43

Corran Horn snapped the Headhunter up on its starboard S-foil and pulled back on the stick. He feathered the throttle back, slowing his fighter, and pulled it through a tight turn. Leveling off he triggered two blaster bursts that blazed through the air in front of a TIE starfighter. The eyeball broke off its run on Wedge’s airspeeder. The black vehicle slid into the gaping cavern marking what had once been a fifth-floor office.

Corran rolled the ship left, dropped into a dive, then came back up and over the computer center. “Hunter Lead here, anyone need help?”

Asyr’s voice came back through the comm. “I show six more interceptors vectored in on us. Estimated time of arrival, five minutes.”

“I copy, Five.” Corran glanced at his scanner and saw the group she was indicating. “See if you can pull the fight more in this direction.”

“As ordered, Lead.”

Leveling out, Corran began a slow loop to the east. All of a sudden a golden dagger of sunlight stabbed down through the night. The wedge of light focused on an ostentatious building fitted with columns and a cascade of ever broadening steps. The building grew in brilliance until it shone like a beacon. For the barest of moments it even rivaled the exalted edifice of the Imperial Palace.

Then the building began to melt.

Window casings began to smoke and glow, then the pressure from the superheated air inside the building blew them out. Pennants flying from the top of the building burst into flame. Huge iron doors went from black to orange, red, and finally white before they began to waver and collapse. Columns began to wither and the building’s sharp edges softened.

The building began to sag in on itself, then it swelled at the center. The roof rose up volcanically, then an explosion shook the building. Half-molten granite blocks split apart and sloughed to the side like rotting vegetable matter as a gout of steam shot skyward. It billowed out and thickened as it hit the layer of cooler air above it. The expanding vapor darkened precipitously, then Corran saw golden highlights illuminate it from within.

The first silvery lightning bolt slashed down at the Imperial Palace. Corran laughed aloud. “Even the elements want the Empire dead!”

He keyed his comm unit. “I hope you can hear me, Wedge. You’ve got one fantastic storm brewing out here. Keep it going.”

The image of Coruscant floating in front of Captain Uwlla Iillor on the bridge of the Corusca Rainbow began to change. Beneath the twin shields the datastream began to sketch in an angry red storm centering itself over the Palace district. Gold pinpoints marked lightning strikes and quickly became so numerous that flecks of red floated like islands in a golden sea.

Jhemiti inclined his head toward the image. “The storm appears to be fierce.”

“The worst Coruscant has seen in generations, I would imagine.” She leaned forward and studied the image through half-closed eyes. “Rogue Squadron must have caused this storm somehow. It becomes a weapon of fantastic power, but it is very difficult to direct.”

The Mon Calamari nodded. “Perhaps the Jedi Knight …”

“Can control it? I doubt the Emperor could have controlled a storm of this magnitude. This I take as a good thing because it means the Empire cannot stop it.”

The inner shield sphere flickered and went dark. Jhemiti pointed at the holographic projection. “There, the shields are coming down.”

“Perhaps.” Iillor looked at the chronometer. “We have five minutes until the fleet comes through. Begin initial power up of the gravity well projectors.”

Jhemiti’s eyes half shut. “But the shields.”

“The shields still exist.” Captain Iillor gave her First Officer a cold stare. “We’ll give Rogue Squadron time to finish their mission, but if they cannot, we will finish ours.”

Wedge came around the corner and into the computer center after getting an all-clear from Gavin. Because the construction droid had the same anti-intruder system installed on it, Mirax, Iella, and he had been able to appropriate breathing gear from it before they made the run to the center. He immediately crossed to the workstation where Winter sat while Iella and Mirax took up defensive positions near the door.

“How are things going?”

Tycho looked over at him while Winter typed furiously on her datapad. “Good and bad. The storm is fierce enough that skyhooks are detaching and moving off. Better yet, the inner shields have come down. Unfortunately, it appears their collapse has resulted in a shift of resource allocation programs within the computers. The storm is taking some power plants off-line, but others have been directed to shunt their output through previously unused conduits.”

Wedge frowned. “You’re telling me that the destruction of one layer of shields has diverted power through backup systems to reinforce the remaining shields?”

Winter nodded. “No one knew the backup system of conduits existed—no power ran through them so folks scouting for places to tap the grid never found them. In essence, this is a whole new power grid. It allocates power to essential services, of which this center is part, but it means that main shield isn’t coming down.”

This is not good. Wedge leaned with one hand on the workstation. “Can you pull a map of this grid up?”

“Not available.”

Emtrey tottled over. “If I might suggest, sir …?”

“Please do, Emtrey.”

“Lightning will travel along the easiest course from the ground to the clouds and vice versa. The new grid, and especially its substation transfer points, will leak a certain amount of power. Lightning strikes will cluster at these points, so a plot of strikes should show you where the grid is.”

Winter’s fingers played quickly over the datapad’s input surface. The globe flattened out and golden pinpoints started to dot the resulting grid map. The image became localized to the Palace district and enlarged, but the strikes still bled together into a golden network. Wedge saw dark spaces fill in on the map with each staccato thunderclap from outside.

Tycho pointed to a solid cluster that appeared to be the hub from which many gold spokes spread. “That’s likely a substation. The whole purpose of this storm was to hit and knock out power stations. This one looks invulnerable to lightning. So much for our plan.”

Wedge shook his head. “The grounding that will protect it from lightning won’t help it against missiles. Winter, can you pinpoint that substation?”

“Done.”

Tycho looked over at Wedge. “You’re going to send someone in at that target with the storm raging above it?”

“The airspeeder I came in doesn’t have missiles or I’d go.”

“Yes, but you’re a Corellian. You have no respect for how truly hopeless some tasks really are.”

“Right.”

“So you’re sending Corran.”

“Right again.” Wedge slapped Tycho on the back. “There’s no pilot I know of for certain who can outfly lightning, but I’d sooner bet on Corran than against him.”

Corran brought his fighter around on the heading Winter gave him. “You want me to fly into that?” Six kilometers distant, the lightning strikes came in sheets, not individual bolts. “It’s very ugly over there.”

“I copy, Corran, but it’s got to be done. Take heart, the target is twice the size of the conduit on Borleias.”

“Oh, you should have said that from the start.” Corran nudged the throttle forward. “On an inbound vector.”

“You have four minutes.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Corran took the fighter into a dive and tried to sink as low as he could in the duracrete chasms. The storms had already begun to kick up high winds, but the buildings tended to break them up. He did hit some nasty sheers when he flew through intersections, but the worse of them occurred at the largest intersections, giving him plenty of time to recover.

He started to come up and out of the urban maze two kilometers away from his target. Rain immediately lashed his fighter. It beat so heavily on the cockpit canopy and shook the ship enough that it wasn’t until he saw his shield indicator go from green to yellow that he realized someone was shooting at him. A glance at his aft monitor showed two Interceptors coming up on his tail.

Corran rolled and started a dive that he aborted almost immediately. Rolling again violently, he righted his craft and kicked in power to the repulsorlift drives. The drives cut in on cue and bounced his fighter up over a crumbling skywalk between buildings. With power going down, they don’t have their little lights on.

Behind him something exploded and his aft sensor indicated he only had one squint on his tail. A pair of near misses, with green bolts shooting past his starboard S-foil, told him that the Imp pilot behind him was good. Coming up on his left wing, he pulled a hard turn around the corner of a building, then rolled 180 degrees and cut back around another. The figure-eight maneuver got rid of his pursuit for the moment, so he came back around and set up to make his run on the target.

The Headhunter sliced through the air amid a cacophony of thunder and a forest of lightning bolts. Corran knew there was no way to dodge a bolt—one second it would not be there and the next it would. The lightning strikes silhouetted darkened towers, helping him steer around trouble. In that way they proved more helpful than harmful, but he knew one solid strike and his controls would fry. They will fry, fighter won’t fly, and I will die.

Turbulence in the air began to bounce him around. The stick tried to pull itself out of his grasp, but he hung on firmly. Flying through rough air he had to strike a balance between becoming rigid, which would lock things up and crash him, and being too flexible, which meant he’d lose control of the stick and the fighter would crash. He trimmed his speed and did his best to keep the fighter on target.

More green laser blasts shot past. At least the turbulence is making me tough to hit. He shoved the stick hard to the left, then rolled right and pulled back. After two seconds he rolled left again and hauled back on the stick. Leveling out right, he hit rudder and brought his nose in line with the aft of the Interceptor. His quick turns amounted to taking a long time to cover the distance the squint covered swiftly in its swoop. He ended up behind it and fired.

The blaster bolts clipped the starboard wing on the Imperial fighter. It rolled right and got out of his line of fire. Corran could have followed it and killed it, but he’d closed on his target, so he switched over to concussion missiles. He set them on single fire, rolled, and dove in on the target. He dropped the targeting box on what appeared to be the base of a massive obelisk honoring the Emperor and let fly.

The concussion missile streaked out and hit the base of the statue. It exploded, casting rock in all directions. The obelisk cast a massive shadow up over the face of the Imperial Palace, then it tottered and fell. Hitting the ground, it shattered into a thousand pieces, but Corran saw no secondary explosions. Ruined a monument, but nothing else. One more run better do the trick.

Wedge stared at the map. He’d seen Corran’s attack run and had a track of the missile going into the target, but the lights didn’t go out and the image didn’t die. “What happened? He hit it, didn’t he?”

Winter nodded. “Right on target, but not enough power. He’s cracked the outer case. Another shot or two should do it.”

Tycho shook his head. “It better just be one more shot because that’s all he’s got.”

Wedge pointed to a green Interceptor icon coming in and around toward Corran’s red Headhunter icon. “Provided he gets one more shot. Can’t you do something about that squint, Winter?”

She looked up at him. “That squint was the source of the data on the missile hit. You really want us to be blind out there?”

“No, of course not.” Wedge looked down for a moment, then clapped his hands. “You’re getting datafeeds from him? You have his identification number and internal identification, right?”

“Can’t get this data any other way. We’re inside the Imperial system, so getting that data is easy.”

“Good. I’ve got an idea. Tap into Coruscant Traffic Control and get the Taxi, Hangar, and Maintenance programs set up with his numbers.” Wedge keyed his comlink. “Corran, listen to me. Your first hit was good, but you need to pack more into the next one. Here’s the plan …”

•    •    •

Corran closed his mouth. “I copy, Wedge.” He punched a couple of buttons on his console. “Telemetry coming your way. You know, you’re always stealing my data for runs. Can I start getting Pathfinder pay?”

“Sure, I’ll add it to your back-pay file. Squint’s coming up on your tail. Get ready.”

“As ordered, sir.” Corran let a smile spread across his face. According to the boss I want you with me as tight as possible, but still loose enough that you aren’t going to burn me down. Corran unconsciously pressed his hand to his throat, but the medallion he normally wore wasn’t there. It’s with Whistler. That’ll have to count for luck for now.

Coming around on another attack vector against the target, Corran let the squint drift onto his tail. Loosening his grip on the stick ever so slightly, he let the air bounce him around a bit. Green laser bolts played out all around him. With a flick of his thumb he shunted all forward shield energy to the rear shields, then he tightened his grip and rolled ninety degrees to the left. He remained diving in at the target, but was ready to pull out at the last minute.

He spitted the hole the earlier missile had made with his targeting reticle. “Control, three, two, one!” He hit the trigger, then pulled back on the stick for all he was worth. “Missile away.”

Winter punched a button on her datapad. “Link established and flowing.”

Captain Iillor looked at Jhemiti. “Thirty seconds and counting. Bring the gravity well projectors to full power on my mark.”

Corran’s concussion missile sailed in at the target. Throughout the short flight the targeting computer built into the missile took sensor readings, compared the coordinates they supplied with those of the target, determined if it should explode or not yet, and reported the whole process back to Corran’s Headhunter. A million times a second it went through that same process, constantly updating its position relative to the target and relaying the data to the Headhunter.

Corran’s Headhunter, in turn, sent that information on to Winter’s datapad. There it remained for a nanosecond, then flowed into the Imperial computer network. It routed itself through several key systems and finally poured into Coruscant Traffic Control. The data then fed into the Taxi, Hangar, and Maintenance programming that, because of the override and emergency data flags Winter had provided, sent it back out to the Imperial Interceptor closing on the Headhunter.

The chief benefit of computers is that they can automate boring and routine jobs that need not concern a human. If an X-wing fighter needed to be moved from a landing pad to a hangar position, or on into maintenance, the R2 unit assigned to that X-wing could perform that simple task without the need to trouble the pilot. Since TIE fighters do not use R2 units, other programs had been created to supply travel routes, coordinates, and speeds to a TIE fighter so it could be moved about without a pilot.

In this case, the course supplied to the Interceptor on Corran’s tail was the course the missile was traveling. The destination was the missile’s target coordinates and the speed was as close as the fighter could manage to approximating the missile’s speed. The implementation of such programming required an override code, which had been supplied. Because of the potential problems caused if such codes were to fall into enemy hands, the pilots could override the automatic programming, provided they hit the correct console buttons in the appropriate order.

Doing that required approximately 2.5 seconds of the pilot’s undivided attention.

The Interceptor pilot’s attention was anything but undivided.

The concussion missile caromed off the edge of the breach its predecessor had opened and exploded. It blasted a hole in the shielding of the energy conduit. Shards from the conduit and its shielding sprayed the interior of the conduit, severing some cables, merely nicking others. Sparks flew and several circuits shorted out. Power died in several buildings for a second, but other lines accepted more power and the shields remained intact.

Then the Interceptor hit. While it was not traveling as fast as the concussion missile, it did mass significantly more than the projectile. It was able to build up a considerable amount of kinetic energy that it transferred to the target upon impact. In addition, the crash compacted the Interceptor’s fuel cells, compressing the fuel that subsequently detonated. The Interceptor’s crushed hull sheered through the power conduit, severing the thick bundle of cables running through it, and the explosion that followed tangled and fused lines that had never been meant to touch.

Outside Corran’s cockpit, Coruscant went black.

“Ten, nine, eight,” Captain Iillor counted down.

“Look!”

Her eye came up off the chronometer. The last shield sphere flickered.

“Seven, six, five …”

The shield sphere died.

“Kill the projectors, Lieutenant Jhemiti.” Captain Iillor looked out toward the planet sparkling like a star in the distance. “Now the battle for Coruscant begins.”