Honor Among Thieves: Star Wars (Empire and Rebellion) (32 page)

Leia walked to him. Her blaster was still in her hand.

“Thinking about him?” she asked.

“Thinking he's the only man I've ever known who stole from Jabba the Hutt and died of something else,” Han said. “And that he saved us.”

“Complicated.”

“The universe is a complicated place,” Han said. “Unless you're Luke.”

“You don't think he's complicated?”

“No. He's a farmboy who loves flying his fast ship. You don't get much simpler than that.”

“He won't stay that way,” she said, and there was regret in her voice.

“No one does.”

Thirty

“Looks complicated,” Han said in what he was pretty confident was the universe's greatest understatement.

“It's a planet-scaled mechanism using technology we don't understand in a language that's not only alien, but dead. So a little bit, yeah,” Scarlet said, pointing at the blinking device. “He did make some progress, though. If I can figure out which one of these was affecting the relays, I think we can—
Don't touch that one!
”

Han yanked back his finger. “That one? Is it dangerous?”

“I think so,” Scarlet said. “This baby's channeling an impressive amount of energy. Galassian has a lot of notes about small imbalances getting big quickly. And, you know, a giant force field keeping the planetary crust from collapsing into the exposed core. Don't want to turn that off.”

She tapped something and the screen lit up. She moved through several pages of translations of the control panel's runes and diagrams without slowing to read them.

“Can you tell what he was doing?” Leia asked, trying to read the information flashing across the table.

“Not really, no.”

“All right,” Leia said, grabbing Scarlet's hands to stop her from touching the panel. “General Rieekan is going to jump in with the strike force. Once he's here we can figure out how to keep any Imperial ships from jumping into the system. Then we'll have time to—”

The first blaster shot passed so close to Leia's face, Han saw the flash reflected in her eyes. A volley of shots followed it, but Han had already grabbed Leia and Scarlet and pulled them to the ground. He tried to cover Leia's body with his own, knowing it would only buy her a few seconds but doing it anyway. The first blaster shots that hit the fragile control board would blow it apart, and then there would be nothing between him and death.

Han turned to find whoever was shooting. The round door had irised open silently behind them, and a mass of stormtroopers had taken position just outside the platform. Several lowered their weapons to aim at him on the ground.
This is it,
he had time to think, and then they opened fire.

After several seconds of continuous fire from half a dozen troopers, they stopped. The thin sheet of what looked like glass that held up the control panel didn't even have a scorch mark on it.

“Huh,” Scarlet said.

“I guess they built their stuff to last,” Han said, then rolled off Leia and to his knees. He pulled Baasen's blaster and took several shots around the side of the control board. It was actually sort of nice to have cover he could see through. He could place his shots without having to risk sticking his head out. A second later, two troopers were down and the rest had ducked back out of the doorway. They reached their weapons around the edge to take a few indirect shots, but only one of them even hit the panel, and it did no damage.

“Still going to be hard to hold this position,” Scarlet said.

“We have to reopen the hyperwave relays,” Leia shouted. “If we can signal General Rieekan to start the attack—”

“Little busy right now,” Scarlet said.

“We can't let them take control of it,” Leia said. She moved in a crouch to the other side of the panel and began firing at the doorway, forcing the stormtroopers to pull back.

As Han and Leia traded ineffective shots with the stormtroopers, Scarlet studied the control panel. “I think . . . I think I found the thing that's blocking the hyperwave relays from sending messages out. Maybe.”

“Do it!” Leia shouted over the top of a fusillade of blasts from the stormtroopers. Han managed to drop one with a shot to the thigh, and the trooper dragged himself away from the doorway and out of sight. Han could see where his shots were landing, but he'd be much more accurate if he actually stood up and sighted down the blaster. Another wave of incoming fire splashing against the control panel convinced him it wasn't worth the risk. He didn't need to win this fight, really. He just needed to survive it.

Han pulled his hand back to avoid the next barrage of shots, but Leia leaned out and fired off a few blasts that downed another stormtrooper.

“How many do you think are left out there?” Han asked.

“Pretty soon it will be all of them on this planet,” she replied. Scarlet grunted out a laugh but didn't look up from her work.

“At least Wedge and Luke guaranteed we won't have that Star Destroyer dropping reinforcements,” Han said, firing off a couple more shots as punctuation. His blaster started flashing at him, so he pulled a charge pack from his belt and reloaded.

“Luke! We'll call Luke!” Leia shouted, scrabbling at her comlink. “Red Wave, this is Pointer, are you there?”

“Uh-oh,” Han said to no one in particular. The stormtroopers were doing something just outside the door. He could only see the edge of their activity, but it looked as if they were setting up some sort of tripod-mounted heavy weapon.

“Red Wave, this is Pointer, come in!”

“Probably getting some interference from being so far underground,” Scarlet said.

“One of us has to make a break for it,” Leia said. “Get far enough up that we can ask Luke to tell General Rieekan to start the attack. And then get back down here so that we know when he's through.”

“Another really bad plan,” Han muttered.

Leia said something else, but it was drowned out by the massive concussion of the stormtroopers' heavy weapon. They'd wheeled it around the doorway and fired it. They hadn't taken time to aim, so the blast hit a meter and a half in front of the control panel. The thin grating of the floor instantly turned white with heat.

“I hope our cover can survive a hit from that,” Han said.

“I hope the
floor
can,” Leia replied.

The big cannon fired again, this time hitting the control panel's single fragile-looking support. The concussion of the blast knocked Han onto his back and sucked the wind out of his lungs. Both Leia and Scarlet were tossed across the floor, rolling to a stop several meters away.

The blast had left a discoloration on the support glass. A vaguely yellowish spot, with tiny hairline cracks running through it. They couldn't afford to let the troopers hit them again with the big gun. Not if it could actually damage the only thing they could hide behind.

Scarlet and Leia began crawling across the floor back to the control table. The stormtrooper crew manning the cannon were lining up a second shot. They seemed to have noticed the damage the first shot had done and were trying to hit the same spot again.

“Hey!” Han shouted. “You know that thing you're shooting at controls the planet, right? What happens if you blow it up?
You
don't know.”

The stormtroopers ignored him. Han popped up, his arms braced on the top of the table to get one clean, accurate shot. The trooper at the back of the cannon was just about to fire when Han's blaster bolt hit one of the supporting legs and blew it apart. The big cannon canted forward, pulling the gunner along with it. Halfway to the floor the weapon fired, hitting the grating just a little over a meter from the crew with a sound like thunder. The blast hurled the entire crew away. Two of them lay motionless and smoking. The third unlucky man went over the edge of the grating and pinwheeled down and out of sight toward the molten core. Han hoped for the stormtrooper's sake that the blast had killed him before he went over. A few other stormtroopers peeked around the corner of the doorway at the carnage. Han drove them back. The K'kybak control panel glowed under his arms.

He hesitated, then tapped at it and ducked back down.

“How are we doing?” he asked.

“I'm okay,” Leia said, crawling back over to her side of the control board and taking cover, blaster in hand. She didn't look okay. There was a trickle of blood running from her hairline and down her cheek, and her forehead was bruised. She'd get upset if he pressed the issue, so he let it drop. Scarlet groaned.

“Are you all right?” Han asked the spy. The wound in her leg looked bad.

“I'm fine,” she said, but she seemed a little unsteady. “I just need to . . .”

She wobbled up to her feet to look at the control board, which took her out of cover. The stormtroopers crowded the doorway to fire at her, too many for Han and Leia to drive back all at once. Scarlet yelped and dropped to her knee, clutching her elbow. The troopers paid for it, with two more dead before they could withdraw.

“This is getting old,” Scarlet said. She was examining her upper arm, where a blaster bolt had burned through the flesh just above her elbow. It was another ugly wound, but it wasn't bleeding. “Can you believe today's the first time I've ever been shot? Years in the field, nothing. Today, shot twice.”

“No!” Han said. “Anyone as reckless as you should be getting shot all the time!”

“Sort of thought it would never happen to me,” Scarlet continued. Han hoped she wasn't going into shock.

One of the stormtroopers leaned out and tossed out an explosive device. It rolled across the floor at them. Han shot it, sending it rolling in the opposite direction. The stormtroopers peeking out ducked back just before it blew up right outside their doorway.

“There might be a pattern, though,” Scarlet said. Her eyelids were drooping and she started to sag onto her back. “We should ask him . . .”

“Sure, sweetheart, I'll give him a call. Whoever ‘he' is,” Han said. “Leia, grab her medpac and give her something to keep her on her feet.”

Leia pulled the pack off Scarlet's belt and started rummaging through it.

“Did you hear what she said earlier? Force fields and tricky-to-balance energies?” Han asked. “That means we can blow this place.”

“Are you insane?” Leia asked. “If we figure this device out, it ends the war.”

“If—”

“It
ends
the war,” she repeated, looking up from her work to stare him in the eye. Han didn't know how her eyes could be that soft and that hard at the same time. “No more Alderaans. No more Kiamurrs. Never again, Han. What is that worth? We stay here. We hold
this
position until General Rieekan comes.”

A stormtrooper risked a quick look into the room, but Han put a blaster bolt into the door frame right next to his face and he pulled back.

“We can't do it,” he said, keeping his pistol trained on the same spot, waiting to see if the trooper would peek out again. “And even if we could, you're talking about making a government with absolute power to control travel. The first government that can enforce its laws without anybody slipping through the cracks.”

Leia pressed an injection ampoule to Scarlet's neck, then began winding a bandage around her arm. The spy mumbled something unintelligible.

“This isn't the time for that conversation,” Leia shouted. But a few seconds later she went on, “You say that like it's a
bad
thing. Only criminals would have anything to worry about.”

Han laughed and fired a few shots at a trooper who'd looked around the corner to take a few desultory blasts at him.

“Leia, hate to break it to you.
We're criminals
. I'm shooting at the government
right now
. That's why they call it a rebellion!”

“We're fighting to restore—”

“Yeah, yeah, the glorious Republic of old,” Han snorted. “I've heard the sales pitch, sister. But tell me this: if that glorious Republic had had this technology, would it have stopped Palpatine from taking control?”

Leia opened her mouth to answer, then closed it and frowned. Han stood up and fired off a few more shots at the doorway. No one was visible, but he wanted it to stay that way. Scarlet blinked and sat forward, rubbing her eyes.

“Probably not,” Leia finally admitted. “By the time anyone realized what he was up to, he controlled the bureaucracy.”

“And would there now be a Rebel Alliance?” Han asked gently. He trusted her to see what he saw. He didn't need to browbeat her into it.

“No,” she said. Her expression was almost hurt. “I'd never misuse this, you know. I'd never let anyone else, either.”

Scarlet coughed and struggled to focus on them. “What are we talking about?” she asked, but they both ignored her.

“I know you wouldn't,” Han said, taking her left hand with his. “I trust you, Princess. But the guy who's elected after you? I don't know him.”

Leia frowned and looked away. Something moved in the shadows on the other side of the doorway, and Leia took a quick shot at it. Whatever it was stopped moving.

“If we take this,” Han said, using his blaster to wave at the massive machine all around them, “the next evil galactic empire that rises never ends. Does the fact that we probably won't be there to see it make you feel better?”

“No,” Leia said. “No. You're right. Let's blow it.”

Han let out a long breath. “I've got to admit, it's a huge relief to hear you say that,” he said with a grin. Leia frowned at him, confused. Her eyes went wide.

“You already set it to collapse?”

“Yeah, that one thing Scarlet told me not to touch? I touched it about a minute ago. But I was having trouble figuring out how to break the news.”

Thirty-One