The Jedi nodded, made a point of meeting Leaft's angry gaze, then cleared
her throat.
'When I was on Wayland, I managed access to one of the Yuuzhan Vong
data-storage modules, what they call a_qahsa._ That's how I dis-covered
which ship Bey would be on and where it was going. I also had a look at the
structural design of the ship. The outer hull doesn't have nerve endings,
but the inner hull does. Breech it, and alarms go off everywhere.''
'Okay,'' Vega said. 'We knew that.''
'Here's something you may not know. Near the dovin basal, the inner hull
nerves are compromised.''
'Compromised?'' Uldir said.
'Yes. The dovin basals are creatures in their own right-they don't grow as a
part of the ship but are nursed separately and then grafted on. But it's not
a perfect symbiosis-the gravitic distortion of the dovin basal desensitizes
the nerve clusters immediately adjacent to it. In war-ships or on any vessel
where it's important to have a complete tactile net, the Vong compensate by
implanting special nerve biots around the dovin basals that aren't confused
by the gravitic anomaly. In transports like this, such a small vulnerability
isn't worth the effort of amending.''
Leaft switched his scratching to his chin. 'So there's a dead spot where we
can breach the hull without them noticing. Great. What's that mean?''
'It means the boss really has gone out of his m-'' Vega began, then caught
Uldir's glare. '-gone out of his way to really think this plan through,''
she finished.
'So I have,'' Uldir said. 'Here's what I have in mind. Vook? Are you
listening? You're important to this.''
Vook watched the Yuuzhan Vong vessel edging nearer. He keyed on the comlink.
'I warned you!'' He snapped. 'Come no closer.''
'The holy and terrible Yun Yuuzhan and all the gods know you will never be
in a position to command me,'' Vintul Qat informed him.
Something hit the_No__Luck Required, then,_ hard. Vook cursed in Duro.
'Perhaps without your sensor grid you did not notice our escort,'' The
Yuuzhan Vong commander said.
Vook allowed himself a thin smile. 'Perhaps in your arrogance you did not
notice that my ship is fully functional.''
He flipped on the shields, launched a spread of concussion mis-siles, and
kicked in the ion drive. 'Uvee,'' he told the astromech droid, where it was
patched into turbolaser, 'Destroy those coralskippers. I will handle the
transport.''
_Affirmative_, the droid's reply scrolled across the translator.
'This is foolish,'' Vintul Cat warned. 'What can you hope to accom-plish?''
'Wouldn't you like to know,'' Vook said, under his breath. But over the
comlink he shouted, 'For Duro! Death to the Yuuzhan Vong!''
'It's started,'' Uldir said, pointing to the sudden flashes of light across
the interstellar night. 'Klin-Fa-if you please, before they start
maneuvering. We don't want to be standing next to the dovin basal when they
turn it on.''
'Got it.'' The Jedi's yellow blade strobed into existence and she began
quickly hacking at the yorik coral hull they had tethered them-selves to.
Leaft pulled at the chunks as she cut them loose, sending them drifting off
into space.
It took only minutes before Uldir felt the gentle pressure of atmos-phere
blowing out of the hole. A moment later it was large enough for them to
enter.
Uldir stuck his head in.
Like the outside of the ship, the inside had the grown, organic look that
came from actually being grown and organic. The walls glowed a pale
yellowish green, though even as he watched the light began to fade as the
absolute chill of space killed whatever creature created the luminescence.
Uldir pulled himself quickly through. 'Hurry,'' he said. 'They might not
notice the hull breech, but pretty soon they'll figure out they're losing
air.''
'They'll put it down to a laser strike,'' Klin-Fa said.
'I hope we aren't counting on that,'' Vega grumbled.
Pseudo-gravity pulled Uldir to the deck, which-though biotic--was already
frozen harder than most metals. He saw that they stood in a long corridor
that followed the curve of the outer hull. In either direction, membranes
were dilating to close off the breached section.
He picked the nearest seal, only about three meters away, but before he
could reach it, it had completed its job.
'What now?'' Leaft grunted.
'I can cut it,'' Klin-Fa said.
'Right,'' Vega drawled. 'Then the next section decompresses and seals off,
we cut through that, and the next section decompresses-no, they'll never
guess we're coming.''
'Watch and learn,'' the Jedi said. With the tip of her weapon, she cut a
narrow horizontal line through the emergency bulkhead. Then she stepped
forward and pushed through the flexible membrane.
'Hurry,'' she said.
Uldir went through last, and found it difficult, for the slit was now only
half the size as when Klin-Fa cut it.
'It's alive, remember?'' She said. 'It heals quickly. No more
decom-pression. They won't know we're here until we're nearly to our
desti-nations. Maybe not even then, if they're really distracted by the
bat-tle outside.''
Uldir noticed the barometer on his wrist array registered breath-able
pressure. He pushed up the visor on his pressure suit mask. The others did
the same.
'Which way, Klin-Fa?''
She gestured up the corridor. 'This way.''
Now that they had opened their visors, Uldir could smell the ship. It wasn't
unpleasant, exactly-a faint musk with hints of iodine and sul-fur compounds.
The bioluminescent whatevers were still alive in this section, and though it
provided them enough light to navigate, the dimness was unsettling. Too many
shadows, and in every one Uldir imagined a Yuuzhan Vong warrior bristling
with weapons. But none of the shadows moved, and the corridor was silent
save for the faint swish of clothing and shush of breath. Even their
footfalls were silent, for the deck here-also still alive-flexed faintly
beneath their feet.
Klin-Fa passed several small corridors, and then stopped at a larger one.
'This leads to the auxiliary passage,'' she said. 'Follow it until you reach
a large, straight corridor. You can follow that up to their bridge.''
'Which way when we get there?''
'Right. I think.''
'You think?'' Uldir said.
'Hey, I've gotten us this far.''
'Right,'' he sighed. 'Okay. Vega, you go with her to find the prisoners.''
'See, this is another part of the plan I don't like,'' Vega said. 'The whole
splitting-up part where I have to trust my back to our oh-so--dependable
Jedi pal here. Why don't we just all take the bridge and then worry about
the prisoners?''
'Because the guards will kill them once they know they ship has been taken,
that's why,'' Klin-Fa shot back. 'Besides, the prisoners can help us fight.
Especially Bey-he's a Jedi too, remember?''
'Yes,'' Uldir said, 'An unarmed one, fighting enemies who don't exist in the
Force.''
&n
bsp; 'Boss-boy, you for this plan or not?'' Vega asked. 'I take orders from you,
not from her.''
'No, she's right. They will probably execute the captives once we've taken
the bridge-if not before.''
'If we take it, as opposed to standing here all day wagging mandibles,''
Leaft said.
'Right,'' Uldir said. 'Come on, Leaft. Good luck, you two.''
'Wait a moment,'' Klin-Fa said. 'A word alone with you, captain?''
Uldir noticed Vega raising an eyebrow.
'What about?'' He asked.
'Alone?''
'You can trust everyone here,'' Uldir replied. 'I do. Just say what-ever it
is you wanted to say.''
Klin-Fa sighed and stepped closer. 'Okay. If that's the way you want it. I
just wanted to thank you for trusting me, that's all. Whatever happens.''
She was very near. All he could see were her eyes. He could feel her breath
on his face, and something went funny in his chest.
And then she kissed him. It was just a brush on the lips, but it nearly
knocked him off his feet.
Then she spun on her heel and started down the corridor.
'Brother,'' Vega said, her voice registering a mixture of impatience and
disgust. She followed the Jedi, shaking her head.
'Hey...'' Uldir began, but the two women had turned and were out of sight.
'That's one of the single most sickening things I've ever wit-nessed,''
Leaft said. 'Thanks for ruining the rest of my day.'' He shud-dered.
'Humans.''
'Hey, I didn't do anything!'' Uldir protested.
'Right. You just stood there and took it.''
Uldir scratched his head. 'Yeah. I did, didn't I?''
'Come on,'' Leaft growled. 'Now I really want to kill something.''
This corridor was as empty and silent as the last, save for the occasional
distant thud that testified that Vook and Uvee were still out there
shooting. He hoped the Duro was okay; he and Uvee should be able to handle
four coralskippers, and the transport's defenses were probably too slow to
nail him. Still, so many things could go wrong...
The corridor took a hard turn to the left, just as Klin-Fa had said it
would. The lack of guards and personnel were really starting to make Uldir
nervous-he kept reminding himself that this was just a trans-port, and like
his father's freighter, didn't need a large crew. Besides, the Yuuzhan Vong
had spread themselves pretty thin in the last few months. Though they were
technically at peace with the New Republic, they still had to control the
planets they had taken-and they had taken a lot of planets. And if Klin-Fa
was right, and they were gearing up for a military strike-shoot, maybe there
weren't any war-riors on this vessel at all.
He was just thinking that as he emerged into the auxiliary corridor and saw
a Yuuzhan Vong. He never even got a chance to see what caste he-or she-was;
Leaft snapped off shots from all three of his blasters nearly
simultaneously, and the Vong went down, smoking.
'That might not have been a warrior, Leaft,'' Uldir said.
The Dug looked at him as if he had just suggested a nudist colony on Heth.
'Boss-I don't care,'' Leaft said. 'It's four of us against a whole ship. We
stop to ask questions, we'll be alight meal for one of their ugly gods.''
'True,'' Uldir said. 'Still-''
He was interrupted by the whirr of thudbugs. Two Yuuzhan Vong--clearly
warriors by their tattoos and facial mutilations-had just stepped from
somewhere in front of them and released the deadly insect-weapons. Uldir
turned sideways and fired his blaster. Leaft joined him, filling the
corridor with a web of coherent light. One of the thud bugs struck Uldir a
blow in the shoulder, but it was already car-bonized and didn't hurt to
speak of. The warriors rushed forward, rais-ing amphistaffs. Blaster bolts
sparked and ricocheted from Vonduun crab armor, but the warriors weren't
wearing masks. Uldir walked his blasts up the front of the lead Vong until
he came to the face. Leaft hit both knee joints of the other, sending him
stumbling. He didn't fall, though, but kept coming, jerking his amphistaff
up in an arc, then swinging down in a blow that would crush even Leaft's
hard skull. Leaft coolly fired at point-blank range into the armpit thus
exposed. Experience had taught that that was the most vulnerable point in
such armor, and experience did not let the Dug down. The warrior collapsed,
and whirled the blaster around his finger.
'Nice shooting,'' Uldir said.
'There's plenty more where that came from,'' the Dug said.
'That's good, because there's plenty more of them,'' Uldir noticed, firing
down the corridor at another five warriors charging toward them.
'Good!'' The Dug roared, and was suddenly off, holstering the blaster in his
foot-hand and firing with the other two as he propelled himself along. Uldir
followed more slowly, picking his shots, wishing the Dug had just a little
more common sense and discipline.
A thudbug was suddenly right in his face. He jerked to dodge, and almost
did, but it grazed his forehead. Blood exploded from the wound, and he
cursed, his shots going a wild as blood blinded his left eye and his depth
perception was suddenly grossly impaired. Ahead, Leaft and the warriors were
in hand-to-hand range; the Dug was bouncing in and around three of them. As
Uldir watched, he leaped high over an arcing amphistaff and the head of its
wielder, sending a blaster bolt straight down through the crown of the
Yuuzhan Vong's skull, whooping as if completely mad.
The other two were still coming for Uldir. Trying to wipe blood from his
eye, he nailed one in the head, but the other threw a thud-bug. Uldir tried
to shoot it but managed only to interpose the gun between the insect and
himself. It struck the blaster and sent it skit-tering down the corridor.
Howling in satisfaction, the warrior fol-lowed up, amphistaff held at the
ready.
Uldir blinked once at the heavily armored warrior, then ran as fast as he
could after his weapon.
The amphistaff relaxed, whipped out, wrapped around one of his ankles, and
yanked Uldir off his feet. He went down, face and belly slapping into the
deck. Stunned, he clawed at the organic surface, but a viselike grip closed
on his neck and lifted him off of the floor, turning him. He kicked feebly
at the air as the Yuuzhan Vong warrior's face came into view.
'Pray to your infidel Force,'' the warrior growled.
Over the warrior's shoulder, Uldir saw Leaft was still busy. Blaster bolts
were flying, and the Dug was a small cyclone, but there he still had two
enemies left. No help was coming from that quarter.
'Put me down, now, and you might walk away from this alive,'' Uldir advised.
The warrior's eyes widened. He laughed harshly, and then began to close the
space between his fingers. The only thing stopping him was Uldir's neck,
which didn't seem to be much of an impediment. Uldir wrenched at the Yuuzhan
Vong's massive hands, to no avail.
Or so he thought. But as the universe faded to black, the pressure suddenly
let
up. The warrior set him almost gently back on his feet, and then slowly
toppled over. Uldir fell with him, noticing almost absently that the Yuuzhan
Vong no longer had a head.
Leaft was bouncing down the corridor toward him, his remaining opponents
prone and still. Uldir shook his head and stood groggily.
'You okay, Boss?'' Leaft asked.
'Yeah. Thanks for the assist.''
The Dug cocked his head. 'What? What do you mean?''
'That one almost had me,'' he explained, gesturing at the head-less warrior.
'Looks like you took pretty good care of him,'' Leaft observed.
Uldir frowned. 'You didn't shoot?''
'Urr? Negative, captain.''
That's when Uldir noticed the hole in the ceiling, and a correspon-ding
charred area on the deck. A moment before the Yuuzhan Vong's head would have
been on the line drawn between those points. Leaft followed his gaze.
'Vook must have gotten a shot through the hull,'' Uldir murmured. 'He wasn't
supposed to fire at the transport.''
'You're kidding,'' Leaft said.
'It's the only thing I can think of.''