38
Drysso stared down at his aide. “How many incoming torpedo tracks, Lieutenant Waroen?”
“Twenty, sir.”
Two per X-wing. Survivable. “You see, only twenty.”
“Wait, sir. I have twenty-four.”
“No matter.”
“Now I have forty, no, eighty. Eight zero.”
Drysso’s jaw dropped as he saw a nova flare blossom up over the horizon of his starboard bow. The shields held for a second or two, then collapsed. Warning sirens started shrieking on the bridge as multiple torpedo and missile hits exploded six kilometers away on the ship’s bow. The brilliant fire gnawed at the clean lines of his ship, shattering armor plates and triggering dozens of secondary and tertiary explosions.
Even before the tremors reached the bridge, Drysso started shouting orders. “Waroen, kill those sirens. Give me damage control reports. Guns, what have you lost and why haven’t you gotten me the Freedom yet?”
Waroen’s voice rose above the din. “Captain, we have full bow shield collapse.”
“How did they get that many missiles off, Lieutenant?”
“Sir, I don’t know, sir.”
“Sithspawn! Find out how!” Drysso watched as the Freedom fired down at the Super Star Destroyer. Salvos of red turbolaser bolts pulsed out from the smaller ship, savaging the Lusankya’s unprotected bow. Vaporized armor immediately condensed into metal clouds that hid the full extent of the damage done, but Drysso had no hopes that his bow would look like anything but a blackened, battered lump. Still, that damage is nothing compared to what we can do.
Over a hundred starboard ion cannons fired back at the Freedom in a display so massive it appeared as if sheets of blue energy had erupted from the Lusankya’s side. The Imperial Star Destroyer’s shields imploded, leaving azure lightning to skip and arc all over the ship’s surface. Drysso saw secondary explosions ripple through the smaller ship’s port gun decks, letting him know the Freedom had been badly hurt.
“Captain, I’ve lost fifteen percent of my starboard firepower.”
“Thank you, Guns. Lieutenant Waroen, where did those missiles come from?”
“The freighters, sir, they’re launching missiles that appear to be using the starfighter telemetry to target us.” Waroen glanced at his monitors. “Sir, I can reestablish the bow shield, but it will lower our protection elsewhere.”
“Do it, Waroen. Guns, forget the Freedom. Kill the freighters.” Drysso clasped his hands at the small of his back. “The freighters are our main threat now. Kill them, and this battle is over.”
Tycho Celchu rolled his X-wing to port, then pulled back on his stick. He cruised in on the tail of a TIE fighter and pulled the trigger. Two bursts of dual-fire lasers shot out, stabbing deep into the engine assembly. He rolled quickly to starboard and dove, clearing the exploding TIE’s blast radius.
“You still with me, Eight?”
Nawara Ven’s voice came back a little less calm than Tycho would have wanted. “With you, Seven, just barely.”
“New flight, Eight, then our second run on the Lusankya. You take lead.”
“As ordered, Seven.”
Tycho throttled back a bit to let Nawara Ven pass him, then he sideslipped to the left and took up a position in Nawara’s port aft arc. Coming back off the first run on the Super Star Destroyer, the X-wings had boiled into the fourth TIE flight. Between them and the Twi’lek Chir’daki, the TIEs never had a chance. As they closed on the fifth flight, it lost unit cohesion as four of the pilots pulled away and headed back toward the incoming Interceptors.
“Only eight out there, Nawara. Choose your target carefully.”
“Got one in mind, Seven.” Nawara’s X-wing remained straight and level as it raced in toward the TIEs.
Tycho began to wince. Head-to-head is usually a winner for us, but it burns some shields. In this environment, I’m not so sure that’s wise.
Nawara’s X-wing snap-rolled up onto the starboard stabilizer foils, then fired four dual bursts of lasers at its target. The first two missed wide, as did the TIE’s return fire, but the last two hit the TIE dead on. Two of the bolts sheered the starboard solar panel in half while the other two peeled back the flesh of the cockpit. The TIE started a crazy tumble through space, and suddenly Tycho found himself through the line of TIEs and clear to run on the Lusankya.
“Lead, Seven and Eight are going in.”
“I copy, Seven.”
Tycho rolled left to give Nawara more room, then put his ship into a weave. Coming in at the Lusankya from the front, he dropped his aiming reticle on the blackened portion of the ship’s bow. Guttering flames indicated places where the ship was leaking atmosphere. Tycho picked a particularly bright torch as his aim point. He shifted over to missiles and immediately got a keening target lock tone from his astromech. Seconds later he got a red light from his telemetry transponder.
“Double-lock for Seven. Two away.” He pulled the trigger, sending two proton torpedoes streaking on jets of blue flame at the Lusankya. From all around the larger ship other blue lights suddenly ignited and began to cruise in toward the point Tycho had targeted.
From the very beginning of their operations, Wedge and Tycho had agreed that the only way they could defeat the Lusankya was to overwhelm it with proton torpedoes and concussion missiles. The problem they had was that to do the job correctly they would require twelve or more X-wing squadrons—squadrons they didn’t have. Taking a lesson from the conquest of Coruscant, they decided that freighters equipped with launchers and missiles would give them the launching platforms they needed. By slaving the freighters’ missiles to the X-wing telemetry, they eliminated the need for target acquisition sensors on the freighters—the use of which would have immediately designated the freighters as targets for the Lusankya.
To prevent anyone from figuring out their strategy, Wedge had Booster buy launchers, munitions, and sensor units from Talon Karrde. Reluctant to buy something and not use it, Booster hooked the sensors up to the station, noting that just lighting them up would be enough to make even the Lusankya think twice about engaging the station. As their plans evolved, Booster agreed to stay behind and make the Lusankya think it had been trapped while the Rogues left the system, rendezvoused with Sair Yonka’s Freedom, and rode the rest of the way in relative comfort to Thyferra. The freighters moved on in to set up the ambush while the Freedom waited at the fringes of the system for the arrival of the Lusankya.
Tycho’s missiles exploded against the ship’s shields, but they buckled quickly enough as the rest of the missiles locked into his telemetry hit the ship. Nawara’s shots likewise raced in, sowing explosions over the ship’s surface. Other Rogues continued the assault on the ship’s starboard gun decks, destroying turbolasers, ion cannons, and concussion missile launchers. If we can kill Lusankya’s ability to strike from one side, our ships can operate with impunity.
Toward the other end of the Super Star Destroyer, Tycho saw the Alderaanian War Cruiser Valiant pour fire into the ship. The Lusankya’s tail guns exchanged shots with the Valiant, but Aril Nunb’s droid crew managed to maneuver the smaller ship so shots impacted against shields that were still strong. The Super Star Destroyer’s aft shields appeared to be holding, but the Valiant’s constant battery had to be draining energy that could have been used elsewhere to great effect.
Rolling to port and diving, Tycho sailed his fighter beneath some return fire and noticed the Lusankya had begun to strike out at the freighters. They presented a diverse choice of targets and began to scatter as the big ship turned its guns on them. Evasive maneuvers, as per orders, but that’s going to make missile launching tougher. He glanced at his monitor. Only two missiles left anyway, enough for one more run.
He checked the location of the Interceptor squadron, but saw it had not closed as quickly as anticipated. “Lead, Seven is set for one more run.”
“Negative, Seven. The squints have picked up a lamb and are running it clear of here. You and Nine, with your wings, are to pursue.”
Tycho’s astromech flashed a quick scan of the shuttle onto his monitor. “Shuttle is positive for one lifeform. You think that’s Isard?”
“Like as not. She’s not getting away. Go, Tycho, go.”
“I copy, Jesfa.” Iella crouched and quickly ducked her head around the corner. She jerked her head back and rolled away as three blaster bolts gouged a divot out of the ferrocrete wall. That was closer than I have any interest in getting in the future.
Iella keyed her comlink. “Your report was dead on, Jesfa. Keep telling me what holocams he’s killing and we’ll get to him.”
Elscol came running up and dropped to one knee at Iella’s side. “What have you got?”
Iella jerked a thumb at the corridor. “Trapped rat, it appears. Your people secured the stairwells?”
“Yeah. He’s trapped here on the fifth level.” Elscol gave Iella a half-smile. “You want us to evacuate innocents, or do we just track this guy down?”
“Let’s get him.”
Elscol waved a team of two men and two Vratix forward. “We have a live one. Be careful.”
Two of Elscol’s people took up positions at the mouth of the corridor. Their efforts to look down it produced no fire, so they gave the all-clear signal. The two Vratix then rushed forward to flank the only door in that hallway and then checked it. They indicated it was locked. Elscol and Iella went running down the hall to its end and crouched there, preparing to glance down either branch after their quarry.
Iella pressed her back against the corridor’s left wall. She started to nod to Elscol, inviting her to check her end of the corridor first, but she saw movement back the way she had come. The duraplast door exploded out into the hallway as blasterfire chewed it in half. Two bolts caught the Vratix on the right side of the door in the abdomen, spinning him further into the corridor. As the fire swung back through the doorway the second Vratix took a pair of shots to the thorax, dropping him to the floor with his sextet of limbs twitching.
The two men at the far end of the corridor came running up and rushed the doorway before Iella or Elscol could call them off. The second man in straightened up abruptly, then flew back into the corridor all loose-limbed and burning from a trio of shots to the chest.
Of the first man Iella only saw booted feet that jerked twice, then lay still.
“Jesfa, get me a six-man team up here now.” Iella looked over at Elscol. “We wait, right?”
“For that guy to escape? If he got in that room, he knows override codes. He could have a secret turbolift in there and be on his way out.”
“I doubt it.” Iella keyed her comlink again. “Jesfa, have them bring concussion grenades.”
Smoke drifted out of the doorway, then a blaster carbine came sailing out of it and clattered to the floor in the midst of the dead commandos. “I give up.”
Iella and Elscol exchanged glances, then Iella snapped a command. “Come out with your hands in the air.”
“Do I recognize that voice?”
Iella’s jaw dropped open. Fliry Vorru? She slowly smiled. “Vorru? I’m expecting those hands raised.”
The small white-haired man appeared in the doorway and gingerly stepped between the legs lying therein. “Ah, Iella Wessiri. Someone I can trust to do the right thing.”
Elscol stood and leveled her blaster carbine at the man. “You want the right thing? I have justice in a clip right here for you, murderer.”
Iella reached up and laid a hand on Elscol’s carbine. “You can’t. He’s surrendered.”
“Surrendered? He just burned down four people.”
“More crimes for him to be tried for.”
“Exactly.” Vorru smiled rather smugly. “I’m sure the people of Thyferra will want to try me, if the New Republic will let them.”
Iella frowned as she stood. “Oh, once the New Republic is through with you, the Thyferrans will have their chance.”
“I hope you’re right, Iella, because I know the Thyferran people have a strong sense of justice.” Vorru’s hands slipped down to the level of his shoulders. “Of course, since I know which of the New Republic officials have been hoarding bacta and I know the backdoor deals made by member states to get bacta, well, I suspect this is information they won’t want to have come to light.”
Iella laughed. “You think you’re not going to pay for your crimes because you’ll make some political deal?”
“Alas, Iella, that is the reality of the situation.”
Iella sharpened her laugh and her expression. “You’re assuming, of course, that I don’t have my own brand of justice in mind. I wanted Isard because she killed my husband. If I can’t have her, you’ll do.” She raised her carbine and pointed it at his head. “One shot and a lot of crime files are closed.”
Vorru brought his hands together and applauded her. “Nice bluff, but I’ve read the Imperial and Corellian files on you, my dear. You could never shoot me.”
“True.” Iella lowered her blaster. “But she can.”
Elscol’s single shot caught Vorru in the throat. It pitched him against the doorjamb, from which he rebounded and fell on top of his blaster.
“Nice shooting.”
Elscol looked down at her blaster. “I don’t remember setting this weapon on stun.”
Iella smiled. “I do, when I stopped you from shooting him the first time.”
Elscol frowned. “Why only stun him? Why the charade?”
“Vorru always likes being in control. He was expecting you to burn him down—it would have been his victory because you would have killed a man who had surrendered, and that would make you as much of a murderer as he is. Once he realized I was out here, he decided to play another game. He was in control until the last second, when I let you shoot him.”
The other woman nodded, then snapped her carbine’s selector lever off stun. “What he said, though, about paying for his crimes is probably true. The New Republic will make a deal with him.”
“Sure, if they get a chance.” Elscol smiled. “The Rogues pulled him off Kessel. We can always dump him back there. No deals, only justice.”
Elscol laughed aloud. “You know, you keep this up and you might convince me there’s more to do with unreconstructed Imperials than kill them.”
“Let’s work on it, Elscol, but only after Thyferra is free.”