Star Wars_ X-Wing 02_ Wedge's Gamble - Michael A. Stackpole [121]
He has a point there, but he’s still inferring a great deal from a dying man’s last statement. “You think Tycho is the Imperial agent?”
“You know his history. What do you think?”
“I do know his history, but the whole of it.” Wedge pointed over to where Tycho and Winter sat in close conversation. “I’ve watched him go through countless missions against the enemy. He has a facility for being in the right place at the right time.”
“A bonus for a spy.”
“Or for a hero. He’s saved my life and he saved yours, as I recall, on numerous occasions for the both of us. I trust him absolutely. If there is a spy—and I don’t find a spiteful tale told by Zekka Thyne very reliable—I’d sooner believe it was any one of us than I would believe it is Tycho. More importantly, though, I need Tycho and everyone else if we’re going to bring the shields down tomorrow night.”
Corran folded his arms across his chest. “So you’re telling me to leave it alone even though his presence might jeopardize whatever we do?”
Wedge opened his hands. “Look, Corran, I respect your instincts, I really do, but I’ve been down here for fifteen hours more than you have. Our other caches have been hit by Imps. This is the only safe place for us. If Tycho had betrayed us, this place would have been hit, too. And, yes, the Imps could be holding off for some other reason, but I can’t think of one aside from their not knowing where we are. That may not seem like much to you, but it’s enough for me to hope we have a shot at accomplishing our mission here.”
The younger man frowned heavily. “It isn’t much, but right now it’s more solid than anything I have. I’ll try to keep an open mind here, but if the least little thing gets screwed up, I’m going to find out who did what and there will be hell to pay.”
“I’ll back you all the way.”
“I guess that’s as good as it gets, given the circumstances.”
Wedge brushed a droplet of water off his shoulder. “That’s not saying much here.” He led Corran over to an area with a table and chairs set up under an overhang. “If I could have everyone over here, we need to figure out what we’re going to be doing. Any and all suggestions are welcome.”
The others gathered around the table. Aside from the members of Rogue Squadron the group included Iella, Winter, Mirax, Inyri, Portha, and Asyr. The Trandoshan and Shiel both remained on cots and did not join the meeting. Wedge could see both were sleeping, albeit fitfully in Shiel’s case, so he decided not to waken them. Better they rest now and are able to fight later.
Wedge leaned forward on the table. “Our basic problem is the same as it’s always been: The shields on this rock have to come down. We took one shot at getting a computer override established, but that didn’t work. What do we do now?”
Winter raised a hand. “Things are not exactly the same as they have always been. The loss of the memory cores means the central computer has begun to delegate jobs to the subsidiary systems to conserve memory media. The disks they’re using now are in sad shape—a lot more errors are creeping into things. They’ve got a construction droid building a new manufacturing plant as an adjunct to the computer center to bring the memory-core manufacture under Imperial control, but it won’t be able to turn out product for another two days.”
Wedge shivered. He’d seen construction droids work before and found their efficiency as impressive as he did their potential for destruction. Vast, huge machines, they combined the whole of the manufacturing cycle in one highly mobile package. The front end used lasers and other tools to dissect a structure. Little ancillary droids—some as big as a gravtruck—sorted through the debris and fed the appropriate