15

Face was actually enjoying his main course, some sort of fowl in a sunfruit marinade, and idly hoping it wasn’t poisoned, when Zsinj asked a question he wasn’t prepared for. “Am I mad, General Kargin, or do you have an Ewok pilot in your unit?”

Face froze. He swallowed and hastily cleared his throat. “What leads you to that conclusion, sir?”

“Intercepted transmissions. Analysis of the vocal characteristics of your pilot, Hawk-bat One, suggests that he was probably, though not definitely, an Ewok. But I don’t understand how that could be possible.”

Face shrugged and ran through a mental list of a dozen different possible responses. “Well, he is an Ewok. Mostly an Ewok. Lieutenant Kettch. My most ferocious pilot, actually. He can’t really reach the controls, but a somewhat crooked prosthetics expert on Tatooine built him a set of hand-and-leg extensions he can wear, so his height has not limited him in the least.”

“Obviously. But I thought Ewoks were far too primitive to handle complex machinery or astronautics theory and practice. Too primitive even to learn an adequate vocabulary in Basic.”

“They are. But Kettch was … modified. We don’t know where or why it happened. He was taken from the sanctuary moon of Endor as a cub, reared in a laboratory somewhere, and fed chemicals that apparently increased his ability to learn. He’s a genius, especially with mathematics.” That was, in fact, the true background of Piggy, and Face was suddenly very glad to have it on hand as a resource.

Zsinj and Melvar exchanged a glance and Face suddenly felt his heart race. There was something in their expressions, as brief as that glance was, that told Face this subject was of vital interest to them. What did it mean?

“Anyway,” Face continued, “he has a very nasty disposition. I wouldn’t care to bring him to you even if you’d asked about him in your earlier communication. He bites strangers. I’d hate to have him tear away a mouthful of Zsinj and for the rest of us to be spaced for his bad manners.”

Once again jovial, Zsinj turned his smile on Face. “Very amusing. Still, I hope to see him fly sometime. Perhaps even a practice run against our best pilot.”

Face looked around. “Is he here?”

“Baron Fel? No, he’s on duty.” The warlord shrugged. “Not the most congenial of dinner guests in any case.”

“So he bites, too?”

Zsinj laughed.

Castin waited until the hallway was momentarily clear. He moved up to the closed turbolift and quickly popped open its control panel. Beneath was the usual collection of wiring and computer boards. Deftly, he stripped the insulation from two wires and twisted them together.

The turbolift doors slid open, revealing an echoing shaft beyond. Castin untwisted the wires, slapped the control panel shut, and stepped out to grab the maintenance access rungs inside. He swung his feet clear of the opening just in time; the doors slid shut again just as rapidly.

Now he had to find a level where he could have some privacy—and access to a computer interlock.

Down or up? He could see the terminus of the shaft above him, some considerable distance, but not below him. That meant there was more to explore below. He climbed down.

Moments later, he gripped the rungs as though his life depended on it while a fast-moving turbolift sailed past. The wind of its passage shook him and knocked his feet from the rail they rested on. Swearing to himself, he pulled himself back up and continued downward.

If only these Imperial twits had seen fit to label the interiors of the turbolift doors. Level 15: HANGARS, ARMORY, CAFETERIA—that would have been nice.

Still, there were clues he could interpret. The pattern of wear on the turbolift’s machinery against the walls of the lift shaft, for example. There were telltale marks where the lifts came to rest, marks where the metal of the shaft had been worn away, showing which levels were the most heavily accessed. He’d have to avoid them.

Six levels down, he found a turbolift door where the shaft showed almost no wear. A good sign. He opened the maintenance panel leading to the control box … and nearly dropped off his rung in surprise.

This control box was not standard. In it was a sealed security module, an indication that whatever was beyond the door was very important to somebody.

He leaned away and held tight as another turbolift shot past, this time rising from below, then returned to the problem at hand. This was probably too dangerous a level to enter for his task. On the other hand, he was curious. He broke out his pouchful of tools.

The sealed security module was sophisticated, but he’d grown up slicing Imperial hardware and software, so after a few minutes it yielded to his experience and opened. Within were the standard turbolift door controls, plus a variety of security measures—sensors to register whenever the doors were opened or closed, to note whenever a turbolift was called from this level or directed here, and to send all that data to the ship’s main computer. He disconnected the sensors. He couldn’t disconnect the computer relay; it also handled the permissions for people to enter and leave the level, and if he disconnected it and someone with proper authorization tried to enter or leave, his modifications would be detected immediately.

He could open the door from here without effort, but once the door was closed, he wouldn’t be able to leave again without that authorization. It was time for some improvisation. He patched a small comm-enabled datapad into the circuit, programming it to do two things: monitor his comlink frequency and issue the command to open this door when he broadcast a specific signal. That should do the trick.

He put away his tools and brought out his blaster rifle. Then he tripped the switch to open the door.

It slid open silently, unlike most turbolift doors, revealing a darkened passageway beyond. There was no one in sight. He hopped from his rung perch to the passageway floor and swept it around in a covering arc, but there was still no one to see.

It wasn’t a passageway, precisely. It was a gallery, a long hall in which one wall was made up of large viewports. The chambers beyond the viewports were well lit. He liked that; it would be next to impossible for people within them to see him. He reached back, tripped the switch again, and then yanked his arm out of the way so the door wouldn’t close on it.

There was a computer interlock here, just beside the turbolift door, but that would not be safe. He advanced along the gallery with the precise pace of an Imperial stormtrooper, looking for another.

The chambers beyond the large viewports came into view as he passed them. The first was large. Against the far wall were large cages or small cells, stacked three high, made of glass or transparisteel, each occupied by a single creature. Castin saw a number of Gamorreans, a large dark arthropod whose cell was festooned with some sort of organic webbing, and an Ewok. In one oversized cell mostly filled with water was a dianoga, a tentacular scavenger with a single eye-stalk; it watched him as he passed. There was one human male outside the cages, seated at a desk with a large, elaborate computer terminal on it, his feet up on the desk as he idly tapped away at a personal datapad; he looked as though he were playing a game. He took no note of Castin.

Up ahead, despite the dimness of the passageway, Castin could make out a darkened desk and computer terminal in the left corner. He couldn’t tell whether this passageway ended there or turned to the right. That terminal was what he needed, assuming he could power it up without alerting anyone.

He passed by the next section of viewports. These displayed a smaller chamber, an operating theater. There was an operation in progress, a team of four human males, gloved and masked, working on a large, white-furred creature with two large eyes and two small. Castin recognized it as a Talz, then took a closer look.

The Talz had some sort of drip tubes implanted in its head; fluids moved slowly from the bottles set up beside the operating table. The creature was strapped in place … and it was awake. As Castin watched, it opened its mouth and roared, the noise not penetrating the viewports. Its clawed hands opened and closed as it strained against its bonds and its four eyes glared redly at the doctors.

These were not roars of pain, Castin decided, but of rage. An unsettling image. The Talz were supposed to be peaceful creatures.

A few steps more, and the operating theater was behind him. He seated himself at the darkened terminal and brought out his tool kit again.

“Return to Iron Fist? I don’t think so.” Lara shook her head. “I’ll be far more valuable to Zsinj on Mon Remonda.”

“Not necessarily,” Rossik said. “We’d be getting a couple of X-wings—which you’d be able to fly for us in covert missions—and your analyses of the missions you’ve flown so far and of the thought processes of the Wraiths and Rogues. These could be as valuable as getting an accurate fix on Mon Remonda’s position.”

“I’d still prefer to return to the Wraiths.”

“Well, it’s not going to happen that way. Now, assuming that he’s looking at us, keep your wingman distracted with some animated conversation with the most unanimated Tavin while I get into position.”

Gloom settled over Lara as she realized what she had to do … as she realized that she was about to take prisoners who knew her secret, that she had to reveal that secret to Wedge Antilles. “I don’t think so. Put your hands in the air. You’re now in the custody of the New Republic.”

From underneath his tunic, Tavin brought out a small blaster and aimed it at her. Rossik glanced at Tavin, his expression openly derisive, and merely placed his own hand on the butt of his own blaster. “You don’t appear to be in a position to make such demands, Petothel. Your partner is a kilometer away and may not even be watching. I know you haven’t been broadcasting; my scanner would have told me.”

Lara looked at the blaster in Tavin’s hand and raised her arms, a gesture that was half surrender, half insolent stretch. “I’ll give you two just one chance. Throw down your weapons now.”

Rossik said, “Keep her covered and take her blaster. I’m doing what I told you—leaving through the rear of the house and circling around behind her partner. Just keep her here and quiet until then.”

“Easily done,” Tavin said.

“You should have surrendered,” Lara said. She closed her hands into fists.

A brilliant lance of light from the hill took Tavin right in the stomach. The sudden explosion of superheated tissues threw the man down and back; his blaster dropped to the charred ground.

Rossik turned toward the source of the laser fire and took a step forward. Lara drew her blaster. Rossik was in the air, throwing himself to the ground, when Lara’s blast took him in the side. He hit the ground and lay there unmoving.

Lara rose and kept the two men covered as Donos ran down from his sniper position. She didn’t need to; it was clear to her that both men were dead. She tried to simulate rattled nerves and was surprised to discover that she had them for real. Part of her reaction, she knew, was the sudden relief that her secret was once again safe for the time being.

“Are you all right?” Donos asked.

Lara nodded. “They wanted—” Her voice broke and once again it was a genuine reaction. “They wanted me to go back to Iron Fist with them. They weren’t going to leave me an option where I could feed them false information. I was just going to disappear.” She shuddered. “I couldn’t do that.”

Donos prodded Rossik with a foot. The body rolled halfway over, displaying staring, vacant eyes. He reached down to take the man’s blaster away. “Why did your brother draw on you?”

“I said no. I said I wouldn’t go back with this man, Rossik. Apparently my brother wasn’t going to get paid unless I went back with Rossik. If he wasn’t going to be paid, he was going to kill me.”

“Not exactly a loving brother.” Donos looked over Tavin’s body and took his weapon, too. Then he looked back over his shoulder at Lara. “I’m sorry. That was a callous thing to say.”

“That’s all right. The Tavin I loved just stopped existing when I was a little girl; he turned into this. I miss him … but you didn’t kill him.”

“We can’t be sure there’s not more to Rossik’s team. Let’s grab their papers, give the house a quick look, and then head back for the X-wings. I want to get off this world as soon as possible.”

Castin had to keep a certain amount of attention on the hallway behind him as he continued to hammer away at Iron Fist’s computer security from the terminal. So far, none of the scientists or technicians from the rooms beyond the viewports had stepped out into the hall, but he couldn’t count on his luck lasting forever.

And the computer security here was good. Someone nearly as skilled as he had set up the multilayered defense that so far kept him from sliding his program into place in the communications system. And while Castin was certain that he was superior to this unknown code-slicer, that individual had had weeks, months, or years to perfect his code; Castin was trying to bypass it in a matter of minutes. Even with his superior skills and the tools he’d brought, it wasn’t going well.

So he was upset. Barely able to concentrate on what he was doing.

No, that didn’t make sense. Tough systems were a challenge to him, not an aggravation, and sharpened his concentration rather than diminishing it. So why was he upset? He leaned back, away from the screen with its unhelpful rejections of all his most reasonable requests, to think about it.

Even his stomach was upset, and that, finally, pointed him to the source of his emotion. It was what he’d seen moments ago. The creatures in the cages. The Talz on the operating table, a peaceful being maddened by chemicals until it was full of rage.

It was ridiculous. He didn’t care about such things. They weren’t human, they weren’t particularly important, and if the scientists decided to work on them, that was fine.

But the sick feeling persisted.

That Talz’s life was over. Even if it miraculously escaped its captivity, it would be forever changed by what had happened to it. Could it return home to its world, its family, knowing how it had been violated, knowing what it had been made to feel and do, and still go back to the way of life it had known before? Castin didn’t think so.

He swore to himself. He didn’t have time for this. And he didn’t need to concern himself with the fate of a grab bag of nonhumans Zsinj decided to perform tests on.

But the images persisted, crowding out the techniques and procedures he needed to use for his current mission, filling him with an unwanted emotion.

Sympathy.

Sympathy for those hairy, smelly, and most unhuman beings crowding those cells he’d seen. They were a concentration of tragedy.

Caught up as he was in these thoughts, Castin still heard the hiss of the turbolift door far behind him. He powered down the terminal, grabbed up his datapad and helmet, and scuttled around the corner to the right before peering back the way he’d come.

A half squadron of stormtroopers, dimly visible in the passageway’s gloom, advanced toward him. Their steps were unhurried. Halfway toward him along the passageway, the leader rapped smartly against the nearest transparisteel. Having apparently gained the attention of someone beyond it, he tapped the side of his head, an obvious signal for someone inside to get to a comlink to receive his transmission.

Damn it. They had to be looking for him. What had he done wrong? He was certain he’d covered his tracks when powering up the corner terminal.

No, wait. When he’d first popped the cover on the control box inside the turbolift shaft and discovered the heavy-duty security there—he hadn’t known about that level of security until he’d opened the box in the first place. If there was a sensor on the box itself, a sensible precaution for a set of controls leading into a very secure area, he would have set it off without ever realizing it.

He drew away from the corner. Behind him was another viewport, this one into an office area, currently unoccupied. Beside it was an armored door with a standard set of controls beside it. He tapped the “open” button and the little screen on the control pad read ENTER AUTHORIZATION CODE.

At the stormtroopers’ rate of approach, they’d be on him before he could break through that security and get into the office.

What was it to be—bluff or fight? There was no way a bluff would work; it would only serve to keep him in one place while the rest of the stormtroopers approached. He readied his blaster rifle.

The lead stormtrooper came around the corner and froze momentarily. “What’s your—”

Castin fired. His shot took the stormtrooper in the gut and threw him back against the far wall.

Castin didn’t wait for the next trooper to appear. He fired again, this time into the viewport, shattering it inward, and leaped, following the broken transparisteel into the office beyond.

He landed and spun, aiming back through the broken viewport. Two more stormtroopers rounded the corner, bringing their long arms to bear on the spot where he’d stood a moment before. He fired again twice, his first shot taking the nearer stormtrooper in the chest. The other trooper dove for the deck, out of sight below the rim of the viewport, and Castin’s second shot missed him.

A shrill Klaxon alarm sounded and the lights in the office began flickering in time to it.

There was another door out of the office, leading in the general direction of the turbolift, and its control panel was responsive. It opened into what appeared to be a scrub room, all sinks and lockers and decontam chambers, with no viewport out into the passageway.

The next door opened just as readily—into the operating theater. The medical technicians there had ceased their ministrations to the Talz and were watching the activity on the other side of the picture viewport—the last of the stormtroopers passed by, heading toward the scene of the action Castin had just left.

A blaster bolt went over Castin’s shoulder and hit one of the technicians in the back of the head. Castin saw the man, his head now a black mass of char, topple forward as slowly as if sinking into heavy oil, saw the other technicians as they turned toward him in similar slow motion.

He spun, firing before he could even see his target. A stormtrooper stood in the open doorway between office and scrub room, a perfect target, and Castin’s unaimed blast took him in the knee. The man toppled with a shriek.

Castin slapped the near control panel and the door slid shut. He turned back to the technicians; they already had their hands up. One couldn’t take his eyes from the smoking mass that had once been the head of his colleague.

It would take just one blast to blow out the near viewport. He could leap through and get back to the turbolift before the three stormtroopers still mobile were likely to catch up to him. That was it, then. But as he traversed to aim at the viewport, he saw the Talz looking at him. Its four eyes seemed to be holes leading to a world of pure pain.

He hesitated, then pulled his vibroblade from a belt pouch. He cut through the Talz’s ankle restraints, then went to work on its wrist straps.

“Don’t!” That was one of the technicians, his eyes wide. “That’s not a Talz anymore, it’s a killer—”

“Right.” Castin finished with the last strap, then backed away.

The technician who’d spoken bolted, got to the doorway, slapped the control. The door opened … and the technician caught a blaster bolt just beneath his gut. He folded over, still alive, and began screaming.

The Talz rolled up off the table, tubes still gruesomely inserted into its skull. It glared with malevolence at Castin, then turned toward the remaining technicians and advanced on them. The rolling carrier holding the bottle of drip chemicals tipped over and was dragged along. The Talz spotted something through the door, probably the stormtrooper who’d last fired, and paused, obviously trying to decide what foe to attack first.

Castin fired at the viewport, blowing it out, and leaped through the hole he’d made. There was nothing between him and the turbolift door. He dropped his vibroblade and dragged out his datapad as he ran.

Then there was pain, an agony so intense he couldn’t even tell where it began, and he was falling, slamming down onto the passageway floor.

Pain bent him as though he were a puppet in the hands of a malevolent child. He could see, and even barely understand, the spot on the back of his left thigh where a blaster bolt had cut through the stormtrooper armor and the flesh beneath. He could see the stormtrooper who’d shot him; the man was advancing at a walk, his rifle ready for another shot.

And then there was the turbolift door, too far away for a man reduced to crawling.

They had him. They had him, and they had his datapad, which contained everything Zsinj would need to know about him and his mission here.

Hands twitching from the pain, he held his datapad out before the barrel of his blaster rifle and squeezed the trigger.

“Now,” Zsinj said over the iced pastry that was their dessert course, “to the matter which has led to our meeting.”

Face sat back, assuming a false expression of contentment. “Please.”

“I am about to embark on a mission. It will be a large-scale military engagement.”

“You’re going to attack your Rebel enemies?”

“That’s correct. I anticipate starfighter and capital ship response and need all the starfighter support I can get—especially considering my recent squadron losses.” He made a growl of that last statement. “But if you’re as effective against my enemies as you have been against me, I will have lost effectively no strength.” An aide appeared over his shoulder and whispered to him. His expression did not change, but he rose. “I must attend to business for a few moments. Melvar, please continue this briefing.” He took a few steps away with the aide.

Melvar smiled, an expression that suggested he’d be happiest if pulling the wings off insects. “It’s an orbital refueling and trade station. In its warehouses is a considerable quantity of material we need—critical supplies. We also need some time to load that material into our cargo vessels—not a lot of time, but enough time for the planetary defenses below to begin sending up squads of starfighters from the surface … and to bring in more squadrons from capital ships arrayed around the planet.”

Face whistled. “You’re after valuable cargo. What is it?”

Melvar shook his head. “That’s a secret … until you’re at the mission site.”

“What we need to know,” Zsinj said, returning to his seat, “is how many starfighters you can bring to bear in support of this mission.”

“Six,” Face said. He noted that Zsinj’s merry demeanor now seemed forced.

“Only six?”

“We fight like twenty.”

“You fight like thirty. And we’ll pay you like thirty.”

“Meaning …”

“Your commission is four hundred thousand Imperial credits, deliverable immediately upon completion of the mission.”

Face tried to keep from displaying the surprise he felt. That was a fortune, enough to purchase two X-wings plus replacement supplies. “And if your mission fails, no payment at all?”

“No, you get the entire amount regardless—assuming you don’t let me die in the engagement.”

“I’m still impressed. If I didn’t know my unit’s skills, I would suspect you were overpaying us.”

Zsinj dropped his false smile. “I am overpaying. I predict that some of yours, and some of mine, will die in this engagement. I intend to pay enough that all our pilots go into battle eager to succeed, happy to risk their lives—and comforted that if they die, their widows and children will be amply compensated.”

Face considered it. “I’d be happy to earn still more. I have more Hawk-bats than I do starfighters. Many with technical proficiency. Many with other skills.”

“Intrusion skills?”

Face smiled. “I was right. You’re going to position a team before your fleet arrives.”

Zsinj shrugged. “We obviously think alike. Yes, of course.”

“I have intrusion experts. Some with experience with both Imperial and New Republic systems.”

“And also,” Melvar interrupted, “you have him.” He extended one silvery nail toward Kell.

“And his teacher,” Face said.

Melvar looked surprised. “His … teacher?”

Kell brushed his hair back, his signature gesture, and looked miffed.

“His teacher. Deadliest unarmed combatant I ever met. A woman, deceptively sweet of appearance, which makes it easy to insert her in most environments. Not his equal as a pilot … but I once saw her kill a Wookiee. Unarmed.”

Zsinj and Melvar exchanged glances. Zsinj said, “Surely you’re exaggerating.”

“He’s not,” Kell said, his first words since they sat. “A Wookiee’s incredibly strong by human standards, but no faster … and has just as many vulnerabilities. Pressure points. Joints. You can’t wrestle with one—that’s automatic death. And its longer reach means you constantly have to drop in and out of its range. But it can be done.

“Qatya, that’s my teacher, started with a shot to the spine that compressed its spinal cord and apparently damaged a couple of its vertebrae, all of which partially paralyzed it … especially its legs. The next time it swung at her, she trapped its hand at a position to give her advantageous leverage, then twisted it to break its wrist. She broke two of its fingers then, too, just for fun. You know how women are. Then—”

“Dissek, please.” Face made his voice admonishing, but inwardly was pleased by Kell’s improvisation—it was just the sort of gruesome detail he would not have felt knowledgeable enough to provide. “Do forgive him. Combat is his only love.”

“Quite all right,” Zsinj said. “You will provide me with dossiers on the Hawk-bats who have technical skills so I can evaluate possible roles for them?”

“I will. Just give me a way to send them to you.”

“Melvar will give you a set of HoloNet times and frequencies before you leave.”

“And as much data as you can give us on this mission so we can run our own simulations?”

Melvar produced a datapad from a pocket and slid it over to him.

“Would you be averse to a small commission now?” the warlord asked.

“Not at all.”

Zsinj stared back toward the security foyer, the route by which the Hawk-bats had entered the command center. Two stormtroopers there were advancing, dragging a third stormtrooper backward between them. The third man was limp in their arms and had no helmet on; his hair was golden blond.

“I must be sure of your ruthlessness,” Zsinj said. “I know you are capable of killing in fair combat, but I want men—oh, yes, and women—who can kill under less adverse circumstances. So, if you’d please shoot this man for me?”

The stormtroopers dumped their human cargo by the foot of the table.

The man they had carried was Castin Donn. His eyes were closed. There was a blaster burn mark on his right leg. His chest rose and fell in regular rhythm.

Face swallowed the bile that tried to crawl up his throat and hoped that he had not gone as pale as he felt. Castin, you idiot. You’ve killed us all.

Kell glanced down at Castin and then at Face, admirably keeping his features emotionless. His look was a question—Jump Zsinj now? Or wait? Dia kept her gaze on Castin’s face, her own expression oddly enrapt.

“Not much of a target,” Face said, stalling. There had to be something he could do without revealing their hand, some way to preserve all their lives without managing to jettison their entire mission.

Nothing came to mind.

“True,” Zsinj said. “Would you shoot him, please?”

“Oh, I should imagine,” Face said, but did not move. “It seems rather a costly test for you, though—having us shoot one of your own stormtroopers.”

“Not one of mine,” said Zsinj. “An intruder.”

“You’re not going to question him?”

Zsinj shook his head. “I’m not interested in what he has to say. Would you shoot him, please?”

Face clamped down on the panic rising within him. The ship’s officers at the table were watching him with increasing interest. And no plan was coming to mind. “Of course,” Face said. “How much?”

Zsinj looked surprised. “What?”

“How much to shoot him? How much are you paying?”

“General Kargin, you surprise me. You’re already here, and the cost of a single pistol blast is negligible—especially as we are providing the blaster.” He nodded toward one of the officers, who produced a blaster pistol. “You can’t do this as a demonstration of goodwill?”

“Intelligent life is the most precious commodity in the galaxy,” Face said, making his voice pompous. “Consequently, I never take it without adequate financial reward.”

Dia stood, her sudden motion startling everyone at the table. She smiled at the warlord, a heart-melting expression, and said in her husky Seku voice, “The general is just looking out for the well-being of his officers and troops, Warlord. He can’t abandon his policies; they’re written up in the Articles of the Hawk-bats. But I can do this for you as a private commission. The blaster, please?” She held out her hand.

Face felt a sudden surge of elation. She had a plan. He saw Kell bring his legs up under him. The big man would probably go after Zsinj. That left General Melvar for Face, with Dia to hold the others at bay with the blaster. Assuming they gave her a functional one.

Melvar nodded; his officer handed Dia the blaster pistol. She checked the charge, moved over beside Castin—

And shot him in the throat.

A chatty junior officer, apparently cheered by the murder of the intruder, led the Hawk-bats back to their shuttle.

Once the security foyer doors closed behind them, Zsinj rose. He clapped his hands, and all the talk in the room ceased. “You’ve done very well,” the warlord said. “Thank you for a fine performance.”

The men saluted and began filing out of the ersatz crew pit. Zsinj sat. “How is—what’s his name? Yorlin?”

Melvar’s features relaxed and became bland and non-threatening once more. “That man Dissek hit him hard enough to give him a concussion and damage some teeth.”

“Well, he’s to be commended for following orders even at the cost of considerable pain. Give him a commendation, and when he gets out of the medical ward, give him a three-day leave.” He nodded at the body of the intruder; smoke still rose from what was left of its neck. “Hand that over to our technicians. I want to know who he was, where he came from, where he’s been living, and how he got aboard Iron Fist—since he appears not to have been one of the Hawk-bats after all.”

“Done. What did the intruder cost us?”

“Initial reports indicate that he shot two stormtroopers and two technicians, then our best Talz specimen killed another two technicians and another stormtrooper, and finally the remaining troopers shot the Talz. Costly.” Zsinj fixed Melvar with a serious stare. “Have we lost an Ewok test subject?”

“Not from Iron Fist. But it could be that one of the planet-bound laboratories has lost one—and covered up the loss.”

“I’m going to have to execute someone for that, Melvar. Find out who lost him, then kill that idiot.”

“Yes, sir.”

•      •      •

Face made it clear, by gesture and private code, that he wanted the others to remain silent even as they accelerated away from Iron Fist. Only when they had entered hyperspace on their first leg out did he speak. “Report.”

“He was already dead.” The words burst from her like water finally breaching an old dam. “He was gone, Face.” Pain tugged at her words, made them waver. There was bleakness in what he could see of her face.

“He was breathing.”

“No, he wasn’t. It was some sort of trick. Some sort of mechanical pump, I don’t know.” She took a deep, shuddering breath. “He was completely limp when they brought him in. Not unconscious limp. Dead limp. There was blaster charring on his armor’s pelvic plate that should have continued up into his chestplate but didn’t, so they had to have put a new chestplate on him—to replace the one that was burned through when he was killed. And the guards carrying him, their posture said they were hauling cargo, not a prisoner who might wake up someday.” She closed her eyes and bowed her head. “Body language is something I know a lot about, Face. He was dead.”

“Accepted.” Face sighed and leaned back. “Dammit. If only he’d followed orders. Will you be all right?”

“I’ll be—I’ll be—” Her voice choked off. She gulped a couple of times and then just stared.

“Dia?”

She shrieked as if stabbed and was suddenly a whirlwind of motion, lashing out in all directions. Her random blows landed on Kell, on the command console, on the windscreen, on the shuttle wall beside her.

Kell leaned between her and the controls, fending off her blows. “Face, get her off me before she bumps the wrong things and sends us down a blind hyperspace path.”

Face leaned forward, grabbing at Dia, received a blow to his chin from a brain tail for his trouble. “Dia! Power down!”

But her shrieks and blows redoubled, joined now by what looked like painful spasms. Face reached around the copilot’s seat and got both hands on her, then bodily hauled her over the chair and into his lap. He took another pair of random blows before getting his arms around her waist, pinning her to him.

She let out one last, keening moan and collapsed. Tears ran unchecked down her cheeks and Face found himself frozen, staring at them, evidence of emotions he had never believed she possessed. “Dia?”

Her voice was a moan. “She’s dead.”

“She? She who?”

“Dia. Diap’assik. She is dead.”

He put heat and anger into his words. “No, you are not.”

“Yes! She would not have done that. She would not have shot him. She would have died first. She is dead, Face.”

He heard a snap, heard metal slide on leather, and was prepared when her hand came up with her blaster and its barrel came in line with her chin. He released Dia with his left hand and got his thumb under the trigger, preventing her from squeezing it.

She shrieked again, a haunted noise compounded of agony and bottomless guilt. “Face, let me!”

He wrenched the blaster from her hand, held it over Kell’s shoulder until he took it, and pinned her again. “No.”

“Then kill me.”

“No.”

“Yes. I will not live this way.”

“You have to. We need you.”

She surrendered then to silent tears and racking sobs. He held her to him and finally had a moment to think.

Dia, who in simulator combats cut down the enemy with a cold-bloodedness that sometimes shook the other squadron members—where had she gone? Who was this doppelgänger, torn by grief, in his arms? She had to be a Dia who lived under her shield of ruthlessness, some remnant of the Dia who had been stolen as a child slave off Ryloth a dozen years before. A Dia who could know terrible guilt—self-destructive guilt.

As gently as he could, he said, “Dia, thank you.”

She didn’t respond.

He repeated his words, and finally she drew back and looked up at him, incomprehension and pain on her face. “What?”

“Thank you.”

She shook her head. “For shooting—for shooting—”

“No. For my life. If you hadn’t done what you did, I would be dead. I would have failed to convince Zsinj, and he would have killed us. I prefer to be alive, Dia. Thank you.”

He finally could see comprehension flickering around in her eyes.

Kell turned and caught her attention. “Dia. Me, too. Thank you. Without you, I’d be dead. Or in Zsinj’s tender care, worse than dead. Face and I owe our lives to you.”

She stared at him in confusion for a long moment, then collapsed again into Face’s arms. “No,” she said, and repeated it again and again as her tears flowed unchecked.

Finally she slept.

Face let Kell handle the routine tasks of getting them back to the Halmad system. They’d have to rendezvous with Cubber and—and whoever was assigned in Castin’s place—in the asteroid belt, in order to do a complete sweep of the shuttle for tracking equipment, then head on in to Hawk-bat Base.

He had just that much time to compose his report, a report in which he had to explain just why it was that two subordinates had died in his immediate vicinity in just a few days.