Star Wars_ The Black Fleet Crisis 03_ Tyrant's Test - Michael P. Kube-McDowell [139]
“Too bad. Spoils a grand heroic story for the newsgrids,” said Morano. “Captain saves his ship by ramming a suicide bomber—”
“There’s still a story there,” said A’baht, tapping the key. “A lot of stories here, and they won’t all get told.”
Tap—tap—tap—
A’baht shook his head. “What a terrible price we paid for this one.”
“Second thoughts, General?”
“No,” he said firmly. “Oh, no. What I said earlier, about wanting to spare them at the end—I’m lucky I didn’t have that chance. It would have been a mistake.”
“I don’t understand.”
A’baht gestured at the screen before him. “Can you imagine if they’d had the patience to wait another ten years or so, studying us, building up their fleet? No, no regrets, Captain. I’m glad for what happened today, even though doing it made me sick at heart. I’m glad we did this before the Yevetha got any stronger, or any smarter about us.” The general closed the casualty file and pushed his datapad away from him. “I just hope we’re smart enough now to figure out a way to see that they never build a starship again.”
Nil Spaar’s arms were bound at his sides, his claws locked helplessly against the restraining bar. His ankles were manacled together with a short plasteel cable. Even so, he tried to lunge at Sil Sorannan when the Imperial officer appeared in the bridge’s escape pod access tunnel.
The lunge did not carry him far. It was not even necessary for anyone to shoot the viceroy—Lieutenant Gar, one of the four witnesses, simply hooked Nil Spaar’s ankle cable with his own foot, bringing the Yevetha down hard on the deck.
“For twelve years of torture, and too many friends, there isn’t enough I can do to you,” said Sorannan, stepping closer. “I already know that killing you won’t be satisfying. No matter how I do it and how long it takes, I’ll wake up tomorrow and see the face of someone who didn’t get to go home with us, and I’ll know in my gut that you got off too easy.
“But still, you deserve to die. And the only thing I can think of that will help me answer those faces that come into my mind is to make you wait for it—and make sure that my face stays in your mind while you wait.
“So here’s something you should know about me. Before I joined Black Sword Command, I was detailed to the Research Section as a pilot for the experimental hyperphysics team. We were trying to learn how to drop bombs from hyperspace. We never learned how.”
Sorannan crouched by Nil Spaar’s head, and his voice grew soft. “You see, it turns out that no matter which way you go through the magic door, you need a hyperdrive to open it. Anything that we released in hyperspace just stayed there. We even took a drone and blew it up in hyperspace, to see if that might open the door. None of the wreckage ever appeared again in realspace.”
As he stood up again, he gestured to Captain Eistern, who stepped to the hatch of escape pod 001 and unlatched it.
“It’s really too bad the project didn’t work out,” Sorannan said, stepping back while Gar and another witness dragged Nil Spaar to his feet. “Because it turns out to be very easy to release an object in hyperspace. One good shove will do it—like the ejection charge of an escape pod, for example.”
The viceroy stood tall and silent, his expression one of contempt and haughty pride.
Sorannan leaned his face close to Nil Spaar’s, so that the breath of his whisper kissed the viceroy’s cheeks. “I don’t know how long you will survive there,” he said. “I do know that you will die there.”
Stepping back, the major watched as the others forced Nil Spaar into the escape pod and sealed him inside.
“Die slowly,” Sorannan said hoarsely, and slammed his hand down on the firing switch.
With a roar, the escape pod hurtled away into oblivion.
INTERLUDE V:
Rendezvous
Joto Eckels stared at the sensor display with a degree of awe approaching