Showdown at Centerpoint (29 page)

“Just about right, sir,” said Lieutenant Kalenda. “However, it is more than a question of possessing the repulsor. It is knowing how to use it. And I’m not entirely sure Thrackan Sal-Solo is able to control it.”

“But they fired it already.”

“Not really, sir. It was an—an uncontrolled start-up. There was a massive burst of unregulated repulsor radiation, that’s all. The Selonian repulsor shot was much more controlled. And there’s another reason. Remember his assault boat went into the repulsor after it was fired. We’re only
assuming
it was his techs who fired it.”

“After seeing that broadcast he made, I’ll tell you who I think set it off,” said Lando.

“And who might that be?” Ossilege said, smiling coldly, indulgently. An expression that said he had already rejected whatever Lando was about to say.

“The children,” Lando said. “I think they managed to turn it on by accident. The repulsor burst attracted Thrackan’s attention, the same as it did yours, and he got there first.”

“Don’t be absurd,” Ossilege said, all but openly sneering. “How could children activate a planetary repulsor?”

“I don’t know. It’s possible Chewbacca did, but I doubt he would be so careless as to allow an uncontrolled burst like that. Maybe the two Drall did it. But someone in that group is the one who pushed the button.”

“I doubt it. I believe it was some of Sal-Solo’s people who activated the repulsor, an advance team if you will. I believe they somehow captured the children whilst in the process of searching for the repulsor. But all this is beside the point. Sal-Solo has the repulsor now. And I have a marine assault force preparing to go in and take it from him. It is just before local dawn at the repulsor site now. The marines plan to go in just after sunset tonight—though I may push that forward if circumstances merit. They are holding tactical exercises and running simulations right now.”

“Why not go in now?” Lando asked.

“I asked Commander Putney, the assault troops’ commanding officer, that same question, some hours ago. I assure you Putney is feeling as much anxiety as you to go at once, but it’s not that simple. The main problem is that, as per my orders, their assault boats were combat-loaded for a prolonged exploratory sortie onto Centerpoint, in case that proved necessary. That is a wholly different mission than a quick-strike attack against a small force in a fixed position. It simply takes time to unload the boats from one mission profile and repack for another. There are other factors. The marine commander believes that going in during darkness will be to their advantage. He has also worked out the relative time zones, and the effects of changes in local time and duration of day. He calculates that the Corellians in the repulsor will be at their most tired, their most sleep-deprived, just about at local sunset this evening. Suffice to say that although you and I are actually in agreement on this point, and wish the attack to happen sooner, there are cogent reasons for the delay. The risks are obvious—but I believe that once all
the factors are weighed, our best chance for success is to wait.”

“And you’re either right, or you’re wrong, with no way to know for sure until it’s too late. Then you’re a genius for guessing right, or a monster and a fool for guessing wrong. I don’t envy you that sort of decision, Admiral. They stuck me with a generalship once, a long time ago,” said Lando. “I didn’t care for it. Mostly because of decisions just like this one. You have my sympathy.”

“Thank you, Captain Calrissian. Given our past differences, that was most generous of you to say.”

“Believe me, every word was sincere. But we haven’t touched the main question. Do any of you believe that our friend down there, the very high and mighty Thrackan Sal-Solo, is now able to operate that repulsor? Or, if not, will he be able to soon?”

“Hard to tell, really,” said Kalenda. “My working theory is that the outside force running this thing sent in technical teams, intending to have their own people control the repulsors and not trusting to the locals. Sal-Solo would have been given enough techs to cover one repulsor. Has he kept those techs home, or has he brought them along? How good are they? Do they know what they are doing? What sort of shape is the repulsor in? Was it damaged by the uncontrolled startup?” Kalenda shook her head. “There are too many variables.”

“Hmmph. Someday, an intelligence officer will answer a question with an answer, instead of a new collection of questions. The Selonian repulsor is up and running. The Drall repulsor is a question mark. What about the Corellian one, or the units on Talus and Tralis?”

Kalenda shook her head. “We have no indication that they are functional. But that doesn’t mean a thing. That they haven’t been used might mean they haven’t been found yet, or that the technicians have their finger on the button, just waiting for their big moment.”

“Murk and muddle,” Ossilege said. “All of it murk and muddle. Nothing clear, nothing absolute, no one clear enemy you can point your finger at and say it’s him! Attack! What do you make of it, Madame Prime Minister? You have sat there, quite silent, for a while now.”

Gaeriel leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms thoughtfully. “You have pointed your finger square at the chief difficulty. There are too many enemies, and they are too vague, too uncertain, too diffuse. I think that is part of a deliberate tactic. It is meant to confuse us, distract us, get us looking in all the wrong directions. And, I am afraid, it has worked. We have heard so many conflicting stories, dealt with so many contradictory claims, that we no longer know what is real. All I know for sure is that we have not met the real enemy yet. I no longer believe the rebellions have any reality. The rebel groups are essentially fakes, all of them. Some are wholly artificial, and some are tiny little splinter groups, fringe organizations that the real outside force has pumped up with money and support. The partial exception is the Human League. It was a real organization—but it got financed by the same outsiders as the rest of the rebels. And I feel quite confident that the Human League is now as much in rebellion against its paymasters as it is against us. The outsiders, the external enemy, set all this in motion in order to grab the Corellian Sector and damage the New Republic. But the Human League and Thrackan Sal-Solo have decided to grab Corellia for themselves.

“We haven’t seen the real enemy yet. We’ve only seen their frontmen, their stooges, their stand-ins. But I think that the end of the communications blackout means that we are going to meet the real enemy, and very soon.”

There was a discreet bleep from the intercom set on the desk. Ossilege turned and walked back to the desk. “Yes, what is it?” he asked.

“Sir,” said a voice on the comm unit, “we’ve just
detected the interdiction field coming down. It is fading away very rapidly, and is already below the threshold to permit hyperspace travel.”

“Is it indeed? Then I think we can assume someone or other is about to do some hyperspace travel. All stations on all ships to standby alert. I want the detection officers sharp.”

“Yes, sir. Sir, there is another matter. The moment the field came down, we received another communication from Source A. He is on the—”

“One moment.” Ossilege stabbed a button down on the comm, cutting off the speaker. He picked up the comm’s handset.
Rare to see a handset,
thought Lando.
Even rarer to see one used
. Most people were glad to talk to the empty air with their hands free, rather than holding a hunk of plastic to the side of their head and talking into it. But handsets had the great advantage of keeping those nearby from hearing the conversation. And Ossilege had clearly never been one for letting anyone know anything unless they needed to know it. “All right, go ahead.” Ossilege listened. “Is he indeed? By all means, put him through. No, no, voice only is fine. But one moment please.” Ossilege put his hand over the handset’s speaker. “My apologies to you all. If I had not promised otherwise, I would gladly include you all in this. But I gave my word to keep discussions with—ah—this source—private.”

Gaeriel stood up, and Lando and Kalenda took their cue from her. “Of course, Admiral. We understand. Your word must be your bond.”

“Thank you for your understanding, Madame Prime Minister. Lieutenant Kalenda, Captain Calrissian. We will continue this discussion later.”

*   *   *

“I wish I could head up to the bridge and watch the show,” said Lando as the three of them stepped out into the corridor.

“Why can’t you? In fact, I think I’ll go myself,” said Gaeriel.

“Well, uh, yeah, but you’re an ex-Prime Minister and the plenipotentiary and all that,” said Lando, a bit hurriedly. “You’re a very official person. I’m just some guy who’s along for the ride.”

“Lieutenant Kalenda?” Gaeriel asked. “Are you coming?”

“No, ma’am. Not just now.”

“I see,” said Gaeriel, though it was clear she did not. “I seem to be missing something. I should think you’d both be most eager to get up there and see what’s going on.”

“Well, yes, we are,” Lando admitted. “But the last thing a bridge crew needs during a crisis is off-duty personnel playing tourist,”
or uninvited high-ranking guests breathing down their necks and jiggling their elbows,
he thought, though he never would dare say such a thing to her out loud.

“I see,” said Gaeriel. “I expect that military etiquette would preclude my going as well, wouldn’t it?”

The woman was sharp. You had to give her that much. “Ah, well, yes, ma’am.”

“In that case, to hell with military etiquette. I will go to the flag deck, which is designed with the purpose of letting those in it observe without interfering. I will not bother anyone. I will not get it into my head to start issuing freelance orders. But I am going up there to see what is going on.”

“My, my apologies, Gaeriel—ma’am. Madame Prime Minister. I meant no offense,” Lando said.
At least not so much that you need to bite my head off
.

Gaeriel Captison sighed wearily. “And none taken,” she said. “My apologies to you. That was uncalled for on my part. But, by all that’s sacred, this is my mission. I’m the reason this ship is here. Luke Skywalker came to me and asked me for help, and I got it for him. And my government named me as plenipotentiary, empowered to make all decisions in its name. I am entitled, I
am honor-bound, to see everything, know everything, before I make those decisions. But they all coddle me here, insulate me, keep all the awkward facts and unimportant details away from me. It was a relief to go to Centerpoint and nearly die of smoke inhalation. At least I was doing something. And now Centerpoint is going to incinerate another star in three days time, and the interdiction field has just dropped, and the devils of dark space alone know what that means, and I’m supposed to just go to my cabin and sit quietly in polite ignorance because going to the flag deck isn’t the done thing?”

“You’ve got a point,” said Lando.

“And you two should see it all too, but you’re not going to, because it would be rude?”

“Yes, ma’am. It sounds ridiculous, but—”

“It sounds ridiculous because it is ridiculous,” Gaeriel said. She looked from Lando to Kalenda and back again. “I order you to accompany me to the flag deck, right now.”

Lando glanced at Kalenda. He was just about certain that Gaeriel Captison had no legal authority under any interpretation of space law at all, to issue him an order, and he was only slightly less sure that she had no right to issue orders to Kalenda, either. But who was going to tell that to an ex-Prime Minister and plenipotentiary? “Very well, Madame Prime Minister,” he said. “If you insist.”

Gaeriel grinned. “Oh, I do, I do,” she said. “So let’s get going,” she said, and led the way.

Kalenda and Lando followed, and they let her get a few steps ahead, and then a few steps more. Once she was safely out of earshot, Lando leaned over toward Kalenda and spoke in a low voice. “Well, I put my foot in it that time,” he said.

“That you did,” Kalenda said, her voice just as low. “But on the bright side, at least we get to see what in blazes is going on out there.”

“Sounds good to me.”

“On another subject,” Kalenda whispered, “do you have any idea what that Source A business is about?”

What indeed, Lando thought. There was something about the idea of a casual question from an intelligence officer that didn’t quite ring true with Lando. She was not the sort of person who ever asked questions without a reason. Was it a trick question? Was she trying to see if he knew more than he should? Or did she just see him as a good analyst, a good guesser, a good source for informed speculation? Or was she just making conversation while he was getting paranoid?

Not that it mattered what she was or was not after—Lando had no information. He had a guess or two, but that didn’t count. The second he had heard the words “Source A,” he had immediately thought of the brilliantly original idea of calling Tendra Risant Source T. That brought an immediate idea to mind as to who Source A might be. But he knew better than to stick his neck out. “You’re the intell officer,” he said, “your guess is as good as mine. Probably better.”

“Oh, come on. You can do better than that.”

“Okay, okay, I do have a guess or two, I admit it. I just think I’d like to keep them to myself. Even I don’t quite believe them.”

Kalenda laughed. “Fair enough,” she said. “But I’ve got a feeling I have the same idea you do. Come on, let’s hurry and catch her up, before she has us thrown in the brig for disobeying a direct order.”

*   *   *

Tendra Risant figured she had to be the first one in. She had to be. It didn’t take much of a guess to figure that whoever had dropped the field had done it to jump their own ships in, or that the ships would be at the ready. But even so, she would get there first. The
Gentleman Caller
was old and slow, to be sure, but how
many other inbound ships were there likely to be inside the interdiction field?

It was not until after the automatics activated the hyperspace drive that it dawned on her that being first might not be the best idea when jumping into a war zone. After all, she knew for a fact that there were warships waiting in-system, at least some of them in the vicinity of Centerpoint—the spot she was headed for. The crews of those ships would be able to detect the interdiction field going down every bit as well as Tendra could—better, in fact. And they would know that meant ships—warships, enemy warships—coming in. So the incoming ships would be on alert, because the Bakuran ships would be on alert, with their weapons at the ready—in short, a fearful muddle of everyone on alert.