[Last Of The Jedi] - 04(30)

Captain Typho strode toward Ferus as he emerged from the Theed generator. “Your friends are all safe,” he said, before Ferus could ask.

Ferus saw a blur of brown and blue, and Trever ran toward him, his blue hair flying, his tunic torn. “Did you get Malorum? Did you stop him?”

“He fell into the central core of the generator.”

“So the secret is safe,” Solace said, coming up to them. “Whatever it is.”

“We’ll clean up quickly,” Captain Typho said. “There will be no trace of battle. We’ve been monitoring the comet system. Coruscant Imperial Control is trying to raise the battalion here but getting no response. They’re sending a ship to investigate from a nearby system. It could be here within the hour. It’s time to blow the weapons cache.”

“Looks like we’re up, mate,” Clive said to Ferus. “It’ll be a mite tricky, but I think I’ve got the explosives figured out so we can get out in time.”

Ferus blinked at him. “You think?” he asked.

Clive grinned. “Your pal here helped me with a few ideas.”

Ferus looked at Trever.

“Don’t look at me that way,” Trever said. “I’m not coming with you this time. Do you think I’m crazy?”

Clive and Ferus entered the great Theed hangar, empty now of all personnel. The area around the hangar had been cleared of people and any valuables, just in case the hangar blew up the surrounding area. Theed pilots had flown a few ships to safety, but they would have to sacrifice some of their fleet so that the blast wouldn’t look suspicious.

“The trick is to arrange the stuff so that it blows here, in the center,” Clive said. “The shock wave will go down, not out. But this side wall has to pack some explosive power so that it blows the Imperial headquarters, too. We have to account for the loss of those stormtroopers.”

“Let’s do it,” Ferus said.

They approached the boxes cautiously. Clive began to open them with a vibro-cutter.

“Some of this is highly volatile baradium,” Clive said, eyeing the instructions on the durasteel boxes. “Just don’t drop anything.”

“Right,” Ferus muttered.

Carefully, they picked up the boxes and bins and moved them to the center of the hangar. They took the highly volatile synthetic explosive and pushed it against the wall. Then Clive carefully walked through, setting the sequence charges. “Trever fixed these so that they’ll disintegrate with the blast - no trace of metal or explosive will remain. They’ll never know we blew it.”

“So how are we getting out in time?” Ferus asked.

“The pattern is designed so that one alpha charge will set off an explosion that will set off the next, and the next, and so on, until it gets so bloody hot in here that the whole place goes up. It’s going to be one crazy blow,” Clive said fondly.

“Clive? How are we getting out?” Ferus asked, enunciating each word.

“Oh. I have a plan.” Clive placed the last alpha charge against a drum of missile fuel.

“Good,” Ferus breathed in relief.

“We run.” Clive placed the last charge down and set it. “Now!”

Ferus spurted after Clive, cursing him in his head. Clive was one of those insane individuals who enjoyed extreme danger. Ferus felt the first explosion at his back. He felt the heat on his neck. He charged toward the doors. The next explosion gave him a push at the small of his back that almost sent him sprawling. The third made the air come alive. He rode a wave of air out the double doors and landed on his knees on the street. Clive rolled over, laughing.

“Come on, it’s not over yet,” he shouted.

The Imperial headquarters blew as they raced under a pedestrian bridge. The bridge fell in a shower of mellow ochre stone. Ferus grabbed Clive and Force-leaped to safety.

Sprawled on their backs, they watched as half the hangar burned and Imperial headquarters collapsed in a heap of rubble and a giant cloud of dust.

Coughing, they made their way to Solace, Oryon, Keets, Curran, and Trever, who were standing with Captain Typho watching the awful spectacle.

“I’m sorry about the building,” Ferus said. “It was a gracious part of Theed. It will take a long time to rebuild that hangar.”

“It is a thing,” Typho said. “The people of Naboo are more important.”





CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO


The orbiting space platform in the Rainbow Nebulae was somewhere between Naboo and nowhere, and it was a good place to stop. The group refueled there. It had been imperative that they take off from Naboo immediately.

They all stood together while their ships were hooked up to the refueling stations. The sky above vibrated with red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet.