appearance so she can claim to be Kirtana Loor, Imperial Intelligence
agent, and take the Delight's crew from custody without having to
notify you for authorization. Several landspeeders have been organized
for transport."
"And the Delight is ready?"
The small man nodded solemnly. "Using TIE pilots as workers was
difficult, but once I explained the necessity of limiting knowledge of
the operation to them, they agreed they were the best people for doing
the job. The X-wing munitions are on board the Delight, though the
spare parts appear to have been pilfered. As a skilled technician can
convert them to work in Incom's T-47 landspeeder, my assumption is that
someone in property storage gave himself a bonus. I have a few leads
in that regard."
"We will deal with him, later." Barris snorted, drank and set his
glass down. "The shields on the ship are disabled?"
"Yes, sir. We replaced a duplex circuit with its triplex
equivalent."
"But a codepatch will allow them to bring the shields "Yes, sir, but an
initial diagnostic run on the ship will report the circuits as
complete. Only when they discover
the failure will they begin to look for the triplex. At that point slicing the proper sequence out of it
will take approximately an hour."
The Prefect tapped a finger against the empty rim of his shifter.
"An hour they will not have."
"Precisely, sir." Eamon refilled the glass with choholl.
"While you have been busy, Eamon, so have I." Barris winked at his
man. "I have composed the report about your execution."
"Not on the system, sir?"
Barris smiled in response to the urgency in Eamon's voice. "No, of
course not." He tapped the fingers of his r ight hand against the side
of his white-haired head. "I have it all up here. You were terminated
for 'anti-Imperial activity."" "Very good, sir."
"I may modify it. I want it to be perfect."
"I am certain it will be more than suitable, sir."
"I thought I would enter it into the computer just around sunset
tomorrow. Things should be ready by then?"
"Yes, sir. Agent Loor will be arriving then, so he should see the
pursuit and how you handle it."
"Excellent." Barris hefted the glass and raised it again in a
salute.
"The destruction of the Delight should make for great entertainment. I
think I will have some friends in to watch."
Eamon nodded solemnly. "Very good, sir. I had already requested the
kitchen prepare suitable refreshments for a gathering of ten. Will
that be sufficient, sir?"
"Quite, Eamon." Barris sipped his choholl and smiled.
"You anticipate my desires as well as my needs. What would I do
without you?"
"A hypothetical question, sir." Eamon's expression became placid.
"One hopes there is never need to answer it."
Her now-brown hair pulled back into a tight bun at the back of her
head, Dynba stepped from the first land-speeder and tugged at the hem
of her uniform jacket.
She marched crisply to the door of the local detention center and drew
from the jacket's breast pocket what looked to be an ordinary rank
cylinder. She touched it against the I/O port beside the door.
Somehow, above the thundering of her heart, she heard a click and the
door withdrew upward. At the other end of the short corridor she saw a
guard standing behind a transparisteel shield look at her, then at the
image on the screen of his datapad and back again. As he did so the
blood drained from the man's face.
His clear anxiety gave Dynba a chance to conquer her own fear.
Eamon had assured her that the rank cylinder he had given her would
identify her as an Imperial Intelligence agent sent out from coruscant
to inspect Garqi. It made her Kirtana Loor and made her answerable to
no one on the planet. A word from her and anyone could be sent to
Kessel to mine spice while awaiting interrogation.
"You will be someone they fear as much as you fear them.
Use it and you will dominate them," he had told her.
And use it I shall. Keeping her steps crisp, and relishing the click
of leather on stone, she approached the guard.
"Are the prisoners ready for transfer?" She let the lilt of the common
Coredweller accent enter her voice, and underscored her words with
impatient indignation.
The man's lower lip started quivering. "Transfer? I know nothing of
.
. ."
"Of course you don't." She drew her black leather gloves off by
tugging on each finger in succession, then slapped them against the
palm of her left hand. "The inefficiency of Rim-world officials should
not surprise me, should it?"
"Well, I . . ."
"You were not going to venture an opinion, were you?
What is your name?"
The man smiled weakly. "Which prisoners were those, my lady?"
"The crew of the Star's Delight." Her eyes became slits and she forced
her nostrils to flare. "Returning them to the scene of the crime--you
do know about using that investigative technique, don't you?"
The man furiously punched keys on his datapad.
"Well, I . . ."
"Of course you don't--the technique predates the Emperor's murder by a
year, so it hasn't gotten out here yet.
You probably think he is still alive."
"Yes, my lady, I mean, no . . ."
Dynba barked a harsh laugh. "You don't know what you mean. Why the
Rebels would strike at this witspare compost heap, I do not know."
"No, my lady."
The door to her right buzzed and slid into the ceiling.
Three bedraggled figures, a small female Sullustan, a morose giant of a
Duros and a Devaronian with several missing teeth and a broken horn
shuffled through the doorway. They wore binders on their wrists and
had another pair hobbling them. Each individual looked away from the
dying sunlight pouring through the open doorway to the street.
Dynba looked up at the Duros. "Captain Lai Nootka, you and your crew
are charged with treason. I am a representative of Imperial
Intelligence and the resolution of your case is in my hands. Come with
me."
She led the prisoners from the detention center and waved the
landspeeders forward. Each prisoner was secured in a different
speeder, then they headed off toward the hangar where the Star Delight
had been kept in impound.
The vehicles followed one after the other all the way to the
spaceport.
Dynba regretted not being able to tell the crew they were safe and with
friends, but doing so would have put the mission in jeopardy. If the
crew did not look scared and defeated as they rode through the streets
of
Pesktda, someone could note their happy demeanor and that would attract attention to them and the operation.
Eamon had pointed out that people tended not to pay too much attention
to those who appear to be doomed because they might attract attention
in doing so. Even before he'd said anything, she'd known that was
true.
In keeping with her rol
e as Loor, she met the gazes of the curious and
held them until the others turned away. I don't like making people
afraid, but it is the only way to save these people and Eamon. And
myself and my friends, too. She kept her stare hard and terrifying
throughout the ride until the speeders slid into the shade of the
hangar.
The second her landspeeder stopped, she loosened her hair and shook it
out over her shoulders. "Open the binders." She pointed at Nootka.
"The ship is ready to go, complete with your X-wing munitions.
Start pre-flight.
The only thing on this world that can stop us from getting out of here
are four TIE starfighters. Is that a problem?"
The Duros rubbed at his wrists as his driver tinkered with the binders
on the starpilot's ankles. "We are matched for speed. We have
hyperdrive, they do not. We have a blaster cannon, they have lasers.
We have shields, they do not. I think we are not far from freedom."
"Dynba, you did it!" A Twi'lek woman came running down the gangplank
of the long CorelliSpace Gymsnor-3
Freighter. With her head tails twitching excitedly, she brandished her
datapad. "No alarms, no traces. We're clear.
"Good." Dynba looked past Arali Dil's shoulder, then frowned.
"Are Eamon or Xeno here?"
Arali shook her head. "No one has been here except Sihha and me."
Dynba frowned. Prior to departing for the prison, Dynba had left a
message with Eamon telling him when they planned to leave, and another
to Xeno inviting him to reunite with his crew and escape. She had
expected both of them to be present when she returned and she
had especially wanted to see the look on Eamon's face when he realized his
plan had worked perfectly.
"Arali, link into the comnet and see if you have anything from Xeno or
Eamon."
"Right."
The Twi'lek and a Bothan had turned out to be the only non-Humans in
Xeno's circle. The circle itself only had seven members, not counting
Xeno, and all of them had thought it funny that even being so few in
number, they had caused enough trouble for the Empire to send an
Intelligence agent out from the Core to Garqi to deal with them.
Dynba had briefed everyone on their role in the Great Evacuation.
Because of the Empire's xenophobic bias, neither Arali nor Sihha, the
Bothan, would pass for Imperial officers, so they had remained with the
ship while the five Humans used the speeders to get the prisoners. Now
back in the hangar, everyone hurried aboard the Delight and prepared
for departure.
"Interesting."
Dynba glanced away from the hangar opening and toward Arali.
"What is?"
"Message to all of us from Xeno. He says his work here isn't done.
He'll catch up with us later and we will all laugh about this."
"I'd prefer it if he came with us. I hope they don't need him to run
the ship."
"Sihha can fill in--he was an astrogation student here."
"Right." Dynba felt a heavy darkness begin to spread from her stomach
out to her limbs and stab straight up into her heart. "Nothing from
Eamon."
"By the foul hearts of the Sith!"
Dynba whirled at the sound of Arali's voice. "What?"
The Twi'lek held her datapad out and Dynba snatched it from her
trembling hands. "By order of Prefect Mosh Barris, at the conclusion
and in resolution of his personal investigation into the actions of
Eamon Yzalli, ordered
and carried out the discreation of an enemy of
the state."
Her voice dropped to a whisper as she read. "He's dead."
The datapad slipped from her hands, but the Twi'lek deftly caught it,
then started pulling on Dynba's arm.
"Come on, we have to go."
Dynba pointed back toward the doorway. "Maybe it's a trick."
"The Empire doesn't play jokes, Dynba. Eamon's dead." Arali pulled
her friend up the gangplank. "Let's get out of here. We'll mourn
Eamon on the trip, then when we get to the New Republic, we'll find a
way to get even with the Empire."
Barris felt the comlink clipped to his belt vibrate like the Warning
scales on a Gorgarian buzzadder. He opened his arms to take in the
whole of the crowd in his reception room, then pointed them toWard the
"My friends, I have just been informed that the Rebels have taken the
bait in the trap that had been set for them.
If you will join me outside, I think you will find their end a
spectacular disaster."
Pulling the comlink from his belt, he thumbed it on.
"Garqi Eagles, you are clear to intercept and destroy your target."
Arali got Dynba into one of the jumpseats in the cockpit and strapped
her in. "Barris got our last passenger, Captain.
You better move now."
The Duros nodded to his mouse-eared pilot. The Sullustan chittered her
way through a checklist. The low hum of the repulsorlift drives filled
the ship, then a gentle tremble ran through it as the sublight drives
began to push it forward, up and out of the hangar.
The nose of the ship came around to the east, facing the ship away from
the sun and on a course that meant they would be moving away from the
star's mass as they left the planet.
That would permit them to enter hyperspace faster, and everyone on the
ship knew speed was a virtue when escape was the object of the
exercise.
Through the forward viewport Dynba got a spectacular look at the lights
of Pesktda. She found the city where she grew up quaint and even
beautiful, with lights winking on and off as gentle breezes stirred the
dark, leafy canopy that covered everything. Part of her felt the loss
of leaving the place of her birth, but that regret was nothing compared
to the pain she felt over Eamon's murder.
The Star's Delight picked up speed and shot out of the spaceport.
The Sullustan pilot kept the ship at a steady angle of ascent. As they
broke above the shadow of the world, sunlight lit the sky. It passed
quickly as the atmosphere thinned, then the stars above stopped
shimmering and just hung there like distant jeweled sparks on the
inside of a vast black bowl.
Captain Nootka hunched forward over a screen. "We have four
starfighters in our wake. Shields to full in the left arc."
The Sullustan hit a button on the console, but it remained dark.
She hit it again, then shrieked.
Nootka reached over and hit the button himself. "Saricia, we have no
shields."
"Invert and give me a shot." The Devaronian's bass voice came from
above the companionway that led into the cockpit. Dynba looked back
and saw an open hatchway that allowed access beyond the passage's
ceiling.
Arali tightened down her restraining straps. "The blaster cannon
turret is up top. We have to invert for him to shoot at targets coming
from behind and below, otherwise he'll hit the cargo pods."
"Not a good design, is it?"
Nootka turned around and gave Dynba a hard stare.
"This is a freighter, not a warship. Saricia is good."
&nb
sp; "How good? Good enough to stop them?"
"Are you sure?"
The Duros shook his head. "If I am wrong, I will not live long in
regret." He hit some more switches on the console. "You said the ship
was in working order."
"That's what I was told. Eamon said . . ." Dynba's jaw dropped
open.
"He's not here."
The tips of the Twi'lek's head tails shook with a start.
"We were set up, Dynba, set up to die by Eamon Yzalli."
She flashed sharp peg-teeth. "I hope part of Xeno's work on Garqi is
killing him."
Nootka glanced at his screen, then shook his head. "I would have hoped
the situation would not get worse. We have a fifth ship closing
fast."
The ship shook violently and sparks shot through the companionway,