Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 04_ Backlash - Aaron Allston [60]
“They’ll power up their mobile turbolasers and blow the StealthXs out of existence by sight, one by one, as they leave the hangar.” Angry, Jaina sat back. “We can’t reinforce Uncle Luke. We can’t do anything about the Sith or the Maw.”
“We can’t even get Jedi Saar offplanet. The sneaky ways we have to get into and out of the Temple without being seen presume that the parties involved are cooperating.”
Jaina sighed. “Any word from the government?”
“Demands for our surrender. Master Hamner’s on the arrest list, me, you, Thul, pretty much anyone they recognized or recorded during the assault. And Saar, of course. How are Thul and Tainer?”
“Up and around. In casts.” Jaina became contemplative. “It was good to see Raynar in action again. He was … almost … normal.”
“We’ll let him be abnormal. These are abnormal times.”
DATHOMIR SPACEPORT
NIGHT HAD FALLEN. ALLANA HAD BEEN FED, HAD COMPLETED HER studies, had been tucked into bed by C-3PO.
Now that he was gone, she rose and dressed again, this time adding a dark hooded jacket to her ensemble to make her harder to see in the dark, then got Anji and crept to the mini lift. Just as they had the previous night, they exited the Millennium Falcon and descended to the ground. Just as the previous night, Allana saw someone standing night watch in the needleship berthed near the Jade Shadow. This time, the silhouette seemed to be that of a woman, sitting alone in the cockpit and barely visible behind the canopy. Allana didn’t like the way that made her feel—like the woman was watching her. But wasn’t that the way she always felt when she disobeyed?
Instead of heading straight for Monarg’s hangar, Allana led Anji around in the darkness until she could see the Falcon’s cockpit. Through the viewport, she could see C-3PO, sitting in the copilot’s seat, apparently studying the baffling array of controls on the main console.
Allana activated her comlink. “Threepio?”
The droid jerked upright. He looked back along the Falcon’s cockpit access corridor, and his voice came back across the comlink. “Yes, Miss Allana? Have I forgotten something? Would you care for a nice glass of water or milk, perhaps?”
“We can see you.”
C-3PO leaned forward a little, as if to assure himself that Allana could not be crouching at the end of the corridor, out of his sight. “Oh, I doubt that very much. None of the bulkheads between us is made of transparisteel.”
“But the forward viewport is. Turn around and look hard.”
The droid did as commanded, swiveling in his seat, looking first at the monitor screens on the console, then peering out through the forward viewport.
Allana stood on tiptoes, stretched her hand as far above her head as she could, and waved at him.
The droid came to his feet. “Oh, my. Miss Allana, how did you get out there?”
“We walked here.”
“I clearly must have forgotten to lock the exterior hatches. Yet I remember doing so. Did you decrypt the password? Thirty-four characters long and composed of a baffling array of illogical alphanumeric sequences. You would have to display skills far beyond those you have demonstrated in your studies.”
“It doesn’t matter. We’re going out.”
“No, no, you must come back inside. I’ll be right out.”
“We’ll be gone by then. But you can find us at Monarg’s Mechanic Works. We’re going to rescue Artoo-Detoo.”
“Oh, no, miss—”
She switched off her comlink and dashed out of sight of the cockpit viewports, knowing with a child’s certainty that C-3PO would be along to sort things out if she couldn’t rescue her other droid friend.
* * *
Moments later she stood once more in the shadow of the stack of lubricant barrels beside Monarg’s permacrete dome. She knew she didn’t have much time; though C-3PO walked comparatively slowly, it wasn’t all that far from here to the ship.
She hefted an empty container. It was, in fact, almost empty; perhaps half a liter of fluid sloshed inside. She set that barrel aside for the moment.