Part 36 (1/2)
”Not a problem,” Jade a.s.sured him. ”Let's take a look.”
Marcross's chest plate expanded slightly as he took a deep breath. ”Turn right at the next corner.”
His directions led them off the main road and into a slightly marshy area crisscrossed by meandering creeks. The streets turned narrow and winding as they threaded their way through and between the creeks, and LaRone noticed that most of the houses were built up as much as a meter above ground level. Apparently flooding was a constant concern here.
”There,” Marcross said, pointing ahead. ”Where the wall bows out a little and almost touches the edge of the street.”
LaRone took his foot off the accelerator, letting the speeder truck coast as he peered ahead at the spot framed in his headlights.
”Not very secure,” Quiller commented doubtfully. ”If your enemies were smart enough to surround the grounds, you'd walk right into their arms.”
”There's supposed to be a heavy long-range fighter prepped and hidden in that house over there,” Marcross said, pointing to a dilapidated house on the far side of the street from the wall. ”There's also supposed to be a force-field tunnel you can activate that'll give you safe pa.s.sage between the wall and the house. I never saw that work, though.”
”What are we going to do about a pa.s.skey?” Grave asked.
”We don't need one,” Jade said. ”We're not going in that way. Keep driving, LaRone-I'll tell you where to stop.”
”If we're not going to use it, why did you want me to show it to you?”
Marcross demanded as LaRone continued on past the secret door.
”Watch your tone, stormtrooper,” Jade warned. ”We're not going in that way because it'll be the entrance of choice for the conspirators, and I don't want us b.u.mping into them until we're ready. There-that section between the two trees. Pull over there.”
LaRone brought the speeder truck to a halt. ”Everyone out,” Jade ordered, pus.h.i.+ng up her own swing-wing door. ”Give me a perimeter.”
She strode over to the wall, lightsaber in hand. LaRone had formed the others into a standard, outward-facing guard-box formation by the time Bright.w.a.ter glided his speeder bike back around and came to a halt beside them. ”What are we doing?” he asked.
”Fm not sure,” LaRone admitted, watching Jade out of the corner of his eye. She was leaning against the wall, her hands and one ear pressed against the cold stone. Slowly, methodically, she moved herself in a grid search pattern along and down the surface. ”We're going in, but I'm not sure exactly how.”
”Quietly and without casualties,” Jade said, stepping away from the wall.
”Ever hear of cryseefa gas?”
”It's an acidic poison,” Bright.w.a.ter said. ”Highly corrosive and lethal to most oxygen-breathing species.”
”Very good.” Jade tapped a section of wall. ”There's a canister of compressed cryseefa buried in the wall right here. And here-” She indicated another spot. ”-and here, and here.”
”Ready to kill anyone who tries to punch through the wall,” LaRone murmured, a s.h.i.+ver of disgust running through him.
”Along with everyone for fifty meters around him,” Jade said. ”A simple but very undiscriminating weapon.”
”And you can tell where the canisters are?” Grave asked.
”Walls like this collect a lot of sun heat during the day,” Jade explained, unlimbering her lightsaber. With a sizzling snap-hiss, the brilliant magenta blade burst into existence. ”Stone and metal make different contraction sounds as they cool down. You might want to step back for this.”
None of the stormtroopers moved. Lifting the lightsaber horizontally, Jade pushed the blade's tip gently into the stone. For a few seconds she continued to force it straight in, then s.h.i.+fted to a sideways motion, carefully carving out a circle. She finished the circle and shut down the lightsaber. ”Do you want us to get that out?” LaRone asked.
”No need.” Lifting a hand toward it, Jade inhaled slowly.
And with a m.u.f.fled grinding sound of stone on stone, the cylindrical plug she'd carved worked its way out of the wall. Marcross stepped forward and caught the plug as it came free. Nodding her thanks, Jade reactivated her lightsaber and set to work on the next canister.
Five minutes later there were six stone cylinders lying on the ground beside the wall. ”Is that all?” LaRone murmured.
”All we need to worry about,” Jade said, turning to face them.
”Understand me now. When we step inside this wall, we'll be in enemy territory. If you can get through without killing any of the guards, fine. But if you have to kill, you kill without hesitation.”
”Understood,” LaRone said for all of them.
A minute later, Jade had carved an opening through the safe parts of the wall big enough for them to get through. On the far side, LaRone could see some of the garden areas Marcross had described earlier. ”Commander?”
Jade invited as she closed down her Lightsaber. ”Deploy your troopers.”
LaRone nodded acknowledgment. ”Bright.w.a.ter, you'll swing around toward the main gate,” he ordered. ”I want to know what their security looks like, including how many men they'll have available to draw on when the balloon goes up. Grave, Quiller: you're on flank. Marcross, you're on point. You'll lead Jade to your best choice of entrance and get her inside. I'll take rear guard. We close up as soon as Marcross gets us in and re-form to quiet incursion. Grave, give Bright.w.a.ter a hand with his speeder bike.”
Bright.w.a.ter waddled his speeder bike to the wall, and together he and Grave maneuvered it through the opening. The scout trooper got on and took off with a subdued whine, heading to the left and the cover of the garden foliage. Grave and Quiller went next, branching to right and left, with Marcross behind them. LaRone took a step forward- ”A moment, Commander,” Jade murmured, putting a hand on his arm.
”Sensible policy dictates that the second in command knows what the mission is.”
”Yes, ma'am,” LaRone said, feeling his heartbeat starting to pick up.
”Our target is Governor Ch.o.a.rd,” she said. ”He's committed high treason, both in conspiring with pirates against Imperial s.h.i.+pping, and in sending the Reprisal to try to kill me on Gepparin. Those crimes have earned him the death penalty.”
”Understood,” LaRone said, a strange sense of unreality sifting into him like fine desert sand. It was one thing to sit out in s.p.a.ce or at a pirate nest and talk about judgment and duty and principle. It was quite another to stand outside the palace of an Imperial governor and contemplate his execution in cold blood.
”Then let's do it,” Jade said. s.h.i.+fting her lightsaber to her left hand and drawing her blaster with her right, she slipped through the opening.
To defend the Empire and its citizens ... Making sure the safety on his E-11 was off, LaRone climbed through behind her.
Chapter Twenty-Two.
GOVERNOR Ch.o.a.rD APPARENTLY LIKED HIS GAR-dens rough and primitive. Once they were through the wall and past a narrow brook that ran along the estate's inner edge, they hit a wide patch of trees, closely s.p.a.ced bushes, and reedy plants growing out of a ground cover composed mainly of flagstones interspersed with flakes of dead bark.
Oddly enough, for the first few minutes it seemed as if the enemy had completely missed their arrival. Mara saw and heard no one as they slipped through the trees and could sense no suddenly heightened alertness anywhere around them.
The patch of forest ran for about thirty meters, then abruptly gave way to a wide, gra.s.sy area, across which they could see a double row of comfortable outdoor chairs set up near the wall of the palace itself.
”That's the game field,” Marcross said, pointing to the field. ”That door behind the seats leads into a kitchen adjunct where refreshments can be set out for the players and spectators.” ”What's past the adjunct?”
”The main kitchen,” Marcross said. ”From there you can go to the first-floor private dining area, the formal dining room, or the main ballroom.”
”Stairs?”
”Closest set is behind the kitchen, off the service corridor,” Marcross said. ”There's a set of turbolifts there, too.”
Mara pursed her lips thoughtfully. It all looked very straightforward, as it was no doubt meant to. But as usual, looks were deceiving. The palace's stylishly crenellated walls had been combined with careful placement of decorative colored lighting to create deeply shadowed indentations at regular intervals along the walls. Most of those nooks probably sheltered sentries-human, animal, or droid-with their eyes and other senses trained on the wide lawn she and the stormtroopers would have to cross.