[Legacy Of The Force] - 08(63)
She wasn’t sure how many Jedi had regrouped on Endor, but they had a way of punching way, way above their weight.
Give him a punch for me, Luke…
When Luke appeared, she spoke quickly. “Master Skywalker, Fondor will be ring-fenced by Vigilante mines. Double shell. I estimate four or five hours and the fleet will follow shortly afterward.”
Luke paused as if he was visualizing that. “I think Fon-dor was expecting something after the skirmish with the Anakin Solo.”
“Yes, that was provocative. But there’s more. Jacen’s following at twenty-three fifty-nine with part of the Fourth Fleet and a hundred and fifty thousand troops. He’s planning to isolate the orbital yards by mines and force a surrender, or so he says. The Imperial Remnant is backing him up. I’m sending you the data now-I’ll update it when I can.”
“What makes you think he might be lying?”
“He’s Jacen. It’s what he does. I don’t believe he’s stupid either. Too few troops to take and hold both orbitals and planet, but a lot of capital ship firepower. My personal view is that he plans to draw the Fondorian forces out and then pound them so that the Imperials can move in.” The thoughts were rolling out as she spoke, ideas breeding. “But he’s not invincible.”
“Is it a decoy attack?”
“I’ve seen no other ship movements or troop deploy-ments that even hint that he’s going to stage a bigger operation elsewhere.”
“Or a smaller one?”
“I just don’t know. But I’m going to spend the evening briefing a few captains to get my people out if this all goes to rot.”
“Thanks, Admiral.”
“You’re welcome, Master Skywalker. Go ahead and ruin his day for me.”
And maybe my own people’s day, too. I hope not. I really do.
Niathal wandered down to the dining room and tried to work up some enthusiasm for the menu, but she had lost all desire to eat. She sat gazing in defocus at the fine linen and gold-rimmed Naboo porceplast plate, and found that even the water she sipped stuck in her throat.
She had been so certain that undermining Jacen Solo was the right thing to do. But collateral damage could never be avoided. It was part of war. She sent beings into battle, and some didn’t come back.
But that was when she looked them in the eye, and more often than not stood on that same deck with them.
She had never felt less worthy of the uniform in her life.
Chapter 9
You’ve probably heard this before, but it’s a trap.
-Luke Skywalker, to the President of Fondor, warning of minelaying activity in Fondorian space
BRALSIN, NEARKELDABE
“It’s hard not to hate the Vong, “Jaina said.
She slipped off the pillion seat of the speeder bike and looked downhill, hands shielding her eyes against the sun. The broad shallow valley that sloped away from her was a patchwork of cultivated fields, woodland, ancient circular fortified homesteads, and a rash of small round roofs that marked new homes being built.
But there were still huge swathes of dead land, poisoned by the Yuuzhan Vong, where nothing grew.
“I don’t try.” Beviin unloaded the panniers and stacked armor plates. “I have a good hate and feel better for it. Better out than in, that’s what I say.”
“Did you bring me up here for the view?”
Jaina picked out MandalMotors’ tower in the distance and an ungainly vessel tracking across the sky behind it; it was the tank-like thing that had given her a surprise when she entered Mandalorian space. There were two of them, in fact. She was intensely curious, partly because she had a feeling she might face one from the wrong side of a border one day, and partly because she was a pilot. It must have felt like flying a permacrete slab.
“Not really, “Beviin said. “But we won’t have an audience, and it’s a spot with its own history.”
“Yeah, I do seem to draw a crowd in your barn. You should sell tickets.”
“A lot of folks haven’t seen a live Jedi before.”
“That’s not very reassuring.”
“Just a figure of speech.”
Jaina followed Beviin to the top of the small hill, a gen-tly rounded dome that flattened out into downs dotted with trees and bushes. The feel of the place made her nape bristle in the way that battlefields did, but many times magnified. It wasn’t actually a feeling of dread; just a sense that terrible things had happened but that it had somehow been triumphant, even oddly content in the end. Across the expanse of short spongy grass was an avenue of trees. She couldn’t see what it led to, but it led to something. She felt it.
“Sacred site?” she asked. Beviin bent over and took a few swings at the turf with his beskad. He looked as if he was digging for something. “I can feel something happened here, a battle maybe.”