by James Luceno
Salvo and the clone troopers followed, descending one-handed on individual cables, triggering their rifles as they slid to the beach. When the final trooper was on the ground, the gunship lifted its nose and began to veer away from shore. Up and down the beach the same scenario was playing out. Several gunships failed to escape artillery fire and crashed in flames before they had turned about.
Others were blown apart before they had even off-loaded.
With projectiles and blaster bolts whizzing past their heads, the Jedi and troopers scurried forward, hunkering down behind a bulkhead that braced a ribbon of highway coursing between the beach and the near-vertical cliffs beyond. Salvo’s communications specialist comlinked for aerial support against the batteries responsible for the worst of the fire.
Through an opening in the bulkhead hastened the four members of a commando team, with a captive in tow. Unlike the troopers, the commandos wore gray shells of Katarn-class armor and carried heftier weapons. Hardened against magnetic pulses, their suits allowed them to penetrate defensive shields.
The enemy combatant they had captured wore a long robe and tasseled headcloth but lacked the sallow complexion, horizontal facial markings, and cranial horns characteristic of the Koorivar. Like their fellow Separatists the Neimoidians, Passel Argente’s species had no taste for warfare, but felt no compunction about employing the best mercenaries credits could buy.
The burly commando squad leader went immediately to Salvo.
“Ion Team, Commander, attached to the Twenty-second out of Boz Pity.” Turning slightly in Shryne’s direction, the commando nodded his helmeted head.
“Welcome to Murkhana, General Shryne.”
Shryne’s dark brows beetled. “The voice is familiar …,” he began.
“The face even more so,” the commando completed.
The joke was almost three years old but still in use among the clone troopers, and between them and the Jedi.
“Climber,” the commando said, providing his sobriquet. “We fought together on Deko Neimoidia.”
Shryne clapped the commando on the shoulder. “Good to see you again, Climber—even here.”
“As I told you,” Chatak said to Starstone, “Master Shryne has friends all over.”
“Perhaps they don’t know him as well as I do, Master,” Starstone grumbled.
Climber lifted his helmet faceplate to the gray sky. “A good day for fighting, General.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” Shryne said.
“Make your report, squad leader,” Salvo interrupted.
Climber turned to the commander. “The Koorivar are evacuating the city, but taking their sweet time about it. They’ve a lot more faith in these energy shields than they should have.” He beckoned the captive forward and spun him roughly to face Salvo. “Meet Idis—human under the Koorivar trappings. Distinguished member of the Vibroblade Brigade.”
“A mercenary band,” Bol Chatak explained to Starstone.
“We caught him … with his trousers down,” Climber continued, “and persuaded him to share what he knows about the shoreline defenses. He was kind enough to provide the location of the landing platform shield generator.” The commando indicated a tall, tapered edifice farther down the beach. “Just north of the first bridge, near the marina. The generator’s installed two floors below ground level. We may have to take out the whole building to get to it.”
Salvo signaled to his comlink specialist. “Relay the building coordinates to Gallant gunnery—”
“Wait on that,” Shryne said quickly. “Targeting the building poses too great a risk to the bridges. We need them intact if we’re going to move vehicles into the city.”
Salvo considered it briefly. “A surgical strike, then.”
Shryne shook his head no. “There’s another reason for discretion. That building is a medcenter. Or at least it was the last time I was here.”
Salvo looked to Climber for confirmation.
“The general’s correct, Commander. It’s still a medcenter.”
Salvo shifted his gaze to Shryne. “An enemy medcenter, General.”
Shryne compressed his lips and nodded. “Even at this point in the war, patients are considered noncombatants. Remember what I said about hearts and minds, Commander.” He glanced at the mercenary. “Is the shield generator accessible from street level?”
“Depends on how skilled you are.”
Shryne looked at Climber.
“Not a problem,” the commando said.
Salvo made a sound of distaste. “You’d trust the word of a merc?”
Climber pressed the muzzle of his DC-17 rifle into the small of the mercenary’s back. “Idis is on our side now, aren’t you?”
The mercenary’s head bobbed. “Free of charge.”
Shryne looked at Climber again. “Is your team carrying enough thermal detonators to do the job?”
“Yes, sir.”
Salvo still didn’t like it. “I strongly recommend that we leave this to the Gallant.”
Shryne regarded him. “What’s the matter, Commander, we’re not killing the Separatists in sufficient numbers?”
“In sufficient numbers, General. Just not quickly enough.”
“The Gallant is still holding at fifty kilometers,” Chatak said in a conciliatory tone. “There’s time to recon the building.”
Salvo demonstrated his displeasure with a shrug of indifference. “It’s your funeral if you’re wrong.”
“That’s neither here nor there,” Shryne said. “We’ll rendezvous with you at rally point Aurek-Bacta. If we don’t turn up by the time the Gallant arrives, feed them the building’s coordinates.”
“You can count on it, sir.”
Murkhana had been a dangerous world long before it had become a treacherous one. Magistrate Passel Argente had been content to allow crime to flourish, under the condition that the Corporate Alliance and its principal subsidiary, Lethe Merchandising, received their fair share of the action. By the time Argente had joined Count Dooku’s secessionist movement and drawn Murkhana into the Confederacy of Independent Systems there was almost no distinguishing the Corporate Alliance’s thug tactics from those of Black Sun and similar gangster syndicates, save for the fact that the Alliance was more interested in corporate acquisitions than it was in gambling, racketeering, and the trade in illegal spice.
Where persuasion failed, the Corporate Alliance relied on the tank droid to convince company owners of the wisdom of acceding to offers of corporate takeover, and scores of those dreaded war machines had taken up positions on the steep streets of Murkhana City to thwart Republic occupation.
Shryne knew the place about as well as anyone, but he let the commandos take the point. Dodging blasterfire from battle droids and roving bands of mercenaries, and trusting that the captive fighter had known better than to steer them wrong, the three Jedi followed the four special-ops troopers on a circuitous course through the switchbacked streets. High overhead, laser and ion bolts splashed against the convex energy shields, along with droid craft and starfighters crippled in the furious dogfights taking place in the clouds.
Shortly the allied team reached the approach avenues of the southernmost of the quartet of bridges that joined the city and the landing platform. Encountering no resistance at the medcenter, they infiltrated the building’s soaring atrium. Wan light streamed through tall permaplex windows; dust and debris wafted down to a mosaic floor as the building trembled in concert with the intensifying Republic bombardment.
The particle-filled air buzzed with current from the shield generator, raising the hairs on the back of Shryne’s neck. The place looked and felt deserted, but Shryne sent Chatak, Starstone, and two of the commandos to reconnoiter the upper floors, just in case. Still trusting the captive’s intelligence, Shryne, Climber, and Ion Team’s explosives specialist negotiated a warren of faintly lighted corridors that led to a turbolift the captive had promised would drop them into the shield generator room.
“Sir, I didn’t want to say anything in front of General Chatak,” Climber said as they were descending, “but it’s not often you find a Jedi and a commander at odds about tactics.”
Shryne knew that to be true. “Commander Salvo has good instincts. What he lacks is patience.” He turned fully to the helmeted commando. “The war’s changed some of us, Climber. But the Jedi mandate has always been to keep the peace without killing everyone who stands in the way.”
Climber nodded in understanding. “I know of a few commanders who were returned to Kamino for remedial training.”
“And I know a few Jedi who could use as much,” Shryne said. “Because all of us want this war over and done with.” He touched Climber on the arm as the turbolift was coming to a halt. “Apologies up front if this mission turns out to be a waste of time.”
“Not a problem, sir. We’ll consider it leave.”
Outside the antigrav shaft, the deafening hum of the generator made it almost impossible to communicate without relying on comlinks. Prizing his from a pouch on his utility belt, Shryne set it to the frequency Climber and his spec-three used to communicate with each other through their helmet links.
Warily, the three of them made their way down an unlighted hallway and ultimately onto a shaky gantry that overlooked the generator room. Most of the cavernous space was occupied by the truncated durasteel pyramid that fed power to the landing platform’s veritable forest of dish-shaped shield projectors.
Macrobinoculars lowered over his tinted visor, Climber scanned the area.
“I count twelve sentries,” he told Shryne through the comlink.
“Add three Koorivar technicians on the far side of the generator,” the spec-three said from his position.
Even without macrobinoculars, Shryne could see that the majority of the guards were mercenaries, humans and humanoids, armed with blaster rifles and vibroblades, the brigade’s signature weapon. Cranial horns—a symbol of status, especially among members of Murkhana’s elite—identified the Koorivar among the group. Three Trade Federation battle droids completed the contingent.
“Generator’s too well protected for us to be covert,” Climber said. “Excuse me for saying so, but maybe Commander Salvo was right about letting the Gallant handle this.”
“As I said, he has good instincts.”
“Sir, just because the guards aren’t here for medical care doesn’t mean we can’t make patients of them.”
“Good thinking,” Shryne said. “But we’re three against twelve.”
“You’re good for at least six of them, aren’t you, sir?”
Shryne showed the commando a narrow-eyed grin. “On a good day.”
“In the end you and Salvo both get to be right. Even better, we’ll be saving the Gallant a couple of laser bolts.”
Shryne snorted a laugh. “Since you put it that way, Climber.”
Climber flashed a series of hand gestures at his munitions expert; then the three of them began to work their way down to the greasy floor.
Surrendering thought and emotion, Shryne settled into the Force. He trusted that the Force would oversee his actions so long as he executed them with determination rather than in anger.
Taking out the guards was merely something that needed to be done.
At Climber’s signal he and the spec-three dropped four of the sentries with precisely aimed blaster bolts, then juked into return fire to deal with those who were still standing.
As tenuous as his contact with the Force sometimes was, Shryne was still a master with a sword, and almost thirty years of training had honed his instincts and turned his body into an instrument of tremendous speed and power. The Force guided him to areas of greatest threat, the blue blade of his lightsaber cleaving the thick air, deflecting fire, severing limbs. Moments expanded, allowing him to perceive each individual energy bolt, each flick of a vibroblade. Unfaltering intention gave him ample time to see to every danger, and to carry out his task.
His opponents fell to his clean slashes, even one of the droids, whose melted circuitry raised an ozone reek. One mercenary whimpered as he fell backward, air rasping through a hole in his chest, blood leaking from vessels that hadn’t been cauterized by the blade’s passing.
Another, Shryne was forced to decapitate.
He sensed Climber and the spec-three to either side of him, meeting with similar success, the sibilant sound of their weapons punctuating the shield generator’s ceaseless hum.
A droid burst apart, flinging shrapnel.
Shryne evaded a whirling storm of hot alloy that caught a Koorivar full-on, peppering his sallow face and robed torso.
Tumbling out of the reach of a tossed vibroblade, he noticed two of the technicians fleeing for their lives. He was willing to let them go, but the spec-three saw them, as well, and showed them no quarter, cutting both of them down before they had reached the safety of the room’s primary turbolift.
With that, the fight began to wind down.
Shryne’s breathing and heartbeat were loud in his ears but under control. Thought, however, intruded on his vigilance, and he lowered his guard before he should have.
The shivering blade of a mercenary’s knife barely missed him. Spinning on his heel, he swept his attacker’s feet out from under him, and in so doing rid the human of his left foot. The merc howled, his eyes going wide at the sight, and he lashed out with both hands, inadvertently knocking the lightsaber from Shryne’s grip and sending it skittering across the floor.
Some distance away, Climber had been set upon by a battle droid and two mercenaries. The droid had been taken out, but its sparking shell had collapsed on top of Climber, pinning his right hand and blaster rifle, and the pair of mercs were preparing to finish him off.
Climber managed to hold one of his would-be killers at bay with well-placed kicks, even while he dodged a blaster bolt that ricocheted from the floor and the canted face of the shield generator. Rushing onto the scene, the spec-three went hand-to-hand with the merc Climber had booted aside, but Climber was out of tricks for dealing with his second assailant.
Vibroblade clasped in two hands, the enemy fighter leapt.
Shryne moved in a blur—not for Climber, because he knew that he could never reach him in time—but for the still-spinning lightsaber hilt, which he toed directly into Climber’s gloved and outstretched left hand. In the same instant the merc was leaning over Climber to deliver what would have been a fatal blow, the commando’s thumb hit the lightsaber’s activation stud. A column of blue energy surged from the hilt, and through the Separatist’s chest, impaling him.
Shryne hurried to Climber’s side while the spec-three was moving through the room, making certain no further surprises awaited them.
Yoda or just about any other Jedi Master would have been able to rid Climber of the battle droid with a Force push, but Shryne needed Climber’s help to move the sparking carcass aside. Years back, he would have been able to manage it alone, but no longer. He wasn’t sure if the weakness was in him or if, with the death of every Jedi, the war was leaching some of the Force out of the universe.
Climber rolled the mercenary’s body to one side and sat up. “Thanks for the save, General.”
“Just didn’t want you to end up like your template.”
Climber stared at him.
“Headless, I mean.”
Climber nodded. “I thought you meant killed by a Jedi.”
Shryne held out his hand out for the lightsaber, which Climber was regarding as if noticing it for the first time. Then, feeling Shryne’s gaze on him, he said, “Sorry, sir,” and slapped the hilt into Shryne’s hand.
Shryne hooked the lightsaber to his belt and yanked Climber to his feet, his eyes falling on Chatak, Starstone, and Ion Team’s other two commandos, who had rushed into the room with weapons drawn.
Shryne gestured to them that everything was under control.
“Find any patients?” he asked Chatak when she was within earshot.
“None,” she said. “But we hadn’t checked out the entire building when we heard the blasterfire.”
Shryne turned to Climber. “Set your thermal charges. Then contact Commander Salvo. Tell him to alert airborne command that the landing platform energy shield will be dropping, but that someone is still going to have to take out the shore batteries on the bridge approaches before troops and artillery can be inserted. General Chatak and I will finish sweeping the building and catch up with you at the rally point.”
“Affirmative, sir.”
Shryne started off, then stopped in his tracks. “Climber.”
“General?”
“Tell Commander Salvo for me that we probably could have done things his way.”
“You certain you want me to do that?”
“Why not?”
“For one thing, sir, it’s only going to encourage him.”
Ras says you made a kill with General Shryne’s lightsaber,” one of the commandos who had accompanied Bol Chatak said to Climber while all four members of Ion Team were slaving thermal detonators to the shield generator’s control panels.
“That’s right. And knowing that you’d want to see it, I had my helmet cam snap a holo.”
Climber’s sarcasm was lost on the small-arms expert, a spec-two who went by the name Trace.
“How’d it handle?”
Climber sat still for a moment. “More like a tool than a weapon.”
“Good tool for opening up mercenaries,” Ras said from nearby.
Climber nodded. “No argument. But give me a seventeen any day.”
“Shryne’s all right,” Trace said after they had gone back to placing the charges.
“I’ll take him over Salvo in a firefight,” Climber said, “but not on a battlefield. Shryne’s too concerned about collateral damage.”
Completing his task, he walked with purpose through the control room, assessing everyone’s work. Ion Team’s comlink specialist hurried over while Climber was adjusting the placement of one of the detonators.
“Has Commander Salvo been updated?” Climber asked.
“The commander is on the freq now,” the spec-one said. “Wants to speak to you personally.”