Alliances (Star Wars: Thrawn, #2)(54)

“I have a thought,” Thrawn said. “But as you say, further study will be necessary.” He leaned forward and tapped the comm control. “Commodore Faro.”

“Faro here, Admiral,” the commodore’s voice came back promptly.

“Is the captured freighter secure aboard?”

“Yes, sir. The engineers have given it a cursory examination, and are now assembling the tools and equipment necessary for a deeper study.”

“The Defenders?”

“Also returned, sir. Captain Skerris is compiling the pilots’ reports on their encounters with the enemy.”

“Excellent,” Thrawn said. “Plot a minimum time course back to the point in the Batuu hyperlane where we left that path and turned to Mokivj.”

“Yes, sir.” If Faro was surprised by the order, it didn’t show in her voice. Probably, Vader thought, odd orders were the norm under the grand admiral’s command.

“Execute as soon as we are secured aboard,” Thrawn continued. “Inform Commander Kimmund and Captain Skerris that we will confer two hours after the Chimaera has made the jump to lightspeed.”

“Yes, sir.”

Thrawn keyed off the comm. “Two hours?” Vader asked. “Their reports should be finished in one.”

“I am certain they will be,” Thrawn said. “But I first wish to examine the remnants of the Grysk cargo.”

Vader ran the whole thing over in his mind. So Thrawn wanted to go back to the Batuu hyperlane?

But not to the point where the Chimaera had first been dropped back into realspace, which should be an easier and quicker point to locate. Did he expect to find something at the exact point where he’d originally given up the effort?

Or was something else going on? Could he be making Faro go to all this effort because he was stalling for time?

And if so, why? What could he possibly be stalling for? “And you expect the Batuu hyperlane will now be open?” he asked.

“Not at all,” Thrawn said. “But I believe we now hold the key to its closure.”

“The Grysks and their hibernating Force-sensitives?”

“That, and more,” Thrawn said, his voice going darker. “We will know soon if I am correct.”



* * *



—

“Our first thought was that they were some kind of covert fighter escort,” Captain Skerris said, pulling up the images he and the other TIE Defender pilots had recorded from their encounters with the Grysk freighters. “But it turned out they didn’t have much in the way of armament, or at least nothing they were willing to show us. They weren’t very fast, either.” His eyes flicked briefly to Faro. “If we hadn’t been ordered to assist the Darkhawk I could have taken out one or more of them.”

Faro suppressed a grimace. And that one was squarely on her. She’d given Skerris and the others the order to put the First Legion’s mission at top priority.

And Vader was standing right there.

His helmet turned toward her.

There were rumors about what happened to people who displeased the Dark Lord. None of those stories were pleasant. None of them ended well. Kimmund was still here, so Vader had apparently decided the loss of the other ships wasn’t the First Legion’s fault. But Faro had no such guarantees for herself.

“The freighter was the more important target,” Thrawn said calmly. “Would you not agree, Lord Vader?”

“I would,” Vader rumbled. For another moment his blank faceplate remained pointed at Faro. Then, he turned to Skerris. “Flight characteristics?”

“Unimpressive, my lord,” Skerris said. “They looked like small, heavy-load transports, and that’s exactly the way they seemed to handle.” He touched a spot on one of the images. “For what it’s worth, all of them had just the single cargo hatch, and it was big enough to handle the cylinders Commander Kimmund saw in the freighter.”

He looked at Kimmund, and for a moment Faro thought he was going to add before the Grysks blew them up. Fortunately, Skerris, for all his arrogance and propensity for ignoring officers, wasn’t the type for cheap shots.

Neither, apparently, was Kimmund. “I concur with Captain Skerris’s assessment,” the First Legion commander said. “I also agree with his conclusion that none of these ships were particularly well armed. They seemed to be at Batuu for a pickup, nothing more, and weren’t expecting trouble.”

“Given the bartender’s comments about the fear the Darshi and Grysks engendered in Black Spire’s residents,” Thrawn said, “I am certain they did not anticipate resistance.”

“Maybe not,” Kimmund said, his voice going a little sour. “But they were sure ready in case it happened. By the time we got to the cockpit the entire computer system had been wiped clean, and every bit of electronics had been fried. In fact, there were places where it looked like they’d taken literal flame to the walls and equipment.”

“Yes, I saw,” Thrawn said, nodding. “They were no doubt attempting to destroy any evidence of their point of origin.”

“Including themselves,” Kimmund said. “They were throwing themselves at us during the incursion, and I don’t think it was just to slow us down. I think they all wanted to die fighting so that we wouldn’t have anyone to interrogate. The only reason we have any prisoners at all is that we caught three of them still working on the electronics wipe and were able to get into stun range before they could get to their weapons. Which were DL-18s and old DC-18s, by the way,” he added. “Probably locally bought.”