Star by Star Page 36

  Tesar, who had never even been to Yavin 4, was the first to object. “We risked our lives to save Dark Jedi?” The Barabel trained his minicannon on the pair. “Blaster boltz!”

  “Check that, Tesar.” Anakin pushed the minicannon down, then turned to the dark woman. “Are there any Jedi—”

  “We are Jedi,” she replied. Though she was oozing blood from a hundred different wounds, the pain seemed to trouble the woman no more than it would a Yuuzhan Vong. “But in answer to your question: not alive. We were the ones you sensed when you entered the system.”

  “All the same, there’s no harm in looking around.” Anakin nodded to Tesar and his hatchmates. “Be careful.”

  “Do as you wish, young Solo.” The woman smiled. “But there is no need to doubt us. We will be happy to help destroy the voxyn.”

  “How do you know—”

  “You are certainly not here to rescue us.” Leaving Welk pinned on the wall behind her, she started for the door. “My name, by the way, is Lomi Plo. Perhaps I should start by telling you what we know of this place.”

  Anakin raised his brow. “You aren’t holding that to bargain? What makes you think we won’t leave you?”

  Lomi regarded him coldly. “And who would be the dark one then, Anakin?”

  Anakin was still trying to figure out how she knew his identity when his earpiece activated again.

  “We’ve got trouble, Little Brother.” This time it was Ganner on the other end. “That shuttle? You won’t believe who’s on it.”

  “I don’t,” Jacen added. “It looks like Nom Anor!”

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  Talfaglio lay dead center in Han’s cockpit display, a point of fire just three light-years distant. That meant the light in his eye had been created three standard years ago, before the Jedi had become an endangered species and the Yuuzhan Vong had pulled a moon down on Chewbacca. Though seldom one to live in the past, Han would have given his life to ride that orange ray back to its birth, to add one more being to the thousands he had saved on Sernpidal that day. He no longer blamed himself or anyone else for the Wookiee’s death, and he was even past wishing he had never tried to rescue anyone in the first place. He only wanted his friend back. He only wanted a galaxy safer for his children than it had been for him, a galaxy where a man and wife could go to sleep at night reasonably sure the world would still be there at dawn.

  Some things were too much to ask.

  Leia, who had been curled up in the Falcon’s Wookiee-sized copilot seat, opened her eyes and sat up straight. There was no grogginess or confusion to her actions; she had not slept—not really—since Anakin’s strike team had departed for Myrkr. Neither had Han, for that matter. She slipped her crash webbing over her shoulders and began to cinch it down.

  Han activated a self-test routine to warm the Falcon’s circuits. “What’s happening? You sense something from Luke?”

  “Not from Luke.” Leia closed her eyes, reaching for her children in a way Han could never share. “Anakin and the twins. They’re in the middle of it now, something dangerous.” She paused, then added, “I think our turn will come soon.”

  Han started to activate the intercom, then recalled who would be manning his guns and looked over his shoulder. As expected, the Noghri were standing quietly in the back of the cockpit.

  “Take the turrets—and tell See-Threepio to lock himself down,” he said. “We’re helping Lando and the Wild Knights with the yammosk hunt, so when Corran sends us in, it’ll be hot.”

  The two Noghri dipped their heads and retreated down the corridor. Han watched them go, a little unnerved by the shadow that came to their black eyes whenever combat was at hand, but still grateful for their presence. Over the last fifteen years, the Noghri had saved Leia’s life uncounted times and rarely left her unprotected—which was more than he could say for himself. He still found it hard to understand what had come over him after Chewbacca died, why mourning his friend’s loss had meant withdrawing from Leia and the kids.

  “Remind me to thank those guys,” he said.

  “You have,” Leia said. “At least a dozen times.”

  Han gave her a crooked smile. “Yeah, but they never say ‘you’re welcome.’ ”

  For the first time in days, Leia laughed, then Corran Horn’s voice came over the comm speaker.

  “Time to wake up, people. Outlying sensors show a Yuuzhan Vong assault fleet moving into the Talfaglio system.”

  Leia stretched over and armed the depressurization safety on Han’s combat suit. “I’m scared, Han.”

  “Me, too.” Han reached across and lowered her flash visor. “But what can you do? They’re adults now. They get to pick their own fights.”

  Eclipse had managed to put pilots in fifty of its new XJ3 X-wings, and over half of them were Jedi. Another two dozen Jedi were operating blastboats and other support craft. Given that Luke was risking half the galaxy’s Jedi and most of its Masters on a single operation, he should probably have been nervous. He was not. The Force was with them in a way he had never before experienced, a presence so tangible he could almost see it shimmering against the velvet starlight.

  Not too calm, Skywalker.

  Mara’s voice was so clear in Luke’s mind that it took him an instant to realize she had not spoken over a comm channel. He glanced at her X-wing, floating close enough that their S-foils almost touched. He wanted to tell her there was nothing to worry about, that Ben would be losing no parents today, but such a thought would have implied a vision of the outcome he had deliberately avoided seeking. If the Force wanted to show him the future, fine; if not, it was better to trust it and take what came. Whatever that was, making this attack was the right thing. He could feel it.

  So can I, Mara added.

  Luke raised a brow. Through their bond, each could usually sense what the other was feeling, and it was not even uncommon for them to receive short, semiarticulated thoughts. But this was something new; Luke’s contemplations had barely risen to the level of consciousness when Mara sensed them. Perhaps the presence of so many powerful Jedi was gathering the Force, drawing it together in the same way a cloud of gas became a star.

  “More like a lens gathering light,” Mara said. “The effect of so many Jedi concentrating on a common purpose.”

  “This is really something.” Luke added a long thought question to test the limits of their mental link; when his only reply was an impression of curiosity, he asked aloud, “I wonder if the old Jedi Councils focused the Force like this?”

  “It certainly would have helped them see clearly—but it might have had its drawbacks.”

  Luke sensed an uncommon moment of embarrassment in his wife as Mara’s mind flashed from the cognitive union they were experiencing to a more physical kind, and he found himself sharing in her hope that nobody else was picking up the connection.

  If they were, they had the good sense not to say so.

  Smiling both inwardly and outwardly, Luke glanced at his tactical display and saw the enemy assault fleet lumbering into the Talfaglio system. The deliberate approach, he suspected, had less to do with a fear of space mines or ambushes than allowing the hostages plenty of time to contemplate their doom. There were four cruiser analogs, a warship analog, a skip carrier, and twenty frigates. The carrier would have at least two hundred coralskippers, and the five largest vessels would have their own squadrons, as well.

  Ouch, Mara thought.

  Luke was not worried. The Jedi were there to break the blockade and buy the refugee convoy time to escape, not destroy the fleet. There was one aspect of the mission that would need rethinking, however. He asked R2-D2 for an open channel.

  “This is Farmboy.” His call sign had been picked by Mara. “Operation Safe Passage is still a go, but there are too many hostiles for the Yammosk Action. Repeat, Yammosk Action is—”

  “Hold a moment, Farmboy,” Corran said. As the Jedi battle controller, he was aboard the Wild Knights’ freighter, Jolly Man, using a new subs
pace eavesdropping suite to monitor the Talfaglion sensors. “We have company exiting hyperspace.”

  “Company?” Luke’s heart did not sink; there was nothing in the Force to suggest an ambush. “Who?”

  “An old Rogue,” the familiar voice of Wedge Antilles said.

  “And an old Rebel.”

  Though this voice was also familiar, Luke did not recognize it until R2-D2 ran a scan analysis and identified it as that of General Garm Bel Iblis. Luke switched his tactical display to local space and saw a pair of unfamiliar Star Destroyers—the transponder identified them as the Mon Mothma and the Elegos A ’Kla—moving into position behind his fleet. Accompanied by a cruiser and two frigates each, both ships were bleeding squadrons of XJ3 X-wings and Series 4 E-wings into space.

  “Gentlemen, welcome!” Luke commed. “But if you don’t mind my asking—”

  “We just happened by on a shakedown cruise,” Bel Iblis said, cutting him off.

  “So close to Talfaglio?” This from Mara, whose years in Palpatine’s service had given her a deep distrust of unanticipated gifts. “I don’t think so.”

  “An old employer of yours recommended the route,” Wedge said. He was referring to the infamous Talon Karrde, onetime smuggling king/information broker and sometime intelligence agent. No one ever knew exactly what Talon Karrde was up to. “He seemed to think we would have a chance to test some new weapons.”

  “That you might.” Luke did not bother to ask how Karrde had learned the timing and location of their operation; Karrde always protected his sources. “Control will fill you in on the plan.”

  “Karrde already has,” Bel Iblis said. “We thought we’d let you punch through ahead, then take cross-fire positions to either side of the escape corridor. We’d assume lead, but we’re not sure how well this new stuff is going to work.”

  “And this is a Jedi operation,” Luke finished, reading between the lines. Someone wanted to improve their image on the news-vids. “Thanks.”

  “We’d be willing to detach a squadron to support the Wild Knights on their mission—say Rogue?” Wedge offered. “We want to keep them off the ’Net anyway.”

  Though Luke’s bond with his sister, Leia, was not as strong as the one with Mara, it was more than potent enough for him to sense her suspicion. The whole thing was beginning to stink of Borsk Fey’lya’s influence, which automatically raised the question of what the chief wanted in return—and of who else he might have told about their plans. A simple battle was beginning to look very complicated, but Wedge’s offer was too generous to refuse.

  “Hisser, what do you think?” Luke asked. “Still want to try for that yammosk?”

  “By all meanz,” Saba replied. “It would be an honor to hunt with Colonel Darklighter.”

  “You two work out the details,” Luke said. “Everyone else, double-check your jump coordinates, and blast anything that looks like a rock. On your mark, Control.”

  “Broadcasting escape route coordinates to Talfaglio now,” Corran said. “Dozen squadron, jump on my mark. Three, two, mark.”

  Kyp’s Dozen shot forward in a flash of blue efflux, then vanished into hyperspace. Luke switched his tactical screen back to Talfaglio local and watched as, a minute later, the squadron appeared insystem and streaked toward the yellow shell of Yuuzhan Vong blips trapping the refugee fleet in orbit.

  At the far edge of the system, the enemy assault fleet began spreading into attack formation and accelerated, no doubt preparing to make a hyperspace microjump toward the planet. The Talfaglion gravity well would prevent them from jumping directly into battle, but Luke knew Corran would need to time their own fleet’s arrival carefully.

  As the Dozen drew near the blockade, Kyp pulled his squadron in tight and angled for the light cruiser. Half a dozen corvette analogs left their blockade posts to defend the larger ship, and long tongues of plasma began to arc out from the cruiser itself. The Dozen merged into a single blip and continued forward, jinking and juking as one, the pilots weaving in front of each other to keep a fresh pair of shields always facing the enemy.

  Kyp’s squadron began to pour blue lines of laserfire into the light cruiser. More enemy corvettes accelerated toward the Dozen, abandoning their blockade stations. So far, so good; the Yuuzhan Vong seemed to think this was another rogue operation, a desperate attempt to save the doomed refugees.

  A pair of proton torpedoes flashed away from the Dozen and vanished, swallowed by the cruiser’s shielding system. There followed another exchange of laser bolts and plasma balls, then an unexpected spray of static as a Jedi shadow bomb exploded. Basically a variation on the tactic Kyp used to slip his proton torpedoes past enemy shielding crews, shadow bombs were proton torpedoes drained of propellant and packed with baradium instead. They were armed with standard proximity fuses and guided to their targets using the Force. The weapons were far more powerful than a standard torpedo, difficult to detect in the heat of battle, and just one of the new tricks in the Jedi arsenal.

  Kyp’s squadron finished off the cruiser with a pair of standard proton torpedoes, then raced through the debris and swung around as though preparing the escape route. A steady flow of refugee vessels began to leave orbit and stream toward the flight corridor. It did not take long for the blockade to collapse inward as Yuuzhan Vong picket ships rushed to respond.

  “Control, time to swing the hammer,” Luke commed.

  “Concur, Farmboy.” Corran actually sounded as though he were cringing when he spoke the call sign. “New Republic task force, Shockers, and Sabers jump to preassigned coordinates on my mark.”

  The Saber squadron was Luke’s personal squadron. It consisted of himself, Mara, seven non-Jedi veterans, and half a dozen newly trained Jedi pilots. Their assignment was to fly cover while the more experienced Shockers drove off the assault fleet.

  “Three, two, mark.”

  Luke jammed his accelerator forward and watched the stars stretch into lines.

  “Be careful, kid,” Han commed. “We just finished raising three Jedi. We don’t need you sticking us with another one.”

  “Han! That’s—”

  Talfaglio’s orange point vanished into the colorless blur of hyperspace, and Leia’s rebuke was lost to the jump blackout. Luke was aware of Mara beside him, calmly running through last-minute systems checks to keep her circuits warm and her attention focused on the coming battle. There had been no need to discuss the wisdom of flying into combat together. They were a team in a way that even Han and Leia could never understand, and they had seen many times before that each was far more likely to survive with the other present.

  The blur of hyperspace dissolved into starlines, and Talfaglio appeared outside Luke’s canopy, a small orangish crescent hanging alongside the brilliant disk of the system’s crimson sun. Though the flotilla had jumped as close as they dared to the gravity well, the battle remained a tiny web of laser bolts and plasma trails hanging in the darkness between them and the planet. The enemy assault fleet was not yet visible to the naked eye, but Luke found it quickly enough on his tactical display. It had already made its microjump and was now on the other side of the blockade, directly opposite the Jedi flotilla, vectoring toward the escape corridor.

  Rigard Matl led his Shockers toward the blockade at near-light, a favorite assault tactic that had earned the squadron its name. The Sabers shed just enough velocity to assume their cover position. The tactical display showed the New Republic Star Destroyers decelerating alongside the escape corridor in staggered positions, each retaining an escort of a single frigate and two squadrons of short-range starfighters. The rest of their flotilla streaked toward Talfaglio behind the Sabers.

  In Luke’s canopy, the battle swelled quickly from a tiny web into a moon-sized snarl of plasma trails and laser flashes. The blockade ships were still constricting around Kyp’s Dozen, pouring fire in on the squadron from every direction. The Dozen bounced back and forth inside the sphere, sharing shields and reserving their laserfire for gru
tchins and magma missiles. There were only nine X-wings visible, but when Luke stretched out with the Force, he felt all three missing pilots scattered throughout the battle area, alone and frightened and no doubt in EV suits. He had R2-D2 send a message to the recovery team and tried not to think about what would happen if they were struck by a stray plasma ball or efflux tail.

  The nearest blockade ships peeled off to meet the Shockers, who launched a flurry of proton torpedoes and continued forward. The weapons reached their targets almost the instant they were launched. A pair of corvettes broke apart when their shielding crews missed incoming torpedoes; eight more began to vent bodies and atmosphere when the proximity fuses detonated close to their hulls. Then the Shockers were through, streaking past Kyp’s Dozen toward the opposite side of the collapsing blockade.

  Luke led his squadron into the hole behind the Shockers. They did not waste energy expanding their inertial compensators—the corvettes’ dovin basals were more than strong enough to rip their shields. When a pair of corvettes rushed to block their way, Luke dropped a shadow bomb—they were flying too fast to lock their S-foils into firing position—and used the Force to hurl it into the second vessel. There was no need to assign the first to Mara; he knew she would take it with the same tactic. An instant later, simultaneous proton detonations broke the spines of both ships.

  Wow! Mara sent.

  A corvette’s dovin basal caught Luke’s shields. Warning alarms filled the cockpit. Mara slid her fighter over his to protect him for the instant it took R2-D2 to activate the backup charge. The third member of their shielding trio, the young Tam Azur-Jamin, blasted the attacker with his own shadow bomb.

  “Thanks, Quiet,” Luke commed.

  Tam clicked his transmitter—a garrulous reply for the reticent Jedi—and then they were crossing the kill zone where Kyp had been “trapped.” Dozens of refugee ships were already lumbering up from Talfaglio, in their haste to escape willing to brave even the heart of the fighting. Still moving at a substantial percentage of lightspeed, the Sabers flashed past a trio of Dozen X-wings.