Solo Command (32 page)

“We’re in luck,” Wedge said. “He’s still in here.” He extended the bowl of food. “Here, take some. Maybe we can lure him back.”

Janson grimaced as he grabbed up a handful of the smelly Ewok food.

They headed forward, only to hear the forward door out
of the chamber hiss open, followed by the
patter-patter
of bare feet and the door hissing closed again. Wedge headed forward at a dead run, Janson at his heels.

The door opened for them, revealing dimness beyond, then Wedge was skidding to a halt and Janson ran into him. They toppled over together, crashing into containers of some sort, and fluid, liters of it, splashed over them.

A sharp, poisonously clean smell forced its way into Janson’s nose. “Sithspit, what’s that?”

“Cleansing fluid of some sort. We must have hit a janitor droid’s stash.” Wedge sat up. Janson could see him wrinkling his nose even in the dim light. Somewhere else in the room, a door hissed open and closed again.

“Oh, this is no good,” Wedge said. “He’s running now because we’re chasing him, and he’s going to be able to smell us from kilometers away.”

“So let’s call in Kell and Tyria. They can hunt him down while we clean up.”

“They’re not part of our Kettch conspiracy.” Wedge rose and moved away from the puddle. “Strip.”

“What?”

“Get those clothes off. We’ll rub some of the Ewok food over the parts of our skin that have the cleansing fluid on them. That should make it possible for us to get close to him.” Wedge suited action to words, unzipping his jumpsuit.

“Oh, sure. Would you stand still if you were being approached by two naked men with Ewok food smeared all over them?”

“No, but I’m not an Ewok. Just do it.” Wedge nodded right and left. “Looks like there are two doors out of here. I don’t know which one he took, but they’ll both go into General Solo’s mess. You take that one, I’ll take this one.”

“Wedge, this is the last time I’m feeding Kettch.”

“Me, too.”

The door opened for Janson and he crept through into the dimly lit room beyond.

Not three meters ahead stood an Ewok, wearing the traditional bonnet-style headgear of the species, his back to Janson.

Janson took a careful, silent step forward. The Ewok didn’t react. One more step and he was in range—Janson lunged, grabbing the Ewok with his left hand, the one uncontaminated by Ewok food. “Got you!”

The Ewok didn’t struggle. Nor did it weigh much. Janson looked at it. It wasn’t a live Ewok; it was the stuffed toy the Wraiths had brought with them from Hawk-bat Base, the one they called Kettch.

Then Janson realized that the room was full of people—all the other members of Wraith Squadron. In the dimness, they stood like statues, in poses suggesting they’d been in the middle of a social gathering, in conversational groups of twos and threes, and then had been flash-frozen.

No, not frozen, exactly. They still breathed. Some swayed a little where they stood.

And none of them looked at Janson.

Janson stood still for a long moment, waiting for some reaction from them, or for some realization to set in and inform him why they’d be standing stock-still in a dimly lit room. None came.

So he held the stuffed Ewok toy before him and backed to the door through which he’d entered.

His bare skin touched metal and he flinched. The door had closed and wasn’t opening for him.

He scraped the Ewok food off his hand against the door-jamb. Slowly, silently, his sense of unreality mounting, he walked sideways toward the other door into this chamber. To get there, he’d have to pass close to Piggy, Shalla, and Elassar, who were grouped close to the wall. As he neared them, he paused and reached out to touch Piggy, the Wraith nearest him.

His fingers encountered real flight suit and solid flesh beneath. He jerked his hand back. Neither Piggy nor any of the others reacted.

It was a dream, it had to be. And by the rules of dreams, doubtless there was to be some bad result if he failed to escape before the Wraiths awoke. In case he could short-circuit the
process, he pinched himself, hoping to awaken prematurely, but he had no such luck. The scene remained before him.

Moving with less caution, he made it to the other door and backed into it … and his bare rear once again contacted metal as the door failed to open.

Well, then. There was one more door out of this chamber, which should open up into a corridor—a corridor that he could, with luck, duck down unobserved and perhaps reach the pilots’s ready room, where he had another uniform in his locker. He continued sideways along the wall, around the corner …

He reached the doorway and turned into it. The door whooshed open. And beyond was Wedge, fully uniformed, bellowing, “Attention!”

The room lights blazed into normal brightness and Janson heard the Wraiths behind him snapping to attention. He felt his cheeks burn as he realized they had to be facing his bare backside.

Wedge looked at Janson, then at the Ewok toy he held protectively before him. “Lieutenant, you’re out of uniform. And you know, wearing an Ewok as a swimsuit is a felony on some worlds.”

Janson nodded. He could not keep a rueful grin from forming on his lips. “I have been so set up,” he said.

“Good analysis,” Wedge said. “You’re showing real leadership potential, among other things. Lieutenant Nelprin?”

Shalla approached, standing beside Janson so he could see her without turning. In her hands was a folded mass of orange cloth. She unfolded and displayed it before him. It was a cloak, in New Republic flight-suit orange, with the words “Yub, yub, Lieutenant” stenciled on the back in black. She swept it across his shoulders and fastened it around his neck. Then she leaned in close and whispered, “Nice rear, Lieutenant.”

Janson felt his cheeks burning hotter. “Thank you for noticing, Lieutenant.” He handed her the Ewok doll and draped the cloak in a more concealing fashion about himself. “I take it this is revenge for that bet about your not speaking Wookiee?”

Wedge stepped into the room and the door shut behind
him. “Well, for that, and for your antics with Lieutenant Kettch here and at Hawk-bat Base.”

Janson couldn’t keep the surprise from his face. “You knew about that?”

“Well, not at first, of course. Not for sure.” Wedge threw an arm over Janson’s shoulders and turned him, leading him back into the room, into the midst of the grinning Wraiths. “But you didn’t do much of a job of concealing your tracks. The doll showed up immediately after your return from Coruscant, which meant that it was probably you or someone else involved with that trip. Then, after it was obvious that the doll was wandering pretty much at will, I had a transmitter sewn into it.”

Janson winced. “You tracked its movements. And knew it was me. And waited all this time for payback.”

“So, do you still think revenge is beneath Wedge Antilles, Hero of the New Republic?”

“I’m not sure anything is beneath you anymore. Who was playing Kettch? Or Chulku, or whatever his name was supposed to be?”

Wedge grinned. “The first time, we had Squeaky in the box you saw. He speaks Ewok, of course.”

“Of course.” Janson sighed.

Dia said, “I was the footsteps you were following a few minutes ago. And I was the one who splashed you with the bucket full of cleansers. Had to make sure you got plenty on you. We couldn’t rely on you to fall correctly onto the buckets we’d placed.”

Wedge accepted a small glass of amber-colored liquid from Kell, passed it to Janson. “A reward. You’re taking it very well, Wes. Just remember that, when it comes to pranks, you have the necessary enthusiasm, you have the inventiveness, you have the experience … I have the resources.”

“Granted.” Janson sipped at the glass, made an appreciative face. It was Whyren’s Reserve, a Corellian brandy with a rich, smoky flavor. “But it’s over now. No ongoing punishment for me. Right?”

Wedge’s expression became serious. “Well, not after the holorecording of tonight’s events has been circulated.”

“Tell me you’re kidding.”

“What, and deny the universe the chance to see a rear end that the Wraiths have proclaimed so hologenic?”

Janson didn’t even try to keep the dismay off his face. “
Please
tell me you’re kidding.”

“I’ll decide tomorrow. Tonight we celebrate.”

Donos leaned in. “And remember what a very wise man once told me. ‘You can’t look dignified when you’re having fun.’ ”

“If I knew who that wise man was,” Janson said, “I’d shoot him.”

The next morning, the last pilot to enter the briefing amphitheater was Donos. He remained standing until Wedge noticed him. “Permission to sit in, sir?”

“Why? You’re still off the active list.”

“I’d like to volunteer for this mission.”

Wedge looked momentarily baffled. “Did I misstate myself? You can’t fly.”

“I’m not volunteering as a pilot, sir. Nothing in my current reevaluation indicates that I’m unfit to handle a ship’s guns. I’d like to volunteer as a crewman on the
Millennium Falsehood
. I’m a Corellian, I know the equipment, and I’m a good shot.” That was understating it somewhat; though his greatest talent was with a sniper’s rifle, Donos was marksman-rated with most sorts of blaster and laser weapons.

“Good point,” Wedge said. “Yes, you can attend the briefing; I’ll decide on your request later.” He stood behind the lectern and turned to the assembled pilots.

“Today is a standard ‘let them see the
Falsehood
then run’ exercise. Our target is the Comkin system. Comkin’s security measures are more extensive than some we’ve recently encountered, so we can’t count on smuggling in our TIE interceptor escort. However, Chewbacca has temporarily attached plating to the surface of the
Falsehood
that gives it a sensor echo much more like that of a YT-2400 freighter, and that plating will contain a bit of a surprise for Comkin’s defenders. We have transponder data corresponding to that of a real YT-2400
mercenary trader, so we should be able to make it to the planet’s surface; however, if we’re identified on entry, we just evacuate and achieve our primary objective, another appearance by the
Millennium Falcon
.

“Another modification we’ve made to the
Falsehood
will allow for quicker response time by the support squadron when it’s supposed to come in for rescue: we’ve installed a miniature holocomm unit worth more than the rest of the ship put together. Yes, Face?”

“Sir, is it a bad time to point out that a good shot of brandy is worth more than the rest of the ship put together?”

“Yes. Wraith Squadron will be our primary escort …”

Melvar appeared silently beside Lara’s station. His mild words contrasted with the cruelty of his features. “Baron Fel would like to see you fly.”

“Really.” Lara made a face suggesting that she was surprised and pleased. “You mean, for real, not in a simulator.”

“For real. Broadaxe Squadron will be supplementing the One Eighty-first, and they’re a pilot light. Would you care to suit up and fly with them?”

“I’d be delighted.”

“Report to their ready room at thirteen hundred.” Melvar gave her a mirthless smile. “Don’t do too well. We’d hate to lose you as an analyst.”

“I’ll keep it in mind. Thank you, sir.”

When he was gone, she stared at her screen, seeing none of the data on it, and tried not to shake. She prayed that she’d been wrong in her initial assessment, that the next
Mon Remonda
strike would be on any system other than Comkin Five.

For if she’d been right, she might end up facing her former squadmates in mortal combat.

Comkin Five was a green-blue world circling a yellow star. As the
Falsehood
neared the planet’s surface, blotches of color resolved themselves into blue sea, deep green tropics, and bands of cloud cover, with only the smallest patches of arctic ice.

“Pretty,” Donos said. “What do we blow up first?”

Wedge, ahead of him in the pilot’s chair, turned to glance at him. “Write that down,” he said. “That ought to be the Wraith Squadron slogan.”

“Good point. Squeaky, record that.”

“If I must.”

Wedge’s attention was diverted by data on his sensor board. “We’ve just been tapped by planetary sensors. Now we find out if our camouflage fooled them.”

“I don’t see how it can,” Squeaky said, his voice even more petulant than usual. “On close examination, the extension off our starboard side just does not look genuine. And Chewbacca has failed to minimize the
Falsehood’
s forward mandibles, which are, if I’m not mistaken, characteristic of the YT-1300s but not the YT-2400s. We are, I think, probably dead.”

Donos frowned at the two-tone 3PO unit seated beside him. Squeaky looked absurd in his ill-fitting clothing, a New Republic general’s uniform. “Then why did you volunteer for this mission?”

“Habit?”

“No.”

“Because I thought my absence would doom the mission?”

“Although Emtrey could have substituted for you.”

Chewbacca grumbled something.

“Certainly not,” Squeaky said, his tone turning indignant. “This is not fun, and I wouldn’t miss you.”

Chewbacca grumbled again.

“No, you don’t keep having to remind me to belt in. I am firmly belted in. My belt is fixed with more finesse than that of any belt in this cockpit.”

Donos shook his head. Maybe he ought to set up at one of the gunport turrets now.

Lara sat in her cockpit, drenched in sweat and feeling miserable.

It wasn’t because the cockpit was more uncomfortable than usual, or because of the protracted amount of time she’d been in it.

She’d met the Broadaxe Squadron pilots and had been
assigned a TIE interceptor and a wingman, the squadron commander. She’d gone through the routine power-up checklist and transferred, with the rest of the Broadaxes and the 181st, to another ship—a Dreadnaught, older than the Empire, named
Reprisal
. She remembered it from the Levian mission. Broad-axe Squadron occupied the Dreadnaught’s fighter bay, while the 181st was divided among officers’ bays and cargo bays. Lara shook her head over that; she’d have thought that the more prestigious unit would choose the more convenient bay.