medical care but Gavin forced him to go. Net result, we're at two-thirds
strength, but only if we can find X-wings to replace the ones we lost. If not,
we're below fifty percent."
The infantry officer looked around the crowded, above-ground pavilion, then
leaned forward and lowered his voice. "This mission was vape-bait from before
Kre'fey ordered the Y-wings home."
"No kidding." The pilot glowered at the mug. "About a second before the cannons
took the Modaran apart I realized that just because the cannons hadn't shot
didn't mean they couldn't shoot."
"That occurred to all of us, I think, except for General Kre'fey. He was blind
to that possibility." Page shook his head. "We all knew he wanted Blackmoon so
the Council would give him command of the Coruscant invasion. In three weeks
the planet's orbit takes it through an annual meteor shower. I wanted to use
that as cover to bring my
commandos in to do a ground recon of the base, we would have taken the ion
cannons down."
"That makes sense. Why didn't he approve it?"
"The world's only moonthe Blackmoon that gave the system its codenamewould be
in our entry and exit vector. It would act as a natural Interdictor cruiser,
which could make things a lot more dangerous."
Corran shrugged. "The ion cannons made things dangerous enough, thanks."
"No kidding." Page smiled. "We would have taken them down. And we would have
found the base for those squint squadrons that came in late to the fight."
"The Bothans didn't even know they were there."
The infantryman winced. "And they should have. They're very good at worming
their way into Imperial networks."
"So this time they failed." Corran hesitated as an idea occurred to him. "Or
records of those forces aren't part of the official garrison."
Page frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Working with CorSec I was involved in a sweep of a smuggler's headquarters. She
was very sharp and had always distanced herself from glitterstim stores, so we
couldn't pin anything on her. This one time, though, we found a couple of kilos
of glitterstim in a warehouse she owned. She said she knew nothing about it and
accused us of planting it. Turned out that she didn't know anything about it.
The glitterstim had been skimmed from shipments by one of her aides and hidden
there until he could find a way to move it himself."
"You're saying the Empire doesn't know those Interceptors were there?"
"A squadron is a rounding error for Imperial
bookkeepers." Corran leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. "And the
Bothans didn't know about whatever power source was used to boost the shields
back up after we took them down. Whoever is in charge of wherever Blackmoon is
might be running some operation his Imperial masters know nothing about."
Page nodded slowly. "The data on the covert operation is kept away from the
Imperials, so the Bothans had no way of discovering it."
"Not without being on the ground."
"We had intel on the vislight from the galaxy, but we got jumped by the IR and
UV." Page rapped his knuckles on the plasteel tabletop. "If we'd been given
proper background on Blackmoon, we might have been able to guess at the kind of
information we really needed."
"I understand the need for operational securitybut you can bet now the true
location of Blackmoon won't be declassified until we're all dead and gone."
Page nodded. "Still, the simulations of an assault are only as good as the
databases from which they are constructed. Bad intel gets people killed."
Corran ran a hand over his face. "Well, now we have an inkling of what we don't
know about Blackmoon. At least two squint squadrons and a power generator are
hidden there somewhere hidden from us and Imp officials."
"The information in the official Imperial survey files is clearly useless."
"Right. And that means ..." The chirp of the comlink on the table cut off
Corran's comment. He picked it up and opened the channel. "Horn here."
"Emtrey here, sir."
"Something wrong with Ooryl?"
"No, sir."
"Is Erisi coming out of the bacta?"
"No, sir."
Corran frowned. "Then why did you call me?"
"Sir, Whistler asked me to inform you he has completed the calculations of the
wind currents you requested."
"Wind currents?"
"On Blackmoon, sir. He said he has found some very interesting things."
"We'll be there in a second. Horn out." Corran looked up at Page. "It may be
raising the shields after the base had been strafed, but I'm up for learning a
little more about the world we just ran from. How about you?"
"I had friends on the Modaran. I didn't like seeing them die."
"Good, let's go." Corran shot him a smile. "Maybe, just maybe we can find a way
to go back in and make the Imps pay."
Wedge wasn't certain he had heard General Salm correctly. "Did you just say it
was just as well that we failed to take Blackmoon?"
Salm nodded slowly and pointed with a glass of pale blue Abrax cognac at the
datapad on his desk. "Intelligence reports that the Imperial Star Destroyer-II
Eviscerator left the Venjagga system on a course that would have put it in at
Blackmoon within six hours after we launched our operation. Its six squadrons of
TIEs would have matched our fighters and the Eviscerator would have pounded on
the Emancipator. Chances are very good we would have lost our strike force and
Blackmoon."
The Corellian's jaw dropped. "The mission was a go with a Impstar-Deuce within
six hours of the target? How did that happen?"
"I don't know. Iceheart has been shifting some
resources around, and some Admirals move them even further to avoid her control.
It could be the Eviscerator was moved at random."
Wedge frowned. "Or Iceheart anticipated where we were likely to strike."
"Or"Salm looked at Wedge over the rim of his glass"someone told Iceheart where
we were going to be."
"Tycho was in the dark about our destination as the rest of us wereand he was
out there without any lasers or torps pulling in EV pilots."
Salm held up his open hand. "Easy, Commander, I wasn't accusing your XO. I don't
trust him, but I know he was innocent this time."
"You checked the monitor logs on him?"
"I checked the logs on everyone. There were more call-outs than I like, but
nothing inc riminating. Now I didn't know where we were going before we pulled
out, so I assume no one else did, but there are always leaks." The General set
his cognac on his desk, then walked over to the small bar in the corner of his
quarters. "Would you like a drink, Commander Antilles?"
"I'd prefer it if you'd call me Wedge."
The smaller man seemed to consider that for a moment, then he nodded. "Very
well, Wedge. A drink?"
"How old is the Abrax?"
Salm smiled. "I don't know. My aide obtained it from the black market so your
guess is as good as mine. The bottle does have Old Republic tax holograms on
it, though."
Wedge shrugged. "I'll chance it, then, thanks."
The General poured him a generous dollop of the aquamarine liquid. "P
lease, be
seated."
The General's quarters were as sparsely furnished as his own, with munition
cases and old ejec-
tion seats being about the best thing available to use as tables and chairs.
Salm's liquor cabinet had been built out of a plasteel helmet case with foam
inserts to keep glasses and two bottles safe. Wedge appropriated one of the
ejection seats and raised his glass of cognac. "Thank you for coming to our
rescue out there."
"Defender Wing pays its debts."
Glasses clinked as they touched and both men drank. The liquor's spicy vapors
opened up all of Wedge's nasal passages. He let the liquid pool on his tongue
for a moment more, then swallowed it. A warmth started in his belly and pulsed
out to ease some of the fatigue in his limbs.
The General hunched forward, cupping his glass in both hands. "I want to ask you
what you intend to put in your report about what I did out there."
Wedge made no effort to cover his surprise. "You saved my unit. I thought I
might recommend review for the Corellian Cross. Since I'm not your commanding
officer I can't put you in for it, but ..."
Salm shook his head. "That's not what I'm talking about."
"What, then?"
The man's brow furrowed. "I disobeyed a direct order to leave the system."
Wedge blinked in confusion. "If you had returned to the Mon Valle, your entire
wing would have been killed."
"We know that now, but we did not know that at the time the order was given."
Salm swirled the cognac around in his glass. "General Kre'fey and I had often
been at odds with each otheryou may have gathered that from the briefing. I
felt, when he ordered me out, that he wanted to rob me of any credit for the
operation. I started us on an outbound vector, but came in close to the
Emancipator so I
could claim its mass prevented us from making me jump to light speed. I didn't
want to leave and closing with the Star Destroyer made for a convenient excuse,
but datafeeds from the onboard computers will reveal the truth."
"And so you were in position so the Emancipator could screen you from ground
sensors and the incoming squints." Wedge shrugged. "If I'd been given that order
and thought of that trick to let me stick around, that's what I would have
done."
"I know." Salm stood and began to pace. "That's the problem, Commander Antilles
What I did is exactly what you would have done."
"It worked."
"It doesn't matter that it worked. I'm not you. My people are not your people."
Salm's face became a mask of frustration. "The only thing that keeps my people
alive out there is rigid adherence to discipline, and this discipline is
instilled through consciously constructed drills that build them into a unit.
My people lack the native talent in your squadron, but we make up for it
because we cover for one another and watch out for each other."
"As you watched out for my people."
"Yes, I did that, but only by disobeying an order from a superior officer. And
you have to write it up that way."
Wedge shook his head. "I don't want to see you taking slugs for something that
wasn't wrong."
"But that's not up to you, Wedge. You can excuse something one of your pilots
does, but only Ackbar and the High Command can forgive me for this mutiny." Salm
tossed off the last of his cognac. "So, don't give the Admiral a single byte
reporttell him what happened."
"What, and pretend I understand it?" Wedge sat back in the padded chair.
"Interceptors came out of
nowhere and the base suddenly developed more power than even the worst case
allowed. If the Eviscerator had showed up and dumped two wings' worth of
fighters into the battle, we would have lost all our ships. With the Star
Destroyer-II in the area, of course, Blackmoon won't fall."
"You're probably right, though the presence of an Impstar-Deuce is not
insurmountable." Salm splashed some more cognac into his glass. "Stripped of
their fighters, they are vulnerable to TRD."
Wedge waved away a refill and smiled. TRD was Alliance slang for Trench Run
Disease, or the tactics that had destroyed the first Death Star. The Empire had
developed Lancer-class frigates to prevent TRD from claiming any capital ships.
While attacks by snubfighters had proved relatively insignificant in hurting
Star Destroyers, TRD was something Imperial officers feared and took great
pains to avoid.
"Fine, I'll head out with my half-dozen pilots and we'll vape the Eviscerator's
TIEs so you can waltz in and give it a dose of TRD."
"It would be my pleasure, Commander, but High Command is going to want a lot of
questions asked and answered about Blackmoon before more operations are
conducted in that sector of space."
A tone sounded at the door, but before Salm could say anything, the door
retracted and Corran Horn rushed in, followed closely by an infantry Lieutenant.
"Commander, you wouldn't believe ..." The enthused smile on Corran's face died
as he saw Salm.
Both men snapped to attention. "Begging the General's pardon."
"At ease, Lieutenant Page, Lieutenant Horn." Salm clasped his own hands behind
his back. "What's the meaning of this?"
Corran's gaze darted back and forth from Wedge to Salm. "Emtrey just said
Commander Antilles was here, sir. He didn't mention these were your quarters,
sir."
Salm looked at Wedge. "Your officers barge into your quarters uninvited?"
"Not so far. Perhaps, General Salm, I need to institute some of the discipline
you were speaking about earlier." Wedge stood and gave Corran a hard stare.
"News of our compatriots in the medical unit?"
"No, sir."
Wedge could see Corran was fit to burst. "This had better be good, Mr. Horn."
"Yes, sir." Corran looked at Salm. "With the General's permission."
Salm nodded. "Proceed."
Corran's smile blossomed again. "If we want Blackmoon, we've got it."
"What?"
The junior officer nodded. "Whistler, my astromech, collected a lot of data
while we were out there and has been running it through the programs he used to
analyze smugglers' bases so CorSec knew where to hit them."
Salm's face hardened. "This is an Imperial base, not some bandit's hideout."
Page shook his head. "Begging your pardon, sir, but the droid found a lot of
parallels to smugglers' bases, and that gives us some new options. Whistler also
pinpointed Blackmoon from a star chart and is pulling up more data than we were
given in our briefings. It can fall."
Wedge shook his head. "Good work, gentlemen, but there's an Imperial Star
Destroyer Mark II we have to figure into the scenario. That changes everything."
Salm held a hand up. "Perhaps not, Commander."
"No?"
"Not entirely." Salm folded his arms. "Who knows about this information you
have?"
Horn thought for a second, then answered, "As nearly as I know, just Page, my
R2, the unit's 3PO, and me."
"I want you to confirm that. You two are hereby sworn to secrecy. If any word
about this gets out I'll have you flying solo missions against Ssi-ruuk
&n
bsp; strongholds, got it?"
"Yes, sir."
Wedge smiled. "Being a bit lenient there, aren't you, sir?"
"Perhaps I am, but I think they know I'm serious." Salm smiled confidently.
"Now let's see what you have, gentlemen. Blackmoon was picked as our best,
closest step to Coruscant yet. No reason we should abandon our quest if we don't
have to."
28
Kirtan Loor raised a hand to ward off the dust storm raised by the shuttle's
landing jets. The Sipharium settled down easily, its landing lights strobing
brightly in the Borleiasian evening. The hum of the engines filled the air,
drowning out the sound of the gangway being lowered from the belly of the ship.
The Intelligence agent smiled at General Derri-cote as the base's commander
crested the stairs to the landing platform. "Come to see me off? I'm honored."
Derricote returned the smile. "Your visit was not as onerous as you might
imagine, Agent Loor." The older man held a bottle out to him. "A memento of your
visit."
Kirtan took it. "Corellian whiskey, Whyren's Reserve, no less." He looked
closely at the cap and the holographic tax seal. "It looks genuine. Is it, or
have you prepared this so I can poison myself and eliminate a problem for you?"
Derricote opened his hands. "If you want to open it and lumguzzle, I'll join
you. It is genuine,
and quite costly, but I have connections that make it possible for me to obtain
it. It's not poisoned because it is given by way of thanking you. Had you not
come here the Rebels might have taken me by surprise. I think the result would
have been much the same as it actually turned out to be, but one can never know.
Your use of influence to transfer a squadron of TIE starfighters from the
Evis-cerator until my fighters can be replaced was also appreciated."
The General's openness surprised Kirtan. "You do not feel my being ordered back
to Imperial Center is a threat to your operation here?"
Derricote shrugged. "I am too much a realist to imagine I could keep this
operation secret forever. I trust you will use your knowledge of it to your own
gain, which means I will not be sacrificed casually. This operation, of course,
has use s. I would think that Ysanne Isard would find it more valuable than any
object lesson she could provide others by destroying it and me."
The man's eyes hardened. "Besides, if I saw you as a threat, you would have died