by James Luceno
“Luke, are you all right?” Leia asked anxiously.
“Sure,” he said. His voice sounded better this time. “I’m fine. What’s wrong?”
“You’re what’s wrong,” Han cut in. “You planning to chase them all the way home?”
Luke blinked, looking around in surprise. The buzzing TIE fighters were gone, leaving nothing but bits of wreckage strewn across the landscape. On his scope, he could see that the Star Destroyer had left Nkllon’s shadow again, driving hard away from the planet toward a point far enough out of the gravity well for a lightspeed jump. Beyond it, a pair of miniature suns were approaching: two of Lando’s shieldships, belatedly arriving—now that it was too late—to assist in the fight. “It’s all over?” he asked stupidly.
“It’s all over,” Leia assured him. “We got two of the TIE fighters before the rest disengaged and retreated.”
“What about the troop carriers?”
“They went back with the fighters,” Han said. “We still don’t know what they were doing here—we sort of lost track of them during the fight. Didn’t look like they ever went very close to the city itself, though.”
Luke took a deep breath, glanced at the X-wing’s chrono. In and among all of that, he’d somehow lost over half an hour. Half an hour that his internal time sense had no recollection of whatsoever. Could that strange Jedi contact really have lasted that long?
It was something he would have to look into. Very carefully.
On the main bridge screen, showing as little more than a bright spot against Nkllon’s dark backdrop, the Judicator made its jump to lightspeed. “They’re clear, Admiral,” Pellaeon announced, looking over at Thrawn.
“Good.” The Grand Admiral gave the other displays an almost lazy examination, though there was little to worry about this far out in the Athega system. “So,” he said, swiveling his chair around. “Master C’baoth?”
“They fulfilled their mission,” C’baoth said, that strangely taut expression on his face again. “They obtained fifty-one of the mole miner machines you sent them for.”
“Fifty-one,” Thrawn repeated with obvious satisfaction. “Excellent. You had no problem guiding them in and out?”
C’baoth focused his eyes on Thrawn. “They fulfilled their mission,” he repeated. “How many times do you intend to ask me the same question?”
“Until I’m sure I have the correct answer,” Thrawn replied coolly. “For a while there your face looked as if you were having trouble.”
“I had no trouble, Grand Admiral Thrawn,” C’baoth said loftily. “What I had was conversation.” He paused, a slight smile on his face. “With Luke Skywalker.”
“What are you talking about?” Pellaeon snorted. “Current intelligence reports indicate that Skywalker is—”
He broke off at a gesture from Thrawn. “Explain,” the Grand Admiral said.
C’baoth nodded toward the display. “He’s there right now, Grand Admiral Thrawn. He arrived on Nkllon just ahead of the Judicator.”2
Thrawn’s glowing red eyes narrowed. “Skywalker is on Nkllon?” he asked, his voice dangerously quiet.
“In the very center of the battle,” C’baoth told him, very clearly enjoying the Grand Admiral’s discomfiture.
“And you said nothing to me?” Thrawn demanded in that same deadly voice.
C’baoth’s smile vanished. “I told you before, Grand Admiral Thrawn: you will leave Skywalker alone. I will deal with him—in my own time, in my own way. All I require of you is the fulfillment of your promise to take me to Jomark.”
For a long moment Thrawn gazed at the Jedi Master, his eyes glowing red slits, his face hard and totally unreadable. Pellaeon held his breath … “It’s too soon,” the Grand Admiral said at last.
C’baoth snorted. “Why? Because you find my talents too useful to give up?”
“Not at all,” Thrawn said, his voice icy. “It’s a simple matter of efficiency. The rumors of your presence haven’t had enough time to spread. Until we can be sure Skywalker will respond, you’ll just be wasting your time there.”
A strangely dreamy look seeped onto C’baoth’s face. “Oh, he’ll respond,” he said softly. “Trust me, Grand Admiral Thrawn. He will respond.”
“I always trust you,” Thrawn said sardonically. He reached a hand up to stroke the ysalamir draped over his command chair, as if to remind the Jedi Master just how far he trusted him. “At any rate, I suppose it’s your own time to waste. Captain Pellaeon, how long will it take to repair the damage to the Judicator?”
“Several days at the least, Admiral,” Pellaeon told him. “Depending on the damage, it could take as long as three or four weeks.”
“All right. We’ll go to the rendezvous point, stay with them long enough to make sure repairs are properly underway, and then take Master C’baoth to Jomark. I trust that will be satisfactory?” he added, looking back at C’baoth.
“Yes.” Carefully, C’baoth unfolded himself from his chair and stood up. “I will rest now, Grand Admiral Thrawn. Alert me if you need my assistance.”
“Certainly.”
Thrawn watched the other wend his way back across the bridge; and as the doors slid solidly shut behind him, the Grand Admiral turned to Pellaeon. Pellaeon braced himself, trying not to wince. “I want a course projection, Captain,” Thrawn said, his voice cold but steady. “The most direct line from Nkllon to Jomark, at the best speed a hyperdrive-equipped X-wing could take it.”
“Yes, Admiral.” Pellaeon signaled to the navigator, who nodded and got busy. “You think he’s right about Skywalker going there?”
Thrawn shrugged fractionally. “The Jedi had ways of influencing people, Captain, even over considerable distances. It’s possible that even out here he was close enough to Skywalker to plant a suggestion or compulsion. Whether those techniques will work on another Jedi—” He shrugged again. “We’ll see.”
“Yes, sir.” The numbers were starting to track across Pellaeon’s display now. “Well, even if Skywalker leaves Nkllon immediately, there won’t be any problem getting C’baoth to Jomark ahead of him.”
“I knew that much already, Captain,” Thrawn said. “What I need is a bit more challenging. We’re going to drop C’baoth off on Jomark, then backtrack to a point on Skywalker’s projected course. A point at least twenty light-years away, I think.”
Pellaeon frowned at him. The expression on Thrawn’s face made the back of his neck tingle … “I don’t understand, sir,” he said carefully.
The glowing eyes regarded him thoughtfully. “It’s quite simple, Captain. I mean to disabuse our great and glorious Jedi Master of his growing belief that he’s indispensable to us.”
Pellaeon got it then. “So we wait along Skywalker’s projected approach to Jomark and ambush him?”
“Precisely.” Thrawn nodded. “At which point we decide whether to capture him for C’baoth”—his eyes hardened—“or simply kill him.”
Pellaeon stared at him, feeling his jaw drop. “You promised C’baoth he could have him.”
“I’m reconsidering the deal,” Thrawn told him coolly. “Skywalker has proved himself to be highly dangerous, and by all accounts has already withstood at least one attempt to turn him. C’baoth should have more success bending Skywalker’s sister and her twins to his will.”
Pellaeon glanced behind him at the closed doors, reminding himself firmly that there was no way for C’baoth to eavesdrop on their conversation with all the ysalamiri scattered around the Chimaera’s bridge. “Perhaps he’s looking forward to the challenge, sir,” he suggested cautiously.
“There will be many challenges for him to face before the Empire is reestablished. Let him save his talents and cunning for those.” Thrawn turned back to his monitors. “At any rate, he’ll likely forget all about Skywalker once he has the sister. I expect our Jedi Master’s wants and desires will prove to be as erratic as his moods.”
Pellaeon thought back. On the matter of Skywalker, at least, C’baoth�
��s desire seemed to have remained remarkably steady. “I respectfully suggest, Admiral, that we still make every possible effort to take Skywalker alive.” He had a flash of inspiration—“Particularly since his death might induce C’baoth to leave Jomark and return to Wayland.”
Thrawn3 looked back at him, glowing eyes narrowed. “Interesting point, Captain,” he murmured softly. “Interesting point, indeed. You’re right, of course. By all means, we must keep him off Wayland. At least until the work on the Spaarti cylinders is finished and we have all the ysalamiri there we’re going to need.” He smiled tightly. “His reaction to what we’re doing there might not be at all pleasant.”
“Agreed, sir,” Pellaeon said.
Thrawn’s lip twitched. “Very well, Captain: I accede to your suggestion.” He straightened himself in his seat. “It’s time to be going. Prepare the Chimaera for lightspeed.”
Pellaeon turned back to his displays. “Yes, sir. Direct route to the rendezvous point?”
“We’ll be making a short detour first. I want you to swing us around the system to the commercial outvector near the shieldship depot and drop some probes to watch for Skywalker’s departure. Near-system and farther out.” He looked out the viewport in Nkllon’s direction. “And who knows? Where Skywalker goes, the Millennium Falcon often goes, as well.
“And then we’ll have them all.”
C H A P T E R 14
“Fifty-one,” Lando Calrissian growled, throwing a glare at Han and Leia as he paced a convoluted path around the low chairs in the lounge. “Fifty-one of my best reconditioned mole miners. Fifty-one. That’s almost half my workforce. You realize that?—half my work force.”
He dropped down into a chair, but was on his feet again almost immediately, stalking around the room, his black cloak billowing behind him like a tame storm cloud. Leia opened her mouth to offer commiseration, felt Han squeeze her hand warningly. Obviously, Han had seen Lando in this state before. Swallowing back the words, she watched as he continued his caged-animal pacing.
And without obvious warning, it was over. “I’m sorry,” he said abruptly, coming to a halt in front of Leia and taking her hand. “I’m neglecting my duties as host, aren’t I? Welcome to Nkllon.” He raised her hand, kissed it, and waved his free hand toward the lounge window. “So. What do you think of my little enterprise?”
“Impressive,” Leia said, and meant it. “How did you ever come up with the idea for this place?”
“Oh, it’s been kicking around for years.” He shrugged, pulling her gently to her feet and guiding her over to the window, his hand resting against the small of her back. Ever since she and Han had gotten married, Leia had noticed a resurgence of this kind of courtly behavior toward her from Lando—behavior that harkened back to their first meeting at Cloud City. She’d puzzled over that for a while, until she’d noticed that all the attention seemed to annoy Han.
Or, at least, it normally annoyed him. Right now, he didn’t even seem to notice.
“I found plans for something similar once in the Cloud City files, dating back to when Lord Ecclessis Figg first built the place,” Lando continued, waving a hand toward the window. The horizon rolled gently as the city walked, the motion and view reminding Leia of her handful of experiences aboard sailing ships. “Most of the metal they used came from the hot inner planet, Miser, and even with Ugnaughts doing the mining they had a devil of a time with it. Figg sketched out an idea for a rolling mining center that could stay permanently out of direct sunlight on Miser’s dark side. But nothing ever came of it.”
“It wasn’t practical,” Han said, coming up behind Leia. “Miser’s terrain was too rough for something on wheels to get across easily.”
Lando looked at him in surprise. “How do you know about that?”
Han shook his head distractedly, his eyes searching the landscape and the starry sky above it. “I spent an afternoon going through the Imperial files once, back when you were trying to talk Mon Mothma into helping fund this place. Wanted to make sure someone else hadn’t already tried it and found out it didn’t work.”
“Nice of you to go to that kind of trouble.” Lando cocked an eyebrow. “So, what’s going on?”
“We should probably wait until Luke gets here to talk about it,” Leia suggested quietly before Han could answer.
Lando glanced past Han, as if only just noticing Luke’s absence. “Where is he, anyway?”
“He wanted to catch a fast shower and change,” Han told him, shifting his attention to a small ore shuttle coming in for a landing. “Those X-wings don’t have much in the way of comfort.”
“Especially over long trips,” Lando agreed, tracing Han’s gaze with his eyes. “I’ve always thought putting a hyperdrive on something that small was a poor idea.”
“I’d better see what’s keeping him,” Han decided suddenly. “You have a comm in this room?”
“It’s over there,” Lando said, pointing toward a curved wooden bar at one end of the lounge. “Key for central; they’ll track him down for you.”
“Thanks,” Han called over his shoulder, already halfway there.
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” Lando murmured to Leia, his eyes following Han across the room.
“Bad enough,” she admitted. “There’s a chance that that Star Destroyer came here looking for me.”
For a moment, Lando was silent. “You came here for help.” It wasn’t a question.
“Yes.”
He took a deep breath. “Well … I’ll do what I can, of course.”
“Thank you,” Leia said.
“Sure,” he said. But his eyes drifted from Han to the window and the activity beyond it, his expression hardening as he did so. Perhaps he was thinking of the last time Han and Leia had come to him for help.
And what giving that help had cost him.
Lando listened to the whole story in silence, then shook his head. “No,” he said positively. “If there was a leak, it didn’t come from Nkllon.”
“How can you be sure of that?” Leia asked.
“Because there’s been no bounty offered for you,” Lando told her. “We have our fair share of shady people here, but they’re all out for profit. None of them would turn you over to the Empire just for the fun of it. Besides, why would the Imperials steal my mole miners if they were after you?”
“Harassment, maybe,” Han suggested. “I mean, why steal mole miners anyway?”
“You got me,” Lando conceded. “Maybe they’re trying to put economic pressure on one of my clients, or maybe they just want to disrupt the New Republic’s flow of raw materials generally. Anyway, that’s beside the point. The point is that they took the mole miners, and they didn’t take you.”
“How do you know there’s been no bounty offer?” Luke asked from his seat off to the right—a seat, Leia had already noted, where he and his lightsaber would be between his friends and the room’s only door. Apparently, he didn’t feel any safer here than she did.
“Because I’d have heard about it,” Lando said, sounding a little miffed. “Just because I’m respectable doesn’t mean I’m out of touch.”
“I told you he’d have contacts,” Han said with a grimly satisfied nod. “Great. So which of these contacts do you trust, Lando?”
“Well—” Lando broke off as a beep came from his wrist. “Excuse me,” he said, sliding a compact comlink from the decorative wristband and flicking it on. “Yes?”
A voice said something, inaudible from where Leia was sitting. “What kind of transmitter?” Lando asked, frowning. The voice said something else. “All right, I’ll take care of it. Continue scanning.”
He closed down the comlink and replaced it in his wristband. “That was my communications section,” he said, looking around the room. “They’ve picked up a short-range transmitter on a very unusual frequency … which appears to be sending from this lounge.”
Beside her, Leia felt Han stiffen. “What kind of transmitter?” he demanded.
“This kind, probably,” Luke said. Standing up, he pulled a flattened cylinder from his tunic and stepped over to Lando. “I thought you might be able to identify it for me.”
Lando took the cylinder, hefted it. “Interesting,” he commented, peering closely at the alien script on its surface. “I haven’t seen one of these in years. Not this style, anyway. Where’d you get it?”
“It was buried in mud in the middle of a swamp. Artoo was able to pick it up from pretty far away, but he couldn’t tell me what it was.”
“That’s our transmitter, all right.” Lando nodded. “Amazing that it’s still running.”
“What exactly is it transmitting?” Han asked, eyeing the device as if it were a dangerous snake.
“Just a carrier signal,” Lando assured him. “And the range is small—well under a planetary radius. Nobody used it to follow Luke here, if that’s what you were wondering.”
“Do you know what it is?” Luke asked.
“Sure,” Lando said, handing it back. “It’s an old beckon call.1 Pre–Clone Wars vintage, from the looks of it.”
“A beckon call?” Luke frowned, cupping it in his hand. “You mean like a ship’s remote?”
“Right.” Lando nodded. “Only a lot more sophisticated. If you had a ship with a full-rig slave system you could tap in a single command on the call and the ship would come straight to you, automatically maneuvering around any obstacles along the way. Some of them would even fight their way through opposing ships, if necessary, with a reasonable degree of skill.” He shook his head in memory. “Which could be extremely useful at times.”
Han snorted under his breath. “Tell that to the Katana fleet.”2
“Well, of course you have to build in some safeguards,” Lando countered. “But to simply decentralize important ship’s functions into dozens or hundreds of droids just creates its own set of problems. The limited jump-slave circuits we use here between transports and shieldships are certainly safe enough.”