[Republic Commando] - 03(101)

“That’s as of fifteen minutes ago,” A’den said.

Eyat’s boundaries were ringed with vehicles and vessels, and there was no steady procession of civilians out of the city as was usual when attacks were expected. There was nowhere else for the Gaftikari to go. They were marooned on islands in an ocean of enemies. All they could do was dig in.

“You reckon they really know what’s coming?” Atin asked. “I mean, really know?”

A’den, fully armored, tilted his head as if listening to a separate helmet comlink. “No. Not a clue.”

“This is them reacting to the Seps reacting to our inbound ships, yes?”

“That’s their only source of surveillance,” said A’den. “I’m not sure who they’re more worried about, us or the Marits. But they know we’re coming, so I’m not prepared to risk a squad in there to prep the battlefield if we’ve got two battalions, a squadron of Torrents, and Captain Pellaeon’s nice big cannons arriving within a day. Unless Eyat’s got some hidden superweapon we failed to spot, the place is just one big target.”

Darman still couldn’t work out why the two task forces couldn’t simply engage in space and leave the planet alone. But taking Eyat without a bit of muscle and cannons behind them meant very messy fighting if there was no air cover to make the point. He wasn’t sure which was the worse outcome for the civilians.

“We’re not really the main game in town now, are we?” Niner said. “Are we going forward with the Thirty-fifth?”

A’den must have switched his audio feed from Leveler to the general circuit, because Darman’s helmet was suddenly full of the voice traffic between vessels. They seemed more concerned with keeping an eye on the Separatist flotilla, waiting for it to power up to hyperjump. A’den cut the link again and sat in silence, as if he was staring at the holochart lost in thought. He was waiting for instructions.

“Who’s the Jedi in command?” Darman asked.

A’den looked up. “General Mas Missur. Did you want to stay on the circuit?”

“No …”

“It’s that woman of yours, isn’t it?”

“She wouldn’t tell me where she was but she’s been with Levet for some months, so yes-I want to know if she’s with that flotilla and not telling me.”

Personal business didn’t matter on the brink of a battle, but nobody argued with him. A’den switched to another channel, head barely moving. Darman heard the slight pop as he switched, and he guessed the Null was on a secure link to someone, either finding out or asking why he’d been saddled with a commando who couldn’t save his private life for off-duty hours.

“Levet says she’s not with the Thirty-fifth and she’s not in a combat zone,” A’den said, unusually kindly. “So stop fussing.”

Darman could have called her. He had a secure link: it wasn’t as if he was going to give away a position to the enemy. He dithered, trying to decide whether to slip into the refreshers and comm her discreetly, just to be sure she wasn’t somewhere even worse. He just wanted to tell her …

Niner, as ever, seemed to read his mind. He shoved Dar-man with his shoulder plate. “Go on,” he said quietly. “Be quick about it, though.”

Darman stepped out into the corridor, opened his helmet link with a couple of blinks, and voice-activated Etain’s code. The display in his helmet told him what he could hear: NO RESPONSE. He carried on paging the system for a couple of minutes, telling himself she might have been taking a shower or even asleep, and then he left a message. It was hard to say the words to cold dead air instead of to her standing in front of him.

“It’s me, Et’ika,” he said. “I never told you I love you.”

When he closed the link he felt embarrassed, but he’d done it, however inelegantly. If anything happened to him, at least she knew.

A’den and Niner walked out of the ops room, heads moving in a conversation that couldn’t be heard outside their helmets. Fi and Atin followed. Darman’s audio circuit popped again.

“Change of plan, Dar,” Niner’s voice said in his ear. “The general wants us to play forward air control. As soon as it gets dark, we’ll move up to the outskirts and recce the positions of their mobile triple-A. Levet says Leveler will be on station a couple of hours before dawn.”

“Lovely,” said Fi. “It’ll all be over in time for breakfast.”

The squad spent the next hour or so stripping out the rental speeder to make room for a couple of E-Webs. Atin removed its ID transponder and poked an assortment of probes into it to scramble the registration details.