since we dropped out of hyperspace?”
“Four minutes thirty-eight seconds,” she said. “Thirty-nine, forty, forty-one—”
“Yes, yes.” Klauskin blinked. The Corellian armed forces must be very sloppy not to have their first fighter squadrons off the ground after more than four and a half minutes.
Then the other fleet winked into existence.
He saw the flicker of green running lights in his left-side peripheral vision even as the bridge’s threat alarms began howling. The admiral spun to look and stood there, transfixed.
Stretched thin as a veil, a formation of spacecraft now occupied space between Klauskin’s formation and every reasonable exit path away from Corellia. It was on the same course as Klauskin’s fleet, a higher orbit, its vehicles and vessels traveling much faster than Klauskin’s in order to maintain the same relationship to the world below and Klauskin’s fleet in between.
The admiral could not tell, just by eyeballing, the makeup of the intruder fleet; at this distance, all he could determine was that each of the scores or hundreds of vehicles and vessels had green running lights, an impressive visual formationwide show of unanimity. He wished he’d thought of it for his own formation.
He became aware that his bridge crew was talking, shouting over the threat alarms, doing their business. Words intruded on his shock: “… formed up on the far side of Crollia or Soronia and jumped in …” “… no hostile moves …” “… communicating among themselves, but haven’t opened comm with us …”
Klauskin finally regained control of his voice. “Kill the alarms,” he said, his voice, to his own ears, sounding weak. “We already know they’re there. Composition?”
“Working on it,” his chief sensor operator said. “They have nothing in the size class of Dodonna, but they have Strident-class Star Defenders and a large number of frigates, corvettes, patrol boats, gunships, and heavy transports. Mostly Corellian Engineering Corporation, of course. They must have lifted every half-finished frame, every rusted hulk, and every pleasure boat insystem to have pulled this off.”
Klauskin smiled mirthlessly. “Our sensors can’t tell us which are the rusty hulks and which are the shipshape vessels of war, though, can they?”
“No, sir, not at this range. We also count at least a dozen squadrons of starfighters, possibly more—a tight grouping at a distance will sometimes return a signal as a single medium-sized ship. We suspect they’re mostly older fighters. Kuat A-Nines and A-Tens, Howlrunners, various classes of TIE fighters.”
“With crazed Corellian pilots at the controls,” the admiral said.
“Yes, sir.”
Klauskin’s unobtrusive aide Fiav decided to become more obtrusive, stepping up beside the admiral. “Sir,” she whispered, “have you revised orders for the operation?”
“Revised orders?” Klauskin’s mind went oddly blank as he considered that question. It was an unsettling feeling, especially in one for whom decisiveness had always been a career hallmark.
Ah, that was the problem. Revised orders should be issued to enable his formation to accomplish its goals despite the complication that the Corellian formation posed. But that was now impossible. The overriding goal of this operation was to use a show of force to induce fear, awe, and consternation in the Corellians.
But he could not do that now. They had matched his first move with an equal move. At this point, they could not be awed by the forces arrayed against them. They could be defeated … but a bloodless victory was out of the question.
He had failed. Less than five minutes into his operation, he had failed. His thinking processes became attached to that notion and could not pull free of it.
“Orders, sir?”
Klauskin shook his head. “Continue with the operation as per existing orders,” he said. “Redeploy half our starfighter squadrons to positions screening the capital ships. Do not initiate hostile actions.”
He turned his back on the Corellian fleet and stared down at the planet’s surface, at the gleaming star-like patterns of nighttime cities, at the brightening crescent ahead of the daytime side of the world. Dimly, he was aware that his new orders hadn’t accomplished much, and certainly wouldn’t do if the Corellians had any more surprises for him.
This was a problem he had to address. He’d get right on that.
VibroSword Squadron launched, a typical fast-moving stream of Eta-5 interceptors. As they poured out of Dodonna’s forward-port-flange starfighter hangar, Lysa saw the distant thrusters of Luke Skywalker’s Hardpoint Squadron far ahead. Already the Jedi X-wings were roaring down toward the atmosphere for their mission, which would begin on Corellia’s day side.
Then Lysa became aware of all the green running lights in the port-side distance. She turned and stared. “Leader, we have a problem …” Her voice mixed with others, a sudden babble of alarm across the squadron frequency.
“Maintain course and speed.” V-Sword Leader’s voice, as ever, was calm, reassuring. This time, at least, it wasn’t mocking. “Correction. Stay on me.” With that, V-Sword Leader and his wingmate rolled over and looped back almost the way they’d come, heading back toward Dodonna but swinging out a bit from the carrier. Once they were parallel to the carrier but out several kilometers, he brought them around again on a course paralleling the capital ship. “This is our new station,” he said. “Keep your eyes open for aggressive action by the Corellians.”
“Leader, Seven,” Lysa said. “Sir, doesn’t their just being here constitute aggressive action?”
“They’re probably asking the same thing about us, Seven. And the answer to both questions is yes.”
“Thank you, sir.” Lysa’s leg began twitching again. This time she didn’t bother to try to control it.
chapter ten
CENTERPOINT STATION,
CORELLIAN SYSTEM
Jacen brushed aside the cloth over his head and peered out—out, up, back.
The conveyance he lay upon was one open-topped car of a repulsor train. The cars, connected end-to-end, floated along a containment track laid years earlier along Centerpoint Station’s long axis. Jacen could tell from the way the ceiling was no longer kilometers away but only hundreds of meters above, and getting closer, that they were heading out of the vast open central area known as Hollowtown and into a narrowing choke point toward the station’s “top”—the region where the greatest number of significant control chambers had been found, the region where the majority of the investigating scientists’ new installations of equipment and computer gear had been made.
Far overhead, Jacen saw a cluster of buildings, blocky apartment residences in subdued brown and green tones that seemed very out of place in this ancient technological artifact. Despite the urgency of his mission, he grinned. He was staring up at the apartments’ roofs, which were upside down to him. It had to be disconcerting to emerge every morning from sleep and stare up at a distant floor, one across which turbolifts and repulsor trains were always moving.
He lay alone in the midst of a mound of supplies for the station residents—bolts of cloth, preserved foods, crates full of entertainment data cards, deactivated worker droids. Ben was also aboard the repulsor train, several cars back, maintaining his own hiding place. Jacen had settled on this method of operation as the mission planning entered its final stages. “You’ll trail me at a distance of not less than fifty meters,” he had said. “Practice stealth techniques and make no effort to contact me unless your life is in danger. If I’m disabled, defeated, sucked through a malfunctioning atmosphere contai
nment shield, or otherwise distracted from my goal, you set out on your own to accomplish it.” And Ben had nodded solemnly, perhaps finally being convinced that things were serious by the prospect of performing a mission alone.
The ceiling continued to get closer, until it was a mere thirty meters overhead, and then Jacen lurched as the repulsor train took a sharp turn and a plunging descent into a tunnel. The tunnel was three times the width necessary for the repulsor train and lit by pastel green glow rods at intervals; protruding from the walls every hundred meters or so were box-like metal extrusions. Jacen decided that the tunnel had not been intended by the station’s creators for the purpose to which it was now put—the station’s new masters had simply discovered it and decided that it would be a convenient way to keep the homely repulsor train out of sight as it entered the station’s more sensitive areas.
Someone had marked the metal extrusions with huge painted numbers. Dr. Seyah had explained their meaning—they corresponded to hatches providing access to specific sets of chambers and accessways above and below. Often that access was suitable only for workers or athletes—it was common for it to be no more than a crudely installed, open-sided winch turbolift, the sort found on building construction sites all over Coruscant.
At the box extrusion marked 103, Jacen swung aside the cloth concealing him, took a careful look around to make sure there were no observers present, and leapt free of his car. He landed beside the box extrusion and moved toward the nearest wall hatch—an access helpfully, if inelegantly, emphasized by splashes of orange paint.
It was a depression in the wall, nearly oval but with more squared-off corners, about two-thirds the height of a human male. The hardened durasteel door plugging it was of modern manufacture, as was the computer control panel mounted on the wall beside it.
Jacen tugged at the bar that indicated the hatch was dogged closed. Only the handle portion of the bar was accessible through an arc-shaped slot in the doorway, and pulling it from the left to the right position should have opened the hatch.
The bar didn’t budge. The hatch was locked.
He gave the control panel a look. He knew the combination required to open the door—Dr. Seyah had given it to him. But if CorSec’s Intelligence Section mandated different access numbers for different personnel and then tracked their use, using that number would compromise Dr. Seyah.
He ignited his lightsaber and drove it into the hatch toward the base. This was slower going than many obstacles he cut through; the hatch metal was thick and treated against heat. Slowly he pushed it through, and even more slowly he pulled it laterally.
Half a minute later, the edges of the cut glowing gold from the lightsaber’s heat, there was an audible thunk and the metal bar swung free. Well above the area of overheated metal, Jacen gave the hatch a push and it swung open.
Beyond was a cylindrical metal shaft, almost featureless, lit by green glow rods affixed at intervals. Dangling at head height were four heavy metal cables ending in loops and four lighter cables ending in small two-button controls, standard for industrial lifting and lowering. Jacen nodded. In ordinary use, a worker would attach a personal safety hook to one of the loops and activate the corresponding LIFT button. Jacen merely put his lightsaber away, grabbed a loop with his left hand, and punched the LIFT button with his right. The winch controls at the top of the shaft activated and raised him with arm-jarring swiftness.
Moments later, forty meters up, the ride came to an end. A circular side tunnel led away from the shaft. Jacen gave himself the most fleeting push with the Force and swung over the floor of that tunnel, then dropped noiselessly. A few meters down, a ramp led up to another modern-era hatch.
The dogging bar on this hatch was already in the righthand position, and the control panel beside the hatch was not lit. Jacen stared at it for a moment. Dr. Seyah had given him the access code for this hatch, too, but apparently it wasn’t needed now.
Apparently.
Jacen took his lightsaber in hand again and pushed the hatch open.
It required a little more push than its mass would ordinarily have called for. The atmospheric pressure on the other side of the hatch was higher than on Jacen’s side, and once he got the hatch more than a hand span open cool air began to pour across him. He shoved the hatch open far enough to see through—there was only darkness beyond—and then wider yet. Once beyond, he slowly shut the hatch, not letting the air pressure differential slam it shut.
Here, the only sounds were his own breathing and echoes from the air-conditioning system. He could not see anything, but the chamber felt large, very large. He nodded. That matched what Dr. Seyah had told him; this was supposed to be a featureless oval chamber, big enough to host small-scale groundspeeder races, its purpose unknown. On the far side would be a set of ramps allowing access to a higher walkway level, which would, in turn, give him access to Centerpoint Station’s control room governing the station’s artificial gravity generators. Those generators had been installed over several years and only recently made completely operational.
The hatch by which he’d entered went thunk. The control panel next to it lit up, the red and yellow glows from the numbered buttons providing Jacen with just enough light to see himself and the floor.
Jacen cleared his throat. He raised his voice so that it would carry. “Am I about to endure a speech?”
Far overhead, banks of white light came on, dazzlingly bright. Jacen shaded his eyes, focused his attention on the Force—on incoming danger, on malevolent intent.
There was none.
But a voice came from those walkways high on the other side of the chamber. “Is this somebody’s sense of humor? Sending you?”
As Jacen’s vision cleared, he saw a man in deep blue civilian dress—boots, pants, ruffly tunic, and open overcoat—and a dozen armored CorSec agents up on the balcony that was Jacen’s route out of the chamber. Though Jacen knew the man, he still felt a momentary shock of a different sort of recognition.
For the man wore the face of Han Solo—but bearded, a little leaner, a little grayer, and possessed of a confidence that looked like political arrogance rather than Jacen’s father’s cockiness.
“Thrackan Sal-Solo,” Jacen said. “I thought you were spending all your time groundside on Corellia, telling the population what to think and pretending not to be a convicted felon.”
“Little Jacen.” His father’s near double gave him a condescending smile. “I’m also still in charge of restoring Centerpoint Station. And when word reached me that the GA intended to execute an offensive in Corellian space, an offensive that was premature by almost every political measurement—unless you factored in the possibility that they knew just how close I was to restoring the station to full operability—I decided I needed to be here. To prepare against strike teams. And commandos. And Jedi.”
Jacen gave his cousin an admonishing look. “You can never prepare against Jedi.”
“Yes, you can. And I must admit to being offended. For a target as important as Centerpoint Station, shouldn’t they have sent Luke Skywalker? Are you stronger than he?”
Jacen offered a humorless smile. “No, just educated in different directions. Besides, it’s been my experience that anyone who claims to be stronger than Luke Skywalker receives a lot of grief from his admirers.”
Thrackan gave Jacen an expression of sympathy. “I understand that. Just as they criticize one who claims to be more Corellian than Han Solo.”
“So.” Jacen held up his lightsaber but left it unlit. “Would you and your troops do me a favor and get out of my way? There will be fewer severed limbs that way. Or heads.”
Again, Thrackan offered him a pitying look. “Jacen, we can’t afford to let you damage or destroy this station. It’s not going to happen. Surrender now and you won’t be killed. You won’t even be hurt.”
“Uh-huh.” Jacen began walking toward the foot of the closest ramp below Thrackan.
Thrackan, nonchalant, held a hand out to h
is side. One of the CorSec officers there handed him what looked like a flight helmet. With slow, deliberate motions, watching Jacen all the time, Thrackan donned it. Then he snapped his fingers. Two droids, looking much like R5 astromechs but with their top halves removed and replaced by naked machinery, rolled up from behind the CorSec officers to the rail.
And the sound began.
Jacen didn’t even experience it as sound at first. It hit him like a windstorm, blasting him to his knees, bringing pain to every millimeter of his skin as though he were being scorched by a gigantic blowtorch. His lightsaber fell from his lifeless fingers and rolled away.
Even as the attack convulsed him with pain, Jacen, in some dim portion of his mind that still functioned, recognized it—a sonic assault, something that did not have to be aimed or tracked to bring a Jedi down.
Moving from shadow to shadow with the noiselessness of a ghost, Ben reached the hatch Jacen had entered just in time to hear it thunk to a locked position, to see its control board light up. He stared at it in momentary confusion. Why would Jacen have locked him out?
Then he heard voices approaching from the tunnel’s other end—voices and footsteps, some of them ringing heavily on the tunnel’s metal floor. Ben sprinted back the way he’d come, to the lip of the vertical shaft.
There he hesitated. If he leapt for one of the cables and rode it back down, his presence would be detected—the whir of the winch, the swinging of the cable would give him away.
Instead, he moved to the side of the tunnel and swung over the lip of the vertical shaft, holding on by one hand, his other hand on the lightsaber at his belt. Four motionless fingers would be much less likely to be detected than a swinging winch cable.
He held his breath while the footsteps, seemingly more and more numerous, approached. They halted meters away, though—at Jacen’s hatch, he assumed.
