Star Wars_ Legacy of the Force 07_ Fury - Aaron Allston [29]
“Understood, Grayfeather One. We’ll have support your way within minutes.”
Oldathan shook his head. Starfighter Control was not likely to divert vehicles already engaged in Commenor orbit, meaning that what he’d get would be some reserve squadrons—likely as not, some planetary defense TIE fighters so old that their solar array wings wobbled.
As Oldathan climbed away from Commenor, the other Grayfeathers continued to supply him data. More lines appeared on his sensor board. They didn’t form a clean image; the triangle was shortening.
Danen muttered to himself as he ran mathematical calculations. “Best guess, it’s now at about twenty thousand clicks. And moving at about forty thousand clicks per hour.”
Oldathan grunted an acknowledgment. “It should begin decelerating pretty soon.”
Under constant acceleration, Grayfeather One closed the distance to the target in short order. Oldathan decelerated and swung wide of the incoming vessel’s approach path—not being able to see it or precisely calculate its speed made him twitchy, nervous about collision.
But now his target was easy to detect. Sensors still did not pick it up, nor could the naked eye, but there was a growing dark spot in space where stars just blanked out.
A big dark spot in space. “Danen, can you give me an estimated size?”
“Uhhh…Circle it, would you?”
Oldathan did, drawing ever closer as he maneuvered. His own estimates made his mouth go dry. “I hope your numbers are friendlier than my guesses.”
“I don’t think so. I’d hazard…thirty, forty kilometers across. At least.”
“Grayfeather One to Control. Incoming blip is meteor-sized. Repeat, meteor-sized. Nature and identity still not known. Blip is cloaked. Request authority to fire upon it.” There was a chance, a bare chance, that it was a friendly vehicle, planetoid-sized, arriving under the auspices of and with the permission of the planetary government, and refusal of authorization would be a sign that this was the case.
“Grayfeather, you are authorized to fire.”
Oldathan turned toward the void and accelerated. The rapidness with which it grew in his viewport suggested that he was close to it, but he had no good way of determining how close. No way before now.
“Arm two bangers. Report their transceiver codes to squadron and Control sensors. Then fire.”
Danen’s voice, now that he was engaged in acts of war, was cool, professional. “Yes, sir.”
A moment later the K-wing shuddered slightly and two glowing lines streaked away from its outer wing hard-points—emissions from the concussion missiles Danen had launched.
The two lines converged in the distance, and, seconds later, ended in what looked like a single detonation.
Oldathan checked his sensor board. It showed the missile paths as lines and reported a distance to target of 321 kilometers.
He swore, swung the nose of his starfighter out of line with his target, and banked to fall in behind the target’s approach path. Now, as he turned back toward the planet, he saw the void as a featureless blackness obscuring the middle of the planet.
“Something’s happening.” Danen’s voice sounded professionally detached. “Sensor readings—”
On Oldathan’s sensor board, a shape appeared for a moment, a huge shape, then disappeared again. Moments later, it returned…and through the forward canopy he could finally see his target.
It was roughly oval, but very irregular, with a dark, mottled surface. There was activity on its surface, lights igniting. He increased magnification on his visual scanner and could see small craft launching from what looked like a power plant installation on the surface. One vehicle was a shuttle; there were also a dozen or more starfighters and something that looked like a small, highly modified Blockade Runner–style frigate, but with a prow shaped like a balloon instead of a sledgehammer.
Danen no longer sounded matter-of-fact. “Nickel-iron