Rebel Dream: Enemy Lines I (14 page)

Their lasers flashed close enough to the
Falcon
, Han thought, to peel paint from her hull. Then the X-wings were gone, and so were four of the pursuing coralskipper signals.

Five. The
Falcon
’s upper gun turret scored a kill, and suddenly pursuit was down to three coralskippers. “Who was that?” Han shouted.

“Me!” The voice was female. So it was Alema in the top turret, Ganner in the bottom.

“Three we can handle,” Han said. This time he remembered to shout, “Hold on!” Then he set the freighter into a painfully tight loop upward. He was pushed hard back into his pilot’s couch as the acceleration compensator failed to keep up with the maneuver.

In the midst of the maneuver, when the acceleration forces were at their height, he glanced at his wife, expecting her to be crushed motionless against the back of her chair, but she was actually sitting forward against the tremendous acceleration. She gave him an amused, even superior, look.

A Jedi technique, it had to be, something on the order of levitating rocks. He tried to keep jealousy from his expression, and called over his shoulder, “Alema, wait for the booms before firing, one-two-three.”

“Understood!”

As the three remaining coralskippers came back into view, Han saw that they were only just beginning to rise in pursuit of the
Falcon
—his maneuver, executed so soon after the Rogues had cut their numbers in half, had confused and delayed the Yuuzhan Vong for a fatal moment.

Han armed the
Falcon
’s concussion missile launcher and fired at the foremost coralskipper. At this distance, he could fire again at the second and once more at the rearmost before the first missile hit.

Then it did, an explosion that should have shattered the skip into flinders of yorik coral but was instead sucked into the void projected by the vehicle’s dovin basal.

But Alema Rar’s shot with the turret laser flashed past the void and sheared through the skip’s coral armor. The coralskipper exploded as its internal mechanisms were superheated, their fluids converted instantly to steam and gas.

The second missile detonated, with the same result, and Alema’s second shot punched through the amber-colored canopy. The canopy blew out as though the pilot were about to eject, but Han knew the skips didn’t have ejection seats. There was no pilot left behind, just a blackened crater where his body and seat had been.

The third skip pilot, fast on the reflexes, turned and dived away from the
Falcon
, presenting a narrower profile to aim at, maneuvering to be below the top turret’s angle of fire. The concussion missile’s explosion flooded into the void at the skip’s rear … and then Ganner’s laser shot penetrated the skip’s lower hull, shearing through the vehicle, emerging through the top hull amidships. Amazingly still flyable, the skip accelerated away, trailing cloudy debris that had to be body fluids flash-frozen by exposure to vacuum.

“The Rogues?” Han asked. He felt out of breath.

“Reaching
Lusankya
,” Leia said. “We have a friendly ahead.” Indeed, there was another Imperial Star Destroyer in their path, an older model than
Mon Mothma
; it was maneuvering around from an outbound course to turn toward
Lusankya
.

“What say we tuck into her launching bay and rest for a minute?”

She smiled. “You’re the captain.”

“I notice you never say that to me when you disagree with something I’ve said.”

As they neared the Star Destroyer, Leia let out a little noise of surprise. “Han, she’s the
Rebel Dream.
”

Han looked, startled, at the ship before them.
Rebel Dream
had once been Leia’s flagship—not her command, since naval officers always captained her, but a vessel at her beck and call, chosen to lend credence to her importance as she conducted negotiations between the New Republic and unaligned planetary systems. The
Millennium Falcon
had rested for some months in one of
Rebel Dream
’s cargo holds while Han had led a military campaign against a rogue warlord.

Leia’s expression was open, thoughtful, and years seemed to drop away from her as she revisited those long-ago times. “What do you think, Han? She looks like she’s in wonderful condition.”

“Yes, she does.”

Leia glanced over and realized that her husband wasn’t looking at the ship. She flushed but looked amused. “Han. Get your mind back on work.”

“Sorry. Getting old. Easily distracted.” Han kept his exultation, his victory from his face. For one moment, he’d distracted Leia from the ache that had consumed her since Anakin and Jacen were lost. Maybe if he could
do it again from time to time, the poison of that ache would not claim Leia, would not take her from him too. “Sure. Old. Of course.”

“Lusankya
has her escort,” Tycho said. “And with them keeping the Yuuzhan Vong fighters and frigate analogs at bay, she’s ripping a seam right through their fleet.”

Wedge nodded. The hologram bore out Tycho’s statement.

No new friendlies had appeared in
Mon Mothma
’s vicinity for a couple of minutes; she’d finished with her interdiction field generators. “Order
Mon Mothma
to bring up the rear of our force there, and tell her to tuck in close. The Vong will fall on any stragglers; they don’t need a yammosk to tell them to do that.”

The hologram showed the Yuuzhan Vong fleet, which had grown large and diffuse, gradually contracting as it moved against the group centered on
Lusankya
. But without yammosk coordination, the Yuuzhan Vong were unable to mount any sophisticated tactics or manage any real concentration of fire on the New Republic’s capital ships. As Wedge watched, the Yuuzhan Vong numbers began to thin. Wedge felt a professional impatience with the enemy commander, or whoever had taken charge of their fleet after their designated commander had died; if he didn’t acknowledge defeat and order a retreat, he stood a good chance of losing his fleet.

Then it came. First a
matalok
-class cruiser analog peeled away from the engagement, then a frigate analog and two or three coralskipper squadrons, and suddenly the battle was essentially done, all the Yuuzhan Vong capital ships outward bound, only a few coralskipper-on-starfighter duels continuing as some Yuuzhan Vong pilots chose a futile but honorable death over retreat.

“Issue the order,” Wedge said. “Set up for the fleet’s return.” He offered Tycho a bitter little smile. “We also need to celebrate our victory.”

Tycho looked at him, expressionless. “I’m giddy already,” he said.

Han Solo marched down the
Falcon
’s ramp, one arm around Leia’s waist and the other raised in a wave as he acknowledged the cheers of pilots and crew in Borleias’s main docking bay. “Why are they so happy? I mean, I’m happy, but they’re acting like I won this one single-handed.”

Leia gave him a little smile, the best she’d been able to manage since—Han turned his thoughts away from the memory. She said, “You dropped into the middle of a Yuuzhan Vong fleet and came out without a scratch. The famous Han Solo. You’ve just reminded them that they can win.”

“Ah.”

“Besides, you win every one of your fights single-handed. Just ask your admirers. I’ll find you a historian who knows how to appreciate a bribe, and tomorrow you’ll be the man who told
Lusankya
to drop out of hyperspace where she did, the man who blew up the enemy flagship with his blaster pistol.”

“Don’t you dare.”

Ahead of them, the
Falcon
’s passengers moved through the crowd, led by one of Wedge Antilles’s officers. Many of them were Jedi, but not all of them had ever been the object of a rambunctious crowd’s attention before.

Ganner, the dark-haired and all-too-handsome Jedi Knight, was first of them. He waved at the crowd with all of Han’s poise but none of Han’s self-aware irony, and the smile he turned on some of the ladies in the crowd was nothing if not brilliant. Beside him was Alema Rar,
the blue-skinned Twi’lek Jedi; a proficient organizer of rebellion and espionage, she had spent long periods disguised as a dancer, and she demonstrated a dancer’s ease and poise now as she smiled at the crowd. Next were Zekk, the former street urchin who had trained as a Dark Jedi before joining Luke’s academy on Yavin 4, and Tesar Sebatyne, male Barabel offspring of Saba.

Last but for Han and Leia were Tahiri Veila and Tarc, two worries for the Solos. Han shook his head. No, they weren’t worries; they were genuine heartaches.

Tahiri, a slender blond Jedi student, had been one of Anakin Solo’s closest friends. In recent months and weeks, they’d been closer than friends, had been on the verge of becoming something more. It had been Anakin who had rescued her from Yuuzhan Vong captivity; Anakin who had helped her overcome the brainwashing that nearly convinced her that she herself was one of the Yuuzhan Vong.

And then Anakin had died. Han could no longer maneuver his thoughts away from the memory. He felt something grip his heart and squeeze; the pain almost caused him to stumble. He spared a glance for Leia; she was looking at Tahiri, too, and the bleakness Han felt was reflected in her eyes.

Though dressed in Jedi robes, Tahiri was characteristically barefoot. There was little strength or pride in her posture now; Anakin’s death had hit her hard, possibly as hard as it had hit his parents. She was silent; once upon a time, there would have been no way, short of an order from Luke Skywalker, to shut her up.

Tahiri had one arm around Tarc, guiding him, lending him reassurance. Tarc was twelve, a boy of Coruscant chosen as part of Viqi Shesh’s kidnapping plot against Ben Skywalker. Viqi had chosen him as a distraction because of his extraordinary resemblance to the Anakin of a few years before, a resemblance so distressingly close
that Han felt his stomach lurch each time he saw the boy’s perpetually mussed brown hair, icy blue eyes, and open expression.

It hurt merely to see the boy, but it would be cruel and wrong to abandon him, to reject him. It was a problem Han couldn’t solve with a blaster or fancy flying.

Han glimpsed a head of blond hair bobbing up and down as its owner pushed through the crowd. “Incoming flier,” he said.

And then Luke Skywalker was on them, embracing both Han and Leia, his grin youthful and infectious. “You picked a good time to visit,” Luke said.

“Your sister’s fault,” Han said. “We broadcast on the HoloNet to find out if you were still on Borleias. We got both confirmation and an invitation to accompany
Lusankya
. ‘Let’s go with
Lusankya
,’ she said. ‘More safety for our passengers’ ”

Leia gave him a cool look. “You really need to enjoy these rare occasions when you’re right.” Then she caught sight of something and her expression brightened again. “Mara!” She pulled free to embrace her late-arriving sister-in-law.

“Listen,” Luke said. “Wedge is getting quarters set up for you. You have time to clean up a little. But we all need to talk to you.”

Han gave him a curious look. “Who’s ‘we all’?”

“The Insiders.”

In as few words as they could afford, Han and Leia told the story of their time in the Hapes Cluster after the departure of Luke and Mara—of Jaina’s terrifying drift toward the dark side of the Force and Kyp Durron’s unexpected help on her behalf, of the skirmish that had left Han with a skull fracture from which he had barely recovered, of Ta’a Chume’s attempts to displace daughter-in-law Teneniel
Djo and persuade Jaina Solo to wed Teneniel’s husband, Isolder. “The situation there isn’t resolved,” Leia said. “But Han and I couldn’t make it any better. We have to trust Jaina to make the right choices.”

They were in the biotics building’s mess hall rather than the Insiders’ usual conference room. With Han and Leia were Wedge, Iella, Luke, Mara, and Lando, a comfortable group of intimates. They seemed pleased to see Han and Leia, but otherwise somewhat tense and distracted.

“You’re not acting like someone who’s won a substantial military victory, Wedge,” Leia said.

Wedge made a glum face. “It’s the sort of victory that can cost us the war. We were hoping to get a Yuuzhan Vong commander of average skills, with an average fleet, and I suspect that we did. We were going to string him along for as much time as we could, but circumstances today dictated that we wipe him out right away. The next one they send is going to be much tougher, and that’s going to make things more difficult for all of us. But you two have come at a good time. We need your skills.”

“Leia’s skills, you mean,” Han said. “Without her, I don’t think there’s any way the New Republic can hold together.”

“Both your skills,” Wedge said. “Because the New Republic is dead. An oversized hulk with a decentralized nervous system; the extremities don’t realize that the heart isn’t beating anymore.”

Leia and Han exchanged a glance. “Let’s hear it,” Leia said.

Maal Lah paused outside the barrier leading into the tracer spineray chamber. He glanced at the guard who had conducted him here as though to ask,
Are you certain he is here?
But the guard avoided eye contact, whether because he dared not look into the eyes of a superior or because he knew what fate waited beyond the barrier, Maal Lah could not say.

As Maal Lah advanced, the barrier retracted, a fishlike mouth that parted before him, and he stepped into the chamber.

It was a place of knowledge and of training. The tracer spineray was close kin to the provoker spineray that was capable of tracing neural pathways as its subjects thought about certain topics … and then directing pain into those pathways to prevent the subject from reexamining those thoughts. The tracer, too, traced neural paths, but had only related functions: to determine how efficiently signals were transmitted along those pathways, and to issue pain to receptors with micromillimeter precision, allowing the subject to gauge the degree to which tissues remained injured or imbalanced once healing seemed complete.

The chamber was poorly lit, bioluminescent glows reflecting from red and black coral walls suggesting thick
deposits of half-dried blood. It featured one central table with a gray oval top, the carefully engineered terminus of the tracer spineray, tilted so that one end nearly touched the floor. A male of the shaper caste stood beside the table; Tsavong Lah lay atop it, his feet toward the ground. He was fully clothed, but his left arm lay bare against the leatherlike surface of the table, and Maal Lah knew that the warmaster’s visit was purely medical; the tracer spineray had to be evaluating the condition of the radank claw grafted onto his arm. It looked no worse than the last time Maal Lah had seen it, but no better. Perhaps the warmaster wished him to see that it had not deteriorated, so that he might inform others, head off speculation about Tsavong Lah’s possible rejection of the graft.