The Hand Of Thrawn Duology_ Specter Of The Past Part 10

Leaning slightly into the steady wind, the three X-wings settled smoothly onto the bluff overlooking the city. "Easy for you," Lando muttered under his breath, mentally gauging the chunk of s.p.a.ce they'd left him to put the Lady Luck down onto. It would be tight, but pride alone dictated he not back out now. Muttering some more, he eased the yacht down toward the bluff.

It was indeed a tight squeeze, made all the trickier by the wind. But he managed it without too much trouble and, more important, without any embarra.s.sment. Dropping the engines into their standby settings, he climbed down the ladder just aft of the c.o.c.kpit bridge and headed for the yacht's hatchway.

Wedge, Janson, and Tycho were waiting for hint at the foot of the Lady Luck's ramp.

"Chilly up here," he commented, gripping the edge of his cloak to keep it from flapping.

"I hope the Old Recluse's cave is heated."

"At least it'll be out of this wind," Janson agreed, pointing toward a narrow, two-meter-high crack in the cliff face. "That must be it. Let's go."

The cave was much deeper than Lando would have guessed from the relatively small size of the entrance. It was also surprisingly warm. "Looks like a glow up ahead," Wedge said, his voice sounding odd in the enclosed s.p.a.ce. "Around that bend."

"I wonder if we should announce ourselves," Lando said, glancing around uneasily. Flying in cramped s.p.a.ceships had never bothered him in the least, but walking down a narrow pa.s.sageway with the top of a mountain weighing down on him was something else entirely.

Or maybe it was that the place reminded him too much of the inside of Mount Tantiss.

Either way, as they rounded the corner, he found his right hand resting on the grip of his holstered blaster.

Which made the scene that opened up in front of them just that much more anticlimactic.

Sitting at the back of a widened section of the cave was a single ancient Morish, even older than the one they'd talked to at the booth, meditatively plucking the stretched wires of some kind of musical instrument. To his right was a squat military-surplus worklight; to his left, an antique wood brazier. On both sides of the cave, only vaguely touched by the worklight's glow, were a collection of objects that were apparently the Old Recluse's household goods. At his back, not quite covering the cave's back wall, was a hand-decorated curtain of heavy-looking cloth.

If the Old Recluse was surprised to see them, he didn't show it. He studied them for a moment in silence as they stepped to within a couple of meters of him, then dropped his gaze back to his instrument and muttered something in his own language.

"He's greeting us," Tycho translated. "Sort of. He also demands to know what we want."

"Tell him we've heard he knows something about the destruction of Caamas," Wedge said.

"We'd like to hear more."

"He'll want money," Janson warned.

"Right," Tycho agreed. "Try offering him fifty."

The Morish stirred. "Three hundred," he said in clear and nearly unaccented Basic. "This story is worth three hundred."

Well, well," Wedge said dryly. "So much for local color. I thought they probably spoke more Basic than they were letting on. I'll give you one hundred."

"Three hundred," the Old Recluse insisted. "Or no story."

"One-fifty," Wedge offered. "New Republic currency. All I have on me."

"Three hundred. No less."

"I'll cover it," Lando spoke up, looking around the cave. There was something odd about this place. Something that was triggering some very unpleasant memories .

"All right," Wedge sighed. "Three hundred it is. But this had better be worth it."

"It is," the Old Recluse a.s.sured him. "As the dark battle fleet a.s.sembled outside Caamas-"

And suddenly it clicked in the back of Lando's mind. Stepping around behind the brazier, he got a grip on the edge of the curtain&mdash "Ka'alee!" the Morish screeched, tossing aside his musical instrument and lunging toward the worklight. His hand darted beneath it&mdash "Freeze it!" Wedge snapped. All three Rogue Squadron pilots had dropped into combat crouches, blasters in their hands and steady on the Morish "Bring your hand out," Wedge ordered. "Empty."

Slowly, glaring at them, the Old Recluse pulled his hand back out. Janson circled over to the worklight and crouched down beside it, coming up with a small but nasty-looking blaster. "All right," Wedge said as Janson returned to Tycho's side. "Now you just sit there and be good. And keep your hands where we can see them." Holstering his blaster, he walked around behind his teammates and came over to Lando. "What did you find?"

"The source of his omniscience," Lando said grimly, pulling the curtain aside. "Take a look."

Wedge whistled softly under his breath; and even Lando, who had more or less known what to expect, had to admit he was impressed. Crammed into a wide floor-to-ceiling crack in the back wall of the cave was a fully functioning Imperial communications center, complete with encrypt/decrypt modules, the input jacks for a variety of droids and sensor feeds, a s.p.a.ce/planetary monitor module, and a self-contained Generations III power generator.

"Well, well," Wedge commented. "Nice find, Lando, What tipped you off?"

"The smell," Lando told him, an involuntary shiver running through him. "Dusty electronics have a smell like nothing else in the universe. The Spaarti cylinder chamber in the Mount Tantiss storehouse was reeking with it."

"Probably set this place up just before we took Morishim back from them," Janson suggested. "Must have used it to spy on the base."

"And for propaganda and incitement of the locals," Wedge said, pushing aside the curtain for a closer look. "There's a direct feed to the Imperial news service here. And a direct feed to Coruscant Hourly."

"Might be interesting to have someone go back through the recent history records," Lando said. "See if we can spot their hand in events."

"Yes," Wedge agreed. "They must have abandoned it in a hurry to have left this much stuff behind . . ."

He trailed off, frowning at the s.p.a.ce monitor display. "Tycho, get out to your X-wing and give the base a call. Looks like we've got a Corellian Corvette coming in. Broadcasting an Imperial ID-"

Abruptly he stiffened. "Belay that," he snapped, dropping the curtain and charging past the Old Recluse. "Get to your fighters&mdashdouble-time."

The others fell into step behind him, the group disappearing around the bend in the tunnel. "What is it?" the Old Recluse demanded anxiously. "You-human-what is it?"

A single look at the display was all Lando needed. "It's an Imperial Star Destroyer," he said. "It dropped in right behind the Corvette.

"Heading this way."

"Lando?" Wedge's voice came from the Lady Luck's console. "You reading me?"

"Loud and clear," Lando said, making one last adjustment to the speaker control.

"Stay close," Wedge warned. "This freq-mixing trick won't work against their jamming if we get too far apart."

"Got it," Lando said, eyeing the confused readouts from his comm board. His comm system was pretty much state-of-the-art, with a few exotic add-ons besides, but it wasn't really set up to deal with New Republic military frequencies and encrypts. But so far the jury-rig he'd thrown together on the fly seemed to be holding. "What's happening?"

"I got through to the base while you were getting set up," Wedge said. "The rest of Rogue Squadron's on the way, along with every starfighter the base can scramble."

A couple of wings of X-wings and A-wings, against an Imperial Star Destroyer. Terrific.

"What about them Peregrine and the a.s.sault Frigate that Admiral Vriss came in with?"

"The Peregrine's on its way, but it's having to come from around the far side of the planet," Wedge said, an edge of contempt creeping into the cool professionalism in his voice. The a.s.sault Frigate, unfortunately, is going to be out of it. Apparently, they let the systems drop a little too far past standby."

"Sloppy," Lando grunted. "Who's in command?"

"A committee of Bagmims," Wedge told him. "The crew is mostly Bagmims, humans, and Povanarians."

"Bagmims are pretty good fighters when they get riled."

"They should have stayed more riled, then," Wedge said. "Right now, they're just a waste of air."

"Too late to worry about it now," Lando said, carefully refraining from reminding Wedge about his own earlier comments on how much more relaxed things had become. "What's the plan?"

"We try to slow them down," Wedge said. "The Peregrine's on its way, and the general's got two Star Cruisers coming from Haverling. Until they get here, we're on our own."

The three X-wings and the yacht rose above the curve of Morishim's horizon; and there they were: the awe-inspiring bulk of the Imperial Star Destroyer with the Corvette leading it toward the planet.

And then Lando frowned. "Wedge?"

"I see it," Wedge murmured. "Rogue Seven, give me a fast a.n.a.lysis."

"No mistake, Rogue Leader," Tycho's voice came promptly. "Those aren't accidental misfires-the Star Destroyer's definitely targeting the Corvette. The Corvette's running flank speed, with full aft deflector shields. She's being chased, all right."

"They're jamming her transmissions, too," Janson added. "Course projection shows she's making straight for the edge of the base's energy shield. Looks like we've got a theft-and-defection on our hands."

"Could be," Wedge said cautiously. "It could also be a trick to get us to let an unexamined ship in under the energy shield."

"So what do we do?" Janson asked.

"Let's try running a little interference," Wedge said. "Rogue Two, Rogue Five: cut in around the Corvette's starboard side and see if you can draw some of the Star Destroyer's attention. I'll take the other side. Watch out for tractor beams-they may try to pull the Corvette in."

"Copy, Rogue Leader."

The two X-wings swerved smoothly away from Wedge and Lando. "What about me?" Lando asked.

"Better stay back here," Wedge told him, putting on a burst of speed of his own. "That yacht isn't designed for this sort of maneuvering. Anyway, we may need you to act as relay between us and our reinforcements."

The words were barely out of his mouth when there was a sort of m.u.f.fled flash from the Corvette, accompanied by a cloud of debris. "Topside sensor group's been hit," Janson reported. "Internal fire&mdashprobably going to have to shut down the main reactor core."

Which meant no drive, no shields, and no hope of escape. Lando swore under his breath, keying his secondary comm system to scan across the channels. Static hissed out at him at each of the frequencies the Imperials were jamming.

"Tractor beam activated," Tycho said tightly. "Making connection . . . they've got her."

"Incoming to aft," Janson cut in. "The rest of Rogue Squadron, plus three wings of A-wings and two of X-wings. ETA, about four minutes."

Wedge's sigh was a softer echo of the jamming hiss. "Too little, too late," he said reluctantly. "Break off. There's nothing we can do to help them now."

Lando looked out at the Corvette, tapping a frustrated fist gently against the edge of his control board. Muzzled and helpless both, the Corvette would be taken or destroyed without anyone knowing who they were or what they were doing here.

Unless . . .

"Wedge?" he called. "I've got an idea. Fire up all the transmission frequencies the three of you can handle-full power, with all the encryption you can put on them. Maybe we can dilute their jamming enough to at least get something out of the Corvette."

"Worth a try," Wedge said. "Let's do it, Rogues."

Lando swiveled around to the comm board, keying in one of those exotic add-ons he'd spent all that good money for. This probably wouldn't work. Almost certainly wouldn't work, in fact, and the effort alone might easily irritate the Imperials into taking a lethal swipe at him. But at least it was doing something. He stared at the comm readings, holding his breath .

And then, to even his gambler's amazement, there was a flicker of something through the static. "Keep it up," he shouted to Wedge and the others, keying madly at the board. The flicker strengthened, faded, strengthened again .

It cut off suddenly. Lando looked up just in time to catch a final glimpse of pseudomotion as the Star Destroyer vanished into hypers.p.a.ce. "Well, that's that," Tycho said.

"I wasn't watching," Lando said. "Did they take the Corvette with them?"

"Pulled it into the bay and took straight off," Wedge told him. "You get anything?"

"I don't know." Lando keyed for replay. "Let's see."

There was a burst of static; and then, almost buried beneath the hissing, a few faint words could be heard. "-is Col . . . zh Ver . . . ecial envoy fro . . . . miral . . . on, sent here . . . ontact Gen . . . el Iblis concern . . . ego . .

. ce . . . crc . . . . be . . . Empire and New Repub . . . under atta . . . traitorous ele . . . the Empire . . . do not expect . . . urvive. If the New Re . . . to hold su . . .

ions, Adm . . . Pel . . . at the aban . . . mining cent .

. . itiin in . . . nth to meet wi . . . peating: This is . . . nd Me . . . . Vermel . . ."

The recording ended. "Not much there," Wedge commented.

"No," Lando conceded, "What now?"

"You'd better head back and get that recording to General Bel Iblis," Wedge said. "I think we'll stay out here a little while longer."

"In case this was just the first act?" Lando suggested.

"You never know."

Lando gazed out at where the Corvette had lost its race for safety, an unpleasant chill running up his spine. The whole thing was very similar-disturbingly similar, in fact-to the race Princess Leia Organa's consular ship had lost to Darth Vader's Star Destroyer above the planet Tatooine nearly two decades ago. It had been a pivotal point in the struggle against the Empire's tyranny, though no one had known it at the time.

And now, here over Morishim, the same scene had just been played out again. Could there have been something of equal consequence behind it? "Wedge?"

"Yes?"

"There weren't, by any chance"-Lando hesitated, afraid this was going to sound silly-"any escape pods jettisoned from the Corvette?"

"Actually, that's the first thing I thought of," Wedge told him soberly. "But no, there weren't."

"Didn't think so," Lando said, shaking away the memories of the past. History never truly repeated itself, after all. Odds were that Janson had already called it: a simple theft-and-defection.

The odds also were that none of them would ever know for sure.

Officially, the planet was named Muunilinst--unofficially, it was known to many as Moneylend. And if Bastion was the political center of the Empire, Muunilinst was its financial core.