[Republic Commando] - 03(26)
“Then we’d have been fighting in diapers,” Atin muttered. “Because the Republic didn’t have any other army worth a mott’s backside.”
Fi raised an eyebrow. “Shabla lucky, if you ask me.”
“Time to move it,” A’den said sharply, and Darman suspected he was breaking up the speculation for a reason. Judging by the expression on Fi’s face, he felt that, too. “I’ll bring you up to speed with the local situation, and you can spend the rest of the day getting to know our allies.”
The longer the war went on, the less sense it made to Dar-man. After years of clear certainty in training-knowing what he had to do, and why he would have to do it, because there had never been any doubt in anyone’s mind that they would one day be deployed-the reality of the war didn’t match any of it. Shambolic organization, indecisive leadership from the top, and… too many gray areas. The more places he was sent, the more things Darman saw that made him ask why they didn’t just let planets cede from the Republic. Life would go on.
Fi’s thinking was getting to him. Every thought now started with a why.
Stay busy. There was nothing he could about it now except get on with his job. He smiled at the Marits. “I’m Darman,” he said, holding out his hand for shaking. “Want me to show you how to make shrapnel out of a droid?”
Chapter 3
No, General Zey-finding Chief Scientist Ko Sai is as much a priority as locating General Grievous. Our survival depends on a strong army, and that means the highest-quality clones-conscription of ordinary citizens is a poor second and would be politically unacceptable. Find her, if only to deny the Separatists her expertise. You have the best intelligence assets the Republic has ever known. So I’ll accept no excuses.
-Chancellor Palpatine, to Jedi general Arligan Zey, Director of Special Forces, Grand Army of the Republic
DeepWater-class ship Aay’han, Mygeeto space, 471 days after Geonosis
Fierfek.” Skirata sighed, watching the transponders mapped on the cockpit holochart. The picket of ships around Mygeeto made it look as if it were ringed by its own constellation. “I know Bacara’s keeping them busy down there, but that’s still quite a gauntlet to run.”
“And we’re a forty-five-meter cargo ship,” Ordo said. “Just a laser cannon by way of armament. Mandalorian crew in full beskar’gam. Definitely not a Republic vessel.”
“What d’you think, just walk in?”
“Could do. Nothing links us to the Republic. And I always carry a range of current transponder codes, so that’s an easy fix.”
“Well, we won’t win a battle with a warship, so that’s our choice made for us.”
“Of course, a submersible’s sensors are perfect for getting an accurate three-dimensional scan of the site.”
“In we go, then, Ord’ika.”
Ordo studied the long-range orbital scan of the landing site. It was a vast glacier in a landscape of sheet ice and crystal rock. The penetrating scan showed few crevasses, but the sheet was honeycombed with irregular tunnels that meandered around one another like tangled yarn and occasionally crossed. The straight, uniform outlines of the ventilation shafts were easy to identify by contrast. Around the warm shafts, underground lakes of melted water had formed, capped by thinner ice sheets. Ordo copied the section of holochart to his datapad and didn’t even have to do the calculations to realize that searching each tunnel in the site that Delta had pinpointed would take days.
Too long.
An idea formed immediately in his mind, as well as a theory on what had happened to Vau. He might have fallen into the warren of tunnels-or through the ice into the liquid water beneath.
It wasn’t good either way.
“Crystal-worm runnels,” Ordo said. “It’s fascinating how life-forms survive even in the most extreme places.”
“If Vau’s out in those temperatures,” said Skirata, “he won’t be one of them. It’s been hours. Even in his beskar’gam, the seals won’t keep out that kind of cold indefinitely.”
Ordo slid his electronic tool case out of his sleeve and took out an overwrite probe. He selected a randomly generated transponder code with a Mandalore prefix, and Aay’han ceased to register as licensed on Mon Calamari.
“Okay, Kal’buir, now or never.”
He maneuvered Aay’han into a landing trajectory and wondered whether to brazen it out by pinging Mygeeto Traffic Control and requesting permission to land. No water on board, a civilian vessel that anyone could scan to confirm its configuration-he’d sort that the moment they got out of here-and a couple of wandering meres at the helm: even with a battle going on, he might get away with it.