Star Wars: Welcome to the Rebellion

1

Samica Trey, until recently Lieutenant in the Imperial Navy, sat in the pilot’s seat aboard the shuttle Jugurum, staring out of the viewport at the swirling shapes and forms of hyperspace.

She had been twelve when her father had taken her and her mother on a trip to a vacation world in the Core, and it had been the first time she had seen and touched trees that actually grew free and animals that lived completely on their own, and she had walked over grass that had not been planted there for decoration, but simply grew wild. It had also been the first time that she had seen hyperspace, and neither grass nor birds nor trees had been able to surpass the amazement she’d felt during the five-hour flight through the Core. That day, young Samica had decided that she would be a pilot, and nobody, not her father, not her friends, not the men who’d almost thrown her out when she sent in her application for the Imperial Space Academy, had been able to prevent her from putting her decision into action.

She could tell that her father had been proud after all—she had graduated with honours, and instead of joining the Imperial Survey Corps, which had been her destination from the start, she was offered a posting as a TIE fighter pilot. Jonos Trey, her father, who worked as a clerk in the Department of Transport, had dragged her around posh restaurants and there had been young men at the door who had never been interested in her while she was still at school, and their interest couldn’t have sprung from her hardly fashionable shaven head. She had hated it all and been glad when she could turn her back on Imperial Centre following her one-week leave after graduation.

Now, after not quite a year, her world had shattered so completely and so suddenly she still didn’t know how it could have happened. She had betrayed the Navy, had deserted from the Empire while the Star Destroyer she had served on was under attack, had left her flight group to die under enemy fire, and she had killed her Captain. She did not have anywhere to go to, and so she had agreed to accompany Rhun van Leuken to the Alliance on the assumption that they would be slightly more lenient than the Empire would be. Maybe the fact that she had helped him and Doctor Blissex escape would induce the Rebels to believe her she was not a spy. She had considered, briefly, to hyper-jump back to some Imperial world once she knew where the Rebel base was located, but although that would have been expected of her, she could not have begun to explain to her superiors why she had killed Captain Kolaff.

The chrono on the control console indicated that they would leave hyperspace in two and a half hours. She knew she should probably try to get some sleep, but although she was more tired than she had ever been in her life, sleep wouldn’t come. Van Leuken had seen to her wounds after they had been safely in hyperspace, and they had all rid themselves of their bulky stormtrooper armour, so she now sat there in her completely torn and scorched Imperial uniform, for lack of anything else to wear.

The hatch to the passenger compartment hissed open, and Rhun let himself fall into the co-pilot’s seat. He looked hardly any better than she did, his eyes tired.

‘I’ll stay here for the rest of the trip, Lieutenant,’ he said. ‘You can go aft and get some sleep if you want.’

Samica shook her head. ‘I don’t think I can sleep. And I prefer to sit here.’ She turned to look out of the viewport again.

‘You’re in pain?’

It was a statement rather than a question. There had been a medpak in the shuttle, but they had used up all of the painkillers in it hours ago.

‘It’s not too bad, actually,’ she replied, and it hadn’t even been a lie. She guessed she was too tired to feel anything right now—or maybe too scared.

‘There’s a medical frigate at the base,’ Rhun said. ‘My guess is that they won’t ask you anything until you’re better.’

She threw him a sceptical look. ‘Oh, yes. I’d forgotten you are all philanthropists.’

Rhun sighed. ‘Listen, Lieutenant, I know they must have told you all kinds of garbage about the Rebellion, but most of it isn’t true.’

‘Like what?’

‘That we’re a bunch of disorganised smugglers who don’t know what to do with their time, that it’s our aim to bring disorder to the galaxy, that we murder innocents and civilians, that we shoot defecting Imperials and that we eat small children, among other things.’

‘You’re telling me what I want to hear.’

‘I’m telling you the truth. Tell me, Lieutenant, how many Rebels have you met in your life?’

‘More than enough.’

‘No, no. I mean met them face to face and talked to them, not on holo or something.’

She rolled her eyes. ‘Two.’

He nodded. ‘What were they like?’

She shook her head. ‘That’s something completely different.’

‘How can you know that? You just said you’d met only two. I assume that none of those two ever did anything you thought was wrong. How can you say that these two were the exception rather than the rule?’

‘I haven’t been exactly lucky with assumptions about rules and exceptions lately, van Leuken.’

‘You’re talking about Kolaff.’

‘Yes.’

‘He’s the rule.’

‘Now why should I believe you? Are you saying that all Imperial officers have personality problems somehow?’

‘What I’m saying is that Captain Kolaff impersonated everything the Empire stands for—injustice, cruelty, corruption, and lust for power. What we do—what the Alliance does—is to protect the galaxy from the Empire, so that everyone can hope to live in peace someday, not just a couple of humans on a couple of worlds in the Core.’

Samica frowned. ‘Justice. Peace. Equality. What’s that to you? What has the Empire done to you that was so terrible?’

Rhun shook his head. ‘That doesn’t matter. Many of us have suffered some kind of injustice, but some are just idealistic. The Empire is corrupt, Lieutenant, and if we can’t change it, we’ll do our best to destroy it. This war has nothing to do with the population, and if there’s a danger of harming civilians when we plan a mission, we don’t do it. We don’t blow up hospitals to make our point. That’s what terrorists do, but that’s not our way.’

Samica didn’t answer, just turning towards the viewport again, and Rhun sighed. To be honest, he hadn’t expected to be able to wipe out a lifetime of indoctrination within minutes. Still, he strongly suspected she’d come around. He could remember the way he had felt when he realised that his world had changed forever, and that he would not be going home again, but he suspected that it had been easier for him, since he’d never liked the Empire much.

He thought about the people she’d meet when they reached the base and grinned. Oh yes, she’d come around.

OoOoO

Samica saw the star lines fade to spots of light against the blackness of space again as she brought the shuttle out of hyperspace. They were in Suolriep sector, far away from any inhabited system as far as she could tell, and ahead of them, she could see a scattering of ships still too far away to identify. The shuttle’s sensors were still out of order, but she thought she saw the characteristic shape of a Nebulon-B escort frigate. The others seemed to be bulk cruisers and transports, maybe with a Carrack-class cruiser in between.

Two smaller ships came towards them, and she felt a queasiness in her stomach as she saw them. Y-wings. Moments later, her comm crackled to life, and a voice with a Corellian accent spoke.

‘Imperial shuttle, this is Gold Leader. You are entering Alliance space. We have a laser lock on you. Do not attempt to offer resistance or you will be destroyed.’

Rhun hit the comm key. ‘’Morning, Gold Leader. This is Agent Rhun van Leuken, Alliance IntelOps, from Operation Pickup. The operation was a success. Sorry if we gave you a scare. But there was no other transport available.’

There was a pause, then the pilot’s voice came in again. ‘We’ll have to confirm that, Agent van Leuken. Please stand by.’

‘While we’re at it, could we dock with Redemption? We’ve got two wounded, Commander.’

‘I’ll check.’ The two Y-wings did not leave them, in case there was something wrong, but then there came another voice, this time apparently from one of the capital ships.

‘Agent van Leuken, this is Captain Decomes. Is Sergeant Haynes with you?’

Rhun looked down briefly. ‘No, sir,’ he said, subdued. ‘He’s not with us anymore. But we’ve got Doctor Blissex.’

‘Who’s we, Agent?’

Rhun threw Samica a reassuring look. ‘An officer aboard Resolve, sir. Lieutenant Trey. She helped Blissex and me to escape.’

There was a long pause on the other end, and the feeling in Samica’s stomach got worse.

Finally, the captain spoke again. ‘Very well, Agent, you have docking clearance with Redemption. And welcome back.’

‘Thanks, sir,’ Rhun replied and cut the link. ‘Don’t worry,’ he told Samica.

She took a deep, steadying breath and nodded, preparing for the docking manoeuvre, wondering why there was no hangar in the frigate where she could land more conveniently. When she got closer to the ship, she realised that the former Imperial escort frigate had been heavily modified, and that it bore the markings of a medical ship. The hangar bay had obviously made room for more infirmary space.

Samica docked at the Nebulon-B frigate, then opened the hatch. Blissex had joined them in the front of the ship, looking slightly better after his ordeal. He patted Samica’s shoulder encouragingly. ‘You’ll be fine, Lieutenant. And thank you.’

Samica gave the old man a half-smile, but then saw the two Rebel soldiers standing outside the airlock. They were dressed in what looked like civilian trousers and shirts, but wore blast vests and helmets. Both of them had blasters, and one of them addressed her.

‘Lieutenant Trey?’

‘Yes.’

‘I am Corporal Tarrett.’ He kept his tone absolutely neutral. ‘We’ll be your guards until the commander decides that we won’t be needed anymore.’

‘I’m under arrest?’

‘No, ma’am. This is just a precaution. You’re free to go where you want as long as you stay on this ship . . . and you’ll have to accept the fact that there’ll always be a guard around somewhere when you leave your quarters.’

She saw van Leuken wink at her, and nodded. ‘Very well. I’m ready.’

‘Follow me, please, ma’am,’ the corporal said.

Another man stood at the airlock, tall and lanky in a kind of uniform with a small rank insignia plate on his chest, which displayed one black dot. He’d been watching the exchange between the Imperial lieutenant and the corporal, but now turned towards Rhun.

‘Commander Willard is ready to debrief you, Agent,’ he said, ‘after you’ve seen a medical droid.’

Rhun rolled his eyes. ‘That’s not necessary, Lieutenant Rover. I’m fine.’

Lieutenant Rover looked him up and down. ‘Yes, I can see that. The commander is absolutely adamant on this, Agent van Leuken.’

Rhun’s shoulders slumped dejectedly. ‘All right, all right, I’m going.’ Now it was Samica’s turn to smile, and she vaguely wondered if he was pulling off this little show to put her at ease.

Corporal Tarrett nodded at her, and she followed the Rebel soldier through the corridor to a small room that she recognised as a surgery. A small part of her anxiety left her. If they were going to treat her injuries, they’d probably not stand her against a wall afterwards.

OoOoO

Rhun left Commander Willard’s office two and a half hours later, in comparatively high spirits. Even though Lieutenant Trey’s role in this remained still unclear and despite the loss of Sergeant Haynes, the commander had been impressed with his performance in the mission, which had gone wrong almost from the start but still been a success where its objectives were concerned. Praise from the detached Suolriep Sector HQ commander was as rare as rain on Tattooine, and it felt even better because Rhun knew how much he’d earned it.

Haynes’ death still hurt. He hadn’t known the Sarge for all that long, but it had been more than a year, in which the old agent had been his teacher in most things that were concerned with operations and practical training. He’d liked the old man a great deal, and he still reproached himself for his failure to save him.

Now, however, he was going to see the other old man whom he liked a great deal. Dyson was not in his room, where he’d spent the past weeks recovering from a tropical fever, so Rhun went to look for him in the recreation room aboard Redemption. There were not many patients here at the moment; Suolriep hadn’t seen much action for a while. The large common room was occupied by a few patients and two medics. There was a man standing at the viewport along one bulkhead, who had been looking out into space, but turned at the sound of the door opening, and grinned broadly as he saw Rhun, slightly surprising the young man by giving him a rib-cracking bear hug.

Captain Grant Dyson was a tall man approaching fifty, with thinning hair that had once been blond but was now greying. He was also developing the beginnings of a paunch, but that added to his overall image of the fun-loving businessman in the Corellian tradition. He slapped Rhun on the shoulder and then held him at arm’s length to scrutinise him, and the young man laughed.

‘Don’t say I’ve grown,’ he said. ‘I’m fairly sure I haven’t.’

Dyson shook his head. ‘I was just worried about you, kid. After you were overdue for more than three days . . .’

‘Hey,’ Rhun said. ‘You were the one who taught me to take care of myself, remember?’

‘Must have done something right there. What about something to eat? That’s the reason I’m still on Redemption. I could have left days ago, but the food is better.’

Rhun laughed again. ‘Sure. I could use something to eat as well. First Imperial prison food and then two days on survival rations . . . Though I must say that the stuff you get in an Imp detention cell is better than what we’ve got on Liberty.’

Dyson’s face became serious again. ‘Atmos is overdue as well,’ he said. ‘He was supposed to arrive two weeks ago with new supplies.’

‘So that’s why you were waiting here,’ Rhun said softly.

‘Yes, but no sign of Bunny. I dearly hope the old pirate hasn’t gotten himself into trouble.’

‘Maybe just got delayed,’ Rhun guessed, although he knew Atmos. If anyone stuck to his flight plan, he would. ‘A lot of things can happen, and it needn’t always be the worst.’

Dyson drew a deep breath. ‘You’re right, kid. What about that plan of ours about having something to eat?’

‘Just go ahead,’ Rhun answered. ‘I could eat a bantha.’

OoOoO

Samica awoke in a small room that had a definite medical touch to it, with monitors on the walls and a button to call for assistance beside her bed. It smelled of sick bay, of disinfectants and cleaners. She was alone, although there was a thermal food container on a small table beside the bed.

She sat up carefully, and saw that she was wearing some sort of tunic and loose-fitting trousers. Her torso and leg were bandaged. Glancing around, she saw that what was left of her uniform lay on a stool by the table, with her chrono on top. Her eyes widened as she realised she had slept for almost twenty-four hours.

The plate contained something that was warm and smelled of stew. It wasn’t very exciting, but she was hungry enough to be glad about anything to eat. When she was finished, she sat back, remembering what van Leuken had told her about her not being interrogated before she was better. It seemed that he had been right. She was feeling a lot better, only an occasional sting in her chest reminding her of the wounds she’d carried from Resolve. That, however, probably meant that the close season would be over very soon.

The door opened, and a 1B medical droid wheeled in. ‘How are you feeling, ma’am?’ he asked in a gentle voice.

‘Better. Can I get up?’

The droid scanned her thoroughly, then he replied, ‘Yes, you may. But I advise you to take it easy for the time being, ma’am. You are not yet fully recovered.’

‘When are they going to interrogate me?’ Samica asked.

‘That I cannot tell you, ma’am. I am only a medical droid. Do you need anything?’

‘No, it’s all right. Is there something like a common room or a holo library or something near?’

‘Yes, ma’am. Down the corridor, to your right.’

He paused, as if he waited for something else, then left her. It hadn’t waited for a thank you, had it?

Samica waited for a while, then left the room, walking towards the common room. After a couple of steps, she heard someone fall in behind her. Well, she was used to security goons following her around. At least this one had been decent enough to introduce himself to her.

She entered the common room. It was empty except for a furry bipedal sitting in a chair and reading. It did not look up as Samica came in. There was a small collection of datacards with books—unremarkable stuff, for the most part, but Samica found an adventure novel she had once read when she was a child, which was good enough for her. There was a simulator in a corner as well, where you had to finish a racecourse on a speeder bike. Samica did not feel up to it at the moment, but made a note to have some fun on that when she was better. She’d always loved things like those. She took the reader over to a couch and began to read.

Nobody came for her that day, nor the next. Corporal Tarrett or one of his people was always with her whenever she left her room, but most of the time, she forgot they were there. She could have done all sorts of things without them even knowing, she supposed; security was rather lax here, it appeared.

After Samica had been on Redemption for three days, she saw a young human take a ride on the speeder bike simulator. There were several people in the room this time, and he had quite an audience. She noted that it was an obstacle course, like one of the illegal races that were held everywhere in the galaxy, and that he was quite good. There was applause from the little crowd of people and aliens surrounding the young man, and he was asked to give an encore, but he shook his head, grinning and a bit flushed.

Samica waited for the crowd to dissolve, then sat down on the seat, which was modelled exactly on a real speeder bike. It was not the military Aratech version she had trained on at the Academy, but the controls were close enough. She reached down to press the start button, and immediately, the screen before her sprang to life, making her believe that she was racing through a jungle course at breathtaking speed. A computer generated adversary appeared next to her, trying to get her off the track, and she veered to the side, avoiding a fallen tree trunk that had suddenly appeared in her path. Her opponent had kicked off his thrusters to fly over the obstacle, but that had cost him time; Samica was in his path before he was on her level again, and he had to break hard in order to prevent a collision. You can always tell when your opponent is computer generated, she thought with a wolfish grin as she tackled the next one in front of her. The course now opened in a wide canyon that gave her a good look at the field. She could see four riders ahead of her, one almost directly before her speeder. When she saw movement next to her from the corner of her eye, she realised that there were boulders coming down from the slopes around her. She zigzagged around the boulders, but close enough to shave milliseconds off her time. The speeder in front of her swept too wide around one of the obstacles, and she was beside him, losing him centimetre by centimetre. A large rock rolled directly towards them, and she waited for the last possible second to break. He’d chosen the safer side and veered off earlier, falling in behind her. Three to go. Ahead, she saw something blue—the canyon was filling with water. The boulders lying in the middle were still sticking out, thus providing the repulsorlift engines with some substance to work on, but you had to take the road with the most rocks, and everyone tried to take the same track. Samica saw one come too far off the track and hit the water when the repulsors collapsed. Two to go. The opponent ahead of her let himself fall back now, trying to take her out by force rather than betting on his own speed. When he was directly in front of her speeder, he braked hard, but she’d expected him to and cut to the left, where another path of boulders took her over the water, although this one was slightly longer. He kicked off again, but she could see that the water section was almost over. Wait until we get to dry land, buddy. She didn’t have to wait long. The canyon closed in around them, forming a long, narrow, dimly lit cave, where it was virtually impossible to draw up next to one another. Still, this was the kind of flying she liked: saving time by taking the bends slightly tighter than the others, relying on her TIE fighter pilot reflexes to warn her off course changes in time. When the course brightened again, the canyon opening, she could see her two opponents not further than ten metres away.

Suddenly, she felt the ground shake and saw that they were heading towards a stampeding herd of some animals that looked like a cross between a bantha and a nerf. They didn’t leave out a thing, did they? Still, this was fun, more so than anything she had done for weeks. She leaned over to sweep around the herd, having to dodge rocks that were falling from the canyon walls, loosened by the thundering hooves of the panicked animals below. The speeder that was currently in first place suddenly lurched after its driver had tried to get too high. Repulsors didn’t work too well on animal backs. The speeder rolled, then went down and was trodden underfoot. There was only one speeder bike remaining, and they were entering the home stretch. The last obstacles were poles extending out of the ground and retracting again in irregular intervals. She decided to take the straight way forward, several times breaking barely in time to avoid the poles. Her opponent did the same, but he was obviously designed to know the track, and Samica could not catch up on him. They retained that constellation to the finish line, and she sat back, breathing hard, when her score scrolled over the screen. The bonus points for finishing second had propelled her to rank number two in the computer’s reckoning.

She became aware of applause around her, and turned. There were half a dozen humans and aliens standing by the speeder bike simulator, all cheering.

‘Hey, that was excellent! But you’re a pilot, certainly, aren’t you?’ a man asked.

She was surprised that he would automatically assume she was a pilot, but then she remembered that one of the Y-wing pilots that had attacked Resolve had also been female. Maybe female pilots were not as rare here as in the Empire.

‘Ah—yes,’ she replied.

‘Thought so. Not Gold Squadron, are you?’

‘No.’ She didn’t know what to say, she could hardly tell him it had been Alpha.

They seemed to realise she was not very inclined to talk, and with some more backslapping, left her alone.

Samica sat down on the couch again, then saw two young women come over to her, both her age or a bit older. One had brown hair much like her own, but she wore it in a long ponytail. The other had long blond curls and was stunningly beautiful, but she looked no less friendly. In fact, she reminded Samica a bit of her school friend Tass. The two of them had always been an unlikely pair—outgoing, pretty Tass who was the object of every boy’s desire in their grade, and reserved, silent Samica who couldn’t even be persuaded to wear make-up.

‘Have you been practising with that thing when nobody was looking, or was that really your first time?’ the brown-haired woman asked. ‘You don’t mind us joining you, do you?’

‘No, that’s fine,’ Samica replied, and the two sat down.

‘I’m Mandy,’ the blonde said, ‘and this is Cora. That was quite good, you know. Hey, the guy who was on the machine before you has been training for weeks to get that far!’

Samica smiled slightly. ‘No, that was the first time. I’m Samica.—But you can call me Sam,’ she added. It seemed natural.

‘You’re new, aren’t you?’ Cora asked. ‘I haven’t seen you on the base before.’

Samica hesitated. ‘Yes.’

‘Well, it’s not too difficult to find one’s way around here,’ Cora said, apparently not noticing Samica’s hesitation. ‘You’ve been injured?’

‘It’s much better than a couple of days ago. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have tried this.’ She nodded over to the speeder bike with a grin.

Mandy leaned forward, legs crossed. ‘Okay, Sam, where are you from? You’ve got a funny accent. Core?’

‘Yes . . .’

‘Right, don’t say. Let me guess. Not Alderaan, is it? It’s . . . Ralltiir, right?’

‘Close,’ Samica replied. ‘It’s Imperial Centre.’

Cora raised her eyebrows. ‘We don’t have many of those,’ she said. ‘But don’t worry, you’ll get rid of that accent of yours before you know it.’

Samica shook her head, smiling. ‘You work on Redemption?’ she asked.

‘Yes, although Mandy practises her sport everywhere, right, girl?’

Mandy elbowed her in the side. ‘Says the one whose last date with the food processor was two months ago,’ she countered.

‘That was the cook, dummy, not the food processor.’

‘Even less interesting. Cora, I keep telling you, you sell yourself way too short . . .’

Samica laughed, feeling reminded almost eerily of Tass. She hadn’t been aware of how much she’d missed her friend, a woman to talk to and to be silly with from time to time. She allowed herself to relax as they talked about inconsequential things, told anecdotes and made small talk, but Samica noted they didn’t talk about anything that had to do with the Rebellion or the Empire, and she wondered vaguely whether the two had known who she was before they joined her. Oddly enough, though, Samica didn’t mind. It was good to talk to somebody, and it was good to just be Sam, not an officer, not an Imperial, not a defector, not a pilot for a while. Just Sam.

OoOoO

That night, there was a knock on Samica’s door. Van Leuken didn’t even wait for her to answer it but came in immediately. He looked well again, apart from a few bruises still visible on his face and hands, but they did not seem to worry him.

‘How’re you?’ he asked.

She nodded. ‘Fine. What about your shoulder?’

He looked a bit puzzled at first. ‘Oh, that. Not as bad as the medical droid that treated it.’

‘You know, I’ve been wondering about that,’ Samica said. ‘Now that you say it . . . Your droids are very . . .’ She searched for the right way to put it. ‘They can be as annoying as humans. I mean, do they get memory wipes at all?’

‘How would you like to get a memory wipe?’ Rhun countered.

‘I’m not a droid.’

Rhun shrugged. ‘No, but there are many in the Alliance who see droids as something like people. I’ve even heard about friendships between droids and animates. They consider it a good thing if a droid develops a personality, and they would never wipe its memory.’

Samica shook her head. ‘Sorry, but that’s beyond me.’

‘Well, my best friend is not a droid either.’ Rhun looked around the small room. ‘Have you been out?’

‘Yes.’ She grinned. ‘I’ve been taking some sim time with a speeder bike.’

‘The one in the common room? Was it good?’

‘I made some friends with my performance. There . . . there are quite a few female pilots in the Alliance, aren’t there?’

Rhun carefully hid a smile. ‘Yes, you could say that. It’s still more males than females, but if you’re good, you’re in. That’s the way it works here.’

‘Males?’ Samica echoed, frowning. ‘Are you saying you’ve got . . . aliens as well? Wookiees and stuff?’

‘Well, first, we prefer the term "nonhuman", since it’s slightly less discriminating. Second, a Wookiee wouldn’t fit into a fighter cockpit anyway. Third, I’d rather not talk about a Wookiee as "stuff"—you never know if there’s one listening. And last, like I said, if you’re good, you’re in, no matter if you are a human male or a Rodian female. You know what, Lieutenant? That’s the reason why the Empire can’t win.’

She shook her head. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘About seven percent of the known galaxy’s inhabitants are human. I’m talking about intelligent life here. There are a lot of species that I personally consider smarter than us, like the Calamaris or Ithorians, but that doesn’t matter. The human race is made up by about 51 percent male and 49 percent female. Now, if you follow this through, not quite four percent of all the people in the galaxy stand a chance of being reasonably happy within the Empire. Don’t you think that’s a wee bit too little for one nation to build their ideology on?’

Samica tried to find a point against his, but she couldn’t find the fault in his reasoning. ‘But the Old Republic failed because power was divided between too many. It could just not be governed anymore. One nation has to take the responsibility.’

‘Responsibility? Lieutenant, the Emperor doesn’t give a damn about most beings under his rule. A republic works when everybody takes responsibility. The Old Republic got corrupted at the end, and that’s why Palpatine could take control in the first place.’

‘I’ve heard a different version,’ Samica said, feeling cornered, and he backed off.

‘I know. And I don’t expect you to go ahead and believe everything I say. All I’m asking is that you think about it.’

She sighed. ‘All right. I’ll think about it.’

2

Samica was reading a book in her room the following day when there was another knock on the door.

‘Come,’ she said, for once not expecting anything important.

The door opened, and Corporal Tarrett entered, with another Rebel trooper behind him, and Samica felt her stomach do a slow, queasy roll.

‘Lieutenant Trey? Commander Willard is awaiting you. Would you please follow me?’

Samica nodded and stood slowly. She suddenly wished she had something different to wear than her sick bay clothes, but that could not be helped now.

Tarrett led her through the medical frigate to a door near the ship’s bridge. The lieutenant who had met them at the shuttle—his name had been Rover, she remembered—stood before it, and made room for them as they entered.

The office was tiny, cramped, and in a chaos. Stacks of data discs piled on the desk, and a man looked up from behind them as the door opened. Samica had never thought about how a Rebel officer should look like, but she was still mildly surprised not to see a pirate with a mechanic leg and an eye patch, but a small man of medium build in his sixties, with grey hair turning white, a tanned face and sad brown eyes which nonetheless looked as if they missed little. Like all military personnel she’d seen so far, he was wearing clothes that looked rather civilian, but with a rank insignia plate on his chest, this one bearing three black dots arrayed in a triangle. Samica filed away three for commander, one for lieutenant.

There was another lieutenant in the room, standing near the back, with short, spiky red hair and a broad face. Next to him was a medical droid. The dark, lanky officer who had shown her in completed the little tribunal as he entered behind her and closed the door.

Samica remained standing in front of the commander’s desk, meeting his eyes levelly.

‘Lieutenant,’ he addressed her. ‘Have a seat.’

She sat, her back ramrod straight, and waited.

Willard consulted the datapad in front of him for a while. ‘First, Lieutenant, I would like you to tell me your full name and rank.’

‘Trey, Samica, Lieutenant Junior Grade.’

‘Date and place of birth?’

‘14-VI-4160, Imperial City, Imperial Centre.’

He looked at the screen before him again. ‘Your education?’

‘Imperial Naval Academy at Prefsbelt IV, 4176-4178.’

‘And after that?’

‘TIE pilot on Garon II, eight standard months, then posting on VSD Resolve as lieutenant, two months.’

‘You were promoted to lieutenant at the age of eighteen after having served on Garon II for eight months?’

‘That is correct, sir.’

‘That is highly unusual, especially in the Empire, especially for a woman, Lieutenant.’

‘My commanding officer on Garon II did not much care about his people’s gender, sir.’

‘You’re that good?’

‘Yes, sir.’

He leaned back slightly in his chair, folding his hands on the desk in front of him, watching her closely. ‘Lieutenant Trey, there are a lot of gaps in the story as I have heard it so far. Would you fill them in?’

She began to feel uncomfortable. ‘I’ll try, sir.’

The commander leaned forward on the desk again. ‘What made you defect?’

That was the question she had been dreading, that van Leuken had asked her before, and she could still not answer it now. ‘I—don’t know, sir. It just—happened.’

‘Nothing "just happens", Lieutenant.’

‘I don’t know myself, sir. I’d tell you if I did.’

He glanced down at the datapad again. ‘What can you tell me about a Lieutenant Sören Hide?’

Samica bit her lower lip. ‘He served on Resolve as well, sir. He was executed for being a Rebel spy two weeks ago.’

‘Was he a Rebel spy?’

‘I don’t know, sir.’

‘How well did you know Hide?’

‘I only was on Resolve for two months, sir—’

He shook his head. ‘Answer my question, Lieutenant.’

She made herself calm a bit. ‘He was in my squadron, and we sometimes ate in the mess together. We spent some free time together on a handful of occasions. I—I watched as he was executed.’

‘Who executed him?’

She could not keep the anger out of her voice. ‘Captain Kolaff, sir.’

Commander Willard watched her for a few beats, and she forced herself not to back down.

‘Very well, Lieutenant Trey,’ the commander said finally. ‘That’s all I need to know from you for the time being. Would you be willing to submit yourself to a lies detector for further questioning?’

‘Do you think that’s necessary, sir?’

‘Answer my question.’

She inhaled deeply. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Would you also be willing to be subject to a truth serum?’

She returned his gaze. ‘Yes, sir.’

The commander nodded to the tall, dark lieutenant that had seen her in. ‘That will be all for the moment.’ He turned to the lieutenant. ‘Helman, would you see the lieutenant back to her quarters?’

‘Aye, sir,’ Lieutenant Rover replied, and Samica got up to follow the officer from the room. She was not sure what Commander Willard had made of her, but she supposed this could have been worse.

OoOoO

An hour later, Rhun entered Commander Willard’s temporary office aboard Redemption. The commander returned his salute absent-mindedly, brooding over a file, which Rhun suspected to be Trey’s Imperial one that Intentions had managed to procure. He hadn’t been allowed to see it, of course, but he could tell that Willard was still trying to figure it all out. Rhun had not exactly been that much of a help, since he had no proof for his assumption that she could be trusted.

The commander told him to sit down, then put down the datapad from which he had been reading. ‘Well, Agent, I have to say that I’m inclined to believe her, but what worries me is that she does not seem to know why she did what she did.’

‘I know, sir, but that doesn’t mean she wants to fool us. If she had a well made-up excuse for everything she’s done, I would worry a lot more.’

‘True.’ Willard pursed his lips. ‘But I would expect from an IntelOps agent that he can explain his judgment slightly more precisely.’

Rhun scratched his temple. ‘I’d say she’s totally confused at the moment, sir. I mean, her entire view of the world has just collapsed, and she doesn’t know what will become of her.’ He paused. ‘Speaking of which—what will become of her?’

‘I can’t say yet. If she’s serious, I’d very much like her to join us, but the way it looks now, that’s not very likely.’

‘I’m not sure, sir. I still think she might, after all, she can’t go back to the Empire after she’s killed the captain.’

Willard shook his head. ‘I don’t want her to join the Rebellion in order to take revenge, van Leuken. And I don’t think she will. Maybe we’ll have to drop her off on some neutral world, that’s not my concern. My concern is that she doesn’t return to the Empire afterwards.’

‘I can’t imagine she will, sir. I think she has been entirely honest with both of us so far—as far as she can. And I’m absolutely certain that this is not a trick the Empire is playing on us, with or without her knowledge.’

The commander eyed the young agent thoughtfully. ‘That makes sense, van Leuken, but I would still prefer less speculation and more certainties.’

‘You won’t get any certainties before you give her a chance, sir.’

‘Maybe,’ Willard answered. ‘Not yet, though.’ He heaved a sigh and massaged his eyes. ‘There is something else, Agent.’

Rhun frowned. ‘Anything wrong, sir?’

‘You’re a friend of Captain Dyson’s, aren’t you?’

‘I’ve worked for him for quite a while, yes.’ Rhun cocked his head, not sure whether he liked where this was heading.

‘I have bad news for you, Agent. I’ve just had it confirmed that Captain Atmos’ ship, the Bunny, was shot down by Imperials almost three standard weeks ago, with five fugitives aboard. There were no survivors.’

Rhun felt his throat tighten. He’d worked for Atmos as well as for Dyson, not as closely as with the Corellian, but Atmos had been the first captain to employ a sixteen-year-old who’d just run from home, and through him, he’d ended up with Dyson.

‘I—I’ll tell the Captain,’ he finally said, and Willard nodded. ‘Thanks, Agent van Leuken. I thought it might be better if he heard it from you.’ He stood, and Rhun got up as well. ‘That will be all, Agent.’

Rhun went back to the common room aboard the medical frigate. Dyson was there, looking out of the viewport again, waiting. The smile that started to spread across his face vanished as soon as he saw the younger man’s expression, and he frowned.

‘What’s happened, kid?’ he asked.

‘Atmos is dead, Cap,’ Rhun said softly.

Abruptly, Dyson turned back to the viewport, crossed his arms, and leaned his forehead against the transparisteel.

‘The Imps?’ he finally asked, hoarsely.

‘Yes,’ Rhun replied. ‘Commander Willard just told me. He thought it was better coming from me.’

‘It’s never good coming from anybody.’

Rhun did not answer, knowing there was no answer. He sat down on a seat in the bulkhead next to Dyson, hanging his head. Dyson remained standing where he was, still staring out of the viewport, as if a part of him still thought his old friend might come into view any minute. They stayed that way for a while, and Rhun was glad that the room was mercifully quiet at this time.

The silence was broken abruptly by a furious roar outside the room, followed by an anguished scream and more voices in a hurry. Rhun was on his feet immediately, running to the exit to see what was happening, and most of the people in the common room followed as well.

Outside, there was a small gathering of people, humans and nonhumans alike, all trying to restrain a Wookiee, who was doing his best to break free, and tried to get to a small, pale man in a tattered Imperial uniform that was being shielded from the Wookiee by several medics. Rhun felt his insides lurch as he saw that the man was missing an arm.

‘What’s happening here?’ he asked a medic who was watching the Wookiee being sedated by a medical droid. It was a while before the two metre tall nonhuman finally began to sway and sagged down, still trying to strike at the Imperial, who was shaking all over.

‘Our people kidnapped a freighter carrying Wookiee slaves from Kashyyyk,’ the medic explained. ‘We thought we’d done all we could to bring the pilot out without the Wookiees noticing, but this one obviously found out where we were taking him. They’ve been treated worse than animals. I can hardly fault him for trying to take the little piece of scum apart.’ He jerked his head into the direction of the Imp, who was now being carried away by medics.

Rhun followed his glance, but then he noticed Samica standing near the bulkhead. Her face was almost as pale as the Imperial’s—Odd I don’t think of her as one—and she retreated as far backwards as she could when the Wookiee was carried past her.

He went over to her through the crowd, which was dissolving fast now. She didn’t notice him until he was directly beside her, still shaken by what she had just witnessed.

‘How can you let them run loose in here?’ she asked, and he realised that she had it all wrong again. But this time, he was not going to let her stick to her Imperial point of view.

‘Well, I know it’s a risk, letting Imp prisoners walk free around the ship without handcuffs,’ he replied. ‘But you have to admit it’s much more convenient for you as well.’

Samica stared at him for a couple of seconds, then she snorted when she realised what he was talking about. ‘You know what I’m saying,’ she said sharply. ‘That . . . thing could have killed all of us!’

Rhun shook his head in frustration. ‘Have you ever wondered if he had a reason for attacking that man?’

‘Do animals need reasons for attacking? Perhaps it was hungry.’

‘That’s not an animal, Lieutenant. He can’t speak Basic, but most Wookiees understand it, even if their vocal cords aren’t designed for speaking anything but their own language.’

Samica rolled her eyes. ‘You’re trying to tell me that that thing’s as intelligent as you and me?’

Rhun scowled. ‘More intelligent than you, Lieutenant. He knows an intelligent being when he sees one. Apart from that, that Imp has kidnapped him from his wife and family, stuffed him into a freighter hold like a piece of cargo and shipped him off for work somewhere. Stars, if anyone did that with me and I got a chance of getting at him—and if I could rip off anyone’s arm—I would.’ He looked at her sharply. ‘You have killed people for less, Lieutenant.’

She started to make an angry reply, then stopped herself, her mouth clicking shut, and turned to haste back down the corridor.

‘Your little Imperial friend?’ a voice asked behind Rhun, and he turned to see Dyson, who had joined him outside the common room.

‘Hardly,’ Rhun growled, folding his arms as he watched her retreating back. ‘I may owe her my life, but she’s about as stiff-necked as they come.’

He turned to Dyson again and caught him wiping a smug grin from his face just in time. ‘And anyway, I prefer a woman I don’t mistake for a man the first time I see her,’ the young man added.

‘Oh, I’m certain you do, kid,’ Dyson replied, and Rhun scowled again. It couldn’t possibly be that obvious that his experience with women boiled down to a thirteen-year-old drug addict he’d once kissed when he was sixteen, and a Twi’lek contact in a space station bar. It was not that he hadn’t been interested, he had just always felt that he had too little time to enter a serious relationship with a woman, and something that wasn’t serious wouldn’t do. Now, however, he began to wonder if he would ever have the amount of time he wanted. Anyway, he was most definitely not interested in a former Imp who could not go to the ’fresher unless someone ordered her to.

He glanced at his chrono. ‘I have to get back to Liberty,’ he said, ending the conversation. ‘There’s a shuttle going over in half an hour.’ He glanced at the smuggler, who had sobered again, and he could tell how relieved Dyson had been that his mind had been taken from his best friend’s death for a while. ‘When are you leaving Redemption?’

‘As soon as the medics say I can. The sooner, the better.’

Rhun nodded, patting the older man’s shoulder. ‘I’ll see you then. Before you head off, preferably. I’ll be on Redemption quite often in the next few days anyway, I suppose.’

‘Take care, kid.’

‘Will do.’

OoOoO

Samica left Commander Willard’s office for the second time two days later. This time, the commander had asked her outright if she was willing to cooperate, but she hadn’t been able to tell him either yes or no. She had been surprised to find that, during the interview, neither a lies detector nor a truth serum had been used on her. Over the past few days, she had come to believe the Rebels were nowhere as bad as the Empire had made her think, where organisation was concerned, but she was still very reluctant to accept the fact that everything she’d held true in her life had been wrong. She had heard all kinds of stories from other Rebels aboard the medical frigate, mostly from people from outback worlds, where the Empire ruled far more firmly than in the Core. It was obvious that those who had told the stories had believed them, and that most listeners had believed them too, and Samica could not help but remember the things she’d seen aboard Resolve, although she also remembered Captain Fel. But the stories fit in with many things she had tried to forget for entirely too long. She could understand a man who had lost his family in an assault which the Army had led against a building in which it suspected Rebels, could understand how that man had joined the Rebellion afterwards, although neither he nor his family had never had anything to do with the Rebels. But she had also seen the other side of it, could imagine how a stormtrooper—or a pilot—could believe what his superiors told him for years, without ever suspecting he was doing anything wrong, clinging to what he or she wanted to believe. She remembered people like Caller, or Arras or Doyle, who had never suspected anything was wrong with what they did. If it hadn’t been for the Bunny, and for Hide’s execution, she would have stuck to her old and convenient views, would have left this place as soon as she could. But the past weeks could not be undone, and they had left their mark on her, whether she liked it or not.

She entered the canteen of the medical ship, although the thought of what awaited her there was enough to dispel her appetite. Whatever ethical qualms she might have, the food on Rebel ships was enough to make you rethink any notions about defecting very, very carefully.

The canteen was as crowded as always. Samica had tried, over the past week, to find out whether there was any time of day where there were less people eating there, but hadn’t succeeded. At least she hadn’t seen Corporal Tarrett since morning. She doubted Willard trusted her completely, but at least he seemed convinced that she was not going to try anything foolish.

The commander had been one of the reasons why Samica felt slightly more comfortable with the Rebels than she had thought possible days ago. She had expected either a fanatic or a softie, and had been totally surprised that Willard was neither.

She got something to eat from the food processor, then looked for a free seat somewhere. Before she found one, she spotted a familiar face in the mess—Rhun van Leuken, who waved at her across the room and motioned for her to join him. She noted that he was sitting near a table with some Wookiees, and wondered vaguely if that could have been his intention, but then went across the canteen to sit with him.

‘Hey, Lieutenant,’ he said when she took a seat. ‘You look fit enough to fly again.’

She snorted. ‘Fly what?’

He shrugged. ‘I told you we needed pilots. Just ask Commander Willard.’

Samica looked into her food for a while, then said, ‘Van Leuken . . . I’m sorry.’

‘Sorry? What for?’

‘I behaved like an idiot.’

‘Yes, you did,’ he replied cheerfully. ‘That means you’re learning.’

She looked over at the Wookiees, and noticed, amazed, that they were using cutlery, growling softly to one another, in what sounded a lot more like language than what she had heard from the Wookiee in the corridor two days ago.

‘Can you understand what they’re saying?’ she asked Rhun.

He shook his head. ‘No, but I would imagine they’re talking about their comrade, who’s under arrest.’

‘The one that attacked the Imperial pilot? It—he’s under arrest?’

Rhun shrugged, pretending he hadn’t noticed her slip of the tongue. ‘Sure. He attacked someone, and injured him, so they’ll have to determine if he’s to be accused. Maybe he won’t be, though, because of the state he was in. But he as well as the Imp will get a fair hearing.’

Samica nodded absent-mindedly, concerning herself with her dinner. It tasted of absolutely nothing.

‘Good, isn’t it?’ Rhun asked her with an evil grin.

She made a face. ‘It’s the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen.’

‘It’s the best the Alliance has to offer,’ Rhun scolded her with a hurt expression. ‘You should see the food aboard the other ships. Redemption always gets the best, so people can recover.’

Her expression was one of sheer horror. ‘You’re joking.’

‘Oh no, I’m serious. Go ask anyone you like. You won’t get anything better around here.’

Samica contemplated her dinner again. ‘And I was actually thinking about defecting,’ she said.

Rhun leaned over the table, their banter forgotten. ‘Are you serious?’ he asked.

She hesitated. ‘I don’t know . . . sometimes I think you, Commander Willard, everyone expects me to. Sometimes I think I expect me to. I know there are some things seriously wrong within the Empire, and they should be altered, but I don’t know if that justifies war.’

‘We didn’t start this war, Lieutenant,’ Rhun said softly.

‘Of course you did. On Ghorman.’

‘That’s the official version. Do you want to know what really happened on Ghorman?’

Samica took a while to answer. ‘Yes,’ she finally said.

‘There was a demonstration at the spaceport,’ Rhun told her. ‘People were demonstrating for lower taxes or something. There were quite a few dissidents there, but you couldn’t have called them Rebels. There were strikes everywhere on Ghorman, and finally, the Emperor sent someone to have a look at the situation. The people heard about it, and moved their sit-in to the landing platform of the spaceport. That was when the Imperial commander decided to set his ship down there anyway.’

Samica grimaced, but didn’t say anything.

‘That commander was not even put on trial for killing or wounding four hundred people. Instead, he was promoted. You know who I’m talking about.’

‘But we were told Grand Moff Tarkin had successfully put down an outbreak of violence,’ Samica said. Something told her this was her line, although Rhun’s version sounded more true to her than she dared to admit.

‘We’ve still got the footage,’ Rhun said. ‘We keep several holos here that were never shown on any Imperial channel. I can ask Commander Willard if you may see it. But I have to warn you; it’s not a pretty sight.’

She didn’t answer, and Rhun continued. ‘After that, the Rebel Alliance was founded. There had been several groups of Rebels before that, but now they realised they had to throw their lot in together if they wanted to change anything. They declared Rebellion—openly—and gave the Empire the chance to meet some of their demands. Instead, they were all declared outlaws—although, thus far, they hadn’t done anything—and were forced to go underground. We’re not trying to destroy the Empire, but we’ll do everything it takes to prevent things like Ghorman from repeating themselves.’

‘I hadn’t realised that you are so well organised,’ Samica said.

‘No, of course you wouldn’t. The Empire tries very hard to make us appear like a bunch of anarchists. But maybe they’ll have to rethink their strategy on this, because the Alliance is growing, and so are our opportunities. I’m certain that the more senior officers, at least some, are aware of the danger we pose, and I’m certain the Emperor is.’ He grinned. ‘So I’m not telling you anything new.’

He was, but she found that everything he said made sense. Still, there was the one thing she’d thought about time and time again for days now, the one thing for which she couldn’t find a solution.

‘You know, van Leuken, when I gave my oath to the Empire, I meant it. I may even have been idealistic. To break a word I gave freely was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done.’

‘Yes, but would you have given it if you’d known that it would force you to do things you thought wrong? Of course they won’t let you swear that you’ll kill innocents or torture people, so they lied to you. You have absolutely no obligation to keep an oath you gave to someone who wasn’t honest with you.’

‘I can’t believe Captain Fel knew what was happening elsewhere in the Empire,’ she said, almost desperate.

He shook his head sadly. ‘Lieutenant, if you reach the rank of Captain in any military, you’re bound to see a lot of things, and either you recognise something, or you choose to ignore them. No Imperial officer past the rank of Lieutenant or so can possibly be ignorant about things like Ghorman. Maybe there are some who, like you, try to convince themselves these things are not the rule. But I assure you, ignoring can get pretty tough when you’ve done it for a while and you still pride yourself on something like a conscience.’

‘Are you trying to tell me all Imperials are evil?’

‘I’m trying to tell you that Imperials—some of them, at least— have become very adept at looking away when they see something that doesn’t fit in with their point of view.’

His remark had hit so close to home that Samica drew herself up, feeling challenged. ‘I’m not very comfortable with shooting at people I might know from the Academy, van Leuken. But I doubt you’ve ever faced that problem.’

Rhun met her eyes squarely. ‘I have faced that problem, Lieutenant. My father is a stormtrooper sergeant.’

Samica averted her eyes and did not answer.

‘Don’t believe you’re the only one who has difficulty with some things,’ he went on sharply. ‘That’s what it’s all about. Stop looking away. Stop complaining. Make a difference.’

Samica bit her lip. ‘I don’t think I’m ready for this, van Leuken.’

He got up from the table. ‘Yes, and I can tell you why that is, Lieutenant. You’re a coward and a hanger-on. Just take a good look at those Wookiees. They’ve just broken free from slavery, but you’re not even trying.’ With that, he turned and left the canteen, leaving her staring after him, mouth agape.

OoOoO

Commander Willard massaged his chin and looked about the room, wondering if he’d forgotten anything. Lieutenant Riece waited patiently, shifting the boxes of datacards in his arms slightly for better balance. That was the problem about leaving your command ship temporarily, Willard thought, and he’d better get back soon. This shipping of data discs from ship to ship was highly uneconomical, but transmitting was not an option, since in the Alliance as well as the Empire, there was classified data that was not supposed to be made public. And there was an Equipment section aboard Endurance, and Stars only knew what the lunatics there would do with some of the data. Not that he didn’t find amusing some of the things they pulled from time to time, even though he would never let it show, but most of the time, the enthusiasm of Equipment personnel with new toys could be truly annoying.

‘That’s all, Jerrel,’ he told the red-haired young man. ‘I’d like you to be back at twelve hundred hours, so we can go over the report from Juruz Sector once again. And tell Lieutenant Rover to stay on Liberty tomorrow, to handle everything that might arise. I’ll be back the day after tomorrow.’

‘Aye, sir,’ Riece replied, considering an attempt to salute despite the boxes in his arms, but Willard shook his head. ‘That’s all right, Lieutenant. You can go.’

As Riece tried to elbow the button next to the door, it opened from the outside, and Willard saw the sentry standing there next to the young Imperial lieutenant. He nodded towards Riece to go, then turned to the sentry. ‘What is it, Sergeant? Lieutenant?’

‘Sir, Lieutenant Trey asks to have a word with you. I told her you were probably busy . . .’

The commander looked at the woman, then nodded. ‘Very well, Lieutenant. Come in.’ He stepped back from the door to let her enter, the sergeant following behind.

‘Thank you, sir,’ she said and took the chair he offered her.

‘Well, Lieutenant Trey,’ Willard said. ‘What have you come to see me for?’

She drew a deep breath, suddenly reminding him of a child that had rehearsed a poem and now recited it to her teacher. But her eyes were not those of a child, they were as serious as he’d ever seen them.

‘Agent van Leuken told me you needed pilots, sir. If you have a ship for me, I’ll fly.’

Commander Willard watched her for a couple of seconds, carefully hiding his surprise. He had not expected her to do this, much less so soon. Mentally, he shook his head, remembering van Leuken’s conviction he’d bring her around. Apparently, he had. And in record time, it seemed. The young man was turning out to be full of surprises.

‘What has caused this sudden change of attitude, Lieutenant?’ he asked.

‘I’ve seen that the Rebellion is not what I thought it was, sir. I’ve seen that the Empire is not what I thought it was. I’ve looked away for too long.’

Willard watched her for a few more beats, then nodded slowly. ‘Very well. You’ll understand that I can’t let you go ahead right now and let you fly with a squadron. There are a few formalities that have to be observed. And you’ll have to convince me.’

‘I will, sir.’

‘Well, then you will be transferred to Liberty, to see where we’ll put you. You have experience with starfighters?’

‘Only TIEs, sir, but also with transports, shuttles and the like.’

The commander nodded again. ‘You will soon see that Rebel pilots have to be more than pilots, but also mechanics, interstellar taxi drivers, and sometimes agents, among other things you’ll find out.’

‘I’d also like to work with van Leuken again, if the opportunity arises, sir,’ she said, and he thought she blushed just a little as she said it. Well, that was a motive, too. And perhaps a stronger one than blind idealism.

‘That opportunity might arise, Lieutenant. There’s a shuttle going over to Liberty in two hours. I suppose you don’t need much time to pack.’

‘No, sir.’ She smiled slightly.

‘I thought as much.’ He stood, and she followed suit. ‘You may go, Lieutenant.’

She nodded, and he realised that she was saluting. He returned the salute and watched her go. Someone else who is turning out to be full of surprises, he thought.

When the lieutenant and the sergeant had left, he keyed his comlink.

‘Riece,’ a voice said.

‘Willard here. Jerrel, you can tell Lieutenant Rover I’ll be back on Liberty tonight.’

‘Aye, sir.’

OoOoO

Samica returned to her small room on Redemption, looking around it for a long time. She had something to do before she went over to the command ship, something very important.

Her olive green Imperial uniform lay on the stool by the bed, and she went over to it and picked it up. Carefully, she took off the rank insignia plate from the left breast and put it in her pocket, then carried the uniform over to a garbage chute in the bulkhead, stuffing it in.

She went into the tiny refreshing unit adjacent to her room, and took out the rank insignia. Two red squares above two blue ones, her rank in the Empire, the rank she would probably have kept until she was forty. It wasn’t the fact of not being likely to be promoted that had bothered her, it was the fact of not being respected that had hurt her most. But that was over now.

Slowly, almost ceremoniously, Samica opened her hand and let the small plastisteel square fall into the ’fresher, then flushed it down.

3

Blackness.

For three days, there had been nothing else outside the viewport, not a planet, not a star that was close enough to stick out in any way among the myriads of others, not even a gas cloud, nothing at all to take his mind off his desperate situation. He wished he had gone against regulations just this once and installed an entertainment programme on his ship’s computer—a game of Quadrant, for example, even if he would have had to play against himself. As it was, all he had done for the last three days had been to calculate how long his survival rations would last, how long until the life support systems failed, how long until someone came across him by pure chance. He had begun to update his calculations every few hours, especially the ones about the survival rations. His squad mates had made jokes about the amounts of food he could eat (without notable consequences for his girth) more than once, but he had never wondered if he might ever find himself in a situation like this, where he was actually faced with the danger of starving. He’d been compelled to think about dying – being shot down, or going EV and dying of exposure—when he joined the Navy, and come to terms with the possibility that he might not survive his first tour of duty. At first, the thought of starving in a TIE fighter cockpit had seemed annoying rather than terrifying, but now, after three days in a fighter whose consumables were meant to last for two, he found himself turning to considerations like these more and more often.

He still could not believe what had happened three days ago, when a small Rebel fleet had awaited them at their hyper jump point, attacked Resolve, and destroyed the ship. He didn’t know how many pilots had survived of the Star Destroyer’s wing of TIEs, but he was certain it could not have been more than half a dozen. He’d started out with another pilot from Beta Squadron, but then his fuel had threatened to run out, and he’d been forced to stay behind forty hours ago. Instead of going on, he’d channelled all remaining energy into life support, knowing he’d hold on much longer that way.

He’d come to the conclusion his only hope was to reach Gherro, a neutral station near which Resolve had exited hyperspace, which was usually patrolled by customs craft, sometimes larger Imperial ships. But in the vastness of space, ‘near’ was an elastic term. At some point, one of the TIEs patrolling the area was bound to find him—the question was whether he would live long enough to see that happen. He was afraid to fall asleep, afraid that he might miss the station appearing on his screen at last, and he couldn’t rule out the possibility that he had passed near it when he’d finally fallen asleep ten hours ago. His hope rested on the transmitter he’d set to full power, hoping someone would pick up his signal soon.

When a red dot appeared on his rear screen, he thought at first he’d only imagined it, that his imagination was playing tricks on him, but then the dot split into four, and he identified them as TIE fighters. He suddenly realised his hands were shaking. He was safe.

‘Unidentified TIE fighter, this is HT-124. Identify yourself.’

‘This is VSD-R-168, from VSD Resolve. The ship blew up three days ago.’

‘VSD-R-168, form up with us. We’ll get you back to the station.’

Flight Officer Josh Caller heaved a heartfelt sigh of relief. ‘Thanks, HT-124.’

OoOoO

An hour later, Caller emerged from the shower aboard the Nebulon-B frigate Leveller, shaven and feeling much more alive than he had minutes ago. His knees still felt weak after three days in the cockpit, but he supposed that something to eat would take care of most of the physical discomfort he was currently feeling.

He was lucky; he was finishing the last of an extended dinner when two lieutenants approached his table in the officers’ mess to escort him to the ship’s commander.

Commander Yenko was a tall, thin, aristocratic-looking man with equally thin greying hair and pale blue eyes. He stood with his hands folded at the small of his back, alternatingly studying the young flight officer standing at attention before him and the screen of his computer beside him. Caller supposed that it held his file. There was a COMPNOR officer at Yenko’s side, with a datapad in his hand, as well as an aide in a naval lieutenant’s uniform. Finally, the commander cleared his throat.

‘Now, Officer, you seem to be about the last of the lucky ones who managed to escape from the disaster that destroyed Resolve.’ He spoke with the clipped accent of a native from Imperial Centre.

Caller chose not to answer; the commander was stating the obvious.

Yenko sat down in his chair, folding long legs and contemplating him. ‘Is there anything you can tell us about the events that led to the destruction of Resolve?’

Caller frowned. ‘No, sir.’

Yenko pursed his lips. ‘I thought you might be able to shed some light on the affair about Lieutenant Samica Trey. After all, you were her wingman.’

The young man shifted nervously. He had heard about Trey’s defection when they had already been battling against enemy Y-wings, after she had not appeared in the hangar. He still didn’t know what to make of it, and he had not thought about her for the past twenty-four hours. His stomach had been a far more secure topic.

‘I’m afraid I can’t tell you anything, sir,’ he said, slowly. ‘I heard about it, of course, but I can’t tell you why.’

‘Well, Officer, we’re currently trying to figure out whether she was responsible for the destruction of the ship.’

Caller’s eyes widened. ‘I don’t know, sir, but I wouldn’t have thought she could do such a thing.’

The commander watched him. ‘You never noticed anything out of the ordinary?’

‘No, sir. Well—I know she sometimes—’ He caught himself. What was he doing here? He was speculating wildly, and moreover, he was speculating about someone who, up until seventy-two hours ago, had been his superior officer.

‘She sometimes what, Officer?’ Yenko prompted.

Caller drew a deep breath. If she was a traitor, then he had to tell them. ‘She sometimes talked to Lieutenant Hide, who was later executed for being a Rebel spy, sir.’

The commander nodded. Apparently, this had not been new to him. ‘How did you get along with Trey, Flight Officer?’

Caller resisted the urge to shuffle his feet. ‘I don’t understand your question, sir.’

‘Of course you understand my question. Answer it.’

‘Well—I didn’t have much to do with her, apart from shifts. She—was usually rather friendly.’

Yenko and the COMP exchanged a glance. ‘I see. Thank you, Flight Officer.’ He shut off the screen. ‘You will remain on Leveller for the time being, Officer. You may spend your free time on the station if you wish. I will put in a request to StarCom that you can temporarily fly for us, before they transfer you somewhere else. Dismissed.’

Caller saluted and left the commander’s office, not happy about the prospect of staying on a frigate, which was a regress when compared to the posting on a Star Destroyer, but at least it would only be for a while.

OoOoO

The shuttle set down in the most crowded hangar Samica had ever seen. The light cruiser had not been designed with a carrier ship in mind, but the Rebels had obviously not cared; every inch of the hangar was cramped with ships, and Samica suspected that they had to follow a very strict flight plan in order to leave it at all. There was a medium sized transport waiting next to another shuttle, and in between were six Y-wings. It was the first time she saw one of those (in working order) up close, and she found she had not missed much. In addition to being ungainly-looking, they were also so battered that there were no two that looked the same. One thing they had in common, though: along the nose of each, a golden stripe had been painted in a curve running from the tip to the sides of the cockpit. There appeared to be no other starfighters here, and Samica felt a faint sense of disappointment. She’d half hoped that she might be allowed to fly an X-wing, because she recalled how easily she had shot down Y-wings, or wishbones, as they were called in derogatory Imperial pilot jargon, in simulators. She could see two pilots in the hangar, clad in bright orange flight suits. The colour seemed strange to Samica, who was used to sombre black, but then, she figured, the colour made sense. As opposed to TIE fighters, Rebel ships had ejection seats, and if you had to leave your fighter, it was virtually impossible to find you again in a black suit.

She got up as the hatch hissed open, leaving the small shuttle. She was no longer wearing the loose-fitting sick bay clothes, but had been given a Rebel pilot’s ground uniform. It consisted of a grey jacket and a matching pair of many-pocketed trousers, looking more like a mechanic’s coverall than a uniform, but Samica remembered Willard’s words about the different kinds of work pilots had to perform here, and supposed it was better that way. On her right breast, there was a small rectangular rank insignia plate displaying one blue dot for a lieutenant of Starfighter Command. She had not yet been allocated to a squadron—she was to be tested first, and she guessed that not only her skills, but also her loyalty would be examined closely. Well, she was ready.

‘Lieutenant Trey?’

Samica looked behind her and saw a short blond woman in an officer’s jacket approach, two blue dots on her rank insignia plate denoting her as a StarCom captain. She looked about ten years older than Samica, with a sturdy build and a firm handshake, she noted.

‘I’m Captain Jevarra. Commander Willard has asked me to look after you a bit until you’ve settled in . . . and to see what you can do in a cockpit.’ She eyed the taller woman. ‘I don’t suppose you have experience with X- or Y-wings?’

‘No, s— I mean, ma’am,’ Samica corrected herself hastily, which the older woman commented with a faint smile.

‘Well, then I guess we’ll have to start from scratch,’ Jevarra said. ‘I’ll see you in the simulator room at seventeen hundred. Until then, get settled in and try to find your way around. That shouldn’t be too difficult around here. The sleeping quarters, the canteen and the briefing room are all on level two, the hangar and the sim room on three.’

Samica nodded.

‘And there’s something else,’ the captain went on. ‘I don’t know about you, but most former Imps do not like to make their former employer too public. Around here, most won’t know, unless you tell them. Superior officers will probably know, but they don’t much care where their people come from, as long as they’re good. So don’t worry about that.’

‘Thank you, ma’am,’ Samica said. ‘I’m certain I’ll manage.’

Jevarra nodded. ‘Seventeen hundred then, Lieutenant.’

OoOoO

‘How are you getting on?’

Samica looked up from the table in the canteen as Rhun approached. There was only a very small officers’ mess aboard Liberty, which was frequented mostly by senior officers, so most other people ate in the enlisted canteen. Samica was more comfortable with it as well, since it was a lot more anonymous, and the food was the same everywhere anyway.

She nodded. ‘It’s getting better and better.’ Her first simulator run with a Rebel starfighter had gone so well that she had almost been as surprised as Captain Jevarra. The captain had chosen to test her in the cockpit of an X-wing first, since the controls were very similar to those of a skyhopper, a craft Samica was sufficiently familiar with, and she had been amazed at how agile the X-wing was despite its heavy armament and deflector shields. She had also found out that her experience in dogfights against X-wings (even if they had been simulated) gave her many clues as to how to handle the craft best, and likewise, she could guess at the TIE fighter pilot’s reactions and calculate their speed, which gave her a good edge. She wondered if it had ever occurred to Imperial StarCom how utterly predictable those standard manoeuvres were, and how dangerous predictability could become. One more thing she learned: she still had a long way to go if she was to shake off her ideas about standard manoeuvres. As soon as Jevarra presented her with problems that could not be solved by the book, she began to make mistakes, one of which finally got her ‘killed’, but only after hours of sim-training.

He nodded to the datapad in her hand. ‘What are you reading?’

‘On Starfighter Combat by Adar Tallon. Although they’ve been very worried about me reading anything except "young adult" stuff.’

Rhun shrugged. ‘Precautions.’

‘I know.’ She shut off the datapad and put it away. ‘Any news from you?’

He hesitated. ‘I’m working for Intentions at the moment, decrypting, encrypting, that sort of thing. Not very interesting.’

‘No new missions?’

‘You know that’s classified, Lieutenant.’

She nodded. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean to be curious. I’ve probably made a bad impression just now.’

He didn’t answer, and she wondered—not for the first time—if he had more official motives for spending his time with her than the infinite pleasure of her company. In the week she’d spent on Liberty, she’d seen him almost daily. It was not that she minded, but she would have preferred it if he could have told her he was something like her watchdog.

‘Never mind,’ Rhun murmured finally.

Stars, how he hated this. He’d come to the conclusion that he liked her, and he thoroughly disliked spying on her. He couldn’t even tell her that Willard had told him he might send them on a mission together, to make absolutely sure where her loyalties lay. It was time to start trusting her. But that was Commander Willard’s decision, not his; and as long as the commander thought she needed someone to look after her, that was his job. So far, though, neither he nor the two covert Intel agents who were watching her at all times had found anything to report, and Rhun would have been surprised if they had.

He asked her about her latest sim training sessions, about Mandy, who’d also talked to her infrequently, and about half a dozen other inconsequential things.

Soon, it would be time to talk about more consequential matters.

OoOoO

‘Officer Caller?’

Caller looked up from maintenance works on his TIE fighter, seeing the COMPNOR officer he’d already met coming towards him, and his stomach sank. He’d already told them all he knew about Lieutenant Trey—which was little more than her surname—and he’d hoped they’d finally leave him alone. For almost a week, they had, but it seemed they’d come up with yet another stupid question he’d not be able to answer. His respect for COMPNOR had never run very deep, but after this, it was down to about nothing.

He suppressed a sigh. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Commander Yenko wants to talk to you. Follow me, please.’

Caller felt his eyebrows rise. The last interviews had been held without the commander, and he couldn’t begin to imagine what was the matter now. He’d flown with the station’s TIE pilots for the past week, as well as the dozen pilots who’d survived the destruction of Resolve. Two had been from his squadron, Lieutenant Downlead and Captain Rellis, the others were from the other squadrons. Yenko had split them up, and Caller still wondered why. There had been no word yet where he would be transferred after this.

The COMP led him to Commander Yenko’s office—which Caller would have found without help, but never mind—and he felt his uneasiness increase when he saw another COMPNOR officer beside Yenko, this one wearing commander’s insignia on his white uniform.

Caller bobbed his head in a precision salute that would have done Carrida proud. ‘Flight Officer Josh Caller reporting as ordered, sir.’

Yenko returned the salute. ‘At ease, Officer. This is ISB Commander Karranek,’ he introduced the other man, and Caller felt his stomach arrive at ground level. The Imperial Security Bureau was the intelligence branch of COMPNOR, and although they were not normally considered as competent as Imperial Intelligence, they were far more visible than ImpIntel, and feared far worse. An officer, either Navy or Army, hoped never to meet an ISB official, for usually those who did met with an untimely end, either to their career or sometimes worse. He felt his heart beat in his throat as he saluted the ISB commander as well.

Karranek cleared his throat. He was a broad, heavy-set man in his fifties, with a red face and snow-white hair. He was toying with a stylus, a datapad before him.

‘Officer Caller, first of all, I want to make it clear that everything that will pass within this room is absolutely classified. None of anything we will discuss here is ever to be made public in any way. Is that clear, Officer?’

Caller moistened dry lips with his tongue. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Good. You are aware that a Lieutenant Samica Trey has defected from the Emperor’s service approximately ten standard days ago?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘We have reason to believe that she has joined the Rebels, after she was in close contact with a known Rebel agent. Another agent has recently been detected . . . on this station, Officer.’

Caller swallowed hard. He can’t be referring to me, he thought, I’ve never done anything against the Empire in my life! To his relief, the commander continued, ‘It’s a technician in one of the civilian docking bay levels of Gherro space station, by the name of Troen Marty. We have been able to intercept encrypted messages that he has been sending to his employers . . . and he has been seen talking to Imperial personnel, trying to poison their minds with his Rebel propaganda. The Rebel Alliance is spreading across the galaxy like cancer, Officer. And you could be an instrument in curing at least this station.’

Caller made no reply, but his mind was racing. He still didn’t know what exactly Karranek was talking about, and he thoroughly disliked the commander’s pompous words. At least this did not seem to be one of the occasions he’d put his foot in it.

‘We know that Marty reports to his superiors regularly, and we also know that they have tried once before to kidnap previously loyal officers from under our noses, but this time, we’ll be in the better position. Instead of arresting the man at once, you are going to act as bait for Marty, and when the Rebels send someone to investigate, we’ll either capture them or follow them to one of their hidden bases. The fact that you were the wingman of someone who now has defected to them will give us even more credibility.’

He looked at Caller measuringly, and the young man shifted uncomfortably. ‘Sir, I’ve never worked with Intel – or the ISB,’ he added hastily as he saw a shadow of dislike cross Karranek’s face. ‘I’m just a pilot, and—’

‘Do you mean to say you refuse to be of service to the Emperor in this, Flight Officer?’ the ISB commander wanted to know. He hadn’t raised his voice, but his tone made Caller’s hair stand on end.

‘No—I mean, I am doing everything I can for the Empire, sir, but I don’t think I’ll be a good choice for bait, as you said—I’ve never . . .’

Commander Yenko spoke for the first time. ‘All that will be expected of you will be to make a few derogatory remarks about the Empire in the canteen when Marty’s nearby. None of this will affect your career, you will be transferred after this, where nobody knows you. It won’t even find its way into your file, Officer.’ His tone betrayed no emotion whatsoever, and Caller wondered if the frigate commander was too happy with the ISB’s plan.

‘Sir, I really don’t think I’m the right man for what you have planned. I’m not an undercover agent, sir.’

The red-faced man bent forward. ‘You question my judgment, Flight Officer?’

‘No, sir, I mean . . .’ Caller took a deep breath to steady himself. ‘I’m not a good liar, sir. Marty may get suspicious.’

‘And I say you are going to do it, Caller. I have other means as well, which you might not be so happy about.’

Caller was torn between fear and anger now, and he noted Yenko’s expression had changed to one of disgust. Not very reassuring that the commander didn’t seem to be too powerful on his own ship when COMPNOR was present.

‘You’ve got a mother and sister back home on Yaemon, don’t you, Caller?’ Karranek continued. ‘It would be a sad thing indeed if something happened to them, wouldn’t it?’

‘That will be quite enough, sir,’ Commander Yenko murmured, with an undertone of barely contained fury in the polite words, and Karranek finally took the hint and backed off.

‘I hope I have made myself clear, Flight Officer. In case I haven’t, this is not a proposal, it’s an order you’ll obey. Declining is not an option. Is that understood?’ The pudgy commander looked at Caller as if he almost hoped that he would refuse.

‘Yes, sir,’ Caller said between his teeth.

Karranek concerned himself with his datapad and stylus once more. ‘Dismissed, Officer.’

Caller jerked a salute, face rigid, and turned to leave the office. From the corner of his eye, he saw Commander Yenko’s face, who looked as if he’d just been forced to eat bantha poodoo.

OoOoO

‘Not a starfighter mission?’

Samica stared at Rhun incredulously. ‘I don’t have much experience with intel work, van Leuken. What am I saying—I have no experience. Surely Willard must know that!’

Rhun shrugged. ‘Well, obviously he thinks you’re up to it, Lieutenant. Apart from that, I’ll be doing most of the intel stuff. You fly the transport and get us safely home again.’

Samica shut her mouth again, remembering Willard’s words about interstellar taxi drivers. If she hoped they would trust her some day, she supposed she’d better not complain. At least she wasn’t ordered to interrogate prisoners this time, which was certainly worth something.

‘But I may know what this is all about this time?’ she asked.

Rhun smiled. ‘Yes, you may. But I think the commander is going to brief us in person. And don’t worry, he’s not going to dump you in Support Services. We need pilots—starfighter pilots—too badly. My guess is he wants to see whether you can do other things besides flying.’

‘Well, my old squadron commander once told me to put in a request for transfer into Intelligence,’ Samica said. ‘But I don’t think he was serious.’

‘You didn’t seem so bad when we escaped from Resolve,’ Rhun said.

‘What does that have to do with Intel?’

‘A lot. Unlike pilots, we’re not trained to do things in the same way again and again. We don’t have a "book". Instead, we must be able to assess situations in a heartbeat, react to them without much time to think about our decisions, and be creative.’ He grinned. ‘You displayed some of that – quite a lot, actually, considering you’re an Imp pilot.’

‘Oh, thanks – if that was a compliment.’

‘You’re welcome.’

‘When do we start?’

Rhun scratched his head. ‘I’m not sure. At least, what we’ll be doing this time doesn’t have as close a time window as my last mission.’

‘What do you mean?’

Rhun snorted. ‘You don’t think Sergeant Haynes and I would have tried to get aboard a Star Destroyer if we hadn’t been absolutely desperate, do you?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t really know a lot about how you work . . . if you can choose the circumstances.’

‘Well, I don’t know how we work if we can choose the circumstances. Because that never happens. We just have to make the most of what we’re given.’

‘Have you ever tried to make the odds your own?’

Rhun smiled ruefully. ‘Welcome to the Rebellion, ma’am,’ he said.

OoOoO

Samica hadn’t realised that Commander Willard’s office on Redemption had only been a temporary one. Here, on his command ship, it looked more like a place to work in, with slightly more space and slightly less chaos. The red-haired lieutenant named Riece was present for the briefing, as well as the commander; only Rhun was late.

When he finally entered the office, out of breath and looking a bit flushed, Riece grinned, remarking, ‘You never look very eager to be on a mission, do you, Agent?’

Rhun threw him an angry look, but Willard cut off any remark he might have made in return. ‘That’s enough, Lieutenant, Agent.’ He turned towards Samica and Rhun, who’d sat down at the commander’s gesture. ‘Lieutenant Trey, I don’t doubt you’re surprised that your first mission for the Alliance is not from your special area of expertise, but I have a reason for choosing you to accompany Agent van Leuken and not one of my Intel people. You have heard of the neutral space station Gherro?’

She considered. ‘Yes, sir. I believe it was in the area Resolve was patrolling.’

‘That’s correct, Lieutenant. It is also the place where the surviving TIE pilots of Resolve have found refuge . . . on an escort frigate called Leveller.’

She wasn’t comfortable with the direction in which this was heading, but she waited.

Willard brought up a holo of the station, a disc-shaped construction orbiting the fourth planet in the Gherro system. ‘We have been informed of a possible defector among these pilots, Lieutenant. You will meet with a contact, our systems agent, on the station, who is currently working there as a technician—Agent van Leuken knows the details—and who will be able to tell you who the defector is. Next, you will contact the defector—this part will be the responsibility of the systems agent, although I want you to work with him in this, both of you—and find out whether he is serious. If he is, you will bring him back with you. You will also bring our man along. Lieutenant, how well did you know the other pilots on the Star Destroyer?’

‘Those from my own squadron, fairly well, sir, but I don’t know about the others. I do think it’s possible that someone has drawn the same conclusions from Captain Kolaff’s behaviour I have.’

‘Do you know them all from sight?’

‘From sight, yes. I’m certain.’

‘Good. You will not show yourself too openly then, Lieutenant, since the same will be true for them. If you’re in public, disguise yourself. You will be flying a YT-1300 light freighter which will be disguised as a merchant ship hauling supplies and spare parts. Have you flown one of those?’

‘No sir, but I’ll get some sim time with one, if there’s still time.’

Willard nodded, acknowledging. ‘Very good. You’ll start tomorrow at sixteen hundred hours. Agent van Leuken has all the coordinates. By the way, Agent van Leuken will be in command in this mission, despite his junior rank, apart from everything that’s immediately concerned with flying.’ He watched her reaction as he said this, but she was comfortable with the situation and could understand the measure. In her experience, Intel existed somewhere outside the normal rank system anyway.

‘Any further questions?’ the commander asked.

‘None, sir,’ Samica said, but Rhun was frowning. ‘Sir, I don’t understand why the SystemsOps agent hasn’t already evaluated the defector. I just find it odd that three people get involved in this.’

‘The agent does not have a transport available, so we have to send someone anyway. Besides, as the Talz say, eight eyes see more than four. The danger of being detected is too great for him to start investigating on his own without a chance to get away if things get too hot. That’s why you will take him back with you in the first place—he’s been there for longer than I ever intended him to, and it’s too risky to leave him on Gherro. Is your question answered, Agent?’

Rhun nodded.

‘The ship will be waiting for you in the hangar tomorrow,’ Willard continued. ‘Lieutenant Trey, you can ask Captain Jevarra if she can help you with a YT-1300 sim programme. Dismissed, then.’

Samica stood and saluted, feeling her face blush as she realised she was doing it in the Imperial way again, and hastened to copy Rhun’s touching his forehead with the fingers of his right hand.

Commander Willard did not comment on this, only returned the salute.

4

‘Troen?’

Troen Marty whirled, hasted to make sure that there was nobody around in the small workshop, and then turned to glare at the Shistavanen wolf woman who had entered behind him.

‘What’re you doing here?’ he snarled. ‘I told you not to see me again. It’s way too dangerous.’

‘It’s going to be even more dangerous,’ she answered, her voice a low growl. ‘Haven’t you noticed the whole place is swarming with stormies?’

Marty barked a laugh. ‘That’s what it’s like on a space station with an Imp frigate docking. Go back to your ship. You should have been outta here days ago.’

She shook her head vigorously, her bluish-grey fur bristling. ‘It’s different this time, Troen. We need to talk. Do you know anywhere to go where nobody can listen in?’

‘Rysta, I keep tellin’ you, we mustn’t let anyone see us together.’ There was more anxiety in the urgency in his voice now.

‘Call it a hunter’s instinct if you want, Troen, but there’s something wrong here. I’ve seen a couple of ISB people on the way to the mess. We do need to talk.’

‘All right,’ he finally said, heaving a sigh. ‘Get down to the equipment cache 14 next to hangar five, I’ll join you there in half an hour. Just don’t let anyone see you.’

Rysta showed a disconcerting mass of pointed teeth. ‘Nobody sees me if I don’t want them to. Take care.’ Then she was gone.

Marty went back to work on the astromech droid he’d been repairing, still muttering to himself. That stupid wolf woman was driving him crazy with her hunter’s instincts. She had been around far longer this time than he was comfortable with, should have been on her way back to the Alliance yesterday, at the very latest. What’s that to me? he thought, exasperated. She’d better not stick that cute little snout of hers into too many matters that are too dangerous for her. A low profile, that’s what we want here. Still, he had to admit, if only to himself, that those instincts had served her quite well most of the time—both of them, actually. She’d been running supplies—the more special supplies required by an undercover agent—to Gherro for almost two standard years, and despite his initial resolution not to have anything to do with her in order to protect both her and him, it had become more and more difficult as he got to know her better. He hadn’t dared admit to anyone, not even his superiors, that he’d fallen in love with a Shistavanen.

He wondered if she could have been right, that something was wrong. The Empire had left Gherro alone for a while, but he feared that its neutral status would not hold much longer. He had never liked the Nebulon-B frigate looming over the place like a hawk-bat ready to strike at a granite slug. He knew that the administrator would do all he could to prevent the station from being taken under Imperial control, but there was only so much you could do when trying to take on the Empire. Stars knew even the administrator had a couple of businesses going the Empire would love to learn about. He supposed the man had plans ready for the event of the station being taken by the Empire, but he’d found him very reluctant to deal with anybody, not even the Alliance. So Marty had settled for listening, and watching, and he’d heard and seen signs that the administrator was prepared for an insurrection. The stupid fool. If he’d joined forces with the Rebels, he might just have been able to succeed, but as it was, Marty doubted he would come out of this alive. He knew he did not want to be around when Gherro tried to take on an Imperial frigate.

And then there was the ever-present fear someone could have become suspicious about Marty himself. He’d been afraid of that after he had started to take on another activity besides spying—trying to sound out whether anyone on the station was sympathetic towards the Alliance. IntelOps had decided that he would leave Gherro in a couple of weeks, before anyone could get suspicious, and post him somewhere else. Marty hoped Rysta would run supplies to his new posting as well. Maybe he’d even get a desk job; after all, he was forty-seven years old, and he’d played spy for the Alliance for four years. He was getting too old for this kind of nonsense.

He laid down his hydrospanners and absent-mindedly patted the astromech on its domed head. Time to go.

OoOoO

Rhun whistled as he entered Liberty’s hangar the following day, seeing which craft they would be flying to Gherro. The YT-1300 Corellian freighter Jumper was one of the better ships of that kind, not as heavily modified as most and, consequently, far more reliable and easier to handle and maintain. She was painted white, which was also unusual for a YT, and Rhun wondered, not for the first time, if some agent on some predatory attack had liberated Star Destroyer paint and not known what to do with it, until someone thought of painting a transport with it. The paint was not all that fresh in all places, either, some parts having been exchanged over the years and repainted in a slightly different white, if they had been repainted at all. Some had been left the way they had been—grey, usually—thus giving the freighter some sort of patchwork appearance.

Samica entered the hangar behind him, and her face made it clear that she did not share his positive impression at seeing their means of transport. He noted that she, like him, was wearing civilian clothing, a pair of black trousers and a many-pocketed waistcoat over a cream-coloured turtleneck jumper. He’d never seen her out of uniform before, and found the civilian clothes looked rather favourable on her.

‘I hope that thing is more reliable than it looks,’ she remarked as she joined him at the freighter.

‘She’s one of our best,’ Rhun replied. ‘No, wait, the best exploded last week for some unknown reason, so she is the best.’ He gave her a broad grin.

Samica raised an eyebrow. ‘Reassuring,’ she murmured.

Rhun laughed. ‘I was kidding. You practised with the sim programme?’

She nodded. ‘Ready, Agent?’ she asked.

‘Here we go, Lieutenant,’ he replied.

He followed her into the cockpit, which, as in every YT-1300, was located not in the front or even the middle of the ship, but on its side. She sat down in the pilot’s seat and ran a systems check, then initiated the takeoff procedure. Rhun saw all the lamps wink green, and Samica keyed the comm.

‘Freighter Jumper. We’re ready to start.’

‘You’ve got clearance, Jumper,’ the voice of the hangar bay officer came back. ‘Good luck.’

‘Thanks, control.’

The freighter lifted on repulsors, swaying slightly. Rhun cast Samica a worried glance. ‘You sure you can fly this thing?’ he asked.

‘You can do it if you insist,’ she said, concentrating on flying the ship through the containment field without touching any of the other craft standing in the hangar. She did it slowly, much more slowly than he was used to from watching Dyson, but the old smuggler had flown his Noble Cause for about twenty standard years. He thought he heard her murmur something like, ‘Which idiot would ever think of constructing a cockpit at the side of a ship?’, but she got them out without difficulty.

‘No, I think you’ll manage,’ Rhun finally said when they had left Liberty.

She snorted, but didn’t reply. The freighter slowly left the little fleet behind and steered towards the hyper jump point. He saw her punch in numbers and calculate their hyper route, then she pulled the lever, the stars elongating into bright lines. Thirty-two hours in hyperspace to their destination.

OoOoO

Troen Marty went along the corridor on hangar deck five, whistling slightly off key. He didn’t feel like it at all, but nobody suspected a happy worker, as long as he didn’t look too happy. His anxiety had grown over the past half hour, and by now he was ready to leave with Rysta on the spot if she had been right and his cover had been blown. Squeezing past a group of TIE fighter pilots strutting along the corridor as if they owned the place, he slipped into the equipment locker room near the hangar entrance and switched on the light.

There was nobody in.

Frowning, his anxiety getting worse, he looked around the tiny storage compartment, which was hardly large enough to take up two humanoids, but definitely not enough for anyone to hide in. Rysta was not here.

Muffling an oath, Marty left the compartment again, feeling the urge to go looking for her but facing two problems: first, he had no idea where she might be – and second, he was simply not allowed to get involved. To hell with that, he thought as he went back along the corridor. If she got caught, it’s my damn right to get involved. When he got back to his room, he was relieved to find his roommate, a slow, boring electronics specialist from Esseles, was not in. Rummaging through his locker, he took out a boot, prying off the sole and taking out a small, flat object. He’d kept the computer spike for an absolute emergency, and this was an emergency. With it, he left the room, heading for the least frequently used computer terminal on the station. It had cost him weeks to find out where that was, and he headed down to the lower levels of the station.

The terminal was empty, and with luck, it would remain that way for the next few minutes. He doubted he’d have any longer.

Marty inserted the spike, then hacked himself into the system. He’d cracked it a year ago, just in case, and with the computer spike, it would be virtually impossible for anyone to detect his intrusion. Still, his forehead was dripping with sweat when he finally was granted access into the station’s security files. Quickly, he called up the most recent entries, but didn’t find anything on the capture of a Shistavanen spy.

‘So this idiot tells me repairs would take two days. I mean, how stupid do those mechanic types think we are?’

‘I say they could all use a little kick in the, well, you know what I mean.’

At the sound of voices in the corridor, Marty hurried to leave the system, then saw two men in Imperial uniform round the corner. Both of them eyed the man in the technician’s coveralls suspiciously, and Marty wiped his hands demonstratively on his thighs. ‘Well, it’s working again, sirs,’ he said. ‘Was probably just a little glitch.’ He got up from the chair.

‘Ah – yes,’ one of the two, a captain by his rank insignia, said. ‘Good work.’

Marty sketched a salute and turned to go.

‘Wait a minute!’

Marty fought the instinct to run and made himself turn slowly. ‘Sir?’

‘You’ve forgotten something.’ Emperor’s black bones, not the spike! But that was what the Imperial officer was holding out to him. He didn’t seem to have realised what it was—and what that meant—yet, but Marty felt his heart race.

‘Thanks, sir.’ He grabbed the now useless spike and turned to go down the corridor, his urge to bolt so great now that he seemed to be walking in slow motion.

He’d just turned around a corner when there was another shout from the two officers. ‘Hey, you! Wait!’

This time, Marty gave in to his panic and ran. He could hear the officers give pursuit behind him and cursed again. Blast! And all of this for absolutely nothing! Then he remembered Rysta talking about having overheard ISB people talking on their way to the mess. What if she’d gone back there to find out more before she came to report to him? She definitely had pluck, but he would have preferred her to go directly to the equipment closet.

Passing next to a turbolift, he skidded to a halt and jumped in, punching the key that would take him to level five and the mess. He didn’t have much time, but he had to find out where Rysta was. Through the closing doors, he could just see the faces of the two naval officers, and remembered to punch every single number along the way to level five. At least they’d have no way of knowing now where he’d leave the turbolift.

Level five was one of the parts of the station Troen Marty normally tried to avoid when he didn’t have official business there. The presence of so many olive uniforms always made him queasy. His stomach felt worse and worse the closer he came to the officers’ mess, which was far too crowded for his taste, far too crowded to be normal. When he reached the door, he saw white between the olive. Stormtroopers.

He knew he should have gone back there and then, but he couldn’t leave Rysta. Maybe it wasn’t her, he kept telling himself, there was another reason for the commotion, and he could get back to her ship and escape before the two officers caught up with them. Maybe she’d just been delayed, was now waiting by the storage room . . .

By the wall next to the entrance of the mess, an officer got up from where he’d been squatting on the floor. ‘No, it’s dead,’ Marty heard him say. ‘It can’t have been here on its own. Search the station for its owner!’

Marty was not listening anymore. With an anguished cry, he elbowed his way through the crowd to where Rysta lay.

She must have put up a hell of a fight; he could see several people around him with serious-looking wounds. Rysta lay half-leaning against the wall, her beautiful fur matted with blood and scorched by blaster shots, too many for her to possibly have survived it. Numbly, as if through a haze of pain, Marty felt his arms being grabbed from behind, heard people shouting and bellowing orders. Then a blunt object hit his head, and darkness engulfed him.

OoOoO

‘We’ll proceed as planned, Commander. At least we did get out of him that he got word to the Rebels about Caller’s apparent defection and how they contact him.’ Commander Karranek snorted derisively. ‘Zoneball team. I’d thought that would be beyond the stupidity even of Rebels.’

Commander Yenko, sitting in his chair, frowned as he watched the red-faced ISB officer pace his office. ‘It appears that it has worked for them so far,’ he pointed out. ‘In addition, they’ll notice that something’s wrong. I can’t shake the feeling, Commander, that it was completely unnecessary to execute Marty. He will be missed. If you carry through your plan, it will not gain you anything.’

Commander Karranek stopped his pacing and turned angry eyes on Yenko. ‘Oh, suddenly it was all my plan, was it, Commander? Let me tell you something: if your people hadn’t intervened, this wouldn’t have happened. Marty would still be alive and happily ignorant, and would be able to lead us directly to the Rebellion. But no, your bunch of incompetents steps in and arrests him!’

Yenko raised his voice. ‘My "bunch of incompetents" did their duty, sir! The man was positively begging to be arrested! Certainly you don’t think he would have continued to be happily ignorant about your plan if we had let him get away from what happened yesterday!’

Karranek glared a the taller man. ‘Your people should have known I had my own plans with Marty.’

Yenko’s eyebrows rose. ‘Need I remind you that all of this was supposed to be classified, sir?’

The pudgy ISB official’s face took on an even deeper shade of red, contrasting sharply with his white uniform. ‘Don’t you use that tone with me, Commander! My report to COMPNOR will not be very favourable, I can assure you!’

Yenko did his best to remain calm. He knew the ISB commander’s threat was not an empty one, but he still had faith in the fact that he had the law on his side in this matter. ‘With all due respect, sir,’—not that he felt much respect for Karranek—‘I was doing my duty here, and so was every man on this ship and on the station. If the ISB’s plans have been thwarted, it is not my responsibility. What happened yesterday was unfortunate, but there was no way for me to prevent it.’

Karranek stared at the station commander for a couple of seconds, jaw working, but then he turned on his heel and left Yenko’s office without any further word.

Commander Yenko drew a hand over his face and let out a sigh. If only the ISB would stop getting in the way of people who were doing their best to serve the Empire, this whole Rebellion business would be over within months.

OoOoO

‘What are you doing?’

Samica turned in the pilot’s seat and saw Rhun enter the cockpit. ‘What does it look like to you?’ she asked. They had half an hour to go before the ship would leave hyperspace, and she’d been sitting there for most of the trip.

‘I don’t know. Meditating?’

She shrugged. ‘I just like sitting here and looking out.’

‘There’s nothing to see,’ he pointed out.

‘Yes, but it’s so beautiful, don’t you think?’

He sat down in the seat next to her. ‘I don’t know. I find it a bit unnerving, but maybe that’s because I’m not a pilot.’

‘I don’t think it’s unnerving. I always find it very comforting.’

‘What’s comforting about the idea that we’re light years away from anything?’

‘I used to have a holo of a swirling galaxy above my bed at home and always looked at that before I went to sleep. Sometimes when I’m worried about something, I remember that nothing that can possibly happen will affect the universe in any significant way. I think that’s a very consoling idea.’

Rhun considered. ‘I don’t know,’ he said again. ‘I wouldn’t want to remind myself that nothing I do will change anything.’

‘Well, it will change things, in your own small way, maybe even in this galaxy. But there are hundreds of billions of galaxies in the universe, and that makes it so irrelevant again.’ She had turned to look out of the viewport once more, chin propped on her hand.

For a while, they sat in silence, and he watched her profile against the transparisteel, her dark brown eyes and eyebrows, as well as the brown hair framing her face, in sharp contrast to her pale skin, her generous, curving mouth somewhat easing the severeness and determination the eyes conveyed. He wondered if she knew she was good-looking. Probably not beautiful—in his opinion, that meant you had to be aware of it, and act like it, which she didn’t—but during her years in Imperial service, she must have tried so hard to act like a man in order to gain respect from those around her that she’d forgotten certain aspects about herself. Still, he thought, there had been certain aspects of her personality that the Empire hadn’t succeeded in stamping out.

It had never occurred to him, until now, that it was possible to take certain typically Imperial points of view over into the Rebellion. Hers were still very much Imperial—her sticking to standard procedures, her fears about situations she could not control, her prejudices against droids and nonhumans, but also her ideas about right and wrong, which were not too far away from his own. They might have been ideas the Empire had once called its own, on the beginning, maybe, and which some people still clung to as being Imperial, even if official Imperial propaganda had long moved onwards. He had never realised propaganda could make people go against their own beliefs. When hers had first collided with what the Empire told her, the collision had been thorough indeed, making her stick to what she thought was right rather than twist the rest to fit her points of view.

Rhun had seen the less favourable side of the Empire early, had seen the corruption in the Army, had seen that his father took part in it and so, consequently, he’d rejected everything that had to do with it. His older brother, Jon, had been like him, and he’d hated their father for sending him to the Army training camp. Jon had not been in the Army for long. One day, when Rhun had been fourteen, his mother had received a very short note that said Jon had died in an accident in the camp, in the line of duty. Their father had never talked about it, and Rhun never knew what exactly had happened. Very few knew he’d had an elder brother, except Commander Willard. It was Jon’s death that had convinced Rhun, nearly ten years ago, that he would never become an Imperial.

‘Do you miss home?’ he suddenly asked.

Samica turned to look at him again. ‘Sometimes. I don’t think I ever missed it in the last three years, except perhaps for the very first time at the Academy. But since it’s become clear I can never go back . . .’ She didn’t finish the sentence, but even so, Rhun knew what she meant.

‘Sometimes "home" seems so far away to me that I can’t imagine it ever belonged to my life,’ he said. ‘I’ve been away from my home world for eight standard years. I’ve got a little brother who was a baby when I left. He must be something like a real person by now, and I don’t even know him.’ He didn’t mention Jon.

‘Do they know where you are?’ Samica asked.

‘Sithspit, no. My father would have fits.’ Rhun tried to sound indifferent, but he didn’t know if he’d fooled her.

‘Mine, too,’ she said softly. ‘They wouldn’t understand. Dad was so proud when I got my commission, even if it got me a ground-based posting.’

‘Where was that?’

‘Nothing you’ll have heard about. Garon II. The middle of nowhere.’

Rhun stared at her, eyes wide, then he shook his head. ‘You’re right, the galaxy is small,’ he said. ‘I’m from Garon II.’

Now it was her turn to stare at him. Then she snorted a laugh. ‘Seems to be the place where people learn that the Empire’s rotten,’ she said.

He raised an eyebrow. ‘You never told me that you’d had second thoughts about the Empire before Kolaff,’ he said.

Samica grimaced. ‘Nothing I like to remember.’ She considered saying more, then shook her head.

For a few seconds, Rhun waited for her to continue, then shrugged. ‘We’re almost there,’ he said, changing the subject. ‘You’re not watching the stars because you’re worried about the mission, are you?’

‘No, just out of habit.’ She stretched in her chair. ‘Let’s bring this pile of junk down, shall we?’

Rhun wagged a finger at her. ‘Careful, Lieutenant. You’re talking about the best pile of junk in the Rebel Alliance.’

OoOoO

They left the transport two hours later, after Samica had set it down on one of Gherro Space Station’s landing pads. Their false IDs had held against inspection by the frigate as well as the space station itself, and Samica had wrapped a scarf around her face to conceal her features. Both of them wore blasters hidden under their jackets or waistcoats, respectively.

‘First, we find our contact so he can tell us who our defector is,’ Rhun reminded her. ‘Your task will be to give a first evaluation of him, whether you think he’s trustworthy. Then we decide how we proceed.’

‘Why didn’t the contact tell us the defector’s name in his message?’ Samica wanted to know.

‘Because he doesn’t send any explicit messages. He uses a number of tight-burst signals that won’t tell a casual observer anything, but which the Alliance can decode to mean something that has been previously agreed on.’

‘You mean he sends "Nice weather today" and the Alliance knows there’s a defector.’

‘Something like that.’

Samica looked out of the entry ramp. ‘How do we find him?’

Rhun grinned. ‘Need to know, Lieutenant.’

She raised an eyebrow. ‘And I suppose I don’t need to know?’

‘Not yet, at least. Come on.’

She followed him down the ramp and out of the docking bay. The interior of the station looked a lot like Kwenn, like most Imperial stations, actually; only this time they had used one of the civilian docking bays. Samica didn’t know about the standards elsewhere on Gherro, but the military installations she had seen in other places had been considerably more comfortable. Still, it was an Imperial facility, and for the first time in her life, Samica found that she wished for a more anonymous, even dirtier place. Rhun did not seem to care, walking with confidence in his stride, and she wondered if he was feeling the confidence or just pretending. At least he seemed to know what he was doing, and she put away her worries.

Purposefully, he led the way to a turbolift and they descended to the lower levels, stopping at a public message terminal. Rhun keyed in several words, then sent it the message, and turned back to Samica.

‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘Shall we get something to drink?’

‘What did you send?’ she inquired.

‘Something our man will understand and join us as soon as he can.’ He kept his voice low, although there were very few people around here, most of them technicians, mechanics or other workers, as well as several work droids. ‘Now we’ll have to wait a while, and I’d like to do that in some place that offers something to eat.’

She nodded. ‘Good idea. I’m looking forward to eating something edible for a change.’

He grinned. ‘That’s what I like about this job,’ he said. ‘Plenty of opportunities to get out.’

There was a workers’ and personnel cantina on this level, and nobody took much notice of two apparent spacers joining the techs snatching a bite to eat and something to drink between shifts.

They ordered food and drinks from a serving droid and, for a while, concerned themselves with their meal, when Samica saw someone enter the cantina and look around him searchingly. Her first idea that this might be their contact was followed by her insides turning to ice when she got a clearer look at the man and nearly spat out her food.

Rhun looked at her with concern. ‘What?’ he asked in a low voice.

She pulled her scarf deeper over her face and looked down on the table.

‘Downlead,’ she whispered.

‘Downwhat?’ Rhun asked.

‘He was in my squadron. Worst example of an "exception", if you know what I mean.’

‘Your average Imp?’ Rhun suggested, not looking into the direction of the man.

‘Exactly. He’s an officer, van Leuken. What’s he doing here?’

‘Damned if I know,’ he murmured between his teeth. ‘He couldn’t be our defector, then?’

‘Not in your or my lifetime,’ she said, disgust in her voice, and he felt a queasiness in his stomach. This was not going as planned.

‘Has he seen us?’ he asked.

‘I don’t know. Maybe not. He’s—yes, he’s leaving again.’

Rhun bit his lip and let his breath out slowly. ‘All right, Lieutenant, we’ll have to tread very, very carefully here. This may or may not have been a coincidence, but I’d rather not take any chances. Maybe you should stay on the ship when our contact and I meet with the defector.’

Samica nodded, then asked, ‘Will we be staying here?’

‘For the time being, yes,’ Rhun replied. ‘I don’t like it, but we can’t leave our contact hanging in the air. And I suppose we are much safer in here than anywhere else on the station.’

She didn’t share his opinion, but didn’t protest. He knew more about situations like these, and if he thought their mission was still worth pursuing, she was willing to trust him.

She didn’t want to think about the fact that, on his last mission, he’d tried to infiltrate a Victory-class Star Destroyer for lack of a better plan.

OoOoO

‘No use,’ Rhun murmured.

They had been waiting in the cantina for the better part of three hours, and they both knew they could not risk staying here for much longer. He paid their bill, then they both got up from the table and left the cantina, subdued and worried. Rhun had been told their contact would meet them no later than two hours after he’d sent the message saying ‘There’s a slot free for one male and one female in the station’s zoneball team’, and by now, he was certain that something had gone seriously wrong here. When they walked towards the turbolift that would take them back to the landing pad levels, a short, blond man in blue technician’s coveralls came towards them, frowned, then asked, ‘Don’t I know you?’

Rhun eyed the man cautiously. ‘From our last zoneball match?’ he asked.

A broad smile appeared on the tech’s face. ‘Yes, of course!’ he said. ‘And you gave us a proper beating, too! Can I treat you to a drink?’

‘Sure,’ Rhun replied. ‘But why don’t we go up one level?’ It wouldn’t be such a good idea, he supposed, to go back into the cantina they’d just left.

The tech agreed, and they went up to another bar on another level, talking about a smashball match that had never taken place, but Rhun felt his gut ease somewhat. They had another drink there—Rhun had switched from lomin-ale to fruit juice two hours ago—and talked about insignificant matters, until at some point the tech casually reached into his breast pocket and slipped them a data disc. Rhun took it, and put it into his pocket, never leaving their topic of discussion. He noted that Samica was watching the room from the corner of her eye from time to time, and remembered the former colleague of hers she’d seen earlier. He was rather eager to get away from here, and after half an hour, he asked the tech, ‘When do we meet again?’

The man shrugged. ‘Tomorrow, if you like, same time, same place.’

‘Tomorrow, then,’ Rhun agreed, and they told him good-bye and left.

They returned to the ship, and Rhun inserted the disc into his datapad. It was not coded, which he thought very careless, but there were a few words slipped in into mathematical formulae, reading, ‘F.O. Caller, second level bar, 12.30.’

He looked up from the datapad at Samica, who had waited for him to find the message.

‘Do you know someone named Caller?’

A surprised look crossed her face. ‘Flight Officer Caller was my wingman. He’s the defector?’

‘You think it’s possible?’ he asked.

She considered. ‘I guess it is. He always was a decent sort, and an excellent pilot. He—’ she stopped herself, then continued, ‘He was forced to do something he can’t have liked. Maybe that was enough of a reason for him to consider defecting.’

Rhun nodded, brooding over the file. ‘This is strange,’ he said.

‘What?’

‘The contact told us to meet him again tomorrow morning. That means we won’t get to contact Caller today if we want to wait for him. And I’m not very eager to hang around this place any longer than I have to.’

‘Me, neither,’ Samica agreed. ‘But I don’t think we have a choice, do we?’

Rhun massaged his chin. ‘I could try to meet with Caller today. I won’t give him any reason to suspect who I am, but maybe I can get something out of him. For a first impression. You have any suggestions about a topic that could get him to talk?’

Samica considered. ‘Following orders even if it’s against your own concept of honour,’ she said. He looked at her searchingly, but she didn’t meet his eyes.

Rhun drew a deep breath. ‘All right, then. I’ll go upstairs and see what I can do.’

5

Rhun walked up to level two of the station, trying to convince himself that everything was going as planned. He was not happy with the fact that the tech did not seem to feel any urgency in contacting Caller, but he supposed that the spy had to keep a low profile in a place like this. Samica had described Caller, and Rhun was quite certain that he would not be able to miss the man. Nearly two metres. A miracle he even fit into a cockpit.

The bar was a far-stretching place, brightly lit by glow panels along the walls and the ceiling, frequented by Imperial officers as well as the more wealthy of the station’s visitors, it seemed. Rhun checked his chrono. 12.35. Caller would be here already.

He glanced across the room and noted there were no nonhumans here at all, though the place was well visited. As in the lower levels, serving droids were taking orders, mostly drinks. This bar was considerably cleaner than the canteen below, however.

Finally, Rhun found what he’d been looking for: a very tall young man with short black hair sitting alone at a table near one side, staring into a half-empty glass in front of him. He wore an Imperial uniform with a flight officer’s rank insignia, and when he came closer, he also noticed the small mole under the pilot’s left eye. Unless Caller had a clone, this was their man.

He had hoped he would find him with other people, which would have made it a lot easier to listen in to a conversation and maybe join in later, but he had already come to terms with the fact that, on this mission, nothing worked as he would have wished.

He went up to the Imperial pilot’s table. ‘Excuse me, sir, I am looking for someone called Denet Marler.’

The pilot looked up at him; even though Rhun was standing, ‚up‘ wasn’t very far. ‘I’ve never heard of him.’ His voice was surprisingly gentle for a man his size, his accent sounding like some Colony world’s Rhun couldn’t place.

‘He was supposed to be here,’ Rhun continued, putting up a puzzled look.

‘Maybe he’ll come anyway. I don’t know many of the people here, I’m not permanently on Gherro.’

‘Do you mind if I wait for him here?’ Rhun asked.

The other man shook his head. ‘No, go ahead . . . I didn’t catch your name.’

‘Oh.’ Rhun stretched out his hand. ‘Haaris. Roman Haaris.’

‘Josh Caller, Flight Officer.’

Rhun whistled. ‘StarCom, are you? I’ve heard it say that’s the place to go if you want to come very far.’

Caller just shrugged.

‘Well, further than hauling supplies for a place like this, anyway, right?’ Rhun added.

‘I guess.’ Caller took a swallow from his glass.

Rhun knew better than to get the man to talk if he was as reluctant as this, so he made up small-talk stories about fictitious supply runs to get him to loosen up. He couldn’t shake the impression that Caller was distinctly unhappy about something and afraid to say as much as he would have liked. Well, that was what he would feel like if he wanted to defect but didn’t know whom to trust.

OoOoO

Samica had left the ship only briefly, keeping in mind the possibility of being recognised, and bought a few supplies to restock their ship. She hadn’t seen any familiar faces along the way, for which she was grateful. She didn’t know what Downlead had been doing in the cantina, but she did not want to know how he would react if he saw her again, and on different sides, at that. She had never felt very comfortable thinking she was his friend; she didn’t want to find out what it was like to be his enemy.

When she was about to enter the hangar bay where the Jumper was docked, a faint clatter followed by a shuffling sound from out of the docking bay caused her to stop short, draw up against the bulkhead, and stand there motionlessly, listening. When she heard another, very faint clinking sound, she was certain that someone was in the bay—it might just be a cleaner or something else that was non-threatening, but it might as well be someone who had become suspicious. Samica felt her heart in her throat. Whoever was in there, she mustn’t let him know she was here.

Cautiously, centimetre by centimetre, she leaned around the corner to glance into the hangar bay, ready to retreat any second.

Half-hidden by the landing gear, she saw someone standing under the ship and doing something on its belly. She could see a pair of legs in a mechanic’s coverall, and several loose hull plates on the ground, along with a number of tools. Whatever that person was doing, it was not a standard maintenance job.

She had two options: face him and hope that she could force him to undo whatever modifications he was making, thereby showing herself, or wait until he was finished, and hope Rhun could cope with whatever surprise would await them. She remembered the young agent’s skill with all things technical and decided to wait.

The mechanic was working quickly. After hardly more than five minutes, he fastened the hull plating again and bent down to pack together his tools, thus giving her a first look at his face, and she froze.

Their contact.

Now, what was he doing here, modifying the Jumper without their consent?

Samica did not wait for him to notice her, but quietly went back into the corridor, slipping behind a door opening into a refreshing station at the end. She had to contact Rhun, and she’d have to get to the upper levels to do that. She stayed there for several minutes until she was certain that the man had left the docking bay, then went out again and returned to the ship. A quick survey yielded no result as to what exactly he’d been doing there; the hull looked as it always had, and she wondered what he could have done in this portion of the ship. As far as she knew, there was nothing vital in that section, not the engines, not environmental control, not the deflector shields, not the weapons systems. She had to get back and warn Rhun.

When she left the docking bay, she thought she saw someone hasten away from the corridor, but when she looked, there was nobody there. A sense of impending danger mounting, she hurried for the turbolifts.

Level two was far better frequented than the lower levels, and there was a high proportion of officers here. Samica had wrapped her scarf around her face again and tried not to look too closely at people in olive green. When she was just about entering the bar, she bumped right into somebody. Muttering an excuse, she tried to squeeze past but noted that the man made no move to let her pass. When she looked into his face, her heart sank as she realised it was their ‘contact’—if he was that.

He smiled broadly. ‘Well, if it isn’t our zoneball expert! What are you doing here?’

Samica silently scolded herself for not noticing him sooner. ‘Actually, I’m quite in a hurry,’ she said and tried to slip past him, but he blocked her path.

‘Too busy to spend some time with your old zoneball buddy? Come on, I thought better of you.’

No more need to pretend that this was all a coincidence. He was here because he knew she was going to warn Rhun, and was trying to prevent her from doing just that.

‘You and I both know I’m not your zoneball buddy,’ she said, her voice low. ‘And you’re going to let me pass.’

His smile never wavered. ‘Oh no, sweetheart, I’m afraid I can’t let you. Because I’ve somewhere to go, and you’re coming with me.’

Samica’s hand crept towards the blaster hidden under her waistcoat when she felt something press against her ribs. He’d had the same idea, but he’d had it seconds earlier.

Still smiling, he propelled her away from the bar’s door when a patron came out and nodded in the direction of the turbolift. Samica caught a quick glance of the bar, though she wasn’t sure if she’d seen Rhun, but then the tech poked her again with the blaster, and she involuntarily made a step forward. ‘And I strongly advise you to do what you’re told,’ he told her. ‘This thing’s set for kill.’

Samica bit her lip and complied. She’d think of something . . . but she’d better do it fast.

OoOoO

‘And what do you do for a living?’

Rhun shrugged. ‘Haul cargo, fly errands, that sort of thing.’

Caller cocked his head to one side. ‘For the Empire?’

‘Of course for the Empire—they pay best.’ Rhun leaned back in his chair, hooking his thumbs into his belt, about to make up a few none-too-exciting stories about previous jobs he had supposedly done, when he saw the door to the corridor open and saw Samica with the tech in the doorway, saw her glance about the room for help, then being pushed away. He looked back at Caller, who, apparently, had not noticed that Rhun’s attention had strayed.

‘Hey, that’s Marler,’ he said, getting up from the table. ‘Gone right past the bar. Perhaps he’s been waiting somewhere else . . . anyway, it was nice to meet you, Officer Caller.’

He saw Caller nod as he went towards the exit, his reaction just as sparse as anything he’d seen from the pilot since he’d entered.

This mission still would not do him the favour and go as planned.

OoOoO

Samica had given the tech her blaster before he had the chance to search her for it, which he’d obviously been looking forward to, and all the while, her mind raced as she tried to come up with something that would get her out of this. She didn’t have the slightest idea where her captor was taking her, only that they were heading for the lower levels again. At least that probably meant he was not going to take her to the station commander, and all things considered, her situation could be worse, but even if she somehow managed to escape, she still had to warn van Leuken, and that might be the end of both of them. What would Commander Willard expect her to do? Try to get away on her own, and leave van Leuken behind? Or risk getting herself killed in the attempt to take him with her? She did remember the sergeant who had boarded Resolve together with Rhun, and he’d ordered the young man to leave without him.

The tech finally stopped before a door in the bulkhead, looked around himself, then typed a code into the control panel and shoved her inside. The room was small, but more spacious than a tech’s quarters should have been, but then, Samica had long ago stopped to believe he was a tech – or their contact.

He closed the door behind them and leaned against the bulkhead, arms crossed, his face conveying smugness and—what? anticipation?—then smiled at her, an ugly, leering smile. He kept his blaster trained on her, openly now. Samica remained standing near the door, even if it was closed. She knew the look on his face, and she felt the fear and frustration rise within her, the same she’d felt half a year ago when a COMPNOR commissioner who’d been visiting Garon II had grabbed her when she’d returned from a patrol, who’d thought she must be delighted at the thought of him having some fun with her. Captain Lockhart had let her go, incredulous, when she’d slapped him across the face. Somehow, she doubted it would be so easy with the man she was now facing.

‘Now what?’ she finally said, putting up more courage than she currently felt.

He gave her that disconcerting grin again. ‘I make sure you stay out of trouble,’ he replied. ‘Any ideas how we can pass the time?’

‘You could start by telling me who you are,’ she said. She had to keep him talking, so maybe he’d let down his guard.

The man snorted a laugh. ‘Oh, clever. And I was actually beginning to think you were an Intel agent. But you’re not, aren’t you?’

She didn’t reply.

‘Well, I knew the Rebellion was hopelessly under equipped, but to send little girls . . . Well, I’m not complaining.’ He took a step towards her, and she drew back involuntarily. He laughed and stretched out a hand, and Samica felt her stomach churn. ‘Hey, don’t be sh . . .’

That moment, the door opened, and the Imperial agent whirled, his blaster aimed at whoever had managed to crack his door code. At once, Samica threw herself against him, smacking her elbow into his ribs with all her strength. At the Academy, her weaponless training sessions had been disasters, but this time, she put all her fury and all her fear in her thrust, knocking the wind out of him. He got off a shot, which slammed into the bulkhead, then he crashed down against a table. She hit him again, and again, then a blue stun bolt hit him and he slumped, motionless.

Samica remained kneeling on the floor and took a few minutes to catch her breath and force the fury down, then turned. Rhun van Leuken was standing in the door, now closed again, and looking down on her. She finally scrambled to her feet again.

‘If you’re ever going to get mad at me, please tell me beforehand,’ Rhun said, scratching his ear with the blaster muzzle.

She drew a deep, steadying breath. ‘We’ve been set up,’ she informed him.

‘So I gather,’ Rhun replied.

‘How did you know where to find me?’

‘I saw you leave with that man, and you didn’t look very happy to me. So I followed you here.’ He bent down and took the tech’s holdout blaster, then also relieved him of the one he’d taken from Samica.

She looked him in the eyes. ‘Thank you.’

‘Anytime. We need to get back to . . .’ He broke off as he heard noises coming towards them from outside the room—clattering noises.

‘Sithspit,’ he hissed as he listened. ‘They must have heard the shooting.’ He looked about the room as if he could find the solution there, but there was no second exit, not even a ventilation shaft large enough for them to hide in.

‘The closet?’ Samica suggested with a nod towards a locker standing at the end of the room.

Rhun grimaced. ‘We wouldn’t fit in there—not if we want to hide him as well,’ he answered. Then his face lit up with a grin. ‘But here’s what we’ll do.’

OoOoO

The stormtrooper sergeant looked over the private’s shoulder. ‘Hurry up, GS-3422. This is taking way too long.’

‘Got it, sir,’ the soldier replied and sat back from the door, which slid open once the code was cracked. The other three troopers entered the room with their blasters ready.

‘Two dead, sir,’ the foremost stormtrooper reported when he surveyed the two figures lying on the ground. ‘Our agent and the woman. The male reb—’

Before he could finish, there was blaster fire from above their heads, and then the woman on the ground rolled away and brought up a weapon as well. The sergeant and one of his people had the presence of mind to return fire, the rest was too surprised to react.

OoOoO

Rhun jumped down from the locker and sat down next to Samica, who lay curled up on her side, her hand pressed against her hip. ‘Let me see,’ he said, gently taking her hand away.

She bit back a moan as he examined the wound. It looked more serious than most of what they’d carried from Resolve, and had to hurt a lot, but, like all blaster wounds, was not bleeding.

‘I haven’t brought a medpak,’ he said, apologising, when he was finished. ‘I’ll have to treat this as soon as we get to the ship. Do you think you can manage that long?’

Samica nodded jerkily, teeth clenched against the pain. He rummaged through the locker and took out a clean sheet, which he tore into strips, making a makeshift bandage, which he wrapped tightly around her waist. Then he helped her up, and she nodded again. ‘It’s fine, I’ll manage.’

Rhun looked around the room and made a face. ‘Let’s get out of here,’ he said softly. ‘It’s obvious we can’t do any more good in here, even if Caller wants to defect, which I doubt.’ She looked at him in alarm and some disappointment, but he shook his head. ‘We’re not too far away from our docking bay. With luck, we’ll be well away from here before they send someone to find out what happened to the last search party.’

Rhun made sure there was nobody on the corridor when they left the room, then they headed down to the next emergency staircase, not wishing to rely on the turbolift, which would probably be guarded or monitored with two Rebels on the loose. Still, Rhun had hope that the Imperials had not realised they actually were on the loose, but were waiting for the stormtroopers to report in. They probably had no more than a few minutes, but it wouldn’t take them much longer to reach the Jumper and get away from here. He had no idea how many stormies there were on the base, but this was not an Imperial station, even if it served the Empire.

They had made three or four levels on the staircase when there was a crackle in the station’s speakers, and a voice blared out, ‘Attention, all personnel on Gherro. This is the administrator. Code White has occurred. I repeat, Code White.’ Then the intercom was silent once again.

Samica looked at Rhun, her face worried. ‘What does that mean?’

‘Damned if I know,’ he replied, checking the power cell on his blaster. ‘My guess is that the administrator has been doing his own thing here and the Empire’s found out about it.’

‘Couldn’t have been better,’ Samica said. ‘There’s nothing like a little commotion to cover one’s escape.’

Rhun grinned. ‘Hey, you do catch on pretty quickly.’

They left the stairs on the docking bay level, and saw that there was a hodgepodge mix of people, human and nonhuman, milling around, trying to get to their ships or organising into armed groups of four or five.

Samica grabbed a young man armed with a heavy blaster rifle. ‘The Empire?’ she demanded. Whatever was happening here, that was likely to be the cause of it.

He nodded. ‘They’re trying to take over the station. If you don’t want them to see anything they rather shouldn’t, you’d better get out of here.’ He suited action to words at once and ran towards one of the docking bays.

Samica nodded to Rhun, and they followed the man’s example. They passed several bays on their way to the Jumper, one of which was crawling with stormtroopers rushing out from a troop transport. Just as they ran past, they heard an amplified voice from out of the bay, telling all people aboard the station to surrender, but the corridors were so thick with people, fugitives and fighters alike, that it would take the Imperials some time to break through. Behind them, they heard blaster fire and screams, then a deafening blast from an explosive charge or heavier artillery. Samica did not care to find out, she fought to keep Rhun’s pace. She soon noticed he could have run far faster than she could, at least in her present condition; soon, however, they both had to make frequent use of their elbows to gain any ground at all.

They reached the docking bay near the end where the Jumper stood, with far fewer people around now, most of whom had clustered further back with the bigger ships. They found the bay still locked, and Rhun keyed in their code to open the blast door into the bay, then closed it again behind them.

‘Drop your weapons and hold up your hands where I can see them,’ they heard a voice from behind them, near the ship, which made Samica’s gut go ice-cold.

Malcolm Downlead slowly walked towards them from where he had been waiting by the Jumper’s entry ramp, and Samica dropped her blaster pistol as she saw Rhun doing the same. She remembered the holdout blaster he’d liberated earlier and noted that he didn’t cast it down. Downlead didn’t seem to notice.

Rhun raised his hands halfway, stepping away from Samica. ‘I don’t believe we’ve met,’ he told the Imperial, his voice guarded.

Downlead shook his head, feigning disappointment. ‘Tsk, Trey—I would have thought you’d told your new friends about your old ones.’

‘I didn’t see any reason to,’ she retorted. ‘Apart from you being one of my reasons for defecting, that is, of course.’

‘Such harsh words,’ Downlead said. ‘Am I supposed to feel guilty now?’

Samica made a face. ‘Actually, I owe you one. Without you, it would have taken me much longer to find out what a heap of crap the Empire is.’

Downlead chuckled. ‘You can pay me back right now,’ he said. ‘You’re worth quite a lot now, you know. And don’t count on my not shooting you. The bounty’s dead or alive.’

Before Samica or Downlead had the opportunity to make a reply, Rhun had his holdout blaster out, pushing her away as he fired at the Imperial. Samica yelped as she felt a stabbing pain from the wound in her side, but managed to catch hold of her own blaster pistol on the floor, shooting as well, seeing Downlead go down with a blaster wound across his stomach.

She looked up at Rhun, who appeared to be unhurt.

‘Nice shooting, Agent,’ she said weakly as she got to her feet, stifling a moan.

‘Nice diversion, Lieutenant,’ he replied.

They found the ship empty as they entered, and Rhun threw Samica a worried glance. ‘Do you think you’re up to bringing us out?’ he asked. ‘There’ll most likely be several ships patrolling the area, if not a full-fledged blockade by now.’

‘The sooner we start, the better,’ she replied between her teeth as she ran pre-flight checks. All lights showed up in the green, and she lit up the engines.

‘No use asking permission for take-off, I guess,’ she murmured as the ship lifted from the ground and she steered it towards the containment field, which kept the atmosphere in, but was no obstacle for them.

‘I guess not.’

Samica waited for the deflector shields to reach 75 percent, then took off from the landing pad. At once, her sensors showed her an ongoing dogfight already in progress, with several freighters engaged in one-on-ones with TIE fighters from the frigate, Leveller herself firing at the smaller ships with disconcerting accuracy.

‘Hold on tight,’ she told Rhun, then broke hard to portside when two TIE fighters peeled off from the furball and came towards her. She throttled speed and saw one of them breaking as he foresaw the manoeuvre, but the other shot past her, and she grazed him with her lasers. The TIE pilot lost control over his ship and spun for several seconds before he regained control again, then another blast from the Jumper caused the fighter to explode in a short, brilliant flash.

Samica picked up speed again to dodge the other TIE’s fire, all the while trying to draw him away from the station and the frigate, which was also firing into their direction, thick green laser clusters from the ship’s turbolaser batteries going wide, more slender laser beams from the anti-starfighter guns missing more narrowly. Samica was relieved to find that the Jumper, despite her size, was far more agile than the Lambda-class shuttle she’d last flown. She was still not as fast as the TIE pursuing her, but she could take a lot more punishment, even though Samica knew he would gnaw away at her shields fairly quickly if she let him. She was not going to make hyperspace with a TIE fighter on her tail, that much was clear.

‘Van Leuken!’ she shouted. ‘We need the coordinates!’

He hurried to type them in, grabbing the console in front of him to steady himself when the freighter was rocked by a laser hit. She caught his worried look and gave him a tight smile, then brought the ship around in a turn to starboard when the TIE was almost immediately behind her, at the same time boosting the engine’s power with power from the lasers. The TIE almost collided with her, but the Jumper picked up speed quickly enough to escape more serious damage. Samica saw their attacker spin off into space, trailing sparks, one solar panel hanging at an impossible angle.

She surveyed the area around them and found another two TIE fighters coming towards them, still four klicks away, but gaining. She set the engines to full throttle and glanced over at Rhun.

‘Finished?’

‘Yep,’ he replied, sitting back from the nav computer. ‘Let’s go.’

Samica reached for the lever and Jumper entered hyperspace.

OoOoO

‘Do you think Caller would try to betray you willingly?’ Rhun asked as he took the synthflesh paste out of the medpak. They were in the freighter’s tiny sick bay, fifteen minutes into hyperspace.

Samica bit her lip, partly because of the pain, partly to avoid answering his question. He applied the synthflesh to her wound, and she flinched.

‘I don’t know,’ she finally said, hoarsely. ‘You think he was part of the plan to capture us?’

Rhun bandaged the wound quickly. ‘He seemed very strange,’ he said. ‘Very quiet. As if he had to play along in a game he didn’t like. But he didn’t try to give me any warning either, as far as I could tell. I’m still figuring it all out, but they must have found our man on the station and replaced him with that Imp agent. Caller was probably just the bait. I don’t think he ever entertained any serious thoughts about defecting.’ He gave her a painkiller and sat back from the bed, wiping his hands on a towel.

Samica lay back, feeling bone-weary. ‘At least whatever the tech was doing with our ship hasn’t been too bad,’ she murmured. ‘But then, he wasn’t really a tech.’

Rhun looked at her, alarmed. ‘What are you talking about?’

She squinted, the painkiller taking effect.

‘Lieutenant . . . I need you to tell me what you saw that tech do.’

Samica pulled herself together visibly. ‘He was doing something to the underside,’ she said. ‘Removing hull plates. Then putting them back on again. Don’t know what he was doing.’

Rhun grimaced. ‘Can you bring us out of hyperspace right now?’ he asked, forcing himself not to shout at her.

She blinked. ‘What is it?’

‘Can you?’ he insisted.

Samica bit her lip and nodded, getting up with difficulty. He supported her as she limped back into the cockpit, then he prepared a stim-shot. ‘Sorry, Lieutenant, but I need you to be awake right now. My guess is that we’ve picked up a transmitter, and we need to get rid of that before we return to the base. Okay?’

She nodded once more, sitting down in the pilot’s seat, and he gave her the injection. ‘Sorry, this is going to hit you like a Cracian Thumper.’

Samica made a face as she found it did, then shook herself, feeling her head clear somewhat, raking her fingers through her short hair.

‘Awake?’

‘Yes. You always settle your debts so quickly?’

He was puzzled at first, then remembered their first encounter and gave her a fleeting smile.

Despite her lingering dizziness and the throbbing in her side, Samica programmed the computer to abort the jump, which was safer and less demanding on the ship than simply bringing them out again. The lines outside the viewport faded into dots again.

‘Where are we?’ Rhun asked.

She consulted the chart. ‘Near the edge of the Srillkris system,’ she replied. ‘Nothing in a radius of ten light years, according to the chart.’

Rhun nodded and stood. ‘Good. I’m suiting up and going out to see if there’s really a transmitter installed into the ship. Can you remember where the tech made the modifications?’

‘Just under the cockpit, near the landing gear.’

‘Okay, Lieutenant. Keep an eye on me, please. I don’t like working in space and if the cable gives, I need you to pull me back in.’ He took the space suit out of its locker in the cockpit. It looked as old as the rest as the ship, patched in several places, but Rhun took some comfort from the fact the Alliance normally kept all its equipment in top condition and would certainly not let them set off with a defective space suit. When he had pulled it on and brought up the life control systems box on his chest, all the lights were green, and relief flooded him.

Fixing the cable to his belt, he looked back at Samica. ‘Ready, Lieutenant?’ he asked.

She looked at him a bit sheepishly, her pupils dilated, but she looked awake. ‘I think it’s time you called me Samica,’ she said.

He gave her a crooked smile. ‘All right—Samica.’

‘I hope the cable is not the oldest thing in this ship.’

‘Me, too.’

OoOoO

‘Empty space.’

Commander Yenko decided it was best not to answer. Karranek’s face was the colour of a driburr plant about to explode as he read the message and threw the datapad on the ground, plastisteel casing and small electronic parts flying in all directions.

‘Your people should have shot them down,’ he continued, surveying the wreckage. ‘We knew that Trey had seen our man plant the transmitter.’

Again, Yenko chose to remain silent. He could have pointed out he’d been following Karranek’s orders in letting the freighter escape, sacrificing two TIE fighter pilots in the process in order to make it believable, but something told him it was not what the ISB commander wanted to hear.

‘Any word on the other pilot . . . Downlead?’ Yenko asked.

‘He’s in for another week in bacta, but the medics say he’ll make it. The emissions from the freighter very nearly killed him, though. I am putting in a request to StarCom for his transfer.’ Abruptly, Karranek turned, facing Yenko. ‘I’m leaving aboard Hammer tomorrow, Commander. See to an appropriate escort.’ Then he left the office.

Yenko resisted the urge to heave a relieved sigh when the door slid shut behind the other man. Captain Dacasca of ISD Emperor’s Hammer was not going to be amused to have been called upon to assist in the annihilation of a Rebel base, only to find that the transmitter that was to lead him there had been found somewhere in wild space. But that was not Yenko’s problem. He would have to oversee the repairs to Gherro Space Station and make sure it remained loyal to the Empire this time.

A buzzing sound interrupted his thoughts, and he keyed a button on his desk. ‘Yes?’

‘Officer Caller is here, sir.’

‘Send him in.’

The TIE fighter pilot entered, saluting. ‘Flight Officer Caller reporting, sir.’

‘At ease, Officer. I have good news for you.’ He handed the young man a datapad. ‘Your orders. As of now, you’re being transferred to ISD Emperor’s Hammer. You’ll be serving under Captain Omarn Dacasca, who wants to see you in two hours. As I promised, he won’t hear anything about what you’ve been called to do during your time here.’

Caller nodded, keeping his eyes fixed on some imaginary point behind the commander’s head. ‘Thank you, sir.’

‘That’ll be all, Officer Caller. Good luck. Dismissed.’

Caller saluted and went out, and this time, Yenko did sigh. It seemed he was left with a lot of clearing work from Karranek’s stay, and he wasn’t only thinking about the mess on the floor.

He thumbed the comm key again. ‘Lieutenant, Yenko here. Send a detail of cleaning droids in here. And get me a large pot of caf.’

6

‘. . . so we found the tracking device and disabled it. I am fairly certain that it was the only one, sir.’ Rhun sat back a bit, hoping the report hadn’t sounded as bad to the commander as it had to him. Second mission, second disaster. He still couldn’t believe they’d escaped with their lives twice.

Commander Willard watched the two sitting before his desk and turned to Lieutenant Trey. ‘Do you have anything to add, Lieutenant?’ he asked her.

‘No, sir. That’s pretty much it.’ She looked terrible, Rhun thought, but at the same time, he’d hoped she would add something about the more heroic feats he’d accomplished during the mission. He hadn’t wanted to elaborate on those himself, but he had pointed out how well she’d done in getting them out of the dogfight around the station. Apparently, she hadn’t taken the hint. To be honest, he hadn’t really expected her to. Maybe such recommendations weren’t standard procedure in the Empire—plus the fact that she did look rather pale. She’d slept in her bunk through most of the hyper jump, which worried him. The wound hadn’t looked that serious. Willard had commanded both their presence during the debriefing when Rhun had told him that he’d found a transmitter installed into the Jumper, and even now, a dozen techs was taking the ship apart—figuratively—to hunt for more.

Willard looked at the notes he’d made during the interview, then nodded at Samica. ‘Lieutenant, go get checked out in sick bay. Ask Corporal Tarrett to accompany you there. Agent van Leuken, I’d like you to stay here for some more minutes.’

Samica nodded weakly and stood, swaying slightly. She saluted, then she left the office.

When she was gone, the commander asked, ‘Do you think she had anything to do with this?’

Rhun shook his head. ‘If this is a set-up, it’s the most elaborate I’ve ever come across. And she’s about the worst liar I’ve ever met. She has nothing to do with the failure of the mission.’

Willard glanced at his notes again and nodded. ‘Thank you, van Leuken. By the way, Captain Candela could use you in Intentions. Report to him in the next twelve hours. Dismissed, then.’

Rhun swallowed. This was it. He’d screwed up, and was dumped in Intentions again. Decoding encrypted messages for Stars knew how long. And all because of a narrow-minded former Imp who couldn’t have said anything in the way of, ‘By the way, Commander, Agent van Leuken did a brilliant job of getting us off that station.’

‘Yes, sir,’ he said softly, saluting, then trudged out. Lieutenant Riece was on duty outside the commander’s office, but mercifully, he must have had a hunch that Rhun wasn’t in the mood for any banter right now.

OoOoO

‘Well, Lieutenant, I’m afraid I have good news and bad news.’

Samica looked up when a human doctor, not a medical droid, entered the part of the sick bay room aboard Liberty where she lay. She held a data pad and a medical scanner.

‘Bad news first,’ Samica said, trying to sit up, then deciding against it. She’d been here for two days, with a massive infection, and was only just beginning to feel herself again. She hadn’t seen Rhun since their return to base.

‘You didn’t know you were allergic to synthflesh, did you, Lieutenant?’ the doctor said as she took a seat next to Samica’s bed. ‘There was nothing to indicate that in your medical files.’

Samica threw her a puzzled look. ‘I’m not allergic to synthflesh,’ she said, confused. ‘I’ve never been. What could have caused that?’

‘You belong to approximately 0.2 percent of humans who experience allergic reactions to zyolene, an agent in most synthflesh varieties.’ The doctor looked at her searchingly. ‘But you said you never experienced this before?’

‘No, I’m certain.’

The older woman grimaced. ‘You haven’t always worked for the Alliance, have you, Lieutenant?’

‘What does that have to do with that?’

‘Synthflesh types used by other groups do not contain zyolene, but a substitute called Phetarin. The Empire holds a monopoly on that, however.’

Samica closed her eyes for a moment. ‘That means I can’t use any Alliance synthflesh at all.’

‘I’m afraid not. I first thought you might be allergic to bacta, which is also a component of synthflesh, but I checked that, and you’re not.’

‘Was that the good news?’

‘No, the good news is this.’ The doctor handed Samica the datapad. ‘You’re being transferred as soon as we turn you loose again. Another four days so we can make sure you’re fit to fly, and you’re back on duty. That’s good news, isn’t it?’

‘It is.’ Samica took the datapad. ‘Do you know where I’m being transferred?’

‘I’ll leave you that,’ the doctor answered with a nod towards the pad. ‘It contains your orders. In the meantime . . . try and get some sleep.’ She gave Samica a nod and left the small room, drawing back a curtain that separated it from other compartments.

Samica brought up the file containing her orders, and whistled as she read what it said. She would be moved to Y-wing squadron Gold and was asked to report to Commander Jon Vander in five days’ time.

OoOoO

The escort frigate Defiance had only recently joined the small Rebel fleet gathered in Suolriep sector, having been liberated from the Empire in a coup several weeks back. Unlike Redemption, it still had a starfighter hangar, and thus had been chosen as Gold Squadron’s base of operations. Previously, they had been forced to scatter their snubfighters about two different cruisers, a fact that hadn’t made anybody very happy, or so Samica had been able to gather. She remembered the way the Y-wings had been cramped in between freighters and shuttles on Liberty.

Defiance’s hangar was far from crowded, considering the fact that it had been designed to house two squadrons of TIE fighters, not Y-wing squadron. There were only seven fighters, all painted with the distinctive gold stripe along their noses, so Samica supposed that a flight of them had to be out, on a patrol or maybe on a mission. She couldn’t see any clues as to the designations of the ships. X-wings used stripes for comm code designations, four green stripes for Green Four, for example, but Y-wings obviously didn’t.

There were several techs in the hangar, as well as two people in bright orange Rebel flight suits. A deck officer stood at the shuttle ramp as Samica left the transport.

‘Welcome aboard, ma’am,’ he greeted her.

‘Thanks, Officer,’ she replied. ‘I’m to report to Commander Vander. Can you tell me where to find him?’

‘Well, you’re lucky, Lieutenant,’ the deck officer replied. ‘See the dark-haired pilot over there? That’s him.’

Samica nodded her thanks and went over to the two pilots, one of whom was leaving now, a blond-haired young man, leaving the commander and an astromech droid. The CO of Gold Squadron was of average height, about as tall as Samica, with black hair and a strong build. He didn’t look much older than thirty.

‘Commander Vander?’ she asked when she reached him, but to her surprise, he didn’t react at once, but patted the astromech on the top before turning to her. ‘That’s right, Blooper, and if they don’t do a good job on the power converters this time, bite ’em.’ The droid wheeled away, bleeping to itself, and the commander faced her, eyeing her speculatively. ‘Lieutenant Trey?’ he asked.

She started to salute, but he surprised her by simply taking her hand and shaking it. ‘Welcome to Gold Squadron. I’m Commander Vander, but my people usually call me Dutch. Or Chief, whatever sounds appropriate.’ He spoke with a pronounced Corellian accent, and Samica realised she’d already met him once—he’d been in his Y-wing outside Redemption when she, Rhun and Blissex had arrived at Suolriep.

‘Lieutenant Samica Trey.’

‘Well, Samica, you’ll see things run a bit differently here than you’re probably used to. By the way, in case you’re worried, nobody will know where you come from unless you choose to tell them, except my XO. We’re currently down three pilots, well, two, now, and I’ve decided to team you up with Gold Five—Pops, my XO. I hope you don’t share the dislike of most of your people against Alderaanians?’

She shook her head. ‘No, sir.’

‘Just leave the "sir" aside. Makes me feel older. You’ll be Gold Seven, and when we’re on a mission, that’s as good as your name, but you probably know that. Well, what else? Let me see—I’ll get Pops to show you round the ship, the most important places, mess, briefing room, quarters. We don’t have single quarters available at the moment, so you’ll share with Pops. You’ll meet the others soon enough, but you’ll usually find them in the mess or in the hangar.’ He considered. ‘That’s all I can think of right now. When you’ve got any further questions, just ask me.’

‘Well . . . the first problem’s going to be that I’ve never seen a Y-wing from the inside,’ Samica confessed.

‘You’ve—’ He broke off, shaking his head. ‘Willard, that cunning old devil. All right, so we’ll put you through a couple of sims. What have you flown?’

‘TIE fighters, shuttles, and a YT-1300, and X-wings in sims.’

‘Good. You’ll see that Y-wings combine about the best features of most of those: they’re as tough as a freighter, but with as much firepower as a TIE fighter. And don’t let any X-wing jock tell you otherwise.’ He winked at her, then keyed something into his comlink. ‘Dutch here. Can you spare an hour or two to show the new kid around? – Thanks.’

He put the device away. ‘Pops is coming down to show you where everything is. I’ll see you in the simulator tomorrow, Samica.’

‘Sam,’ she corrected him, much to her own surprise.

‘Sam, then,’ he agreed.

OoOoO

‘Pops’ was really Davish Krail, an aging pilot from Alderaan, with receding hair and a stocky build. Like Dutch, he wore an orange flight suit, even though he hadn’t been on duty just then. As soon as the older man had joined them, the commander left for the mess.

‘You haven’t flown one of those?’ Pops asked Samica with a nod towards the Y-wings.

‘Not yet. I’ve spent the last five days in sick bay.’

‘I’ve heard. Well, if you like, we could see if the sim room is free, and get in some practice time for you. You haven’t got a flight suit yet, either, have you?’

She shook her head.

‘So we’ll see the quartermaster first, after you’ve stored your stuff in our room.—I hope you don’t mind sharing your quarters with an Alderaanian.’

‘Comman— I mean, Dutch was worried about that too, but no, I don’t mind.’

‘Fine,’ Pops said. ‘You wouldn’t believe how often I’d heard jokes about pacifists who ought to stay at home instead of fighting the Empire.’

‘I’ve heard one of them,’ Samica said with a shrug. ‘It was directed at a fellow cadet of mine while I was at the Academy. An Alderaanian called Tycho Celchu. The one who’d pulled the joke never did it again, though; he had to be carried to the sick bay.’

‘Irritable pacifist, was our Celchu?’ Pops grinned.

‘Might have been just one stupid joke too many.’

‘I can’t fault him. By the way, Sam, this is your ship.’

Pops had stopped before one Y-wing near the exit of the hangar. It looked like most of the other snubfighters, maybe a bit more battered than some, with a nasty-looking laser burn along the cockpit. Several parts looked as if they’d been very recently replaced, and a bucket of paint standing next to the Y-wing indicated that more cosmetic work was still in progress.

‘It’ll need a new paint job as well as a new viewport,’ Pops explained. ‘But these ships are the toughest starfighters in the galaxy. Some of them have been in use during the Clone Wars. Not this one, though.’ He patted the ship’s hull. ‘The R2 unit is new; it was part of this frigate when we . . . ah . . . liberated it. This is R2-R5.’

A little R2 unit came wheeling towards them, whistling. Its barrel-like body was painted black with grey, the domed head was white with black stripes. It whistled again.

Samica felt a bit stupid, but said, ‘Hello, R2-R5.’ To her relief, Pops did not seem to find this strange. The astromech droid let out a series of whistles and bleeps.

‘He says hi,’ Pops translated. ‘Don’t worry, you’ll understand them soon enough. And in the cockpit, whatever he says is being translated and shows up on your screen. Astromechs are a tremendous help in a snubfighter. They bother about shields and perform systems checks, and they can be programmed to play against you in a match of Quadrant or Trident.’ He grinned at her wondering look. ‘If Dutch asks, I never said that. But those long hyper jumps can be awfully boring.’

‘What kinds of missions will we be flying?’ Samica wanted to know.

‘All kinds of things, that’s the advantage of Y-wings. They’re among first choice for various functions. Raids, escort duty, starfighter combat, reconnaissance . . . although High Command relies on X-wings for most missions that require speed these days. Still, we’ve got a lot more Y- than X-wings, so be prepared to do about everything you can imagine.’

He led her to a turbolift, which took them up one level to the pilots’ quarters, mess, briefing room and ready station. The room she would share with Pops was small and sparse, with two bunks in the bulkheads, two lockers, and a small table with a data terminal and a chair before it. There was a door leading to a tiny refresher station, which they shared with the adjacent cabin.

Pops waited while she stored her flight bag in her locker. When she was finished and was about to close it again, she saw a flimsi picture hanging on the inside of the door, and she gave it a closer look. It showed a young woman with long reddish-brown hair and freckles, laughing into the imager. There was a small house behind her, a farmhouse maybe, with fields and trees visible in the background.

Pops had leaned in to see what was taking her so long, then reached over to take the picture out. ‘I’ll take that,’ he said, his voice tight.

‘From my . . . predecessor?’ Samica said softly.

Pops nodded. ‘Most of the time, Y-wings last longer than the ones who fly them.’ He folded the picture and laid it into his own locker. ‘Come on,’ he said, briskly. ‘Let’s get you a flight suit.’

OoOoO

That evening, after Pops had shown her most of the places she needed to know, he went through a sim run with her. He had been rather impressed, which surprised Samica, because she felt she could have done a lot better. She supposed she would have to get used to the rather sluggish Y-wings and rely more on her shields than on speed.

After the simulator run, Pops took her to the cantina at the same level, which served as the pilots’ lounge.

There were seven people seated at a long table in the room, eating or drinking, all of whom turned around when she and Pops entered. Pops had already told her that most pilots in the Alliance’s Starfighter Command were human males, and this was true for Gold Squadron as well, as Samica saw only one nonhuman among the six men at the table; there were no women at all. This was rather unusual, or so Pops had told her, as female pilots were not quite as rare here as in the Empire, but that fact didn’t bother her. It had never been any different in her life.

They looked different from Imperial pilots, however. Some of them wore their hair far longer than Imperial regulations would have allowed, and they all appeared to be less conscious about rank and privilege than she’d experienced with any pilots she had ever served with.

Several of them had been engaged in a heated discussion, which broke off abruptly as they entered. One short, very young-looking man, still in his teens, with a thick mop of dark brown hair and twinkling brown eyes, turned to Pops with an exasperated sigh.

‘Pops, we told you to keep her away from the mess! We’re not finished!’

Samica felt a queasy feeling return at the idea that Rebel pilots might be as unhappy about female company as Imperials, but another young man with short blond hair and a merry face, hardly older than the one who had first spoken, finished, ‘Yes, you can’t expect us to come up with a proper welcome committee at only a day’s notice!’

Pops turned to Samica with a grin. ‘You’re lucky. Stars know what that would have looked like.’ To the others, he said, ‘Let’s see some manners, guys. There’s a lady present.’

‘Hardly,’ Samica murmured, which was taken up with grins from the others.

The teenaged pilot stood, holding out his hand. ‘I’m Teddie, and Pops is right, you are lucky. Our last idea was to bring in a group of dancing Wookiees for a welcome and send them into your quarters when you were asleep, but I doubt we’d have survived Pops’ retaliation strike.’

‘I never retaliate,’ Pops said with dignity. ‘That’s below a pacifist.’

‘Go tell it to a stormtrooper, Pop. Or to Dutch. You’re as vindictive as a Hutt whose tail got stepped on.’ The friendly-faced blond pilot nodded towards Samica. ‘I’m Jay. I’m not normally that nasty, however, that’s just Teddie’s bad influence.’

Another pilot, dark-skinned, around thirty, who was sitting with Teddie and Jay, introduced himself as well. ‘Perrard, but everyone calls me Perry.’

‘He’s our stand-in Corellian,’ Teddie chimed in.

‘I’m Samica Trey,’ Samica introduced herself. ‘You can call me Sam, though. Why stand-in?’

‘Because he’s from Saccoria, not a proper Corellian,’ Teddie explained.

‘I never said I was,’ Perry defended himself. ‘You keep harping on that.’

‘Now that we’ve had the kids’ club, you’ll want to meet the adults,’ someone else said, a tall, gangling young man with wavy brown hair and a sardonic grin, who could not be that much older than Teddie or Jay. ‘Lieutenant Gwarn Lepira, Gold Four.’

‘I told you not to lie anymore,’ Teddie rebuked him. To Samica, he finished, ‘He’s called Gawky, but he simply tries to ignore it.’

Gold Four rolled his eyes with all the indignation of maybe two years’ seniority. ‘All right, but I can always try.’

An older pilot in his forties raised a hand in greeting. ‘Ryle Torson, Gold Three. If you need any souping up done on your ship, I’m your man.’

‘And if you want a hyper breakdown because of a complete systems failure due to those modifications, he’s also your man,’ a young man with curly blond hair added. ‘My name’s Tiree, Gold Two. I’m Dutch’s wingman.’ She remembered him; it was the pilot she’d seen with Dutch in the hangar that morning.

‘This is Plancal,’ Tiree introduced the last pilot at the table, who hadn’t added anything to the conversation so far. He was not human, but had a large salmon-coloured head with huge bulbous eyes on the sides. His hands were equally large and resembled fins. Samica had never met a Mon Calamari, but she had seen enough holos to recognise him as a member of the water-loving, peaceful amphibian race of the world that bore the same name as its people, which had been discovered and enslaved by the Empire a decade ago. Samica knew that, in certain circles on Imperial Centre, it had been the latest rage to keep a Calamari slave.

Plancal nodded towards Samica, and she wondered whether he understood Basic at all, then he surprised her by saying, ‘Welcome to Gold Squadron, Sam.’ His voice was very low and gravelly, but perfectly understandable.

‘Now that you’ve had the pleasure, I do hope you’re not thinking about quitting again,’ Pops said quietly as they sat down at the table, but he was smiling.

‘No, certainly not.’ Samica was a bit uncomfortable with being the centre of attention, but she was fairly certain that what she’d just seen was nothing more than high jinks she simply wasn’t used to. They had sat down at the end of the table, opposite Tiree and the Mon Cal, and she was grateful for that. Teddie and his lot were going to take some getting used to.

‘You’ve flown combat missions before, Sam?’ Tiree wanted to know.

‘Yes, a couple. Not in wishbones yet, though.’

Tiree stopped short for a second, and she saw Gawky turn as well. Blast, so she’d managed to put her foot in it first thing.

Tiree leaned across the table. His voice was low, but he didn’t seem to be too offended. ‘Hey, Sam . . . I’d not call them that if I were you. At least I’d never let Dutch hear it. You’ll think differently about them once you’ve flown a few missions.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Samica said, sure she’d blushed beet-red. ‘I don’t know what I’ve been thinking.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Pops interrupted. ‘I’m sure you didn’t want to step on anyone’s toes.’

‘You’re from Coruscant?’ Gawky asked, leaning in.

‘Yes. Is it that obvious?’

‘You talk like a Throneworlder. I’ve got an aunt in Imperial City. I don’t think she likes me a lot right now.’ He grinned.

‘Proper Imperial?’

‘Proper Imperial. You’ve been to the Academy?’

‘Now how did you know that?’ Samica asked.

‘You wouldn’t have learned TIE pilots’ slang anywhere else. But you haven’t shot down any of ours, have you?’

Before Samica could reply, Pops intervened. ‘Leave her, Gawk,’ he said, a hint of annoyance creeping into his voice. ‘Even if she did, the better she’s changed sides. For today, you’ve made it amply clear what a smart-ass you are, thank you very much.’

Gawky drew back with a wink.

OoOoO

Before turning in that night, Samica paid another visit to her ship in the hangar. It was clear that many of the pilots she’d met today had a very personal relationship to their snubfighters, more so than she was used to, and she found that she liked the notion. She doubted she’d go as far as giving her ship—or her astromech—a name, but her life depended on her equipment, and she supposed she’d better treat it well.

When she entered the hangar, she saw that a shuttle had landed in it, and that several techs were working on her Y-wing. For them, it was probably not evening—everyone aboard a space ship had their own schedule and thus their own idea of when evening or morning was, and these techs were probably beginning their morning shift. She helped them for a while, familiarising herself with the interior of the starfighter, when she saw a familiar figure walk across the hangar towards the shuttle. He looked over at their group for a moment, then looked away and hurried towards the transport. It was Rhun, and she was certain that he’d seen her.

‘Rhun!’ she called to him, and he stopped, turning slowly. She didn’t have the impression that he was very happy to see her.

‘Yes?’ he said curtly.

‘I haven’t seen you for a while,’ she said in a conversational tone. ‘What have you been doing?’

He grimaced and turned away. ‘You don’t want to know.’

Samica frowned. ‘If I didn’t want to know, I wouldn’t have asked.’

‘Then maybe I don’t want you to know.’

‘Top secret?’ she guessed.

Rhun gave a short laugh that didn’t sound amused in the least. ‘I’m running errands,’ he said. ‘Delivering data. The most interesting thing I’ve done this week. The rest was sitting in front of the computer for hours.’

Samica threw him a puzzled look. ‘Aren’t you in IntelOps anymore?’ she asked.

‘Nope.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because I screwed up last mission and Commander Willard has decided I’m not capable. Well, I guess he’s right. I haven’t done anything right on that mission, have I?’ He looked at his chrono. ‘Sorry, I must be going.’ Without any further word, he turned and entered the shuttle.

Samica looked after him, speechless, with a lump in her throat she couldn’t quite explain.

OoOoO

The next day, Dutch tested her in the simulator, along with the rest of the squadron. Whether it was because the exercises he gave her were that much harder than what she’d done with Pops the previous day, or whether she was still worried about Rhun’s behaviour last night, Samica did more poorly than she’d ever had in her entire life. Dutch looked at her results, then at the ones she’d scored yesterday, then at the ones he’d obviously got from Captain Jevarra from Samica’s X-wing sessions, and shook his head.

‘I don’t understand this. Sorry, Sam, but that was about the worst sim run any of my pilots has ever flown. Are you sure you’re all right?’

Samica shrugged unhappily. ‘I don’t know, s— Dutch. I’ve been wondering . . . ‘ She looked up at him. ‘In debriefings . . . do you want your people to be short and precise, or do you want them to elaborate?’

Dutch knitted his dark brows. ‘I can’t imagine you’ve been worrying about debriefings, Sam.’

‘Maybe I have. How do you want them to be?’

Dutch shook his head. ‘Well, I certainly don’t want to hear ballads on a mission, but I like it when people evaluate their actions. Helps me to find out how they assess their own achievements . . . or their squad mates’. Does that answer your question?’

‘I think so, sir. Thank you.’

‘I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me what this is all about.’

‘Maybe later, sir.’

‘Sam, I told you—drop the "sir".’

OoOoO

There was only one shuttle going over to Liberty that day, and Samica had to hurry to catch it, half an hour after her disastrous sim run. One more lesson she’d learned. And here she’d thought that, at not quite nineteen, she’d learned all she could. Hah.

A female trooper Samica had never met was on duty before Commander Willard’s office today, and she told her the commander was busy.

‘It’s important,’ Samica said. ‘Please ask the commander if he can spare ten minutes, Sergeant.’

The sergeant cast her a measuring glance, then spoke into her comlink. ‘Sir, Lieutenant Trey is here and needs to talk to you.—Yes, I told her so, but she insists it’s urgent.—Yes, sir.’

She clipped the comlink to her belt again. ‘Ten minutes,’ she said.

‘Thanks, Sergeant,’ Samica said as she entered Willard’s office.

The commander took a while before he put down his work and returned her salute. ‘This had better be important, Lieutenant,’ he said.

‘I’m sorry, sir, but I’ve made a mistake a week ago, and I need to correct it.’

‘What are you talking about?’

She drew a deep breath. ‘I ask you to transfer Agent van Leuken back into IntelOps, sir.’

He frowned at her. ‘What makes you say that? He hasn’t sent you, has he?’

‘No, sir, he doesn’t even know I’m here. I think you’ve misjudged him.’

Commander Willard folded his hands on the desk. ‘I have?’

‘I should have told you that without him, we wouldn’t have left Gherro alive. If it hadn’t been for him, I’d have been captured by the Imps. He was not responsible in any way for the failure of the mission. I didn’t tell you because I . . . I didn’t realise that any evaluation was called for during the debriefing.’

Willard made no reply, only watching her intently. At least he seemed less annoyed with the disturbance than he had when she entered.

‘I’ve made a mistake, sir, and if van Leuken was transferred because of that, I ask you to cancel his transfer. I didn’t mean to question your judgment, but I didn’t give you all the information you needed.’

Willard considered for a couple of seconds, then he nodded. ‘Very well, Lieutenant. Thank you for offering a new perspective on the matter.’

She gathered up all her courage to ask one more question. ‘What will happen to van Leuken?’

‘I’ll see.’ He nodded to her. ‘Dismissed, Lieutenant.’

She saluted and left, heading down to the hangar once more, when she came across Rhun, who was just leaving the canteen.

He frowned when he saw her aboard Liberty, and this time, he stopped.

‘What are you doing here?’ he asked. He looked tired, but maybe he was only downcast.

She shrugged. ‘I’m on my way back to Defiance. My shuttle’s leaving in ten minutes, so I haven’t got long.’

He looked at her for a couple of seconds, then sighed. ‘When will you stop thinking in Imperial standard procedures?’

She smiled slightly. ‘Maybe I already have.’

His face was puzzled and perhaps a little hopeful, but then he frowned again, and she touched him lightly on the shoulder. ‘See you later.’

OoOoO

Half an hour later, Samica returned to Defiance and was surprised to find none of the Gold Squadron pilots in the mess or in the hangar. There was a message on the comm terminal in the room she shared with Pops, saying the whole squadron was to assemble in the briefing room—at 1300 hours.

Which had been half an hour ago.

Her stomach sinking, she hurried for the briefing room, hoping faintly that Dutch didn’t go on first impressions. If he did, her career in Gold Squadron was probably over.

The briefing room was on the small side, with only twenty seats, and nine heads, eight human and one Calamari, turned as she tried to slip in unnoticed.

‘. . . to stay close to your wingman,’ Dutch was saying. ‘Secondly, we have to make sure all are accounted for.’ He waved off Samica’s salute. ‘Sit down, Sam. You can tell me later.’

She swallowed and sat down next to Tiree. Dutch was obviously speaking about that morning’s simulator run, and she mentally kicked herself. She and Dutch had even talked about debriefings before she went off on her own and left the ship without her commander’s leave.

After the briefing, Dutch waited for all the others to leave before he asked Samica, ‘Now what was this all about?’

She sighed. ‘I had to talk to Commander Willard. A week ago, I went on a mission with an IntelOps agent. It went wrong, and it was really nobody’s fault, but he was dumped in Intentions because I had failed to tell the commander it was he who got us out. I hadn’t realised that, so I had to sort that out. I’m sorry; I know I should have asked your permission first.’

He made no reply, only watched her, and she began to shift uncomfortably.

‘And what do you suggest I should do now?’

‘I don’t know.’ She swallowed the "sir" just in time.

Dutch scratched his neck. ‘Awright, get in some more sim time. I have a distinct feeling that after your little excursion, it’s going to be better than the one this morning. And don’t forget to ponder your wrongdoings.’

At least now she was certain he was pulling her leg. ‘Constantly.’

‘Not as constantly as to screw up the way you did last time, please. I’ll join you in two hours and see how you’re doing.’

‘Thank you,’ she said, seriously now, but he waved it off.

‘You’re settling in, I can see that, but don’t you try to pull those stints on me when you’re fully established. Understood?’

‘Yes, Chief.’

He jerked his head towards the exit. ‘Off you go.’

OoOoO

Dutch was more impressed with her results this time, and she found Rhun had been the reason for her poor performance earlier. She still couldn’t be sure that Commander Willard was going to give him his old posting back, but she didn’t doubt that he was willing to reassess the situation once more.

She also found that with Y-wings, her approach had been wrong at first. She had thought of them as starfighters like TIEs or even X-wings, and by her definition, starfighters were agile, and so the craft had seemed horribly sluggish to her. This time, she’d forced herself to think of them as larger craft—like shuttles or freighters, to which they compared very favourably, as their shields were almost as strong, but they were much more nimble. Until she was as used to the ships as she had been to TIE fighters, it seemed a good idea to look at them in a different light, and it was obvious it worked.

Dutch viewed her results and nodded appreciatively. ‘Not bad, Sam, not bad at all. Well, I suppose we can take you on your first patrol tomorrow. Your ship’s finished, or so the techs tell me; I want you to go over it once again with your astromech, to make sure everything’s all right. You can ask the help of one of the others to help you if you’re not certain yet how a Y-wing should look like when it’s in working order. I wouldn’t advise you to ask Ryle, however.’

‘Is he really that bad with modifications?’

‘No, he’s that quick with them. StarCom is not exactly happy about all the modifications that are being done to the ships without their consent. And most of them are completely useless.’

Samica stretched slightly. ‘I’ll see to that after I’ve had something to eat,’ she said.

Dutch consulted his chrono. ‘You’ll fly a patrol with Tiree and me at 900 hours tomorrow, so you’ve got plenty of time. Try and get some sleep, though. There have been pilots who did that during missions.’

She noticed his use of the past tense and grinned.

There were five pilots in the mess when Samica entered: Pops, Tiree, Teddie, Perry, and Jay. She knew that Ryle and Gawky were on a patrol together, Plancal was probably ‘re-hydrating’, which meant he spent hours in the shower. She got some food from the processor and took her tray over to where Pops and Tiree sat.

Tiree grinned. ‘Now what was all this about in the briefing room?’

Samica shrugged. ‘I hadn’t realised there was a briefing.’

Pops gave her an apologetic look. ‘I’m sorry, but Dutch asked me not to remind you. You know, you have to make sure you look at your messages regularly, Sam.’

She nodded. ‘It was an exception.’

‘I bet the others you were a spy,’ Teddie said cheerfully.

Samica snorted. ‘Yes, so I went to Commander Willard’s office to tell him in person. I hope you didn’t bet too much, Teddie.’

‘Just five credits. But we’ve still got no proof you aren’t, do we?’

She started to say something in return when the door flew open, and in came Rhun van Leuken, grinning as hugely as she’d ever seen him, with a kitbag over his shoulder. He went across the lounge to her table, bent over her, kissed her cheek, turned around, called, ‘Thank you!’, and was gone as quickly as he’d entered. Samica stared at the door through which he’d vanished and became aware of her squad mates’ laughter.

‘All right,’ she heard Teddie say. ‘You’re not a spy. I know what the next bets are going to be about.’

She turned back to her food, not knowing whether she should let the grin allow to spread across her face or if the wanted the ground to swallow her.

Pops patted her shoulder. ‘Whatever you’ve been doing, the time wasn’t wasted, it seems,’ he chuckled.

Samica was glad it hadn’t been.

7

Captain Noell Roos stood with his hands folded behind his back, the favoured pose of most senior Naval officers, conveying a certain air of nonchalance and competence, or so Roos hoped. Right now, the pose was a necessity to remind him and his bridge crew of what he was rather than anything else, however. The face visible in the holotank was glaring at him, and the worst thing about the whole situation was that he absolutely deserved being glared at.

Roos swallowed hard and cleared his throat. ‘Admiral Leszek, I assume full responsibility for this. I’d like to point out, however . . .’

‘Hah!’ the admiral spat out. ‘You assume responsibility. Of course you do. Captain Roos, your stupid personal vendetta has cost us the capture of two Rebel corvettes and gained us nothing but a vaped bloody freighter!’

Roos stood stock-still, feeling the atmosphere of feverish activity on the bridge around him. They were pretending they didn’t notice anything of what was happening between their captain and the admiral, but Roos was certain Leszek had chosen both the moment and the setting for his dressing-down with equal care.

‘I thought that the Rebel officers were trying to get away on that freighter, sir, that’s why I ordered pursuit of the ship rather than the corvettes.’

‘Captain, how many starfighters have you got at your disposal?’

‘One wing, sir.’

‘And how many other craft have you got aboard that bloody ISD of yours?’

Roos swallowed again. ‘Five Skipray blast boats and four assault shuttles, sir. But I remind you I was told to keep the Skiprays’ existence secret for now . . .’

‘Then why in the Emperor’s name did you order your entire contingent of TIE fighters—seventy-two, unless I am mistaken—to pursue one freighter?’

‘Admiral, I didn’t order them to–’

‘No, you didn’t, you didn’t give any orders at all concerning the other ships, so absorbed were you in shooting down a single ship. Captain, you will stay in orbit around Ghorman until an Imperial committee has settled this matter. You will not attempt to move anywhere. Is that understood?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Without any further word from the admiral’s image, the ship-to-ship transmission flickered out. Captain Roos remained standing in front of the holotank for a while, then turned abruptly.

‘Lieutenant Commander Juros, you have the bridge.’

‘Aye, sir,’ Juros replied, then the Captain went out, the bridge blast doors sliding shut behind him. There was an almost audible collective sigh of relief running through the bridge of ISD Relentless.

Lieutenant Commander Juros, Executive Officer of the Star Destroyer, sat down on the Captain’s chair, chin rested on his steepled hands. He had spent the last seven standard months hunting for some phantom Rebels the Captain deemed responsible for the death of his wife in the explosion of a factory in the Ghorman system a standard year ago. When Roos had finally found the freighter he’d been chasing for all this time, the man had almost forgotten about the two corvettes that were with his prey. When he had realised at last that he was about to let a good catch escape, the Captain had very nearly panicked, had managed to destroy the freighter, but the two capital ships had made hyperspace before he got his starfighter tactics sorted out.

He keyed a code into the comm terminal at his side. ‘Lieutenant Nawroth, please.’

After a while, he got a reply. ‘Nawroth here.’

‘I’d like a word with you, Lieutenant. Would you please come to my office at 1900 hours?’

‘Certainly, Commander.’

‘Thank you, Lieutenant.’

OoOoO

Samica awoke with a start at a clicking sound outside the door.

The room was in total darkness, and as she listened, the only thing she could hear was Pops snoring softly in the other bunk. She had become used to it and hardly heard it anymore, but there had been something else, like somebody worrying with the door control panel. This struck her as odd; if anyone had a reason for disturbing them, he could just have buzzed.

The light switch was by the door so she couldn’t reach it from the bed, and she didn’t have a glow rod ready, either. For a while, she lay there wondering whether a clicking sound warranted her getting up and having a look, but the noise did not come again, and she dozed off once more.

She jerked upright several minutes later as a deafening noise sounded in the cabin, patting around for her flight suit in a fighter pilot’s reflex, when she realised the noise was music.

The door was open, a slender beam of light from the corridor outside illuminating two giant figures that had moved into the room, swaying about as if on wheels, turning and rocking to the music blasting from a speaker somewhere in the corridor.

Pops had jumped out of bed, holding a blaster pistol and shouting for lights. Outside, several people had run together, and one of them hit the light switch. Samica, who had given up fishing for her flight suit, stared at the scene that presented itself to them.

The figures that had entered where about two metres tall, but they were metal and cloth rather than flesh and blood. They were two astromech droids with poles fixed to them, extending nearly to the ceiling of the room, from which hung something that looked like carpets held together by a lot of engine tape. All the while, the music kept blaring, sounding like a mix between a drummer taking out a mortal grudge on his instruments, and a herd of banthas in mating season.

Pops, Samica and five crew members standing outside the door stared for a couple of seconds before someone thought to turn down the music, then Pops ordered the droids to stop. They did so, dutifully stopping their turning and rocking, and the poles-and-carpet constructions mounted on top of them swayed some more before they, too, stood still.

Pops, clad in shorts and a shirt, was standing before the two apparitions, apparently wondering if a shouting bout was called for, then he looked at the five people outside, who were fighting to keep the corners of their mouths under control, and decided that they probably didn’t have anything to do with this.

‘All right, the party’s over,’ he growled. ‘You!’ He turned to the two droids. ‘What idiot dressed you up like this?’

There was a sheepish hoot from under one of the taped-together carpets.

Pops took off the construction, and Samica followed suit with the other droid, revealing her own astromech as well as Bolts, Pops’ R2 unit.

‘At least he was smart enough not to take his and Jay’s for this,’ Pops mumbled.

‘Who?’ Samica asked.

‘Who else? Teddie, of course. I really wouldn’t have thought he’d actually follow through with his silly "dancing Wookiees" thing.’ Pops shook his head. ‘Bolts, I want you to listen carefully now. If ever Teddie approaches you again, closer than, oh, five metres, you have my permission to get very, very nasty. Got that?’

The little droid whistled happily, then hooting plaintively, probably complaining about his mistreatment.

Samica had sat down on her bed again. ‘How often does this happen?’ she asked, yawning.

‘Never again,’ Pops said, in a tone that augured badly.

‘What are you going to do?’

‘I’ll figure something out. Just don’t tell Dutch. I think that in this case more drastic measures are justified.’

Samica blinked a couple of times, but then went back to bed. She didn’t know how she had expected her wingman to react, but an actual revenge had not been on her list.

There was a briefing scheduled for the following day, concerning an escort mission for a convoy of transports carrying supplies for a new base in the Yavin system. It was the first actual mission Samica would be flying for the Alliance, and Dutch wanted her as his wing for the trip, to see how she got along, and probably the better to have an eye on her.

When they left the briefing room, she could hear Teddie and Jay’s hardly stifled laughter, but she could also see Pops’ expression turning into a vicious grin when they weren’t watching. Mentally, Samica shook her head. She wasn’t used to old-timers like Pops displaying the same sort of juvenile humour teenagers did, but maybe it didn’t have to do with age. Samica was ten standard days short of her nineteenth lifeday, and she wouldn’t have dreamed about dressing up R2 units as dancing Wookiees even if she’d been fifteen.

OoOoO

Lieutenant Commander Juros looked up from his dinner, which he preferred eating in his own quarters, when the door buzzer sounded.

He pressed the admittance key. ‘Yes?’

‘Lieutenant Nawroth, Commander.’

‘Come.’ The Executive Officer of ISD Relentless finished the last of his nerf steak and sat back from the table, shoving the plate out of the way.

The door opened, and a small, wiry man in a spotless white COMPNOR uniform entered.

‘Lieutenant Nawroth. Have a seat.’ Juros gestured to the seat in front of his desk. ‘Drink?’

Nawroth raised an eyebrow. ‘Very well.’

Juros keyed a button, and a droid whirred in, pouring a brownish-yellow liquid for both of them. Nawroth picked up his glass. ‘Corellian brandy?’

‘Whyren’s Reserve.’

The COMPNOR officer took a sip and nodded appreciatively. ‘Well, Commander, you do have taste. I am certain, however, that you didn’t invite me here to have a drink with you.’

‘That’s true, Lieutenant.’ Juros sat back in his chair, crossing his legs. ‘Actually, I was wondering what will happen to Captain Roos after today’s rather . . . spectacular show.’

Nawroth hid a sardonic smile behind his glass of brandy. ‘And I don’t suppose you could have waited to hear about it along with everyone else on the ship?’

‘Call me curious, Lieutenant.’

The commissioner pondered the other man’s words for several seconds, then he said, ‘He’ll be given another chance. Not in the Core, of course.’

Juros frowned. ‘Why so lenient?’

‘You don’t seem to approve of the admiralty’s lenience,’ Nawroth observed.

‘Lieutenant, I am a patriot, and as such, I am convinced that incompetence has no business on the bridge of one of the Emperor’s Star Destroyers.’

Nawroth waited.

Juros hesitated for a few beats, but he knew he’d gone too far already to go back now. ‘What I’m saying is that there are better choices for a Star Destroyer commander than Captain Roos.’

‘Meaning you?’

‘Lieutenant, I’m not an ambitious man. I’m glad to serve the Empire, and I would be more than honoured to serve it under a competent Captain. But we have seen today that Captain Roos is not competent in the least, and I say he should be replaced.’

‘You are talking mutiny, Commander.’

Juros leaned forward across the table to look the COMPNOR officer in the eyes. ‘When the Emperor made himself ruler of the galaxy to counteract spreading corruption, was that mutiny?’

Lieutenant Nawroth stroked his chin. ‘I think I’m beginning to see your point.’

OoOoO

Samica climbed up the ladder that led into the cockpit of her Y-wing. R2-R5 was being lowered into the droid socket in the back of the fighter, and he whistled something. She looked at the screen in her cockpit where the translation scrolled over the display.

IT’S GOOD TO BE DOING SOMETHING USEFUL, the astromech remarked.

‘Indeed,’ Samica replied, putting on her flight helmet. It was open-faced, as opposed to the Imperial ones, and a stained grey; she hadn’t decided on a design for it yet.

Flicking switches on the console before her, she saw all the lamps glow green, and seconds later, the engines began to hum.

‘This is Gold Leader,’ she heard Dutch’s voice come in over comm, heavily distorted, much more so than in an Imperial ship. ‘Report status.’

‘Gold Two, standing by.’

‘Gold Three, ready to burn.’

‘Gold Four, ready.’

‘This is Five, I’m ready.’

Samica keyed her comm. ‘Gold Seven, all in the green.’

‘Gold Eight is ready,’ Jay said.

‘Nine standing by.’ That was Teddie’s voice.

Then Plancal’s gravelly voice, unmistakable even through comm distortion: ‘Gold Eleven, two lit and in the green.’

‘Twelve standing by,’ Perry reported.

‘All right, golden boys . . . and girl. Here we go.’ Dutch’s Y-wing lifted off, and Samica followed against normal order, taking her place as his wing behind him. Ten Y-wings flew towards the hyper jump point and entered hyperspace, towards their destination.

The jump was short by normal standards, but for Samica, ten hours seemed like a lot, considering she sat in a cockpit that would let her stretch her legs from time to time, but little else besides. She had never minded long hyper jumps, but she was used to making them in ships that gave her a chance to stretch her limbs from time to time.

When they had been in hyperspace for about two hours, there was a message from her astromech.

ARE YOU BORED?

‘Why?’ she asked, puzzled.

POPS GAVE ME THIS BEFORE WE STARTED, the droid replied. IT COULD HELP US PASS THE TIME.

Before Samica could ask, the game board of Quadrant, a game commonly played especially in the Empire but apparently also elsewhere, appeared on the screen before her, and she grinned when she saw he’d given her the Rebels.

ESCORT FRIGATE ONE TO BLOCK ALPHA THREE.

‘You knew I was going to move my Carrack-class cruiser there, didn’t you?’

NEVER. I DON’T CHEAT.

She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. ‘All right. Carrack-class cruiser two to block delta three.’

THIS IS GOING TO BE FUN.

‘Don’t count on it. I’m good at this, you know.’

They had played three matches, one won by the droid, two by her, when she realised she was enjoying herself with something she’d always considered a basic commodity.

OoOoO

They exited hyperspace at a planet too small and barren for the Empire to bother with, but for the Alliance, it was a collecting point for larger convoys and their escorts.

There were several bulk freighters here, carrying equipment and larger parts for the new base, as well as medical supplies. R2-R5 identified the transports as Pelican One through Six.

They teamed up with the freighters, Pops and Ryle taking theirs alone, the others escorting their ships by pairs. The one Samica and Dutch were escorting was designated Pelican Three, and the transponder code said it contained spare parts. The convoy moved towards another hyper point on the other side of the planet, and to her, the bulk freighters were almost unbearably slow. She didn’t want to know what would happen if they were attacked.

‘Gold Leader to Pelican group,’ Dutch said over comm, on an open frequency. ‘We’ll enter hyperspace separately, with ten minutes in between, so we’ll clear the hyper point on the other side before the next ships arrive. Each transport will coordinate the jump with its escort. Five?’

‘Yes, Lead,’ Pops’ voice came back.

‘You go first, with Pelican One, then the others, in the order of the freighters’ designation. I want you to go in fifteen minutes.’

‘Copy that, Lead.’

‘Pelican Three, Gold Leader.’

‘Pelican Three, we copy.’

‘My R2 unit will transmit the jump coordinates as soon as Group Two is away.’

‘Affirmative, Gold Leader.’

Samica kept an eye on her sensors. Her Y-wing was the BTL-S3 model, which had a rotating ion cannon and a gunner’s station behind her pilot’s seat, which normally remained empty, but its sensors were weaker than the BTL-A4’s, a reconnaissance ship for only one pilot, without the gunner. They were also weaker than a TIE’s, and that was what worried her most, and she seriously doubted that the bulk freighters were any better in that regard.

Suddenly, she heard R5 hoot, but when she looked at her display, there was no translation.

‘What is it, R5?’

NOTHING. THIS IS WONDERFUL.

‘What do you mean?’

Before the droid had a chance to reply, there was a transmission from Pelican Four, the transport escorted by Teddie and Jay.

‘Gold Leader, this is Pelican Four. Could you be so kind as to translate what your pilots are saying?’

‘Gold Leader here. I don’t understand.’

‘Well, I don’t know about you, but none of the personnel aboard this ship speaks any Wookiee.’

There was a short pause from Dutch. ‘I’m sorry, Pelican Four, I still don’t see . . .’ He switched over to squadron frequency. ‘Gold Nine?’

He was answered by a furious roar that made Samica flinch.

‘Gold Nine, you’re in for some serious trouble if you don’t stop your childish game right now,’ Dutch warned.

Another roar answered him.

Pops’ voice broke in. ‘Kids.’

‘What did you say, Five?’

‘I? Nothing.’

‘Lead? Do you read me?’ Teddie suddenly asked, his voice plaintive.

‘Loud and clear, Nine. Glad to find you’ve grown up. Now would you please see to that coordinating job of yours with your freighter?’

‘Yes, Lead,’ Teddie replied in a very small voice.

‘There’s a good boy,’ Pops said, the grin evident from the sound of his voice.

‘I can’t shake the feeling I don’t have a clue what’s going on here, Five,’ Dutch said, somewhere between annoyance, curiosity and amusement.

‘Let’s just say Nine did some serious growing up today, Chief,’ Pops replied.

Samica heard R5 warble something and read, PROGRAMMED THEIR ASTROMECHS TO REPLACE THEIR TRANSMISSIONS BY WOOKIEE AS SOON AS WE WERE OUT OF HYPERSPACE. I LIKE THAT. I GUESS BOLTS AND I ARE AVENGED.

She just shook her head and, at Dutch’s signal, followed the commander into hyperspace.

CARE FOR A RETURN GAME?

Samica laughed. ‘Just go ahead.’

OoOoO

The most remarkable planet in the Yavin system was Yavin Four, a gas giant glowing red before Samica when they came out of hyperspace nine hours later. It wouldn’t have been that long a jump for a starfighter, but the slow freighters dictated the speed for all the convoy, and she could not wait to use her legs again. At the far side of the planet Yavin lay one of its moons, which was habitable even if it had been deserted for decades. It was an ideal spot for a Rebel base, most emissions being swallowed by the gas giant, which hampered transmissions and made detection difficult. They would briefly stop on-planet before heading back to Suolriep, to refuel and stretch.

The Rebel base lay on the tree-covered main continent of the moon, and the freighters landed on a large bare patch before an enormous stone construction. Samica had seen several of those during their approach, and she could see now that they were buildings entirely built of stone, which ascended in terraces tapering towards the top. The starfighters were guided to one of the buildings, which was large enough to house a hangar for more than three squadrons of starfighters.

When the canopy on her Y-wing popped open, the first thing Samica felt was oppressive heat beating down on her, but worse than that was the humidity. She had spent most of her life on air-conditioned rooms, whether in Imperial Centre, at the Academy or in starships, and she was not used to any harsh climate at all. There was a cacophony of sounds, most of them from animals, birds or the like, when the engines of the fighters died, and the air smelled of decaying vegetation.

She took off her helmet—she found her hair soaked with sweat within minutes—and stiffly climbed down to the ground. To her amazement, it was not duracrete, but solid stone. How did they get all this in here?

She stretched with a moan and walked over to Pops. ‘Quite the place,’ she remarked.

He ran a hand through equally sweaty hair. ‘You can say that.’ Leaning in conspiratorially, he asked her, ‘What did you think of a pacifist’s retaliation strike?’

She shook her head and gently punched him in the shoulder. ‘Little boys, the whole lot of you.’

‘Hey, you’re not going to turn me in, are you?’

‘Wouldn’t want to provoke another retaliation strike.’ She grinned. ‘Pacifist. Hah.’

R5 had been lifted from his socket and came towards them, chirping happily.

Pops grinned. ‘Had a good time, did you?’

She shook her head affectionately. ‘Let’s get something to eat, if they’ve got anything here. And if I don’t find a refresher anytime soon, this will come to an unhappy end.’

OoOoO

They returned to Suolriep sector HQ the following day, after another six hours in the cockpit, but at least they’d had the opportunity to exercise their muscles in between. There was another ship at the gathering point, another cruiser called Steadfast.

Two days later, Samica returned from a joint training mission with X-wing Squadron Blue, a unit that had arrived aboard Steadfast. She was still a bit miffed by the whole exercise—X-wing pilots didn’t hold Y-wings in very high esteem and frequently extended this opinion to the ones who flew them—but her anger vanished when she saw Rhun sitting in the pilots’ lounge aboard Defiance. The lounge was not reserved for pilots, despite its name, but was simply a canteen that happened to be next to the fighter hangar, so it was naturally taken over by the pilots, and it was unusual for anyone else to enter it regularly—unusual, but not unheard of.

‘Rhun!’ she said, smiling. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I heard you were due back, and since I’ve got some free time now, I thought I’d come over.’

Samica sat down with him after she’d paid a visit to the food processor. ‘You’re back in IntelOps?’ She couldn’t quite keep from smiling.

Rhun nodded. ‘How did you know?’

‘Just a hunch.’

He shrugged. ‘Well, not all of the time. I sort of keep commuting between Ops and Intentions. You haven’t done so badly yourself, from what I hear.’

Samica frowned. ‘What would you have heard?’

‘Well, you’ve seen the new base. That means they’ve started trusting you.’

‘And now let me guess to whom I owe that,’ Samica said.

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Rhun replied, and now it was his turn to grin.

OoOoO

Captain Roos looked at his new orders for a long time, torn between relief that he had survived this incident and despair at the nature of his new posting. To be dumped in the Outer Rim Territories after a post in the Core was as good as a dishonourable discharge. He might have survived this, physically, but his career would not.

Slowly, he got up from his chair and walked to the turbolifts that would take him to the bridge. At least he still had his command; they hadn’t taken Relentless away from him. He was still the Captain of a Star Destroyer of the Imperial class, the most prestigious slot to be had in the Imperial Navy, and if he did exceptionally well in his new hunting grounds, he might even return to favour. The possibility was not likely, but it was there. The people who had dumped him here had probably meant it to be life-long exile, but they hadn’t been reckoning with the determination of Captain Noell Roos, Imperial Space Navy.

His bridge crew did their best not to let their curiosity show as the blast doors slid open to admit the Captain. Roos walked over to his chair and sat down.

‘Lieutenant Camaro,’ he said.

His astrogator looked up from his console. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Set coordinates for Suolriep sector.’

‘Aye, sir.’

8

‘I say we just space her,’ Teddie proposed.

The Gold Squadron pilots were sitting in the lounge, after a sim run led by Pops, except Dutch and Tiree, who were flying a patrol. In the three weeks she’d been flying with the squadron, Samica had trained in the simulator far more often than any of the others, and natural talent combined with what Teddie called ‘Imperial work-craziness’, along with her first-hand knowledge on the enemies’ tactics and limitations, had soon propelled her to the slot of one of the squadrons top-notch pilots, at least in simulations. She had yet to see actual combat, but her experience with Imperial procedure had served her so well so far she’d even helped Pops concoct several sim runs.

This one, however, was commonly referred to as the Pops Crusher in Gold Squadron, since it was considered to be the most demanding task. It entailed guarding a Rebel space platform being attacked by a wing of TIEs, with some extra spice added by the fact that the computer was programmed to file away every possible solution any Rebel pilot had ever come up with, so that if you barely succeeded, it was no use trying the same approach again. Samica had cracked the Imperial’s tactics in her first attempt, thus scoring the highest-ever results in the exercise, breaking Dutch’s record by a mere fifteen points.

Samica gave Teddie a smile. ‘Try,’ she said. ‘You in a Y-wing, me in a TIE.’

He scratched his nose. ‘Me in an X-wing, you in a turbolift. And I suppose I’d still get vaped. No, thanks.’

Pops patted her shoulder. ‘Just stay near me in our next mission, kid,’ he said.

She snorted. ‘Don’t try to tell me you need me to look after you,’ she said.

‘Well, in my old age . . . but look who’s here,’ Pops finished as the doors opened and in came Dutch, briefly raising a hand in greeting before getting some caf from the processor.

Jay leaned over the table. ‘Wanna bet he’s not going to bed anytime soon?’ he said with a huge grin.

Dutch came over to their table, taking a seat next to Pops. The caf in his mug looked strong enough to dissolve duracrete. He sipped from the hot beverage, then noticed the others’ expectant looks, and glanced into his mug suspiciously.

‘You didn’t doctor my caf, did you?’

Jay shook his head. ‘Wouldn’t dream about it.’

Dutch drank once more, then set down the mug when the rest of his squadron kept up their loony grinning. ‘What’s up?’ he asked, annoyance creeping into his voice.

‘Sorry, old friend, I think you’d better hear it from me.’ Pops managed to put on the looks of someone bearing tragic news of intergalactic implications. ‘Sam’s just overtaken you in the Crusher.’

‘She hasn’t.’

‘She has.’

Dutch drained his mug and put it down. ‘I have somewhere to be.’ Then he trudged out, and when Samica saw him the next morning, he was wearing a smug grin—and dark circles under his eyes that bespoke some serious lack of sleep.

OoOoO

The data scrolling over the screen of Ensign Berutta, junior communications officer aboard ISD Relentless, would have meant little to nothing to someone unfamiliar with the abbreviations and codes used in comm messages, but Jocelyn Berutta was used to decoding the strings of numbers and letters denoting data gathered from the numerous probe droids Relentless had sent out through space, on the Captain’s orders. She only knew he was acting on the assumption that there was a Rebel base somewhere in Suolriep sector, and the probes were sending in new data every half hour. Most of it simply said that there was nothing to indicate the presence of anything, several others she double-checked with her astro charts to find the emissions picked up by the probe droids came from confirmed settlements and even pirate outposts the Empire knew about but hadn’t acted against yet. Berutta was of the opinion that these pirates should have been Relentless’ true objective, but then, she could understand, to some degree at least, that Roos hoped to be the one to discover and eliminate a Rebel base, rather than letting that honour fall to anybody else.

So she had gone further a step, without asking the Captain, but she was confident her procedure would yield better results than what would have normally been expected of her. Instead of evaluating the data in the order it came in, she picked the ones from middle-of-nowhere first, since she suspected that the Rebels would not be so stupid to hide in any system or near any world known to the Empire. She had done so for five days, with no results so far, and was beginning to worry about the Captain noticing her rather individual style of data gathering. Lieutenant Czerwinski, the senior communications officer and her immediate superior, hadn’t been very interested in her ideas, but as far as she’d been able to tell, he had not forbidden her way of doing things either, so she’d done it anyway. Still, she hoped that there would be something to report soon, because if Captain Roos found nothing in his new hunting grounds, he’d hold the comm officers responsible, and if the most junior comm officer was also a woman, she didn’t need a lot of imagination to find out who’d be picked as scape goat.

More numbers scrolled past, and she hunted for the combination that would tell her one of the probes had found a presence somewhere between uninhabited systems. She knew it was there, and it would be her that would find it.

OoOoO

Rhun sat back from the terminal and yawned. Two hours to go before the end of today’s shift; after that, he’d go over to Liberty to see Samica. He still felt a bit uncomfortable among the pilots, who reminded him of the idiots in Equipment on a particularly bad day, but the two of them had agreed that it was easier for him to break free, because the pilots were normally not allowed to leave the ship on a regular basis.

They’d agreed. That sounded as if anything serious had happened, which was not the case. They were on first-name terms with each other, but he wouldn’t have dared to call her ‘Sam’ the way her squad mates did. At least she’d offered him to call her by her given name before she’d joined the squadron, but she was still an officer.

She still puzzled him, even if he was rather impressed with the way she’d settled in. He liked seeing her, and he was pretty sure that was also true the other way round, but he was still not sure if he was in love with her. Or if she was in love with him, for that matter. Maybe he was even attracted to her because she posed such an enigma to him. But in all fairness to her, she’d come a long way from the stiff Imperial officer he’d met aboard VSD Resolve. Gold Squadron had managed to work wonders—from what he’d heard from Jay, she even talked to her R2 unit.

He set back to work, analysing data from the various Alliance listening posts scattered across space, when he heard a shrill siren wail, and jumped to his feet. Around him, other Intentions people also got up, and he saw red lights flash in the corridor. This was not a drill.

The ship’s intercom crackled to life. ‘Attention, all personnel. Battle stations. An Imperial Star Destroyer has exited hyperspace twenty kilometres distant. Repeat, battle stations, all personnel.’

Rhun saw Captain Candela enter the room, his expression grim, but less disconcerted than he would have expected. Outside, he could see several troopers run towards the turbolift. Rhun knew they were usually detached to help in the damage control centre, but Intel wouldn’t be called upon unless things got really desperate.

Candela stood in the middle of the room, catching everyone’s eye to make sure they were all paying attention and nobody was going to panic. ‘We stay here, out of the way, people,’ he said.

Rhun sat down again, wondering if three Carrack-class cruisers and two frigates stood a chance of surviving an encounter with a Star Destroyer . . . or its TIE fighter complement.

OoOoO

In the hangar, more sirens were wailing, and the red emergency lights illuminated the frantic bustle of activity around the Y-wings. Samica jumped rather than climbed up the ladder and let herself drop into the cockpit. R5 had already started the engines, and she pulled on her helmet and keyed the comm, then checked the systems.

WE’RE READY TO GO, R5 reported.

‘Good.’ Samica retracted the ladder and made sure that the techs had cleared her ship, then she heard Dutch’s voice.

‘Control, Gold Leader. Gold Squadron is ready to launch.’

‘You have clearance.’

‘All right, this is it. Gold Squadron, launch.’ Samica saw Dutch’s ship clear the hangar, followed by Tiree’s, who would act as Dutch’s wingman once again. Ryle and Gawky were next, then Pops steered his fighter out, and she followed her wingman. Several kilometres away, she saw Blue Squadron launch from Steadfast. As soon as she was out, she scanned for enemy ships.

Tiree had had the same idea. ‘Lead, Gold Two. Twenty-four eyeballs coming in from twelve o’clock. Distance five klicks.’

Samica could see them; twenty-four red blips, two squadrons’ worth of TIE fighters.

‘This is Gold Leader. Blue Leader?’

‘I read you, Gold Leader.’ Samica knew that the X-wing squadron’s commander, an Alderaanian called Fregess, was only a few years older than Dutch, and in all fairness to him, he’d never joined his pilots’ jokes about Y-wings . . . not while any Y-wing pilot was listening, at any rate.

‘You can leave Beta Squadron to us. Gold Squadron, save your proton torpedoes for now. Break by pairs; engage at will.’

Samica stayed behind and to starboard of Pops’ Y-wing, picking one of the TIE fighters as her target. They were still in formation, but they would break soon. The Star Destroyer Relentless was hanging back, content for now to launch its starfighters, since even for an ISD, three cruisers and two frigates might prove too formidable an opponent.

But the Alliance fleet did not intend to enter a trial of strength with an ISD. ‘Blue Squadron, Gold Squadron, this is Liberty. Keep the enemy fighters off the capital ships until we can make hyperspace. It should be a matter of no more than ten minutes.’ Samica knew that it was top priority in the Alliance to get all ships out, avoiding hostilities at all costs, even if the enemy was in smaller numbers and/or firepower. Three cruisers and two Nebulon-B frigates pitched against one Imperial-class Star Destroyer were not impossible odds, but the Rebel Alliance could not afford the losses such a battle would inevitably have resulted in.

‘Gold Leader copies. You’ve heard it, people. Good hunting.’

Samica saw Pops before her fire into the cloud of TIE fighters before her, and she followed his example, not waiting to see the result, for Pops broke hard to port, and she mimicked his manoeuvre, staying with him. The TIEs had fired as well, but her shields had held.

HIT, R5 informed her. She bit her lip without noticing, evading a stray laser blow from over her, then heard Pops’ voice over comm.

‘Five here. Seven, trap, I’m going in first.’

‘I copy, Five.’ She saw Pops break and dive, and throttled speed to get behind the enemy fighter that dropped in behind him, then fired. Her shot hit the TIE but did not destroy it, and the Imperial got off a shot at Pops. She saw sparks from his fighter, then the TIE broke off pursuit and climbed, and she stayed behind him, although he was gaining on her slower ship. For a split second, her HUD winked green, and she pressed the fire button, the TIE exploding before her.

She quickly checked the tactical chart. ‘Five? Do you copy?’

‘I copy, Seven. I’ve got severe damage to all weapons systems.’

‘Five, this is Lead. Jump to the rendezvous point right now. That’s an order. You can’t do any good out here.’

‘Copy, Lead. Sorry.’

Pops’ starfighter turned, trailing smoke, which immediately evaporated into vacuum. He seemed to have taken more damage to his ship than just to the weapons systems. Two TIE fighters turned from the dogfight to give pursuit.

‘This is Gold Seven,’ Samica said. ‘I could use some help here.’ She tucked herself in behind the Imperials, hit one of them, and the other broke off the chase, diving. She followed on his tail, towards the medical frigate Redemption, which was two klicks away, but that was still too close for her taste.

Suddenly, she saw the TIE before her blow up, and through the debris came Teddie’s Y-wing.

‘You need help, Seven? Out of pocket?’

She didn’t deign to reply, but turned around to find the TIE she’d damaged earlier. ‘You with me, Nine?’

‘Sure,’ was Teddie’s answer. ‘Wouldn’t want you to run into trouble.’

With Pops’ Y-wing disappearing into hyperspace, Samica teamed up with Teddie and Jay. Jay had some damage to his sensors, but otherwise, he looked to be in working order.

‘R5, status?’

GOLD FOUR AND FIVE OUT OF THE BATTLE, BUT ALIVE, her astromech reported. SEVEN TIE FIGHTERS VAPED, FOUR DAMAGED.

Samica nodded. This could have been worse.

She brought her snubfighter around when Ryle’s voice cut in, ‘Lead, I’ve got two hostiles at three klicks! They’re not eyeballs!’

‘This is Twelve! I’m hit!’

Samica was trying to shake off a TIE at her back at Perry’s panicked cry, and she cursed, jinking randomly, dodging its fire, when the green dot that had been Perry’s Y-wing disappeared from her screen.

‘Lead, Two. They’ve got missiles! I can’t get a clear reading on them, they’re nothing I’ve seen before!’

Samica fired at a TIE trying to slip through their defence towards the capital ships, then there was a transmission on fleet frequency.

‘Gold Squadron, Blue Squadron, this is Liberty. We’re being targeted by missiles!’

‘All right people, this is Gold Leader. Blue Squadron, cover us while we take these newcomers. Seven?’

‘Seven here.’

‘Can you identify the ships?’

Samica shook her head, although Dutch couldn’t see that. ‘Negative, Lead. They’re too large for fighters.’ She dodged another shot from the TIE behind her, this one missing more narrowly. Then suddenly the fighter spun out of control, outwardly undamaged, but the pilot killed by a precision shot.

‘Thanks, Blue Eight,’ Samica said as an X-wing with blue markings drew up behind her.

‘Happy to oblige,’ he replied.

‘This is Eleven,’ said a low, gravelly voice. ‘I can’t shake him.’

‘Seven, team up with Eleven.’

‘I’m on it, Eleven.’ Samica had found Plancal on the tactical, a TIE sticking to his tail. The Mon Calamari pilot was climbing clear of the capital ships to lure his attacker away with him, but that also brought him further away from the friendlies. Samica joined him on a straighter course than Plancal could fly, who was jinking and breaking in order to shake off pursuit, then she had the TIE in her laser range and fired, causing him to blow up in a brilliant flash.

‘Nice shooting, Seven.’ Plancal turned around to rejoin the battle, which had stretched over a larger area now, although the Alliance pilots were trying to keep the larger craft out of this. The X-wings, Samica grudgingly admitted, were a tremendous help against the Imperial fighters. They had lost two pilots, but the remaining ten were taking apart the TIE fighters very effectively. She glanced at the display once more. The two missile-carrying ships were being attacked by Dutch, Tiree and Ryle, but she saw Liberty’s shields were down to twenty percent.

She was well out of range, and she viewed the technical readout R5 gave her on the unknown craft. They were probably twice as large as a Y-wing, but with an odd shape, streamlined, with two sets of stabiliser foils, one extending sideways, the other up and down. She suddenly realised she’d seen the design before. They were—

‘Skiprays,’ she whispered, her blood running cold.

‘What was that, Seven?’

‘That’s two Skipray blast boats over there. They’ve got torpedo and concussion missile launchers, as well as lasers and very powerful ion cannons.’ She reeled off everything she knew about the ships, hoping faintly she could make up for forgetting to tell them about the blast boats sooner.

‘You knew of their existence?’ Dutch’s voice was strained, but she thought she could hear the undertone of a threat.

‘Yes, sir,’ she replied, lapsing into her accustomed way of speaking to a superior officer once again. ‘I—I’m sorry, but I must have forgot—’

‘That can’t be helped now. Get over here, Seven.’ She bit her lip and armed her proton torpedo launchers; the only thing that would really be of any use against a Skipray. Skiprays were far smaller than capital ships, but larger than a starfighter, packing enough firepower to be a serious threat even to a bigger starship, but with strong shields and a reinforced hull that helped them withstand a starfighter’s laser fire very effectively. Samica had learned about their existence briefly, just before her defection, when they were first commissioned, but she hadn’t thought that it might be important to mention them to the Alliance. Obviously, though, the Rebels hadn’t known they existed.

‘This is Liberty,’ a report from the command ship cut in. ‘Our shields are at seven percent.’

‘Redemption is ready to jump out.’

‘Get out of here, Redemption,’ came the reply from Liberty. ‘See you at the rendezvous point.’

‘Good luck,’ Redemption replied, then the medical frigate was gone. Samica tasted something metallic in her mouth and found her lip was bleeding. Rhun was on Liberty.

‘Lead, this is Eight. Twelve fresh eyeballs wanting to join the fray. Distance sixteen klicks.’

‘Take Twelve with you and help the X-wings keep them off us. Seven, I want you to help us here.’

‘Lead,’ Jay’s voice cut in, sombre. ‘Twelve’s gone.’

Samica heard Dutch curse. At length, the commander said, ‘Okay, Two, Three, we’re going to intercept those newcomers. Are you with me, Blue Leader?’

‘’Course,’ the Alderaanian replied.

‘Okay,’ Dutch continued. ‘Seven, you take Eight, Nine and Eleven and keep these boys here off Liberty!’

‘Understood, Lead,’ Samica replied. ‘Eight, Nine, keep those TIEs occupied while Eleven and I worry about the blast boats.’ She forced the thought of Rhun away for now. She’d be of more use to him if she kept her wits together.

OoOoO

Captain Roos stood behind his tactical officer’s station, watching the battle with a growing sensation of triumph. Here was his chance to show he was a good tactician, that under normal circumstances, he was capable of bringing the Rebels to ground.

‘Status report on the cruiser?’ he asked the tac officer.

‘Shields down, hull at 66 percent,’ the lieutenant replied. Roos refrained from gleefully rubbing his hands. His two Skiprays were going to take out a Rebel cruiser all on their own, and even if he was most likely to lose them afterwards, that was a very low price to pay for what he was going to accomplish. There was little hope of destroying the whole Rebel fleet—they were fleeing even now, not intending to battle with a Star Destroyer—but this was his victory, and maybe his return to favour.

‘A word with you, Captain.’

Roos looked around with annoyance on his face. Lieutenant Commander Juros was standing behind him, with Lieutenant Nawroth at his side. Roos hid his disgust. The little ferret, he thought, that’s like him, to seek support from COMPNOR. Birds of a feather.

‘What is it, Commander?’ he asked, deliberately ignoring the COMP.

‘Sir, I’d advise you to capture one of the ships intact.’ Juros’ face looked pinched. ‘We’d gain more from captured Rebels than from dead ones.’

‘You’d advise me. That’s very kind of you, Commander. I acknowledge your advice.’ Roos turned to the tac station once again.

‘Sir, maybe I was expressing myself imprecisely,’ Juros continued, and Roos turned to glower at his exec, then stared at the blaster pistol in the commander’s hand. ‘Captain Roos, you are under arrest, for incompetence and cowardice in the face of the enemy.’

Captain Roos stared at Juros, then at the COMPNOR officer, then suddenly laughed, an incredulous snort, which was all he could think of now. ‘Commander, you’re pushing this decidedly too far. Stop this nonsense and go back to your sta—’ He was cut short by Juros setting the blaster for ‘kill’ with a barely audible clicking sound.

‘I am serious, Mr Roos. Now if you would be so kind as to accompany Lieutenant Nawroth to your quarters?’

Roos retained his goggle-eyed stare, then flushed bright red. ‘Now, listen here, you overbearing little son of a—’

Juros pulled the trigger.

OoOoO

‘Use your torps, Eleven. No use against those boys otherwise.’ Samica brought her fighter around and down on the two Skiprays. This had better work. Liberty didn’t have much more time.

‘Acknowledged, Seven,’ Plancal replied. Teddie and Jay covering them, they dove towards Liberty and the two blast boats, which had just turned around for another strafing run on the cruiser. She targeted one of the two Skiprays and assigned the other to Plancal, then waited for her HUD to turn red. R5 gave a high-pitched, piercing tone indicating a missile lock, and fired two torpedoes.

HIT, the astromech informed her, and she saw the Skipray’s hull was down to thirty percent. Blast, these birds are tougher than I expected, she thought as she armed her torpedo launchers for another pass, checking the tactical for her Calamari wingman. He, too, had fired two torps, and both blast boats were severely damaged.

‘Another go, Eleven,’ she said, then brought her Y-wing around in a tight circle, Plancal remaining directly behind her. She was slightly surprised at the ease with which he copied her manoeuvre, and found she was still far from acknowledging nonhumans as equals. Maybe she ought to start doing that soon.

‘Seven, two eyeballs incoming.’ Teddie’s voice sounded strained. ‘Sorry, couldn’t keep them off you.’

Samica stifled a curse. ‘I’ll bother with them. Finish off those Skiprays, Eleven.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ she heard the Mon Cal’s reply, then she veered off sharply, on an intercept course towards the two TIE fighters approaching her, and she saw one of them was already damaged. She concentrated on the undamaged fighter, firing at him in a head-on run. R5 shrieked as laser blasts pounded her snubfighter, and the deflector shield display flashed white a couple of times, but her astromech had rearranged all shield energy to the front deflectors.

HIT, R5 reported. If he had been human, she supposed, he would have wiped sweat from his forehead.

Her shields down to 10 percent, she broke hard to starboard to intercept the other TIE fighter before he could trouble Plancal. She emerged directly behind him, and guessed his manoeuvrability was hampered by the hits he’d taken earlier, so that speed was no longer his advantage. She got off a shot at him that caused him to break into a spin, ending him up directly in front of her lasers once again. This time, his ship exploded.

‘Eleven, status,’ she demanded.

‘One Skipray destroyed, the other still operational, Seven. He’s going in again. I’ve got damage to stabilisers.’

‘I’m on him. Cover me, Eleven.’

‘Copy, Seven.’

She came down on the blast boat, torpedo launchers armed, when she realised with horror that it was no longer firing proton torpedoes, but blue ion bolts at Liberty. The Skipray was between her and the cruiser, and without a clear lock, it would have been suicidal to fire, since she would most likely have hit the command ship instead. She altered her angle of attack, to have the enemy ship clear of Liberty, when she heard the cruiser’s comm officer’s voice, close to panic:

‘This is Liberty, our systems are failing! Repeat, systems failure due to ion dam—’ Then the transmission broke off abruptly.

OoOoO

Rhun saw the lights go out, immediately followed by the emergency lighting coming online, and jumped to his feet in a reflex to do something, anything, although there was little that could be done on a ship disabled by ion cannons. He saw the other Intentions people in the room look around as panicked as he himself probably did. With systems gone, there were no weapons available for Liberty, no deflectors, no sublight or hyperdrive engines, no communications systems and, once the backup failed, no life support. Although Rhun knew that the Imperials would probably try to pick them up before that.

‘Shut up!’ Captain Candela’s voice cut through the murmur, as he tried to listen to a headset comlink. The others quieted, some of them sitting down again, waiting. The computers in this room were running on backup; the information stored in them was too vital for the Alliance to risk losing it in a situation like this.

Candela’s face was set. ‘All right, listen. The bridge has visual contact to the other ships, and it looks like Defiance is coming around to pick us up. Albeiro, Vilav, Allen, Sarance. You’re going up to the airlock, to help the guys up there. Lanslow, Bania, van Leuken, you’re staying here with me, to purge the intel data from the computers, just in case. Don’t erase them yet, though; download them on data discs, and when this ship gets entered, destroy them. Set to work, then.’

Rhun complied, glad to have something to do, instead of sitting and waiting what would happen. He wondered if it was possible to get used to situations like these, but then, he decided he didn’t want to ever get used to them.

OoOoO

‘Both Skiprays are out, Lead,’ Samica reported.

‘Good work, Seven. We could use some help against the second wave here.’

Samica glanced at the situation on her tactical display. Liberty’s systems had failed, and Defiance was attempting to dock with the command ship in order to rescue the crew; Redemption, Steadfast and Endurance had entered hyperspace, and all that remained of the Alliance fleet, apart from the two cruisers and several freighters entering hyperspace even now, were Gold and Blue Squadron—or what was left of them. Pops and Gawky had left the area, Perry was dead, and Plancal’s ship was damaged. Dutch, Tiree and Ryle, as well as Teddie and Jay, were still operational, and her own shields were rebuilding, thanks to R5’s efforts.

Losses in the X-wing squadron had also been high—Blue Two, Five, Six and Ten were gone, Blue Three having jumped into hyperspace with massive damage to her fighter. Of the second wave of TIEs, seven were still flying, the remnants of the first wave had been destroyed by Teddie and Jay. Another squadron was launching from the Star Destroyer, and the Imperial ship herself . . .

‘Chief,’ Samica said over comm. ‘Relentless is closing in. Distance only fifteen klicks.’

‘Closing in for the kill,’ she heard someone murmur, either Teddie or Jay.

‘Lead here. Cut it, all of you. Eleven, what’s your status?’

‘Operational, Chief,’ Plancal’s low voice came back.

‘Stay with Seven. Lead out.’

‘I copy, Lead.’ Samica formed up with the Calamari, closing the distance to where Dutch, Ryle and Tiree were battling the remainder of the second wave, Jay and Teddie a klick ahead of them.

‘Scratch one eyeball,’ Jay proclaimed as one of the TIEs exploded under his laser fire.

‘That’s more like it,’ Dutch replied, vaping another that had tried to break out of the dogfight to head for the capital ships. Samica dodged fire from a pair of enemy fighters that were coming towards her and Plancal, returning fire at the same time, and heard R5 indicate another hit. An X-wing raced past her, a TIE fighter on his tail, and she brought her ship around to pursue the pair. The Imperial fighter before her was so intent on his prey that he never realised she was there, not before she hit him squarely in his ‘prime target cone’, causing his ship to explode spectacularly.

‘Whew, thanks, Gold Seven,’ the X-wing pilot came in.

‘Never thought I’d see the day,’ she grinned. ‘A pleasure, Blue Eight. I hate debts.’

Suddenly, her astromech began to wail.

TWO MORE SKIPRAYS AT SEVEN KLICKS, he reported.

Dutch had seen them as well. ‘Seven, Eleven, you did pretty well on the last ones. Have you got any torps left?’

‘Five left here, Lead,’ Samica replied. ‘Eleven’s got four left.’

‘Jump to it, then, guys.’

‘Copy, Lead.’ With Plancal directly behind her, she left the furball around the rest of Gold and Blue Squadron and flew towards the two Skipray blast boats that were trying to circumvent the Alliance fleet’s starfighter defence, coming around in a large loop—fortunately, it was also large enough to have taken them out of the range of Relentless’ covering fire. A Star Destroyer’s turbolaser cannons might not be first choice in bringing down something the scale of a snubfighter, but to fight next to one of the giant vessels was not very comforting either. Besides, even a blind hawk-bat might find a granite slug from time to time. And if one of the turbolaser batteries were to hit a fighter by pure chance, there wouldn’t be enough left of it to send home.

‘Arm your torpedo launchers,’ Samica ordered her wingman. ‘Fire on my mark.’

Her HUD turned red the instant the Skiprays started firing on them, and Samica shouted, ‘Mark!’, launching two torpedoes, then broke hard to starboard, into the direction of attack. R5 informed her that her missiles had damaged one of the enemy ships, but she could see that this time, the blast boat’s lasers had eaten through her front deflector screens, inflicting minor damage to the ship’s structure.

‘Eleven, status,’ she said.

There was no response.

Her stomach sinking, Samica searched for Plancal on the tactical chart, but her wingman had vanished from it.

‘Lead, this is Seven,’ she said through clenched teeth. ‘Eleven is gone. Resuming the attack.’

‘I copy, Seven,’ Dutch’s reply came back.

Samica brought the tactical up again, and realised the Skiprays were splitting up to shake pursuit. ‘Seven. I could use some help here,’ she said as she climbed towards the Skipray Plancal had fired on but apparently missed, since it appeared unharmed. She had only three torpedoes left. With luck, that would be enough to finish one of the enemy ships, but not both of them. And they would be in striking distance of Defiance and Liberty within several hundred metres.

She targeted the ship in front of her with two torps again – she’d have to finish this fast—when R5 shrieked, a laser blast slamming into her Y-wing from behind, and she gasped as sparks flew from the console on her right, burning her arm. A TIE fighter had peeled off from the battle behind her and was trying to keep her off the blast boat.

‘I see it, I see it! Stop screaming at me and give me a damage report!’ she yelled at her astromech, trying to stay on target for one shot at the Skipray before her but deciding against it when another laser beam shot past her entirely too close for comfort.

SHIELDS DOWN, R5 answered after a while. ION CANNON’S OUT. SENSOR DAMAGE AS WELL, BUT I THINK I CAN REPAIR THAT.

‘Then do so,’ she ground out. Until now, she’d been in control, but with two blast boats firing at the capital ships before her and a TIE fighter taking her apart from behind, this was getting worse and worse.

There could be no thinking about further pursuing her initial quarry; without shields, it was all she could do to simply stay alive. She jinked and bucked wildly, the TIE right behind her, when suddenly, she saw four red laser beams missing her ship by mere metres, and then the TIE blew up in a bright flash, an X-wing coming through the debris. ‘Whoops, sorry, Gold Seven,’ the pilot said, Blue Twelve, according to her tactical. ‘Don’t take it personal.’

She let out a long, slow breath. ‘Thanks, Blue Twelve . . . I think.’ When she had regained composure, she added, ‘We’ve got to hurry. If they take out Defiance as well . . .’ She didn’t finish her sentence, not wanting to think about what would happen if they did.

‘Roger, Gold Seven. Leave me the intact one, you finish off the other one.’

Samica wasn’t in a mood to protest. Several minutes ago, she would have been appalled at the thought of leaving all the work to an X-wing jock, but in this case, she knew this particular X-wing jock was right; she’d done more than her share in this battle—how many enemies had she shot down today? Four? Seven? Ten?—and her shields were at a meagre twelve percent, not enough to take on a fully operational Skipray and still hope to get away with it.

OoOoO

Rhun was working feverishly, feeling tremors run through the two ships in shortening intervals. Defiance had docked with Liberty a minute ago, and the first of the cruiser’s crew had been evacuated from the ship, but he and the other four Intentions agents would not be allowed to leave before the last of the sensitive data had been erased from Liberty’s memory files.

‘Finished?’ Candela asked.

‘Two minutes, sir,’ Rhun replied. The captain had finished his portion of the work five minutes ago and then joined one of the others, who hadn’t been so efficient. Ritchett Bania was almost done as well, and Rhun wanted nothing so much as to get out of here.

He was inserting his last datacard when another blast hit the ship, and he was knocked from his chair. The emergency lighting flickered and died, and so did the computer screens.

‘Sithspit!’ he heard Candela curse, then a glow rod came to life. Candela considered for a few heartbeats, then bellowed, ‘All right, that’s it! Get the datacards and move it out!’ Rhun hastened to obey, gathering up the cards, and followed the others out of the room, which was now in almost complete darkness. Candela joined them at the door, looking back in to make sure there was nobody left inside.

‘What about the remaining data in the computers?’ Lanslow asked.

Candela produced a remote control ignition stick from one of his pockets. ‘What remaining data?’

OoOoO

‘Gold Leader, this is Defiance. Shields are down to fifty percent. Why is this taking so long?’

The frigate had stopped firing at the enemy blast boats seconds ago for fear of hitting their own, and Samica could tell they didn’t like leaving all the work to the X- and Y-wings.

‘This is Gold Three, we’re working on it, Defiance.’ Samica saw Ryle’s Y-wing fly a graceful arc to intercept the blast boat as it came around for another pass, and she saw the other one in missile range. She was facing the other ship’s flank, but she remembered it had been damaged before, so she switched her torpedo launcher to single fire and targeted the Skipray. R5 indicated a lock, and she fired.

The proton torpedo slammed into the other craft’s flank and detonated, the Skipray blowing up in a spectacular explosion. Momentum, however, carried it dangerously close to Liberty, leaving a black mark in the cruiser’s hull.

‘How much longer, Defiance?’ she heard Dutch ask. ‘I don’t think we can hold off another squadron of them.’

‘Five, maybe ten minutes,’ was the reply from the frigate, and Samica nearly groaned. She saw the others had finished off the third wave, but two more green dots had winked out from her tactical chart, among them Blue Leader. Jay as well as Tiree had suffered damage to their ships. Tiree’s fighter, especially, looked as if it was going to come apart any second, and she doubted he’d make hyperspace with that.

‘Lead,’ she heard Teddie over comm, sounding more tired than she’d ever heard him. ‘I really hate to say it, but there’s another squadron coming as well as another Skipthingummy . . . and the ISD is at eleven klicks.’

‘Hurry it up, Defiance,’ Dutch told the frigate. ‘Nine, we’ll see to our skipping friend. Three, you’re in command against those TIEs.’

‘Copy, Gold Leader.’

Samica set her jaw and armed her lasers.

OoOoO

‘Sir, it looks as if they’re going to escape.’

Lieutenant Commander Juros bent over the tac officer and stared at the display. There were no more than eleven Rebel starfighters left, but so far, these two squadrons had torn to pieces four Skiprays as well as three squadrons of TIE fighters. He was not going to admit that the sudden change in command had anything to do with his pilots’ poor performance, but he knew there were others that were going to suspect just that. His own anxiety did nothing to instil confidence in his bridge crew . . . or in his fighter pilots. Lieutenant Nawroth had assured him that he would support Juros’ cause before any examination board, but he knew he’d have to be able to present to them some proof of his competence, or they’d not only strip him of the command he’d just assumed, but of his head as well.

‘How long until we’re in turbolaser range?’ he asked.

‘Seven point sixteen minutes, sir.’ His engineer sounded as if he was about to wet his trousers, and Juros scowled in disgust.

‘Estimates about how long they’ll need for their docking manoeuvre?’

The tac officer cleared his throat. ‘Approximately the same amount of time, I’d say, sir. In any case, it’s going to be a close call.’

Juros exchanged a glance with Nawroth—at least, that was what he had intended, but he felt his gut freeze when the commissioner didn’t meet his eyes.

‘Give me a link to the starfighters and the Skiprays,’ he said at length.

OoOoO

There was an explosion somewhere near, and Rhun flailed around for balance. Their only source of light was Captain Candela’s glow rod; apart from that, the whole ship was dark. He managed to catch himself on a doorway to his left, but bumped his head in the process. Cursing, he shook himself to clear his head once again, then looked around. The captain as well as one of the others had lost their footing. Something smelled of burning plastic, and further down the corridor, he saw a faint glow of something slowly sizzling.

Candela scrambled to his feet again, looking up. Rhun knew what the captain was thinking: until now, the Empire had intended to make prisoners, and had settled for trying to disable Liberty. That seemed to have changed this moment, for even as they were getting up and ran for the airlock once again, there was another hit shaking the cruiser, making it clear the Imperials were attacking in earnest now. That, however, also meant that the Imperials knew that their time was running out, and the docking operation was almost complete.

‘Hurry it up,’ Candela shouted. ‘Looks like all they’re still waiting for to get away from here is us.’

The corridors of the command ship were almost deserted by now, most of the ship’s personnel having been evacuated already. Situations like these had been practised time after time, and the evacuation had been carried out with as much discipline as anyone could have hoped for.

Commander Willard was standing at the airlock, with his two aides, Lieutenant Riece and Lieutenant Rover, at his side. Both of them looked distinctly unhappy, and Rhun thought he knew the scene that must have passed here. He supposed that, if he’d been the commander’s aide and his superior officer had refused flatly to leave the ship as early as possible, he’d have looked just like those two.

‘Are you the last ones?’ Willard asked.

Candela nodded. ‘Yes, sir. And if you don’t leave this ship right now, I swear I’ll carry you through this airlock, with all due respect, Commander!’

Willard gave him a quick nod, herding the three Intel agents through the airlock, then following after, to his aides’ relief. Candela remained behind, pulling the remote control from his pocket.

When Willard saw what the captain was doing, he shouted to Lieutenant Riece, ‘Jerrel, tell the bridge to close the airlock on my command and detach!’

The red-haired aide nodded, hurrying to establish a comm link to the frigate’s bridge, and Candela paused with the device, then gave the commander a nod.

‘Now,’ Willard said, and the Intel officer pressed the button, then jumped through the hatch, which hissed closed behind him. A tremor ran through Liberty as well as Defiance when the charges in the computer control room on Liberty detonated, then the frigate drifted free of the cruiser.

Rhun sagged against the bulkhead in relief, which, as he soon realised, had been premature. There was another explosion outside, telling him they weren’t out of this yet. Until Defiance could take up speed again after the docking manoeuvre, the frigate was a sitting duck, and there was something out there that could do a lot of damage to a cruiser . . . or a frigate.

He didn’t know if he should be glad about the fact he’d done all he could, or whether he would have been better off with something useful to do.

OoOoO

Those with something useful to do were finding themselves running out of resources.

Dutch and Teddie had shot down the fifth Skipray – Samica fervently hoped that it had been the last – and then joined her, Ryle, Jay and Tiree, as well as the remaining five Blue Squadron pilots, who were engaged in battle against another squadron of TIE fighters. Despite Ryle’s orders, Tiree had not withdrawn, trusting on pure luck to hold his damaged fighter together, knowing full well he couldn’t punch out in this battle, with nobody to pick him up afterwards except a Star Destroyer. Of the twelve TIEs, seven were still flying,

‘Gold and Blue Squadrons, this is the commander,’ they finally heard Willard’s voice. ‘Docking operation is complete. Disengage and get out of here. Good work.’

‘You’ve heard it, people,’ Dutch said over comm. ‘Just don’t forget about the disengaging bit. Gold Two?’

‘Yes, Chief.’

‘I’m sending you coordinates for a micro-jump. I’m coming after you to pick you up there, in case your ship breaks down.’

‘Thanks, Chief.’ The relief was evident from the tone of Tiree’s voice.

Samica fired at one of the remaining TIEs, at the same time dodging fire from one behind her. Disengaging meant, basically, that they’d have to finish off all hostiles before they could make any attempt to get away from here, since entering hyperspace left a ship vulnerable to enemy fire. She saw Ryle shoot down another TIE fighter, then take some more pounding from an already damaged Imperial ship, before Dutch could scratch it off him. Two klicks distant, she saw Defiance vanish into hyperspace, and felt relief flooding her. The headquarters’ command crew was safe, and, most likely, Rhun was with them. She hit one TIE that had been pursuing Tiree, when Teddie’s voice came in, ‘Lead, another twelve eyeballs approaching. The Impstar’s at three point four klicks.’

Dutch and two of the X-wings had shot down the last two TIE fighters, and the squadron commander bellowed, ‘All right, people, jump out!’

Samica turned her ship into the direction of their destination. ‘Ready, R5?’ she shouted.

He answered with a series of high-pitched bleeps for which she didn’t need a translation; she recognised it as his affirmative, and she reached for the hyperspace lever. Beside her, she saw Teddie’s and Tiree’s snubfighters race past, then vanish, followed by Dutch and Blue Eleven. A turbolaser beam as broad as her Y-wing passed her, going wide, then the stars elongated into lines as she entered hyperspace, towards the fourth moon of Yavin.

OoOoO

COMPNOR Colonel Wullf Yularen listened to Lieutenant Nawroth’s report impassively, stroking his white moustache, while the junior officer recounted the events in Suolriep sector. A rather embarrassing encounter, too. Nawroth’s report had sealed Lieutenant Commander Juros’ fate; the man was not going to be given another command. Indeed, COMPNOR had decided he was too dangerous a man to be left running around loose, since the Imperial Navy had no use for an officer whose ambition caused him to bite off more than he could chew. If Relentless had brought the Rebels to ground, Colonel Yularen might have been lenient; Captain Roos had been expendable, and if Juros had been slightly more sophisticated in assuming command of the Star Destroyer, nobody would have bothered. As it was, however, the commander had made the Navy as well as COMPNOR look like fools, and since he couldn’t punish COMPNOR or the Navy, he’d have to punish Juros.

When Nawroth had finished his report, Yularen gestured for him to leave, and turned his chair to face the viewport of the Star Destroyer Eradicator. An unfortunate business, this, but it was not his intention to let it get into his way. His task was to ensure absolute loyalty to the Emperor in his subjects, and he knew he was one of the best. This puny Rebellion might be annoying, but there was nothing to instil loyalty like a well-built up bogeyman on whom to project all one’s fears and hatred. He was almost disappointed that the Rebellion seemed to be coming to an end.

He brought up his latest orders again. They were not very specific, only talked about his next assignment: he would be briefing Grand Moff Tarkin himself, who was currently in charge of a secret project near a penal colony world called Despayre. His sources, which were among the finest in the Empire, had informed him of the apparent disappearance of the planet several days earlier—information that corresponded to the rumours that Tarkin’s project was concerned with the construction of a new super weapon. The fact that the Emperor appointed a supervisor at all for his apparently most trusted subject came as something like a surprise, but Yularen was determined to find out whether there was a reason for any distrust on the Emperor’s part or if this was nothing more than the usual Imperial paranoia.

Colonel Wullf Yularen still doubted that the rumours he’d heard had anything to do with reality, but even if his favourite bogeyman, the Rebel Alliance, was going to perish, he couldn’t deny he was itching with curiosity to see this new project of Tarkin’s.