X-wing_ Iron Fist Part 33

"Good luck," Face said.

Valton nodded, and Face hurried back to Sungra.s.s's own tight-packed hangar bay.

The bridge of Razor~ Kiss was a riot of noise.

The s.h.i.+p's batteries had obliterated the connections between Razor's Kiss and the s.h.i.+pbuilding station, and the Super Star Destroyer was in motion.

Communications from the dying station, from Kuat, and from the main offices of the Kuat Drive Yards were demanding a response from the bridge crew.

Sensors showed launches of squadrons of starfighters from Kuat and from capital s.h.i.+ps not far away in the system, and showed those capital s.h.i.+ps maneuvering to intercept Razor's Kiss on her outbound flight. From the control console, the team's communications specialist was ordering the skeleton crew on Razor's Kiss to go to their stations and prepare for an Imperial a.s.sault.

Through all of it, Shalla sat comfortably in her chair, watching and listening to the others hurry about their duties.

The datapad at the communications console pinged, the audible cue that its current program had completed successfully.

Successfully. The program was in place.

The stormtrooper at the door turned toward her. "Did you hear that?"

"I did." She rose, staring intently beyond him, and came a few steps forward.

"What are you looking at?"

"The door, stupid. That's where the noise came from. The other side of the door."

"No, it was behind me. Toward you."

"Idiot, your helmet is fouling you up." She nodded significantly toward the door. "Something's on the other side."

He moved to the nearest security console, just three seats down from the seat where her datapad lay, and brought up its main screen. It was a holocam view of the hall just outside the main door.

"There's nothing going on out there." He turned back to the door.

Shalla quickly picked up her datapad, yanked the cable free and pocketed it, and joined him beside the door. She took a good look at the main and secondary screens, gauging which portions of the hall outside were under direct holocam observation.

"You're right. It looks clear."

"I told you."

She shook her head. ~I don't trust it. They're trying something. Let me through. I'll give it a look."

The stormtrooper thought that over, then apparently activated his comlink. "Captain, we're hearing some things at the main door, but holocams show nothing. Qatya has volunteered to act as forward reconnaissance in case there actually is some activity out there."

A moment later he said, "Captain says it's a good idea."

"Can I have a sidearm?"

"You won't need one just to report activity. Do you have a comlink?"

"Yes, but I don't have your frequency."

The stormtrooper handed her a comlink.

"Good luck."

He keyed the main door open for her. Then she was through, the door shutting behind her. And though the air was the same here, suddenly she could breathe it more easily.

She was still under holocam observation, though. She moved forward with slow, steady confidence, as though she actually were moving in on a possible enemy emplacement, until she was beyond the range of the holocams they were monitoring.

She waited there a couple of minutes, then keyed her comlink and whispered, "Qatya here."

Bradan's voice: "Report."

"There's a security detail a few meters up the corridor. They have munitions. Looks like they're rigging a shaped charge to blow the door."

"Good work. Fall back and we'll set up to repel."

"No, wait. Their demolitions team is closest to me, and not guarded.

They're not expecting an a.s.sault from this direction. I can eliminate one or two and then set off the charges they've brought. The next group they send is going to be a little put off by the mess I leave."

Moments of silence. Then: "That's authorized. The captain will put you in for a bonus if you pull this off."

"Qatya out." From the datapad she shook the four explosives Kell had rigged for her. She set two of them down on the floor against one wall.

She drew the blaster she'd taken, fired three shots into the ceiling, depressed the b.u.t.tons that would begin the explosives' ten-second countdowns, and began running.

Now it was time to find an escape pod and safely wait out the conclusion of this battle... and the one to come.

Zsinj's fleet dropped out of hypers.p.a.ce well within the Kuat system, where the gravity well of Kuat herself made hypers.p.a.ce progress impossible, and the sensor displays transmitted from Sungra.s.s's bridge showed an oncoming Super Star Destroyer and alarming numbers of starfighters from all directions.

"Launch," Face said, and roared out of the cargo bay as soon as the opening door gave minimal clearance. His tempo-rary wingman, Kell, followed in his own interceptor and the others emerged rapidly.

Emerged into a star system very different from the one they were supposed to have expected, of course. The sun was not quite the shade of Coruscant's, and the oncoming Imperial Star Destroyers were not complemented by Mon Calamari cruisers. The comm waves suddenly became crowded with shouts and infuriated questions. In character, Face keyed his comlink. "Hawk-bat Leader to Iron Fist. What is this? Where's Coruscant?"

The chuckle he received in response was a familiar one; he recognized it as Melvar's. "We never said you were going to Coruscant, Hawk-bats.

Welcome to Kuat. Please keep to your a.s.signed roles. Everything will work out very profitably."

There was a moment's delay, and the pitch of the general's voice lowered.

"Hawk-bat Leader, I regret to inform you that the insertion team reports that they have lost Qatya."

Face's gut went cold and hard. "How?"

"She single-handedly eliminated a demolitions team and was lost in the explosion. Her action has apparently prevented any further a.s.saults on the bridge. You have our condolences."

"Thank you." The tightening of Face's stomach eased but did not go away entirely. Melvar's story sounded like the kind of ploy Shalla might have used to get clear of the insertion team; on the other hand, the story might be entirely true.

And he couldn't ask, Did anyone witness her death? It would create suspicion. He could only pray. He said, "Someone is going to die for this."

All around them, cargo s.h.i.+ps and old cruisers were dis-gorging squadrons of starfighters. Some, like the Hawk-bats, were modern fighter craft in good shape. Others were older craft, kept in barely fnnctional form by their owners. Still others were fleets of Uglies, starfighters patched together from different fighter designs when there weren't enough parts available to reconstruct a normal starfighter design.

In their groups - five here, a dozen there, a score - they turned to their a.s.signed vectors and headed out toward the incoming strike forces.

"Hawk-bats, follow my lead." Face turned toward a distant Imperial Star Destroyer. He could not see its complement of TIE fighters, but his sensors showed them plainly, three full squadrons of them. That was only half a fully equipped Star Destroyer's complement; he wondered whether this vessel was underequipped, or whether it was holding squadrons in reserve.

"Anyone recognize that?"

"Leader, Five. It's Mauler. Nothing special."

Nothing special. Only an average Imperial Star Destroyer.

"That's comforting. Thanks, Five." He opened a wide transmission band.

"This is Hawk-bat Leader. Who else is heading toward Mauler?"

The voice he got in return bore the clipped accents of an upper-cla.s.s man of Coruscant. "Hawk-bat Leader, this is Vibroaxe Prime. You're the spearhead; we're the shaft."

Face's sensors did show an irregular force of between thirty and forty friendlies trailing the Hawk-bats. They were much slower and sensors couldn't lock down a consistent vehicle profile for them - probably Uglies, then.

"Want to trade places, Prime?"

"Thank you, no, Hawk-bat. I'm content for you to take first blood."

"Join us when you get bored, Vibroaxes Out."

Wedge heard the exchange between Face and Vibroaxe Prime, but kept it in the background of his conscious mind. He was still struggling with the Ewok stuffed toy that was the most visible part of his disguise.

When he sat down with the Ewok in his lap, it rode up, interfering with his vision. Now he'd managed to release the main lap strap of his pilot's harness, bring it up over the Ewok's legs, and tighten it back down again, and that seemed to have done the trick... but if it came loose during maneuvers, he could have more trouble with it.

A dozen seconds after the end of Face's exchange with Vibroaxe, the Hawkbats were moments from maximum firing range of the leading edge of the Mauler forces. Wedge heard Face cut in again: "Break by pairs, set up for Kettch's Drill, and fire at will." Sensors showed Face swooping to port, Kell staying on his wing. Tyria and Piggy drifted to starboard. Wedge eased his yoke forward; he and Dia kept the center, losing a little alt.i.tude relative to the others.

As the range-to-target indicator dropped into numbers where a hit was an outside possibility, Wedge nudged his stick back and forth, up and down, making himself as difficult a target as possible, and opened on one of the pair of TIE fighters nearest him. Sensors showed a graze off the enemy's hull, no significant damage. The enemy TIE's green laser fire flashed over Wedge's top viewport, a near miss.

An explosion ahead and to port - Face or Kell had a kill.

Wedge kept up his fire on his target, saw his own green quad-linked beams tattoo the hull again and then penetrate the forward viewport. The TIE's internal lights faded to blackness and the starfighter, now a ghost s.h.i.+p, began straight-line flight - still powered. Doubtless the pilot's dying convulsions had jammed the controls into full thrust. Then they were beyond the first wave of enemies, the first half squad.

Their enemies expected them to break and dogfight with that first wave.

But Wedge's tactic - Kettch's Drill - took them straight forward, at full speed, toward the second wave, a full squadron of TIEs. He saw on the sensor board the four survivors of the first wave curve around to get into position behind them, but their maneuver was a little slow, a little tentative, as they adjusted to the Hawk-bats doing something unexpected.

The second wave was in range. Wedge continued juking around, opened fire, saw lasers spraying from the solar wing arrays of Dia's interceptor to his starboard. Return fire streaked the starfield green all around him and he felt a shudder as one laser blast creased his hull. An unfamiliar sensation, and once again he wished devoutly for a return to his X-wing and its s.h.i.+elds.

His fire and Dia's converged on a luckless TIE fighter. The craft exploded into a ball of incandescent gas and superheated shrapnel. Their two flight paths curved around it as they plunged into the second wave and beyond.

Sensors showed the four TIEs of the first wave closing in and several starfighters of the second wave curving around to join them. He smiled.

The plan was operating perfectly so far. Yes, they had a squad and a half of fighters on their tails, but the forward momentum of Mauler's squadrons was slowing.

The Hawk-bats were doing their job. They were serving Zsinj well. Amused, he shook that thought away and returned his concentration to the third wave of enemies.

These they dove straight toward, each picking a target and maneuvering straight into that TIE's path, juking around enough to be a difficult target yet always homing in on the oncoming starfighter as if meaning to ram it. Wedge's continued fire hulled his target and he flew through the debris cloud, hearing clattering and banging against his hull as he did.

On the sensor board, he saw Dia's target veer away from her at the last second, arcing away straight into the path of a vengeful TIE from the first wave. The sensors showed the two blips merge into one, then disappear altogether.

Ahead, the fourth wave, a half squadron. Wedge saw Face lead the abandonment of Kettch's Drill, 1ooping up and back the way the Hawk-bats had come, the other Hawk-bats joining him in formation, three not-quite-full squadrons of TIEs following in vengeful pursuit.

In full TIE-fighter-pilot regalia, which she had found in a pilot's ready room adjacent to the secondary hangar bay, and carrying extra life-support units, Sha!la lurked on the walkway above the bay's pair of TIE interceptors.

She should have been safely tucked away in an escape pod by now. But with her mission accomplished, another idea had occurred to her... thus the dangerous three-kilometer trek back to the bay by which she'd arrived, thus the trail of unconscious foes along the hallways and pa.s.sages she'd chosen for her return trip.

Thus this skulking on the walkway. Beyond the magnetic-containment field she could see signs of distant battle: tiny flashes and slivers of light, their sources too far away to make out.

Stormtroopers, Kuat loyalists probably wondering what to do about the s.h.i.+p's extraordinary activities, had entered the bay mere seconds after she had and were hard at work rummaging through the intrusion team's shuttle. Others guarded the door into the bay. No matter; that wasn't the way she intended to exit. She climbed down into the left-hand interceptor, the one closest to the bulkhead and farthest from the stormtroopers.

Without belting in, she began her prelaunch checklist. It was longer than usual-this interceptor, obviously a commanding officer's personal escape vehicle, had its own hyperdrive and a more elaborate navigation computer than the standard interceptor.

All systems seemed go, though she didn't power up the engines to make sure; the resulting repulsorlift rumble would be certain to alert the stormtroopers to her presence. She stood and climbed partway out of the access hatch, hanging in place by one arm. She brought up the last of Kell's explosives, activated them, and threw them as far across the bay as she could. They clattered against the bulkhead behind the intrusion - team shuttle.

Stormtroopers perked up, swung their weapons in that direction.

"What was that? You and you, take the far side..."

Shalla dropped back into the c.o.c.kpit and dogged the hatch shut.

She was almost done strapping herself in when the explosions went off.

She saw a ball of yellow-and-orange flame on the far side of the shuttle, saw the shuttle rock, saw stormtroopers thrown through the air like dolls. Her interceptor and the one next to it rocked as well, and a great bubble of atmosphere, shoved through the magcon field by the sudden pressure within the bay, dissipated in the vacuum beyond. As the stormtroopers raced toward their fallen allies and shook their heads against the sudden deafening explosion, she brought her engines up and goosed them. On repulsorlifts, she squirted out through the magcon field and then took an abrupt vector toward the stern. She immediately brought her speed down to something just higher than a good running pace.

As she'd expected, the hull of the Razor's Kiss was littered with debris from the s.h.i.+pbuilding station. Long armatures hung swinging from attachment points, and other metal trash clung to or rolled about on the hull, trapped there by the s.h.i.+p's artificial gravity. The Super Star Destroyer was in motion, heading out-system as fast as its untried engines would take it, and distant Imperial Star Destroyers were drawing ever nearer.

She took a deep breath and tried to quiet her stomach. This improvised plan of hers was more likely to get her killed than anything else. But when she'd recognized the opportunity in front of her, she knew she had to try it.

She skimmed as close to the s.h.i.+p's hull as her flying skills would allow her, and occasionally rolled the interceptor to simulate the motion of debris.

She wouldn't look too odd on sensors. A direct observation or holocam view would reveal that she was a live TIE and not just debris. Then a single shot from a laser battery would turn her into debris. So, white-knuckled, she continued her absurdly slow flight and prayed that nothing noticed her.

19.

The Hawk-bats roared down toward the pursuing Vibroaxes with the Mauler's TIE fighters in close pursuit. The Vibroaxes, with their awkward collection of jury-rigged weaponry, opened fire at just beyond their maximum effective weapons range, and the Hawk-bats and enemy TIEs plunged into that hail of destructive energy as if bent on suicide.