Star Wars: The Old Republic: Fatal Alliance (37 page)

Ax
quelled a sudden rush of excitement. She could betray nothing in
front of her Master: relief, ambition, hope...

The
screens shifted. A world torn and twisted by gravitational forces
appeared before them, blurred with distance.

"My
lord, " said the colonel, "the most energy-efficient route
is around the black hole. " A map appeared in one of the
viewscreens showing a dotted line looping past the singularity then
rising to meet the planet at apogee. "On your command, I will
issue the orders to the fleet captains. "

"Normally
I prefer the direct approach, " Darth Chratis said, peering
through slitted eyelids at the views before him. "What is this I
see here?" One long finger picked out a particular view. "Energy
spikes? Drive signatures?"

The
colonel cast a cold, questioning stare at his bridge staff.

"I-it
appears to be a space battle, my lord, " ventured one of them,
standing timorously in the spotlight.

"Identify
those ships, " barked the colonel. "I want to know who sent
them. "

"Yes,
sir. " The girl who had spoken sat down and began hammering
furiously at her workstation.

Ax
wondered who could be fighting out here. Stryver had the navicomp,
and she had the only whole Hex remnant. Therefore it couldn't
possibly be the Republic. Could the Mandalore have formed an army so
quickly? What could have roused him to unify his people against this
strange outpost rather than a more credible enemy?

"Republic
ships, sir, " called someone from the bridge staff, proving her
wrong. "Definitely Republic, and they're taking a hammering,
sir. No other visible combatants, but there may have been launches
from the ground. "

Darth
Chratis grinned, and Ax grinned with him. The Republic had made its
move and was being rebuffed. How much easier, then, to swoop in as
the savior and "liberate" the planet, right into the
Emperor's arms!

"Take
us in, Colonel Kalisch, " Darth Chratis said. "Launch all
fighters and prepare for battle. "

"At
this distance, our fighters would not be able to break free of the
black hole's gravitational pull" Kalisch said, smoothly
countermanding the order. "The moment it is safe, my lord, I
will launch them. "

"Very
well, " hissed the Sith Lord. "That will have to do. "
He wasn't used to anything as lowly as physics standing between him
and his wishes.

"Full
power, all engines, " Kalisch ordered the fleet. "Lock
courses and prepare to engage!"

The
Imperial fleet came about, straining to reverse the considerable
momentum it had already gained just by being in the black hole's
powerful gravitational field. The Paramount's engines roared and
rumbled, casting a bright blue light across those ships coming up in
its wake. The lighter cruisers fared better than the massive bulk
cruiser and its heavier support vessels. They caught up and began to
draw ahead.

It
soon became abundantly clear that Kalisch's original advice had been
sound. Instead of picking up velocity as they whipped around the
singularity's event horizon, propelled by freely available gravity,
they would struggle to gain every drop of delta-vee, wrung out of the
engines at great expense. Their progress was painfully slow. Ax could
feel her Master's impatience growing-redoubled because he knew he
could say nothing, threaten no one. This was his decision and his
responsibility alone. The crew worked around him in perfect
efficiency and with maximum effort. All knew that Darth Chratis would
vent his frustration on the first person to fail him in the slightest
possible way.

Ax
watched the long-range telemetry closely, eager to learn anything she
could about the planet's forces. What she saw puzzled her deeply.
There were no ships apart from those belonging to the Republic.
Furthermore, there was no obvious assault being conducted from the
ground. It looked like the Republic fleet was fighting nothing at
all.

Even
stranger, the Republic ships appeared to be attacking one another.
Half the fleet appeared to be retreating, while the other half either
did nothing or actively impeded the rest. As she watched, one small
cruiser suddenly switched its drives to full, propelling it wildly
into another ship, disintegrating both. It was as though something
had infected half the fleet, driving it mad.

Darth
Chratis studied the same data with a deeply suspicious expression. Ax
wondered if he thought it was a trap. But to what end? The Republic
couldn't possibly benefit from the destruction of its own ships.

"Would
you like me to hail either party?" the colonel asked.

"No,
" said Ax.

Darth
Chratis and Kalisch both turned to her in surprise.

"Master,
I advise against explicitly indentifying us as servants of the
Emperor, " she said. "Remember that we are the enemy in
Lema Xandret's eyes. "

"Perhaps
the traitorous harridan will change her mind, " said Darth
Chratis, "now that these weak-willed fools have found her. "

With
a blinding flash, the Republic's capital ship exploded, casting
debris in all directions. Ax shielded her eyes against the glare.

"They're
certainly not putting up much of a fight, " she said. Half the
Republic ships had been destroyed or crippled. The rest were
regrouping and recalling their fighters.

"Regardless,
the situation is clear. Sebaddon is no longer a secret. Xandret must
choose to bow to the Emperor's will or face the consequences. "

"She'll
never agree to her own execution. "

Darth
Chratis studied her with cold eyes. "Naturally I will say
nothing of the fate in store for her. Cease your questioning of my
orders. Colonel Kalisch, announce our presence to the citizens of
Sebaddon and advise them that we will be taking possession of their
world once we have cleared the skies of this Republic rabble. "

"Yes,
my lord. "

Ax
went back to studying the viewscreens. The firing pattern of the
Republic ships looked wrong to her, although she couldn't quite put a
finger on what disturbed her about it. Still no launches from the
ground, although infrared showed numerous sites of activity. Cities
and factories, Ax assumed, that would be bombed for certain if
Xandret resisted. Ax's instincts told her that victory wasn't going
to come as easily as an announcement of the Empire's intent to annex
the world, but at the same time she couldn't see how a small, ground-
based civilization could hope to prevail against the high ground of
space. Even if they did have a mysterious weapon that drove ships and
their crews crazy...

The
Republic forces must have been taken by surprise. So she was forced
to assume. Colonel Kalisch would be sure not to make the same
mistakes they had.

No
response came from the ground to the Paramount hail. Apart from
garbled transmissions on Republic frequencies, the bands were empty.

"They
ignore us, " said Darth Chratis, "at their peril. "

"Launching
fighters in two minutes, my lord, " said Kalisch.

Ax
was already heading for the exit from the bridge. "Ready my
interceptor, " she called behind her. "I'm going to take a
closer look. "

It
took her a minute to descend from the bridge to the hangar deck, but
it felt like forever. Her Mk. VII advanced interceptor had been
shipped from Dromund Kaas with the rest of Darth Chratis's materiel
and kept fully fueled in case a fast launch was required. The ground
crew had it warming up and ready for her by the time she got there.
Its familiar jutting vanes reassured her in a way that no amount of
deceptive diplomacy could. Forgoing a full flight suit, she slipped a
helmet over her dreadlocks, climbed aboard, and activated the
internal navicomp. It showed her the projected course for the many
wings about to launch around her. She switched that off and mapped
out her own trajectory.

The
hangar crews retreated as fighters began to stream out of the
cruiser. The launches were clean and well timed, despite their
pilots' eagerness to engage. Ax slipped into their formation with
ease, a sleek black predator surrounded by willing but lesser
packmates. She listened to the comms as she monitored the fleet's
disposition, but didn't respond.

Wave
after wave of angular black ISF interceptors streamed away from the
Paramount and its ancillary vessels. They were easily a match for the
XA-8 and PT-7 starfighters the Republic had launched. Ship- mounted
cannons selected targets and prepared to fire on the Republic craft.
The range was slightly long, but the still-stately pace of the
capital ships ensured a solid base to fire from. A lucky shot or two
wasn't impossible.

Ahead,
the vast field of wreckage left by the destruction of the main
Republic cruiser was spreading at speed. Only as she neared it did Ax
realize what had troubled her about the Republic ships' behavior.

The
surviving ships were firing into the cloud, not at their own renegade
vessels.

She
peeled away from the wing she had been shadowing and headed directly
for the cloud.

"Your
primary targets are the damaged vessels" came the orders from
the Paramount. "Enemy fighters secondary. We will engage the
rest. Fire at will. "

The
sky lit up as a smaller Republic ship exploded.

Against
that cruel light were silhouetted thousands of floating objects,
suspended in space. Some were spinning circles; others were edge-on
lines. All were instantly recognizable as hexes, the droids Ax had
fought on Hutta, their regular hexagonal bodies identical and
faceless apart from the utter blackness of their sensory pods. As she
flew among them now, they reached for her with spider-like legs,
firing bolts of plasma from their hand weapons to propel them
forward.

In
that instant, she understood.

"Paramount,
recall the fighters immediately. Get them away from that debris
field. It's full of hexes!"

She
fired as she flew, destroying one hex with every pulse from her
fighter's ion cannon. For every one she killed, however, three more
appeared in her scopes.

"They're
only droids" came back the reply from the Paramount. "What
harm can they do against starfighters?"

"Put
me through to Darth Chratis, " she snapped. Someone's head would
roll for this. "Master, the Republic ships have been infected
with hexes. That's why they're self-destructing and turning on one
another. I don't know how the infection occurred, but the debris
field is full of hexes. Our targeting priority should be them first,
then the fleeing ships. "

"You
want us to abandon a golden opportunity to rout the Republic in order
to play target practice against a handful of machines?" Darth
Chratis's reply was full of contempt. "Colonel Kalisch's orders
stand. "

Ax
heard one of the bridge crew call out in the background: "Launches!"
She looked at her telemetry and saw what the Paramount had detected.

Four
missiles were rising from the surface of Sebaddon. Full of hexes, she
bet, not conventional explosives. Plus, all of the infected Republic
ships still capable of controlled flight were abandoning their chase
of the others and coming around to ram the Imperials.

The
colonel's imperious broadcast to the citizens of Sebaddon hadn't been
ignored at all.

"Move
the fleet, " she told her Master. "You'll be caught between
them if you continue on that course. "

The
Paramount neither responded nor changed course. A wave of
anti-missile fire was streaking out to intercept the ascending
threats. She could only hope it would be enough.

Around
her, hexes swarmed and clutched at the Imperial fighters. Some had
linked arms to form wide nets and webs across the sky. Any ship that
strayed too close was bound up and crushed. Other hex groups formed
whips capable of slinging individual hexes to incredible speeds. Ax
herself missed two such wriggling projectiles by only small margins.
Other pilots weren't so lucky.

"Target
the larger concentrations, " she advised those fighting around
her. "Ignore the infected ships. If they blow, we'll only have
more hexes on our hands. "

She
received no official acknowledgment of the orders, but they were
obeyed. Squadrons disrupted by the unusual and hostile nature of the
debris field re-formed to strafe the densest concentrations of hexes
they could find. Ax joined them, taking grim satisfaction every time
her cannon blew such an agglomeration to pieces.