501st: An Imperial Commando Novel

by Karen Traviss

  “In a minute. It’s looking like the Plawal Rift.”

  “What is?” Skirata asked.

  “Their main safehouse for their kids. I think they call it Plett’s Well. Some of the data on here is from the Jedi temple archives.”

  Blackmail; it sounded ugly, but having dirt on others and others having dirt on you was a glue that bound folks together across the galaxy. It was as much a power for balance and harmony as the Force.

  “Of course, if we know where they’re holed up, we could just wipe out the rest of them now,” Kom’rk said. “Or even do a deal with the Empire. But I don’t trust any of them.”

  Jusik took to heart the Mandalorian saying that an enemy’s enemy wasn’t always your friend. If they were, then it wouldn’t be for long.

  “Ordo thinks I’m going soft on my old associates,” Jusik said. “I can’t blame him.”

  “Are you?”

  “Do you think I am?”

  “Nah. Do you want me to shoot you if you are?”

  Kom’rk had that kind of deadpan humor. But humor had its serious purpose in life.

  “Yes,” Jusik said, half-meaning it. “Make it before I do any real damage.”

  Jaing just looked up at Kom’rk, the slightest pause as if it wasn’t funny.

  “You got it, ner vod,” Kom’rk said, and went back to his holochart.

  501st Special Unit barracks, Imperial City

  “The droid came in to fix your helmet,” Rede said, strapping on his belt. “It’s over there. He said there was nothing wrong with it and you need to read the manual.”

  Darman draped his towel around his neck, rubbing his wet hair with one end, and stared at the helmet sitting on the bunk. He couldn’t recall reporting a fault. Then it dawned on him; the droid was Jaing’s buddy, the one that had modded Niner’s bucket to give him a secure route to the Nulls. Jaing didn’t hang about. The audio link was installed.

  I can talk to Kad. I can talk to Fi and Atin, too. And Corr. And Kal’buir.

  Darman’s mood lifted instantly. It was almost as good as being there. He checked the chrono on the wall and tried to work out what time it was at Kyrimorut, then realized he had no idea because he didn’t know where the place was. Without a reading for longitude, he couldn’t work it out.

  I’ll call anyway. Whoever answers won’t mind being woken up.

  “We haven’t got a manual,” Darman said.

  “Maybe he was joking.”

  Maybe Rede was, too. It was hard to tell. The kid soaked up experience and knowledge like a sponge, and Darman found it a bit unnerving. He found himself saying things that Skirata used to say back on Kamino, when he was surprised by how fast clones assimilated things, and how they changed before his eyes.

  They grow up too fast.

  Is that Sergeant Kal’s voice, or mine? And who am I talking about—Rede, or my son?

  A month was nearly a couple of years in terms of Rede’s development. Darman watched him going through the checklist on his DC-17, with none of the unconscious ease that years of using the rifle had given the Kamino commandos. He wondered if that meant Rede would carry on aging at that same rate. It was a pretty depressing thought. The new clones might be even worse off than Darman’s generation.

  He knew that Kal’buir had Dr. Uthan working on a way around that. But he wasn’t going to bank on it.

  Niner was still in the ’freshers, but Ennen was sitting on the edge of his bunk, half dressed in his undersuit and lower body plates. He was staring at the floor tiles. The squad was supposed to muster at 0600 hours, which didn’t leave any time to slob around. Darman rapped the chrono on the wall to get Ennen’s attention.

  “Hey, look sharp, ner vod. Doors to kick down, stuff to blow up.”

  Ennen took a few moments to react. “What’s the point? Where’s the peace and freedom and all that garbage we were supposed to see when we got the job done? What is all that, anyhow?”

  Darman knew it was about missing Bry. He’d seen it before with other men. They would go on coping with losses for a long time, and then one death—not always their closest brother, but usually—would hit them hard enough to knock the stuffing out of them. Ennen had fought for three tough, bloody years alongside Bry, and now Bry was gone.

  Dar and Niner had something to look forward to. It might have been out of reach at the moment, but it was there; it was full of promise and potential that he could still see, even through the daily pain of thinking of all the ways Etain wouldn’t be there to share it with him.

  I’ve got a son. I’ve got a home to go to one day. So has Niner.

  “You want to talk, ner vod?”

  Ennen glanced at the chrono on his wrist. “We got to go now.” He stood up and attached his chest and back plates. “The war’s over. It’s over, and Bry made it, and then he gets killed when it’s over. If I thought there was a purpose to it, something more than this, I think I could take it. But it’s just going to be this day after day, isn’t it? Until we’re all dead with nothing to show for it.”

  The sound of running water stopped. Darman could hear Niner whistling as he dried himself. In the sergeant’s absence, he had to deal with this.

  “Ennen, you just have to get through this bad patch.” How could Darman tell him he knew how pointless life could feel, because he’d lost his wife? “We’ve all been there. Even Delta, remember? Look, Holy Roly doesn’t mind us going to cantinas. When we get back, how about we go and get an ale, and work all this out?”

  Ennen stared at him for a moment as if he was looking for the catch, then nodded. “Yeah. Let’s do that. If I had something to make sense of this, some end in sight, it’d make a difference. I just can’t see anything.”

  Is he asking? I don’t know how guys get to find out about Kyrimorut. Shall I tell him?

  It was a tough call. Just mentioning the place was a big risk, because it revealed what Darman knew and suggested he knew a lot more, which he didn’t. Ennen hadn’t been raised by Mando Cuy’val Dar anyway. But neither had Levet, and Niner said he’d deserted to Mandalore, too.

  I’ll find a way to tell him, but not now. I need to ask Ordo how to do this.

  Niner reached for his undersuit. “We all okay here?”

  “Ready to roll,” Ennen said, putting on his helmet. He switched completely. All a guy could do was get a grip and carry on for the moment. “Still the lower levels sweep?”

  Niner nodded. “The cops did a routine stop on a human male with a stolen speeder and he pulled a lightsaber on them. Wisely, because they’re not total di’kute, they pursued him at a safe distance and now they’ve got a wall of squad speeders surrounding the place he holed up in. Why they always bolt to the lower levels I’ll never know. Too obvious.”

  Mandalore was an obvious bolt-hole, too. But, unlike Mandalore, the lower levels of Imperial City were still a place where people could vanish.

  “What’s di’kute?” Rede asked.

  “Don’t encourage them, kid,” Ennen said. “They’ll turn you into a Mandalorian. You wouldn’t want that.”

  Rede paused. Darman could always tell when he was consulting the head-up display in his visor because he wobbled a bit as if he’d lost his balance for a split second. He wasn’t used to the mass of images and telemetry filling his field of vision while he was trying to look past it at what was in front of him. He just hadn’t had enough time alive to get used to it. It was still disorienting. Darman and Niner had worn HUDs almost every day since they were old enough to hold a spoon to feed themselves.

  “I know now,” Rede said. He’d obviously digested the data under M for Mandalore. “Yeah, I know what a Mandalorian is now.”

  Niner leaned close to him as they filed out. “That database,” he said, “will tell you nothing worth knowing about Mandalore.”

  Rede didn’t answer. Maybe he couldn’t yet read his HUD, watch his environment, and talk at the same time.

  There was a LAAT/i gunship waiting for them on the landing pad. Da
rman hadn’t expected to see so many still in service, given the speed with which the Empire had rolled out new hardware, but they were brand-new vessels by military standards and the Empire wasn’t stupid enough to junk everything from the old regime. Like the metamorphosis from Chancellor to Emperor, the change from Grand Army of the Republic to Imperial Army was often a lick of paint and a new name. The gunship had the new Imperial livery and symbols.

  It’s still a larty.

  Darman was secretly pleased to see it. He jumped in knowing where everything was. In pitch blackness and upside down, he could find every switch, handle, and safety device. It was a little bit of what he used to think of as home, and the engine’s noise was—as it always had been—a soothing voice speaking of rescue, resupply, and safe haven. Rede stood beside him in the crew bay and grabbed a deckhead strap.

  “You ever done this in the city before?” Niner asked him. “It’s like nothing else. Just seeing as much of a building below you as above you is weird.”

  “Yeah, and the neighbors love us flying by and gawking through their windows,” Ennen said. “You’ll be amazed what you can see. Use your infrared filter for a real laugh.”

  Poor Rede; Darman doubted his flash training—flash training ten times more rushed and compressed than any Kamino clone’s—helped fill in the gaps there. The pilot had the cockpit door closed, so there was no opportunity for banter. The gunship lifted off high over the barracks, making Darman’s teeth vibrate with that familiar frequency, and wove its way between the towering city blocks.

  Fi loved this. He really got a kick out of the city. I can talk to him now. It’s been—what, best part of two years? He’s married. He’ll have kids by the time I get to see him.

  Niner’s voice cut in. The lack of an audio icon in Darman’s HUD told him this wasn’t an official comm channel.

  “So you’re wired, Dar …”

  “Can they hear us?”

  “No. But Ordo or one of the others probably can.”

  That was fine. Darman had no secrets from them. “When we get back, I’m going to ask to talk to Kad. I want to tell him why I’m not there for him.”

  “Yeah, we can do that from time to time.”

  “Have you spoken to the others?”

  “Not yet. You know what I’m like, Dar. Still got to be careful.”

  “I think we should let Ennen know about Kyrimorut.”

  “He’s pretty down, isn’t he?”

  “He needs some light at the end of the tunnel.”

  “Okay, but clear it with Ordo or Kal’buir.”

  The gunship darted through a forest of glass high-rises, and for a few moments it ran level with a vast advertiscreen urging Imperial citizens to keep an eye on suspicious newcomers to their neighborhood in the upheaval that followed the war. THEY CAN LOOK JUST LIKE US, it warned. Darman wondered who us was on a planet of a thousand different species, but he got the idea.

  Is Ennen a safe bet? Will he shop us to the authorities if we let him know he can desert anytime?

  Darman just didn’t know. He’d have to talk to Ordo. Niner was right. Ordo would have a sensible answer.

  Rede, looking a little nervous judging by the way he edged to the sill of the larty to look below, pointed down. “Wow, they’ve cordoned off a lot of skylanes for one guy.”

  Darman leaned out to look. The ship was flying a few levels above the target area, and the cops were taking no chances. They’d blocked off every intersection for four levels, and in a three-dimensional street grid, that meant a lot of police speeders making sure that nobody wandered into the cordon area as well as stopping anyone trying to get out.

  Darman hoped they’d evacuated the immediate area. It really crimped his style when he had to worry about blowing up the neighbors as well.

  “He’s a Jedi,” Niner said. “Got to take precautions.”

  “I’ve never fought Jedi,” Rede said. “Is it as tough as they say?”

  Darman doubted if Rede had fought at all. It wasn’t the time to embarrass him by asking.

  “They’re definitely not invincible,” Darman said. “They make mistakes like everyone else. And they die like everyone else.”

  He knew that better than anyone.

  13

  Mandalore’s beskar reserves far exceed its domestic needs. The population is four or five million—a village by our standards. They earn revenue from the shipbuilding and equipment contracts we place with them, they have enough ore to equip a moderate fleet of their own—limited, mind you, because they’re a troublesome people—and that will keep them happy while we concentrate on the business of stockpiling beskar. A material that’s effective against Force-users must never be sold to any other government. Of course, we’ll need the cooperation of Mandalorian metalsmiths to produce the finished beskar … but we’ll address that problem when we come to it.

  —Churg Anaris Hej, Deputy Head of Imperial Procurement

  Imperial City, lower levels

  The gunship dropped through ever-narrower skylanes until it reached the nearest landing platform to the cordon.

  It was a few meters longer and wider than the average police vessel, but Niner doubted that the escaped Jedi had factored that in when he went to ground down here. The squad jumped out of the larty and jogged for the knot of police officers taking cover behind their speeders at the perimeter of the cordon. Niner glanced back at the ship to see the pilot tap the chrono on his forearm plate with an exaggerated gesture. The meter’s running. Niner didn’t know him, but at least he had a sense of humor. A job like this could take minutes or hours.

  “Where is he?” Niner asked, looking for a name tab on the nearest cop’s uniform: ANSKOW. He didn’t know any of these cops. They weren’t any of Jaller Obrim’s officers. The blue strip on their badges showed they were part-time community cops, usually drafted for crowd control at big events or traffic duties. “Have you got remote surveillance operating?”

  Anskow pointed at a shuttered cantina. It was flanked by a grocery store, and a lingerie boutique whose window contained items that Niner decided didn’t look sensible or comfortable.

  “You’ll laugh,” he said, “but for all the holocams in this city, we don’t have anything watching down here. Which is where most of the crime is. Funny how they’re spending like crazy on snoop devices for up top, but not here.”

  “I think the Emperor’s more interested in a different kind of crime. Got a floor plan yet?”

  Anskow took out his datapad. “Best we can do is this one from the planning authority, but it’s old. There might be some changes to nonstructural walls.”

  Niner took the datapad from him and transmitted the plan to the squads’ HUDs. “Okay, that looks pretty straightforward.”

  “We don’t think he’s got hostages. Place doesn’t open until the evening. The cook’s normally first in.”

  “Jedi don’t take hostages.” Niner glanced at the cops standing behind the protection of their vehicles, some with blaster rifles resting on the roofs. “I’ve never known them to indulge in a shoot-out, either, but they’re running for their lives now. What have we got, then?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Padawan, Knight, Master? Any clues? Padawans wear a skinny braid, but they’ll have cut those off unless they’re idiots.”

  “Just a guy maybe twenty-five, thirty. The lightsaber was about all we had time to notice, on account of it taking one of my guy’s hands off.”

  “Probably not a Padawan, then.”

  “Does it matter? They’re all dangerous, right?”

  “It matters to us.” Niner glanced at Darman, who’d gone back to the walkway above and was strolling along to get a better look. Niner could see the POV icon in his HUD. “Orders. Padawans, we take alive. Masters, we shoot on sight. Knights—depends, but probably lethal force, too.”

  Anskow gave him a long, dubious look. “Okay. We’ve evacuated the stores and the residential units up to this line. Area at the back of the c
antina is industrial—repair shop, fuel storage, and so on. We’ve shut that off, too.”

  “We’ll try not to hit it. They make a mess when they blow.”

  Anskow gave Niner a look that said he didn’t know if he was joking or not, then motioned his officers to take up position. Darman, now accompanied by Rede, stabbed his finger down at the entrance to the cantina.

  “He’s not going anywhere unless he can fit down a sewage pipe,” Darman said. “He’s stuck in there. He’ll have a reason, of course.”

  Jedi could get out of some pretty tight corners. Niner took nothing for granted, and reminded himself what had happened to Bry; even the most high-minded Jedi was likely to fight dirty when the entire sect was being exterminated. It looked like a dumb place to get cornered.

  It had to be a setup, just like last time.

  “No unnecessary risks, vode,” Niner said. “I want everyone coming back with their head still attached. And he knows we’re all out here waiting, so …” He upped the volume on his helmet’s external speaker to loudhailer level. “Jedi! This is the Imperial armed forces.” It just didn’t sound right—not yet. “Come out—lay your weapons on the ground—hands above your head.” He kept an eye in the POV icons on Darman’s position. “Last chance, or we come in.”

  Predictably, there was no response. Darman took out a roll of detonite tape from his belt pouch and tossed it in his hand. “Knock knock.”

  “Okay, stick a charge on the front doors.” Niner signaled to Rede and Ennen. “Ennen—on my signal, stick a flash-bang through the lower floor window. Rede, you place one through the roof light. Can you reach it from there?”

  “Yes, Sarge.”

  “Okay. It’s going to be quick. Simultaneous doors, flash-bangs, then in.”

  Niner looked up for a moment. Above him, beyond the cordon ceiling, he could see the undersides of stationary speeders hovering for a better look. He was sure the operation had an audience, and whatever they did would be on GNN sooner or later. He needed to get this over and done with fast.

  “He’s too old for a Padawan.” Niner moved closer, twenty meters from the doors. “Shoot first, worry about Intel’s recruitment needs later.”