Kell lowered the side panel on Hawkbat's Vigil. "Not much of one. We're done." He was covered with sweat and, after only half an hour's work, tired. On a job like this, there were usually two to four trained mechanics and half an hour to an hour per vehicle serviced; he'd done it in half the usual time with a crew of willing but inexperienced hands.

"Nine says there's a maintenance skimmer coming this way," Phanan said.

Janson cursed. "Let's move out. We'll bluff them, and if that doesn't work, we'll tear out of here like Falynn in a skiff."

Kell paused as he was entering the c.o.c.kpit. Lashed to the bed in back were three plastic containers, each about the size of an R2 unit, that hadn't been there before. "What are those?"

Tyria grinned. "Our reason for being here. Remember? We're stealing something? Those are recreational holos someone had piled up for loading onto the shuttles. They'll figure we're black marketeers or something."

"I forgot."

"You had plenty to do."

Janson's voice came from underneath his blanket. "Would you two stop smooching up and get us out of here?"

Kell positioned his skimmer to exit. The argument had already started outside, with some words drifting in around the edges of the steel doors: "... tell you, you're already in there."

"... obviously not, since we just got here."

Kell nodded to Piggy, who slapped the wall control. The doors ground their way open. The two nearly identical maintenance skimmers faced each other a mere four meters apart.

The lead guard pointed to Kell's skimmer. "As I told you."

The driver of the other skimmer leaned out of his c.o.c.kpit. "Hey! Who are you?"

"I'm Botkins." Kell glanced again at the name stenciled on the gloves lying in the c.o.c.kpit. "I'm standing in for Laramont."

"Laramont's in the cafeteria, waiting to start his shift!"

"Dammit! They told me he was sick. So he's going to be servicing the shuttles?"

"No, I am!"

"Wrong. I just did."

"Listen, scab, I'm not going to let you cost me my piece - work for the night." The mechanic clambered out of his c.o.c.kpit. He was nearly as tall as Kell and had as much muscle, though a fair amount of it was swathed in fat. Tools swung on his belt as he straightened up.

Kell waited until the man reached the window of his c.o.c.kpit. "Hey," he said, "let's do this like gentlemen. You know, I might not have done such a good job of gauging the hydraulics."

The mechanic scowled at him. "So?"

"So, you scrub my work as not up to spec. You get credit for the whole job but only have to redo the work you don't like. But you don't formally log the complaint, so my record stays clean. That way, you get your pay and I still log the time, so I can keep working toward getting a permanent post here. What do you say?"

The mechanic considered it. "No. I'm just going to scrub your work as not up to spec... and report it that way. Right now."

Kell glanced at Tyria. A call like that to Central would probably alert the s.p.a.ceport operators to the unauthorized maintenance job they'd just done. He returned his attention to the mechanic and said, in an overly reasonable tone, "Well, now. That's my job vaporized. My career at Revos s.p.a.ceport. If you're going to take that from me, I think I ought to have something from you. "

The mechanic twisted his lip in an approximation of a contemptuous smile.

"Such as what?"

"Such as about fifteen square centimeters of your skin, a liter of your blood, and whatever you have left of a reputation." Kell threw open his c.o.c.kpit door, catching the mechanic off guard and hurling him to the duracrete.

Kell stepped out over him, took a couple of steps to the side, and stretched. He caught the chief guard's eye. "I say I break three of his bones before he gives up."

24.

The cargo skimmer swung around to the north of the TIE ready bunker, then angled in straight toward the building. It did not build up speed; it maintained a rate just over a walking pace.

Wedge, Atril, Falynn, and Face cl.u.s.tered at the bow of the thing, braced for the mild collision to come. "I forgot to ask," Wedge said. "Have you ever done anything like this before? The surge at the end?"

Falynn grinned. "Sure. Tried it with a canyon jump back home."

"How'd it turn out?"

"Broken collarbone."

"Just checking."

By now, the sensors in the TIE bunker would show the oncoming vehicle.

Guards might even be leaving by the south entrance to come around and see what was happening. The timing had to be perfect.

They were thirty meters away, twenty, ten-then they hit the bunker wall, a b.u.mp that merely caused them to sway forward, momentarily off balance.

Falynn counted, "Three, two, one-"

The skimmer's engines whined as they overrevved, and suddenly the craft bounced an extra two meters into the air.

The four jumped forward as they felt the skimmer drop from under them.

They landed, awkward, on the bunker roof. Atril immediately twisted and started to fall back into the skimmer, but Wedge and Face caught her flailing arms and tugged her toward them.

Already there were the sounds of oncoming feet. The four flattened themselves as quietly as they could and hugged the roof.

Then there were voices: "You there! What do you think you're doing?"

"Wait a second. There's n.o.body in it."

"Check under it."

Laughter. "That'd be funny. Someone being squashed under a skimmer."

The other voice became resentful. "You just think it's funny because it's never happened to you."

"That's right. Never has, never will. Smell that? It's like an engine bearing has burned out." The man's voice changed. "Control Aleph-One, it's a cargo skimmer. It's unoccupied. It may be a drifter. Jotay's checking out the autopilot."

"I am?"

"You are."

The other man sighed.

They were silent for a couple more minutes, then Jotay said, "It looks like it was slaved to another skimmer, part of a cargo convoy, and its memory was not correctly purged. It would have shot off as soon as it was activated. Maybe even still be receiving signals from the convoy master."

"Well, flush the program and take it back where it belongs."

"Why me?"

"Privilege of rank, sonny. I was hired three days before you."

Wedge heard the skimmer power up and go gliding off, its driver still complaining. The other man wandered back toward the bunker's south face, chuckling and muttering to himself.

Falynn chuckled, too. She whispered, "He's going to have a fine time parking that thing with the brakes not working."

Kell's opponent stood, his face red, twisted with anger.

"I really ought to stop you," the guard said.

"Well, you can do that, or you can get your bets down." Then Kell twisted to avoid the mechanic's charge. He swatted the man's outstretched hand away, continued the twist into a full twirl, and gave the man a slap to the back of his head as he pa.s.sed. The mechanic staggered, off balance from the extra momentum, and went to his knees.

The mechanic came up with a belt hydrospanner in his hand. This wasn't a small, around-the-house tool, but a heavy metal implement two-thirds the length of a man's arm.

Kell dropped his pose of aggressive amiability and a.s.sumed a proper fighting posture, left foot forward, hands up, weight balanced. He'd hoped that potentially deadly weapons wouldn't enter the mix. He'd obviously hoped in vain.

The mechanic charged again, but something in his body language told Kell he was changing tactics. Instead of sidestepping, Kell held his pose, ready to stop-thrust or body-check the man. It was the mechanic, though, who stopped short, swinging the hydrospanner in a horizontal arc that would have connected solidly with Kell's rib cage if he'd duplicated his earlier move.

Kell twisted aside-and the head of the spanner hit him a glancing blow, an impact that kicked the breath out of him and sent him staggering back.

He thought he felt a rib give way.

The mechanic, confident now, followed up instantly with another swing.

Kell didn't try to dodge this one. Despite the pain in his I left side, he twisted, adding energy to the punch that connected with the mechanic's wrist. Kell felt and heard something break in the wrist. The hydrospanner flew free, clanking into the side of Kell's maintenance skimmer.

Kell followed through with a left that rocked the me - chanic's head, then spun around in a kick. He tried to make it look more awkward than it had to, but gave it full force when it connected against the mechanic's jaw. The man uttered a grunt and fell hard to the duracrete.

Kell turned to the guard. "Call this in. He just a.s.saulted me with intent to kill. My career here may be shot, but I'm taking his with me. Get me Central." He suddenly felt drained and was having a hard time breathing.

The guard shrugged and moved to comply. Tyria took a breath, preparing to jump in with an objection, but the mechanic's partner, who'd exited his skimmer during the fight, spoke up first. "Wait. Please."

The guard paused.

Kell said, "Why?" He tried to bring his labored breathing under control.

It wasn't working. Still, that added to his act, made it easy for him to simulate fury.

"He's a good man. Just tense. Let him sleep this off, I'll redo the servicing on the shuttles, n.o.body will report anything, you keep your job, he keeps his job-what do you say?"

Kell took a couple of breaths, as deep as he could bear, and turned to Tyria.

She shrugged. He could read worry for him in her eyes, but her tone was light. "Might as well. Fewer reports."

The guard in charge said, "Fewer reports." He made it bound like a goal of considerable merit.

Kell gave a reluctant nod. "Fewer reports. Sounds good." He moved back to his c.o.c.kpit door. "I'm doing him a favor, you know that?"

The mechanic's partner, already struggling to pull the unconscious man upright, said, "Yeah, sure." He could not have sounded less interested.

A moment later Plague Group's maintenance skimmer was once again in motion.

Tyria asked, "Are you all right?"

"I want Phanan to tape me up as soon as possible. But I don't think it's anything serious. As long as I don't do too much bending."

"Well, you bought us the time we needed."

Kell checked his chrono. Just give us thirty minutes, he thought. Then, it won't matter how many reports they call in.

Wedge gripped the rope attached to his hook and rolled over into the darkness.

Runt's attack came with such swiftness that even the Wraiths, who'd timed his arrival nearly to the last second, were caught off guard by it.

His X-wing was suddenly over the s.p.a.ceport, its engines screaming like some mythical demon, its laser cannons blasting at unoccupied portions of duracrete. Men and women on the field ran in the direction of any cover.

Some ran to dive into the shadow of refueling tanks. Wedge shook his head as he watched them.

A moment later the shrill keen of an Imperial air-raid alert filled the air. Bunkers all over the s.p.a.ceport went dark as their occupants or central computers obeyed emergency blackout procedures.

Runt pa.s.sed over the field, then turned around for another run. His lasers targeted a luggage skimmer and ignited its fuel cell, blowing bags and cases over a fifty-meter radius.

Wedge dimly heard a grinding alarm noise from below. Then the bunker's top door motors whined and the doors began to retract.

He peered through the crack between them. He could see tiny lights below him: green, red, yellow, white, the myriad glows a.s.sociated with computer gear. But the little TIE fighter hangar was otherwise dark, its occupants also observing normal blackout procedures.

As he'd expected. As he'd counted on.

He moved with the leading edge of the door. As soon as the doors were locked open, he placed his grappling hook where the door edge met the duracrete roof. A few meters over, Falynn would be doing the same at the other door.

With a chilling engine roar Wedge would always a.s.sociate with the Empire, two of the TIE fighters below lit up their engines, silhouetting themselves with ionic engine wash, and then leaped up into the sky, not bothering with repulsorlifts for initial takeoff.

Before Runt could make his third pa.s.s over the s.p.a.ceport, a circular slab of duracrete sixty meters from the Narra rose from the ground. Beneath it was a ball-shaped gun emplacement, an open-air metal framework with a gunner's chair and a hemispherical durasteel shield from which protruded four linked laser cannons. The rig rose on a metal column, ten meters into the air, fifteen meters, then rotated to track Runt's X-wing.