[Thrawn Trilogy] - 02(151)

Chapter 27


The proximity alert warbled, and Luke straightened up in his seat. After five days, they’d made it. “here we go,” he said. “You ready?”

“You know me, Han said from the pilot’s seat beside him. “I’m always ready.”

Luke threw a sideways glance at his friend. To all outward appearances, Han seemed perfectly normal, or at least as close to it as he ever got. But beneath the casual flippancy Luke had noticed something else over the past few days: a darker, almost brooding sense that had been with him since they left Coruscant. It was there now; and as he studied Han’s face, Luke could see the tension lines there. “You all right?” he asked quietly.

“Oh, sure. Fine.” The lines tightened a little further. “But just once I’d like them to find someone else to go off on these little jaunts across the galaxy. You know Leia and I didn’t even get a day together? We didn’t see each other for a whole month; and we didn’t even get a day.”

Luke sighed. “I know,” he said. “Sometimes I feel like I’ve been running full speed since we blasted out of Tatooine with the droids and Ben Kenobi way lack when.”

Han shook his head. “I hadn’t seen her for a month,” he repeated. “She looks twice as pregnant as she did when she left. I don’t even know what happened to her and Chewie out there-all she had time to tell me was that those Noghri things are on our side now. Whatever that means. I can’t get anything out of Chewie, either. Says it’s her story, and that she should tell it herself. I’m about ready to strangle him.”

Luke shrugged. “You have to face it, Han. We’re just too good at what we do.”

Han snorted. But some of the tension left his face. “Yeah. Right.”

“More to the point, I guess, we’re on the list of people Leia knows she can trust,” Luke continued more seriously. “Until we find that information tap the Empire’s got into the Imperial Palace, that list is going to stay pretty short.”

“Yeah.” Han grimaced. “Someone told me the Imperials call it Delta Sourse. You got any ideas who or what it might be?”

Luke shook his head. “Not really. Got to be close in to the Assemblage, though. Maybe even to the Council. One thing’s for sure-we’d better get busy and find it.”

“Yeah.” Han stirred and reached for the hyperdrive levers. “Get ready :”

He pulled the levers; and a moment later they were again in the blackness of deep space. “Here we are,” Han announced.

“Right.” Luke looked around, an involuntary shiver running up his back. “Dead center in the middle of nowhere.”

“Should be a familiar feeling for you,” Han suggested, keying for a sensor scan.

“Thanks,” Luke said, “but getting stuck between systems with a d,e,ad hyperdrive isn’t something I want to get familiar with.”

“I didn’t mean that,” Han said innocently as he keyed the comm. “I was talking about Tatooine. Wedge?”

“Right here,” the other’s voice came over the “Looks like we’ve got a target at oh-four-seven mark one-six-six,” Han told him. “You ready to fly?”

“Ready and eager.”

“Okay.” Han took a last look out the viewport and keyed the cargo hatch release. “Go.”

Luke craned his neck to look in the direction Han had indicated. At first all he could see was the normal scattering of stars, achingly bright against the total blackness around them. And then he saw them: the softer glow of a ship’s running lights. His eyes traced the empty space between them, his brain forcing a pattern to the lights; and suddenly the image coalesced. “It’s a Dreadnaught, all right.”

“There’s another one just past it,” Han said. “And three more to port and a little below.”

Luke nodded as he located them, a strange tingle running through him. The Katana fleet. Only now did he realize just how little he’d really believed in the fleet’s existence. “Which one do we check out?” he asked.

“Might as well take the closest,” Han said.

“No,” Luke said slowly, trying to focus on the vague impression tingling through him. “No. Let’s try:that one over there.” He pointed to a set of running lights a few kilometers farther away.

“Any particular reason?”

“I don’t really know,” Luke had to admit.

He could feel Han’s eyes on him. Then the other shrugged. “Okay,” he said. “Sure. We’ll take that one. Wedge, you getting all this?”