Alliances (Star Wars: Thrawn, #2)(95)
Two areas on the moon’s rim shatter, sending dense clouds of dust and rock into the paths of the approaching Defenders.
“Turbolasers: Aim above and below the moon,” Thrawn said. “Low power; continuous fire.”
“They’ve changed vector?” Faro asked.
“I assume so,” Thrawn said. “The debris from those explosions could not possibly damage the Defenders at their range. I conclude therefore the object was to create a visual obstruction while the Grysk ship veered off its projected path.”
“Signal from Skerris, Admiral,” Lieutenant Lomar called from the comm station. His voice holds tension and frustration. “The Grysk ship has jumped to lightspeed. The Defenders were unable to intercept.”
“Understood,” Thrawn said. The web around the moon is disintegrating. The Grysk ships are moving outward, intent on escaping the gravity well. “Fighter squadrons, turbolasers: full attack. Destroy them all.”
The turbolasers open fire. Across the starscape, the TIEs engage the enemy.
“Should we try to take some prisoners, sir?” Faro asked. Her voice holds cautious concern.
“The Grysks have tried once to lure us into a deadly trap,” Thrawn said. “We cannot risk them doing so again.”
“Yes, sir.” Faro is silent a moment. Her body stance continues to hold concern. “Sir…the Chiss prisoners. If we don’t take one of the Grysk ships, how will we find them?”
“We may not,” Thrawn said. “But we may. Lieutenant Lomar, is there word from Lord Vader?”
“Commander Kimmund just reported in, sir,” Lomar said. “They have the prisoners and have cleared the enemy from the courtyard. They’re bringing the Darkhawk in now for a pickup, and expect to be back at the Chimaera within the hour. They also request a transport for additional equipment.”
“Request denied,” Thrawn said. “Inform Commander Kimmund that we will be satisfied with just the prisoners. Order quarters to be prepared for them, and inform Lord Vader that I wish to speak with him immediately upon his return.”
The Grysk ships had been destroyed and the errant moon was drifting along its path toward eternity by the time Vader and the Darkhawk returned to the Chimaera with the freed children. Quarters had been prepared for them near Thrawn’s own suite, and the grand admiral had taken a few minutes to speak with them.
Vader couldn’t understand what they were saying, and their minds had the same opaqueness as Thrawn’s. But he could sense the slow calming of the children’s emotions as they finally grasped that their nightmare was over. One of the girls spoke a little Sy Bisti; Commodore Faro located an assistant maintenance tech who also knew some of that obscure trade language and left the children in his care.
And it was time for Thrawn to stand to judgment.
“You lied to me,” Vader said when they were once again alone in the admiral’s office.
“I did not lie, my lord,” Thrawn said, inclining his head.
“You withheld some of the truth,” Vader countered, keeping a firm grip on his anger as he stretched out with the Force. The sand bridge Thrawn had been continually walking since they first arrived at Batuu had been steadily blown away by the admiral’s words and actions. Now it had eroded to something perilously thin. One more misstep, one more evasion or lie, and Vader would forget that the Emperor still had use of this person. “That is the same as a lie.”
“I told you what I could,” Thrawn said. “What I deemed the Emperor would permit me to reveal.”
“The Emperor knows the whole truth, then?”
Thrawn hesitated, the orderly array of his mind bending a bit under the strain of Vader’s glare and presence. “I have not told him,” the admiral conceded. “But I have no doubt that he does indeed know.”
Vader felt his thumbs tighten in his belt. In that, the Chiss was probably right. “You will tell me all of it,” he said. “Now.”
“As I promised,” Thrawn said, again inclining his head. The deference was real, Vader could sense, as was the caution behind it. The admiral knew exactly where he stood, and recognized that his life was hanging by a thread.
Good.
“You will first appreciate that this is among the most closely guarded secrets of the Chiss Ascendancy,” he said. “As I noted when we first reached this region of space, there are few stable hyperlanes into and through the Unknown Regions. Because of this, most species stay close to their own systems, preferring to travel along shorter lanes and unwilling to take the time necessary for the much slower jump-by-jump travel.”
“But the Chiss do not wish to be so limited?”
“Indeed not,” Thrawn said, a hint of contempt creeping into his voice. “For all their pronouncements of non-interference in others’ activities, the Aristocras have a deep desire to know what those activities consist of. Our scouts range far and wide, entering even into the parts of space once claimed by the Republic and now claimed by the Empire.” He gestured. “As you well know.”
“I have been so informed by the Emperor,” Vader said stiffly. Again, Thrawn was poking uncomfortably close to the edge. “Tell me about the children.”
“We do not have nav computers able to plot safe paths through the chaos of the Unknown Regions hyperspace,” Thrawn said. “Nor do the Chiss produce appreciable numbers of Force-sensitives, though we call their gift Third Sight. But when such rare individuals are born, they come to us with but one ability, that of precognition.”