"A freighter full of fertilizer?" Dash said. "That isdevious. Who'd hijack that?"

"Our operatives inform us that they will be able to obtain the route of the disguised ship shortly. When they do, it will be but a matter of a day or two before the vessel arrives. There are Bothans who have Alliance sympathies willing to help secure the freighter, but theyare relatively unskilled at such sorties. It would help if they had a commander with some experience in s.p.a.ce battles to lead them."

Luke smiled. "That's me." He turned to Dash. "What about you? You in?"

"Risk my ship and neck? For what?"

"I thought you wanted to keep me alive."

"You ain't worth that much."

"One freighter? Against a squad of Bothans and me in my X-wing? How dangerous can it be? A piece of cake."

Dash appeared to consider it.

"Besides, if the information in the computer is as valuable as it seems to be, the Alliance might be willing to give you a bonus for helping collect it. Could be worth a few thousand credits, maybe more."

Dash looked at him. "All right. I got nothing else to do. Why not?"

Luke grinned. This guy did remind him a lot of Han.

18.

The Emperor was normally a clever man. He seldom did anything that Darth Vader thought particularly unwise, much less stupid.

Yet as Vader stood before his master in the Emperor's castle, this latest bit of twisted business fit squarely into the latter category. Stupid-and dangerous.

Not that he would dare say so-to the Emperor's face or behind his back.

But the Emperor was not so powerful as to be able to read thoughts. Just as well, too, because if he could, surely he would destroy Vader here where he stood for his opinion of this foolishness.

Then again, Vader thought as he stared at his master, could he read thoughts, it was doubtful this... plan would ever have come to pa.s.s.

"You disapprove, Lord Vader?"

"It is not my place to disapprove, my master."

"Quite so."

Later, as he walked toward his castle, Vader consid-ered his response to this new gambit. There seemed little he could do save to monitor the situation. To stand still and watch.

This did not improve his mood.

Luke and Dash traveled with Koth Melan in his private landspeeder to a base hidden in the mountains two standard hours away from the city. Here they met with the squad of Bothan pilots and weapons officers and inspected their ships.

The dozen fighters were BTL-S3s-two-seat Y-wings, the Alliance's most common attack craft. They weren't as fast as X-wings or TIEs, didn't have the firepower, but were rugged and could take a lot of punishment. Not the latest or the best ships in vacuum, but they ought to be more than enough to stop a single freighter. They wore Alliance colors and ID codes.

"Buncha antiques," Dash said. "Probably have to get out and push if you want to go any faster than a broke-leg droid."

Luke ignored him. To the leader of the squad he said, "You have astromechs for all of these?"

The leader, a Bothan who looked as young for his species as Luke was, nodded. "Yes, we have droids. And all the ships have Taim & Bak IX-Four laser cannons run off standard Novaldex generators. Unfortunately, we don't have proton torpedoes for the Arakyrd launchers."

Luke shrugged. "Doesn't matter. We don't want to blast the freighter anyhow, we want it in one piece. How much flying time does your squad have?"

"Not much, I'm afraid. Most of us are relatively new. A hundred hours or less in these birds. But the boys are quick, and the gunners are pretty fair shots, though we haven't gotten much practice."

That wasn't so good. "We have a few days before we get our target location," Luke said. "Maybe we can find a place to do a few maneuvers."

"We'd love that, Commander Skywalker. The squad is at your disposal."

Luke grinned. He did still like the sound of that. Commander Skywalker.

He could see it becoming Colonel Skywalker, General Skywalker. Wouldn't interfere with his Jedi studies to be a general-Ben had been a general, hadn't he?

That path would have to begin later. First this; then Han had to be rescued. That might be tough, but for a slow run against a dung freighter, surely he could get these guys into shape in a couple of days?

Leia was contemplating putting a credit coin into one of the rigged gambling machines. She was so bored, she was about ready to give it a try.

Avaro approached her. "I just got a com fwom offplanet. Black Thun'th wepwethentative ith en woute. Thee will be hewah in thwee dayth."

Leia felt a rush of relief. Thank goodness. Then, as Avaro waddled off, she thought about what he'd just said. "Thee" will be here in three days?

She? Well, why not? No rule said a woman couldn't be a criminal. In a perverse way, it pleased her that the representa-tive from Black Sun would be a woman. And about time she got here, too.

The operative they were awaiting arrived at the hidden base on Bothawui three days after Luke and Dash. Koth Melan ushered the operative into a private room, where the four of them met.

"Here are the coordinates of the flight plan," the agent said. He produced a tiny computer and laid it on the table. Melan said, "Any more information on what the project might be?"

"Not even rumors. This is closed up tighter than a Corellian clam."

"Too bad."

The agent looked just like a hundred other BothansLuke had seen. Put him in a crowd and he'd disappear. "You believe these directions to be valid?" Melan asked. He nodded at the small computer. "I do. I received them from our underworld contact. She has never delivered false information before."

"Underworld contact?" Luke said.

"Black Sun," the agent said.

Luke and Dash glanced at each other. Luke said,"Black Sun?"

Melan answered. "It appears that the organization is courting the Alliance," he said. "They have several times provided us with valuable intelligence. I believe they think the Alliance will win the war against the Empire."

"They must be the only ones," Dash said.

Melan looked at Dash but ignored what he'd said. "War, like politics, sometimes makes for strange bedfellows. One uses the tools one has."

Luke shook his head. "I don't like it. They must expect something in return." And it seemed awfully coincidental that Leia had gone to seek out Black Sun andhere they were delivering invaluable information.

Something wasn't quite right about that.

"They have not asked for anything."

"Yet," Dash said.

"Okay," Luke said. "Put that aside for now. If this information is right, how long before we need to launch and get ready?"

"Your squad of volunteers has already been put on alert," Melan said.

"We'll need to be in position in less than three standard hours to make the rendezvous."

" 'We'?"

"I'll be going along," Melan said. "If Dash Rendar has room on his ship?"

Dash gave the Bothan a lazy grin. "No problem. Can you cook? Might want to grab a bite while we collect this freighter."

"I doubt we'll have time to eat," Luke said. "Maybe you won't, kid, but I can fly and eat at the same time."

Luke had to grin. This guy was so full of himself it was a wonder he didn't explode and spew ego all over the place.

"Better get to our ships," Luke said.

Dash gave him a mock salute. "Aye, aye, Commander."

Time to go.

Luke led the dozen Y-wings away from the planet in the sensor shadow of the local moon, to help them avoid Imperial patrols. Although the formation was a little ragged, they flew pretty well for a group who'd had only minimal time in the craft. He wouldn't want to take them into battle against the best TIE wing in the Imperial Navy, but they ought to be able to help surround a freighter and stop it.

The coordinates and time were coming around, and he turned his attention to the ambush.

Behind him, Dash flew his chrome ship, nearly invisible against the backdrop of airless s.p.a.ce, with Koth Melan as a pa.s.senger.

"Keep in tight, boys," Luke said into his comm. "We're almost on station.

Let's hear you sound off, Blue Squad."

The pilots of the Y-wings logged in. He'd kept it simple; each of the attack ships got a number, and he'd christened the unit with a color.

"Copy," Luke said. "We're there. Stall 'em in position."

Blue Squadron obeyed, bringing their fighters to a halt. They floated in the middle of nowhere, waiting. If the information was correct, the freighter ought to be popping out of hypers.p.a.ce less than a hundred kilometers dead ahead-The freighter pilot must have overslept. The ship dropped into reals.p.a.ce, all right, but only fifty klicks away.

It was a stock light freighter, Corellian, though different in configuration from the Millennium Falcon. In-stead of the saucerlike body with the twin nose and offset control c.o.c.kpit, this was a long oval with the ends squared off, with a rectangular, detachable cargo container slung under its belly. It looked kind of like a graphic of a giant blaster.

"Heads up, Blue Squad, there's our target. Attack formation!"

The ship came out of hypers.p.a.ce relatively slowly, but since it was closer than antic.i.p.ated, they didn't have much time. Luke switched to a standard operations channel and hailed the freighter.

"Attention on board the freighter Suprosa. This is Commander Skywalker of the Alliance. Shut down your engines and prepare to be boarded."

If everything went as planned, Koth Melan, in a vacsuit, would be escorted on board the freighter by a couple of guards and technicians also riding with Dash. They'd be in and out in a few minutes.

"This is the captain of the freighter Suprosa. Are you crazy?" came the reply. "We're hauling fertilizer here! What kind of pirates are you?"

"We're not pirates. Like I said, we are with the Alliance. And maybe we have a big garden. Pull it up, Captain, and n.o.body gets hurt."

There came a long pause. It was possible the pilot didn't know what he was hauling, but Luke didn't believe that. If he didn't know, he'd have no objection to being boarded. If he did-"Listen, pal, I'm working under contract to XTS and my orders are to deliver my cargo to the agent on Bothawui. Why don't you go bother somebody smuggling guns or spice or something?"

"Captain, either you shut down your engines or we'll shut them down for you. Some of my gunners can pick flies off a wall with their laser cannons." Well, it was possible, though he hadn't seen any of them shooting quite that well during maneuvers. The freighter pilot didn't know that.

The freighter suddenly dropped its cargo module, speeded up, and turned to starboard.

It was going to make a run for it.

Luke switched back to the tactical opchan. "Gotta do it the hard way, boys. Target the engines only! If you aren't sure, don't take the shot-we don't want to blow this baby up. Move in!"

The distance between Blue Squadron and the freighter decreased in a hurry. This was stupid; the ship was unarmed and much slower than the Ywings. If they wanted to cook the captain, he was dinner-and he had to know it.

The freighter tried to move at a right angle to the incoming fighters, but they were almost in range. Luke was in the lead; his ship was faster than the Y-wings, and it would take only a couple of blasts to knock out the engines, a.s.suming they had standard shields.

Another two seconds...

Artoo whistled.

Uh-oh. Luke didn't like what he heard. "Put it on screen, Artoo." The image of the freighter appeared on Luke's screen. Where there had been four smooth sections of hull before, red lights now blinked. Another two spots flashed blue. Plates had slid back on the freighter to reveal hidden weapons.

"Heads up, everybody, this thing has got teeth! He's got laser cannons fore and aft and what looks like missile launchers ventral and dorsal.

Watch yourselves!"

Luke put his X-wing into a sweeping turn as the freighter's port laser fired. The blast was close enough to scramble his comm.

One of the Y-wings, Blue Four, dived at the freighter, targeting its engine compartment. Luke saw the fighter's beam stroke the target, but the bright blue splash as the beam hit revealed that the freighter had augmented shields.

Not such an easy target after all-The freighter's cannon found Blue Four, and the ship blew apart.

Man, that must be some wattage behind those guns!

"Break off, circle, and regroup!" Luke called into his comm.

Blue Two was on the way in, and it aborted its attack run.