Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 06_ Vortex - Denning Troy [89]
“—change locations,” Madhi finished. She deactivated her collar mike, then tossed the parabolic mike out the window and scrambled across the floor to Tyl. “Will you forget about the shot for a minute? We’ve got to move! Now!”
Without waiting for a reply, she grabbed his arm and started to race toward the back of the room. Another cannon bolt struck the front of the storeroom, pelting them with fist-sized stones and dropping both of them to their knees. Tyl went limp. For a moment, Madhi thought he had been seriously injured.
Then she saw him toss the right-angle lens aside and reach for the wide-angle, and she knew he was fine.
Taking her lead from his example, Madhi activated her collar mike and began to narrate again. “My cam operator has quite a gash over one eye, so please forgive us if our images grow unclear. We remain under fire, and we are fleeing our observation post. Again, this is Madhi Vaandt, bringing you events live from Blaudu Sextus for the Perre Needmo Newshour.”
They reached the back of the room and found Shohta crouched over the uplink antenna and power generator.
“I don’t know if you can see this, but my Chev assistant, the former slave Shohta, is attempting to shield our equipment with his own body.” Madhi grabbed him by the arm and dragged him toward the door. “We’ll keep transmitting until it’s no longer possible, but I’m afraid we will be going off ’Net sometime soon.”
The female voice began to sound in Madhi’s earbud again. “This is great stuff—a Peamoney Award for sure,” she said. “Keep it going as long as you can, and don’t worry about medical expenses. The network has you covered.”
“That’s because there aren’t going to be any medical expenses,” Tyl grumbled. He braced the vidcam on one shoulder and grabbed the uplink antenna with his free hand, then nodded Shohta toward the generator unit and turned to Madhi. “Go!”
Madhi cracked the door open and peered into the hall, then sighed in relief. “No Mandos,” she reported. “Let’s go.”
They stepped through the door and, still trailing a power feed and datalink to the abandoned equipment, scurried down the hallway to the stairwell.
“As you can see, we’re attempting to relocate to a more secure position,” Madhi reported. “We may have to abandon our generator and uplink antenna at any moment, so …”
Madhi reached the top of the stairwell and found herself staring down at Belok Rhal and a handful of armored Mandalorians. She stopped short.
“Tyl, you getting this?” she whispered.
“Wrong lens.” He activated the vidcam floodlights, filling the stairwell with illumination. “But we’re sending pictures.”
That was all Madhi needed to hear. She started down the stairwell toward the Mandalorians.
“Commander Rhal,” she began, “the entire galaxy has just witnessed your company initiate an assault of incredible violence in the Big Circle of Fun. Would you care to explain these atrocities for the record?”
“No.” Rhal pointed his blaster over Madhi’s shoulder, no doubt in the direction of the vidcam. “Turn the cam off.”
Madhi’s knees began to shake, and she grew very afraid that she was going to lose control of her bladder on the intergalactic news.
“That’s not going to happen, Commander Rhal,” she said.
“No?” Rhal shifted the blaster barrel toward her chest, and Madhi knew she was about to die. “I beg to differ.”
As Rhal spoke, two tiny circles of brightness appeared in the stone wall behind him. Madhi could not imagine what they were—but she felt sure it was nothing she wanted to point out to the Mandalorians. She began to descend the stairs, one hand turning the button mike on her lapel toward Rhal.
“The galaxy is watching, Commander. Would you care to comment on what you’ve done here today?” she asked. Behind Rhal, the bright circles turned into lightsaber tips, one green and one blue, and Madhi began to think she and her crew just might