The Black Fleet Crisis_ Before The Storm Part 31

"Primate, there is an ionization inversion above the clouds over this planet. Together, the two are interfering with the targeting computers on all our ships. I am not confident that the accuracy of our firing will satisfy your expectations. "

"The viceroy has expectations as well, which we both must fulfill, " said Jip Toorr. "How do you propose that we do so? "

"Sir-there are scout fighters waiting in their bays to confirm the success of our attack. I ask that three of them be launched now and sent below the clouds to direct the fire of our batteries. "

"Will this provide the accuracy needed to ensure the success of our mission? "

"Without fail, Primate. "

"Then I so order it. Tactics master, launch three scout fighters. The weapons master will direct them. "

The last of the navigation satellites on which Polneye's traffic control system had depended had failed nearly a year earlier, or the arrival of the Yevethan task force would have been detected as soon as the ships exited hypers.p.a.ce.

But the ground components of the traffic control system were still operational. Alarms began to sound the moment the Yevethan scout fighters cleared the ionization boundary, calling technicians to rarely tended stations. Many other Polneyi ran outside to look up and see what sort of visitors had come calling.

Those whose eyes were sharp enough saw three tiny black ships circling just below the clouds. One was over the city called Nine South, a second over Eleven North, and the third over the ghost city of Fourteen North, which was still being cannibalized for its structures and equipment.

Then fire poured down from the sky. Fierce turbolaser pulses tore holes in the clouds and split the air, and all three cities vanished under acrid mushroom clouds of golden dust and black smoke. Even after the firing stopped, thunder rumbled across the open reaches of Polneye like death drums.

On what had been one of the wide, flat landing pads of Ten South, those who had come out to watch the visitors land were evenly divided between the stunned and the screaming. A man near Plat Mallar went to his knees and vomited. Turning away from the sight, Mallar found a woman clawing madly at her allsuit with such force that she was bleeding profusely from beneath what was left of her nails. The sight galvanized Mallar out of his paralysis, and he began edging his way toward the east edge of the pad.

Then a cry went up, as someone in the gathering saw that the tiny ship that had been circling over Nine South was moving to a new position over Nine North.

In a matter of moments, the crowd broke and ran, some for the feeble but comforting shelter of the terminal buildings, some for the open s.p.a.ces beyond the city, as far from the city as their legs would carry them.

Mallar fought free of the sudden stampede, then turned and ran as well.

Twelve students in Mallar's second-form engineering cla.s.ses had been granted the privilege of learning to maintain and fly the TIE interceptor berthed in 10S Technical Inst.i.tute's docking bay and equipment garage. The bay was halfway around the terminal hub from where he had stood with the crowd, and though he ran as hard as he could, he didn't expect to be the first of the twelve to arrive.

But he was. The bay doors were standing open, and members of the junior form were hastily clearing away the droids and vehicles blocking the entrance, but the c.o.c.kpit of the interceptor was still unoccupied.

????????????????????? breather from the equipment lockers, he clambered up on the interceptor's right-side wing brace and popped the access hatch release. "You! " he shouted, pointing at the nearest student. "I need a power droid over here, now! "

By the time Mallar settled in the c.o.c.kpit and started the power-up sequence, two other would-be pilots had arrived. With a cool and purposeful efficiency that would have done a carrier deck crew credit, they helped hasten the dull gray power droid into position beside the fighter.

The moment the power coupling clicked in the starting port, Mallar ran up the capacitors for both ion engines, then dropped them back to a neutral idle.

There was no point in completing the rest of the system checks. There was no time for repairs, and crashing was no more fearful a prospect than the next attack from beyond the clouds.

"That's got it, " Mallar called over the microphone. "Uncouple me, and then clear the bay-I'm flying her out. "

Ordinarily, the TIE would have been towed out of the bay and onto the landing pad on her skids by a tug droid. But that would take precious time, and Mallar was already afraid he was far too late. The moment the last of the other students fled out the bay doorway, he shoved the throttle forward.

The interceptor jerked forward as the engine back-blast lifted loose debris and rained it on the fighter's combat-hardened solar panels.

Picking up speed rapidly, the ship began to lift just as it pa.s.sed through the bay doorway, and the upper edge of the left panel dragged against the durasteel frame with a screech that shivered everyone in earshot, including Mallar.

Then, with a b.u.mp and a lurch, the ship cleared the bay, bursting out into the bright, diffuse light of a Polneye midday. Pointing the twin booms of the wing-mounted cannon skyward, Mallar threw the interceptor into a full-power climb.

The tiny black ships were still circling high in the air like carrion birds. Activating his targeting system, Mallar was heartened to see that three more of the settlement's TIE interceptors were in the air. Selecting the nearest target and steering toward it, Mallar then did something no instructor had ever authorized-powered up the four Seinar laser cannon.

With an insistent beeping, the targeting system informed Mallar that it had identified the primary target as a TIE/rc reconnaissance fighter.

But to Mallar's surprise, there was no safety interlock preventing him from firing on what the interceptor took to be a friendly target.

Moments after the target was identified, the attack computer locked on.

TARGET TARGET, said the c.o.c.kpit display as the indicators changed from red to green.

He squeezed both triggers, and the ship quivered around him as the quad cannon spoke.

No one was more surprised than Mallar when the target stayed in his sights and then exploded in a yellow-white gout of flame. Whether it was the interceptor's superior speed, Mallar's crude headlong rush up from the surface, or simple surprise, the TIE/rc never responded to the approaching ship's presence.

As he blew past the falling debris, Mallar heard voices over the interceptor's combat comm, exulting.

But he himself felt neither joy nor relief. He was shaking and covered in clammy sweat, the reckless momentum dissipated, the awful reality sinking in.

The interceptor entered the clouds, and in the next moment Mallar was suddenly blinded by light pouring in through the viewports. The interceptor was shoved roughly sideways as though by a great hand, and shuddered violently in the aftermath. For a long moment he was certain his ship had been hit and he was about to die.

But the moment stretched out, and he did not die.

The afterimage of the flash began to fade from his eyes, and his ship, still climbing, emerged intact into the s.p.a.ce between the clouds and the stars.

**** gently at him, and Mallar squinted, first to read the display, then to peer out the viewport. What he finally saw nearly overwhelmed him with fear. Riding above him in orbit was the largest ship he had ever seen, a great triangular shape bristling with gun ports and launching fighters from bays on either side.

"Identify. "

PRIMARY TARGET VICTORY-CLa.s.s STAR DESTROYER, the computer informed him.

And he was still climbing toward it.

SECONDARY TARGETS "I don't want to know, " Mallar said nervously.

Hauling the interceptor over on its back, he dove away from the starship at a flat angle and all possible speed, seeking the cover of the clouds.

The weapons master of theDevotionlay cowering on the bridge catwalk.

The ship's primate, whose backhand blow had sent the master sprawling, loomed over him.

"Your incompetence sacrificed the life of a Yevethan pilot! " the primate bellowed. "How will you repay his family for this dishonor? "

"Sir! I wasn't told that this infestation was capable of resistance-"

"The scout fighter was under your direction. You did not free him to pursue or evade when the vermin fighter appeared. That is your offense. "

"We were preparing to fire-"

"You are relieved. And there will be a price in blood, I promise. Get out of here. Report to the stockade. "

The primate turned to the tactics master.

"Launch your fighters. I want the skies of Polneye cleared of vermin. "

The fight for Polneye did not last long.

One of the three TIE interceptors that followed Mallar into the air was piloted by a first-form student who had never been aloft. That he got the ship off the ground under control was a credit to the simplicity of Imperial c.o.c.kpit design. But the first-former's target melted into the clouds while he was still calling for help unlocking the laser cannon. Not long after, a squadron of Yevethan fighters, tracking his comm signal, fell on him from the clouds. His flight ended in a fiery flat spin and an explosion on the plains east of Twelve North.

The interceptor launched from Eleven South was piloted by the engineering instructor. Like Mallar, he climbed through the cloud layer to the edge of s.p.a.ce and found the cruiserLibertyorbiting above. Unlike Mallar, he did not escape after his discovery. An antifighter turbolaser battery on the cruiser tracked the interceptor and blew it into a thousand pieces, which returned to the surface as a rain of metal.

A veteran combat pilot was at the controls of the interceptor from Nine North, but he barely escaped the destruction of the city, and one of the fighter's engines was damaged by shrapnel. It faltered as he was swept into a dogfight with three Yevethan fighters, and he and his ship vanished in a brilliant ball of flame.

The fourth interceptor was destroyed on the ground by strafing TIE fighters as a frantic volunteer crew tried to ready it for launch.

The fifth was lost in the first moments of the attack, as Eleven North came under Liberty's savage cannonade.

Plat Mallar's success against the TIE/rc was the only victory of the day, and no one was more aware than he how meaningless it was. Because he was afraid to die, he fled to the far side of the planet, hiding in the clouds under the ionization shield the Empire had created for Polneye. Because he was afraid to face the guilt of not dying, he lingered there, circling.

Before long, though, both of those fears paled against the fear that no one would ever know what had happened to his parents and lovers and friends.

After reviewing the images captured by his combat recorder, he realized that he had to have more, and turned back.

Approaching the cities of Polneye, Mallar brought the interceptor up above the clouds just long enough to record the three marauding warships, now orbiting together.

If his little fighter appeared on their defense screens at all, it was as a momentary blip among the static caused by the inversion.

Then he dipped below the clouds, and found the sky free of fighters.

His holocam scanned across the ruins of seven cities, captured seven thin plumes of smoke s.p.a.ced across the plains. But only seven, for Ten South was still standing, and a giant transport was ground-docked beside it.

The sight brought the first hope to Mallar's heart since Nine South had disappeared under blaster fire.

There was a chance for more than mere justice-there was a chance he could bring help in time to matter.

Ducking back between the veils, he pushed both the interceptor and his ability to control it to the limit, racing for the receding horizon.

Half an hour later, on the far side of Polneye, a tiny single-seat fighter with a determined young student at the controls flung itself up from the clouds and out toward the stars.

Aboard the flagshipPride of Yevetha , Viceroy Nil Spaar personally supervised the extermination of the Kubaz colony-a particularly repulsive variety of vermin, he thought, with faces so hideously mutated that he actively took pleasure in their destruction.

Then, as Pride continued on to seize the Imperial factory farm at Pirol-5, the viceroy retired to his quarters to receive the attentions of his darna and the reports from the other elements of the fleet.

The news was uniformly good. There had been an unfortunate accident at Polneye that had left a pilot dead and the weapons master a suicide, but that was of no consequence. Everywhere the ships of the Yevetha appeared, the vermin were swept off the faces of the worlds they had soiled.

Calmly, ruthless, efficiently, the Black Fleet drew a curtain of death across the Cl.u.s.ter. One after another the vermin settlements fell beneath it-the Kubaz, the Brigia, the Polneye, the Morath, the Corasgh, the H'kig. The targets included colonies and species whose names and histories were unknown to those who plotted their eradication.

Full sterilizations were carried out on the two worlds to be reclaimed for the Yevetha. The colonists meant for those planets were already outbound from The Twelve in the new thrustships, which were faster than light itself. Others would soon follow.

It was the realization of a great destiny. At the end of one long day of glory, the All again belonged to the Yevetha alone.

When the last report was in hand, Nil Spaar called his broodmates to join him and his darna in celebration.

Afterward, the viceroy slept long, deep, and well.

Leia Organa Solo waited hopefully, eagerly, behind the gate for the Fleet shuttle to land at Eastport 18. The moment the shuttle's engines were cut, she brushed past the gate supervisor's earnest cautions and ran out onto the landing pad. When the hatch hissed open and the boarding stairs unfolded, she was already waiting at the bottom.

Han was the first to appear on the top step, wearing his lopsided grin and carrying his flight bag over one shoulder. Taking the stairs in three long strides, he tossed the flight bag down and gathered Leia up in a hug so deep and warm that it almost began to drive away the icy chill that had invaded her spirit since the collapse of the Yevethan negotiations and her humiliation by Peramis and Nil Spaar. She hid her tears against his chest.

"It's gonna be all right, " Han murmured into her hair. "You should hear about some of the bad days I've had. "

Leia laughed despite herself and hugged him fiercely. "Let's go home. "

"Can't think of one good reason not to, " Han said, bending to pluck his flight bag from the ground. "Don't make too much of it, hon, but I kinda missed you. "

Twenty-three hours out from Polneye, Plat Mallar turned on the c.o.c.kpit recorder of the TIE interceptor.

His face was pale and slick with perspiration. His voice was weak, and his eyes wandered as he tried to force his blurred vision to clear.

Designed without hyperdrive, the interceptor had never been intended for the kind of journey Mallar had attempted-across reals.p.a.ce from one star to another.

He had fled Polneye, eluded the Yevetha, and left Koornacht Cl.u.s.ter behind, but he could not escape the cold equations of time, energy, and distance.

Mallar had run the fighter wide open for as long as the solar panels and the capacitors had allowed, accelerating the little ship to a straightline speed well above that any pilot could use in combat. He had even persuaded the autopilot, designed for simple in-system navigation problems, to accept Galantos as a destination.

But the engines had been cold for hours now, and only emptiness surrounded his hurtling craft. The nose of the fighter was pointed directly at Galantos, but it would not reach that system for-he calculated-nearly three years. And Mallar did not expect to live another three hours.

The ship's small oxygen reserve was gone. His re-breather could no longer cleanse the breaths he drew well enough to end the agonizing headaches. The recirculators were keeping the air dry, but he was slowly suffocating on his own waste gases.

Memory had deceived him. The images from his childhood, of Polneye as a bustling port, as the hub of the region's s.p.a.celanes, were too strong to be shaken by facts. Those images offered what had proved a false promise-that he would find another ship to offer help or transport.

Dirtbound his whole life, he found it was beyond him to imagine how empty s.p.a.ce was, or to believe how deserted that region had become. In twenty-three hours, not a single vessel of any size had been detected by the interceptor's targeting system. He knew he was going to die, and he was going to die alone.

He cleared his throat, an uglier sound than his rasping breaths. "My name is Plat Mallar, " he said. "I was born in the city of Three North, on the planet Polneye. My mother was Fall Topas. She was a plant biologist, and quite beautiful. My father was Plat Hovath, a droid mechanic. I was their only son. We lived in Ten South, on blue level, near the algae pool.

"Yesterday was the fortieth day of Molar. Yesterday warships attacked Polneye without any warning-without any cause. Unidentified ships. Imperial designs. They destroyed most of Polneye-killed my parents-killed most of us. I think the survivors are hostages now-there was a transport-" He paused, heart pounding, to try to catch his breath. His voice had become frail and wheezy.

When he could continue, Mallar said, "The combat recorders of my ship contain evidence of this attack-of the destruction of my home. They murdered my people, thousands and thousands and thousands. Please help us. Please-if any are still alive-try to save them. Whoever sees this-you must find these monsters and punish them. It's wrong. It's terribly wrong. I beg-I beg for justice for the dead. For my parents. For my friends. For me. "

Mallar sagged back into his seat, exhausted by the effort of speaking.

But the recorder kept running-he could not manage to raise an arm to stop it. It kept on, faithfully capturing Mallar's image, for as long as he moved or made a sound at turns.

But it stopped when at last he slipped into unconsciousness.

He was still unconscious, barely clinging to life, when the crew of the Fifth Fleet prowler SP8 stumbled on his hurtling ship.