Rogue Squadron (43 page)

“Indeed, I believe I did.” Her smile grew. “And I believe my prediction will be proven true.”

“Then Horn will come here.”

“And will be looking for you.” Isard licked her lips. “More distraction from his main mission for Lieutenant Horn, and more motivation for you to succeed in Rogue Squadron’s destruction.”

In this case
I’m
not sure those ends justify the means at all
. “I see, Madam Director.”

“I’m sure you do, Agent Loor. Spare me future reports about General Derricote’s tantrums. I want results, and I want them to be successful results.”

“As you will it, Madam Director,” he found himself saying in the darkness resulting from her termination of the communication.

He rocked back and sat on the floor. For a half a second he longed for a return to the days when he and Horn were adversaries at CorSec. They had hated each other, especially after the Bossk incident, but the tension had not yet become lethal. Then he realized he harbored no real fear of Corran Horn’s retribution.
His success would mean release from
her
clutches. If he knew that, of course, Horn would find a way to clone me, so he could have the pleasure of killing me
and
forcing me to work for Ysanne Isard forever!

“Yes, he could be that cruel, but he would hold himself back. Therein is his weakness.” Kirtan Loor grabbed the edge of his desk and pulled himself upright. “Here on Imperial Center, in Isard’s domain, I have neither the compunction nor need to restrain myself. Do come to Coruscant, Corran. Bring your friends and your hidden enemy with you. Imperial City is undoubtedly the last place you ever thought you’d visit, and I will do all I can to make certain it
is
the
last
place you visit.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michael A. Stackpole is an award-winning author, editor, game and computer game designer. As always, he spends his spare time playing indoor soccer and now has a new hobby, podcasting. Mike will publish
A New World
, the sequel to
Cartomancy
, this July, and is currently at work on ideas for a half-dozen other novels.

To learn more about Mike’s podcasting, please visit
www.tsfpn.com
(the website of The SciFi Podcast Network).

BOOKS BY MICHAEL A. STACKPOLE

THE WARRIOR TRILOGY

Warrior: En Garde

Warrior: Riposte

Warrior: Coupé

THE BLOOD OF KERENSKY

TRILOGY

Lethal Heritage

Blood Legacy

Lost Destiny

Natural Selection

Assumption of Risk

Bred for War

Malicious Intent

Grave Covenant

Prince of Havoc

Ghost War

THE FIDDLEBACK TRILOGY

A Gathering Evil

Evil Ascendant

Evil Triumphant

Eyes of Silver
^*

Dementia

Wolf and Raven

Once a Hero
^*

Talion: Revenant
^*

STAR WARS
^®
X-WING SERIES

Rogue Squadron
^*

Wedge’s Gamble
^*

The Krytos Trap
^*

The Bacta War
^*

Isard’s Revenge
^*

Star Wars
^®
: I, Jedi
^*

Star Wars
^®
: Dark Tide

Star Wars
^®
: Onslaught

Star Wars
^®
: Ruin

THE DRAGONCROWN

WAR CYCLE

The Dark Glory War
^*

Fortress Draconis
^*

When Dragons Rage
^*

The Grand Crusade
^*

THE AGE OF DISCOVERY

A Secret Atlas
^*

Cartomancy
^*

*published by Bantam Books

STAR WARS—
The Expanded Universe

You saw the movies. You watched the cartoon series, or maybe played some of the video games. But did you know …

In
The Empire Strikes Back
, Princess Leia Organa said to Han Solo, “I love you.” Han said, “I know.” But did you know that they actually got married? And had three Jedi children: the twins, Jacen and Jaina, and a younger son, Anakin?

Luke Skywalker was trained as a Jedi by Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda. But did you know that, years later, he went on to revive the Jedi Order and its commitment to defending the galaxy from evil and injustice?

Obi-Wan said to Luke, “For over a thousand generations, the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Before the dark times. Before the Empire.” Did you know that over those millennia, legendary Jedi and infamous Sith Lords were adding their names to the annals of Republic history?

Yoda explained that the dreaded Sith tend to come in twos: “Always two, there are. No more, no less. A Master, and an apprentice.” But did you know that the Sith didn’t always exist in pairs? That at one time in the ancient Republic there were as many Sith as Jedi, until a Sith Lord named Darth Bane was the lone survivor of a great Sith war and created the “Rule of Two”?

All this and much, much more is brought to life in the many novels and comics of the
Star Wars
expanded universe. You’ve seen the movies and watched the cartoon. Now venture out into the wider worlds of
Star Wars
!

Turn the page or jump to the
timeline
of
Star Wars
novels to learn more.

1

Even before his X-wing’s sensors had time to scan and identify the new ship, Corran Horn knew it was trouble. That knowledge was not based on the ship’s unscheduled, unannounced reversion to realspace in the Pyria system. In the month since the Rebel Alliance took the planet Borleias from the Empire, more ships than Corran cared to remember had popped in for a quick survey of the place. Some were on diplomatic missions from worlds that had already joined the New Republic coming to inspect the latest conquest of their forces. Other ships had been sent by the rulers of planets who wanted to separate fact from propaganda before they decided if they wanted to shift allegiances in the galactic civil war.

Still others had been Imperial vessels on reconnaissance missions, and a goodly proportion of the rest were Alliance ships with legitimate business in the system. All of them had to be checked out, and the hostiles discouraged, but the patrols had produced no serious incidents or fatalities. This spawned a complacency among the pilots that was not conducive to long life, but even Corran had found it hard to keep his edge when no serious threats presented themselves.

The new ship’s arrival slashed away his peace of mind like a vibroblade. The sensors reported a modified freight cruiser that had started life as a Rendili Star Drive ship—not in the
Neutron
Star-class of bulk cruiser, but something roughly a quarter that size. That in no way made it remarkable or unusual—dozens of ships built on the same design had been through the system since its conquest. The name,
Vengeance Derra IV
, followed the naming convention common among New Republic ships of recalling some event in the course of the civil war. It had even entered the system on the course and at the speed the Rebels had dictated for freighter traffic.

Still, something is not right here
. During his brief career with the Corellian Security Force, hunting down smugglers and other criminals, he’d learned to trust his gut feelings about things. His father, Hal, and even his grandfather—both CorSec officers themselves—had encouraged him to follow his instincts in dangerous situations. The sensation frustrated him with its elusiveness, as if it were no more tangible than the faint scent of a flower teasing his nose and defying identification.

It’s enough that I know something is odd. Exactly
what
isn’t important at this point
. Corran keyed his comm unit. “Rogue Nine to Champion Five, you handle the challenge. Wait here with Six. I’m going to go out and do a flyby.”

“I copy, Nine, but we are supposed to expedite all shipping in this area. They aren’t in the challenge zone yet.”

“Humor me, Five.”

“As ordered, Nine.”

The system patrols had been broken up to cover four zones around the planet of Borleias. The plane of the ecliptic split the system up and down, with sun side and out splitting it core and rim. Corran and two Y-wing pilots from General Salm’s Defender Wing had up-and-out, which was by far the busiest sector because the planet’s moon had moved out of it and sunward two days previously.

“Whistler, see what you can do about boosting our sensors to pick up any anomalous readings from that freighter.”

The green and white R2 astromech blatted harshly at him.

“Yes, fine, there’s likely to be lots of things wrong with that freighter.” Corran frowned as he nudged his throttle forward and the X-wing started off toward the freighter. “I was thinking about inappropriate weapons or other odd things.”

As Corran’s fighter came in closer he began to get a visual feed on the ship. All of 150 meters long, it had the gentle curves of smaller ships, or the larger Mon Calamari warships. The bridge was a bulge on the top of the bow that tapered back and down into a slender midship. Two thirds of the way back toward the stern the ship’s body flared out again to accommodate the star drives. A communications array sat right behind the bridge, and quad laser turrets bristled off the bow and in a ring around the middle of the ship.

Whistler splashed a report on the ship onto Corran’s primary monitor. It was a Rendili Star Drive’s design, from the
Dwarf Star
-class of freighter. It shipped roughly fifteen hundred metric tons of equipment, ran with a crew of four hundred, and had nine quad lasers as well as one tractor beam that could be used to pull salvage into the belly storage area. The guns and carrying capacity made it a favorite for short-haul traders who were willing to work in areas of the galaxy where authority had broken down, or Imperial entanglements could be a problem.

“Champion Five here, Rogue Nine.”

“Go ahead, Five.”

“I challenged the
Vengeance
and it answered with a code that is good.”

That surprised Corran because he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong with the ship. “Did they get it on the first try?”

Five’s comm unit didn’t filter the surprise out of his voice. “No, second pass. Why?”

“I’ll tell you later. Stay where you are, but get someone to lift from Borleias in an assault shuttle. You and Six be ready for trouble.”

“As ordered, Nine.”

Whistler chirped an inquiry at Corran.

“Yes, I think it’s exactly like the doubletaker case.” Back on Corellia he and his partner, Iella Wessiri, had investigated a series of burglaries where things had been stolen from houses, but there were no signs of forced entry. All of the security systems were manufactured by different companies, and installed and monitored by different agencies. The key to cracking the case was that the ROMs used in the security systems all came from the
same
manufacturer. An employee had sliced the code that got burned into the chips so when a particular password was used on the locks, the system would spit out the correct password. On the second try the thief would enter the correct code, get in, and rob the place.

The Y-wing fighters the Alliance used were old, but still vital, and most of them were a patchwork of new and old systems. Spare parts were not easy to come by, and whatever were available were used quickly to keep the fighters in service. It was conceivable that a sensor/comm unit integrator had been fitted with odd chips that gave away codes when checking them. Arranging for such things would not be beyond the Empire’s Director of Intelligence, Ysanne Isard, especially if it would help prevent the Rebel Alliance from taking Coruscant away from her.