by Timothy Zahn
“I’m sure they’ll be looking into that,” Fel said. “But if it was sabotage, it was a pretty poor job of it. Even if those tanks had ruptured, it would only have put one relatively minor sector of the ship out of action. It certainly wouldn’t have killed everyone aboard or anything so dramatic.”
“Unless that’s all the damage the saboteur needed,” Mara suggested. “Maybe all he wanted to do was scuttle the mission, or delay it while another ship was brought out for us to use.”
“Fine, but why would anyone want to delay the mission?” Fel asked reasonably. “Everyone aboard seems pretty eager to get on with it.”
“Seems being the operative word,” Mara pointed out. “Someone could easily be faking.”
“Really,” Fel said, frowning. “I thought you Jedi could pick up on things like that.”
“Not as well as we’d sometimes like,” Luke said. “We can pick up on strong emotion, but not necessarily subtle lies. Especially if the liar is good at it.”
“Or maybe our saboteur does want to get to Outbound Flight, but doesn’t want all the rest of us getting there with him,” Mara said thoughtfully. “If he could manage alternate transport for himself while we were left hanging, that again might be all he needs.”
“But what would getting to Outbound Flight first gain him?” Luke asked. “Besides, the Chiss have already been there, haven’t they?”
“Actually, all they did was a long-range fly-by,” Fel said. “They got enough readings to figure out what they’d found, then hightailed it out of there and forwarded the data to the Nine Ruling Families with a request for instructions. The Families held a quick debate, declared the area off limits, and put Formbi in charge of getting in touch with all of us.”
“Then let’s try backing up a step,” Luke suggested. “What is it about Outbound Flight that anyone might particularly want?”
Mara shrugged. “It’s Old Republic technology,” she pointed out. “Fifty-plus years out of date. That makes it pretty much of historical value only.”
“Only to the three of us here,” Fel said. “A lot of the cultures in this part of space are pretty primitive, technologically. Any one of them could learn a lot from a set of Dreadnaughts in even marginal condition. I daresay even the Chiss military would learn something if they had the time to take everything apart and study it.”
“Or maybe the Geroons figure they can trade what’s left for a new home.” Luke shook his head. “I wish we had more information.”
“We do,” Fel said, sounding puzzled. “Or rather, I do.”
Luke looked at him in surprise. “You do?”
“Sure,” Fel said. “Before we left, Admiral Parck went looking in Thrawn’s records for anything he might have on Outbound Flight. Turns out he had a complete copy of the project’s official operational manual.”
“The whole thing?” Luke asked, frowning.
“The whole thing,” Fel confirmed. “Four data cards covering personnel lists, inventory manifests, technical readouts and maintenance guides, flight operations checklists and procedures, schematics—everything. You want to take a look?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Mara said dryly. “Let’s go.”
The Imperial transport was docked in a mirror image of the half port and reception room that the Jade Sabre was using on the opposite side of the ship. The stormtroopers were already inside in the ready room, stripping off their armor to check for damage from their battle against the fire and talking quietly together about the incident.
“You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a stormtrooper without his armor before,” Luke commented as Fel led the way through the ready room and into a narrow corridor. “Not a conscious one, anyway.”
“They do come out on occasion,” Fel said with a grin. “Though never in public, of course.”
“Fine, but why stormtroopers?” Mara asked. “Why didn’t you just design and create your own elite force if that’s what you wanted?”
Fel shrugged. “Mainly because the psychological advantage was already in place,” he said. “Thrawn had brought several stormtrooper legions out here, and used them very effectively against a whole series of troublemakers. Once potential enemies came to respect and fear men in stormtrooper armor, it paid to keep using it.”
“Even if not all those inside the armor are men anymore?” Luke asked.
Fel smiled. “Yes—Su-mil. Also goes by the warrior name Grappler.”
“Your stormtroopers have names?” Mara asked. “I thought they were just assigned operating numbers.”
“Even some of Palpatine’s stormtroopers had names,” Fel told her. “We all have names here. In case you’re interested, Aurek-Seven consists of Grappler, Watchman, Shadow, and Cloud.”
“Colorful,” Mara commented. “I hope you don’t expect us to keep track of them in public.”
“Especially since they don’t seem to have gotten around to imprinting their names on their helmets,” Luke added.
“And they never will,” Fel said. “We don’t put that kind of identification on stormtrooper armor. That way, no one can tell whether the stormtroopers he’s facing are the absolute best the Empire of the Hand has to offer or a set of freshly trained recruits facing their first genuine action. It keeps our enemies from playing the odds against us.”
“Were Su-mil’s people one of those enemies?” Mara asked.
“Not at all,” Fel assured her. “Su-mil is an Eickarie, one of the latest peoples to join the Empire of the Hand. They were a fragmented tribal people whom we helped liberate from the domination of a very organized warlord with a relative handful of disciplined troops.”
“Helped how?” Mara asked. “Threw him out, then moved in yourselves?”
“Hardly,” Fel said. “The Eickaries were actually very good fighters. They’d just gotten used to fighting among themselves over the years, and the Warlord took advantage of that to keep them working at cross-purposes. All we did was help organize and arm them. They did all the rest.”
“And once they were free they simply decided to join up with you?” Luke asked.
“We’re not Palpatine’s Empire, either, Master Skywalker,” Fel said. “We’re more like a confederation than a true empire, in fact, with allies instead of conquered peoples. We keep the name, again, mainly for the historical aspects.”
“And the psychological value, of course,” Mara murmured.
“Of course,” Fel agreed. “If you’ve gotten used to the notion of the Empire of the Hand being unbeatable, you’re likely to give up that much sooner when a Star Destroyer appears over your planet or a squad of stormtroopers blows a hole through your defensive perimeter. Frankly, our philosophy is that the best battles are those where the enemy gives up before any shots have to be fired at all.”
“You still don’t strike me as a stormtrooper officer type,” Luke commented. “What does your father think of your career choice?”
Fel shrugged. “Actually, I’m in the fleet end of the Imperial military,” he said. “My usual command is a fleet-arm of clawcraft.” He grinned again. “And my father is very proud of me.”
They emerged from the corridor onto a deserted command deck. “No one on duty?” Luke asked, looking around.
“Is there anyone on duty in your ship?” Fel countered reasonably as he crossed to what appeared to be the main sensor station and waved his guests to a pair of chairs at nearby consoles. “Actually, we don’t have a separate flight crew. This kind of transport is designed for a stormtrooper unit to be able to fly by itself, at least on routine operations. Takes some of the strain off our pilot cadre.”
“Does that mean you’re low on trained personnel?” Mara asked as she and Luke sat down.
“Everyone’s always low on skilled pilots,” Fel said, sitting down and swiveling his chair toward a rack of data cards. “I doubt the New Republic’s any different. But at the moment we’re doing all right. There are at least two alien groups within the Empire that have shown very good aptitude f
or general flight operations. . .”
He trailed off, and Luke caught a sudden dark flicker in Fel. “What is it?” he asked.
Slowly, Fel swiveled back to face them. “Well,” he said, his voice studiously conversational. “I think I know now what that fire was all about. Whoever it was figured the Imperial Five-Oh-First would go charging back to help, nobly oblivious to our own safety.”
“What are you talking about?” Mara demanded.
Fel gestured to the rack of data cards. “The Outbound Flight operational manual,” he said. “It’s gone.”
CHAPTER 7
Mara looked at Luke, to find him looking back at her. “Really,” she said, looking over at Fel. “That’s handy.”
“Isn’t it, though,” Fel said. His voice was still quiet, but his face suddenly seemed older and harder. More mature, somehow, than Mara’s first impression of him as a kid playing soldier. “Yes, that’s certainly one way of putting it.”
“I take it you don’t have another copy?” Luke asked.
“This was the copy,” Fel said. “The original records are back on Nirauan.”
“Of course,” Luke said. “What I meant—”
“I know what you meant.” Fel passed a hand across his face; and when he had lowered it, some of the hardness had faded. “Sorry. I’m just. . . I messed up. I hate when I mess up.”
“Welcome to the club,” Mara said, an odd feeling flickering through her. In all her time with the Empire, she wondered, had she ever heard an Imperial officer actually admit to having made a mistake? “Let’s skip the finger pointing and see if we can figure out who’s got it. You have any idea how many people are aboard?”
“Not that many,” Fel said, sounding a little more on balance. “I think this size ship runs a crew of only thirty to thirty-five. There seems to be an honor guard running around, too—call it two squads of six warriors each. Typical ambassador’s staff runs to twenty, plus Formbi, so that’s sixty-eight Chiss, max.”
“Plus five Geroons, you and four stormtroopers, Jinzler, and us,” Luke said. “Unless there’s someone else we don’t know about.”
“Right,” Fel said.
“Wait a second,” Mara said, frowning in concentration as she searched her memory. “You said Formbi had a staff of twenty?”
“I said that was typical for an ambassador,” Fel corrected. “I haven’t actually run the numbers myself.”
“And I presume most of them would be from Formbi’s family,” she said. “That means they’d all be wearing yellow, right?”
“That’s the Chaf family color, yes,” Fel confirmed. “Why?”
“Because I didn’t see more than four yellow outfits at dinner tonight,” Mara said. “Formbi, Feesa, and two others. Everyone else was wearing black.”
“She’s right,” Luke agreed. “Which family wears black?”
“None of them,” Fel said, frowning. “That’s the Chiss Defense Fleet. Black’s a combination of all colors, since the military draws from all the families.”
“What about his honor guard?” Mara asked. “Would they be from his family?”
Fel shook his head. “All honor guards wear military black. Huh. I wonder what he’s done with the rest of his entourage.”
“Maybe he had to leave them behind,” Luke suggested. “With a mission of this sort the Nine Families might not have wanted any one family too heavily represented.”
“I suppose that would make sense,” Fel agreed slowly. “There’s always been a tricky balance of power among the families.”
“We can do a head count in the morning,” Mara said. “Let’s go on. How many of these assorted people might have known you had those files?”
Fel grimaced. “That’s not going to narrow it nearly as much as you think. I was talking about it to Ambassador Jinzler this evening in the reception corridor before we were seated for dinner.”
“You told Jinzler about it?” Mara bit out.
“Yes,” Fel said, frowning at her vehemence. “I wanted to know if he’d brought any records of his own I could compare against ours. Why, shouldn’t I have done that?”
Mara waved a hand in disgust. Of course Fel had no way of knowing the man was a fraud. “Skip it,” she said. “Did he?”
“What, have any records?” Fel shook his head. “No. He said everything useful the New Republic might once have had had been lost or destroyed.”
“Probably true,” Luke murmured. “Could anyone have been able to overhear this discussion?”
Fel exhaled noisily. “Could everyone have been able to overhear it, you mean,” he said. “The whole dinner crowd was milling around the corridor being sociable.”
“Yes, but the whole dinner crowd wasn’t paying attention,” Mara countered. “Tell us who was.”
Fel frowned into space, searching his memory. “For starters, of course, there were several Chiss,” he said slowly. “I remember Feesa passing by at one point—I think she’d just brought you two in. Then there was—”
“Wait a minute,” Luke said, straightening in his chair a little. “We were there by then?”
“Yes, but you were all the way across the corridor,” Fel said. “Talking with Formbi, I think.”
“That’s not the point,” Luke said, looking at Mara. “What do you think?”
“Worth a try,” she agreed. “Just hold those thoughts a minute, Fel. We’ll be right back to you.”
Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes and stretched out to the Force. The memory-enhancement technique the Emperor had taught her only worked on short-term memories, but the reception corridor ought to be recent enough to be accessible. She let the pictures flow backward through her mind’s eye: the fire, the dinner, the flow of conversation before dinner. . .
There it was: Formbi stepping forward to greet them as Feesa brought them into the gathering. She and Luke speaking with him, assuring him their quarters were quite satisfactory and that, no, they didn’t know very much about Outbound Flight but were looking forward to the voyage.
And in the background, Fel and Jinzler across the corridor by one wall, deep in conversation.
She froze the image, studying it. Then, slowly, she let it run forward again, watching everything and everyone around them.
All too soon, she had her answer. With a sigh, she slipped out of the trance and looked over at Luke.
He was already finished with his own memory enhancement. “What do you think?” he asked.
“He’s right,” she said in disgust. “It’d be simpler to figure out who didn’t know. I spotted at least two Geroons close enough to listen in, plus a couple of the Chiss crewers and two command-rank officers.”
“Including General Drask,” Luke agreed. “About the only likely suspects who couldn’t have known were Formbi and us.”
“And, of course, Feesa works for Formbi,” Mara reminded him. “She could have clued him in at any time.”
Luke lifted a hand, let it fall into his lap. “Which leaves you and me. Dead end.”
“Not necessarily,” Mara said as a sudden thought struck her. “Okay, so they got the data cards. But they’d also need a datapad to read them with. That leaves only Jinzler.”
“And the Geroons,” Luke said. “I was talking to them when the explosion went off, and I left my datapad behind in their shuttle.”
“Sorry, but that’s a dead end, too,” Fel spoke up, pointing to another rack above the console. “Whoever took the data cards also helped himself to a datapad.” He brightened suddenly. “Which means it’s not Jinzler or the Geroons,” he said. “Like you said, they wouldn’t need to take one.”
“Unless they deliberately took it to throw us off the trail,” Luke pointed out gently.
Fel’s face dropped. “Oh. Right.” He muttered something under his breath. “Sorry. This sort of thing is a little outside my area of expertise.”
“Ours, too,” Luke assured him. “Don’t worry, we’ll figure it out. If necessary, we can always ask Formb
i to search the ship.”
“What do you mean, if necessary?” Fel asked, frowning. “Don’t we want him to do that anyway?”
Luke shrugged. “There are any number of places aboard a ship like this where you can hide something as small as four data cards,” he pointed out. “Or the thief could easily have copied them into a different system—a droid, even—and then gotten rid of the originals.”
“The Chiss don’t have droids,” Fel said. “But I see your point.”
“On the other hand,” Luke went on, “if we don’t make a fuss, the thief won’t know whether or not we’ve even missed them. That might give us a whole different set of advantages.”
“Maybe,” Fel said, not sounding entirely convinced.
“Trust me,” Luke assured him. “Knowledge of any sort is power, as Talon Karrde always says.”
“As Grand Admiral Thrawn usually proved,” Fel rejoined.
“Don’t remind us,” Luke said ruefully. “Do you know if this ship carries any hypercapable transports or shuttles?”
“I believe this class usually carries one,” Fel said, forehead wrinkling in concentration. “The commander’s glider, it’s called, though on a diplomatic ship like this it would probably be assigned to Formbi instead of Captain Talshib. Why?”
“You might still be right about someone trying to delay us and get a head start,” Luke explained. “Especially now that he’s got an operational manual in hand. If so, he’d need a way to get there once he’d disabled the ship. With your transport, ours, and Formbi’s, that means he’s got at least three to choose from.”
“Plus the Geroons’ shuttle and whatever Jinzler used,” Mara put in.
“You can forget the Geroons’ shuttle,” Luke said, shaking his head. “I wouldn’t trust it to fly to the far side of the Chaf Envoy.”
“That bad, is it?” Mara asked.
“It makes my old T-sixteen look good by comparison,” Luke said wryly. “Anyway, I don’t think it has a hyperdrive.”
“Okay, so that leaves Jinzler’s ship,” Mara concluded. “Fel, do you know what he’s got?”
“Actually, I don’t think he has a ship,” Fel said. “I didn’t see him arrive—he got here before we did—but I believe Formbi mentioned he’d gotten a ride from someone.”